Rich and Poor in the Shepherd of Hermas: An Exegetical-Social Investigation

The references to social differences in the Shepherd especially in the second Similitude and the tenth Mandate, suggest a social context in which traditional biblical values of attention to the poor are in tension with the behavior of the members of the church community to which the author belongs. Rather than the usual judgement of the Shepherd as a treatise on early penitential discipline, it is in fact a window into the social relationships and challenges of an early second-century Christian community.