Despite the fact that the majority of scholars agree that Paul’s letter to the Romans was
written to address the Judean-Gentile ethnic divide in Rome, there is still a continued failure
to follow through with the avenues that this position opens up for the study of Romans.
Traditionally, Paul’s letter to the Romans has been read as a theological tractate, a reading
that assumes an ideational or theological interpretation of the letter to the exclusion of Paul’s
ethnic rhetoric present in the letter and how it might have related and even addressed the
tangible relations between real-world Judeans and Gentiles in first century antiquity. This
study investigates just that: how might Paul’s ethnic rhetoric have addressed the Judean-
Gentile ethnic divide in Rome. After the introduction, the study reviews the current state of
scholarship with regard to Paul and ethnicity in Romans. This then is followed by an
elaborate socio-historical exploration of Judean-Gentile ethnicities and relations in ancient
antiquity and the specific Roman context into which Paul’s letter was addressed. The impact
of those relations to the origins of the early Christian movement in Rome and significant
points of coherence between the socio-historical context and Paul’s letter are also
established. Having established the socio-historical context, Paul’s ethnic rhetoric in Romans
1-4 is probed for how it might have addressed the Judean-Gentile ethnic divide and realised
unity among them. / MA (New Testament), North-West University, Potchefstroom Campus, 2014
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:netd.ac.za/oai:union.ndltd.org:nwu/oai:dspace.nwu.ac.za:10394/11845 |
| Date | January 2013 |
| Creators | Mbevi, Misheck Mutua |
| Source Sets | South African National ETD Portal |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Thesis |
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