Rome Ran Everything (And Everyone Hated It)

You cannot understand the New Testament without understanding Rome. The entire backdrop of Jesus' life, ministry, arrest, and execution is Roman occupation. Every political tension, every loaded question the Pharisees asked, every mention of taxes or soldiers or governors — that's all Rome.

Rome didn't just conquer territory. They had a whole system for running it. For Judea, it worked like this:

• The Emperor sat in Rome making big-picture decisions
• A prefect (later called a procurator) governed the province on-site — this was Pilate's job
• Local client kings like the Herods handled day-to-day governance, but only because Rome allowed it
• Roman soldiers were stationed throughout the region to keep order

The Jewish people had some religious autonomy — they could run the Temple, maintain their courts (the Sanhedrin), and follow their own laws for internal matters. But Rome had final authority on everything that mattered, especially capital punishment. The Sanhedrin could sentence someone to death, but they needed Roman approval to actually execute them.

This is exactly why Jesus ended up before Pilate. The Jewish leaders convicted Him of blasphemy, but they couldn't carry out the death penalty without Roman authorization.

Rome taxed EVERYTHING. There were direct taxes (a percentage of your income and property), indirect taxes (tolls, customs, import/export fees), and the Temple tax on top of all that. Historians estimate the total tax burden on Jewish families was somewhere between 30-40% of their income.

And the collection system was corrupt by design. Rome auctioned off tax collection rights to the highest bidder. The collector paid Rome upfront, then squeezed whatever they could from the people — keeping the difference as profit. The more you overcharged, the richer you got.

This is why tax collectors were despised. They weren't just collecting taxes — they were profiting off their own people's oppression. (More on that in our tax collectors spotlight.)

When Jesus was brought before Pilate, the charge wasn't blasphemy (Rome didn't care about Jewish theology). The accusation was sedition — claiming to be a king in a territory that belonged to Caesar.

The sign Pilate posted on the cross — "Jesus of Nazareth, King of the Jews" — wasn't just a label. It was a political statement and a warning. The Jewish leaders actually asked Pilate to change it to "He SAID he was King of the Jews." Pilate refused. He was sending a message to anyone else who might get ideas about challenging Roman authority.

Rome had dealt with Jewish uprisings before and would deal with more after. They crucified people specifically because it was the most public, humiliating, painful death possible. It was state terrorism. The message: this is what happens when you challenge Rome.

Movies often portray Pilate as a conflicted, sympathetic figure who reluctantly sentenced Jesus. Historical sources tell a different story. The Jewish philosopher Philo described Pilate's administration as full of "corruption, violence, robberies, ill-treatment, and executions without trial."

Pilate wasn't torn about killing Jesus. He was calculating the political cost. A riot during Passover — when Jerusalem's population swelled from about 50,000 to over 250,000 — would be a disaster for his career. He chose the path of least resistance.

Rome was the superpower that shaped every interaction in the Gospels. The taxes people paid, the soldiers they encountered, the laws they lived under, the execution method that killed Jesus — all Roman. When you read "governor," "centurion," "tribute," or "crucifixion," you're reading about an empire that ran the world with an iron fist.

And into that empire, God sent a baby born in an occupied territory to a teenage girl. The most powerful kingdom in history versus a carpenter from Nazareth. Rome didn't see it coming.