The Greek and Latin terms that refer to God-fearers are found in ancient literature and synagogue inscriptions discovered in Aphrodisias, Panticapaeum, Tralles, Sardis, Venosa, Lorium, Rhodes, Deliler and Miletus. Judging from the distinctions in the Acts of the Apostles, it is thought that they did not become gerim tzedekim, which required circumcision, although the evidence across the centuries varies widely and the meaning of the term may have included all kinds of sympathetic Gentiles, proselytes or not. There are also around 300 text references to a sect of Hypsistarians, some of whom practiced Sabbath and which many scholars see as sympathizers with Judaism related to God-fearers.
In early Christian writings
In the early Christian writings, God-fearers is a term used to indicate those Pagans who attached themselves in varying degrees to Judaism without becoming total converts, and are referred to in the Christian New Testament's Acts of the Apostles, which describes the Apostolic Age of the 1st century.
Gentiles and God-fearers are considered by modern scholars to be of significant importance to the growth of early Christianity; they represented a group of Gentiles who shared religious ideas and practices with Jews, to one degree or another. However, the God-fearers were only "partial" converts, engaged in certain Jewish rites and traditions without taking a step further to actual conversion to Judaism, which would have required full adherence to the 613 Mitzvot that were generally unattractive to would-be Gentile converts. The rite of circumcision was especially unappealing and execrable in Classical civilization because it was the custom to spend an hour a day or so exercising nude in the gymnasium and in Roman baths, therefore Jewish men did not want to be seen in public deprived of their foreskins. Hellenistic and Roman culture both found circumcision to be cruel and repulsive. The Apostle Paul in his letters fiercely criticized the Judaizers that demanded circumcision for Gentile converts, and opposed them; he stressed instead that faith in Christ constituted a New Covenantwith God, a covenant which essentially provides the justification and salvation for Gentiles from the harsh edicts of the Mosaic Law, a New Covenant that didn't require circumcision. Lydia of Thyatira, who became Paul's first convert in Europe, is described as "a worshipper of God" ; the Roman soldierCornelius and the Ethiopian eunuch are also considered by modern scholars as God-fearers. In Paul's message of salvation through faith in Christ as opposed to submission under the Mosaic Law, many God-fearers found an essentially Jewish group to which they could belong without the necessity of their accepting Jewish Law. Aside from earning Paul's group a wide following, this view was generalized in the eventual conclusion that converts to Christianity need not first accept all Jewish Law, a fact indispensable to the spread of the early Christians which would eventually lead to the distinction between Judaism and Christianity as two separate religions.