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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.
Luke 3:1-20, John's answers for toll men and soldiers
In the fifteenth year of Tiberius, John preaches repentance around the Jordan. He tells the crowds to share, tax collectors to take no more than is set, and soldiers not to extort, and Herod Antipas shuts him in prison.
Luke 3:1-20, in every translation this tool compares.
Luke fixes the start of John's work against the names of the emperor, the governor, the local rulers and the high priests of the day. John calls people to be baptized as a sign of turning back to God, and gives practical answers: share spare clothing and food, toll collectors should take only what is due, and soldiers should stop squeezing people for money. He says someone stronger is coming who will baptize with Spirit and fire, and Herod Antipas jails him after John condemns his marriage to his brother's wife.
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- {"u":"https:\/\/jayms.com\/bible-study-tools-2\/ancient-world-ideas\/proselyte-baptism\/","n":"Ritual washing and convert immersion","s":"Jews washed often for purity, but one immersion happened only once: the bath a Gentile took on becoming a Jew. John's baptism and the church's took that shape.","r":""}
- {"u":"https:\/\/jayms.com\/bible-study-tools-2\/ancient-world-ideas\/tax-collectors\/","n":"Tolls and tax collectors","s":"Local men who collected tolls and taxes for rulers backed by Rome, distrusted as collaborators and cheats.","r":""}
- {"u":"https:\/\/jayms.com\/bible-study-tools-2\/ancient-world-ideas\/rome-in-charge\/","n":"Rome in charge","s":"Rome ruled through client princes, local elites and governors. It kept the power to execute, and its soldiers, coins and taxes were everywhere.","r":""}
- {"u":"https:\/\/jayms.com\/bible-study-tools-2\/ancient-world-ideas\/herod-and-herodians\/","n":"Herod Antipas and the Herodians","s":"Herod Antipas, son of Herod the Great, ran Galilee for Rome as a tetrarch, not a king. The Herodians were his backers.","r":""}
How to count the fifteenth year of Tiberius is debated: from Augustus's death in AD 14 it gives AD 27 to 29, and from Tiberius's joint rule with Augustus in AD 11 or 12 it gives AD 25 to 27; Strauss and Carson, Moo and Morris think the later reckoning, about AD 28 or 29, most likely. Annas had been high priest until the governor deposed him in AD 15, but he kept the title and his influence, and Caiaphas, probably his son-in-law, held the office from AD 18 to 36 (Keener's notes). Keener thinks the soldiers were Syrian auxiliaries serving Rome; Wright thinks Herod's own troops more likely, and Strauss agrees: probably Jewish troops in Antipas's service, perhaps guarding the tax collectors. Strauss doubts that John modeled his rite on the immersion of converts, since the Talmudic evidence for it is late. Antipas had divorced the daughter of the Nabatean king Aretas IV to marry Herodias. Luke ties the arrest to John's rebuke; Josephus says Herod feared "the great influence John had over the people might put it into his power and inclination to raise a rebellion"; Keener suggests Herod heard moral preaching as a political statement.
- NIV Cultural Backgrounds Study Bible, notes on Luke 3:1, 3:2, 3:14, 3:19 and 3:20
- Craig S. Keener, The IVP Bible Background Commentary: New Testament, on Luke 3:1-2, 3:12-13, 3:14 and 3:19-20
- N. T. Wright, Luke for Everyone, comment on Luke 3:10-20
- Josephus, Antiquities of the Jews 18.5.1-2, trans. William Whiston
- Mark L. Strauss, Luke, in Zondervan Illustrated Bible Backgrounds Commentary, ed. Clinton E. Arnold, on Luke 3:1, 3:2, 3:3, 3:14 and 3:16
- D. A. Carson, Douglas J. Moo and Leon Morris, An Introduction to the New Testament, ch. 1, The Synoptic Gospels, Gospel Chronology, The Beginning of Jesus' Ministry
