Nevertheless, Jews often faced prejudice from the larger Roman society.22 Rome was tolerant of many cultures in its empire, but many Romans guarded more jealously their own city’s traditions, and particularly resented Jewish success at winning converts and sympathizers (especially among Roman matrons). Roman sources explicitly condemn Jews for circumcision (cf. Rom 2:25–29; 4:9–12), which they viewed as a form of mutilation; the Sabbath (cf. Rom 14:5-6), which they viewed as an excuse for laziness (in contrast to Roman market days); and their food customs (cf. Rom 14:2–23). Under extreme circumstances, the Jewish community could even face banishment from Rome (see discussion below).
Jewish and Gentile Elements in the Church
The church’s origins in Rome probably stemmed from Jewish believers there (cf. Acts 2:10),23 but clearly it spread beyond them. Paul’s audience was “among the Gentiles” (Rom 1:5); they were least partly Gentile (11:13) and probably mostly Gentile (1:13; cf. 16:4). Many contend that Jewish believers and God-fearing Gentiles24 remained in the synagogues in Rome for some time, explaining why Paul can presuppose so much knowledge of Scripture and Jewish perspective in the letter (cf. 7:1). At some point in the 40s CE the Jewish community in Rome was apparently divided over questions of the identity of the Messiah, probably Jesus. As a result, the emperor Claudius followed the precedent of the earlier emperor Tiberius and banished the Jews from Rome (cf. the garbled account in Suetonius Claud. 25.4). Given the context in our sources, this may have happened in about the year 49 CE.
Scholars debate whether the entire Jewish community actually left; it would be difficult to reclaim property, hence difficult to imagine generations of Jewish occupation coming to a complete end, then resuming their lives in Rome after Claudius’s edict was repealed (on his death in 54 CE). Certainly the many Jews who were Roman citizens would not have been expelled. Nevertheless, Luke, like Suetonius, speaks of Jews being expelled (Acts 18:2, though prudently omitting the cause). Whether all were expelled (and whether all who were officially expelled actually left), at least those visible in the original conflict must have left. Luke indicates that Priscilla and Aquila, Jews in Rome who were apparently already believers (and possibly church leaders) when Paul met them, had left. It is likely that a substantial number of Jewish Christians, and perhaps all their leaders, left Rome at this point. This means that Gentile Christians had probably constituted the bulk of the Roman church and its leadership for at least five years, and may represent a number of the house churches greeted in Romans 16. (Those with Jewish leaders, as in 16:5, 7, may have organized after many Jews returned.)
Given the different cultural orientation of congregations in the same city, probably at least as loosely connected as the different synagogues, it is not surprising that misunderstandings would arise between groups with a predominantly Jewish ethos. Some Gentiles (especially former adherents of the synagogue) may have held the “Jewish” position, and some especially culturally sensitive Jews (probably including Aquila and Priscilla) may not have insisted on Gentiles observing the whole law, but at least two basic “sides” seem to have existed nonetheless.
Jews and Gentiles in Paul’s Letter
Committed to building up the believers in Rome (Rom 1:11), Paul naturally targets a key issue among them. His letter addresses the relationship between Jewish and Gentile believers (1:16; 2:9-10; 3:9; 9:24; 10:12).25 In Romans 1–3, he establishes everyone’s equal need before God: not only Gentiles (1:18–32) but also Jews (2:1—3:20) are damned. He shows how the law itself need not make Jews better than Gentiles (e.g., 2:14). He shows how the law itself establishes righteousness by faith (3:21, 27, 31), focusing on the example of Abraham (ch. 4). Against Jewish dependence on their corporate chosenness in Abraham, Paul shows that it is those who are of faith who are Abraham’s spiritual heirs (4:11–16), and reminds those inclined to depend on genetic ancestry that all are descended from Adam (5:12–21). The way of faith makes people more righteous, not less (6:1—8:13). Possessing the law does not make Jewish people righteous (ch. 7), and all believers share in a new experience of redemption akin to the promised new exodus (ch. 8). Jewish people believed that they were chosen in Abraham, but Paul shows that God’s sovereignty means that chosenness for salvation need not rest on ethnicity (ch. 9, especially vv. 6–13).
Having established that Gentiles and those who do not observe ancient Israel’s law need not view themselves as inferior, he quickly challenges their inclination to view themselves as superior. God has not abandoned his plan for the Jewish people, and uses Gentile converts as part of that plan; they must not look down on Jewish people who do not follow Jesus (ch. 11). Believers must serve one another (12:1–13) and love one another (the heart of the law, 13:8–10). Those not attached to kosher laws must stop looking down on believers who keep them (14:1—15:7). Framing his concern with division over food and holy days in 14:1–23, he calls believers to welcome one another (14:1–2; 15:7), then biblically grounds his exhortation to Jews and Gentiles uniting for God (15:8–12). Paul offers both Jesus (15:7–12) and himself (15:16–29) as examples of Jews who ministered to Gentiles, and speaks of Gentile believers’ extraordinary debt to Jewish believers (15:26–27). His likely final closing exhortation warns against those who cause division (16:17).
The Roman situation invited Paul to articulate the sort of message he often preached that was relevant for Jew and Gentile alike (1:16; 10:12), and hence invited unity in Christ’s church.26 (Paul’s own setting suggests that such implications were on his mind for additional reasons; see 15:25–27, 31.) In practical terms (highlighted in ch. 14), such unity would require a common understanding of the law that provided obedience to its spirit without constraining Gentiles to adopt its Israelite-specific details (cf. 2:14, 29; 3:27, 31; 8:2–4; 13:8–10).
Indeed, Paul clinches this point toward the conclusion of his argument in the letter body. After using Scripture to argue his case throughout the body of the letter, he concludes that Scripture was meant to sustain hope through “endurance” (nrsv “steadfastness”) and “encouragement” (15:4). Based on what he has sought to provide them from Scripture, Paul prays that God will give them the same mind toward one another (15:5). That is, Paul’s exhortations from Scripture throughout this letter have been to bring them to unity.
An inductive reading of the situation that Romans seems to address thus fits well with what we independently know of the situation. Modern scholars are not the first to notice this situation; Origen, for example, recalls that Priscilla and Aquila left due to the decree and presumably returned in its aftermath,27 and explicitly recognizes that in this letter Paul arbitrates between Jewish and Gentile believers.28 Later, when Paul visits Rome, believers do welcome him, probably without being divided in factions (we cannot be sure whether the two delegations in Acts 28:15 reflect different house churches or perhaps simply different work schedules). So far as one might gather from our limited reports of Nero’s persecution (from a decade after Jewish believers returned and perhaps six years after Paul composed this letter), Christians may have been at that time united as a movement.29 The church must have been massive by that point; Nero seems to have killed hundreds (or possibly thousands) of suspected Christians (Tacitus Ann. 15.44), yet