Recent Books on Greco-Roman Background to the NT which You Should Know About

I’ve always admitted that I’ve been more on the ball in the Jewish world than in the Greco-Roman world. I’ve got a fair grip on my OT, Apocrypha, OT Pseudepigrapha, Josephus, Philo, Dead Sea Scrolls, even read up on inscriptions. But reading scholars like David Aune, Stanley E. Porter, Abraham Malherbe, and Peter Oakes has always reminded me that it is important to get a grip on Greek and Roman stuff too. This was reinforced to me when I read this admission from NTW’s PFG: “What I did not do in the first volume was to say very much about the greco-roman world of late antiquity, and we shall have to redress that  balance in the three chapters that follow this one” (p. 78). I’m trying to remedy that one, I’m slowly reading some Grec0-Roman works like The Aeneid. for the first time. I’m also glad to say that I’ve recently got into several books that really do provide a good overview of topics and issues related to the Greco-Roman background of the New Testament and topics like Empire.

Andrew Abernethy et  al (eds)., Isaiah and Imperial Context: The Book of Isaiah in the Times of Empire (Eugene, OR: Pickwick, 2013).

Yes, I know, its not a book about Greco-Roman stuff. However, anyone interested in “empire” needs to remember that empire and emperor worship did not begin with Augustus. The ancient near east with its ruler cults and various empires provided models and modes of religion and politics that gradually filtered westward and arguably shaped things like the imperial cults in the Greco-Roman world. This collection of essays is a good compliment Anathea Portier-Young, Apocalypse Against Empire about ideologies of resistance in Jewish thought. This collection of essays situated Isaiah in relation to imperial themes, post-colonial interpretation, and some snazzy pictures about archaeological evidence.

Joseph D. Fantin, Lord of the Entire World: Lord Jesus, A Challenge to Lord Caesar? (NTM; Sheffield: Sheffield Phoenix, 2011).

I’m in process of reviewing this book for RBL. It is very good, has a very nuanced understanding of the princeps and imperial cults of the ancient world. Good use of inscriptional evidence and literary evidence! In a nutshell, Fantin shows that kyrios was a relational term and could be used in contexts to indicate a supreme Lord. It is within this notion of supremacy that Paul’s language of Jesus as kyrios has a polemical bite. One of the best things on the imperial cults and its relationship to the NT that I’ve come across so far.

Michael Peppard, The Son of God in the Roman World: Divine in its Social and Political Context (Oxford: OUP, 2012).

I’m somewhat ambivalent about this book. On the one hand, Peppard is correct about many things. First, and just as Fantin also says in his book, that commonly held assumptions about the imperial cult like whether it was just propaganda and imposed from the top down have been disproved. Second, yes, too much of the NT has been read through a platonic lens of being/becoming, whereas much of the assertions in the NT might be honorific rather than ontological. Third, yes, it seems possible to imagine readers/hearers reading the Gospel of Mark in an adoptionist sense, adoptionist in the sense of Roman adoption, not christological adoptionism. Peppard’s thesis has also convinced other authors writing in the sphere of christological origins that I’ve noted. But, on the other hand, I do think that when honorific designations like Son of God are made permanent that they do take on ontological qualities – alas, ontology is part of worldview and it was not invented by Plato. I’d also contest his reading of Mark which, does not deny the Jewish/OT background, certainly does diminish its relevance and significance. Josh Jipp has a review of the book here. I’m also hoping to interact with Peppard’s book in a paper I’m giving at IBR on the subject.

Mark Reasoner, Roman Imperial Texts: A Sourcebook (Minneapolis: Fortress, 2013).

If you are just starting out reading about Greece, Rome, Emperors, Imperial cults, gladiators, apotheosis, pontifex maximus, senators, Caligula and co., then this is a great book to start with. Reasoner’s book gives an overview of the emperors from Augustus to Hadrian using literary, numismatic, and archaeological evidence to demonstrate key points. Reasoner also has a section on community and social life. Plus a section on understanding war, commerce, and games in the Roman empire. Very good overview, very visual, great book to activate interest in the whole area of Greco-Roman context of the NT.

Harry O Maier, Picturing Paul in Empire: Imperial Image, Text and Persuasion in Colossians, Ephesians and the Pastoral Epistles (London: Bloomsbury, 2013).

This is an interesting book about Paul and Empire, unique in two ways. First, it focuses on visual evidence, inscriptions and images of empire, rather than literary texts. Second, and quite boldly, it addresses the disputed letters like Colossians, Ephesians, and the Pastoral Epistles. The pictures in this book, including many in color, are really, really cool! Very interesting to learn how Christian art largely took over Greco-Roman iconography and applied it to Christ. Such an appropriation, Maier argues, was set in motion by Paul himself. Again, a good read because it is such a visual book!