Class and Power in Roman Palestine
The Socioeconomic Setting of Judaism and Christian Origins

Examines how socioeconomic relations between Judaean elites and non-elites changed as Palestine became part of the Roman Empire.

Anthony Keddie (Author)

9781108713726, Cambridge University Press

Paperback / softback, published 11 November 2021

379 pages, 3 b/w illus. 3 maps 2 tables
22.8 x 15.2 x 2.2 cm, 0.581 kg

'… a valuable reference for scholars and graduate students.' Michael Kochenash, Religious Studies Review

Anthony Keddie investigates the changing dynamics of class and power at a critical place and time in the history of Judaism and Christianity - Palestine during its earliest phases of incorporation into the Roman Empire (63 BCE–70 CE). He identifies institutions pertaining to civic administration, taxation, agricultural tenancy, and the Jerusalem Temple as sources of an unequal distribution of economic, political, and ideological power. Through careful analysis of a wide range of literary, documentary, epigraphic, and archaeological evidence, including the most recent discoveries, Keddie complicates conventional understandings of class relations as either antagonistic or harmonious. He demonstrates how elites facilitated institutional changes that repositioned non-elites within new, and sometimes more precarious, relations with privileged classes, but did not typically worsen their economic conditions. These socioeconomic shifts did, however, instigate changing class dispositions. Judaean elites and non-elites increasingly distinguished themselves from the other, through material culture such as tableware, clothing, and tombs.

1. Urban development and the new elites
2. Land tenancy and agricultural labor: 'the land is mine'
3. Taxation: render unto Caesar and the local elites
4. Economy of the sacred
5. Material culture from table to grave
Conclusion
Appendix A. Herodian rulers
Appendix B. High priests during the Early Roman period
Appendix C. Palmyra duties (137 CE).

Subject Areas: Judaism [HRJ], Christianity [HRC], History of religion [HRAX], Religion: general [HRA], Religion & beliefs [HR], Social & cultural history [HBTB], History [HB]