This volume sets about presenting a collection of essays as ambitious as its title would suggest. While the editorial focus on Abrahamic religions and their pagan counterparts is more or less consistent, the concentration on third-century conflict is not always strictly followed. While Jacob A. Latham's ‘Battling bishops’ (pp. 126–37), Ari Finkelstein's ‘The use of Jews in Julian's program’ (pp. 168–78) and Ross S. Kraemer's ‘Gendering (the) competition’ (pp. 200–19) each stand individually as compelling pieces of scholarship, they push the focus into the fourth or fifth century. Kraemer's piece stands as the last article in the collection and takes as its subtitle the title of the collection itself (‘Religious competition in the third century: Jews, Christians, and the Greco-Roman world’) but discusses at length the storied interactions of the very fourth-century Jerome with his retinue of religious women. Three articles of the seventeen have their focus outside the self-imposed third-century restriction. This is contrary to the stated editorial goal in the very first paragraph of the volume's introduction: ‘While many scholars tend to begin with the third century, they typically only address it superficially before springing forward into the fourth century or beyond … As a result, these texts from the third century are often read through a distorted lens.’ Moreover, where the articles do concern themselves primarily with the third century, they tend to focus on internal conflict in a single religious tradition and not necessarily on effects upon other faiths. This is perhaps to be expected given the diversity of the authors who had first met at a Society of Biblical Literature conference, but does result in a collection of rather varied interpretations of the thematic ‘competition’. Such diversity slightly hinders the collection's cohesiveness.

The volume does present individually important surveys of religious competition. The articles by Latham, Finkelstein and Kraemer appealed to this present reviewer's personal expertise in fourth-century Christianity, as they will likely appeal to a wide range of church historians who find the tumultuous post-Constantine period to be of interest. Daniel C. Ullucci's opening article ‘What did he say? The ideas of religious experts and the 99%’ (pp. 21–31) is a pleasantly presented discourse on the makings of an ‘expert’ that includes themes as relevant to modernity as they were to antiquity. Steven J. Larson's ‘The trouble with religious tolerance in Roman antiquity’ (pp. 50–9) pushes back against the indelicate language of ‘toleration’ and its anachronistic implications to describe Roman attitudes to foreign beliefs.

In total, this collection of essays can be commended for its admirable approach to the rather underappreciated third century, although its adherence to its own theme is not strict. None the less, the clarity of its contents and its standout articles make it a welcome addition for any scholar of early Christianity who would like to read innovative approaches to a neglected third century.