© L.D. Underwood 2010

The cultural world of Jesus, that is the intellectual, moral, social, economic world in which Jesus lived was an eclectic mixture of people groups and customs. This world can be introduced in terms of looking at the kind of world in which Jesus lived in the first century, as a welter of conflicting cultures. We can almost picture in our minds this setting like rivers that run into the Mediterranean Sea from every side, pouring into it their sediment, feeding their waters. In much the same way, the peoples comprised within the constantly expanding domain of Rome brought into it all of the cultural contributions. We have Africans, Teutons, Greeks, Jews, Parthians, Phrygians all mingled in the provinces and cities, and all of these different nation groups shared their national heritage with the Latin peoples.