What did it mean to be a Christian in the Roman Empire? In one of the inaugural titles of Oxford's new Essentials in Biblical Studies series, Harry O. Maier considers the multilayered social contexts that shaped the authors and audiences of the New Testament. Beginning with the cosmos and the gods, Maier presents concentric realms of influence on the new religious movement of Christ-followers. The next is that of the empire itself and the sway the cult of the emperor held over believers of a single deity. Within the empire, early Christianity developed mostly in cities, the shape of which often influenced the form of belief. The family stood as the social unit in which daily expression of belief was most clearly on view and, finally, Maier examines the role of personal and individual adherence to the religion in the shaping of the Christian experience in the Roman world. In all of these various realms, concepts of sacrifice, belief, patronage, poverty, Jewishness, integration into city life, and the social constitution of identity are explored as important facets of early Christianity as a lived religion. Maier encourages readers to think of early Christianity not simply as an abstract and disconnected set of beliefs and practices, but as made up of a host of social interactions and pluralisms. Religion thus ceases to exist as a single identity, and acts instead as a sphere in which myriad identities co-exist.

About the Author
Harry O. Maier is Professor of New Testament and Early Christian Studies at Vancouver School of Theology and Fellow of the Max Weber Center of Advanced Cultural and Social Studies at the University of Erfurt. His publications include Picturing Paul in Empire: Imperial Image, Text, and Persuasion in Colossians, Ephesians and the Pastoral Epistles.

Reviews
Harry Maier's excellent new book, New Testament Christianity in the Roman World, offers instructors what standard textbooks do not: a thorough and nuanced, yet brief and accessible orientation to the Roman world as the social context of the New Testament texts. * G. Anthony Keddie, University of British Columbia , Review of Biblical Literature *
Overall, Maiers is an immensely learned, readable, and productive introduction to New Testament writings as artifacts of the sociocultural context in which they took shape. He is to be commended both for how he enlists these sources to accentuate, rather than mandate, a broader investigation of the Roman world and also for doing so in a manner that is suggestive but not determinative of their interpretation. The book is an excellent resource for curious readers and students alike and I see it especially working well as the backbone of a course that favors extensive engagement with primary sources. Or so I intend to use it. * Heidi Wendt, Bryn Mawr Classical Review *
Summing up: Recommended * CHOICE *
This is an excellent book * Wendell Willis, Restoration Quarterly *



Book Information
ISBN 9780190264406
Author Harry O. Maier
Format Paperback
Page Count 264
Imprint Oxford University Press Inc
Publisher Oxford University Press Inc
Dimensions(mm) 140mm * 208mm * 15mm