In its most basic form, “background” is what the biblical writers did not have to say because they could take for granted their original audiences knew it. Modern audiences, however, often do not know it, and some texts become even obscure to us without it. Cultural and historical background can shed light on virtually every text in the New Testament, yet much of this material is difficult for nontechnical readers to find. Although many helpful commentaries exist, no single one-volume commentary has focused solely on the background material. Yet it is precisely this element—the background that indicates how the New Testament’s writers and first readers would have understood its message—that the nontechnical reader needs as a resource for Bible study (most other elements, such as context, can be observed on the basis of the text itself).
Some surveys of the cultural background of the New Testament exist, but none of these is arranged in a manner that allows the reader to answer all the pertinent questions on a given passage. This deficiency convinced me nearly three decades ago to undertake this project, unless someone else provided the service first. This book is written in the hope that more readers will now be able to hear the New Testament much closer to the way its first audience would have heard it.
Cultural context makes a difference in how we read the New Testament. For instance, since there were plenty of exorcists in the ancient world, ancient readers would not have been surprised that Jesus cast out demons, but since most exorcists employed *magic spells or stinky roots to seek to expel demons, Jesus’ driving them out “by his word” was impressive. Viewing the conflict concerning head coverings in 1 Corinthians 11 in the broader context of tensions over head coverings between well-to-do and less well-to-do women in first-century Corinth clarifies Paul’s teaching in that passage. Understanding ancient views on slavery demonstrates that Paul’s teaching, far from supporting that institution, undermines it. Recognizing what Jewish people meant by “resurrection” answers the objections of many skeptics today concerning the character of Jesus’ resurrection. Understanding Roman law helps us understand why Felix was playing unjust politics by not simply releasing Paul after his defense speech. And so forth.
The sole purpose of this commentary (unlike most commentaries) is to make available the most relevant cultural, social and historical background for reading the New Testament the way its first readers would have read it. Although some notes about context or theology have been necessary, such notes have been kept to a minimum to leave most of the work of interpretation with the reader.
Knowing ancient culture is critical to understanding the Bible, especially the passages most foreign to us. Our need to recognize the setting of the biblical writers does not deny that biblical passages are valid for all time; the point is that they are not valid for all circumstances. Different texts in the Bible address different situations. (For instance, some texts address how to be saved, some address Christ’s call to missions, some address his concern for the poor, and so on.) Before we can determine the sorts of circumstances to which those passages most directly apply, we need to understand what circumstances they originally addressed.
This observation is not to play down the importance of other factors in interpreting the Bible. The most important issue, next to the Spirit’s application to our hearts and lives, is always literary context: reading each book of the Bible the way it was put together under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit. This commentary itself is meant only as a tool to provide readers ready access to New Testament background—it is not meant to be the whole story. In my own preaching and teaching, I am more concerned with literary context than with culture. But readers can ascertain the context on their own by studying the Bible itself. For most of us, application of the Bible is also crucial, but specific applications will differ from culture to culture and from person to person, and these, again, are readily available to readers of the Bible without outside helps.
For the majority of the users of this commentary, who have not studied Greek and Hebrew, a good, readable translation is crucial for understanding the Bible. (For instance, both the NASB, which is more word for word, and the NIV, which is more readable, are very helpful. One might read regularly from the NIV and study more detailed passages from or compare with the NASB.) In contrast to the half-dozen mainly medieval manuscripts on which the King James Version was based, we now have over five thousand New Testament manuscripts, including some from extremely close to the time the New Testament books were written (by the standards used for ancient texts). These manuscripts make the New Testament by far the best-documented work of the ancient world and also explain why more accurate translations are available today than in times past. But the biggest reason for using an up-to-date translation is that it is written in the form of language that we speak today and thus is easier to understand. Understanding the Bible so one can obey its teaching is, after all, the main purpose for reading it.
Other methods of getting into the text itself, like outlining and taking notes, are also useful to many readers. For more complete guides on how to study the Bible, the reader may consult (among less technical sources) works like Gordon Fee and Douglas Stuart, How to Read the Bible for All Its Worth (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1981), or J. Scott Duvall and J. Daniel Hays, Grasping God’s Word: A Hands-On Approach to Reading, Interpreting, and Applying the Bible (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 2001).
But the one factor in applying the Bible that is not available to most Bible readers is the cultural background. This commentary is meant to fill that need and should be used in conjunction with other important elements of Bible study: an accurate and readable translation, context, prayer and personal application.
Again, this commentary will not be helpful for those who neglect context, a rule of interpretation more basic than culture. It is best to read through each book of the Bible as a whole, rather than skipping from one part of the Bible to another, so one can get the whole message of a particular biblical book and see each passage in its larger context. For the most part, these books were written one at a time to different groups of readers, who read them one book at a time and applied them to their specific situations. One must keep this point in mind when reading, teaching or preaching from the Bible. (Many alleged contradictions in the Bible arise from ignoring context and the way books were written in the ancient world. Ancient writers, like modern preachers, often applied and updated the language, while being faithful to the meaning, by arranging their materials; so the context is usually inspired guidance on how to apply a teaching in the Bible.) It is always important to check the context of a passage in the biblical book in which it occurs before using this commentary.
But once one has examined a passage in context, this commentary will be an invaluable tool. One may use it while reading through the Bible for daily devotions; one may use it for Bible studies or for sermon preparation. The one book orthodox Christians accept as God’s Word is the most important book for us to study, and it is hoped that this commentary will aid all believers in their study of God’s Word.
Although the format of this book has been tested in the classroom, in Bible studies, from the pulpit and in personal devotions, it may fail to answer some social-cultural questions related to passages of the New Testament. Despite efforts to answer the right questions, it is impossible to anticipate every question; for this reason, some helpful books on ancient culture are listed in the brief bibliography at the end of this introduction.
The reader may also find background relevant to a particular passage under other passages where I had felt it was most important to include it. Because the New Testament itself is composed of books aimed at different audiences (Mark was meant to be read quickly, whereas Matthew was meant to be studied and memorized), my treatment of some books is more detailed than that of others. As the book most foreign to modern readers, Revelation receives the most detailed treatment.
This commentary may be used either for reference or in conjunction with one’s regular Bible reading. In reading the Bible devotionally or in preparing sermons or Bible studies, one has two of the most crucial tools for interpretation in the Bible itself: the text and its context. The third most crucial tool, which was already known and assumed by the ancient readers but is unavailable to most modern readers, is the background of the text. This commentary is written to supply that need to the fullest extent possible in a one-volume work.
The most important ancient background for the New Testament’s ideas is the Old Testament, especially in its Greek translation. Most New Testament authors wrote to biblically informed audiences and could take for granted this shared theological background. This commentary includes Old Testament background, but because that background is available to all readers of the Bible, this commentary especially emphasizes other Jewish and Greco-Roman culture of the first century. Early Christian writers naturally also drew on other early Christian traditions, many of which are available to us in the New Testament. These traditions are often more relevant, especially for later works in the New Testament, than some other background I have offered, but because that material is directly available to the reader, it has been omitted for the most part here. Similarly omitted are notes on background that is transcultural, because readers in all cultures assume this information.
Those who use this commentary in conjunction with personal Bible study should read the biblical passage first and examine its context. Then they may most profitably examine the notes in this commentary; the notes on related passages may also be helpful. Having established what the text was saying to the ancient readers, one has a better feel for the issues being addressed and is ready to move to the stage of application.
The situation behind Paul’s letter to the Romans provides one example of how one could apply what one learns in this commentary. In that letter, Paul argues (among other matters) that Jews and Gentiles are saved on the same terms and urges reconciliation between them within the body of Christ. If Paul’s gospel message challenged ethnic divisions that God himself had in some way established, how much more would it challenge the ethnic, tribal and racial divisions in the body of Christ today, both locally and globally? Once we grasp the point of the text in its original historical setting, we are in a position to apply that text to both our personal lives and our culture today.
Because the Bible’s original message, once understood, speaks to human issues today in a variety of situations and cultures, the way we apply it will vary from person to person and culture to culture. (For instance, if Paul urges the Corinthians to deal seriously with sin, the principle is clear; but different people will have to deal with different sins.) For that reason, most application is left to the reader’s common sense and sensitivity to the Holy Spirit.
This point usually applies even where I strongly felt that guidance should be given concerning application. For instance, in my treatment of Matthew 24:15-22 I emphasize those details that were fulfilled in A.D. 66–70. Some people think that certain prophecies in that passage will be fulfilled again; but because that is a theological rather than a cultural-historical issue, I leave that matter to the reader’s discretion. In the same way, I am convinced that the background provided for passages on women’s ministry should lead modern readers to recognize that Paul does indeed accept the teaching ministry of women. But due to the nature of this work, someone who does not share that conviction can nevertheless profitably use the commentary on those passages without feeling constrained to accept my view. (Most of those who disagree will find at least some use for the background here; few today take the injunction of silence so literally, for example, as to preclude even singing.) At least on most issues, sincere believers, grappling with the same context and the same background, often come to similar conclusions in the end.
Most readers will be familiar with words like priest and Palestine, but terms whose cultural significance may be unfamiliar to the reader are found in the glossary at the end of this book and are marked at least once in a given context with an asterisk (*). Some recurrent theological terms (like Spirit, apocalyptic, Diaspora, Pharisee and kingdom) had a range of specific connotations in the ancient world that cannot be mentioned in each text; the regular reader of this commentary should thus become familiar with these terms in the glossary. I should pause to note that I have often followed common nomenclature even when it is imprecise or sometimes controversial where alternative terms were difficult to supply. Thus I use “Christian” and “Jewish” even though these categories strongly overlapped. Similarly, I am following usual scholarly convention concerning Roman antiquity, not making a political statement (as one critic complained), when mentioning “Palestine”; I am open to an alternative, but Judea-and-Samaria-and-Galilee is too cumbersome to be useful. I retain scholarly convention in mentioning “patrons” rather than the stricter Roman political usage; and so forth.
Not all background in this commentary is equally helpful for understanding the Bible. Some background is almost self-evident, especially where ancient culture and modern readers’ culture overlap. Likewise, not all sources are of equal merit for our purposes. Some sources, particularly rabbinic sources, are later than the New Testament; some of the information from these sources is more helpful whereas other material is less helpful, and I weighed these factors as carefully as possible in writing this commentary. Usually only Old Testament and Apocrypha citations and occasionally citations from the Jewish Pseudepigrapha are explicitly given in this commentary; citing all the rabbinic, Greek and Roman sources would weigh it down too heavily for the general reader. Many observations and analogies offered in my scholarly work are missing here, because it is difficult to determine the likelihood of their relevance (e.g., if a custom is attested only later and rarely).
Some background is included because it appears in standard scholarly commentaries, and readers must judge for themselves how relevant it is for their interpretation. This is a background commentary; it does not dictate how readers must understand or apply the text, and readers who disagree with some interpretations I suggest will nevertheless find the commentary useful.
More importantly, the general reader should be aware that parallels between an idea in the New Testament and an idea in the ancient world need not mean that one copied the other—both may have drawn on a familiar saying or concept in the culture. Thus I cite the parallels simply to illustrate how many people in that culture would have heard what the New Testament was saying. For instance, Paul’s use of the kinds of arguments used by rhetoricians (professional public speakers) indicates that he was relating to his culture, not that he wrote without the inspiration of the Holy Spirit. Further, people and sources from wholly unrelated cultures (e.g., Stoics and the Old Testament) may share some concepts simply because those concepts make sense in those cultures (or even most cultures), even if they do not make sense in ours; our own culture often unconsciously limits our understanding of Paul and his contemporaries. Because ancient peoples did not think as we do does not mean that they were wrong; we can still learn much from their insights in areas like rhetoric and human relationships.
Similarly, when I comment that Paul used the language of Stoic philosophers, I do not mean that Paul had adopted Stoicism; public philosophical discourse had been commonly affected by Stoic ideas and terminology. In other cases, the adoption of philosophical language is intentional; outsiders sometimes viewed Christianity as a philosophical school, and Christians were able to use this outside perception as a means to communicate the gospel. Like other writers, Paul could appeal to his culture in the popular language of his day but give that language a new twist.
When I cite a later Jewish tradition that amplifies the Old Testament, I do not mean to imply that the tradition is necessarily true. These citations are to help us feel how the first hearers of the New Testament felt about the Old Testament characters; sometimes New Testament writers also allude to these extrabiblical traditions (Jude 14-15). (One need not assume that New Testament writers always simply recycled earlier Jewish imagery to relate to their culture, however; often a variety of Jewish views existed, and a New Testament writer often picked a particular one. Although the New Testament writers had to accommodate the language of their day to communicate their point, neither they nor we need see all that language as inaccurate. Some modern readers assume glibly that ancient worldviews are wrong, but experiences and interpretations sometimes attributed to “primitive” worldviews, such as possession by harmful spirits, appear in a wide range of cultures; they need not be explained away by modern Western reductionism.)
Finally, we should always be cautious in application; it is important that we apply biblical texts only to genuinely analogous situations. For an obvious example, it is not accurate to read Jesus’ attacks on the religious leaders of his day as attacks against all Jewish people, as some anti-Semites have. Jesus and his disciples were themselves Jewish, and such an abuse of the text makes no more sense than using the book of Exodus against Egyptians today (later Old Testament prophets did not, e.g., Is 19:23-25). Jesus’ challenges against the piety of religious authorities in his day have nothing to do with their ethnicity; these challenges are meant to confront us as religious people today and warn us not to act as those religious leaders did. The issue was a religious one, not an ethnic one. In other words, we must apply the principles of the text in the light of the real issues the biblical authors were addressing and not ignore the passages’ historical context.
Scholars may be disappointed that the text of this work is not documented or nuanced the way a scholarly work would be, but should keep in mind that this book is not written primarily for scholars, who already have access to much of this information elsewhere. For much of the New Testament, I have already provided the most relevant of my sources in more detailed commentaries. But a concise and handy reference work in one volume can place much relevant information at the fingertips of busy pastors and other Bible readers who have fewer resources and less time available.
Scholars like to document and investigate all angles of a question, nuancing their language carefully and guarding against attacks by those holding other interpretations of the same texts. I follow this procedure in some of my other works, but this approach is not possible in a work of this length. Scholars also like to include all available data, which the same limitation also prohibits here. To be useful for most pastors’ preaching and most other Christians’ Bible study, this work’s language needs to be plain and concise.
I have generally ignored scholarly questions that do not deal directly with the issue central to this book, the ancient context of the New Testament. It is important for the purpose of this book to ask what the text as it stands means; it is not important to ask about the sources behind the text and their editing, and I have dealt with those issues only where absolutely necessary.
The purpose of this book is likewise limited not only to cultural-historical context in general, but also to that which actually sheds light on the New Testament. For instance, to claim that some emphasis of early Christianity is distinctive to Christianity is not to claim that other groups did not have their own distinctive characteristics; but this is a commentary on the New Testament, not a commentary on those other groups.
I have, however, tried to be as fair as possible to the major different views of the background of the New Testament. My own research divides fairly evenly between the Jewish and Greco-Roman contexts of the New Testament, with an emphasis on ancient Judaism as part of the larger Mediterranean culture. I have often labored over a variety of interpretations of the evidence before selecting which interpretation or interpretations I felt were most accurate or most relevant to the text. Not every scholar will agree on every point, but I have endeavored to make the book as accurate and helpful as possible. I hope that this book will both stimulate other students to pursue more detailed scholarship and provide easy access to the world of the New Testament for those whose call in life does not permit them the opportunity to pursue it in more detail.
My comments are based on what were originally one hundred thousand index cards, especially from the primary literature of the ancient world but also recent scholarly research in ancient Judaism and Greco-Roman antiquity, as well as observations in earlier commentaries.
To keep the commentary to manageable length, I have made painful decisions about what material to omit. I have not adduced the many parallels available to turns of phrases or mentioned remote parallels that would not illumine a passage for the Bible teacher or general reader. I have often chosen to delete material of uncertain value, even if it is used by many other scholars. (For instance, given the uncertainty of the date of the document called the Similitudes of Enoch, I have not cited it as background for Jesus’ title “Son of Man,” although it could be relevant.) I have also tried to avoid duplicating the kinds of information available in other commonly used reference works. Because word studies are elsewhere available (and the New Testament contains many Greek words), I have generally omitted discussions of Greek words except where the meaning of the text depends on the broader cultural context of these words.
Readers may detect some points where my own theology has influenced my reading of a text in a manner that disagrees with their own. I genuinely try to derive my theology and applications only from my study of the biblical text, but if the reverse has occasionally happened, I ask the reader’s pardon. This book is meant to be useful, not controversial, and if readers disagree on some points, I hope they will find most of the rest of the commentary helpful nonetheless.
The following sources are useful to readers of the New Testament.
General. See especially John E. Stambaugh and David L. Balch, The New Testament in Its Social Environment, LEC 2 (Philadelphia: Westminster, 1986); David E. Aune, The New Testament in Its Literary Environment, LEC 8 (Philadelphia: Westminster, 1987); Everett Ferguson, Backgrounds of Early Christianity (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1987). A helpful anthology of texts is C. K. Barrett, The New Testament Background: Selected Documents, rev. ed. (San Francisco: Harper & Row, 1989); some one-volume Bible dictionaries (for example, those by Eerdmans and InterVarsity Press) are helpful; see more fully larger reference works, such as Geoffrey W. Bromiley, ed., The International Standard Bible Encyclopedia, 4 vols., rev. ed. (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1979–88); David Noel Freedman, ed., Anchor Bible Dictionary, 6 vols. (New York: Doubleday, 1992); and (esp. on background) Craig A. Evans and Stanley E. Porter, eds., Dictionary of New Testament Background (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 2000). Extremely helpful for understanding the New Testament are reference works on antiquity such as The Oxford Classical Dictionary, 3rd ed. (New York: Oxford University Press, 2003) and Brill’s New Pauly (15 vols.), although, as with all such reference works, one must either read the entire way through or know where to look for information. Several years after my present one-volume background commentary was released (1993), some useful multivolume background commentaries (those edited by Clinton Arnold and Craig Evans) were also published; a different sort of useful background resource, including block quotations from ancient sources, is M. Eugene Boring, Klaus Berger and Carsten Colpe, eds., Hellenistic Commentary to the New Testament (Nashville: Abingdon, 1995). The most thorough work providing New Testament background today is a long-term project that will no doubt prove invaluable to scholars: Ugo Schnelle et al., eds., Neuer Wettstein: Texte zum Neuen Testament aus Griechentum und Hellenismus (New York: De Gruyter, 1996–).
How to Understand the Bible in Its Context. On a basic level, see works such as Gordon D. Fee and Douglas Stuart, How to Read the Bible for All Its Worth: A Guide to Understanding the Bible (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1981); J. Scott Duvall and J. Daniel Hays, Grasping God’s Word: A Hands-On Approach to Reading, Interpreting, and Applying the Bible (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 2001). Two of the recent New Testament introductions that emphasize cultural context are David A. deSilva, An Introduction to the New Testament: Contexts, Methods & Ministry Formation (Downers Grove, IL: IVP Academic, 2004); Gary M. Burge, Lynn H. Cohick and Gene L. Green, The New Testament in Antiquity: A Survey of the New Testament Within Its Cultural Context (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 2009).
For more advanced discussions of interpretive approaches, see, for example, Jeannine K. Brown, Scripture as Communication: Introducing Biblical Hermeneutics (Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2007); Grant R. Osborne, The Hermeneutical Spiral: A Comprehensive Introduction to Biblical Interpretation, rev. ed. (Downers Grove, IL: IVP Academic, 2006); and Kevin J. Vanhoozer, Is There Meaning in This Text? The Bible, The Reader, and the Morality of Literary Knowledge (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1998); with a special focus on cultural issues in interpretation, see William J. Webb, Slaves, Women & Homosexuals: Exploring the Hermeneutics of Cultural Analysis (Downers Grove, IL: IVP Academic, 2001), with a foreword by Darrell L. Bock.
Judaism: General. E. P. Sanders, Judaism: Practice and Belief, 63 bce–66 ce (Philadelphia: Trinity, 1992).
Judaism: Rabbinic Judaism. Our most voluminous corpus of ancient Jewish sources comes from the rabbis; one popular survey of rabbinic literature is Ephraim E. Urbach, The Sages: Their Concepts and Beliefs, 2 vols., 2nd ed. (Jerusalem: Magnes, Hebrew University Press, 1979). Unfortunately, it does little with the comparative dates of the rabbinic traditions; New Testament students must depend on the earliest and most widely attested (preferably in other kinds of sources) traditions. Some detailed work on dating rabbinic traditions appears in the multivolume work of David Instone-Brewer, Traditions of the Rabbis from the Era of the New Testament (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2004–).
Judaism: Surveys of the Documents. One useful work is Samuel Sandmel, Judaism and Christian Beginnings (New York: Oxford University Press, 1978); see most extensively Craig A. Evans, Ancient Texts for New Testament Studies: A Guide to the Background Literature (Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2005). Some recent and progressive approaches may be sampled in volumes such as Robert A. Kraft and George W. E. Nickelsburg, eds., Early Judaism and Its Modern Interpreters, SBLBMI 2 (Atlanta: Scholars Press, 1986). Most issues are treated in detail in more specialized works; for instance, see E. P. Sanders, Paul and Palestinian Judaism (Philadelphia: Fortress, 1977), for Jewish views on salvation (qualified in some respects by more recent studies); on the roles of women see Leonard Swidler, Women in Judaism: The Status of Women in Formative Judaism (Metuchen, NJ: Scarecrow, 1976); Judith Romney Wegner, Chattel or Person? The Status of Women in the Mishnah (New York: Oxford University Press, 1988).
Judaism: Primary Sources. One should especially read the Old Testament and the Apocrypha (in the latter, especially Wisdom of Solomon and Sirach); then translations of the Dead Sea Scrolls (perhaps especially the Manual of Discipline [1QS], the Damascus Document [CD] and the War Scroll [1QM]); and the documents of most relevant date in The Old Testament Pseudepigrapha, ed. James H. Charlesworth, 2 vols. (Garden City, NY: Doubleday, 1983–1985), especially 1 Enoch, Jubilees, the Sibylline Oracles (not all from the same period), the Letter of Aristeas and other works like 4 Ezra and 2 Baruch. Josephus is in many respects one of our most valuable sources next to the Old Testament, though due to the sheer volume of his works, one may wish to focus on Against Apion, the Life and then the lengthier Jewish War. Readers may wish to peruse Philo to acquaint themselves with a major Jewish philosopher in the Diaspora; the works of Philo are now available in a one-volume edition (trans. C. D. Yonge; Peabody, MA: Hendrickson, 1993). Those who wish to examine rabbinic literature firsthand might start with Avot in the Mishnah; many early traditions are also preserved in the Tosefta, Avot de Rabbi Nathan and the tannaitic commentaries on parts of the Pentateuch (Mekilta on Exodus, Sifra on Leviticus, Sifre on Numbers, and Sifre on Deuteronomy). Archaeological data are regularly published in journals and books; collections of inscriptions and papyri, such as Select Papyri, a three-volume work translated by A. S. Hunt, C. C. Edgar and D. L. Page (LCL; Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1932–1941) and discussions, such as Naphtali Lewis, Life in Egypt Under Roman Rule (Oxford: Clarendon, 1983), are also helpful.
Greco-Roman World: General. See Stambaugh and Balch, New Testament in Its Social Environment; James S. Jeffers, The Greco-Roman World of the New Testament Era: Exploring the Background of Early Christianity (Downers Grove, IL: IVP Academic, 1999); David A. deSilva, Honor, Patronage, Kinship & Purity: Unlocking New Testament Culture (Downers Grove, IL: IVP Academic, 2000); M. Cary and T. J. Haarhoff, Life and Thought in the Greek and Roman World, 4th ed. (London: Methuen, 1946).
Greco-Roman World: Secondary Sources. On the way texts were written and understood in the Greco-Roman world, see Aune, New Testament in Its Literary Environment; see also Stanley K. Stowers, Letter Writing in Greco-Roman Antiquity, LEC 5 (Philadelphia: Westminster, 1986). On moralists and moral issues, see primary sources and comment in Abraham J. Malherbe, Moral Exhortation: A Greco-Roman Sourcebook, LEC 4 (Philadelphia: Westminster, 1986). On Greek religion, see Walter Burkert, Greek Religion (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1985).
On history, Tacitus, Suetonius and Josephus are quite readable and may be pursued before the secondary sources; many Greek and Roman sources are available in paperback (e.g., through Penguin Books), although those wishing to do more advanced work should locate the Loeb Classical Library editions. Helpful secondary sources include F. F. Bruce, New Testament History (Garden City, NY: Doubleday, 1972); and Bo Reicke, The New Testament Era: The World of the Bible from 500 b.c. to a.d. 100 (Philadelphia: Fortress, 1974). Specialized works, such as those on women in antiquity (e.g., Mary R. Lefkowitz and Maureen B. Fant, Women’s Life in Greece and Rome [Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1982], one collection of texts), are indispensable for more detailed study. On ancient rhetoric and argumentation, see, e.g., R. Dean Anderson Jr., Glossary of Greek Rhetorical Terms Connected to Methods of Argumentation, Figures and Tropes from Anaximenes to Quintilian (Leuven: Peeters, 2000); Stanley E. Porter, ed., Handbook of Classical Rhetoric in the Hellenistic Period 330 b.c.–a.d. 400 (Leiden: Brill, 1997). Too many valuable sources exist to name them all; one sample could include Edwin A. Judge, The First Christians in the Roman World: Augustan and New Testament Essays, ed. James R. Harrison, WUNT 229 (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2008).
Greco-Roman World: Primary Sources. A broad sampling of documents is available in Robert K. Sherk, ed., The Roman Empire: Augustus to Hadrian, TDGR 6 (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1988). For first-century Roman history, one should read especially Tacitus and Suetonius; for Judea, especially relevant material in Josephus. For first- and second-century moral thought, one should at least sample Epictetus, Seneca, Plutarch and perhaps a satirist like Juvenal; see also Abraham J. Malherbe, The Cynic Epistles: A Study Edition, SBLSBS 12 (Missoula, MT: Scholars Press, 1977). For ancient and argumentation, helpful works include Quintilian’s Institutes of Oratory, the rhetorical essays of Dionysius of Halicarnassus and Cicero, and the like.