3.2. The Author of Romans
The
Epistle to the Romans has been regarded as the “last will and
testament” of the apostle Paul (Saul).1
He was one of the most prominent figures in early Christianity,
largely because of his evangelization efforts and also his writings
(epistles).2
Commonly, he wrote to either the congregations he founded or
individuals he knew. Nonetheless, the Epistle to the Romans was a
special case. The apostle might have never before stepped his feet in
the Empire’s capital city with which the symbol of his citizenship
was attached.3
The
apostle puts his name as the sender of the epistle to the Romans.
“[From] Paul, a servant that belongs to Christ Jesus, called to be
an apostle, and set apart for God's euangelion
(good news, injil).”
(1:1). He further explains that this euangelion
is what God has promised through His prophets in the Holy Scriptures,
regarding His Son, who according to the flesh was a descendant of
David, and according to the Spirit of holiness, declared to be the
Son of God with power, by the resurrection from the dead, Jesus
Christ our Lord (1:2-4).4
This
epistle, which has been dated between 55 and 58 AD,5
bears the deepest heart and highest mind of the apostle. “He was
the right person for the right time,” writes Anthony J. Tambasco,
“raised a Jew in [g]entile territory.”6
Fitzmyer highlights the apostle's own description of himself in this
letter: “I am an Israelite myself, a descendant of Abraham, from
the tribe of Benjamin” (11:1; cf. 2 Corinthians; Philippians 3:5).
He has a strong identification with his people: “For I could wish
that I myself were accursed and cut off from Christ for the sake of
my own people [Greek, my brothers], my kindred according to the flesh
(9:3, NRSV).”
At the same time, he considered himself as Christ’s apostle to the
Greeks (11:13), yet also “indebted” to the non-Greeks, “the
barbarian” (1:14),7
which is the reason why he wanted to go to Rome and beyond.
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1 Günther
Bornkamm, “The Letter to the Romans as Paul’s Last Will and
Testament,” in Romans Debate, 16-28. While the content of
the epistle has been regarded as evidence to the authorship of this
epistle by St. Paul, it is also supported by external evidence. As
Robert Van Voorst points out, “Marcion, the Muratorian fragment,
and second-century writers such as Ignatius, Polycarp, Justin
Martyr, and Irenaeus all affirm its Pauline authorship” (Reading
the New Testament Today [Belmont,
Calif: Thomson Wadsworth, 2005], 385); Cf. Fitzmyer, Romans,
40-43.
2 In
early days the apostle Paul went to Jerusalem to embark in a
rabbinic training under a member of the Sanhedrin, Gamaliel. He took
the strictest camp of the Judaic religion, the Pharisee, and proved
to be a leading figure among his peers. Burning with his zeal for
God and the religion of Israel, he undertook a mission with the High
Priest’s blessing to punish all ‘apostate’ Judeans who joined
the Christ-movement. With this passion, he traveled to Damascus to
bring back to Jerusalem the followers of The Way, but his experience
of meeting with Christ at the gate of the city, which caused him
temporary blindness, turned his course 180 degrees. He
was baptized and continued his journey, now proclaiming the news he
tried to previously muffle
(see The Acts of the Apostles 9ff.)
3 Tarsus
became the capital city of the Roman province Cilicia in 66 BC, and
it had been a city that enjoyed special treatment by the Roman
rulers. Udo Schnelle writes that in this “metropolitan center of
Hellenistic culture,” a person with five hundred drachmas could
obtain the rights of a citizen. He therefore postulates that the
apostle's family could have purchased it. Without Roman citizenship,
“it is difficult to explain the transfer of Paul's case to Rome”
(Apostle Paul: His Life and Theology, 58-62).
4 The
structure of the sentences here is similar to the Terjemahan Baru
version of the Indoneisan Bible
Society (Lembaga Alkitab Indonesia) and Fitzmyer's
translation (Romans, 3).
5 “In
the revisionist chronology” Voorst writes, “51-52 AD” (Reading
the New Testament Today,
384-385). Fitzmyer prefers 57-58 AD, arguing that composition
of Romans as early as 51/52 or 54/55 AD is “impossible” (see
Romans, 86-87).
6 In
the Days of Paul: The Social World and Teaching of the Apostle (New
York: Paulist Press, 1991), 13.
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