Book Review - The Lost Letters of Pergamum (Part I)

If you love the novel “The Shadow of Galilean” by Gerd Theissen, you’d probably enjoy reading “The Lost Letters of Pergamum” by Bruce Longenecker as I did. The genre of the latter however is very much different from the former. What is common between them is both authors are New Testament scholars, both their story is fictional intermingled with historical facts and the setting of their narrative is both in first-century NT time.

“The Lost Letters of Pergamum” is a collection of correspondence between Antipas from Pergamum and Luke in Ephesus. The story began with Antipas invited Calpurnius of Ephesus, the son of Theophilus, to attend a gladiatorial game in Pergamum to be organized by his noble friend, Rufinus. Through the correspondence, Antipas becomes acquainted with Luke who is a real closed friend of Calpurnius and is helping him to oversee his household when Calpurnius has to leave town for a family matter. Antipas by origin is a pagan civic benefactor of his home cities Tyre and Caesarea. He was in Pergamum because of his great interest in studying historical documents. Because of such interest, Antipas soon develops a steady friendship with Luke after reading Luke’s monograph accounting for the life of Jesus of Nazareth. He corresponded with Luke frequently about his reading of the gospel. Later, under Luke’s recommendation, Antipas took the challenge to join a Christian gathering for fellowship at one of the Christians’ house in Pergamum

Antipas began by joining Kalandion’s group with his friend Rufinus, but soon realized that the social life of Christians there was far from what was being said in Luke’s narrative. People at Kalandion’s group were very conscious about their status quo and were attracted to Jesus’ miracles more than by his teaching. On Luke’s advice, Antipas attempted another Christian group led by Antonius. His experience with Antonius’ household and the Christian friends gathered there immediately drew him to reflect deeply in the biblical account of Luke. The fellowship at Antonius’ house was warm and sincere, and the spirit of brotherhood was evident and real. The people were opened to one another and cared for one another irrespective of social status. Noblemen, civic officials, merchants, artisans, women, and even people with no social rank at all like Simon ben Joseph, a past employee of Antipas, was treated as a Christian brother.

Longenecker's account of "The Lost Letters of Pergamum" is undoubtedly convincing and believable. His invention of an editor's preface to introduce the discovery of the "Lost Letters" and the additional footnotes about the dating of those letters is genius. It truly does create an effect like one is actually reading a long lost ancient manuscript. Although the book contains only letter correspondence, the story is carefully constructed out of a cinematic traditional plot. The main character Antipas was introduced as an enthusiast of the gladiatorial game at the beginning, but ironically he had become a victim of the game at the end for his friend's sake.