Politeuma

In her book on The Jews under Roman Rule(225-6), Mary Smallwood observes that the Jews of Alexandria sought to retain their cohesion not only by synagogues but through formation into quasi-civic organizations known as politeumata: 

“A polieteuma was a recognized, formally constituted corporation of aliens enjoying the right of domicile in a foreign city and forming a separate, semi-autonomous civic body, a city within a city; it had its own constitution and administered its internal affairs as an ethnic unit through officials distinct from and independent of those of the host city. It had to be officially authorized by the local ruler or civic body, presumably by a written charter setting out its rights and constitution. . . . Politeumata were a regular feature of Hellenistic cities, and the Jews of the Diaspora could easily be fitted into this pattern and enjoy an official standing in gentile cities without being integrated into their life and therefore without being faced with the dilemma of being expected to participate in their religious observances.”

Smallwood points to evidence of Jewish politeumata elsewhere – throughout Ionia, according to Josephus.

What light might this throw on Paul’s use of the term in Philippians 3:20, where he speaks of a heavenly politeuma? On the one hand, he uses a known political term, one familiar to Jews as well as Greeks. On the other hand, he shifts the balance by locating the politeuma not as an earthly ghetto within a Greco-Roman city but in heaven. At the very least, the term seems to express both the continuity and discontinuity between Jewish communities and the church.