BACKGROUND NOTES ON PAUL'S LETTER TO THE ROMANS

Author
     This letter was written by the apostle Paul, who refers to himself as "a servant of Christ Jesus". Paul's life and ministry can be divided into three parts:
     · Conversion, and personal growth in the faith — approximately AD 33-47
     · Three missionary journeys — AD 48-57
     · Consolidating the churches, arrest and imprisoned in Jerusalem and Caesarea, journey to and arrival in Rome —AD 58-65
     From extra-Biblical sources it seems that Paul was released after his first trial, and engaged in more missionary activity, possibly going to Spain; but by the time he wrote his Second Letter to Timothy (approx. AD 67) he was in jail again, and executed soon afterwards.
 
Why was it written?
     There are two reasons why Paul wrote his letter to the Romans, a church he had never visited:
     · Firstly, as he states in chapter 1:11-13, he had a deep desire to visit the church, to "impart to you some spiritual gift to make you strong", but have been prevented many times. This time he planned to travel to Rome after taking the "love offering" of the Gentile churches to Jerusalem, and wrote the letter as a prior introduction of his teaching to the church in Rome.
     · Secondly: Although Paul does not write to deal with a list of issues (as with Corinthians and others), the situation of the church at Rome had some bearing on what he was writing, especially the section on Israel's place in God's plan of salvation.
     Nobody really knows how the church in Rome started. Most probably some of the Roman Jews who became believers on Pentecost (Acts 2:10) went back and started a church in one of the synagogues — by AD 49, when the anti-Jewish Emperor Claudius expelled all 40,000 Jews from Rome, there was already a thriving church, of which the majority was Jewish. (The Christian couple Priscilla and Aquila (Acts 18:2) was among the expelled Jews, and met Paul when he came to Corinth in about AD 51. They later did further ministry in Ephesus (Acts 18:19) around AD 53.) The Gentile believers in Rome were suddenly left on their own, but it seems that the church prospered. Claudius died in AD 54, and the next emperor, Nero, invited the Jews back because he realized that they were good for business. Some Jewish Christians also returned, but now they were in a church run by Gentiles, and that seems to have created tension:
· Gentiles tended toward licence, thinking that their freedom in Christ allowed them to ignore God's laws; and
·Jews tended toward legalism, thinking that keeping the law gave them merit (righteousness) before God.
     The fact that both Jews and Gentiles are saved the same way, by faith alone, was central to Paul's preaching, and the situation in Rome was a golden opportunity — against the backdrop of a real situation he wrote with his eye on the big picture, explaining the whole doctrine of salvation, stressing that
· it is not attained by works, but also
· it should bear fruit in a changed lifestyle.
 
How and when was it written?
     Paul wrote this letter towards the end of his third missionary journey, probably in AD 57, while he was spending the winter in Corinth. (The Mediterranean Sea was unsafe for travel during the 3 months of winter — see Acts 20:3).
 
First audience and destination:
     The letter was written to the Christians in Rome, "who are loved by God and called to be his holy people" (1:7). At the time of Paul's writing, the majority of believers were probably Gentiles, with a number of expelled Jews returning to their former home church.
 
Literary style:
· Paul's letter is a carefully written formal epistle in Koine (common) Greek.
· Unlike the Gospels, epistles were a well-known literary form in the first century, and contained four elements:
  ·· Salutation: From Sender to Recipients — Greetings
  ·· Thanksgiving: Usually a prayer for the recipients, and often some compliments
  ·· Body: The main part of the letter. Paul usually wrote a doctrinal section, followed by a shorter practical application of the teaching.
  ·· Farewell: Greetings and concluding remarks. (Almost the whole of Romans 16 consists of greetings to various people.) Paul always used the word "grace" in his farewells.
· Because of its length, some scholars consider the Roman epistle to be a formal treatise, rather that an epistle occasioned by the needs of the sender or recipients. As mentioned above, it is actually a combination — a formal treatise presented in a letter!
 
Special themes:
· The person and work of Christ: Paul gives a full systematic explanation of who and what Jesus is, and explains exactly what He did for us.
·Salvation: The bulk of this letter deals with the salvation brought by Christ: The need for it, its legal application to our standing before God, our experience of salvation (here and now, and in the world to come), and how it applies to Jews and Gentiles.
· Justification: Salvation is about what Jesus did, justification is about what His work achieved for us — being legally declared "just" or "righteous" before God. This epistle is a long theological argument about how unrighteous sinners deserving judgement may get in "right standing" with God.
· Faith: Again and again Paul emphasises that salvation and all its benefits are by faith alone.
 
Special features
· The epistle is very long, more than 7,000 words, probably the longest first century letter in existence.
· Paul's passion for his subject comes through sometimes in emotional outbursts, like his famous "God forbid!"
· The main section of Romans forms a long carefully constructed argument. It is not structured around various issues in the church, but the whole doctrinal section of Romans is devoted to his explanation of justification. In developing his argument, Paul appeals to and quotes (Old Testament) Scriptures, and argues with an imagined opponent (2:1, 9:20, etc.)
 
General structure:
Prologue — Chapter 1:1-15
Stating his theme: The gospel is the revelation of God's righteousness — Chapter 1:16-17
The universal need for salvation — Chapter 1:18-2:28
Salvation is from God, through faith alone — Chapters 2-3
The work of salvation:
· Past: Christ has saved us from the penalty of sin — justification — Chapters 4-5
· Present: He saves us (sets us free) presently from the power of sin — sanctification — Chapters 6-7
· Future: He will finally save us from the presence of sin — glorification — Chapter 8
The objects of salvation:
· Salvation first came to Israel — Chapters 9-10
· In the present era salvation comes to the Gentiles (and some Jews) - Chapter 11
· In the last days salvation will again come to Israel — Chapter 11:25-32
Salvation has to be lived out practically: personally, in society, in the community of believers — chapters 12-15
Greetings and conclusion — Chapter 16
 
 

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