King James Version · Under Rome
2 Esdras 3
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1In the thirtieth year after the of the city I was in , and lay troubled upon my bed, and my came up over : 2For I saw the desolation of , and the wealth of them that dwelt at . 3And was sore moved, so that I began to speak words full of fear to , and said, 4O , who bearest rule, thou spakest at the beginning, when thou didst plant the earth, and that thyself alone, and commandedst the people, 5And gavest a body unto without , which was the workmanship of thine hands, and didst breathe into him the breath of life, and he was made living before thee. 6And thou leadest him into , which thy had planted, before ever the earth came forward. 7And unto him thou gavest to love thy way: which he transgressed, and immediately thou appointedst in him and in his generations, of whom came nations, tribes, people, and kindreds, out of number. 8And every people walked after their own will, and did wonderful things before thee, and despised thy . 9And again in process of time thou broughtest the flood upon those that dwelt in the world, and destroyedst them. 10And it came to pass in every of them, that as was to , so was the flood to these. 11Nevertheless one of them thou leftest, namely, Noah with his household, of whom came all men. 12And it happened, that when they that dwelt upon the earth began to multiply, and had gotten them many children, and were a great people, they began again to be more ungodly than the first. 13Now when they lived so wickedly before thee, thou didst choose thee a man from among them, whose name was . 14Him thou lovedst, and unto him only thou shewedst thy will: 15And madest an with him, promising him that thou wouldest never forsake . 16And unto him thou gavest , and unto also thou gavest and . As for , thou didst choose him to thee, and put by : and so became a great multitude. 17And it came to pass, that when thou leadest out of , thou broughtest them up to the . 18And bowing , thou didst set the earth, movedst the whole world, and madest the depths to tremble, and troubledst the men of that age. 19And thy went through four , of , and of earthquake, and of wind, and of cold; that thou mightest give unto the of , and diligence unto the generation of Israel. 20And yet tookest thou not away from them a , that thy law might bring forth fruit in them. 21For the first bearing a transgressed, and was overcome; and so be all they that are born of him. 22Thus infirmity was made permanent; and (also) in of the people with the malignity of the root; so that the good departed away, and the evil abode still. 23So the times passed away, and the years were brought to an end: then didst thou raise thee up a servant, called : 24Whom thou commandedst to build a city unto thy name, and to offer and oblations unto thee therein. 25When this was done many years, then they that inhabited the city forsook thee, 26And in all things did even as and all his generations had done: for they also had a : 27And so thou gavest thy city over into the hands of thine . 28Are their deeds then any better that inhabit , that they should therefore have the over ? 29For when I came thither, and had seen impieties without number, then saw many in this thirtieth year, so that failed me. 30For I have seen how thou sufferest them sinning, and hast spared doers: and hast destroyed thy people, and hast preserved thine , and hast not signified it. 31I do not remember how this way may be left: Are they then of better than they of ? 32Or is there any other people that knoweth thee beside Israel? or what generation hath so thy as ? 33And yet their reward appeareth not, and their labour hath no fruit: for I have gone here and there through the heathen, and I see that they flow in wealth, and think not upon thy . 34Weigh thou therefore our wickedness now in the balance, and their’s also that the world; and so shall thy name no where be found but in Israel. 35Or when was it that they which upon the earth have not in thy sight? or what people have so kept thy ? 36Thou shalt find that Israel by name hath kept thy precepts; but not the heathen.
The 1611 translation, public domain. Its original printing included the Apocrypha, which is why the deuterocanonical books can be read here. Notes and cards are EKLI’s own.
The world at this moment · Under Rome, 63 BC to AD 100 ›
Judea as a client kingdom and then a province. Roads, garrisons, taxes, crucifixion, and a common Greek language that let a message travel the empire faster than any before it.
- Rome
- The republic tears itself apart in civil war and comes out as an empire under Augustus. What follows is two centuries of relative peace across the whole Mediterranean, enforced by legions and paid for by taxes, with safe roads and safe sea lanes. Every one of Paul's journeys depends on that.
- Judea
- Governed first through Herod the Great, a client king of enormous ability and enormous brutality who rebuilds the temple into one of the wonders of the ancient world, then directly by Roman prefects. Crucifixion is the standard penalty for sedition and is used often and publicly.
- The wider world
- Greek is spoken from Spain to Syria, which means a letter written in Corinth can be read in Rome without translation. Jewish communities already exist in most major cities, which is where the first Christian preaching lands. Mystery religions, imperial cult, and philosophy all compete in the same marketplace.
- Further afield
- The Han dynasty rules China and trades silk westward along routes that touch the Roman world at second hand. In Britain the Roman conquest begins within a decade of the crucifixion.