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

Written by Peter Oakes Reviewed By Ben C. Dunson

Reading Romans in Pompeii explores the likely response to Romans among its original recipients. Chapter one is a whirlwind tour through the archeology of a housing block in Pompeii and is fairly complex for those with no training in archeology. However, it does provide an illuminating window into the material culture of an ancient Roman town (size of houses and workshops, etc.). The picture that emerges is one of subsistence living for the majority of society and a life of luxury for a very small minority.

In chapter two, Oakes attempts to place the findings of the first chapter into the broader socio-economic context of the first-century Roman Empire. We can see that many early Christians were probably very poor, while some were in a sort of middle space, neither abjectly poor nor elite (e.g., a craft-worker who might have lived slightly above the subsistence level, but who had very little social influence).

In chapter three Oakes, from the Pompeian archeological data he has analyzed (adjusted for Rome), attempts to provide a greater level of detail about the social situation in Rome than previous approaches to the debate over the purpose of Romans have been able to offer. One of the primary ways Oakes believes his approach sheds light on the letter is that we can now see that the housing space of a typical house church would have been quite small. The primary purpose of Oakes’ reconstructions is to provide concrete information about the kinds of real people likely to be among the addressees of Paul’s letters.

Chapter four consists in the application of Oakes’ archaeological, social, economic, and historical work to a reading of Rom 12. Oakes envisages four specific people who appear to have lived in the various low-income, low-status dwellings at the Pompeian excavation site analyzed in chapter one. Chapter five expands upon the reading in chapter four, attempting to isolate the specific exhortative, theological, and practical matters that would have been most significant for each class of the letter’s hearers. Chapter six extends the type of treatment in chapters four and five, but with reference to how a Gentile householder (with minimal exposure to the Bible) would have received a letter with so much scriptural argumentation in it.

Oakes’ book is commendable on many points. To begin with, thinking through the conditions of life of the probable audience of the letter cannot but help provide important checks on anachronistic interpretations of Romans. This is not to say that in God’s wisdom Romans is irrelevant to God’s people in all times, but simply that the original audience mattered and that Paul was quite specific in applying his scriptural gospel to the everyday circumstances of the churches he wrote. The focus on the practical outworking of the teaching of Romans in the real lives of the original audience should be applauded, especially in light of modern scholarly failures to engage sufficiently in this kind of interpretive work.

However, there are some potential problems with the book. First, it is not entirely clear how the probable audience Oakes reconstructs is substantially different from one that could be sketched on the basis of already available scholarly reconstructions of first-century life (primarily based on literary remains). As a minor, related point, many archeological terms are left undefined, which seems unfortunate for a book that appears aimed at non-archeologists.

Second, chapter two, on social and economic status in the first century, jumps straight into a complex debate which seems too ambitious for the mere twenty-three pages allotted to Oakes’ discussion. This chapter may end up distracting from the overall purpose of the book, and it does not seem to add significantly to Oakes’ development of the probable reception of Romans even if Oakes’ hesitant suggestions are correct about altering how ancient Roman poverty is conceived.

Third, throughout the book Oakes is so extremely tentative in a large number of his descriptions of archeological and socio-economic conditions that his claims for the probable reception of Romans feel burdened with the doubts attendant to such speculation (see for example pp. 57–60; 89–97).

Finally, Oakes describes his book as “an exercise in considering the likely early reception of the letter” (p. 98), although allowing that it can secondarily be seen as shedding light on how Paul intended his letter to be heard. Oakes’ consistent focus on probable reception could lead to a dismissal of either the importance of human authorial intention or divine canonical meaning in interpreting Romans if it was isolated as the onlyvalid approach to understanding the letter. Oakes does not specifically advocate such conclusions, but neither does he seem to be especially interested in textual meaning, strictly speaking. Understanding the socio-cultural factors that likely shaped the reception of Romans is an important early step in the interpretive process, but by itself is not sufficient and can lead to distortions in interpretations if it becomes the controlling methodology for making sense of the letter.

Reading Romans in Pompeii is an interesting thought-experiment in placing Romans in its first century context, although it seems overly ambitious at points and overly centered on hypothetical reconstructions of possible responses to the letter. However, the book should get readers thinking in terms of what day-to-day life was like for the most likely audience of Paul’s letter, a generally non-elite and poor assortment of people who had to deal constantly with many problems and issues that often go unnoticed by affluent, twenty-first-century Christians.


Ben C. Dunson

Ben Dunson is associate professor of New Testament at Reformed Theological Seminary in Dallas, Texas.

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