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 3:18-4:1, The household code
Paul addresses wives and husbands, children and fathers, slaves and masters in the form of an ancient household code, tells husbands to love and fathers not to embitter, and reminds masters that they too have a Master in heaven.
Colossians 3:18-4:1, in every translation this tool compares.
Paul uses a familiar ancient pattern of household instructions, speaking in turn to wives and husbands, children and fathers, slaves and masters. Each side gets a duty: wives are to yield, husbands to love and not be harsh, children to obey, fathers to avoid crushing their children's spirit. Slaves are to work wholeheartedly, as for the Lord, even when unobserved, and masters are to be just and fair because they too answer to a Master in heaven. How far Paul reshapes the old pattern, and what that means for slavery, is debated.
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- {"u":"https:\/\/jayms.com\/bible-study-tools-2\/ancient-world-ideas\/children-and-status\/","n":"Children without standing","s":"Children in the ancient world were loved but powerless. Status came with age, and a child had no rights or voice apart from the adults who provided for them.","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":""}
Minority religions suspected of undermining the family used household codes to show they upheld Roman values; Keener writes, "Paul takes over but modifies the codes considerably." The codes told husbands how to rule, while "Paul instructs husbands here how to love" (the cultural backgrounds notes). Wright notes that, unlike many pagan moralists, Paul balances every duty with one owed back. Law treated slaves as persons by nature but as property, and a master could legally execute his slaves, who "would all be executed if the head of the household were murdered" (the cultural backgrounds article on Philemon; Keener and his notes). Household slaves could earn money and often won freedom, though owners sometimes freed them in midlife to avoid keeping them in old age (the cultural backgrounds article on Ephesians 6). Wright likens slavery's place to that of engines and electricity now. How far Paul goes is disputed: Keener thinks his belief in equality before God shows he does not favor slavery; the ESV Study Bible says Scripture regulates servitude without commending it, the CSB Study Bible that Paul governed the structures with Christian principles, and Wright and Bird that later abolition may owe him its roots.
- Craig S. Keener, The IVP Bible Background Commentary: New Testament, introduction to Colossians 3:18-4:1, and on Colossians 3:18, 3:21, 3:22-25 and 4:1
- NIV Cultural Backgrounds Study Bible, notes on Colossians 3:18-4:1 and 3:19
- NIV Cultural Backgrounds Study Bible, articles Slaves and Slaveholders in Ephesians 6, and Ancient Slavery and the Background for Philemon
- ESV Study Bible, study note on Colossians 3:22-25
- CSB Study Bible, Introduction to Colossians, Message and Purpose
- N. T. Wright and Michael F. Bird, The New Testament in Its World, ch. 20, box Paul and Slavery
- N. T. Wright, Paul for Everyone: The Prison Letters, comment on Colossians 3:18-4:1
