Reading Romans in Pompeii

Peter Oakes relies on demographic information and data from excavations in nearby Pompeii to paint a compelling portrait of daily life in a typical insula, or apartment complex, like the ones in which Pauls audience in Rome likely lived. Imaginatively fleshing out profiles of the circumstances of actual residents of Pompeii, Oakes then uses these profiles to invite the reader into a new way to hear Pauls letter to the Romans as the apostles contemporaries might have heard it.