Theology in the Raw - S2 Ep1036: The Gospel and Empire: Dr. Warren Carter

Episode Date: December 22, 2022

Dr. Warren Carter is the LaDonna Kramer Meinders Professor of New Testament at Phillips Seminary in Tulsa OK. From 2007-2019, he was Professor of New Testament at Brite Divinity School, TCU, Fort Worth TX. Before going to Brite, he was Pherigo Professor of New Testament at Saint Paul School of Theology in Kansas City MO. A native of New Zealand, he is a graduate of Victoria University of Wellington (BA: BA(Honors) First Class), the Melbourne College of Divinity (Bachelor of Divinity; Masters of Theology) and Princeton Theological Seminary NJ (PhD in New Testament Studies). Dr. Carter has written numerous books on the New Testament including The Roman Empire and the New Testament: An Essential Guide and What Does Revelation Reveal? Unlocking the Mystery. In this episode, I talk to Warren about imperial-critical readings of the New Testament and what it means to read the New Testament with the Roman Empire not in the background but in the foreground. Warren talks about the relationship between Romans 13 and Revelation 13, the real meaning of Jesus’s “render unto Caesar” statement, how Jesus’s healings subvert empire, and the relationship between ancient Rome and modern America. https://ptstulsa.edu/warren-carter-2/ Thanks to Doug Smith for helping sponsor today's episode. To check out Doug's newest book, [Un]Intentional: How Screens Secretly Shapes Your Desires, and How You Can Break Free: https://www.amazon.com/dp/1625861966/ 

Hello, friends. Registration is now open for next year's Exiles in Babylon conference, and I cannot wait for this conference. Here's a few topics that we're going to wrestle with. The future of the church, disability in the church, multi-ethnic perspectives on American Christianity, and a conversational debate on the problem of evil and suffering. We have Eugene Cho, Elise Fitzpatrick, Matt Chandler, Michelle Sanchez, Justin Gibney, Devin Stalemar, Hardwick. The list goes on and on. Joey Dodson's going to be there. Greg Boyd and Clay Jones, they're going to be engaging in this conversational debate on the problem of evil and suffering. And of course, we have to have

Ellie Bonilla and Street Hymns back by popular demand. And Tanika Wya and Evan Wickham will be leading our multi-ethnic worship again. We're also adding a pre-conference this year. So we're going to do an in-depth scholarly conversation on the question of women in ministry featuring two scholars on each side of the issue. So Drs. Gary Brashears and Sydney Park are on the complementarian side and Drs. Cynthia Long-Westfall and Philip Payne on the egalitarian side. So March 23rd to 25th, 2023 here in Boise, Idaho. We sold out last year and we'll probably sell this year again. So if you want to come, if you want to come live, then I would register sooner than later. And you can always attend virtually if you can't make it

out to Boise in person. So all the info is at theologyintheraw.com. That's theologyintheraw.com. Hello, friends. Welcome back to another episode of Theology in the Raw. My guest today is Dr. Warren Carter. Dr. Carter is the LaDonna Kramer Meanders Professor of New Testament at Phillips Seminary in Tulsa, Oklahoma. Before that, he was a professor at Bright Divinity School. And he, let's see, is originally from New Zealand. He did his PhD at Princeton Theological Seminary. Warren is one of the most, well, one of the leading scholars on imperial critical readings of the New Testament. We're going to unpack what that means. But basically, reading the New Testament, not with the Roman Empire, not as background to the New Testament message, but as foreground. And I just had a fascinating

conversation with Warren. I've read several of his works and always, always learn a ton from his writings. He's one of those scholars that just unlocks things in the New Testament that maybe you didn't see before. So we talk a lot about different passages in the New Testament and then make some modern day application of, you know, when we talk about critiques, subtle, sometimes subversive critiques of the Roman Empire in the New Testament, does that apply to how we should position ourselves today as Christians living in the American Empire for those of us who are living under that power? So please welcome to the show for the first time, the one and only Warren Carter.

Warren, I'm so excited about this conversation. I've been reading your stuff for a long time. And I wanted to have you on because you are one of the kind of experts on what it means to read the Bible against the backdrop of the empire. You've done a lot of work on Matthew and other New Testament letters in particular. Can we start – or first of all, just tell us, who are you? Where did you come from? How did you get into academia? And then we'll jump into anti-imperial readings. Okay.

Well, thanks, Preston. Good to be here. I look forward to our conversation. I am by origin a Kiwi, a New Zealander, where I grew up. Of course, I grew up in a colony of the British Empire, which is not irrelevant to my interests in reading, particularly the New Testament. And so I lived in New Zealand way down under for some 30 or so years, came to this country, did my PhD at Princeton.

And then I have taught New Testament in Kansas City and then at Bright Divinity School in Fort Worth, where I was deeply involved in the PhD program. And then the last couple of years, I've been here at Phillips Seminary in Tulsa in Oklahoma. Okay. Okay, good. So when I hear a biblical scholar from New Zealand, I always think of Doug Campbell. He was kind of the first major scholar from New Zealand that I got to know. Are you guys friends or do you know each other? No, I don't know him. I do know Paul Trabilko.

Oh, yeah. Who also does New Testament stuff. And I know a few other folks as well. But no, I've never met Doug. Okay. So you've written a lot of books. Is your main area Matthew? That was always my guess. You seem to be always, you've done a lot of work on Matthew. Did you do a dissertation on Matthew? Yeah, I started in Matthew and I did my dissertation in Matthew. I did a study of Matthew 19 and 20, which is the journey from Galilee to Jerusalem with relevant teaching along the way. And I argued that what held those two chapters together was an understanding of households and alternative household structures.

And actually deep in the bowels of that thing was actually some recognition that empire might be relevant to all of this. But I really had no clue at the time that I truly wrote more accurately than I knew and realized. So then subsequently, as I thought some more about that gospel and more about the contexts from which it emerged and which it addressed. The whole imperial piece came much more to the fore. And so I set about exploring the gospel, Matthew's gospel, as a text that negotiates empire and tries to both understand empire and also to think about how Jesus' followers ought to live in that context. So that's where I sort of cut my teeth. Nobody else was thinking about Matthew in those terms at that time.

The main incentive for that in terms of scholarly terms was coming actually out of work on the historical Jesus and also work particularly by somebody like Dick Horsley coming out of work on Paul. But nobody was really doing anything on Matthew in those sorts of terms. So that was kind of fun and pioneering and a little bit frustrating because other people just wanted to talk about synagogues and individual sin and all those sorts of things. I wanted to talk about imperial structures and visions and personnel and practices, et cetera, et cetera.

And so from there I have splashed out. I've done quite a bit on Revelation, which I think is an obvious connection. I've also written a commentary on Mark, doing a similar sort of exercise with Mark's gospel. And then I've dabbled in various other bits and pieces in the New Testament along the way. And particularly as the work has gone on, thinking more and more about the methods,

what sort of questions we're asking and how we're trying to answer them and sort of recognizing the eclectic pieces that come together, which is branched into things like masculinity studies. Of course, we're borrowed from post-colonial work, but these are things that weren't on the agenda in the original work. So it's been an evolving journey over the last 25 or so years, which has kind of been fun, not just doing the same old stuff, but seeing more and more implications and developments from it.

Let's back up and give us just kind of a one-on-one overview of what is it? What are we even talking about here? What does it mean to read the Bible through an anti-imperial lens? Because you said this is kind of a newer study. It's like, wait a minute, we've been reading the Bible for 2,000 years. What is this new angle and what does it look like? Right. Well, we have to locate it in ways of understanding and reading, especially the New Testament over the last couple of hundred years. Occasionally, a few people have dabbled in areas of New Testament and the Roman Empire. We have the very famous scholar,

Rudolf Deismann, early in the 20th century, who sort of did some pioneering work. But generally, New Testament scholars have been interested in two other matters in terms of approaches. One, the New Testament and early Judaism, as though early Judaism is some sort of isolated island. And it hasn't occurred to many folks doing that work that Judaism in the first century was occupied territory and lived under the domination of the Roman Empire. And it was in that context in which Jewish folks did their work and their thinking in the first century. And the second focus for me has been very individualised and spiritualised understandings of reading the New Testament, you know, me and my soul and me and my destiny and all those sorts of very individualised privatised, spiritualised sort of concerns

that even though we've given a nod to historical contexts often what has dominated has been an understanding of an individualized terms in those contexts. imperial critical readings or empire studies, and using critical in the sense not of being, not of an attack, but of discerning. So a film critic doesn't necessarily have to attack a film. A film critic can interpret and engage and evaluate a film, for example. And so that's how I understand the word critical,

as an evaluation, as an engaging. What this work seeks to do initially is to understand that the Roman Empire is not the background, but the foreground for the early Jesus movement and the early texts. You know, we have had a little bit of work on the background of the Roman Empire, but I think the image is totally wrong. You know, it's like a stage set, right, where you have the backdrop, which is in these terms the Roman Empire, and the Christians are

out front in the centre of the stage doing the most important stuff. And that's about as historically wrong as we can get it. The early Jesus movement was marginal. It was minority. It was hardly a blip on the screen in the first century. It wasn't center stage for anything. But center stage was the Roman Empire for the early Jesus movement. You got out of bed and you stubbed your toe on the empire. I mean, you didn't have any say in the matter. I mean, empire was daily life. And so that's where Jesus folks lived. And of course, they lived as followers of one who was crucified by the empire. Jerusalem leaders could not put someone to death. Pilate had to put Jesus to death, and there's a whole bunch of interactions going on there. So this approach, first of all, takes this context of Roman power very seriously and seeks to understand it. How did the Romans do empire?

What was the societal vision? What were the societal practices? What were the societal vision? What were the societal practices? What were the societal structures? Who were the societal personnel doing this thing that we know as empire? Someone has said that, you know, we've been doing empire the same way for a couple of thousand years. And there's a class somewhere that exists called Empire 101, and the syllabus has hardly changed in a couple of thousand years. And I think there's some truth to that. The Roman Empire was a domination system. It was an exploitation system. It was in the hands of a very small group of ruling elites,

both in Rome and in provincial centres. And that was one of the ways that Rome ruled, by making alliances with leading citizens in provincial centres, getting them on board, and therefore they exercised their power. It was about control of land. It was about control of military resources. So it was a legionary empire. It was economically exploitative through land and taxes and resources. It was an empire that benefited elites at the expense of non-elites. All the mapping of the Roman Empire suggests a huge percentage,

and we can argue about where to put it, but 70%, 80%, something like that, of folks in the empire lived in varying degrees of poverty in this world. Some on a seasonal basis, some permanently. No margin for error and no safety net. And this was a system that had divine sponsorship. As far as these stakeholders are concerned, the empire is sanctioned by the gods. Rome is chosen by the gods to be the agent of the gods in ruling, controlling, dominating the known world. One of the basic sort of texts of that understanding is Virgil's book, The Aeneid,

or the 12 books of The Aeneid. And in book one, we have Jupiter declaring that he has given to Rome empire without end. This is what he has given to Rome to exercise. So it's divinely sanctioned. And if you're smart and you want divine blessing, then of course you're going to Rome to exercise. So it's divinely sanctioned. And if you're smart and you want divine blessing, then of course you're going to submit to it. If you don't want to submit, then we just roll out the legions and take care of you that way. So it's this sort of dominating force. And one of the things that New Testament scholars have not taken seriously is that this empire is daily life. And so the New Testament texts, when there has been any attention to this question at all, has focused on these so-called

well-known chapters, you know, Romans 13, Revelation 13, 1 Peter, et cetera. And then the rest of the time have read the New Testament as though the empire doesn't exist. Okay. As though the empire has gone away. Well, it didn't go away. You know, Jesus is crucified by the empire.

The fact that there are so many healing stories in the gospels is a reflection of the damage that these imperial structures do to people's health. Empire should come with a warning. It's bad for your health because the resources are siphoned off by elites at the expense of non-elites. It's a very stressful world for non-elites. And we have some classical scholars working on stress in uh in the roman empire and the cost of it in terms of health and all these sorts of things can i real quick on that note because that's that's fascinating are you suggesting that when jesus heals people that

that is that has empire in not just the background but in the foreground like he's like that is that is making a statement against the structures of empire when he heals because most 99 of people listening probably have only read those stories as you know the the coming of the the dawn of the new age the spirit of god is now you know running around healing people can you expand on that a little bit because that's that's yeah yeah yeah um what i think is happening is that we have imperial claims that the empire has healed a sick world. is a repairing of the imperial damage that the imperial systems cause to people. You know, we know what poverty does to people in the 21st century. We know the ill effects of poverty in our own world. And it was no different in the first century, except it was larger in the first century. Structures that remove adequate resources from people,

that put people under stress, cause people to be sick. So when Jesus, first of all, I think that is an act of repairing this damage that the empire does. It's a way of rolling it back. It's a way of countering that damage. But secondly, I think it's also an act of anticipation. Matthew 11, for example, you know, when the followers of John the Baptist come to Jesus, and I think this is quite a witty scene, and they say to Jesus, you know,

our guy John thinks he's supposed to be preparing the way for somebody, and would it happen to be you? You know, and it's quite a witty scene. And instead of Jesus, Matthew's Jesus just saying, yeah, sure, you can go back and tell John it's me. He says, look around and see. And he quotes from Isaiah, the blind get to see, the deaf get to hear, the lame get to walk, the poor have good news brought to them. And what he's doing is quoting these passages from Isaiah that anticipate the establishment of God's good world, a world that's under God's rule, that's a world that is blessing for all people, that it's an eschatologically anticipatory vision that he's offering.

And we know from a bunch of eschatological visions from the ancient world that this world in which God's reign is established in all its fullness, there's abundance of good food. So we have visions of the big final feast. It's a world of good health. It's a world where the lion and the lamb can lie down together. It's a world of peace where the nations don't fight each other anymore. where the nations don't fight each other anymore. And part of that is restored somatic wholeness, that there are good bodies. I think it's Tu Baruch that talks about,

Tu Baruch is a text from late in the first century, a Jewish text, and it talks about the dew of health, as though in the morning when the dew descends, the dew affects good health amongst the folks. I don't think there are any premiums on that except for getting out of bed. I mean, that sounds ideal. So I think that Jesus' healings are anticipations of, and I'm using the Isaiah material, are anticipations of this eschatological completion,

are anticipations of this eschatological completion, the signs of the beginnings of this new age. And it's a new age where Rome's empire is destroyed. There's no room for Rome's empire in this establishment of God's purposes. So I think he's rolling back damage. So I think he's rolling back damage. And secondly, I think these are anticipatory signs that point towards this new age that, you know, someone has said that the worst thing that any tyrannical system can cannot tolerate is when somebody says it does not have to be this way. The world does not have to be this way. And I think in the healings, that's essentially what Jesus is doing. The world does not have to be this way. This is not God's intention for the world.

And this is an anticipation of a different sort of world. Would you say, I mean, connected to that, and this might be so obvious to you, but just to kind of connect the dots in a way that would be really clear, I think, for people listening, like anytime Jesus announces that just the word basilea, just the kingdom of God is coming, it is here, you know, all of that's political language. I mean, it's, yes, it's spiritual and religious, but those categories were just all wrapped into one. That would be a pretty dangerous thing to talk about the kingdom of God if you're not talking about the kingdom of Rome, some kind of other kingdom that's going to take over. Is

that right? Absolutely, that's right. And I think part of the big problem that we've had there is a translation problem. The Greek word basileia, I think, ought to be translated as empire, and there is really good linguistic basis for that. I don't like the translation of kingdom because kingdom is such an antiquated word for us, right? For me, it sort of zaps up castles and maidens in distress with the air coming down to the ground and, you know, squealing for rescue and some knight charging by on a big white stallion to come rescue the poor thing. And there's smoke breathing dragons. You know, that's what we think of as kingdoms, right? It's a fairy tale. And I don't think the action of God in the world is a fairy tale.

So I would much rather translate it as empire. And I know that folks have argued over this translation. But I like the translation of empire for a couple of reasons. is that, as you say, it forces us out of the spiritualized religious talk as though kingdom is something that's only in my heart somewhere or some other part of my anatomy. But it's the empire of God. And the divine purposes, according to the New Testament texts, are cosmic. You know, they're not just about my heart.

They're actually a little bigger than that. And stunning as it is, it's not just about me. You know, that's a shattering fact. So the empire of God is about the reign of God that is going to, that is in the process of being established and going to be completed. But also, which is all good news on a cosmic structure, but also that alerts us to the dynamic that New Testament texts are not just counter-Empire texts.

They're not just against the Empire, but they also co-opt the empire. They co-opt this whole imperial paradigm and attribute it to God. So the things of Caesar get attributed to God as kind of the new emperor, and the empire of God is going to be established. And I think that raises questions. I think that causes some hesitation. It certainly does for me. I understand that when you marinate an empire, as New Testament writers did, as the early Jesus folks did, of course, you're going to think in terms of empire. Of course, you're going to think in terms of empire,

and so you're going to replicate it. But our empire is bigger than your empire, and that's how it comes out. And our New Testament texts find it very hard to imagine any other structure other than one empire replacing another. Sure, I'd much rather have God in charge of the empire than the Roman emperor any day and any president any day. But empire still brings with it those connotations of domination and hierarchy and inequality. And our New Testament writers and places replicate that.

If you don't get with the program, if you don't join our empire, then our emperor, God, is going to slay you, which is a real loggerheads with other affirmations about how gracious and merciful and inclusive this God is. Visions of God that I would much rather go with than the dominating, patriarchal, punitive sort of God who replicates Roman ways. So there is some, you're saying there's some structural continuity between god's empire and the roman empire but it even that has some kind of internal tensions or subversion even within that this this god who is father patriarch you know does a lot of things that acts in ways that are very different

than what we expect that that kind of figure to you know before i yeah respond to that but um really quick what what is what can you define empire how's an empire different than just a government or a country like is every country an empire or what does it take to be an empire well again we're into disputed territory in terms of how we actually do the do the definition but for me i think there are a couple of things one is this fundamental system of domination. Okay. I think domination is at the heart of it.

It's a regime that wants to dominate its own people and dominate territory, dominate resources. So I think that're talking about widespread domination, especially that has a center that extends to various other territories and peripheries. Land is the famous phrases, a controlling of people's thinking and aspirations and loyalties, those sorts of things. So I think a powerful center that exerts its dominating power basically as far as it can get away with it, I guess, would be another way of saying that. So those would be a couple of dimensions. So clear. I mean, obviously, the roman empire is an empire that that's not in dispute but would you also consider like modern day america an empire i mean it sounds like oh yeah i mean and i've even heard some on this one oh uh i think it's only from political right-wing commentators they've positively spoken of america as an empire like unashamedly like

They've positively spoken of America as an empire, unashamedly. We are America gets to spread American values and structures and all those sorts of things across the world. That, of course, is seen as a good thing if you're one of, then you're being dominated, you're being subjugated, you're being forced into a particular system. Your resources are going to be, I'll use the economic term, raped. Your land is going to be taken. Your people are going to be indoctrinated. Your local customs, et cetera, et cetera, are going to be impacted. going to be impacted. So I do see the US as an empire or trying to be an empire. And I don't think that's a good thing for those sorts of reasons. And I think increasingly in our world, and I might be wrong on this, I've been wrong before. But I think lots of local folks fight back. Lots of countries fight back. And those in this country who think that the whole world is just waiting for and longing

for American control, I think delude themselves, actually. And I don't think it's quite as simple as that. And I say that as someone who comes from a colony, former colony of the British Empire. The Brits thought they were expanding their power all around the world on a God-given mission to create all good things, and they did terrible damage, terrible damage where they went. And I know in New Zealand, or Aotearoa as I prefer, there was terrible damage done to native folks and to settlers.

And there's been a long, long legacy of that in the country. And I don't think it was any different in the Roman Empire. You know, we do have folks who fight back. I've got a lot of modern application questions I want to get to. Let's go back to the New Testament. Perhaps you can – so there's one story that often comes up in this conversation, and people read this story very differently. Jesus

and taxation to Caesar. Render unto God what's God's, render unto Caesar what's Caesar's. And there's just very different ways of reading that story. Can you give us a reading, give us how you understand that passage on Jesus and taxation? Yeah.

I think taxation, of course, is one of the ways in which empires exercise control. They do it as a means of economic control because it's a way literally of removing production and resources from one part of the empire to the center. And we have to remember that in the ancient world, much taxation, not all because we do have a coin in that story, but much taxation was levied in goods in production. So if you're a small farmer, then you literally load a certain percentage of your crop onto wagons that take your crop away. That's your food supply going down the road. So taxation is a very visible, tangible sign of domination in an imperial structure. After the destruction of Jerusalem in 70, the Romans co-opted the temple tax the Romans co-opted the temple tax and redefined it as a tax on Jewish folks that was to be paid annually by Jewish males into a fund that was set aside

for the temple of Jupiter Capitalinus in Rome, the temple that happened to burn down and need rebuilding. Happened to. Oh, yeah. the temple that happened to burn down and need rebuilding happened to you so you know I mean that's a that's a salt in the wound insult to injury you know you're a destroyed captive defeated people now you have to pay the same tax but it's been redirected repurposedosed, and not to your destroyed temple, but to the temple of the sponsoring deity of the victor of the Roman power to Jupiter. So taxes are really loaded, right? something that you write a check for in February and think, well, I'm tossing my little bit into the big bucket. And if everybody tosses their bits into the bucket, then we're on roads or education or whatever. It doesn't work like that in the Roman Empire. This is a means of

subjugation. It's a means of oppression. It's a means of asserting power and control. So what I think is happening in that scene, you know, should we pay the tax or not? I think that's a real question. I don't think that's a set up question. I think it's a real question for Jewish folks. And I think it's a real question for Jesus folks as well, precisely because of those sorts of values. To pay the tax is to recognize the subjugations, to recognize the domination. So do we pay it or not? And I think the outcome of all of that, and people make much about, you know, who has the coin and Jesus doesn't have it, but the Pharisees do, and, you know, naughty, naughty, et cetera, et cetera. I think the outcome of it is that, yes, you do pay the tax.

And I think we have exactly the same thing in Matthew 17 with the coin in the fish's mouth, that strange little story. Yes, you are to pay the tax, but the paying of tax is redefined. It's given new significance. So you don't pay it as somebody who is defeated and subjugated, but you pay it as a recognition that the earth is the Lord's and the fullness thereof. So you render to Caesar what is Caesar's, you pay the tax.

But it's relativized because you render to God what is God's, which is a greater sovereignty, a sovereignty of the whole earth, which of course casts Rome's claims to exercise sovereignty over the earth as fake. They're false. They're delusional. They're wrong. It's not theirs to claim dominion over the territory. But what can you do if you're a small peasant farmer or you're a small tradesman, craftsman in a town in the empire?

How do you negotiate the situation? Well, you could revolt. You could try and take up arms. But one of the reasons that most peasant folks, artisan folks never do that is that they know what's going to happen. Most peasant folks, artisan folks never do that, is that they know what's going to happen. So it's a matter of survival. But by recognizing that you give to God what belongs to God, any claim that Rome makes is relativized. It's not absolute, even if it wants to claim it. And that's the same thing in the coin in the fish's mouth, you know, that God supplies the coin in the fish's mouth.

Yep, you go pay the tax, Peter, but you pay it with a coin that God has supplied as a way of saying Roman power is not absolute here. Rome does not have the final word. Rome is not the ultimate power, even if it wants to think it is. And so it's a strategy in the meantime. There's kind of a submissive subversiveness in what's going on. It's not, no, we're not going to, you know, if there's some zealots looking on, they might want Jesus to say, screw this coin, whatever, you know. And Jesus doesn't take that route, but it's not because he's pro-empire or even neutral empire. He is reacting in a way that is still quietly, confidently subverting the empire, at least the empire's ideology.

Yeah, so those things are coexisting, and I think that's really important. That's a really big recognition in imperial critical work or empire studies, that people don't negotiate empire just in one way, that there are multiple strategies and often multiple simultaneous strategies. There's a guy by the name of James Scott who's written a really important book, I think, called Domination and the Arts of Resistance. And Scott argues that, you know, often people think about negotiating empire or power, you know, you either take up arms and fight it, or you totally submit to it. And he says, no, no, no, no. That studies of all sorts of historical context show that there's a huge middle ground between violence and submission, where folks do, as you say, subversive things, but often covertly, often in ways that assert their own dignity and assert their own identity when everything of an imperial system is trying to tear that down. And I think his argument is so helpful for thinking about what New Testament texts are doing.

They're asserting this identity. what New Testament texts are doing. They're asserting this identity. They're defining an identity of allegiance to God and to Jesus in the midst of a system that is demanding their loyalty in other ways. Even if you appear to conform outwardly, you have an interior identity, you have some alternative practices that say, you know, I'm a follower of Jesus.

I'm not defined by the empire. I'm not going to get my head chopped off either. I'm not stupid. But I have a different allegiance and a different loyalty in the midst, and it is quite subversive. I would say the healing stories that we talked about earlier, I would say they were that kind. The feeding miracles, I would say that kind as well.

And the other biggie, I think, in the New Testament is the holy eschatological expectation, this expectation that one day Jesus will return and Jesus will establish God's kingdom in all God's empire and all its fullness. That Rome can claim to be the eternal empire as much as it likes. But we know otherwise. We have a different story. We have a different expectation.

And Rome is deluded, even though it doesn't know it. So it's relativized in that way. Hello, friends. Today, I want to tell you about our recent guest, Doug Smith, and his newest book, Unintentional, how screens secretly shape your desires and how you can break free. Look, I'm all about thinking deeply and loving widely, but many of us can't actually think and his newest book, Unintentional, How Screens Secretly Shape Your Desires and How You Can Break Free. Look, I'm all about thinking deeply and loving widely, but many of us can't actually think deeply because we're addicted to screens. And so that's why Doug Smith wrote Unintentional.

It's a tech-focused discipleship book, and it is absolutely incredible. With biblical wisdom from Greg Boyd and Oz Guinness and others, Doug helps you and your family overcome screen obsession. So check out the notes where you can find a link to purchase Doug's book, Unintentional. Oh, there's so many places we need to go. Why don't we jump to Romans 13 now? Because this text is often, and I think when I say Romans 13, people are familiar with it, but it's kind of the text that seems to be, I mean, some have take it at the very least, a very neutral stance on the

governing authorities, if not a positive view, like God has positively established Rome and other governments and empires to do good in society, and even says, you know, to reward those who do good, to punish those who do bad. The phrase servant of God is often taken as like, and he even says, you know, to reward those who do good, to punish those who do bad. The phrase servant of God is often taken as like, yeah, this is, you know, we should be pro, in a sense, government. And people often, one's historical situatedness often determines whether they use that phrase or not. In America, it's usually depending on who's in office. Well, no, I mean, that's unfair. I think people in America would say that regardless. They might just kind of grit their teeth depending on who's in office. Well, no, that's unfair. I think people in America would say that regardless, they might just kind of grit their teeth depending on who's in office. But yeah, how do you understand Romans 13 and this command to submit to governing

authorities? I think this is a really difficult text for anybody to get their heads around, because I think there are a whole bunch of things happening here. You know, I'd want to back up a little bit and just sort of make the point that, you know, people go to Romans 13 because they think it explicitly says something about ruling power, as though this is one of the few places in the New Testament where that becomes obvious. And I would want to just go back to what I've just been saying. I think engaging ruling power is something that the texts do all the way along. And Romans 13 is just another part of that rather than an exception to it. But I think you're right. Whenever I talk about this stuff in church groups or in classes, somebody always goes to Romans 13 and says, hey, but we're supposed to obey the governing powers

and that's all there is to it. Well, I don't think it's that simple. And I think there are some mixed messages in Romans 13. Whatever folks might want to say about the beloved apostle Paul, he's not stupid. That's one of the things we know. Paul is not silly. He's a bright person. He can see things. And so some folks have argued that when he talks about this stuff, about being subject to the governing authorities who always reward good behavior, they're instituted and appointed by God and all the rest of it, that he's doing one of two things, either flattery about the empire or what I prefer to think it's irony about the empire that when he says these things about you know governing authorities are instituted and appointed by god and the god servants all these sorts of things i think he's sort of he's he's saying you know this is true

for just rule rule that is just and fair and life-giving, but nudge, nudge, wink, wink, we know that's not what we've got here in this current setup. So some have suggested that it's kind of an idealistic, ironic beginning to that passage. And it's only then when we get to verses six and seven, do we get anything concrete, which is about paying the taxes. And again, yes, you pay the taxes because that's what you're supposed to do. But paying the taxes is not a sign of compliance. It's not a sign of loyalty to Rome. It's not a sign that Roman power is forever. And I say that because we have to put Romans 13 into context of the letter. You know, he starts off in Romans chapter 1

by talking about how hostile toward God and how corrupt the Gentile world is and that it's subject to divine wrath. Well, the Gentile world happens to be, among other things, the world of the Roman Empire. In Chapter 12, which, you know, deep statement, comes right before Chapter 13, he declares that they're not to be conformed to this world.

And this world is the world of Rome's power. Rather, that is to discern the will of God, that to present their bodies as a living sacrifice to God. So at the beginning of chapter 12, and some folks would see that's a major turning point in the letter, 12, 13, 14, 15, he begins by asserting loyalties and the central loyalty for his readers and hearers in these churches in Rome, in the center of the empire, is that their loyalty is to God. They are not to be conformed to this world. At the end of chapter 12, he talks about God punishing evil and evildoers, which comes right before this passage in Romans 13. And right after this passage in Romans 13, in the last part of chapter 13, he offers up this eschatological perspective again, that the empire is going to be destroyed,

that the empire is going to be destroyed, that God's purposes are going to prevail. So all that material around 13.1-7 in chapters 12 and the second half of chapter 13, I think puts 13.1-7 in perspective. And anyone who wants to claim this is sort of the absolute and final statement that Paul offers, that yes, you must submit to the ruling powers without question. I think that's far too simplistic, and I think it misses the larger implications of what he's saying in the rest of that section. There's no absolute compliance. And it's often taken as, when people describe Romans 13, it often sounds like almost like a God and country text, meaning like, no, I love God, I follow God. And over here, I also give my allegiance to my country and follow my country or whatever, because Romans 13, God's in control and he established these authorities for good.

And so I give my allegiance to the authority. And it's kind of this God and country theme. give my allegiance to the authority. And it's kind of this God and country theme, but you're saying, I hear you saying, please, I don't want to put words in your mouth, but like, just the fact that Paul so emphasizes God's authority over Roman authority, Romans 13, like that is actually more of a co-opting subversive statement because any Roman person listening on to that would be terribly offended at um the christian god embodied in this you know jew who committed treason was crucified to say that that person is actually in authority over rome would have been terribly offensive i mean it's not not a subversive but in in a submissive

way because he's again he's blending it with no we're gonna obey rome we're not gonna violently revolt um but we know why we have a higher reason why we're going to obey Rome. We're not going to violently revolt. But we know why. We have a higher reason why we're doing that. Yeah. One of the things that Scott talks about in his book, Domination and the Arts of Resistance, is that dominated folks resort to ambiguity. And ambiguity becomes a survival strategy. So, you know, you give to Caesar, but you give to God. And we all know who is, we all, Jesus followers, know who is the higher power there, right? And I think there's a fair bit of that happening in Romans 13.

Yeah, we've got these platitudes about government that get trotted out at the beginning, plus you pay your taxes. But it's all in the context of don't be conformed to this world. And it is coming after this world to hold it to account, this is the end of Romans 13, to hold it to account and to destroy those who have not played the game, the divine game. I think of sandwiches for some reason. I mean, it's sandwiched between these very strong assertions of supreme loyalty to God. So, yeah, you can take parts of Romans 13 and say, yeah, see, we do what we're supposed to do. We pay our taxes.

But it's not simple like that. It's relativized. It's subverted in a way that's a little more tricky. Let's, since we're on chapter 13, yeah, can we go over to Revelation 13? I mean, this is a book we've done work in. And this is often when people describe it in various ways, as a tension, a contradiction, whatever. But Romans 13 seems to be this kind of positive portrait of government authorities, where Revelation 13 pretty – I mean, explicitly might be too strong. But I don't know.

From my reading, it seems to be explicitly saying that the government authorities are empowered by Satan. You have the dragon giving power to the beast. And if you read the context of the letter, we know that the beast is Rome and Rome-like empires and the devil is, or the dragon is clearly Satan and it's demonic powers. So it seems to be very different portraits. Can you help us unpack what's going on there? No, I think you're absolutely right. And I think it points to the fact that we don't have one

single way of engaging empire in the New Testament. We have a number of strategies by which the writings hold out for Jesus' followers to live in this imperial world. And so Revelation 13, I think, is one of the most drastic statements about the Roman Empire. And as you say, the claim of Revelation 13, I think, is that the Roman Empire is in the hands of the devil. 13, I think, is that the Roman Empire is in the hands of the devil. Now, that claim is also made actually in both Matthew and Luke in the temptation story in both of those gospels. You'll remember the devil says to Jesus, if you'll bow down and worship me, I will give to you all the empires of the world. That is, the devil has all the

empires of the world in the devil's control and will hand them over to Jesus. This is a common notion in the ancient world that ruling powers, powers in the heavens and the cosmos exert control over human affairs. Of course, we have it in the Hebrew Bible tradition of angelic powers. You know, Michael, for example, is the patron angel of Israel. But we have it all through Roman stuff as well, that the gods sanction Roman power. You know, Victoria or the goddess Nike, before she was a sports apparel company, goddess Nike ensured victory for Roman military forces.

So this is not an uncommon idea, but here in Revelation 13, the devil is said to be in control of the Roman Empire. And this is all part of what I think is Revelation's basic argument, that in chapter 18, as Rome is judged and collapses, the call is to Jesus' folks to come out from her. Come out, my people. And, of course, that notion of coming out is consistent with the metaphor of fornication that's been introduced in the seven letters in chapters 2 and 3, that Rome is this great prostitute presented in chapter 17. prostitute, presented in chapter 17. And involvement with the empire is fornication,

because it is an idolatrous power, and Jesus' folks are to have nothing to do with the empire. What's interesting in Revelation is that that argument is made in the seven letters in chapters two and three of the document. And by the time we get to the end of chapter three, where John, whoever John is, keeps saying, I have this against you, and wants them to retreat from involvement in the empire, the argument's been made by the end of chapter 3 so what happens after that from chapters 4 to 22 and I think what happens is that the writer sets out arguments perspectives on the Roman Empire that show readers this is why you shouldn't be involved with the Empire so in chapters four and five,

there's a vision of heavenly worship. This is the true worship. You can't be involved with idols. It must be true worship, like chapters four and five or chapters six, seven, and eight. The empire is imploding. It's already under judgment. It's already falling apart under its military, the four horsemen of the apocalypse in chapter six. It's already falling apart under its military, the four horsemen of the apocalypse in chapter six. It's already falling apart with military violence and economic exploitation and all these sorts of things. And in chapters 12, 13 and 14, you can't be involved with the empire because it's under the power of the devil. You can't make that sort of alliance. Then in chapters 15 to 18, God is judging it and it is coming apart. So this is, I think, the most kind of consistently devastating attack on the Roman Empire. things. One, the document is full of passion, but there's no program. The writer wants them to come out. To where? Where are they going to go? Where are they going to escape from empire? Even if they

all go to Patmos, it's still part of the empire. What are they supposed to do? And if you're a poor trades worker or tradesman, craftsman, how are you going to live? If you're a poor small farmer, how are you going to live? Because land is controlled in the empire. So in the end, I think it's full of passion, but there's no program. And the second thing that I think is so clear in Revelation, as much as Revelation hates empire, and I think that's an appropriate verb, as much as it just disdains this Roman imperial system,

it borrows it and ascribes it to God. Because in the last chapters of Revelation, we have these visions of the establishment of God's empire. So as much as it's resisting empire, it's also imitating and co-opting empire with its vision of God's world. I was going to ask, I love the unified reading of that. So it's not just a passage here and there. It's not just Romans 12 and then 17 and 18. This is actually a thread woven throughout. Yeah, when you said come out of her, that command in chapter 18, I was going to ask, I think you might have answered it. I was like, well, what was John expecting them to do? And you're saying he doesn't have any clear expectation. I mean, I'm thinking, I always think of like modern day applications, because you could go the Amish route who have come out of empire

pretty much as much as they can. I, you know, that would be maybe one approach. Another might be just maintaining that quiet, confident subversion, even in things like economic justice, where do you buy your food from, your products, not doing our best to not participate in this really unjust economic system that we find ourselves just entangled in, right? We can maybe slide now to some modern applications starting here. Like what would you, in your opinion, it doesn't need to be, you know, inspired, but what would it look like for Christians to read, come out of her and put that into some kind of practice today? Yeah. Well, I think you're right. I mean, I don't think we know from Revelation what the writer has in mind, except for some sort of retreat. But there is no program there except to somehow be taken up into the new empire. But there's no pragmatism in the meantime. And I think that's where we have to, as 21st century followers of Jesus, that's where we have to look. And I think what you're starting to say there about understanding an economic system of capitalism that is so exploitative, that so benefits a few and so

damages the rest, is one really good discussion that we have to have. I don't think that's any different from a first century context. Whenever I talk about this stuff in church groups, you know, I get about three minutes into it and somebody inevitably blurts out, oh, that's just like our world. And it's true. I mean, so I think there are a whole bunch of things that we can take seriously as followers of Jesus, because one of the other strategies that we have in the Gospels is precisely this commitment to transformative actions and transformative justice. So when Jesus begins his public ministry in Luke's Gospel, he reads from Isaiah 61, the Spirit of the Lord is upon me and has anointed me to bring good news to the poor

and release to the captives and sight to the blind. I mean, these are all actions that roll back imperial damage. Likewise, at the end of Matthew's gospel, where we have this eschatological vision, the son of man, the Daniel figure has returned to judge the nations. And there's only one question on the test at the end, you know, how have you treated the vulnerable and the disadvantaged among you? You know, when you saw somebody hungry, what did you do? When you saw somebody without clothing, what did you do? When you saw someone without housing, what did you do, right? And so I think that there's a real kind of call for these sort of transformative actions in the midst of this are left with the damage that empire does. about doing what we can to those conditions,

to repair that damage. And I think that's sort of a mixture of survival. It's a mixture of subversion. It's a mixture of hope and anticipation eschatologically. And it's a refusal to take the current status quo as being the final and most desirable word. It isn't. And to work accordingly.

Do you see, I mean, you hinted at it before, comparing Rome with America, and here we're going to wander into complicated territories. I'm reminded of the – is it the apotheosis? How do you say that? Apotheosis. Apotheosis of George Washington in the Rotundra in the Capitol Building where you have this – I mean, I'm looking at that when I was there, and then I've read I've read about it since and it's like, wow, this is not even quiet.

Like this is replicating the Roman narrative 110%. Like, so that would be an example of like, no, no, America very much prided itself on seeing itself as a new Roman empire. Roman Empire. And yet others would say, you know, you cited a statistic, 70 to 80% of people under the Roman Empire were living in grinding poverty, or at least some level of poverty, where today, there's certainly poverty, but it's not 80 to 70, 80%. We do have a democracy, sort of, we can maybe talk about that, capitalism, and so on. Like, there's some things that seem to be very clear parallels, other things that aren't so parallel. How would you, I guess, respond to the question?

I mean, this could be a whole nother hour discussion, but is America just like Rome, kind of like Rome, not really like Rome? And should we use these texts that talk about the Roman Empire and map them onto modern day America? Yeah, I think those options I would go kind of like because we do have significant differences, and there's no doubt about that. Some folks have argued that contemporary empires are actually not nation states but are multinationals, that multinationals are a more accurate and more consistent similarity with some of what we see from Rome. Yeah, maybe, but I don't want to say all multinationals are big, bad and horrible either. And certainly they also do very good things, just as our government does very good things. So I don't

want to sort of just take it totally as one thing or the other and set up a binary that I think is unhelpful. But I think what all of this does is alert us to some very important questions. You know, how is power being used in our world? What sort of society is being created? And that's back to the question of societal vision. You know, do we want a world that is dominated by a small percentage of elites who pursue their agenda and the rest of us all come running or we pay for the price of it. We are damaged by it. You know, what sort of societal vision is at work? What sort of practices are at work?

What sort of structures are at work? Who are the personnel? Who's doing the stuff? Those, I think, are the really, really big questions where there is an enormous similarity. So, you know, it's not just a matter of this or that building or, you know, how much territory somebody has or whatever. Although those, of course, are in the mix somewhere. But I think the questions are more fundamental than that about the use of power. What sort of world do we want?

are more fundamental than that about the use of power. What sort of world do we want? Do we want a world where in this country, 20 to 25% of kids are food insecure? That's a horrendous statistic in our society. I mean, that's an absolute abomination, surely. We can't feed ourselves in our society. I think that's completely and utterly and totally unacceptable because there are certainly many of us who are overstuffed. And I'm not doing that to shame, folks. I'm simply saying that we've got this massive disconnect in our society, and that's just around food, housing. That's another one. So these sorts of things. What sort of world do we want? What sort of society do we want? How is our power and our wealth being used?

Who's benefiting? Who's getting hurt? I think those are the big questions that sort of run parallel and I think help us read both the scriptures and read our own world. Warren, that's a great word to end on. Thank you so much for giving us your time. And I would really encourage people to check out your mini books. Is there one or two you'd recommend Abingdon Press, and you can find them easily on one of those big, big, big multinationals called Amazon. One's called The Roman Empire and the New Testament, an Essential Guide. Roman Empire and the New Testament, an Essential Guide.

That's one. And that sort of does a general discussion of these sorts of things that we've been talking about across the New Testament. Secondly, if you want to dig into Revelation, and I know a number of church groups have used this book, I've written a book called What Does Revelation Reveal? What Does Revelation Reveal? And it's set up with six or seven chapters or so, and there are study guide questions. And I know groups have worked their way through it, you know, reading a chapter a week and all that sort of stuff. So those would be two that would be most accessible.

If you want to get into the heavier stuff, I've written a commentary called Matthew on the Margins. I've written a commentary on Mark, stuff. I've written a commentary called Matthew on the Margins. I've written a commentary on Mark. And that would help with a sort of a passage-by-passage reading of those particular texts. Cool. Well, thank you so much, Warren. I appreciate you and many blessings on your work in ministry. Thanks, Preston. And likewise, pleasure to talk with you and to visit with you. Thanks

much. This show is part of the Converge Podcast Network.