When was the book of Romans written?
Paul's letter to Rome carries no date of its own, so the timing has to be pieced together from the travel details and personal names in its closing chapter. Those clues point to one short stay in Greece, near the end of Paul's third missionary journey, while Rome was still a city he had never seen.
Place of writing
The clearest markers are geographical. Paul greets Gaius, his host, and commends a woman from the port town next door.
The Christian's FriendThe letter to the Romans was written from Greece, and probably from Corinth (Rom. 16:23), during Paul's third missionary journey, which ended abruptly at Jerusalem, where he went with the collection raised by the churches of Galatia, Macedonia, and Achaia for the poor believers in that city. The immediate occasion of his writing appears to have been to commend to them Phebe, a servant of the church in Cenchrea, the eastern port of the city of Corinth, only a few miles away.
Ancient copies of the letter carry the same tradition in their closing notes. Several manuscripts add the words "written from Corinth," and one adds "by Phebe the deaconess" (Various).
The year
Most place the writing in the late fifties, tied to the moment Paul was about to sail for Jerusalem with the relief money.
Arend RemmersWhen Paul was writing the Epistle to the Romans he was going to go to Jerusalem. The mention of the servant Phebe from Cenchrea (Rom. 16:1-2) and of Gaius (Rom. 16:23; compare with 1 Cor. 1:14) indicate that Paul wrote the Epistle to the Romans shortly before he left Corinth for Jerusalem. This was around the year 57/58 AD.
One chronology of the period fixes it more sharply still, placing the letter in the spring of 58, immediately before Paul left Corinth, passed through Macedonia, preached at Troas and spoke to the elders at Miletus (Church History). Commentators differ on the exact year: a Bible dictionary gives "about A.D. 58" (Morrish Bible Dictionary), while Ironside dates it "in the year A. D. 60, at least three years before Paul's imprisonment" (H. A. Ironside). The differences are of a year or two; the setting is agreed.
The scene behind the writing
The letter was composed during a short pause in a busy journey, and Paul dictated it rather than writing it himself.
Arno C. GaebeleinThis Epistle was written by Paul in the year 58. Paul was staying in the house of Gaius (Romans 16:23). He was a wealthy Corinthian whom Paul had baptized (1 Corinthians 1:14). His secretary was Tertius, who says so himself: "I Tertius, who wrote this letter, greet you in the Lord" (16:22). It was during the brief visit to Corinth (Acts 20:3) that the Apostle wrote the Epistle. He was on his way to Jerusalem, with the great desire in his heart, "I must also see Rome" (Acts 19:21).
Where it falls among Paul's letters
Its position at the front of the letters in our Bibles is not a claim about its age.
Arno C. GaebeleinThe Epistle to the Romans is not the first Epistle which the Apostle Paul wrote. The First Epistle to the Thessalonians was written six years before the Epistle to the Romans, that is in 52 A.D., and the Second Thessalonian Epistle a few months later. The place given to this great document, immediately after the Book of Acts, is the right place, for the Epistle to the Romans has for its leading theme the Gospel of God, and that needs to be unfolded first of all.
Why the timing shapes the letter
Paul wrote as a man who had never set foot in the city, and that fact left its mark on what he wrote.
William KellyThe circumstances under which the epistle to the Romans was written gave occasion to the most thorough and comprehensive unfolding, not of the church, but of Christianity. No apostle had ever yet visited Rome. Something was still lacking to the believers there; but even this was ordered of God to call forth from the Holy Spirit an epistle which more than any other comes close to a complete treatise on the fundamentals of Christian doctrine, and especially about righteousness.
He did reach Rome, but not by the route he expected. The letter was sent "a little before he was sent a prisoner to Rome," and he had no idea what means the Lord would use to bring him there (C. Stanley).
Summary
- Place. Corinth, in Greece, during Paul's third missionary journey — confirmed by the greetings from Gaius and the mention of Cenchrea, Corinth's port.
- Date. Roughly A.D. 57–58, with one chronology naming the spring of 58; Ironside prefers A.D. 60, so the exact year is debated.
- Moment. Written just before Paul sailed for Jerusalem with the collection gathered for the poor believers there.
- Occasion. Phoebe was travelling to Rome, and the letter went with her as a commendation.
- Result. Because no apostle had yet visited Rome, God used the gap to draw out the fullest statement of Christian doctrine, especially righteousness.