Cicero
Cor. Marcus Coriolanus
De esu Eating Flesh
De laude Boasting Inoffensively
Frat. amor. On Brotherly Love
Isis Isis and Osiris
Ought not Borrow That We Ought Not Borrow
Quaest. conv. Table-Talk
Quaest. rom. Roman Questions
Superst. Superstition
Thes. Theseus
Poryphyry
Ar. Cat. On Aristotle’s Categories
Marc. To Marcella
Pseudo-Callisthenes
Alex. Alexander Romance
Pyth. Sent. Pythogorean Sentences
Quintilian
Inst. Institutes of Oratory
Rhet. Alex. Rhetorica ad Alexandrum
Rhet. Her. Rhetorica ad Herennium
Sallust
Bell. Cat. War with Cataline
Rep. Letters to Caesar on the State
Seneca the Elder
Controv. Controversiae
Suas. Suasoriae
Seneca the Younger
Ben. On Benefits
Dial. Dialogues
Ep. Lucil. Epistles to Lucilius
Med. Medea
Nat. Natural Questions
Sextus Empiricus
Pyr. Outlines of Pyrrhonism
Sophocles
Phil. Philoctetes
Suetonius
Aug. Divus Augustus
Claud. Divus Cladius
Dom. Domitian
Jul. Divus Julius
Tib. Tiberius
Tacitus
Ann. Annals
Hist. Histories
Terence
Andr. Andria
Theon
Progymn. Progymnasmata
Virgil
Aen. Aeneid
Vit. Aes. Life of Aesop
Xenophon
Anab. Anabasis
Apol. Apologia Socratis
Cyn. Cynegeticus
Cyr. Cyropaedia
Hell. Hellinica
Mem. Memorabilia
Inscriptions, Papyri, and Other
ANET2 Ancient Near Eastern Texts Relating to the Old
Testament, edited by J. B. Pritchard (2nd ed.;
Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1955)
CIJ Corpus inscriptionum judaicarum
CPJ Corpus papyrorum judaicarum, edited by V.
Tcherikover (3 vols.; Cambridge: Magnes Press,
Hebrew University, 1957–64)
P. Giess. Griechische Papyri im Museum des oberhessischen
Geschichtsvereins zu Giessen, edited by E. Kornemann,
O. Eger, and P. M. Meyer (Leipzig-Berlin, 1910–12)
PGM Papyri graecae magicae: Die griechischen
Zauberpapyri, edited by K. Preisendanz (Berlin: B.G.
Teubner, 1928)
P. Lond. Greek Papyri in the British Museum, edited by F. S.
Kenyon and H. I. Bell (London, 1903–17)
P. Oxy. The Oxyrhynchus Papyri, edited by B. P. Grenfell and
A. S. Hunt (17 vols.; 1896–1927)
Introduction
Because Romans is the first Pauline letter in our NT canon, I begin with an introduction that may shed some light on the letters in general, although it is designed with Romans particularly in mind.
Reading Letters
In the past, some scholars made much of the difference between “letters” and “epistles,” placing Paul’s in the former category to show their proximity to most surviving ancient letters (from Egyptian papyri) rather than literary letters. While Paul did not belong to the elite circles of leisured letter writers like Cicero or Pliny, he did not simply compose his major letters, like Romans, off the top of his head. Given the time necessary to take normal dictation in antiquity (shorthand being unavailable), Paul may have taken over eleven hours to dictate this letter to Tertius, its scribe (Rom 16:22).1 Since such a major undertaking probably involved more than one draft (and Paul could draw on his preaching experience), the final draft may have taken less than this estimate, but the total time invested in the letter was probably greater. Given the cost of papyrus and of the labor required (though Tertius, a believer, might have donated his services), one scholar estimates the cost of Romans at 20.68 denarii, which he calculates as roughly $2275 in recent US currency.2 In other words, Paul did not simply offer this project as an afterthought; Romans is a carefully premeditated work.
As we shall note below, Romans is no ordinary letter; it is a sophisticated argument. The average ancient papyrus letter was 87 words; the orator Cicero was more long-winded, averaging 295 words (with as many as 2530 words); and the philosopher Seneca averaged 995 words (with as many as 4134). The extant letters attributed to Paul average 2495 words, while Romans, his longest, has 7114 words.3 Because ancient urban argumentation typically involved rhetoric, we shall
