Editing Christianization (section)

=== A seismic moment on the Iberian Peninsula ===
[[File:SanPedroNave1.jpg|thumb|200px|[[San Pedro de la Nave]], one of the oldest churches in Spain|alt= photo of San Pedro de la Nave, one of the oldest churches in Spain]]
[[Hispania]] had become part of the Roman Republic in the third century BC.{{sfn|Barton|2009|p=6, 7}} Christian communities can be found dating to the third century, and bishoprics had been created in [[León, Spain|León]], [[Mérida, Spain|Mérida]] and [[Zaragoza]] by that same period.{{sfn|Barton|2009|p=11}} In AD 300 an ecclesiastical council held in [[Elvira]] was attended by 20 bishops.{{sfn|Barton|2009|p=12}} With the end of persecution in 312, churches, baptistries, hospitals and episcopal palaces were erected in most major towns, and many landed aristocracy embraced the faith and converted sections of their villas into chapels.{{sfn|Barton|2009|p=12}}

In 416, the Germanic [[Visigoths]] crossed into Hispania as Roman allies.{{sfn|Barton|2009|pp=13–14}} They converted to Arian Christianity shortly before 429.{{sfn|Ghosh|2016|p=116}} The Visigothic King [[Sisebut]] came to the throne in 612 when the Roman emperor [[Heraclius]] surrendered his Spanish holdings.{{sfn|Bouchier|1914|p=58}} Sisebut banished all Jews who would not submit to baptism. Roman historian Edmund Spenser Bouchier says 90,000 Hebrews were baptized while others fled to France or North Africa.{{sfn|Bouchier|1914|pp=58–59}} This contradicted the traditional position of the Catholic Church on the Jews, and scholars refer to this shift as a "seismic moment" in Christianization.{{sfn|García-Arenal|Glazer-Eytan|2019|pp=5–6, 15}}