Tool Beta
The Ancient World Behind the Text
Pick a passage anywhere in the New Testament. See the customs and ideas a first reader knew without being told.
Colossians 3:1-17, Things above, and no Greek, Jew, barbarian or Scythian
Raised with Christ, the believers are to set their minds on things above, put to death the old ways, take off the old self and put on the new, in which there is no Greek or Jew, barbarian, Scythian, slave or free, and above all put on love.
Colossians 3:1-17, in every translation this tool compares.
Since they have been raised with Christ, Paul tells the believers to fix their minds on heaven, where Christ reigns, and to kill off the old ways of sexual sin, greed, anger and lies. They have taken off the old self and put on a new one, being remade in their Creator's image, and in that new people the old labels of race, religion, culture and class no longer divide. Above all they are to clothe themselves with love, let Christ's peace rule among them, and do everything in the Lord's name.
- {"u":"https:\/\/jayms.com\/bible-study-tools-2\/ancient-world-ideas\/heavenly-ascent\/","n":"Caught up to heaven","s":"Jewish visionaries told of being caught up through the heavens to see God's throne and paradise, and writers numbered the heavens differently. Paul's third heaven speaks that language, though he refuses to make it his credential.","r":""}
- {"u":"https:\/\/jayms.com\/bible-study-tools-2\/ancient-world-ideas\/adam-in-jewish-tradition\/","n":"Adam in Jewish tradition","s":"The Old Testament says little about Adam outside Genesis, but by Paul's day Jewish writers spoke often of his lost glory and of the sin and death he brought into the world. Each person, they added, became his own Adam.","r":""}
- {"u":"https:\/\/jayms.com\/bible-study-tools-2\/ancient-world-ideas\/greeks-and-barbarians\/","n":"Greeks, barbarians and the nations","s":"Greeks split humanity into Greeks and barbarians, people whose speech sounded like babble. Jews split it into Israel and the nations. Paul uses both maps.","r":""}
- {"u":"https:\/\/jayms.com\/bible-study-tools-2\/ancient-world-ideas\/slavery\/","n":"Slavery and slave managers","s":"Slaves were everywhere in the Roman world, from field hands to stewards who ran whole estates and handled their master's money. A master away and slaves left in charge was a familiar story.","r":""}
Philosophers were known for gazing upward, and Jewish apocalyptic writers stressed the purity of God's upper heavens; in Paul's version the one thing named in heaven is Christ (Keener and his notes). The vices of verse 5 were the ones Jews thought typical of Gentiles (Keener and his notes). The old self and the new probably allude to Adam and Christ, and image and Creator echo Genesis 1:26-27 (Keener and his notes). Putting off and putting on may borrow the moralists' image of armor or the Jewish image of being clothed with virtues. Keener notes that how churches outside Judea baptized is unknown, while Wright thinks the early custom by which "a candidate for baptism would take off the old suit of clothes" may well be in mind. Barbarian meant every non-Greek, and Scythians, nomads north of the Black Sea, were thought the most cruel of peoples (Keener and his notes; the ESV Study Bible; the Zondervan dictionary), "the people furthest away from what they regarded as civilization" (Wright). Slave or free was a main social division, though some household slaves outranked many free people (the cultural backgrounds notes).
- Craig S. Keener, The IVP Bible Background Commentary: New Testament, on Colossians 3:1-4, 3:5-7, 3:9-10, 3:11 and 3:14-15
- NIV Cultural Backgrounds Study Bible, notes on Colossians 3:1-2, 3:9, 3:10, 3:11 and 3:14
- ESV Study Bible, study note on Colossians 3:11
- N. T. Wright, Paul for Everyone: The Prison Letters, comment on Colossians 3:5-11
- J. D. Douglas and Merrill C. Tenney, Zondervan Illustrated Bible Dictionary, entry Scythian
