Essay #5 Individuals in the Epistles
We commend to you our fellow worker, John Kramer, who printed this for you. How would you like to see your name in an epistle from Paul? Who were the many people he mentioned, for example in the long list in chapter 16 of Romans? There are many answers. Some believe that chapter 16 may not have been an original piece of the letter. Manuscript evidence suggests that copies were in circulation without this chapter. Perhaps, however, the chapter was omitted when the epistles were copied for delivery to another location. Whatever the complexity, this chapter remains in our received text for Romans, and it has much to teach us about the early life of the Churches.
Paul names 26 persons in Rome and 8 persons in Corinth from where he is writing. Peter Lampe suggests that there appear to be as many as seven or eight congregations in Rome. This corresponds roughly to the number of synagogues in the city. The suggestion is in line with the tone of the whole letter, that Jew and Gentile worshipped together at this time. Some of the 26 named are Paul's co-workers. Notable among these are Prisca and Aquila, with whom Paul worked in Corinth and Ephesus (Acts 18, 1 Corinthians 16:19). Paul also mentions three others as his "kins(wo)men" (16:7, 11, 21). The earliest readers took Junia to be a woman's name, perhaps the wife of Andronicus. These were apostles who preceded Paul, "in Christ before me", he writes. Were they perhaps among his teachers with Ananius after his Damascus road experience? Bernadette Brooten writes: "John Chrysostom was not alone in the ancient church in taking the name [Junia] to be feminine. The earliest commentator on Romans 16:7, Origen of Alexandria (c. 185-253/54), took the name to be feminine (Junta or Julia, which is a textual variant), as did Jerome, Hatto of Vercelli, Theophylact (c.1050-c.1108), and Peter Abelard (1079-1142). In fact, to the best of my knowledge, no commentator on the text until Aegidius of Rome (1245-1316) took the name to be masculine."
Paul also mentions the mother of Rufus. Is this the same Rufus as in Mark 15:21, the son of Simon of Cyrene? Were they perhaps living in Antioch the year that Paul stayed there and did Paul stay at their house, where Rufus' mother mothered him as if one of her own children (16:13)? Story can be woven around all these names. Gaius of Corinth has a wonderful history: I have imagined him a landowner and farm estate manager, given to hospitality, of Roman descent, a third generation colonist. He was a proselyte, and is listed in 1 Corinthians as one of those who was baptized by Paul. Perhaps he is the Gaius of 3 John also, with holdings in Ephesus. He would have known well the culture of Roman patronage and would have learned from Paul that obligations in Christ are different (13:8). Prisca, writer and teacher, say from Antioch, and Aquila, her husband, from Pontus (Black Sea southern coast), were fellow workers with Paul. They were all tentmakers. Tertius, a scribe, perhaps one of Gaius' slaves, manumitted, becomes amanuensis to the apostle, travels with him to Jerusalem, perhaps even assists in the compilation of the Gospels! What fun we can have with imaginative speculation!
Lampe's study marks only 5 of those named in Rome as being Jewish. This would make the composition of the Roman synagogues as much as 80% Gentile. Imagine the concern in our community if some new faith was being proclaimed and a large influx of new believers came to St John's with a strange message - and they were excused from observing the old rules. We might say "Some of those rules are critical. Our covenant demands that we follow them, or else we would be cut off from our tradition." How difficult it is to accept something new. How would we know it to be true?
Behind these intriguing names are real people and Paul's words will have had real meaning for them. Jewish synagogues had privileges in the Roman Empire. Jews constituted 10% of the population of the empire in the first century (7 of 70 million). They were exempt from military service and, by imperial agreement from the days of Julius Caesar, they did not have to attend public cult sacrifices for the emperor. Instead, a daily sacrifice for the Emperor was offered in the temple in Jerusalem. Every year a half-shekel was collected from each person and sent to Jerusalem. Substantial wealth accumulated in the Temple treasury, which itself acted as a bank, a slaughterhouse, and a place of worship. We would have found it strange. Romans regarded Jews with mixed emotions: resentment over the special privileges and a separate tax collection system, yet attraction for the purity of their faith and the tenacity of their resistance. The preponderance of Gentiles in the Roman synagogues may have created opportunities for many tensions - much as tensions may arise in our own churches today.
Paul uses the term "greet" 21 times in this chapter, more times than in all of his writings combined. The original meaning of the Greek means literally to "wrap ones arms around". In the midst of potential and actual conflict between groups, is Paul encouraging them to greet one another rather than judge one another? Robert Jewett points out that Paul uses the second-person plural imperative form, "you should greet", not "I send greetings to". This suggests that the ones being greeted are at the same time those whom the Roman congregation should grant recognition. This epistle ends with an implied emphasis on the unity in the body that we have and are in Christ. It also encourages us to greet and welcome one another in the warmth of this holiness in which we find ourselves.
[Bob MacDonald]
References: Peter Lampe, The
Roman Christians of Romans 16, 1991
Robert Jewett in Paul and Politics ed. Richard Horsley 2000
Bernadette Brooten, Women
Priests, 1977