Civilized Piety: The Rhetoric of Pietas in the Pastoral Epistles and the Roman Empire

By T. Christopher Hoklotubbe

Early Christians in Asia Minor had to navigate the troubled waters of Roman social, political, and economic life while also preserving their faith. The church faced a double threat: Greeks and Romans viewed Christianity as a barbaric and potentially seditious superstition and, at the same moment, wealthy Christian benefactors, and their client teachers, were both perceived to threaten the integrity of the Christian community.

Christopher Hoklotubbe investigates how the author of the Pastoral Epistles (1, 2 Timothy and Titus) strategically appealed to the Greek and Roman virtues of piety ( eusebeia, pietas) to ease these external and internal sociocultural threats. The Pastoral Epistles’ rhetoric of piety—a term not found in the genuine Pauline epistles—becomes pointed when read alongside ancient discourses on piety from Roman imperial propaganda, civic benefaction/patronage, and moral philosophy. As Hoklotubbe demonstrates, piety was rhetorically potent in the efforts of the Pastoral Epistles to present the fledgling Christian communities in a compelling cultural light, as well as efforts to unite communities around a socially conservative vision of the household of God.
 
Civilized Piety reveals the value of  pietas within an ideological marketplace of emperors, benefactors, and philosophers, all of whom contend with one another to monopolize cultural prestige. The Pastoral Epistles, by employing a virtue so highly esteemed by forces hostile to Christianity, manifest a deep desire to establish good order within the church as well as to foster goodwill with the church’s non-Christian neighbors.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Baylor University Press
• Release date: Sep 1, 2017
• ISBN: 9781481307192

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Civilized Piety

The Rhetoric of Pietas in the Pastoral Epistles and the Roman Empire

T. Christopher Hoklotubbe

Baylor University Press

© 2017 by Baylor University Press

Waco, Texas 76798

All Rights Reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the prior permission in writing of Baylor University Press.

Cover design by Will Brown

Cover image: Coin, Hadrian, Roman Empire. Photograph © The Trustees of the British Museum. All rights reserved.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Names: Hoklotubbe, T. Christopher (Thomas Christopher), 1983– author.

Title: Civilized piety : the rhetoric of pietas in the pastoral epistles and the Roman Empire / T. Christopher Hoklotubbe.

Description: Waco, Texas : Baylor University Press, [2017] | Includes bibliographical references.

Identifiers: LCCN 2016053605 (print) | LCCN 2017027763 (ebook) | ISBN 9781481307208 (ebook-Mobi/Kindle) | ISBN 9781481307192 (ePub) | ISBN 9781481307215 (web PDF) | ISBN 9781481307178 (cloth) | ISBN 9781481307185 (pbk. : alk. paper)

Subjects: LCSH: Bible. Pastoral Epistles--Criticism, interpretation, etc. | Piety. | Rome—Religion. | Church history—Primitive and early church, ca. 30–600. | Christianity and culture—History—Early church, ca. 30–600.

Classification: LCC BS2735.52 (ebook) | LCC BS2735.52 .H65 2017 (print) | DDC 227/.8306—dc23

LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2016053605

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Contents

Acknowledgments

Abbreviations

Introduction: The Politics of Piety in the Pastoral Epistles

Chapter 1. Piety in Caesar’s House

Chapter 2. Piety in God’s House

Chapter 3. Honoring Piety in the City

Chapter 4. Honoring Piety in the Ekklēsia

Chapter 5. The Mystery of Philosophical Piety

Chapter 6. The Mystery of Pastoral Piety

Conclusion: A Pious and Civilized Christian in the Roman Empire

Notes

Bibliography

Index

Acknowledgments

This book is the culmination of the instruction, support, and friendship I have received from mentors, colleagues, editors, and family during my doctoral studies at Harvard University. I am thankful for my doctoral advisor, Karen L. King, whose invaluable insight guided the development and articulation of my arguments. I could not ask for a more attentive, encouraging, and sagacious mentor. I am grateful for Laura S. Nasrallah, who took me under her wings early on during my M.Div. studies as her research assistant and has remained an important influence in my intellectual development. Her careful reading of the manuscript has saved it from countless sins of verbosity, awkward wording, and theoretical imprecision. And thanks are due to Emma Dench, who cheerfully agreed to read my work in order to ensure that its treatment of Greek and Roman source materials would be intelligible and even persuasive among scholars in the field of classics. I hope to emulate her cheerful enthusiasm for the study of antiquity in my own teaching and research.

I am appreciative of the spirit of collegiality at Harvard Divinity School that has nourished my mind and spirit. I am especially thankful for the friendships of Roberto Mata and Michelle C. Sanchez, whose informed perspectives on postmodern, sociological, and postcolonial theories have enriched my reading of ancient materials. I am grateful for those who carefully read and commented upon early drafts of my chapters, including Professors Giovanni Bazzana, Eldon J. Epp, and Elisabeth Schüssler Fiorenza, as well as Margaret Butterfield, Jung Hyun Choi, Chan Sok Park, Eunyung Lim, Jennifer Quigley, and Tyler Schwaller. I am also grateful for the many friendships formed at Harvard that have sharpened my scholarship as iron sharpens iron: Geoffrey S. Smith, Matthew Ketchum, Arminta Fox, Courtney Wilson VanVeller, and Michal Beth Dinkler. My reading of the philosophical materials was enhanced from spirited gatherings of Lawrence Wills, Nathaniel P. DesRosiers, Daniel C. Ullucci, and Christopher Stroup. And I would be remiss not to recognize the many ways my scholarship and life have been enriched by the mentorship of Helmut Koester, S. Scott Bartchy, and Cavan W. Concannon. My deepest gratitude extends to each of you and your beautiful families—Gisela Koester, Nancy Breuer, and Rae Huang—for welcoming me and my own into your homes and lives.

It was both an honor and a pleasure to work with Carey Newman and his talented team at Baylor University Press. Carey’s seasoned instincts for what makes a readable book were foundational for reframing the argument of my manuscript and reclaiming my voice throughout the book.

My appreciation also extends to the Louisville Institution, Andover Newton Theological School, and Loyola Marymount University for their institutional support of my early career that made it possible to revise and expand my dissertation. I am especially grateful for Loyola Marymount University’s financial support in covering the costs of images included in this book.

And most importantly I thank God for blessing me with such a wonderful and supportive family. My parents, Tom and Robin, whose immeasurable support that goes beyond their financial assistance and loving guidance throughout my undergraduate and graduate studies has allowed me to flourish into the scholar I am today. Thank you for everything. I especially stand in the debt of gratitude to my amazing wife, Stephanie, without whose support and love I could not have accomplished what I have here. Thank you for your unfailing love. And finally, to my beautiful and brilliant daughters, Claire and Emily, even with this book completed, you both remain my greatest accomplishment in life yet.

Chris Hoklotubbe

Corona, California

Abbreviations

AB ——— Anchor Bible

AHB ——— The Ancient History Bulletin

AJP ——— American Journal of Philology

ANRW ——— Aufstieg und Niedergang der römischen Welt: Geschichte und Kultur Roms im Spiegel der neueren Forschung. Part 2, Principat. Edited by Hildegard Temporini and Wolfgang Haase. Berlin: de Gruyter, 1972–.

BDAG ——— Frederick William Danker, Walter Bauer, William F. Arndt, and F. Wilbur Gingrich. A Greek-English Lexicon of the New Testament and Early Christian Literature. 3rd ed. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2000.

Bib ——— Biblica

BibInt ——— Biblical Interpretation

BJS ——— Brown Judaic Studies

BMCRE ——— Coins of the Roman Empire in the British Museum. Edited by Harold Mattingly. 6 vols. London: Trustees of the British Museum, 1965–1966 (1923–1936).

BNTC ——— Black’s New Testament Commentary

BTB ——— Biblical Theology Bulletin

BZNW ——— Beihefte zur Zeitschrift für die neutestamentliche Wissenschaft

CH ——— Church History

CJ ——— Classical Journal

CIL ——— Corpus inscriptionum latinarum

ECC ——— Eerdmans Critical Commentary

EKKNT ——— Evangelisch-katholischer Kommentar zum Neuen Testament

EPRO ——— Études préliminaires aux religions orientales dans l’empire romain

EvQ ——— Evangelical Quarterly

FRLANT ——— Forschungen zur Religion und Literatur des Alten und Neuen Testaments

HBT ——— Horizons in Biblical Theology

HSCP ——— Harvard Studies in Classical Philology

HThKNT ——— Herders Theologischer Kommentar zum Neuen Testament

HTR ——— Harvard Theological Review

ICC ——— International Critical Commentary

IEph ——— Wankel, Herman, et al., eds. Die Inschriften von Ephesos. 8 vols. Bonn: Habelt, 1979–1984.

ILS ——— Inscriptiones latinae selectae. Edited by Hermann Dessau. Berlin: Weidmann, 1892–1916.

Int ——— Interpretation

ISmyrna ——— Petzl, Georg, ed. Die Inschriften von Smyrna. 2 vols. Bonn: Habelt, 1982–1990.

IStratonikeia ——— Şahin, Mehmet Çetin, ed. Die Inschriften von Stratonikeia. Bonn: Habelt, 1981–1990.

JBL ——— Journal of Biblical Literature

JECS ——— Journal of Early Christian Studies

JRS ——— Journal of Roman Studies

JSJ ——— Journal for the Study of Judaism in the Persian, Hellenistic, and Roman Periods

JSJSup ——— Journal for the Study of Judaism Supplement Series

JSNT ——— Journal for the Study of the New Testament

JSNTSup ——— Journal for the Study of the New Testament Supplement Series

JTS ——— Journal of Theological Studies

LCL ——— Loeb Classical Library

LEC ——— Library of Early Christianity

LNTS ——— Library of New Testament Studies

MEFR ——— Mélanges d’archéologie et d’histoire de l’école française de Rome

MZAW ——— Münchner Vorlesungen zu antiken Welten

NewDocs ——— New Documents Illustrating Early Christianity. Edited by Greg H. R. Horsley and Stephen Llewelyn. North Ryde, NSW: The Ancient History Documentary Research Centre, Macquarie University, 1981–.

NICNT ——— New International Commentary on the New Testament

NovT ——— Novum Testamentum

NovTSup ——— Supplements to Novum Testamentum

NTOA ——— Novum Testamentum et Orbis Antiquus

NTS ——— New Testament Studies

OGIS ——— Orientis Graecae Inscriptiones Selectae. Edited by Wilhelm Dittenberger. 2 vols. Hildesheim: Olms, 1960.

PACS ——— Philo of Alexandria Commentary Series

PAwB ——— Potsdamer Altertumswissenschaftliche Beiträge

Phil ——— Philologus

PTS ——— Patristische Texte und Studien

RAC ——— Reallexikon für Antike und Christentum. Edited by Theodor Klauser et al. Stuttgart: Hiersemann, 1950–.

RIC ——— Roman Imperial Coinage. London: Spink and Son, 1923–.

RIDA ——— Revue internationale des droits de l’antiquité

SBLDS ——— Society of Biblical Literature Dissertation Series

SEG ——— Supplementum epigraphicum graecum

SNTW ——— Studies of the New Testament and Its World

SP ——— Sacra Pagina

SPhiloA ——— Studia Philonica Annual

SR ——— Studies in Religion

ST ——— Studia Theologica

SVF ——— Stoicorum Veterum Fragmenta. Hans Friedrich August von Arnim. 4 vols. Leipzig: Teubner, 1903–1924.

TAPA ——— Transactions of the American Philological Association

TDNT ——— Theological Dictionary of the New Testament. Edited by Gerhard Kittel and Gerhard Friedrich. Translated by Geoffrey W. Bromiley. 10 vols. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1964–1976.

THKNT ——— Theologischer Handkommentar zum Neuen Testament

TJ ——— Trinity Journal

TLZ ——— Theologische Literaturzeitung

TQ ——— Theologische Quartalschrift

TSAJ ——— Texte und Studien zum antiken Judentum

WBC ——— World Biblical Commentary

WTJ ——— Westminster Theological Journal

WUNT ——— Wissenschaftliche Untersuchungen zum Neuen Testament

ZPE ——— Zeitschrift für Papyrologie und Epigraphik

Introduction

The Politics of Piety in the Pastoral Epistles

Ancient Christian leaders faced several challenges that threatened the sustainability of the fledgling movement during the early second century C.E. Two of the foremost problems were the perception among Greek and Roman neighbors that Christians promoted a barbaric and subversive superstition that threatened conventional social values and the internal divisions within local Christian assemblies (ekklēsia)¹ over what constituted correct doctrine, practice, and institutional hierarchies. Our extant sources from non-Christian Greek and Roman authors during this period are practically univocal in their disdain for this new cult. The Christian movement was perceived to have maliciously infected the minds of the gullible masses, leading people astray from their customary devotion toward their ancestral gods and from their loyalties and obligations toward their emperor, cities and villages, and families.² In a word, Christians were perceived to be uncivilized, and dangerously so. As a result, early Christians experienced sporadic and localized oppression according to the fluctuating prejudicial impulses of imperial authorities, civic leaders, and subjects throughout the Roman Empire. If the refusal of Christians to participate in communal sacrifices toward and in behalf of the Roman emperor and local patron gods were not enough to raise the anger of their neighbors, then the proclivity of some Christian groups to promote women to leadership positions and encourage equality between slaves and their masters—and so disrupting traditional societal hierarchies—placed the movement within the crosshairs of imperial and civic ire. Moreover, whether such radical social practices were even appropriate within the Christian movement and who decides such matters were precisely up for debate among Christian leaders. In such debates, the letters of Paul of Tarsus were held to be authoritative by many early Christians. But precisely how these letters were to be interpreted and their implications for how the Christian ekklēsia should be organized and operate were highly contentious.

The author of the epistles to Timothy and Titus, the so-called Pastoral Epistles, presents one of a number of early Christian attempts to navigate the dicey waters of imperial prejudices toward the Christian movement and to institutionalize a particular ecclesial structure, complete with behavioral norms that pertain to women and slaves. With so much focus on the questions about whether or not Paul authored the Pastorals and the theological significance of the Pastorals’ statements for modern ecclesiological policies,³ it is only recently that scholars have begun to attend to how the social and political realities of the early second century C.E. shed light upon the meaning and goals of the Pastorals.⁴

The Pastoral Epistles present piety (Greek, εὐσέβεια; Latin, pietas)⁵ as comprising an ideal way of life (1 Tim 2:2; 4:7; 2 Tim 3:12; Titus 2:12) that is in line with proper instruction (1 Tim 6:3) and the truth (Titus 1:1). The contents of this truth are described as the mystery of piety (τὸ τῆς εὐσεβείας μυστήριον), which is expressed by what many scholars have identified as an early Christian creed or hymn celebrating the incarnation and vindication of Christ (1 Tim 3:16).⁶ The correct instruction of piety stands in stark contrast to the profane myths and old wives’ tales (1 Tim 4:7) spread by sophistic teachers whose lust for wealth taints their vain attempts to be pious (1 Tim 6:5; 2 Tim 3:5). And, finally, piety is invoked in the exhortation to care for one’s elderly relatives unless the church become overburdened in its provisions for the poor and widowed (1 Tim 5:4). Among the undisputed letters of Paul,⁷ the historical apostle to the Gentiles never describes followers of Jesus as pious.⁸ Justified,⁹ sanctified,¹⁰ and holy,¹¹ yes—but not pious.¹² This should give reason for pause.

Piety was a particularly important virtue within the ancient Mediterranean world that encompassed the writings of the New Testament.¹³ According to Cicero, pietas is the feeling which renders kind offices and loving service to one’s kin and country¹⁴ and arises from the knowledge of the gods.¹⁵ Whereas in the Roman period the Greek εὐσέβεια tended to signify both a reverent attitude toward and proper ritual conduct before the gods,¹⁶ the Latin pietas encompassed an affectionate dutifulness directed also to one’s parents, homeland, and emperor. Pietas was the fulfillment of one’s filial, religious, civic, and imperial obligations that sustained reciprocal relationships between kin, neighbors, allies, and contracting parties as well as demonstrated reverent loyalty toward country, divinity, and ruler.¹⁷ Roman emperors and Latin authors justified the legitimacy of the Roman Empire on the basis that the Roman people and its rulers were the most pious among all humanity, and so favored by the gods. Benefactors sought to show themselves as more honorable than other elites in the public square, and so made elaborate donations to cities and temples, with the result that their piety was publicly immortalized in inscribed stone and sponsored festivities. And finally, the topic of what constitutes true piety was a common topic of philosophy that dated back to Socrates. Philosophers represented their teachings as constituting true piety out of concern for legitimating their teachings in the face of rival teachers and defending themselves against public suspicions that their philosophical ideas lure naive audiences away from their duty to worship the ancestral gods. Claims to piety in the ancient world carried a significant amount of cultural prestige that has yet to be appreciated among most modern interpreters of these letters.

The Politics of Piety

Reading the Pastoral Epistles’ deployment of piety as participating in such cultural domains of its day can assist modern reconstructions of the author’s aims and sociopolitical interventions within the Roman imperial world and the Christian ekklēsia of the second century.¹⁸ In particular, such a reading illuminates how the author of the Pastorals appropriates contemporary ideas about piety in order to construct a culturally dignified and civilized Christian identity for his audience to embody so that the ekklēsia might better navigate the treacherous waters of popular prejudices among their neighbors. One important goal of the author’s alignment of Christian behavior with popular notions of proper filial piety and reverence directed toward the Roman emperor (both popular connotations of the Latin pietas) is precisely to reign in controversial leaders who promote women preaching in the assembly and an equality among slaves and masters. This study of the author of the Pastorals’ rhetoric of piety seeks to better explain the sociopolitical tensions within a particular segment of the early Christian movement that prompted the urgent composition of these pseudepigraphal letters in the name of Paul. And so, this study aims to enlighten those interested in the New Testament and early Christianity about an important early Christian strategy for negotiating the Roman imperial situation, promoting cultural legitimacy, and establishing institutional conformity within the burgeoning ekklēsia that would prove influential among early church fathers in the coming century.

The aim of this study is to explain not simply what the term piety may or may not have meant to either the author or the ancient audience of the Pastorals, but rather what such claims to piety did. That is to say, this book explores what kind of sociopolitical work appeals to piety performed in the Roman Empire in order to explain what a rhetoric of piety might have accomplished among the Pastorals’ audiences.¹⁹ It is imperative to understand that within ancient Greco-Roman society, piety was political. Unlike modern, conventional uses of piety, which distinguish the domain of religion from the political sphere, appeals to the virtue of piety appeared in diverse sociopolitical contexts in the Greco-Roman world.²⁰ If modern interpreters are to appreciate the rhetorical significance of piety in the Pastoral Epistles, then these letters must be recontextualized among the discourses of piety that pervaded the political, civic, and philosophical domains of the Roman Empire.²¹ How piety is used for distinct sociopolitical ends in each of these cultural domains will be shown to have implications for interpreting the Pastoral Epistles.

The rhetoric of piety within the Pastoral Epistles played an important role within the author’s attempt to negotiate his imperial situation that was marked by prejudicial bias that, in part, trickled down from elite Roman discourses that denigrated Christianity as a barbaric and potentially seditious superstition.²² This imperial situation was not monolithic, and comprised a number of localized and intersecting ideologies that manifested in poetry, coins, and sculptural reliefs (chapter 1) as well as particular civic and cultural domains, including civic benefaction (chapter 3) and ancient philosophy (chapter 5). The Pastorals’ rhetoric of piety will be shown to both accommodate and resist specific elements of its cultural milieu in response to the perceived threats of prejudice and persecution from the outside and division and the promulgation of unsound behavior and Pauline theology from the inside.

The Pastoral Epistles can be located among a variety of early Christian attempts to persuade their audiences to adopt distinct and often contrasting attitudes and dispositions toward ruling authorities and the Roman Empire. For example, texts like Acts heroize the apostles who boldly defy the orders of the Jerusalem Sanhedrin, preferring to obey God rather than human authority (Acts 5:29), while in Romans 13:1, Paul exhorts his audience to be subject to the governing authorities, which have been instituted by God. Also of note are passages like Romans 12:2, where Paul warns his audience against conforming themselves to the patterns of this world, and others where he encourages his audience to maintain cultural customs of covering one’s head (1 Cor 11:13-16). In complicated ways, many of the earliest Christians both subverted and reinscribed the patriarchal (or kyriarchal) social values and habituated practices of honor seeking that maintained the status quo of Roman imperial society (e.g., Rom 12:10). Each of these texts could be nuanced within its own literary and cultural contexts more than these flat juxtapositions provide.²³ But the point is to draw attention to the recurring challenges that Christians faced in figuring out what it meant to be in Christ while being in the world but not of the world. Christians had to discern what cultural ideas and behavioral patterns they could maintain alongside their neighbors and which were antithetical to the new Creation and new covenant lifestyle they were called to embody. The problem, then, that the Pastoral deployment of piety sets out to solve is, How could Christians show themselves to be loyal and obedient subjects to the Roman Empire and good neighbors to their peers without compromising the integrity of their exclusive devotion to a countercultural Jewish messiah who had been crucified by the Romans?

A close reading of the rhetoric of piety in the Pastoral Epistles within its intersecting political, civic, and philosophical contexts promises to introduce modern readers to the distinct strategy and voice of the author of the Pastorals (and quite possibly the whispers of his obscure rival interlocutors) in order to understand how early Christians navigated both the external and internal social, political, and theological challenges of bringing Christ to bear upon ancient Greek and Roman imperial culture.

* * *

This study seeks to contextualize the Pastoral Epistles’ rhetoric of piety within different cultural domains that made up the epistles’ imperial situation in order to illuminate the Pastorals’ attempts to improve Christians’ public relationship with outsiders and establish clear guidelines for ecclesiastical order, theology, and behavior so as not to provide further reasons for others to suspect the ekklēsia of promoting a foreign and subversive superstition. The chapters to follow will demonstrate how piety was operative in a given cultural domain (e.g., Roman imperial politics, civic benefaction, and ancient philosophy) in order to elucidate both the cultural prestige that attended claims to piety as well as the social and political ends to which piety was deployed. After introducing what piety did in a particular cultural setting, the following chapter will then turn to the Pastoral Epistles to examine how these contextual insights make the author of the Pastorals’ use of piety more intelligible to modern readers and so help us to understand more fully these texts’ own social, political, and theological challenges and aims. Only then is it possible to appreciate the significance of the Pastorals’ claims to piety—not simply as some banal description of Christian devotion to God but as a much more contested and politically charged claim that played an important part in inventing a civilized Christian subject capable of navigating the potentially treacherous terrain of the Roman imperial world.

1

Piety in Caesar’s House

After the Roman emperor Augustus’ death on September 2/3, 14 C.E., and in accordance with his will, his Res gestae divi Augusti (Accomplishments of the Divine Augustus) were memorialized across the Roman Empire. Within the capital they were read before the Senate, engraved upon two bronze tablets, and inscribed upon pillars that may have marked an entrance gate into the mausoleum located at the Campus Martius adjacent to the Tiber River. Across Rome’s conquered provinces the Res gestae were copied in both Latin and Greek upon the walls of provincial sebasteia (temples dedicated to the imperial cult) and other monuments honoring Augustus and the imperial family. The most complete extant copies come from cites located in the province of Galatia in Asia Minor, including Apollonia, Antioch near Pisidia, and Ancyra.¹ The following portion of Augustus’ Res gestae evidences how the virtue of pietas was closely identified with Augustus’ reign.

In my sixth and seventh consulships [28, 27 B.C.E.], after I had extinguished the civil wars, although I was in control of all affairs in accordance with the prayers of my fellow citizens, I transferred the rights of ownership from my power to that of the senate and the people of Rome. From this cause by senatorial decree I was called Augustus (Σεβαστὸς), and my entranceway was publicly crowned with laurels, and the oak wreath, which is given for saving fellow citizens, was set up above the gateway of my house, and a golden shield, set up in the council chamber [the Curia Julia] by the senate and people of Rome, bore witness through its inscription to my valor (ἀρετὴν/virtutis), clemency (ἐπιείκειαν/clementiae), justice (δικαιοσύνη/iustitiae), and piety (εὐσέβειαν/pietatis). I excelled all in rank, but I had no more power than those who shared office with me. (Res gestae 34)²

And so, engraved upon columns and walls belonging to edifices venerating Augustus and his imperial household within Asia Minor where the Pastoral Epistles were likely composed and received,³ these inscriptions were neither the first nor would they be the last promotion of the Roman emperor’s pietas.⁴

Claims to pietas proliferated as a coveted and contested quality during the early principate of Octavian Augustus and the later reigns of Trajan and Hadrian, servicing the ideologies and power of its imperial possessors. The association of pietas with the emperor’s character, household, and reign was marked by shrewd political calculation aimed at persuading Roman and provincial subjects about the legitimacy of the current political regime. Within imperial ideology,⁵ pietas signified a loyal devotion toward the gods, the nation, and family, which coalesced with Augustus’ vision of restoring Rome’s ancestral traditions and values (mos maiorum) and thus its moral grounding. Rome’s citizens and provincial subjects were conceptualized as an enlarged familia that owed due pietas to Augustus, the father of the nation (pater patriae). Additionally, pietas signaled the emperor’s devotion to the gods, whose munificent benefactions were secured through his prayers as the pontifex maximus. Pietas, along with other virtues including valor, clemency, and justice, was an important element of imperial propaganda that portrayed the emperor as possessing the qualities necessary to secure the welfare (salus) and peace (pax) of the empire.⁶

The imperial rhetoric of pietas that marked the reigns of Trajan (98–117 C.E.) and Hadrian (117–138 C.E. provides an informative cultural analogue and context for interpreting the rhetoric of piety in the Pastoral Epistles, which were probably composed during this period. This study lays the groundwork for the next chapter’s analysis of the social and political implications of the Pastorals’ rhetoric of piety, including 1 Timothy’s admonition for the ekklēsia to pray for governing authorities so that they might live a life in all piety (ἐν πάση εὐσεβείᾳ; 1 Tim 2:1-2) and for women within the household of God (οἶκος θεοῦ; 1 Tim 3:15) to be modest and well ordered—in effect, manifesting Roman pietas. Such admonitions and their reception among early Christians were informed by the representations of the piety of the emperor and the women of his household that proliferated through coins minted during the reigns of both emperors. These coins not only signaled that Rome’s empire was under the right management but also invited provincial subjects to recognize that the pietas that had favorably marked the reign of Augustus was present again in the reigns of Trajan and Hadrian. Augustus’ own pietas was not only memorialized in his Res gestae, which were inscribed upon monumental inscriptions in Asia Minor, but was also recounted with poetic flourish in Virgil’s popular epic, Aeneid, which had already become a standard of Roman literature by the second century. Augustus’ portrayal as the restorer of Rome’s ancestral customs and values (mores maiorum), which were promulgated through Augustus’ marriage legislation and poetry, further legitimated his imperial authority. Within the scope of Augustan ideology, the pius and well-ordered household constituted an essential element and symbolic emblem of a pius and well-ordered empire.

Additionally, many elite Romans understood pietas to be the distinctive quality of the Roman nation that set Romans apart from all other nations and explained why the gods sustained Rome’s imperial dominion. Within this elite discourse, non-Roman foreigners or barbarians were suspected of practicing an excessive pietas or superstition (superstitio), which was often perceived as posing a threat to Rome’s own ancestral traditions. The beliefs and practices of both Jews and Christians were susceptible to such racially charged prejudice and, as evidenced by Philo and Pliny the Younger, such stigmatism could lead to social ostracism and sometimes physical violence. Rome’s esteem for pietas and concern against superstitio frame the imperial situation of the Pastoral Epistles’ own appropriation of piety and its negotiation of imperial authority and culture.

The Pietas of the Households of Trajan and Hadrian

Pietas was especially emphasized among the social values associated with the reigns of Trajan and Hadrian.⁷ Coins featuring busts of the emperors Trajan (fig. 1.1) and Hadrian (fig. 1.2) were disseminated with depictions of the goddess Pietas on their reverse sides.⁸ The deification of abstract ideas like Pietas, Concordia, Libertas, Pax, and Victoria in Roman culture was a common phenomenon among ancient Indo-European cultures.⁹ The goddess Pietas was typically depicted as a draped and veiled woman, often seated or standing beside a lighted altar. The goddess’ hands are variously portrayed as pouring sacrificial libations with a patera, holding a scepter, covering her breast, or raised in prayer (compare figs. 1.1–1.4). When the goddess’ identity is not given in the legend, it can be inferred by her orans-posture of prayer with raised hands (fig. 1.1).¹⁰ In these portraits of Pietas, the goddess symbolizes a dutiful devotion to the gods that was powerfully at work within either the emperor’s character or the empire itself on account of the emperor’s pious reign. Pietas could also signal the emperor’s dutiful loyalty to the legacy of the preceding emperor, as seems the case with coins minted at the beginning of Trajan’s reign, which seem to commemorate Trajan’s own pietas toward his deified adoptive father, Nerva.¹¹ A similar rhetorical tactic can be seen in coins minted early in Hadrian’s reign that display Hadrian’s pietas toward Trajan and thus support the legitimacy of Hadrian’s succession to the principate despite some public doubt.¹² In fact, as Noreña has shown, coins displaying Pietas were minted more than any other virtue type coin during the reign of Hadrian.¹³ Such coins constituted a broader rhetorical strategy of imperial self-representation manifest in panegyrics, imperial benefaction, and monuments.¹⁴ Qualities and conditions like piety (pietas), peace (pax), and harmony (concordia) signaled the empire’s prosperity (felicitas) and the legitimacy of the rule of its capable and virtuous emperors.¹⁵

Figure 1.1. BMCRE 3.403, p. 85; 103–111 C.E.

Obv. Head of Trajan; IMP TRAIANO AVG