Romans

Background and History

The chapters above are the King James text. This essay is the setting of Romans: who is said to have written it, when and where, what happens in it, and how the text has been copied.

At a Glance

Who Wrote It

The letter signs itself. Romans 1:1Romans 1:1 · King James VersionPaul, a servant of Jesus Christ, called to be an apostle, separated unto the gospel of God,Romans 1:1 · King James VersionOpen the Source (1) begins, “Paul, a servant of Jesus Christ, called to be an apostle, separated unto the gospel of God.” Romans 1:7Romans 1:7 · King James VersionTo all that be in Rome, beloved of God, called to be saints: Grace to you and peace from God our Father, and the Lord Jesus Christ.Romans 1:7 · King James VersionOpen the Source (1) addresses all that be in Rome. The argument is in the first person of that apostle through Romans 15.

Romans 16:22Romans 16:22 · King James VersionI Tertius, who wrote this epistle, salute you in the Lord.Romans 16:22 · King James VersionOpen the Source (1) says, “I Tertius, who wrote this epistle, salute you in the Lord.” Tertius is the hand that put the words on the page. He inserts his own greeting. He does not claim the theology. Ancient letters were often taken down by a scribe. The author is the person in the greeting, which is Paul. A reader who stops at Tertius’s line and calls him the author has missed the first verse.

Romans 16:1Romans 16:1 · King James VersionI commend unto you Phebe our sister, which is a servant of the church which is at Cenchrea:Romans 16:1 · King James VersionOpen the Source commends Phebe, a servant of the church at Cenchrea. The King James spelling is Phebe. She is the one Paul asks the church to receive. Many readers infer that she carried the letter. The verse says commend and receive. It does not say “Phebe wrote this.”

The Muratorian fragment lists Paul’s letters and includes Romans, after Corinthians and Galatians in its own order, as a letter on the rule of the Old Testament Scriptures and on Christ as their aim. (4) The Latin is damaged and the English follows restorations. The same fragment says letters to the Laodiceans and to the Alexandrians are forged under Paul’s name and are not to be received. Romans is on the received side of that list, not the forged side. Irenaeus names Paul among those through whom the Gospel came. (6) He does not, in Against Heresies 3.1.1, give a separate account of this letter’s drafting. There is no article on this site yet that is only about who wrote Romans. The letter’s own greeting is the evidence this page leads with.

Who It Is Not

Tertius is not the apostle. Phebe is not the author. The church at Rome is the audience, not a committee that composed the argument and signed Paul’s name. The forged letters the Muratorian fragment rejects are a different pair. They are not Romans.

Scholars discuss whether Romans 16 originally belonged with chapters 1 through 15, because the chapter is a long series of greetings and some later copies circulate the letter in shorter forms. That is a real question about the ending. It is not a question about whether Paul wrote the argument of Romans 1 through Romans 15. This page does not claim to have collated those copies. It notes the question and leaves the names in chapter 16 as the King James text prints them.

When and Where

Romans 15:25Romans 15:25 · King James VersionBut now I go unto Jerusalem to minister unto the saints.Romans 15:25 · King James VersionOpen the Source (1) says Paul is now going to Jerusalem to minister to the saints. Romans 15:26Romans 15:26 · King James VersionFor it hath pleased them of Macedonia and Achaia to make a certain contribution for the poor saints which are at Jerusalem.Romans 15:26 · King James VersionOpen the Source says Macedonia and Achaia have made a contribution for the poor saints there. The letter stands just before that journey. Acts 20:2–3Acts 20:2–3 · King James Version^20:2 And when he had gone over those parts, and had given them much exhortation, he came into Greece, ^20:3 And there abode three months. And when the Jews laid wait for him, as he was about to sail into Syria, he purposed to return through Macedonia.Acts 20:2–3 · King James VersionOpen the Source (2) has Paul in Greece for three months and then departing for Syria. Bible Gateway’s survey gives Romans as AD 56–57. (7) That is the range in At a Glance. It is one editor’s approximation. The letter prints no year. This page does not add a year from the Gallio inscription. That inscription was not checked for this essay.

Romans 16:23Romans 16:23 · King James VersionGaius mine host, and of the whole church, saluteth you. Erastus the chamberlain of the city saluteth you, and Quartus a brother.Romans 16:23 · King James VersionOpen the Source sends greetings from Gaius, “mine host, and of the whole church,” and from Erastus, the chamberlain of the city. 1 Corinthians 1:141 Corinthians 1:14 · King James VersionI thank God that I baptized none of you, but Crispus and Gaius;1 Corinthians 1:14 · King James VersionOpen the Source (3) says Paul baptized Gaius. Acts 18 places Paul in Corinth for a year and six months. Identifying the host Gaius with the Gaius of Corinth, and the city with Corinth, is an inference from those names. It is a strong one. It is not a sentence that says “written at Corinth.” Ancient Corinth is in the Peloponnese, south-central Greece, about 50 miles west of Athens. Modern Corinth, founded in 1858, is three miles northeast of the ancient site. (8) Cenchrea, where Phebe serves, is Cenchreae, the port on the Saronic Gulf. The Corinth article does not give that port a separate modern town name.

The letter does not name an emperor. This page does not add one.

Places in This Book

What Is Happening

Romans is an argument, not a travel diary. Romans 1 greets Rome and states the gospel as God’s power for salvation, to the Jew first and also to the Greek. Romans 1:18Romans 1:18 · King James VersionFor the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who hold the truth in unrighteousness;Romans 1:18 · King James VersionOpen the Source through Romans 3 says both Gentile and Jew are under sin. Romans 3:21Romans 3:21 · King James VersionBut now the righteousness of God without the law is manifested, being witnessed by the law and the prophets;Romans 3:21 · King James VersionOpen the Source through Romans 5 is justification by faith, Abraham as the example, and peace with God. Romans 6 through Romans 8 is death to sin, the struggle of the will, and life in the Spirit, ending with nothing able to separate from the love of God. Romans 9 through Romans 11 is Israel, mercy, and the olive tree. Romans 12 through Romans 15 is the common life, rulers, the weak and the strong, and Paul’s travel plans. Romans 16 is Phebe, the greetings, and Tertius.

Key Themes

The gospel, justification, and the union of Jew and Gentile are the load-bearing lines. Romans 1:16Romans 1:16 · King James VersionFor I am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ: for it is the power of God unto salvation to every one that believeth; to the Jew first, and also to the Greek.Romans 1:16 · King James VersionOpen the Source (1) says Paul is not ashamed of the gospel of Christ, for it is the power of God unto salvation to every one who believes, to the Jew first and also to the Greek. Romans 3:28Romans 3:28 · King James VersionTherefore we conclude that a man is justified by faith without the deeds of the law.Romans 3:28 · King James VersionOpen the Source says a man is justified by faith without the deeds of the law. Romans 5:1Romans 5:1 · King James VersionTherefore being justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ:Romans 5:1 · King James VersionOpen the Source says being justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ. Churches that confess the Trinity still dispute how those lines sit beside James and beside baptism. What Does the Bible Say About Predestination? quotes the disagreement and does not pick a side. This book page does not add a verdict either.

How the Book Points to Christ

Romans 1:1–4Romans 1:1–4 · King James Version^1:1 Paul, a servant of Jesus Christ, called to be an apostle, separated unto the gospel of God, ^1:2 (Which he had promised afore by his prophets in the holy scriptures,) ^1:3 Concerning his Son Jesus Christ our Lord, which was made of the seed of David according to the flesh; ^1:4 And declared to be the Son of God with power, according to the spirit of holiness, by the resurrection from the dead:Romans 1:1–4 · King James VersionOpen the Source calls the gospel God’s, concerning his Son, Jesus Christ our Lord, declared to be the Son of God with power by the resurrection from the dead. Romans 3:24–25Romans 3:24–25 · King James Version^3:24 Being justified freely by his grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus: ^3:25 Whom God hath set forth to be a propitiation through faith in his blood, to declare his righteousness for the remission of sins that are past, through the forbearance of God;Romans 3:24–25 · King James VersionOpen the Source says redemption is in Christ Jesus, whom God has set forth as a propitiation through faith in his blood. Romans 5:8Romans 5:8 · King James VersionBut God commendeth his love toward us, in that, while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.Romans 5:8 · King James VersionOpen the Source says God commends his love in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. Romans 9:5Romans 9:5 · King James VersionWhose are the fathers, and of whom as concerning the flesh Christ came, who is over all, God blessed for ever. Amen.Romans 9:5 · King James VersionOpen the Source in the King James Version speaks of Christ as over all, God blessed for ever. The Greek of that verse is on the verse page. Punctuation of the sentence has been read in more than one way. What Is the Deity of Christ? is the page that sets the line with the other New Testament claims. Jesus is God. The letter’s gospel is about his death and resurrection, not about a creature promoted later.

Text and Manuscripts

Codex Sinaiticus, written in the middle of the fourth century, contains the earliest complete copy of the Christian New Testament. (5) Romans is part of that copy. This site’s SBL Greek text does not mark any verse of Romans as absent from the critical text the way it marks Acts 8:37Acts 8:37 · King James VersionAnd Philip said, If thou believest with all thine heart, thou mayest. And he answered and said, I believe that Jesus Christ is the Son of God.Acts 8:37 · King James VersionOpen the Source or John 5:4John 5:4 · King James VersionFor an angel went down at a certain season into the pool, and troubled the water: whosoever then first after the troubling of the water stepped in was made whole of whatsoever disease he had.John 5:4 · King James VersionOpen the Source. A famous papyrus of Paul’s letters, often called P46, is not described here, because a museum page for it was not checked for this essay.

The doxology at the end of the letter sits in Romans 16:25–27Romans 16:25–27 · King James Version^16:25 Now to him that is of power to stablish you according to my gospel, and the preaching of Jesus Christ, according to the revelation of the mystery, which was kept secret since the world began, ^16:26 But now is made manifest, and by the scriptures of the prophets, according to the commandment of the everlasting God, made known to all nations for the obedience of faith: ^16:27 To God only wise, be glory through Jesus Christ for ever. Amen.Romans 16:25–27 · King James VersionOpen the Source in the King James Version. Where copies place those verses is a known question. This page does not claim a manuscript-by-manuscript map of that doxology.

Further Reading

There is no separate “who wrote Romans” article on this site yet. Who Wrote the Bible? is the wider claim about the human authors. Is the Bible True? is Sinaiticus and the limit of what a copy proves. What Is the Deity of Christ? includes Romans 9:5Romans 9:5 · King James VersionWhose are the fathers, and of whom as concerning the flesh Christ came, who is over all, God blessed for ever. Amen.Romans 9:5 · King James VersionOpen the Source. What Is the Trinity? is the confession this letter’s gospel assumes: one God, and Jesus Christ our Lord.