A Historical Commentary on St. Paul's Epistle to the Galatians

By W. M. Ramsay

Part 1

Society and Religion in Central Asia Minor in the Time of St. Paul

Chapter 23

Summary

THE most important political and social facts to observe in the central districts of Asia Minor, when Paul entered it, are —

1. The vigour of Roman administration: it was afterwards relaxed, but the Pauline history is true to the facts of A.D. 40-60.

2. The steady spread, through natural causes, of a uniform Hellenic form of civilisation and law throughout Asia Minor, first in the cities, later in the villages and rustic districts: as a rule, the villages on the south of the plateau begin to be Hellenised only in the third century, in the north only in the fourth and fifth centuries.

3. The alliance of Roman and Greek influence in diffusing a mixed Graeco-Roman system of social and political ideas.

4. The line along which this Graeco-Roman influence moved: before A.D. 285 the southern route from inner Asia through Ephesus to Rome, affecting the south side of the plateau: after 285 the northern route from inner Asia through Ancyra to Constantinople, placing North Galatia in the van of progress.

5. The character and influence of the native religion and social system in Asia Minor, fundamentally the same everywhere, everywhere opposed to the Graeco-Roman civilisation.

6. The struggle between East and West, Asia and Europe, which is always going on in Asia Minor in forms that change from century to century: in the time of Paul it was mainly between the native religion and the Graeco-Roman civilisation (Christianity, on the whole, being on the side of the latter).

7. The contrast of the plateau and the western coastlands of Asia Minor, the former tending towards the European type, the latter towards the Asiatic.

8. The essential continuity of character in the people of Asia Minor from immemorial antiquity down to the present day according to the two types, plateau and west coastlands: the people as they are now offer the best introduction to the study of the people as they were in A.D. 40-60.

 

 

Book Navigation Title Page Preface Table of Contents Religion in Asia Minor      ► Chapter 1      ► Chapter 2      ► Chapter 3      ► Chapter 4      ► Chapter 5      ► Chapter 6      ► Chapter 7      ► Chapter 8      ► Chapter 9      ► Chapter 10      ► Chapter 11      ► Chapter 12      ► Chapter 13      ► Chapter 14      ► Chapter 15      ► Chapter 16      ► Chapter 17      ► Chapter 18      ► Chapter 19      ► Chapter 20      ► Chapter 21      ► Chapter 22      ► Chapter 23 Historical Commentary      ► Section 1      ► Section 2      ► Section 3      ► Section 4      ► Section 5      ► Section 6      ► Section 7      ► Section 8      ► Section 9      ► Section 10      ► Section 11      ► Section 12      ► Section 13      ► Section 14      ► Section 15      ► Section 16      ► Section 17      ► Section 18      ► Section 19      ► Section 20      ► Section 21      ► Section 22      ► Section 23      ► Section 24      ► Section 25      ► Section 26      ► Section 27      ► Section 28      ► Section 29      ► Section 30      ► Section 31      ► Section 32      ► Section 33      ► Section 34      ► Section 35      ► Section 36      ► Section 37      ► Section 38      ► Section 39      ► Section 40      ► Section 41      ► Section 42      ► Section 43      ► Section 44      ► Section 45      ► Section 46      ► Section 47      ► Section 48      ► Section 49      ► Section 50      ► Section 51      ► Section 52      ► Section 53      ► Section 54      ► Section 55      ► Section 56      ► Section 57      ► Section 58      ► Section 59      ► Section 60      ► Section 61      ► Section 62      ► Section 63      ► Section 64