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‘Peace and Security’ (1 Thess 5.3): Prophetic Warning or Political Propaganda?

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  08 June 2012

Jeffrey A. D. Weima
Jeffrey A. D. Weima
Affiliation:
Calvin Theological Seminary, 3233 Burton St. S.E., Grand Rapids, MI 49546, USA. email: weimje@calvinseminary.edu
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Abstract

The phrase ‘Peace and security’ in 1 Thess 5.3 has traditionally been understood as an echo of the OT prophetic warnings (Jer 6.14; Ezek 13.10; Mic 3.5) against false claims of peace. Stronger evidence exists, however, that the apostle is making use of a popular theme of the imperial Roman propaganda machine. The Romans vigorously promoted themselves through various public media as those who provided not only ‘peace’ but also ‘security’, thereby providing a closer parallel to Paul's statement in 5.3 than any OT text. This essay reviews four kinds of evidence—numismatic, monumental, inscriptional and literary—in order to demonstrate in a decisive fashion that the phrase ‘peace and security’ involves an allusion not to prophetic warning but to Roman political propaganda.

Keywords

1 Thessalonians1 Thessalonians 5.3ThessalonicaPax Romanapeacesecuritypolitical propaganda.
Type
Articles
Information
New Testament Studies , Volume 58 , Issue 3 , July 2012 , pp. 331 - 359
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2012

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References

1 Two additional factors indicate that this brief phrase stems not from Paul himself but from some other source: first, the word ϵἰρήνη which, elsewhere in the apostle's writings always has a religious meaning, has here a secular sense such that it is paralleled with the word ἀσϕάλϵια; second, the word ἀσϕάλϵια occurs nowhere else in the apostle's writings.

2 Fee, G. D., The First and Second Letters to the Thessalonians (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2009) 189Google Scholar.

3 This portrayal of Roman rule as one characterized by peace and security did not originate de novo with the Roman leaders themselves but is a development of political propaganda already present in the Hellenistic period and used by these earlier kings to idealize and justify their rule. The specific benefits of peace and security occur with some frequency in honorary inscriptions to Seleucid and Ptolemaic rulers: e.g., ϵἰρήνη: OGIS I 56.12; ἀσϕάλϵια: OGIS I 90.21 (I thank both Lukas Bormann [Universität Erlangen] and Young R. Kim [Calvin College], each of whom independently made this point in email correspondence).

4 Wengst, K., Pax Romana and the Peace of Jesus Christ (Philadelphia: Fortress, 1987) 204Google Scholar n. 42.

5 So, e.g., Donfried, K., ‘The Cults of Thessalonica and the Thessalonian Correspondence’, NTS 31 (1984–85) 344Google Scholar, 355 n. 55: ‘a frontal attack on the Pax et Securitas program of the early Principate’; Koester, H., ‘Imperial Ideology and Paul's Eschatology in 1 Thessalonians’, Paul and Empire (ed. Horsley, R. A; Harrisburg: Trinity, 1997) 161–2Google Scholar; Holmes, M. W., 1 and 2 Thessalonians (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1998) 167Google Scholar; Gaventa, B. R., First and Second Thessalonians (Louisville: John Knox, 1998) 70Google Scholar; Green, G. L., The Letters to the Thessalonians (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2002) 233–4Google Scholar; Oakes, P., ‘Re-Mapping the Universe: Paul and the Emperor in 1 Thessalonians and Philippians’, JSNT 27 (2005) 317–18Google Scholar; Witherington, B. III, 1 and 2 Thessalonians (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2006) 146–7Google Scholar. The earliest proposal that 1 Thess 5.3 alludes to Roman propaganda about peace and security is that of Bammel, E., ‘Ein Beitrag zur paulinischen Staatsanschauung’, ThLZ 85 (1960) 837–40Google Scholar. His suggestion was later picked up by Wengst, Pax Romana, esp. 77–9. Other proponents include Hendrix, H. (‘Archeology and Eschatology at Thessalonica’, The Future of Early Christians: Essays in Honor of Helmut Koester [ed. Pearson, B. A.; Minneapolis: Fortress, 1991] 107–18)Google Scholar, though he spends only a little over two pages justifying the claim (112–14). The Roman background of 5.3 has been defended more extensively by vom Brocke, C., Thessaloniki—Stadt des Kassander und Gemeinde des Paulus (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2001) 167–85Google Scholar. Vom Brocke advances the argument by dealing with a few ancient sources not cited in previous discussions (e.g., the Pompey statue and inscription from Ilium). Yet he does not survey in a more comprehensive manner, as we do in this essay, the totality of the numismatic, monumental, inscriptional and literary evidence which cumulatively demonstrates in a decisive manner how widespread were the themes of both peace and security in the first century CE.

6 Von Wahlde, U. C., Letter, BAR 36 (2010) 10Google Scholar.

7 Grant, M., Roman History from Coins (Cambridge: Cambridge University, 1958) 12Google Scholar.

8 Wengst, Pax Romana, 11.

9 All the images of coins in this article (except for Fig. 13) are used by permission from the Classical Numismatic Group, Inc. (www.cngcoins.com).

10 BMCRE 605; RIC 252. Sutherland, C. H. V., Roman Coins (New York: Putman's Sons, 1974) 119Google Scholar (nos. 208 and 209).

11 BMCRE 612. Sutherland, Roman Coins, 119 (nos. 210 and 211).

12 These two coins were part of a set of six, divided into two series of three pairs. In the one set of three, a portrait head of Octavian is on the obverse and a full-length image of the goddesses Pax (Peace), Venus and Victoria (Victory) on the reverse. In the other set of three, the images are reversed: a portrait head of the goddesses Pax, Venus and Victory is on the obverse and a full-length figure of Octavian is on the reverse. For the image of the series, see Zanker, Paul, The Power of Images in the Age of Augustus (Ann Arbor: University of Michigan, 1988) 54–55Google Scholar, Figs. 41 and 42.

13 Sutherland, Roman Coins, 119.

14 Zanker, Power of Images, 54.

15 BMCRE 691–3. Sutherland, Roman Coins, 125 (nos. 226 and 227)

16 BMCRE 124, 125, 126, 127. Mattingly, H. and Sydenham, E. A., The Roman Imperial Coinage, vol. 1 (London: Spink & Son, 1923)Google Scholar: ‘We shall probably be right in identifying the type as a figure of Pax’ (1.99). Grant, M. (Roman Imperial Money [London: Thomas Nelson, 1954] 134)Google Scholar states of this coin image: ‘But the olive-branch certainly symbolizes Peace, the unequalled Pax Romana which, established by Augustus, Tiberius did a vast amount, by unending labour, to stabilize’. The female figure on these coins was likely identified in Roman times additionally with Livia, the wife of Augustus and mother of Tiberius. Although Tiberius, especially in the latter part of his reign, was reticent about granting honors to his ambitious mother, ‘others were always ready to propose them and he could not always refuse’ (Mattingly and Sydenham, Roman Imperial Coinage, 99).

17 BMCEmp. I, Claudius, nos. 3, 16–19; RIC I, Claudius, nos. 19–20. See the discussion of this coin issue by C.H.V. Sutherland, Coinage in Roman Imperial Policy (London: Methuen, 1951), 127–28, plate XII.4.

18 Sutherland, Coinage in Roman Imperial Policy, 127. Sutherland also states: ‘But the topical framework within which these ideas were combined adds an even greater interest since, as has been recently demonstrated, this complex coin type was first issued in a year which marked the third centenary of the temple of Janus (so intimately associated with Pax), the bicentenary of the earliest known ceremony of the augurium Salutis, and the half-centenary of Augustus' cult-association of Pax, Salus and Janus’ (127).

19 BMCRE 321.

20 BMCRE 360, 363, 364; RIC I2 531. Mattingly and Sydenham, Roman Imperial Coinage, 139, 143. Note also the comment of Grant, Roman History from Coins: ‘certain coins, with their usual topical but backward-looking tact, display an Altar of Peace (ARA PACIS) imitated from, if not identical with, Augustus' famous altar of the same name at Rome’ (34).

21 This monumental triumphal arch was erected by Nero to commemorate Roman military campaigns against the Parthians in Mesopotamia and Armenia. Although not very successful in a military sense, the war did end with a peace treaty favorable to Rome that was upheld for nearly fifty years. The arch was later dismantled after Nero's ignominious end in 68 CE and is only known through its depiction on this series of coins.

22 Kent, John P. C., Overbeck, Bernhard and Stylow, Armin U., Die Römische Münze (Munich: Hirmer, 1973)Google Scholar Table 52, no. 206 (right). Same image on other coins: BMC 183, 184, 187, 188, 329, 333 (RIC I 143, 144, 147, 148, 432, 433, 500). Twelve coins with this image are listed in Mattingly and Sydenham, Roman Imperial Coinage, 155 (nos. 147–58).

23 Mattingly and Sydenham (Roman Imperial Coinage) list some 45 coins with this image (156–8, nos. 159–204). See also Sutherland, Roman Coins, 168 (no. 309).

24 There are two inscriptions seen on Nero's Temple of Janus coins: PACE P(opuli) R(omani) VBIQ PARTA IANVM CLVSIT and PACE P(opuli) R(omani) TERRA MARIQVE PARTA IANVM CLVSIT.

25 Several separate series of coins, although struck under varying circumstances, have in common the fact that none bear the emperor's portrait or legend but are closely connected with Galba. Some have the goddess Pax standing with a caduceus in one hand and corn-ears and poppies in the other with the inscription identifying her simply as PAX or more fully as PAX P R— ‘peace of the people of Rome’ (Mattingly and Sydenham, Roman Imperial Coinage, 190, nos. 3 and 4; the obverse of these coins have DIVVS AVGSTVS). A larger number have the image of clasped hands holding a winged caduceus between either two crossed cornucopiae or two ears of corn along with the inscription PAX or PAX P R (Mattingly and Sydenham, Roman Imperial Coinage, 182 (nos. 11–16), 185 (no. 19), 189 (no. 13). Many coins have been found with the laureate head of Galba on the obverse and the goddess Pax in a variety of traditional poses and the inscription PAX AVGVSTVS (Mattingly and Sydenham, Roman Imperial Coinage, 203 (nos. 36–37), 205–6 (nos. 61–66), 216 (no. 163). See also the coin series issued by Otho with Pax on the reverse with the inscription PAX ORBIS TERRARVM (‘Peace throughout the World’) (Grant, Roman History from Coins, 69, Plate 26, 1).

26 Mattingly and Sydenham, Roman Imperial Coinage, 179 (emphasis added).

27 BMCRE I, 152, no. 36; RIC I2, 110, no. 33. The three sisters are personified as Securitas, Concordia and Fortuna respectively (so, e.g., Sutherland, Coinage in Roman Imperial Policy, 113; Grant, Roman Imperial Money, 141).

28 Sutherland, Coinage in Roman Imperial Policy, 114. Drusilla died in 38 CE shortly after the coins were first minted and both Agrippina and Julia were exiled in 39 CE, so that no ‘three sisters’ coins appeared after this time.

29 So Barrett, A. A., Agrippina: Sex, Power and Politics in the Early Roman Empire (New Haven: Yale University, 1996) 61Google Scholar (I owe this reference to J. Gabrielson, ‘Paul's Non-violent Gospel: The Theological Politics of Peace in Paul's Life and Letters’ [Ph.D. diss., University of St. Andrews, 2011] 187 n. 55).

30 BMCEmp. I, pl. 44; RIC I, Nero, nos. 284–5. Sutherland, Coinage in Roman Imperial Policy, 169, plate XVI, 5.

31 See, e.g., RIC I2, 268, no. 12; Kent, Overbeck and Stylow, Römische Münze, nos. 216–17; Sutherland, Coinage in Roman Imperial Policy, 119–20.

32 SEG XLVI 1565. Winter, E., ‘Stadt und Herrschaft in spätrepublikanischer Zeit: Eine neue Pompeius-Inschrift aus Ilion’, Die Troas. Neue Forschungen zu Neandria und Alexandria Troas, vol. 2 (ed. Schwertheim, E. and Wiegartz, H.; Bonn: R. Habelt, 1996) 175–94Google Scholar.

33 For an extensive discussion of the victory monument, see Murray, W. M. and Petsas, P. M., Octavian's Campsite Memorial for the Actian War (Transactions of the American Philosophical Society 79, Part 4; Philadelphia: American Philosophical Society, 1989)Google Scholar. For a much briefer discussion, see Murray, W. M. and Petsas, P. M., ‘The Spoils of Actium’, Archaeology 41 (1988) 29–35Google Scholar.

34 This is the restored translation proposed by Murray and Petsas, Octavian's Campsite Memorial, 86.

35 Murray and Petsas, Octavian's Campsite Memorial, 138.

36 Translation of the Res Gestae here and elsewhere in this paper is from Cooley, Alison E., Res Gestae Divi Augusti. Text, Translation, and Commentary (Cambridge: Cambridge University, 2009)Google Scholar.

37 Budde, L., Ara Pacis Augustae: der Friedensaltar des Augustus (Hanover: Tauros-Presse, 1957)Google Scholar 6 (translation mine: ‘Auch das Marsfeld sollte nun davon zeugen, dass die Kriegszeiten beendet seien, dass die Herrschaft der Göttin Pax, das goldene Zeitalter des Friedens, in dem Kriege und Nöte allein ihren Sinn finden, angebrochen sei’). Cooley (Res Gestae, 156): ‘Its location at the point where military power was put aside suited its dedication to Peace’.

38 Galinsky, Karl (Augustan Culture: An Interpretive Introduction [Princeton: Princeton University, 1996] 106)Google Scholar: ‘There is no question that of all the relief panels of the Ara Pacis Augustae, this is the one most emblematic of peace and tranquility’.

39 Zanker, Power of Images, 175; Cooley, Res Gestae, 155.

40 See n. 20 for further information about this coin series.

41 Zanker, Power of Images, 314–15, fig. 246. See also Casriota, David, ‘The Ara Pacis Augustae and the Imagery of Abundance’, Later Greek and Early Roman Imperial Art (Princeton: Princeton University, 1995) 55Google Scholar, fig. 70. The relief is currently located in the Louvre, Paris.

42 CIL 14, 2898–2899; ILS 3787–3788. Zevi, F., ‘Proposta per un'interpretazione dei rilievi Grimani’, Prospettiva 7 (1976) 38–41Google Scholar.

43 Crossan, John Dominic and Reed, Jonathan L. (In Search of Paul [San Francisco: Harper, 2004] 166)Google Scholar wrongly present the two inscriptions as being located on both sides of a single altar.

44 Zanker, Power of Images, 307.

45 Zanker, Power of Images, 308, fig. 240.

46 RIC I 271; BMCRE 633–6.

47 For an English translation of the letter, see Chisholm, K. and Ferguson, J., Rome: The Augustan Age (New York: Oxford University, 1981) 539–41Google Scholar. For analysis of the letter, see Rostovtzeff, M., ‘Pax Augusta Claudiana’, Journal of Egyptian Archaeology 12 (1926) 24–9CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

48 RIC I 38, 61, 67; BMCRE 116, 133. For another image of this coin, see Kent, Overbeck and Stylow, Römische Münze, Table 42, 164R.

49 Zanker, Power of Images, 111.

50 Zanker, Power of Images, 112–13.

51 Judge, E. A., The First Christians in the Roman World: Augustan and New Testament Essays (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2008) 201Google Scholar.

52 Judge, First Christians in the Roman World, 210.

53 See also the inscription from the victory monument of Nicopolis discussed above, which has the key phrase ‘after peace had been secured on land and sea’, as well as the decree from the city council of Halicarnassus discussed below, which opens with the expression: ‘Land and sea have peace…’

54 Cooley, Res Gestae, 222.

55 Cooley, Res Gestae, 30.

56 Cooley, Res Gestae, 50–1.

57 For a helpful introduction to this inscription, see Danker, F. W., Benefactor: Epigraphic Study of a Greco-Roman and New Testament Semantic Field (St Louis: Clayton, 1982) 215–22Google Scholar.

58 Translation from Danker, Benefactor, 217.

59 The most complete copy is from Priene (OGIS 458) but fragments have also been discovered in Apameia (CIG 3.3957; CIL 3.12240), Eumeneia (CIG 3.3902b), Dorylaion (CIL 3.13651) and Maioneia (Umberto Laffi, ‘Le iscrizione relative all'introduzione nel 9 a.C. del nuovo calendario della Provincia d'Asia’, Studi Classici e Orientali 16 [1967] 5–98).

60 The Collection of Ancient Greek Inscriptions in the British Museum. Vol. 4, Knidos, Halikarnassos and Branchidae (ed. Hirschfeld, G.; London: Clarendon, 1893)Google Scholar number 894.

61 ILS 103.

62 OGIS 613.

63 Wengst, Pax Romana, 11.

64 On ‘peace’, see, e.g., Virgil Aeneid 6.847–853; Seneca On Mercy 1.4.1–2; Epistles 91.2; Apocolocyntosis 10.1; Ovid Fasti 1.719; Strabo Geog. 6.4.2; Velleius Paterculus History of Rome 2.126.3; Philo Embassy 147; Pliny Nat. Hist. 28.3; Martial Epigrams 9.70.7–8; Epictetus Discourses 3.13.9; Plutarch Precepts of Statecraft 32. On ‘security’, see, e.g., Tacitus Hist. 2.21.2; Josephus J.W. 4.94; Aelius Aristides Eulogy of Rome 104; Pliny Letters 10.52–53; Panegyric to Emperor Hadrian 80.

65 Pliny, Nat. Hist. 4.36.

66 Riesner, R., Paul's Early Period: Chronology, Mission Strategy, Theology (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1998) 339Google Scholar.

67 H. L. Hendrix, ‘Thessalonicans Honor Romans’ (Ph.D. diss., Harvard University, 1984) 253.

68 C. Edson (‘Macedonia, II. State Cults in Thessalonica’, HTR 41 [1948] 133) argues that the founding of the new cult of Roma and the Roman benefactors dates to 42–41 BCE immediately after the city's support of the victorious Mark Antony and Octavian, while Hendrix (‘Thessalonicans Honor Romans’, 22) dates this event to 95 BCE or earlier.

69 IT = Inscriptiones graecae Epiri, Macedoniae, Thraciae, Scythiae, Pars II Inscriptiones Macedoniae, Fasciculus I Inscripitones Thessalonicae et viciniae (ed. C. Edson; Berlin: de Gruyter, 1972).

70 Hendrix, ‘Thessalonicans Honor Romans’, 287.

71 Since the remains of this temple have not yet been uncovered, Jewett's, R. statement that ‘There are impressive archaeological remains of the large temple of Roma’ is puzzling (The Thessalonian Correspondence [Philadelphia: Fortress, 1986] 126)Google Scholar.

72 Hendrix, ‘Thessalonicans Honor Romans’, 312.

73 RPC I 1554 and 5421. See also the later re-issue of this coin series under Domitian: RPC 1555.

74 Hendrix, ‘Thessalonicans Honor Romans’, 179, 188. Cited also by Donfried, ‘Imperial Cults’, 218; Green, Thessalonians, 40; Kim, S., Christ and Caesar: The Gospel and the Roman Empire in the Writing of Paul and Luke (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2008) 5Google Scholar.

75 Tellbe, M., Paul between Synagogue and State: Christians, Jews, and Civic Authorities in 1 Thessalonians, Romans, and Philippians (CBNTS 34; Stockholm: Almqvist & Wiksell International, 2001) 84Google Scholar.

76 Archaeological Museum, Thessaloniki. Number 1065.

77 Vokotopoulou, Julia, Guide to the Archaeological Museum of Thessalonike (Athens: Kapon, 1996) 85Google Scholar.

78 Archaeological Museum, Thessaloniki. Numbers 2467, 2468.

79 Hendrix, ‘Archeology and Eschatology’, 117–18.