. Light from the ancient East; the New Testament illustrated by recently discovered texts of the Graeco-Roman world. ardour of the Apocalypse. With the lapse of time,the religious antithesis must have been felt moreand more acutely until at length imprinted on theChristian conscience in indelible characters. And so it really was. If it has not been seenbefore, that is because the literary sources of theImperial age are particularly deficient on the new texts, however—some of which are them-selves direct evidence of the cult of the Caesar—enableus to judge of the feelings aroused by e
. Light from the ancient East; the New Testament illustrated by recently discovered texts of the Graeco-Roman world. ardour of the Apocalypse. With the lapse of time,the religious antithesis must have been felt moreand more acutely until at length imprinted on theChristian conscience in indelible characters. And so it really was. If it has not been seenbefore, that is because the literary sources of theImperial age are particularly deficient on the new texts, however—some of which are them-selves direct evidence of the cult of the Caesar—enableus to judge of the feelings aroused by exhibitionsof the cult of the sovereign even at the time ofSt. Pauls mission in the minds of those who hadnothing but their God in Christ and their con-science. It must not be supposed that St, Paul and hisfellow-believers went through the world blindfolded,unaffected by what was then moving the minds ofmen in great cities. These pages, I think, havealready shown by many examples how much theNew Testament is a book of the Imperial age. Wemay certainly take it for granted that the Christians Cf. p. 247 Fig. 51.—Original Limestone Plate (c/io-Tayma) inscribed with the seal of , 5-6 Now in the Berlin permission of the Directors of the KoyalMuseums. [p. S45 ILLUSTRATED FROM THE NEW TEXTS 345 of the early Imperial period were familiar with theinstitutions and customs that the Empire had broughtwith it. That they were familiar even with apparentlyout-of-the-way points is shown, for instance, by theallusion in Rev. xiii. 16 f. to the custom, now knownto us from the papyri, of imprinting on deeds ofsale and similar documents a stamp which containedthe name and regnal year of the Emperor and wascalled, as in the Revelation, a charagma. To theexamples previously given ^ from Augustus to Trajanthere now comes a welcome addition in the formof an imperial stamp affixed to documents ^ from theFayum, dated 48 As a concrete illustrationI reproduce
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