A Review of "The First Urban Christians," by Wayne Meeks
Nearly two millenia stand between us (the modern readers) and the authors of the NT, as well as countless social, cultural, and other differences. We cannot assume that we automatically understand the NT text as written without also knowing something about the contextual world in which that text was originally written and received. For example, when Paul offers his magnificent "theology of generosity" in 2 Cor 8:9, is he addressing people who are relatively rich, poor, or somewhere in the middle? Not only does the answer to this question illuminate the text's rhetorical and emotional force, but it directly impacts how the modern reader plausibly interprets the concluding phrase, "so that you ... might become rich."
This book seeks to bridge the gap by articulating a social history of the early Christian communities, especially those founded by the apostle Paul and continued by those he discipled in the fledgling Christian faith. Because Paul travelled extensively throughout his missionary career, these communities formed along prominent trade routes and by-ways in the Roman Empire, which means they developed in cities; hence the book's title. Meeks describes his task: "to discern the texture of life in particular times and particular places," that is, Greco-Roman cities of the 1st century c.e.; and "to describe the life of the ordinary Christian within that environment––not just the ideas or the self-understanding of the leaders and writers" (p.2). Meeks describes his methodology as follows:
In this study the use of theory will be suggestive, rather than generative in the manner of experimental sciences. ... In asking about the social context and social forms of early Christianity, we ... are seeking rather to understand a particular set of phenomena in the second half of the first century. ... Within this general context, this view of religion as a system of communication, as a subset within the multiple systems that make up the culture and subcultures of a particular society, I assume the position of a "moderate functionalist." That is, the sort of questions to be asked about the early Christian movement are those about how it worked. The comprehensive question concerning the texts that are our primary sources is not merely what each one says, but what it does. [p.5-7]
This last point bears emphasizing in order to illustrate its importance. Consider the previous example from 2 Cor 8 – was Paul advocating that Christians strive for upward economic mobility, and was the text appropriated for that specific purpose within the Corinthian church? Or might the textual dynamics operate in the exact opposite direction? Because the texts themselves provide the primary window into the world Meeks is attempting to describe, he affirms the need to understand the text's form and function within that world in order to draw correct conclusions.
Meeks does not develop a specific argument in this work, but rather paints a picture of urban life based on the collection of various data. Roman cities in the first century were not exceptionally large in total geographical area yet had wide public spaces, making the residential areas densely populated – about the same as an urban slum in a modern industrialized city (p.28). News traveled extremely fast, privacy was virtually non-existent, and civil unrest escalated quickly when provoked. Generally, similar tradepersons would clump together in a specific street or area, such as "Linenweaver's Quarter, Leatherworkers' Street, Portico of the Perfumers" (p.29); the same can also be said of residents in general, pertaining to their ethnicity (and language, presumably).
The typical household was a bustle of daily activity, connecting various types of people across all strata of urban society. The house would have been owned by a relatively wealthy family and included: professional rooms and offices for the master; quarters for household servants, and perhaps slaves; shops and/or apartments for rent on the side adjoining the street; and large central spaces for entertaining personal guests, business associates, and all sorts of other visitors. If the master was particularly wealthy or the household exceptionally large, the house might also serve as the meeting place for a social club, professional association, or in the case of the early Christians, a religious community.
Because of this tendency of early Christian churches to convene in private dwellings, they penetrated a wide cross-section of society, perhaps wider than any other spontaneous social grouping of the time. Meeks affirms that these local church gatherings probably did not include the very poorest (i.e. rural peasants) nor the very richest (i.e. royalty or high-level imperial bureaucrats), and they were united by unusually strong cohesive bonds both internally within themselves and externally with each other (although not necessarily with those outside the religious community). Meeks spends a chapter on each of the following topics: the urban environment; the socio-economic make-up of the local community; the proposed social models of early Pauline communities; the governance and rituals practiced by the local churches; and some general patterns of belief and life for Pauline Christians as a whole. He brings all these together in a well-worded correlative summary in the final three pages of the book.
Pauline Christian communities occurred within urban environments, at the intersection of various poles of 1st-century society – rich and poor, foreigners and natives, masters and slaves, men and women, etc. Perhaps this explains (partly) the rapid growth of Christianity in the initial decades of its existence; that is, those who came into these communities were, like Paul himself, people in transition of one kind or another. The leap of religious conversion, with its accompanying reorientation of personal loyalties, would not have seemed as daunting for someone who had already left behind a significant part of their own personal identity and/or encountered ideas drastically different from the milieu of their own background.
Applying the historical insights from this book to our example of Paul's "theology of generosity" in 2 Cor 8, it makes little sense to conclude that Paul is utilizing a theological principle to advocate Christian upward social mobility (for its own sake, at least). Paul appeals to the strong bonds of intimacy within these religious communities, that is, the universal brotherhood/sisterhood of believers, which he claims is ideologically based on the actions of Jesus Himself even as it reaches across lines of division drawn up in ordinary society. The wealth he describes is relational, not monetary, and is engendered by peace – with God, with one's neighbors, even with one's enemies. It is fitting, then, that those within the confessing community at Corinth who have financial resources should share those resources in order to meet the needs of those who are suffering in Jerusalem. After all, Paul says, that's what Jesus did for all of us.
While reading this work I was struck by the obvious organic nature of Christianity in its cultural situation. The early urban Christians did not invent new social forms, per se, but rather integrated their new-found confessional faith into the patterns of life which were already part of their culture (mystery religions, social clubs, etc.). I find this simple principle extremely powerful, especially in my native context (the United States) where many self-identifying Christians overemphasize claiming the public socio-political space for Christianity. We might debate the merits of doing so, either for or against; but Meeks appears to conclude that the early Christians neither did nor taught any such thing. There is an incisive moral lesson here, for all Christians everywhere.
The Gospel transforms, it does not overpower.
This book seeks to bridge the gap by articulating a social history of the early Christian communities, especially those founded by the apostle Paul and continued by those he discipled in the fledgling Christian faith. Because Paul travelled extensively throughout his missionary career, these communities formed along prominent trade routes and by-ways in the Roman Empire, which means they developed in cities; hence the book's title. Meeks describes his task: "to discern the texture of life in particular times and particular places," that is, Greco-Roman cities of the 1st century c.e.; and "to describe the life of the ordinary Christian within that environment––not just the ideas or the self-understanding of the leaders and writers" (p.2). Meeks describes his methodology as follows:
In this study the use of theory will be suggestive, rather than generative in the manner of experimental sciences. ... In asking about the social context and social forms of early Christianity, we ... are seeking rather to understand a particular set of phenomena in the second half of the first century. ... Within this general context, this view of religion as a system of communication, as a subset within the multiple systems that make up the culture and subcultures of a particular society, I assume the position of a "moderate functionalist." That is, the sort of questions to be asked about the early Christian movement are those about how it worked. The comprehensive question concerning the texts that are our primary sources is not merely what each one says, but what it does. [p.5-7]
This last point bears emphasizing in order to illustrate its importance. Consider the previous example from 2 Cor 8 – was Paul advocating that Christians strive for upward economic mobility, and was the text appropriated for that specific purpose within the Corinthian church? Or might the textual dynamics operate in the exact opposite direction? Because the texts themselves provide the primary window into the world Meeks is attempting to describe, he affirms the need to understand the text's form and function within that world in order to draw correct conclusions.
Meeks does not develop a specific argument in this work, but rather paints a picture of urban life based on the collection of various data. Roman cities in the first century were not exceptionally large in total geographical area yet had wide public spaces, making the residential areas densely populated – about the same as an urban slum in a modern industrialized city (p.28). News traveled extremely fast, privacy was virtually non-existent, and civil unrest escalated quickly when provoked. Generally, similar tradepersons would clump together in a specific street or area, such as "Linenweaver's Quarter, Leatherworkers' Street, Portico of the Perfumers" (p.29); the same can also be said of residents in general, pertaining to their ethnicity (and language, presumably).
The typical household was a bustle of daily activity, connecting various types of people across all strata of urban society. The house would have been owned by a relatively wealthy family and included: professional rooms and offices for the master; quarters for household servants, and perhaps slaves; shops and/or apartments for rent on the side adjoining the street; and large central spaces for entertaining personal guests, business associates, and all sorts of other visitors. If the master was particularly wealthy or the household exceptionally large, the house might also serve as the meeting place for a social club, professional association, or in the case of the early Christians, a religious community.
Because of this tendency of early Christian churches to convene in private dwellings, they penetrated a wide cross-section of society, perhaps wider than any other spontaneous social grouping of the time. Meeks affirms that these local church gatherings probably did not include the very poorest (i.e. rural peasants) nor the very richest (i.e. royalty or high-level imperial bureaucrats), and they were united by unusually strong cohesive bonds both internally within themselves and externally with each other (although not necessarily with those outside the religious community). Meeks spends a chapter on each of the following topics: the urban environment; the socio-economic make-up of the local community; the proposed social models of early Pauline communities; the governance and rituals practiced by the local churches; and some general patterns of belief and life for Pauline Christians as a whole. He brings all these together in a well-worded correlative summary in the final three pages of the book.
Pauline Christian communities occurred within urban environments, at the intersection of various poles of 1st-century society – rich and poor, foreigners and natives, masters and slaves, men and women, etc. Perhaps this explains (partly) the rapid growth of Christianity in the initial decades of its existence; that is, those who came into these communities were, like Paul himself, people in transition of one kind or another. The leap of religious conversion, with its accompanying reorientation of personal loyalties, would not have seemed as daunting for someone who had already left behind a significant part of their own personal identity and/or encountered ideas drastically different from the milieu of their own background.
Applying the historical insights from this book to our example of Paul's "theology of generosity" in 2 Cor 8, it makes little sense to conclude that Paul is utilizing a theological principle to advocate Christian upward social mobility (for its own sake, at least). Paul appeals to the strong bonds of intimacy within these religious communities, that is, the universal brotherhood/sisterhood of believers, which he claims is ideologically based on the actions of Jesus Himself even as it reaches across lines of division drawn up in ordinary society. The wealth he describes is relational, not monetary, and is engendered by peace – with God, with one's neighbors, even with one's enemies. It is fitting, then, that those within the confessing community at Corinth who have financial resources should share those resources in order to meet the needs of those who are suffering in Jerusalem. After all, Paul says, that's what Jesus did for all of us.
While reading this work I was struck by the obvious organic nature of Christianity in its cultural situation. The early urban Christians did not invent new social forms, per se, but rather integrated their new-found confessional faith into the patterns of life which were already part of their culture (mystery religions, social clubs, etc.). I find this simple principle extremely powerful, especially in my native context (the United States) where many self-identifying Christians overemphasize claiming the public socio-political space for Christianity. We might debate the merits of doing so, either for or against; but Meeks appears to conclude that the early Christians neither did nor taught any such thing. There is an incisive moral lesson here, for all Christians everywhere.
The Gospel transforms, it does not overpower.
posted by Joel @ 2:53 PM
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