Reading Romans in Pompeii : Paul's Letter at Ground Level

by Oakes, Peter

• ISBN13: 9780800663599
• ISBN10: 0800663594
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2010-01-01
• Publisher: Augsburg Fortress Pub

Summary

Peter Oakes relies on demographic information and data from excavations in nearby Pompeii to paint a compelling portrait of daily life in a typical insula, or apartment complex, like the ones in which Paul's audience in Rome likely lived. Imaginatively fleshing out profiles of the circumstances of actual residents of Pompeii, Oakes then uses these profiles to invite the reader into a new way to hear Paul's letter to the Romans as the apostle's contemporaries might have heard it.

Table of Contents

List of tables	p. viii
List of figures	p. ix
Preface and acknowledgements	p. xi
Craftworkers' houses, a bar and a mansion	p. 1
The House of the Stoneworkers (I.10.6)	p. 1
Sabina the stoneworker	p. 10
The Insula of the Menander as a whole	p. 11
The House of the Cabinet-Maker (I.10.7)	p. 15
Holconius the cabinet-maker	p. 32
Iris's bar (I.10.2-3)	p. 33
Iris the barmaid	p. 36
The non-elite in the House of the Menander (I.10.4)	p. 37
Primus the bath-stoker	p. 42
Pompeian houses and the study of Pauline Christianity: some initial reflections	p. 44
Pompeian houses and first-century society	p. 46
Wallace-Hadrill's survey of housing in Pompeii and Herculaneum	p. 47
A space-distribution model and its implications	p. 49
A socio-economic model	p. 56
Comparison with other models	p. 62
The space-distribution model and the study of Pauline Christianity	p. 67
A model craftworker house church for reading Romans	p. 69
Specific social types in Pompeii and among the expected hearers of Romans	p. 71
The expected hearers of Romans	p. 73
Towards a Pompeian model house church	p. 80
A Pompeian model craftworker house church	p. 84
A model craftworker house church for reading Romans	p. 89
Romans 12 for a model craftworker house church	p. 98
Romans 12.1-2: A communal living sacrifice	p. 99
Romans 12.3: A new scale of value	p. 100
Romans 12.4-5: Symmetrical relationships in Christ across household boundaries	p. 102
Romans 12.6-8: The diverse gifts that make a house church work	p. 104
Romans 12.9-10a: Family love beyond family boundaries	p. 107
Romans 12.10b: Mutual honouring in a hierarchical world	p. 110
Romans 12.11: Hard work	p. 112
Romans 12.12: Hope, endurance and prayer	p. 113
Romans 12.13: Giving and hospitality	p. 115
Romans 12.14: Bless, rather than curse, your persecutors	p. 118
Romans 12.15-16: Family sympathy beyond family boundaries; involvement with the poor	p. 119
Romans 12.17-21: Against Christian retributive violence	p. 123
At the end of Romans 12	p. 126
Primus, Sabina, Iris: justice, survival, tension	p. 127
A campaign speech, a sermon, and Romans	p. 127
Four hearers and Paul's ideas of salvation	p. 130
Primus and the God of justice	p. 132
Justice	p. 132
New status	p. 135
Sabina and the gospel of survival	p. 137
Help for endurance	p. 138
Eternal life	p. 141
Iris and the redemption of the body	p. 143
The body: dead or alive?	p. 144
Holconius and the Jewish salvation of a holy people	p. 150
The Jewish salvation of Jews and gentiles	p. 152
Romans 1-4	p. 152
Romans 5-8	p. 156
Romans 9-11	p. 159
Romans 12-15	p. 161
The creation of a holy people	p. 163
Reading Romans in view of first-century social diversity	p. 175
Bibliography	p. 180
Index of biblical references	p. 187
Index of modern authors	p. 190
Index of subjects	p. 192
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