Rome #20

Rome, capital of the empire that governed the entire world of the New Testament, frames the Gospel story from its opening scenes. Luke sets the nativity itself against the machinery of imperial administration: “there went out a decree from Caesar Augustus, that all the world should be taxed” (Luke 2:1), a census that sends Joseph and Mary from Nazareth to Bethlehem. Decades later Jesus is tried and executed under the authority of a Roman prefect, Pontius Pilate, whose approval was required for a legal crucifixion (John 19:15-16).

Paul’s Appeal to Caesar

Rome’s presence runs throughout the book of Acts and Paul’s letters, and Paul’s own legal status as a Roman citizen becomes central to the story’s final act. Facing trial before a hostile crowd in Judea, Paul, refusing to be handed over to his accusers, exercises the right of every Roman citizen and declares, “I appeal unto Caesar” (Acts 25:11), a decision that guarantees he will be sent to Rome itself to stand trial (Acts 25:10-12). After a harrowing sea voyage and shipwreck on Malta, Paul finally arrives in the capital and, though held under guard, is permitted to live in his own rented lodging. The book of Acts closes with him there, “preaching the kingdom of God, and teaching those things which concern the Lord Jesus Christ, with all confidence, no man forbidding him” (Acts 28:31), having “dwelt two whole years in his own hired house, and received all that came in unto him” (Acts 28:30).

Letter to the Romans

Even before visiting the city, Paul writes to the church already flourishing there, addressing his letter “to all that be in Rome, beloved of God, called to be saints” (Romans 1:7). The letter to the Romans became his fullest written exposition of the gospel of grace, in which he declares himself eager to preach there too: “I am debtor both to the Greeks, and to the Barbarians… I am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ: for it is the power of God unto salvation to every one that believeth” (Romans 1:14-16). Early church tradition, though not recorded in the New Testament itself, holds that both Paul and Peter were later martyred in Rome under the emperor Nero, likely in the persecution that followed the great fire of Rome in AD 64.

Legacy

The empire that crucified Jesus and periodically persecuted his followers is remembered in Revelation’s imagery of “Babylon” and a beast with seven heads, which the text itself glosses as “seven mountains, on which the woman sitteth” (Revelation 17:9) — a detail widely understood by interpreters, ancient and modern, as a veiled reference to Rome, the city built on seven hills. Centuries later, under the emperor Constantine, that same empire reversed course entirely, becoming the framework through which Christianity spread legally and eventually dominantly across the Mediterranean world.