Romans, an Intro

Reading the first part of the first chapter of Romans was pretty difficult for me, and I’m thinking that it’s because of Paul’s writing style. It did make me feel better, however, that the IM notes that “even among early Christians, Paul’s writings were regarded as ‘hard to be understood,’ and his teachings were sometimes distorted and misrepresented.” So now that we are off on that note, let’s get into some background on the book of Romans.

Who wrote it: The book of Romans is a written correspondence from Paul the apostle to the Christian believers in Rome. This was confusing for me because I thought that just yesterday I had read that Paul was the first person to ever preach the gospel in Rome. The IM explains, “The origins of the Church in Rome are unknown but probably date to seen after the day of Pentecost, when Jews visiting from Rome heard Peter preach.” On the day of Pentecost, there were hundreds of thousands of foreigners in Jerusalem because of the Festival of Week, roughly 7 weeks after the Passover. It would make sense that there would have been some Jews from Rome visiting Jerusalem when the outpouring of the Spirit prompted Peter and many other apostles to preach the gospel.
To whom was it written: These Jews might have taken what they had heard in Jerusalem back with them to Rome where they might have had more correspondence with the church leaders or perhaps even traveled to other places where there was gospel preaching. So even though there might not have been any active missionary preaching in Rome prior to Paul’s arrival, there very clearly were Christians and believers in Christ. The IM points out that Priscilla and Aquila had lived in Rome. Even looking back at were we first meet Priscilla and Aquila, we are reminded that Claudius “had commanded all Jews to depart from Rome,” and that’s how they ended up in Corinth when they met Paul.
When and where was it written: The IM says that it “appears to have been written around A.D. 57, near the end of Paul’s third missionary journey… several clues suggest that Paul wrote Romans during the three months he stayed in Corinth.” When Paul met Priscilla and Aquila in Corinth, they probably had the inside information on the faith in Rome. Because they had lived there so recently, they would probably have known what the people there were in need of to keep the faith. Maybe it is no accident that Paul focused his attention on building the faith in Rome when he was working closely with people who had just come from there.
Why was it written: the IM gives three reasons why Paul wrote to the Romans. First was because he wanted to go there to preach the gospel and was hoping to establish some relationship in the city before he got there. Second was to straighten out some misunderstandings that he believed were circulating concerning gospel doctrine with the members in Rome. This would make sense if Paul was in fact talking with Priscilla ad Aquila about the Roman members.
And third, “to promote unity between Jewish and Gentile members of the Church.” Claudius had ordered all Jews and Jewish Christians to leave Rome in A.D. 49. He died in A.D. 54 so by the time that this letter was written in A.D. 57, Jews would have been returning back to Rome for a few years. I was confused about the whole “Jewish Christian” thing, but all those who were Jewish by heritage had to leave Rome, even if they had been baptized as Christians. I would imagine that most Jewish Christians would not have renounced their heritage as Jews just because they believed in Christ.
While the Jewish Christians were gone, only those gentile Christians would have remained to build the church in the city, and when the Jewish Christians came back, the IM says they “would have returned to predominantly Gentile Christian congregations in Rome, a situation that may have given rise to some of the tensions and problems between Jewish and Gentile Christians.” Those were the three reasons given by the IM as to the purposes of Paul’s letter to the Romans.
I have found it pretty difficult to follow though, so I might also read a “New Age” version or something like that so that it might be easier for me to follow. If I do supplement with another version, I will not replace the King James Version, only add the other one in addition. I have done that before with the Old Testament with profitable results because they explain more of the background and context for some of the more difficult to understand portions.
The example that sticks out most to me is when it was talking about David and his men who were going to go into a village and kill “every man who pisseth against a wall.” The New Age version explained that this phrase indicated that all the fighting men of a certain age were to be punished because they had robbed and disrespected David, etc. It was really enlightening and I learned a lot from it.