I Was Shown Mercy
(1) The testimony of Paul (Acts 22:1-21)
The venerated Gamaliel, a Pharisee and teacher, influenced the Sanhedrin not to oppose the apostles. He spoke not from sympathy for the church, but from insight into God’s sovereign working on earth (cf. v. 39).
GAMALIEL I (Γαμαλιήλ, Gamaliēl). A first-century AD teacher of the law of Moses, under whom Paul studied (Acts 5:34; Acts 22:3). He was part of the school of Hillel and a member of the Sanhedrin.
(2) The hatred of the crowd (Acts 22:22-23)
(3) A citizenship that is free (Acts 22:23-29)
The Romans evaluated a person’s status based on whether the person was a citizen or a foreigner, patron or client, free or slave, ethnic Roman/Latin or not, voluntary ally or conquered enemy, male or female, and married or unmarried.
For example, a well-educated, wealthy, noncitizen, former slave would have been thought lower in status than a poor, uneducated, freeborn citizen.
At the other end of the spectrum, a Roman citizen was required to possess wealth greater than 250,000 denarii, or $10 million, to become a senator.
Paul’s status as a Roman citizen was more important to the Romans than his religion.
Roman Attitudes toward Other Religions Page 108
A citizen could not have been executed in the ways Tacitus describes: dismemberment by wild dogs, crucifixion and death by fire.
This agrees with a Roman law, the lex Iulia, that forbids a Roman citizen from being beaten or bound by a magistrate without provocation or by any other person in any circumstance.
Christians and Roman Law Page 162
This confirms what we know about Roman law, that a citizen could be flogged after a legitimate trial and sentencing.
a Roman citizen was not allowed to take part in a religion not sanctioned by Rome
Since Roman citizens could form a legal marriage only with other citizens, even after retirement neither their marriage nor their children would be recognized legally.
The Roman Military Page 177
At times emperors addressed this by recognizing the marriage of a retired Roman soldier and recognizing as citizens children born to this union after his retirement.
The Roman Military Page 177
Children born before his retirement probably were never granted citizen status.
Throughout the Empire there were four main types of cities: the Roman colony, the municipality, the temple city and the traditional Hellenistic city. The Roman colonies and municipalities were especially privileged under Roman law. Around six hundred cities in the Empire, most in Spain and North Africa, fell into one of these two, very similar, categories. In all the eastern provinces there were strikingly few Roman colonies and municipalities. This is probably because the network of existing Hellenistic cities was so dense that it was not possible to insert many new colonies.
In the early Empire era, the most important type of city was the Roman colony. Its original settlers were Roman citizens sent out from Italy or from Roman legions. Non-Romans who lived in or around them were often granted Roman citizenship as well. Colony citizens, because of their Roman citizenship, were exempt from tribute and most forms of taxation, and their government was based on a Roman model. Philippi was such a colony (Acts 16:12), as was Corinth, where Roman colonists lived together with noncitizen Jews and Greeks (Acts 18:4–8). The ancient Greek city of Corinth had been destroyed a century earlier by the Romans. It was refounded as a Roman colony by Julius Caesar in 46 B.C. Caesar moved a number of poorer Romans from Rome to Corinth to populate the new colony.
Originally, Roman colonies were settled by Roman citizens with a standard Roman city constitution. Beginning with Claudius, Rome began to confer the title of Roman colony on existing cities. This practice became widespread in the second century
Other cities were known as municipalities or municipia. This title originally referred to free or federate cities that enjoyed some degree of autonomy. During the Empire, Roman municipalities usually came into existence when a previously existing city, which had a large number of Roman citizen residents, was designated a city with full Roman citizenship rights. The city was allowed to govern itself and in return promised to render military service and active political support to Rome. A city that received this benefit would enjoy immunity from all state taxes and freedom from oversight by the provincial governor.
A number of Greek city-states had voluntarily allied with Rome at one time or another and thus enjoyed a special status as free or federate cities. Unlike those in Roman colonies, its citizens did not become Roman citizens. A federate city like Athens paid no tribute to Rome and was independent of the provincial government of its province (Achaia). Ephesus was a free city in the province of Asia. It had its own senate and assembly and considered itself the principal site for the worship of the goddess Artemis. But a free city’s independence lasted only as long as Rome trusted the city’s leaders. This helps explain why the clerk of the assembly in Acts 19 was so anxious to avoid a public disturbance over the activities of Paul. He realized that the Romans might look on unauthorized meetings, which could not readily be explained, as seditious and consequently revoke their free status.