Islam critiqued unearth another NT gem; who were Jesus' followers?

In answer to the video "Answering Muslims: Jesus and the "Lost Sheep of Israel"

After Jesus' departure his early followers constituted a small group of 120 Acts1:13-16 (Most translations say "brethren" and "believers". The Alexandrian copy reads "in the midst of the brethren", the Vulgate Latin and Ethiopic versions "in the midst of his own brethren") until the conversion of Constantine. 400 years after Jesus this ruthless and opportunistic Roman emperor made Christianity into a state religion, extending favors and limitless funds to a chosen form of the cult among others who were fought.

It is important to note that up to that point, there did not exist a single orthodoxy from which emerged a variety of competing "heretical" minorities. Instead, a number of divergent forms existed, no one of which represented a clear majority of believers against all others. In some regions, what later became "heresy" was in fact the original and only form of Christianity. Elsewhere, "heresies" coexisted with later dominant views, without a clear demarcation between the competing ways.

It was only through socio-political exertion that one view gained dominance over another and became orthodoxy. The major driving force that would define orthodoxy all throughout the Christian world, was, as said above, the conversion of Constantine.

Fringe Christian sects began fading into insignificance wile 2 great groups remained, Unitarians and Trinitarians. The Roman empire’s support fluctuated between these two groups for a long time until the Trinitarians finally gained the upper hand and all but wiped the Unitarians off the face of the earth.

Simultaneously, the once pagan empire was alienating, assimilating and destroying pagan beliefs and worship sites. Their resources, amassed over centuries, were drained to finance a Christian totalitarian dynasty and its parasitic religious structure that equalled if not outnumbered the army. This religious establishment had full control over individual life, drained Roman towns for religious projects while the religious elite were themselves exempt from taxes. They similarly had full access to public services while being exempted from civil law. All these known excesses of the Church under Constantine and beyond were justified in them being the necessary intercession between man and God. The vibrant ancient Roman civilisation collapsed, nothing remained of it. Constantine's incompetent successors blamed it on the "invading barbarian" myth. Yet these same barbarians had many times failed doing so before, and only succeeded 16 years following the end of the pagan Roman civilisation, meaning when it had already became Christian. Europe was ultimately fragmented into barbarous Christian kingdoms and the infrastructure fell into decay which in turn severely diminished trade and commerce. Currency and standard weights and measures passed out of use, and transportation and communication constantly became more difficult. Astronomy, which served to orientate sea travellers and merchants, was replaced with supernatural devices such as "oracles" on which mariners were forced to rely upon. This precipitated the decline of maritime trade. 

Human progress ceased and poverty increased to an extent that life inside the Empire became harder than it had ever been before. For those bright and privileged enough to seek education, career opportunities now lay exclusively within the hierarchy of the church and a Christianised state bureaucracy. With the active cooperation of the imperial court the Church had grasped complete control over education and, having done so, restricted instruction to potential priests. In the times of the Ottomans rapid conquests, had they not seen Western Europe as the wasteland it was at the time in early Ottoman history, they would have continued or supported the push further north into Germany and Britian, but they did not consider the sacrifice worth it. Otherwise, German and English would probably have an Arabic script and we all would be speaking Arabic right now, as a good portion of southern Europe and Eastern Europe used to.

But back to these 120 followers of "the way" Acts19:9,23,22:4,24:14,22 and known as the Nazarenes Acts24:11. This was a small band of believers in Jesus, an inconsequential number considering the spectacular wonders that accompanied his life, death and resurrection. The Quran calls his original followers nasara from nusra/help in reference to those few core elements that valliantly stood by him, when he started sensing disbelief among his followers 3:52,61:14. This inner circle are not the cowards presented in the NT as fleeing Jesus when adversity came or unable to understand most if any, of his teachings which is why they abandonned his instructions to abide by the law soon after his death.  In the Quran they pray Allah to make them witnesses of the truth, that their life becomes an embodiement, a testimony to Jesus' teachings. "Christian" is a later appellation Acts11:26. In fact the word Christian itself is in reference to the belief that those who hold that qualification are anointed with God's oil, according to the earliest Christians such as Theophilus. 

Nasara is phonetically close to the historical Nazarene/Nazoraios (Greek) or Nasraya (Syriac) Acts24. In the region of the Levant from where the Christians of the Hijaz originated, Christians called themselves Kristyane. It is expected that the Quran would address them by that same name just as it addresses Jews and other groups by their own names. Instead it chose to bring back to the spotlight an appellation forgotten by Christians themselves, found in their books, in reference to the first followers of Jesus, so as to illustrate how far they have gone astray. The last revelation this way vindicates Jesus' true followers, the Nazarenes, by bringing them back to the forefront of history after they had been relegated to darkness by the Christian pauline movement.

Another similarly remarkable feature of the Quran, is in its emphatic description of Jesus' mission as exclusively meant for the Israelites. To the Jews of 7th century Arabia, as is the case today, the reason for Jesus' mission and to whom it was directed to, was of no importance. No Jew would have walked around teaching the notion that Jesus was sent to the Jewish tribes. Christians on the other hand, teach that Jesus' mission was meant for all of humanity. The NT itself makes the claim, contradicting itself. It is thus expected for a 7th century Arab who is neither a Jew nor Christian, and who awkwardly decides to reveal Jesus' target audience, to similarily state that Jesus was sent to all people. Or at the very least that he was sent to Christians just as Moses was sent to the Jews. That appellation of Nazarene which was attached to Jesus Matt26:71,Mk1:24,10:47,14:67,Lk4:34,Jn17:5,Acts2:22 could not have been in reference to his supposed hometown of Nazareth (a fruitless effort by Matthew's writer to make Jesus' birth fulfill an inexistent prophecy of the HB), since his followers, who came from different places were also referred to by that title. It is interesting noting that, besides the total absence of archeological evidence attesting to its existence, Nazareth is never mentioned in the writings of Josephus, nor is it mentioned in any other first-century writings. Josephus even mentions a village close to the present site of Nazareth, yet says nothing about a Nazareth. Even if one goes by the theory that it was an insignificant location hence its absence from all available contemporary records, one would think that by Josephus' time, Christianity would have gained enough fame so as to attract the writers curiosity as to this new movement's origins and that of its founder known by his hometown of Nazareth.

It isn't mentioned in the HB either. The Book of Joshua records 12 towns and 6 villages in that area, but no mention of a "Nazareth". The Talmud lists 63 Galilean towns, but again no mention of a "Nazareth." This total silence could be due to the location being an out-of the-way hamlet of around 50 houses on a patch of about four acres, populated by Jews of modest means as recent archaeological finds point to.

This however causes major problems to the NT fable.

Among many such issues one needs to explain how such a rustic and small clan did not hear of the 12 year old prodigy among them Lk2 and that none from outside of the small town has ever come anywhere near his home to inquire of him. It would then necessarily make the village famous and put it on every map. This young Jesus prodigy did not appear in a vacuum either, considering how the NT speaks of the events forecasting the coming of the highly anticipated messiah as happenning just a few years earlier. How could this small hamlet not have heard anything of the visiting magis, coming from far to worship the promised king Matt2. How could their expensive gifts have gone unnoticed within this clan of poor relatives and close friends.