It was really hard to get into this book. Even with my bible beside me, attempting to reference some of the topics, it just was not happening for me. Maybe because it is more of an academic book. Not that I am not an educated person, but because of the jargon.

Know your audience. Who was this title written for?

Very scholarly, not helpful for me in studying the book of Romans in order to teach a Bible study.

This book continues an ancient practice of using relevant nonscriptural texts along with the letter of Paul to the Romans.
The author's hope is that this technique will help us to understand Paul better.
This is an excerpt from the book that shows how the author used different sources to explain a passage from Romans more thoroughly.

"Wisdom 13:1–9 Romans 1:19–20 The wasted opportunity to know the true God manifests itself in false religion.
Wisdom 13:10–14:11, 15–21 (and 15:7–13) Romans 1:21–23 The turn to idols occasions a corresponding decline into immorality. Wisdom 14:12–14, 22–29 Romans 1:24–31 A fitting divine judgment awaits those guilty of idolatry and immorality. Wisdom 14:30–31 Romans 1:32
These connections ensure that Jewish readers of Romans —that is, readers in the tradition of Wisdom of Solomon —would find themselves sympathetic to Paul’s announcement that those who “served created things rather than the Creator”(Rom 1:25) and were therefore given over to immorality (1:24, 26 –31) “deserve death”(1:32).

Romans 2:1 –5 seems to suppose and exploit this sympathy. Israel’s Inclusion among Sinful Humanity. Romans 2:1 addresses a dialogue partner whom Paul characterizes as both judging the sinful people depicted in 1:19 –32 and participating in the idolatry and immorality cataloged there.
Because “you who pass judgment”also “do the same things,” his condemnation of the other is necessarily a condemnation of the judge himself (2:1, 3). The judge, however, appears to presume that he “will escape God’s judgment”(2:3), and this because God is patient and kind —an echo of Exod 34 that echoes Wisdom’s appeal to LXX Exod 34:9 (Rom 2:4; cf. WisOnly 15:1).

As mentioned above, however, Wisdom decontextualizes divine mercy, borrowing words from the aftermath of the golden calf incident to insist on Israel’s innocence in relation to idolatry. But Paul is quick to remind his conversation partner of an element of Wisdom’s theology: God “overlooks human sin for the sake of repentance”(Wis 11:23; cf. Rom 2:4). Like Exod 34, Paul locates mercy in the matrix of idolatry and immorality. Whereas Wisdom 13 –15 excludes Israel from the otherwise universal history of false religion and ethical decline, Paul’s reminder that “you who pass judgment” also “do the same things”(Rom 2:1, 3)


This is an excellent resource for laymen who want to thoroughly understand the meanings of the book of Romans and comparative texts.
The author is very thorough in his research of ancient texts and in his understanding of the events and persons mentioned in the book of Romans.

Scholars interested in this topic will find this book enlightening, although it is a bit dry for the layperson. Thankfully, the chapters are relatively short, making it easier to pace yourself through all of the information.

This book is a must have if you are at all interested in studying the book of Romans. Much like St. Paul's letter to the Romans, this book must be read slowly and savored. There is so much information in this title. Purchase it for your library, Bible study group, or for yourself. You'll be glad you did!

This book isn't for everyone. It isn't even for all Christians.

You must start with an idea: the books outside the established Biblical canon have value. This is important because the entire context presented for Romans to be bathed in is made of these books. The Apocrypha, Philo of Alexandria, and others are presented not only as a comparative and contrasting study, but as a setting for how Paul's world may have actually looked.

It is important to note that the assertion is not firmly made that Paul read these books (many of them were contemporary with him), but that they set a worldview for the Jewish world of the day. Having accepted this, having laid aside the belief held by many fundamentalists that these books should be excluded from reading by the truly faithful, I found tremendous value in this book.

It is written as a series of essays by different authors, some of whom overlap their ideas. The book moves progressively through the book of Romans, finding along the way extracanonical texts to shed alternate perspectives on the subject matter. The value in this is taking familiar scripture and reframing it; by seeing what other people in and around Paul's time were writing in comparison, we get a much fuller picture of the truly revolutionary nature of Paul's ideas.

This is not casual reading. I will say, however, that I came into the text with almost no familiarity with the Apocrypha, Philo, and other texts, and I did not find it offputting. I read some with the flow of the text, some I read only in this book itself, and I found the exposition to be exceptional either way.

You could easily use this for an introduction to the Apocrypha and the other texts. It sheds great light on the enduring purposes of these books, excluded from the Bible for many: a more rich understanding of Paul's being misunderstood and even defied, situated as he was among people looking for a different kind of Messiah that Paul presented. In Philo, we get a different kind of Greek: a man making a genuine, even grueling effort to rectify philosophy and the nature of God.

Not very well formatted honestly, I had a heck of a time reading this . there were many parts I struggled with within this book, and just overall not well played out.