
Arguably there are strong and disturbing similarities
between what is happening in the United States today and the gradual transition
of Rome from a republic in the sixth century BCE to an imperial order governed
by an emperor in the first century BCE. During this long and turbulent history,
strongmen rulers inspired personality cults; senatorial ineptness and personal
avarice compromised democratic institutions; and, the demands of an expanding
empire taxed both the resources and the will of the republic. It is not a
foregone conclusion that our republic will suffer the same fate. Our democratic
institutions and traditions may yet prevail over personality cults, the
influence of dark money, the global reach of US militarism, and the threats
posed by global warming. But the parallels are worrisome. I argue below that the
resemblances between then and now make Paul’s letter to the Christians in Rome
especially timely.
Paul’s letter to the Romans, most likely written sometime
between the year 54 and 58 CE, is often interpreted as a letter of self-introduction
in which he set forth his theological positions. It is also read as a defense
of Gentile Christianity against Judaizing influences. Yet another theory finds Paul
offering a Christian theology of the state, sometimes referred to as the “two kingdoms”
theory.
What all the above named schools of interpretation have in
common is that they make Paul into a social conservative. They dull whatever
political edge his counsel carries. As a result, the revolutionary Paul who
endured numerous arrests, beatings, and imprisonments, and who was eventually
executed by the state, is buried under a mound of theological tomes.
Fortunately, today postcolonial biblical scholars are bringing us a more
radical understanding of Paul’s letter to the Romans as a message of glad
tidings of good news to people who are oppressed. I am indebted to these
scholars for today we need this radical Paul, who counsels resistance to the
empire.

While the Romans generally tolerated religious diversity,
the aristocracy long regarded Jews with suspicion and contempt. The lower
classes resented the parasitic Roman tax policies that privileged Jews, and
they blamed Jews for the high taxes they had to pay. Anti-Jewish propaganda
circulated throughout the empire from the time of Augustus onward. Sometime
between 41 and 53 CE, the emperor Claudius banished Jews from Rome, in part
because they rebelled against a tax he levied on them. Nero rescinded this
policy when he became emperor in 54 CE. The Jews and Jewish Christians who
returned to the city were very likely a wretched lot with great needs and meager
resources. It may well be, as postcolonial scholars suggest, that this is the
situation that necessitated Paul’s letter to the Romans. So understood, Paul
was not writing to defend Gentiles against Judaizing influences, but just the
opposite. He was encouraging a congregation that was threatened by external
pressure and internal division to stay together. I argue below that an ethic of
mutual obligation, literally an ethic of “one-anothering,” is one of the central
themes of this letter and a core strategy of resistance to the empire.

Paul begins this letter by identifying himself as “a servant
of Jesus Christ, called to be an apostle, set apart for the gospel of God . .
.” (Rom. 1: 1, RSV throughout). The translation “servant” is a bit misleading.
A more accurate translation is “slave.” Paul calls himself a “slave of Jesus
Christ,” thus defining not only his relationship with Jesus, but also his
solidarity with the lowest class of people in Roman society. Noteworthy, too,
is the word “gospel,” meaning “glad tidings.” “Gospel” is a term the Roman
military used when sending the emperor glad tidings of victory from the front
lines of battle. Paul’s use of the word “gospel” is, thus, a direct challenge
to the militaristic “glad tidings” of the empire. Paul’s first sentence puts
the Christian community on the front lines of struggle against the empire.
The contrast between the Way of Jesus and the way of the
empire is sharpened by the claim that Jesus was “designated the Son of God . .
. by his resurrection from the dead” (Rom. 1: 4). Since Octavian, Rome’s first
emperor, had been given the title “Augustus,” (Reverend/Highly Honored), the
Roman imperium claimed that it had established a new world order, with itself
as the only superpower. Octavian and those who followed were acclaimed “Saviors”
of the world. Spires and temples honoring the emperor were erected in prominent
places throughout the empire. But Paul charged that the empire was a culture of
death, responsible for killing Jesus, who was raised from the dead by God. Those
who “belong to Jesus Christ” (Rom. 1: 6), belong to a culture of life. The
difference between the Way of Jesus and the way of the empire is clear and
unequivocal.

Later, in Rom. 1: 18 - 32, Paul vividly describes the Roman
culture of death as a culture that is ruled by “dishonorable passions” (Rom. 1:
26). Contrary to what is commonly alleged, in these verses Paul is neither
launching into a diatribe disparaging human nature in general, nor condemning
homosexuality as a sin. Rather he is denouncing the practice of turning human
beings into sex slaves, and even more broadly he is condemning the practice of human
trafficking sanctioned by imperial power and the aristocracy. He alleges that
people who claim to be “wise,” are, in truth, “futile in the thinking,” because
“they have exchanged to glory of the immortal God for images resembling mortal
man or birds or animals or reptiles” (Rom. 1:23). Simply put, the sin of
idolatry manifests itself in the disparagement of human dignity. Positively
stated, the measure of a good society is not the wealth of the few, but the
well-being of the many, especially slaves and the marginalized. A good society
honors the image of God by protecting human dignity and nurturing healthy
communities. A moral society promotes a culture of life for all people.

Paul not only exposes the callous cruelty of the empire, he
builds up communities of resistance by giving them encouragement and practical
advice. We have to read passages like the following in this context: “In all
things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. For I am sure that
neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor things present,
nor things to come, nor powers . . . will be able to separate us from the love
of God in Christ Jesus our Lord” (Romans 8: 37 - 39). Here, Paul is not denying
the reality and power of the empire, but he is saying that a community rooted
in the power of God’s love will find the strength to resist the pressures the
empire brings to bear upon it.
Paul forthrightly addresses the theme of imperial power in
Chapter 13, which I suggest it is best understood as a treatise in political
realism. Christians in Rome would have remembered that Nero became the emperor
after his mother fatally poisoned the emperor Claudius, and that Nero himself
killed his own mother four years after he became emperor. They would also have
remembered that Claudius had expelled Jews and Jewish Christians from Rome in
the year 49. Therefore, the admonition to “pay taxes” (Rom. 13: 7) was more
than a summons to good citizenship. Additionally, Paul may have anticipated
future persecutions, which began in the year 68 with the Great Fire in Rome. At
the very least, his message served to remind the congregation of the recent
past and the power of the empire.
We might also surmise that Nero rescinded Claudius’s ban of
Jews because it was politically expedient for him to have them in Rome. The
presence of an unpopular religious minority provided a convenient “target” when
Nero felt it was necessary to “fire up his base,” to use a contemporary phrase.
Additionally, he may have anticipated that the return of the exiles would give
him added leverage over both Jewish Christians and Gentile Christians.

Paul’s response to this situation was to encourage a spirit
and an ethic of “deep solidarity,” to use a phrase coined by Joerg Rieger, a
postcolonial theologian. The following verse is one of many in which we find
this ethic: “Owe no one anything except to love one another; for he who loves
his neighbor has fulfilled the law” (Rom. 13: 8). I believe that the ethic of
mutual obligation, the ethic of “one-anothering,” was then and is now a core
element of the good news that kept and keeps the community together. The
concluding chapters, in which we find an appeal for funds for “the poor among
the saints in Jerusalem” (Rom. 15: 26), and recognition of fellow workers and
prisoners in Chapter 16, is further evidence of the importance of the ethic of
deep solidarity.
Before concluding this brief study of the letter to the
Romans, I want to call attention to two additional passages. Paul boldly
declares: “I am not ashamed of the gospel: it is the power of God for salvation
for everyone who has faith, to the Jew first and also to the Greek” (Rom. 1: 16).
Roman society functioned on a system of honor and shame. Honor is a statement
of worth and an affirmation of a person’s value to others. The dynamic of honor
and shame structures social relationships and institutions. Thus, Paul’s
statement, “I am not ashamed of the gospel,” is a declaration of freedom from the
Roman shaming culture of death. He is not ashamed to be a slave, because he is
the slave of Jesus Christ, who has been raised from the dead by God.

Lastly, I want to offer a reflection on the passage that is
often called the centerpiece of the Protestant Reformation. We are “justified
by . . . [God’s] grace as a gift . . . [through] faith in Jesus” (3: 23 - 26).
There is a strong tendency in contemporary theology to reduce these words to a
narrow framework of atomistic individualism and a personal belief in Jesus. But
in the letter to the Romans faith in Jesus is evidenced by loyalty to and trust
in members of the community of liberation who are opposed to the prevailing
culture of death, and who are witnessing to a culture of life, a cultural of
mutual obligation, a culture of “one-anothering.” Faith is made real through
the practice of deep solidarity with members of the body of Christ.
Against all common sense, Paul had the temerity to tell
Christians living in Rome in the first century that Pax Romana (the peace of Rome), was a culture of death to be
resisted at all costs. The basis of resistance, he counseled, was the love of
God revealed in the resurrection of Jesus from the dead, which made possible
the creation of a new order based on an ethic of mutual obligation.

In these worrisome times, it is not a foregone conclusion
that the republic of the United States will go the way of the Roman republic.
Our democratic institutions and traditions may yet prevail. Likewise, it is not
a certainty that Christian communities in the United States will have the
wisdom and courage needed if we are to follow Paul’s wise counsel. But we know
this simple truth. Creation is groaning in travail and standing on tiptoes of
expectation (Rom. 8: 22), eager to see how followers of the Way of Jesus will
answer the call.
Rev. David P. Hansen
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