»Y^LE«¥lMWE]iSSflW-

DIVINITY SCHOOL
TROWBRIDGE LIBRARY

GIFT OF
Estate of
The Rev. Orrille A. Petty

THE LIFE AND EPISTLES

ST. PAUL.

UUINS OK TIIK SITL OK EIMIESUS.

PEOPLE'S EDITION.

THE LIFE AND EPISTLES

Saint Paul.

BT
THE REV. W. J. CONYBEARE, M.A.,
LATE FELLOW OF TRINITY COLLEGE, CAMBRIDGE ;
AND
THE REV. J. 8. HOWSON, D.D.,
PRINCIPAL OF THE COLLEGIATE INSTITUTION, LIVERPOOL.
WITH
A PRELIMINARY DISSERTATION BY
THE EEV. LEONARD BACON, D. D.,
PR0EES30R OF REVEALED THEOLUGY IN YALE COLLEGE.

HAETFOED, CONK:
S. S. SOEA^TO^ & CO.
1896.

PREFACE

THE PEOPLE'S EDITION.

r 1 1 HOUGH the death of one of the writers of this book has
-*- now thrown the sole responsibility of revision on the sur
vivor, the plan of a " People's Edition " was contemplated by both
writers from the time when the first edition was published.
The survivor, in doing his best, while his life was yet spared,
to prepare for a wider circle of readers a book which has been
received with remarkable favor, has found, however, the execu
tion of the plan beset with peculiar difficulties. The simplest
course would have been to give the text of the work without
the notes ; but it was soon seen that many parts of the narrative
would thus have been left destitute of important illustration, and
many passages of the Epistles would have embarrassed, rather
than helped, the mere English reader. On the assumption, then,
that some of the notes must be retained, a question arose as to
the selection. The writer of this preface might easily have cut
down his own notes to a very narrow compass ; but how was he
to deal with the notes of a friend whom he could not consult ?
To have omitted nearly all the former, and to have retained all
the latter, would have been to disturb the whole symmetry of
the book. Then came the further difficulty, — that, so far as the

Tl PREFACE TO THE PEOPLE'S EDITION.
notes were criticisms of passages in the New Testament, they
were, in the two former editions, based on the original text. Ex
clusion or adaptation in all such cases was necessary for the reader
who is presumed not to know Greek. But criticisms of this kind
are, of course, by far the most frequent in the notes on the
Epistles, which were not translated by the present editor : so that
some change was most required precisely where, to him, adapta
tion was most difficult of execution, or where he was naturally
most unwilling to assume the responsibility of exclusion.
It is hoped, that, under all these circumstances, general appro
bation will be secured for the arrangement which has been
adopted. Those readers have throughout been kept in view,
who, though well educated, would not find it easy to refer to
Greek or German books. Some few technical Greek terms are
retained ; and here and there there is a reference to classical
authors, which has seemed peculiarly important, or which it was
hardly worth while to remove : but, on the whole, there are few
citations except from books which are easily within reach. The
references to Scripture are very frequent ; and it is believed that
such references can hardly be too frequent. It is presumed that
the reader has the Authorized Version before him ; at the same
time, it is hoped that the notes will continue to be useful to stu
dents of the Greek New Testament. Some criticisms must
necessarily, however, be taken for granted ; and, in such cases,
occasional reference has been made to the two larger editions.1
In Mr. Conybeare's part of the work, no alteration whatever has
been made, except as regards the verbal adjustments requisite
for leaving out the Greek.2 It is impossible to know whether his
1 The first edition, in quarto, and with course of a thorough repernsal : but, besides
very numerous illustrations, was completed in the modifications mentioned above, the notes
1852 : the second, with fewer illustrations, but in the narrative portion are very considerably
after careful revision, was published in 1856. retrenched. Thus each of the three editions
In this edition, the illustrations are still few- has a character of its own.
er ; the text is unaltered, with the exception 2 This remark applies to the general bodi
of slight verba? changes suggested in the of the work. The Appendices, written by Mr

PREFACE TO THE PEOPLE'S EDITION. vn
translation of some phrases and his interpretation of some texts
might have been modified if he had taken part in the revision.
Wherever it has been thought worth while to express a difference
of opinion, this is separately indicated.1 Such cases are very few.
The separate responsibilities of the whole work are clearly stated
in the Postscript to the Introduction.
The present writer is far from satisfied with the result of what
he has done, in this edition, with considerable labor, and to the
best of his judgment and ability ; but this he can say with truth,
that, while he feels the imperfection of his own work, this last
revision has left in his mind a higher estimate than ever of the
parts written by his fellow-laborer and friend. J. S. H.
Conybeare, have been abbreviated in conformity and other retrenchments have been made here
with the principles stated above. Such ques- in accordance with the special aim of this
tions as the verbal peculiarities of the Pastoral edition.
Epistles could hardly be presented with clear ' By notes in square brackets, distinguished
ness to those who have no knowledge of Greek; by the letter h.

INTRODUCTION.1

THE purpose of this work is to give a living picture of St. Paul himself, and of the
circumstances by which he was surrounded.
The biography of the Apostle must be compiled from two sources : first, his own let
ters ; and, secondly, the narrative in the Acts of the Apostles. The latter, after a slight
sketch of his early history, supplies us with fuller details of his middle life ; and his Epis
tles afford much subsidiary information concerning his missionary labors during the same
period. The light concentrated upon this portion of his course makes darker by contrast
the obscurity which rests upon the remainder ; for we are left to gain what knowledge we
can of his later years from scattered hints in a few short letters of his own, and from
a single sentence of his disciple Clement.
But, in order to present any thing like a living picture of St. Paul's career, much
more is necessary than a mere transcript of the scriptural narrative, even where it is full
est. Every step of his course brings us into contact with some new phase of ancient life,
unfamiliar to our modern experience, and upon which we must throw light from other
sources, if we wish it to form a distinct image in the mind. For example, to comprehend
the influences under which he grew to manhood, we must realize the position of a Jewish
family in Tarsus ; we must understand the kind of education which the son of such a
family would receive as a boy in his Hebrew home, or in the schools of his native city,
and in his riper youth " at the feet of Gamaliel " in Jerusalem ; we must be acquainted
with the profession for which he was to be prepared by this training, and appreciate the
station and duties of an expounder of the Law. And, that we may be fully qualified to
do all this, we should have a clear view of the state of the Roman Empire at the time,
and especially of its system in the provinces ; we should also understand the political
position of the Jews of the " Dispersion ; " we should be (so to speak) hearers in their
synagogues ; we should be students of their Rabbinical theology. And in like manner,
as we follow the Apostle in the different stages of his varied and adventurous career, we
must strive continually to bring out in their true brightness the half-effaced forms and
* [It has been thought better to leave this Intro- lating to views and illustrations are not strictly
duction quite nntouched, though the passages re- applicable to the present edition. — H.]
ix

X INTRODUCTION.
coloring of the scene in which he acts ; and while he " becomes all things to all men, that
he might by all means save some," we must form to ourselves a living likeness of the
things and of the men among which he moved, if we would rightly estimate his work.
Thus we must study Christianity rising in the midst of Judaism ; we must realize the
position of its early churches with their mixed society, to which Jews, Proselytes, and
Heathens had each contributed a characteristic element ; we must qualify ourselves to be
umpires (if we may so speak) in their violent internal divisions ; we must listen to the
<-' -ife of their schismatic parties, when one said, " I am of Paul ; and another, I am of
Apollos ; " we must study the true character of those early heresies which even denied
the resurrection, and advocated impurity and lawlessness, claiming the right " to sin that
grace might abound," * " defiling the mind and conscience " 2 of their followers, and mak
ing them "abominable and disobedient, and to every good work reprobate;"8 we must
trace the extent to which Greek philosophy, Judaizing formalism, and Eastern supersti
tion, blended their tainting influence with the pure fermentation of that new leaven which
was at last to leaven the whole mass of civilized society.
Again : to understand St. Paul's personal history as a missionary to the Heathen, we
must know the state of the different populations which he visited ; the character of the
Greek and Roman civilization at the epoch ; the points of intersection between the politi
cal history of the world and the scriptural narrative ; the social organization and grada
tion of ranks, for which he enjoins respect ; the position of women, to which he specially
refers in many of his letters ; the relations between parents and children, slaves and mas
ters, which he not vainly sought to imbue with the loving spirit of the gospel ; the quality
and influence, under the early Empire, of the Greek and Roman religions, whose effete
corruptness he denounces with such indignant scorn ; the public amusements of the peo
ple, whence he draws topics of warning or illustration ; the operation of the Roman law.
under which he was so frequently arraigned ; the courts in which he was tried, and the
magistrates by whose sentence he suffered; the legionary soldiers who acted as his
guards ; the roads by which he travelled, whether through the mountains of Lycaonia
or the marshes of Latium ; the course of commerce by which his journeys were so often
regulated ; and the character of that imperfect navigation by which his life was so many
times * endangered.
While thus trying to live in the life of a bygone age, and to call up the figure of the
past from its tomb, duly robed in all its former raiment, every help is welcome which en
ables us to fill up the dim outline in any part of its reality. Especially we delight to look
upon the only one of the manifold features of that past existence which still is living.
We remember with pleasure that the earth, the sea, and the sky still combine for us in
the same landscapes which passed before the eyes of the wayfaring Apostle. The plain
of Cilicia ; the snowy distances of Taurus ; the cold and rapid stream of the Cydnus ;
the broad Orontes under the shadow of its steep banks, with their thickets of jasmine and
1 Rom. vi. 1. 4 " Thrice have I suffered shipwreck," 2 Cor. xi.
8 Tit. i. 15. 26; and this was before he was wrecked upon
" Tit. 1. 16. Mellta.

INTRODUCTION. XI
o jander; the hills which "stand about Jerusalem,"1 the "arched fountains cold" in the
ravines below, and those " flowery brooks beneath that wash their hallowed feet ; " the
capes and islands of the Grecian Sea ; the craggy summit of Areopagus ; the land-locked
harbor of Syracuse ; the towering cone of iEtna ; the voluptuous loveliness of the Cam-
pauian shore, — all these remain to us, the imperishable handiwork of Nature. We can
still look upon the same trees and flowers which he saw clothing the mountains, giving
color to the plains, or reflected in the rivers ; we may think of him among the palms of
Syria, the cedars of Lebanon, the olives of Attica, the green Isthmian pines of Corinth,
whose leaves wove those " fading garlands " which he contrasts a with the " incorruptible
crown," the prize for which he fought. Nay, we can even still look upon some of the
works of man which filled him with wonder, or moved him to indignation. The " tem
ples made with hands'" which rose before him — the very apotheosis of idolatry — on
the Acropolis, still stand in almost undiminished majesty and beauty. The mole on which
he landed at Puteoli still stretches its ruins into the blue waters of the bay. The remains
of the Baian villas, whose marble porticoes he then beheld glittering in the sunset, — his
first specimen of Italian luxury, — still are seen along the shore. We may still enter
Rome as he did by the same Appian Road, through the same Capenian Gate, and wander
among the ruins of " Caesar's palace " 4 on the Palatine, while our eye rests upon the same
aqueducts radiating over the Campagna to the unchanging hills. Those who have visited
these spots must often have felt a thrill of recollection as they trod in the footsteps of the
Apostle ; they must have been conscious how much the identity of the outward scene
brought them into communion with him, while they tried to image to themselves the feel
ings with which he must have looked upon the objects before them. They who have ex
perienced this will feel how imperfect a biography of St. Paul must be without faithful
representations of the places which he visited. It is hoped that the views * which are
contained in the present work (which have been diligently collected from various sources)
will supply this desideratum. And it is evident, that, for the purposes of such a biogra
phy, nothing but true and faithful representations of the real scenes will be valuable ;
these are what is wanted, and not ideal representations, even though copied from the
works of the greatest masters : for as it has been well said, " Nature and reality painted
at the time, and on the spot, a nobler cartoon of St. Paul's preaching at Athens than the
immortal Rafaelle afterwards has done." 6
For a similar reason, maps have been given (in addition to careful geographical de
scriptions), exhibiting with as much accuracy as can at present be attained the physical
features of the countries visited, and some of the ancient routes through them, together
with plans of the most important cities, and maritime charts of the coasts and harbors
where they were required.
i " The hills stand about Jerusalem : " even so sentence in the text applies in strictness only to the
" standeth the Lord round about his people." Ps. quarto edition. In the intermediate edition, it was
rxxv. 2. remarked in a note, that, even there, " most of the
2 1 Cor. ix. 25. larger engravings were necessarily omitted, on
8 Acts xvii. 24. 4 Phil. 1. 13. account of their size." — H.]
fBee note on p. ix, and the Preface. The • Wordsworth's Athens and Attica, p. 76.

XH INTRODUCTION.
While thus endeavoring to represent faithfully the natural objects and architectural
remains connected with the narrative, it has likewise been attempted to give such illus
trations as were needful of the minor productions of human art as they existed in the firsi
century. For this purpose, engravings of coins have been given in all cases where they
seemed to throw light on the circumstances mentioned in the history ; and recourse has
been had to the stores of Pompeii and Herculaneum, to the columns of Trajan and Anto
ninus, and to the collections of the Vatican, the Louvre, and especially of the British
Museum. But, after all this is done, — after we have endeavored, with every help we can com
mand, to reproduce the picture of St. Paul's deeds and times, — how small would our knowl
edge of himself remain if we had no other record of him left us but the story of his adven
tures ! If his letters had never come down to us, we should have known indeed what he
did and suffered ; but we should have had very little idea of what he was.1 Even if we
could perfectly succeed in restoring the image of the scenes and circumstances in which
he moved; even if we could, as in a magic mirror, behold him speaking in the school of
Tyrannus, with his Ephesian hearers in their national costume around him, — we should
still see very little of Paul of Tarsus. We must listen to his words, if we would learn to
know him. If Fancy did her utmost, she could give us only his outward, not his inward
life. " His bodily presence " (so his enemies declared) " was weak and contemptible ; "
but " his letters " (even they allowed) " were weighty and powerful." 2 Moreover, an ef
fort of imagination and memory is needed to recall the past ; but, in his Epistles, St. Paul
is present with us. " His words are not dead words ; they are living creatures with hands
and feet," a touching in a thousand hearts at this very hour the same chord of feeling
which vibrated to their first utterance. We, the Christians of the nineteenth century,
can bear witness now, as fully as could a Byzantine audience fourteen hundred years ago,
to the saying of Chrysostom, that " Paul by his letters still lives in the months of men
throughout the whole world : by them not only his own converts, but all the faithful even
unto this day, yea, and all the saints who are yet to be born until Christ's coming again,
both have been and shall be blessed." His Epistles are to his inward life what the moun
tains and rivers of Asia and Greece and Italy are to his outward life, — the imperishable
part which still remains to us when all that time can ruin has passed away.
It is in these letters, then, that we must study the true life of St. Paul, from its inmost
depths and springs of action, which were " hidden with Christ in God," down to its most
minute developments and peculiar individual manifestations. In them we learn (to use
the language of Gregory Nazianzene) " what is told of Paul by Paul himself." Their
most sacred contents, indeed, rise above all that is peculiar to the individual writer ; for
they are the communications of God to man concerning the faith and life of Christians,
which St. Paul declared (as he often asserts) by the immediate revelation of Christ him-
1 For his speeches recorded in the Acts, charao- by his Epistles, they become an important part of
teristic as they are, would by themselves have been his personal biography. 2 2 Cor. x. 10,
too few and too short fro add much to our knowl- 3 Luther, as quoted in Archdeacon Hare's Mift-
edge of St. Paul; but, il 'jstrated as they now are sion of the Comforter, p. 449.

INTRODUCTION. xin
self. But his manner of teaching these eternal truths is colored by his human character,
and peculiar to himself. And such individual features are naturally impressed much
more upon epistles than upon any other kind of composition : for here we have not trea
tises or sermons, which may dwell in the general and abstract, but genuine letters, writ
ten to meet the actual wants of living men ; giving immediate answers to real questions,
and warnings against pressing dangers ; full of the interests of. the passing hour. And
this, which must be more or less the case with all epistles addressed to particular church
es, is especially so with those of St. Paul. In his case, it is not too much to say that his
letters are himself, — a portrait painted by his own hand, of which every feature may be
" known and read of all men.''
It is not merely that in them we see the proof of his powerful intellect, his insight into
the foundations of natural theology 1 and of moral philosophy ; " for in such points,
though the philosophical expression might belong to himself, the truths expressed were
taught him of God. It is not only that we there find models of the sublimest eloquence
when he is kindled by the vision of the glories to come, the perfect triumph of good over
evil, the manifestation of the sons of God, and their transformation into God's likeness,
when they shall see him no longer 3 " in a glass darkly, but face to face," — for in such strains
as these it was not so much he that spake as the Spirit of God speaking in him,4 — but in
his letters, besides all this which is divine, we trace every shade, even to the faintest, of
his human character also. Here we see that fearless independence with which he " withstood
Peter to the face ; "5 that impetuosity which breaks out in his apostrophe to the " foolish
Galatians ; " * that earnest indignation which bids his converts " beware of dogs, beware of
the concision," 7 and pours itself forth in the emphatic " God forbid " * which meets every
Antinomian suggestion ; that fervid patriotism which makes him " wish that he were him
self accursed from Christ for his brethren, his kinsmen according to the flesh, who are Is
raelites ; " ' that generosity which looked for no other reward than " to preach the Glad-
Tidings of Christ without charge," 10 and made him feel that he would rather " die than
that any man should make this glorying void ; " that dread of officious interference which
led him to shrink from " building on another man's foundation; "" that delicacy which
shows itself in his appeal to Philemon, whom he might have commanded, " yet for love's
sake rather beseeching him, being such an one as Paul the aged, and now also a prisoner
of Jesus Christ,"12 and which is even more striking in some of his farewell greetings, as
(for instance) when he bids the Romans " salute Rufus, and Ms mother, who is also mine ; " "
that scrupulous fear of evil appearance which " would not eat any man's bread for
nought, but wrought with labor and travail night and day, that he might not be charge
able to any of them ; " " that refined courtesy which cannot bring itself to blame till it has
1 Eom. 1. 20. express the force of the original by any other Eni?
' Rom. ii. 14, 15. Ush phrase.
« 1 Cor. xiii. 12. ° Eom. ix. 3.
* Matt. x. 20. ™ 1 Cor. ix. 15 and 18.
' Gal. ii. 11. u Rom. xv. 20.
i q.bi, jii, i, u Philemon 9.
' l"iil. iii. 2. ls Rom. xvi. 13.
" Rom. •¦' 2; 1 Cor. vi. 15, &c. It is difficult to "1 Thess. ii. 9.

XIV INTRODUCTION.
first praised,1 and which makes him deem it needful almost to apologize for the freedom
of giving advice to those who were not personally known to him ; ' that self-denying love
which " will eat no flesh while the world standeth, lest he make his brother to offend ; " *
that impatience of exclusive formalism with which he overwhelms the Judaizers of Galatia,
joined with a forbearance so gentle for the innocent weakness of scrupulous consciences ; '
that grief for the sins of others, which moved him to tears when he spoke of the enemies
of the cross of Christ, " of whom I tell you even weeping ; " 6 that noble freedom from jeal
ousy with which he speaks of those, who, out of rivalry to himself, preach Christ even of
envy and strife, supposing to add affliction to his bonds, — " What then ? notwithstanding
every way, whether in pretence or in truth, Christ is preached ; and I therein do rejoice,
yea, and will rejoice ; " ' that tender friendship which watches over the health of Timothy
even with a mother's care ; ' that intense sympathy in the joys and sorrows of his converts
whinh could say even to the rebellious Corinthians, " Ye are in our hearts, to die and
live with you ; " * that longing desire for the intercourse of affection, and that sense of
loneliness when it was withheld, which perhaps is the most touching feature of all, be
cause it approaches most nearlv to a weakness, — " When I had come to Troas to preach
the Glad-Tidings of Christ, and a door was opened to me in the Lord, I had no rest in my
spirit because I found not Titus my brother ; but I parted from them, and came from
thence into Macedonia." And, " when I was come into Macedonia, my flesh had no rest,
but I was troubled on every side : without were fightings, within were fears. But God,
who comforts them that are cast down, comforted me by the coming of Titus."8 "Do
thy utmost to come to me speedily : for Demas hath forsaken me, having loved this pres
ent world, and is departed to Thessalonica ; Crescens to Galatia, Titus to Dalmatia; only
Luke is with me." 10
Nor is it only in the substance, but even in the style, of these writings, that we recog
nize the man Paul of Tarsus. In the parenthetical constructions and broken sentences,
we see the rapidity with which the thoughts crowded upon him, almost too fast for utter
ance ; we see him animated rather than weighed down by " the crowd that presses on him
daily, and the care of all the churches," u as he pours forth his warnings or his arguments
in a stream of eager and impetuous dictation, with which the pen of the faithful Tertius
can hardly keep pace.12 And, above all, we trace his presence in the postscript to every
letter, which he adds as an authentication, in his own characteristic handwriting,18 " which
is a token in every epistle : thus I write." " Sometimes, as he takes up the pen, he is
moved with indignation when he thinks of the false brethren among those whom he
addresses : " The salutation of me Paul with my own hand : if any man love not the
1 Compare the laudatory expressions in 1 Cor. ' 1 Tim. v. 23.
i. 6-7, and 2 Cor. i. 6, 7, with the heavy and almost 8 2 Cor. vii. 3.
unmingled censure conveyed in the whole subse- fl 2 Cor. ii. 13, and vii. 5.
quent part of these Epistles. 10 2 Tim. iv. 9. "2 Cor. xi. 28.
* Rom. xv. 14, 15. 12 Rom. xvi. 22. " I Tertius, who wrote this
» 1 Oor. viii. 13. Epistle, salute you in the Lord."
« 1 Oor. viii. 12, and Rom. xiv. 21. ls Gal. vi. 11. " See the size of the characters in
6 Phil. iii. 18. which I write to you with my own hand."
• Phil. i. 16. " 2 Thess. iii. 17.

INTRODUCTION. XT
Lord Jesus Christ, let him be accursed." J Sometimes, as he raises his hand to write, he
feels it cramped by the fetters which bind him to the soldier who guards him : * " I Paul
salute you with my own hand : remember my chains." Yet he always ends with the same
blessing, — « The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you ; " to which he sometimes
adds still further a few last words of affectionate remembrance, — " My love be with you
all in Christ Jesus." 8
But, although the letters of St. Paul are so essential a part of his personal biography,
it is a difficult question to decide upon the form in which they should be given in a work
like this. The object to be sought is, that they may really represent in Enghsh what they
were to their Greek readers when first written. Now, this object would not be attained
if the Authorized Version were adhered to ; and yet a departure from that whereof so
much is interwoven with the memory and deepest feelings of every religious mind should
be grounded on strong and sufficient cause. It is hoped that the following reasons may
be held such : —
1st, The Authorized Version was meant to be a standard of authority and ultimate
appeal in controversy : hence it could not venture to depart, as an ordinary translation
would do, from the exact words of the original, even where some amplification was abso
lutely required to complete the sense. It was to be the version unanimously accepted by
all parties, and therefore must simply represent the Greek text word for word. This it
does most faithfully, so far as the critical knowledge of the sixteenth* century permitted.
But the result of this method is sometimes to produce a translation unintelligible to the
English reader.5 Also, if the text admit of two interpretations, our version endeavors, if
possil le, to preserve the same ambiguity, and effects this often with admirable skill ; but
such indecision, although a merit in an authoritative version, would be a fault in a trans
lation which had a different object.
2d, The imperfect knowledge existing at the time when our Bible was translated made
it inevitable that the translators should occasionally render the original incorrectly ; and
the same cause has made their version of many of the argumentative portions of the
Epistles perplexed and obscure.
3d, Such passages as are affected by the above-mentioned objections, might, it is true,
have been recast, and the authorized translation retained in all cases where it is correct
and clear ; but, if this had been done, a patchwork effect would have been produced like
that of new cloth upon old garments : moreover, the devotional associations of the reader
would have been offended ; and it would have been a rash experiment to provoke such a
contrast between the matchless style of the Authorized Version and that of the modern
translator, thus placed side by side.
4th, The style adopted for the present purpose should not be antiquated ; for St. Paul
was writing in the language used by his Hellenistic readers in every-day life.
1 1 Cor. xvi. 22. c Tet, had any other course been adopted, every
• Coloss. iv. 18. 8 1 Cor. xvi. 24. sect would have had Its own Bible : as it is, this one
* Being executed at the very beginning of the translation has been all but unanimously received
seventeenth. for three centuries.

XVI INTRODUCTION.
5th, In order to give the true meaning of the original, something more than a mere
verbal rendering is often absolutely required. St. Paul's style is extremely elliptical, and
the gaps must be filled up. And, moreover, the great difficulty in understanding his argu
ment is to trace clearly the transitions 1 by which he passes from one step to another.
For this purpose, something must occasionally be supplied beyond the mere literal ren
dering of the words.
In fact, the meaning of an ancient writer may be rendered into a modern language in
three ways : either, first, by a literal version; or, secondly, by a. free translation; or, thirdly,
by a paraphrase. A recent specimen of the first method may be found in the corrected
edition of the Authorized Version of the Corinthians, by Prof. Stanley ; of the Galatians
and Ephesians, by Prof. Ellicott ; and of the Thessalonians, Galatians, and Romans, by
Prof. Jowett ; all of which have appeared since the first edition of the present work
The experiment of these translations (ably executed as they are) has confirmed the view
above expressed of the unsatisfactory nature of such a literal rendering ; for it cannot be
doubted, that though they correct the mistakes of the Authorized Version, yet they leave
an English reader in more hopeless bewilderment as to St. Paul's meaning than that ver
sion itself. Of the third course (that ot paraphrase), an excellent specimen is to be found
in Prof. Stanley's paraphrases of the Corinthian Epistles. There is, perhaps, no better
way than this of conveying the general meaning of the Epistles to an English reader ;
but it would not be suitable for the biography of St. Paul, in which not only his general
meaning, but his every sentence and every clause, should, so far as possible, be given
There remains the intermediate course of a, free translation, which is that adopted in the
present work : nor does there seem any reason why a translation of St. Paul should be
rendered inaccurate by a method which would generally be adopted in a translation of
Thucydides. It has not been thought necessary to interrupt the reader by a note 2 in every instance
where the translation varies from the Authorized Version. It has been assumed that the
readers of the notes will have sufficient knowledge to understand the reason of such varia
tions in the more obvious cases. But it is hoped that no variation which presents any real
difficulty has been passed over without explanation.
It should further be observed, that the translation given in this work does not adhere
to the Textus Receptus, but follows the text authorized by the best MSS. Yet, though
the Textus Receptus has no authority in itself, it seems undesirable to depart from it
without necessity, because it is the text familiar to English readers. Hence the translator
has adhered to it in passages where the MSS. of highest authority are equally divided
1 In the translation of the Epistles given in the stroyed by such inattention in the Authorized Ver-
present work, it has been the especial aim of the sion I — " Who hath believed our report 1 So, then,
translator to represent these transitions correctly. faith cometh by hearing."
They very often depend upon a word which sug- 2 [See again note on p. ix, and the Preface. In
gests a new thought, and are quite lost by a want this edition, no note appended to the translations has
of attention to the verbal coincidence. Thus, for been altered in meaning. Only such changes are
instance, in Rom. x. 16, 17, — "Who hath given made as is required by the omission oi Greek
faith to our teaching J So, then, faith cometh by words. — H.l
teaching," — how completely is the connection da-

INTRODUCTION. XVII
between its reading and some other, and also in some cases where the difference between
it and the true text is merely verbal.
The authorities consulted upon the chronology of St. Paul's life, the reasons for the
views taken of disputed points in it, and for the dates of the Epistles, are stated (so far
as seems needful) in the body of the work or in the Appendices, and need not be further
referred to here.
In conclusion, the authors would express their hope that this biography may, in its
measure, be useful in strengthening the hearts of some against the peculiar form of unbe
lief most current at the present day. The more faithfully we can represent to ourselves
the life, outward and inward, of St. Paul, in all its fulness, the more unreasonable must
appear the theory, that Christianity had a mythical origin ; and the stronger must be our
ground for believing his testimony to the divine nature and miraculous history of our Re
deemer. No reasonable man can learn to know and love the Apostle of the Gentiles
without asking himself the question, " What was the principle by which, through such
a life, he was animated ? What was the strength in which he labored with such immense
results ? " Nor can the most sceptical inquirer doubt for one moment the full sincerity of
St. Paul's belief, that " the life which he lived in the flesh, he lived by the faith of the Son
of God, who died and gave himself for him." 1 " To believe in Christ crucified and risen,
to serve him on earth, to be with him hereafter, — these, if we may trust the account of
his own motives by any human writer whatever, were the chief if not the only thoughts
which sustained Paul of Tarsus through all the troubles and sorrows of his twenty-years'v
conflict. His sagacity, his cheerfulness, his forethought, his impartial and clear-judging
reason, all the natural elements of his strong character, are not, indeed, to be over
looked : but the more highly we exalt these in our estimate of his work, the larger share
we attribute to them in the performance of his mission, the more are we compelled to
believe that he spoke the words of truth and soberness when he told the Corinthians,
that, ' last of all, Christ was seen of him also ; ' 3 that ' by the grace of God he was what
he was ; ' that, ' whilst he labored more abundantly than all, it was not he, but the grace
of God that was in him.' "'
1 Gal. ii. 20. * 1 Cor. xv. 8. 8 Stanley's Sermons on the Apostolic Age, p 186.

POSTSCRIPT.

IT may be well to add, that, while Mr. Conybeare and Dr. Howson have undertaken
the joint revision of the whole work, the translation of the Epistles and Speeches of
St. Paul is contributed by the former ; the historical portion of the work principally, and
the geographical portion entirely, by the latter : Dr. Howson having written Chapters I.,
H., HI., IV., V., VI., VTL, Vin., IX., X., XL, XH., XIV., XVI., XX., XXI. (except the
earlier portion), XXII. (except some of the later part), XXDII., XXIV., the latter pages of
XVU., and the earlier pages of XXVI., with the exception of the Epistles and Speeches
therein contained ; and Mr. Conybeare having written the Introduction and Appendices,
and Chapters Xm., XV., XVH. (except the conclusion), XVm., XIX., XXV., XXVI.
(except the introductory and topographical portions), XX Vii., XX Viii., the earlier
pages of XXI., and some of the later pages of XXH

1 This seems the proper place for explaining tion. In such references, however, the rram-
the few abbreviations used. T. R. stands for bering of verses and chapters according to the
Textus Receptus; 0. T. for Old Testament; N. T. Authorised Version (not according to the Sep-
for New Testament; A. V. for Authorised Vtr- tuagint) has been retained, to avoid the causmg
sion ; and LXX. (after a quotation from the Old of perplexity to English readers who may at-
Testament) means that the quotation is cited by tempt to verify the references.

St. Paul, according to the Septuagint transla-

CONTENTS.

CHAPTER I. Run.
Great Men of Great Periods. — Period of Christ's Apostles. — Jews, Greeks, and Ro
mans. — Religious Civilization of the Jews. — Their History, and its Relation to that of
the World. — Heathen Preparation for the Gospel. — Character and Language ot the
Greeks. — Alexander. — Antioch and Alexandria. — Growth and Government of the
Roman Empire. — Misery of Italy and the Provinces. — Preparation in the Empire for
Christianity. — Dispersion of the Jews in Asia, Africa, and Europe. — Proselytes. —
Provinces of Cilicia and Judaea. — Their Geography and History. — Cilicia under the
Romans. — Tarsus. — Cicero. — Political Changes in Judaea. — Herod and his Fami
ly. — The Roman Governors. — Conclusion  I
CHAPTER H.
Jewish Origin of the Church. — Sects and Parties of the Jews. — Pharisees and Sad
ducees. — St. Paul a Pharisee. — Hellenists and Aramaeans. — St. Paul's Family Hel
lenistic, but not Hellenizing. — His Infancy at Tarsus. — The Tribe of Benjamin. —
His Father's Citizenship. — Scenery of the Place. — His Childhood. — He is sent to
Jerusalem. — State of Judaea and Jerusalem. — Rabbinical Schools. — Gamaliel. —
Mode of Teaching. — Synagogues. — Student-Life of St. Paul. — His early Man
hood. — First Aspect of the Church. — St. Stephen. — The Sanhedrin. — St. Stephen
the Forerunner of St. Paul. — His Martyrdom and Prayer  2t
- CHAPTER HI.
Funeral of St. Stephen. — Saul's continued Persecution. — Flight of the Christians. —
Philip and the Samaritans. — Saul's Journey to Damascus. — Aretas, King of Petra. —
Roads from Jerusalem to Damascus. — Neapolis. — History and Description of Damas
cus. — The Narratives of the Miracle. — It was a real Vision of Jesus Christ. — Three
Days in Damascus. — Ananias. — Baptism and first Preaching of Saul. — He retires
into Arabia. — Meaning of the Term " Arabia." — Petra and the Desert. — Motives to
Conversion. — Conspiracy at Damascus. — Escape to Jerusalem. — Barnabas. — Fort
night with St. Peter. — Conspiracy. — Vision in the Temple. — Saul withdraws to
Syria and Cilicia  ... 71
CHAPTER IV.
Wider Diffusion of Christianity. — Antioch. — Chronology of the Acts. — Reign of Caligu
la. — Claudius and Herod Agrippa I. — The Year 44. — Conversion of the Gen-

XXII CONTENTS.
tiles. — St Peter and Cornelius. — Joppa and Cassarea. — St. Peter's Vision. — Bap
tism of Cornelius. — Intelligence from Antioch. — Mission of Barnabas. — Saul with
Barnabas at Antioch. — The Name " Christian." — Description and History of Anti
och. — Character of its Inhabitants. — Earthquakes. — Famine. — Barnabas and Saul
at Jerusalem. — Death of St. James and of Herod Agrippa. — Return with Mark to
Antioch. — Providential Preparation of St. Paul. — Results of his Mission to Jerusa
lem   IM

CHAPTER V.
Second Part of the Acts of the Apostles. — Revelation at Antioch. — Public Devotions. —
Departure of Barnabas and Saul. — The Orontes. — History and Description of Selu-
cia. — Voyage to Cyprus. — Salamis. — Roman Provincial System. — Proconsuls and
Propraetors. — Sergius Paulus. — Oriental Impostors at Rome and in the Provinces. —
Elymas Barjesus. — History of Jewish Names. — Saul and Paul . . . 121
CHAPTER VI.
Old and New Paphos. — Departure from Cyprus. — Coast of Pamphylia. — Perga. —
Mark's Return to Jerusalem. — Mouutain-Scenery of Pisidia. — Situation of Anti
och. — The Synagogue. — Address to the Jews. — Preaching to the Gentiles. — Perse
cution by the Jews. — History and Description of Iconium. — Lycaonia. — Derbe and
Lystra. — Healing of the Cripple. — Idolatrous Worship offered to Paul and Barna
bas. — Address to the Gentiles. — St. Paul stoned. — Timotheus. — The Apostles re
trace their Journey. — Perga and Attaleia. — Return to Syria  139
CHAPTER VII.
Controveisy in the Church. — Separation of Jews and Gentiles. — Difficulty in the Narra
tive. — Discontent at Jerusalem. — Intrigues of the Judaizers at Antioch. — Mission of
Paul and Barnabas to Jerusalem. — Divine Revelation to St. Paul. — Titus. — Private
Conferences. — Public Meeting. — Speech of St. Peter. — Narrative of Barnabas and
Paul. — Speech of St. James. — The Decree. — Public Recognition of St. Paul's Mis
sion to the Heathen. — St. John. — Return to Antioch with Judas, Silas, and Mark. —
Reading of the Letter. — Weak Conduct of St. Peter at Antioch. — He is rebuked by
St. Paul. — Personal Appearance of the two Apostles. — Their Reconciliation . 171
CHAPTER VIIi:
Political Divisions of Asia Minor. — Difficulties of the Subject. — Provinces in the Reigns
of Claudius and Nero.— I. ASIA. — II. BITHYNIA. — IH. PAMPHYLIA. — IV.
GALATIA. — V. PONTUS. — VI. CAPPADOCIA — VH. CILICIA. — Visitation
of the Churches proposed. — Quarrel and Separation of Paul aud Barnabas. — Paul
and Silas in Cilicia. — They cross the Taurus. — Lystra. — Timothy. — His Cir
cumcision. — Journey through Phrygia. — Sickness of St. Paul. — His Reception in
Galatia. — Journey to the JEgean. — Alexandria Troas. — St. Paul's Vision . . 203

CHAPTER IX.
Voyage by Samothrace to Neapolis. — Philippi. — Constitution of a Colony. — Lydia. —
The Demoniac Slave. — Paul and Silas arrested. — The Prison and the Jailer. — The
Magistrates. — Departure from Philippi. — St. Luke. — Macedonia described. — Its

CONTENTS. XXTU
Condition as a Province. — The Via Egnatia. — St. Paul's Journey through Amphipo-
lis and Apollonia. — Thessalonica. — The Synagogue. — Subjects of St. Paul's Preach
ing. — Persecution, Tumult, and Flight. — The Jews at Beraa. — St Paul again perse
cuted. — Proceeds to Athens  24fi
CHAPTER X.
Arrival on the Coast of Attica. — Scenery round Athens. — The Piraaus and the "Long
Walls." — The Agora. — The Acropolis. — The " Painted Porch " and the " Gar
den." — The Apostle alone in Athens. — Greek Religion. — The unknown God. —
Greek Philosophy, — The Stoics and Epicureans. — Later Period of the Schools. —
¦ St. Paul in the Agora. — The Areopagus. — Speech of St. Paul. — Departure from
Athens .... ....... 298
CHAPTER XI.
Letters to Thessalonica written from Corinth. — Expulsion of the Jews from Rome. —
Aquila and Priscilla. — St. Paul's Labors. — Arrival of Timothy and Silas. — First
Epistle to the Thessalonians. — St. Paul is opposed by the Jews, and turns to the Gen
tiles. — His Vision. — Second Epistle to the Thessalonians. — Continued Residence in
Corinth  338
CHAPTER XII.
The Isthmus and Acrocorintbus. — Early History of Corinth. — Its Trade and Wealth. —
Corinth under the Romans. — Province of Achaia. — Gallio the Governor. — Tumult at
Corinth. — Cenchrea. — Voyage by Ephesus to Csesarea. — Visit to Jerusalem. —
Antioch .  357
CHAPTER XIH.
The Spiritual Gifts, Constitution, Ordinances, Divisions, and Heresies of the Primitive
Church in the Lifetime of St. Paul  372

CHAPTER XIV.
Departure from Antioch. — St. Paul's Companions. — Journey through Phrygia and Gala
tia. — Apollos at Ephesus and Corinth. — Arrival of St. Paul at Ephesus. — Disciples
of John the Baptist. — The Synagogue. — The School of Tyrannus. — Ephesian
Magic. — Miracles. — The Exorcists. — Burning of the Books .... 402
CHAPTER XV.
St. Paul pays a short Visit to Corinth. — Returns to Ephesus. — Writes a Letter to the
Corinthians, which is now lost. — They reply, desiring further Explanations. — State
of the Corinthian Church - St. Paul writes the First Epistle to the Corinthians . 418
CHAPTER XVI.
Description of Ephesus. — Temple of Diana : her Image and Worship. — Political Consti
tution of Ephesus. — The Asiarchs. — Demetrius and the Silversmiths. — Tumult in
the Theatre. — Speech of the Town-Clerk. — St. Paul's Departure . . . 4bl

XXIV CONTENTS.

CHAPTER XVII.
St. Paul at Troas. — He passes over to Macedonia. — Causes of his Dejection. — He meets
Titus at Philippi. — Writes the Second Epistle to the Corinthians. — Collection for the
poor Christians in Judaea. — Liberality of the Macedonians. — Titus. — Journey by
Illyricum to Greece .....  478
CHAPTER XVIII.
St. Paul's Return to Corinth. — Contrast with his First Visit. — Bad news from Galatia. —
He writes the Epistle lo the Galatians  518
CHAPTER XIX.
St. Paul at Corinth. — Punishment of contumacious Offenders. — Subsequent Character of
the Corinthian Church. — Completion of the Collection. — Phoebe's Journey to Rome.
— She bears the Epistle to the Romans .  539
CHAPTER XX.
Isthmian Games. — Route through Macedonia. — Voyage from Philippi. — Sunday at
Troas. — Assos. — Voyage by Mitylene and Trogyllium to Miletus. — Speech to the
Ephesian Presbyters. — Voyage by Cos and Rhodes to Patara. — Thence to Phoenicia.
— Christians at Tyre. — Ptolemais. — Events at Caesarea. — Arrival at Jerusalem . 585
CHAPTER XXI.
Reception at Jerusalem. — Assembling of the Presbyters. — Advice given to St. Paul. —
The Four Nazarites. — St. Paul seized at the Festival. — The Temple and the Garri
son. — Hebrew Speech on the Stairs. — The Centurion and the Chief Captain. — St.
Paul before the Sanhedrin. — The Pharisees and Sadducees. — Vision in the Castle. —
Conspiracy. — St. Paul's Nephew. — Letter of Claudius Lysias to Felix. — Night
Journey to Antipatris. — Caesarea ......... 620
CHAPTER XXH.
History of Judaea resumed. — Roman Governors. — Felix. — Troops quartered in Palestine.
— Description of Caesarea. — St. Paul accused there. — Speech before Felix. — Con
tinued Imprisonment. — Accession of Festns. — Appeal to the Emperor. — Speech before
Agrippa ....  652
CHAPTER XXIH.
Ships and Navigation of the Ancients. — Roman Commerce in the Mediterranean. — Corn-
Trade between Alexandria and Puteoli. — Travellers by Sea. — St. Paul's Voyage from
Caesarea, by Sidon, to Myra. — From Myra, by Cnidus and Cape Salmonc, to Fair
Havens. — Phoenix. — The Storm. — Seamanship during the Gale. — St. Paul's Vision.
— Anchoring in the Night. — Shipwreck. — Proof that it took Place in Malta. — Win
ter in thei Island. — Objections considered. — Voyage, by Syracuse and Rhegium, to
Puteoli  .... ... 677
CHAPTER XXIV.
The Appian Way. — Appii Forum and the Three Taverns. — Entiance into Rome. — The
Praetorian Prefect. — Description of the City. — Its Population. — The Jews in Rome.
— The Roman Church. — St. Paul's Interview with the Jews. — His Residence in
Rome • .... .79*

CONTENTS. XXV
CHAPTER XXV.
Delay of St. Paul's Trial. — His Occupations and Companions during his Imprisonment. —
He writes the Epistle to Philemon, the Epistle to the Colossians, and the Epistle to the
Ephesians (so called)  . 744
CHAPTER XXVI. '
The Praetorium and the Palatine. — Arrival of Epaphroditus. — Political Events at Rome.
— Octavia and Poppsaa. — St. Paul writes the Epistle to the Philippians. — He makes
Converts in the Imperial Household  779
CHAPTER XXVII.
Authorities for St. Paul's subsequent History. — His Appeal is heard. — His Acquittal. —
He goes from Rome to Asia Minor. — Thence to Spain, where he resides two Years.
— He returns to Asia Minor and Macedonia. — Writes the First Epistle to Timotheus. -
Visits Crete. — Writes the Epistle to Titus. — He winters at Nicopolis. — He is again
imprisoned at Rome. — Progress of his Trial. — He writes the Second Epistle to Timo
theus. — His Condemnation and Death  799

CHAPTER XXVTJJ..
The Epistle to the Hebrews. — Its Inspiration not affected by the Doubts concerning its Au
thorship. — Its Original Readers. — Conflicting Testimony of the Primitive Church
concerning its Anthor. — His Object in writing it. — Translation of the Epistle . 848
APPENDICES. '

Appendix I. — (On the Chronology of Gal. ii.)
Appendix IL — (On the Date of the Pastoral Epistles)
Appendix HI. — (Chronological Table and Notes)
INDEX 

PRELIMINARY DISSERTATION.

IT is not because this truly great work needs any commendation from me
that I consent to stand, as it were, for a little while between the learned
authors and their readers, but because I have ventured to hope that what I have
to say by way of introduction may be accepted as a humble contribution to the
usefulness of "The People's Edition." This Life of Paul the Apostle, with
his writings incorporated as biographical documents in a free but conscientious
translation, was designed originally for the use of scholars conversant in some
degree with the sources of the affluent and various learning by which the narra
tive is enriched and illustrated ; but in a People's Edition it will find, I doubt
not, many intelligent readers to whom the facts and considerations offered in
these few pages may be helpful.
Even an unbeliever, if he be at all intelligent, must admit that the Christian
religion is, at this moment, one of the most important facts in the condition of
the civilized world ; and that, ever since its first appearance in history, it has
been one of the most powerful among the forces that have impelled or controlled
the world's progress. The year which was fixed upon, fourteen hundred years
ago, as that in which Jesus Christ was born, has become, by the general consent
of civilized nations, the point from which all time is measured, backward to the
dimmest antiquity, and forward into the yet unknown future. In other words,
the importance of Christianity as a fact and a force in history is recognized
in the recognition of the Christian era. Any other method of dating, as, for
example, in the British Empire, from the accession of the reigning sovereign, or,
in our country, from the Declaration of Independence, is more for form than
for use. The attempt of revolutionary Prance to abolish the Christian era, and
to substitute for it the era of the Eepublic, was as futile as the simultaneous
attempt to abolish the division of time into weeks, and is already remembered

XXVIII PRELIMINARY DISSERTATION.
only as a curiosity of history. Nothing future is more certain than that, in the
progress of civilization and of international intercourse, making the knowledge
and the arts of Christendom a common possession for mankind, all nations will
learn to count their years and centuries from the supposed birthday of Christ.
So signally has this Christian religion inserted itself into the world's history.
It is not only a marvellous fact; it is a transcendent power : its beginning is the
one epoch from which all the centuries before and after must be measured.
No thoughtful man, then, can fail to be deeply interested in the inquiry con
cerning the origin of Christianity, however he may doubt or deny its authori
ty as a revelation from God. When, where, and how did this religion begin ? It
appears to-day under various forms and aspects, but always resting on the same
basis of alleged facts. In its dogmas, in its ritual, in its external discipline, it
has been modified from age to age ; at one time gradually corrupted by enthusi
asms or superstitions, at another time reformed. What was it in its beginning?
What were the ideas and sentiments, the faith, the expectations, the practices,
and the character, of those who were first called Christians ? Such questions,
surely, even if considered as historical questions only, are profoundly interesting
to a thoughtful mind. What sources of information are there from which we
may obtain a satisfactory answer to such questions ?
Apart from that little collection of writings which we call the New Testament,
we have really no information concerning the origin of Christianity. The great
est of all revolutions in human thinking and in human affairs began, and passed
through the earliest stage of its progress, in an obscurity beneath the notice of
philosophers and historians. When it first comes into recognition in secular
literature, its existence is already a mystery to be accounted for, and no light
appears in regard to its origin. Yet that was not a barbarous age. It was just
the age in which the old civilization had reached its highest advancement. Over
the wide extent of the empire that called itself the world, literature and the arts
were in their glory. Grecian culture and the Grecian spirit of speculation had
been superinduced upon the sterner qualities of the Roman race ; and many a
provincial city, as well as the great centre of dominion, had its literary men, and
its institute or college, in which accomplished teachers gave instruction in philoso
phy and rhetoric to crowds of pupils. But the literature of that age took no
careful notice, and made no deliberate record, of a movement, which, as we now
see, was destined to change the history of the world. Three eminent Eoman
authors, who lived near the close of the first century and in the beginning of
the second, and they only, mention distinctly the fact of Christianity as a new
religion ; but they give no intelligent report of how it came into being.

PRELIMINARY DISSERTATION. XXIX
It happens that those three authors were related to each other as friends.
1 te oldest of them, Caius Cobnelius Tacitus, was born about the year 55 of
the Christian era. Caius Plinius C^cilitjs Secundus, commonly called in
English the younger Pliny, was born in 61 or 62. Caius Suetonius Tban-
quillus was born about the year 70, or two years before the fall of Jerusalem.
They were all eminent men, of rare talents, accomplished by the best culture
which the time could give, personally conversant with public affairs, employed
in various offices of great responsibility, honored with the friendship of such an
emperor as Trajan, yet more desirous of winning celebrity with future ages by
literary achievements than by rising to the highest honors in the forum or in the
imperial court. Two of them were historians, recording with exquisite art, and
with something of philosophic sagacity, the events of their own age and of the age
immediately preceding. The other survives in a voluminous collection of
familiar letters to his friends, — just such memorials of men and times as the stu
dent of history most delights in. What information, then, do these three illus
trious authors give us concerning that most important theme in the history of
their century, the origin and early progress of the Christian religion ?
The great work of Suetonius is his " Lives of the Twelve Csesars," beginning
with Julius, and ending with Domitian. In his " Life of Claudius Caesar," whose
reign began a.d. 42, and continued about eight years, there is one sentence
which is commonly understood as referring to disturbances occasioned by Jewish
hostility to the belief in Jesus as the Christ : " He [Claudius] expelled from
Eome the Jews, who were continually raising tumults at the instigation of
Chrestus." 1 That brief sentence, as the reader of this volume will have occa
sion to observe, describes, no doubt, the expulsion which brought the Christian
Jew Aquila and his wife Priscilla from Italy to Corinth.2 But at present we
need only observe how meagre and unsatisfactory is the notice of a fact about
which our curiosity in this nineteenth century demands full information. If
the historian heedlessly wrote Chrestus for Christus, without inquiring what
any person of that name had to do with the riots, then the Christian religion,
some time after the year 42, and before the year 50, had become a subject of con
troversy among the Jews at Eome, and its enemies had attempted to suppress it
by violence ; and farther this witness has nothing to say.
But in his " Life of Nero," the successor of Claudius, there is another passage,
more explicit. Describing summarily those things done by Nero which were
in part blameless and in part praiseworthy, before touching upon the crimes
i " Judasos impulsore Ohresto assidue tumultu- » Acta xviii. 2. See pp. 336, 336, ot this volume.
antes Roma erpulit." — Suetonius, Claud. 25.

XXX PRELIMINARY DISSERTATION.
which have made that name forever infamous, he says, " The Christians, a sort
of men of a new and mischievous superstition, were severely punished." 1 It
seems, then, there were Christians at Eome when Nero was emperor. Their reli
gion was at that time new, and was considered (then, and forty or fifty years
later, when Suetonius told the story) a mischievous superstition. They were
severely punished for being Christians ; and, in the opinion of the historian, one
of the good things which Nero did, or at least one of the things in that reign
which deserve no reprehension, was the fact that Christians were thus punished.
But why did he not tell us something more about those Christians ? Surely he
might have told us (had he thought it worth the telling) what their new super
stition was, whence it came, what mischievous practice or tendency there was
in it. Could he have had only the faintest anticipation of what was to be
about two hundred years from the date of his writing, — a Christian Caesar in
the place of Nero, and that " new superstition " everywhere triumphant over the
old religion, — surely he would have taken pains to find out and to report some
authentic particulars concerning the origin and early progress of a movement
that was to bring about so great a change.
Of what Tacitus wrote, much has been lost; but there is one memorable pas
sage in which he speaks distinctly of the Christian religion. His " Annals " gave
the succession of leading events in the empire, from the death of Augustus,
a.d. 14, to the death of Nero, a.d. 68; and only about one-third of the ^reat
work has been lost. In the composition of such a work, nothing, it would seem,
could be more natural than that he should find occasion to describe with some
degree of minuteness, and with careful attention, the beginning and the early
propagation of Christianity. Such an occasion occurred to him. He could not
avoid speaking of the new religion ; but his account of it is very unsatisfactory
to us, who know the historic importance of the facts which he ought to have
described. Having narrated with picturesque effect the great conflagration of
Eome in the reign of Nero, and the efforts which the emperor made to efface
from the minds of men the suspicion that he was himself the author of that
destruction, Tacitus says, " Therefore Nero, to get rid of the rumor, substituted
as the criminals, and punished with most exquisite tortures, those persons, odious
for shameful practices, whom the vulgar called Christians. Christ, the author of
that name, was punished by the procurator Pontius Pilate in the reign of Tibe
rius ; and the deadly superstition, repressed for a while, broke out again not only
1 " Afflicti suppliciis Christlani, genus hominum mediocri laude digna, in unum contuli : ut eecerne-
superstitionis novsa ac malencsB." — Suet., Nero, 16. rem a probris ao aceleribuB ejus, de quibus dehinc
"Hrec partim nulla reprehensione, partim etianv non dicam." — Ibid. 19.

PRELIMINARY DISSERTATION. inrri
through JudaBa, the original seat of that evil, but through the city also, whither,
from every side, all things horrible or shameful flow together and come into vogue.
First, some were arrested who made confession ; then, by the information obtained
from them, a great multitude were found guilty, not so much of burning the city
as of a hatred of the human race. Even in their dying, they were made sport
of, — some covered with skins of beasts, that they might be mangled to death by
dogs ; others nailed to crosses ; others condemned to the flames, and, when the
day went down, they were burned for illumination in the night. Nero had offered
his own gardens for that spectacle, and gave at the same time a circus exhibition,
going about himself among the rabble in the dress of a charioteer, or actually
driving a chariot. The consequence was, that although the sufferers were
wicked, and worthy of extreme punishment, commiseration was awakened, as if
they suffered not from any consideration of the public welfare, but for the grati
fication of one man's cruelty." 1
Tacitus, then, making his record of public events, was compelled to take
notice of the Christian religion as a fact in the reign of Nero. He describes
more at length, what Suetonius mentions so briefly, the persecution of the
Christians at Eome by that emperor. He tells us that it followed the great con
flagration, which is known to have been a.d. 64. From him we learn, in addition
to what Suetonius has told us, the occasion and motive of the persecution, and
what cruelties were inflicted on the sufferers. He even gives some information
concerning the origin of that new religion ; that it arose in Judaea under the
reign of Tiberius, which extended, as we know, from a.d. 14 to A.d. 37 ; that
its name was derived from Christ, who was punished by the procurator Pilate,
whose term of office began, as is ascertained from other sources of information,
in the twelfth year of that reign ; that, instead of being suppressed by the pun
ishment inflicted on its author, it spread through Judaea, and through Eome itself.
Yet the description which he gives of Christianity is no more satisfactory to
our reasonable curiosity than the more compendious statement given by Suetonius.
The great conflagration, and the torture of Christians in Nero's gardens, were
1 " Ergo abolendo rumori Nero subdidit reos, et addita ludibrla, ut forarum tergis contecti laniatu
qusBsitissimis posnis adfecit, quos per flagitia invi- canum interirent, aut crucibus affixl, aut flammandi
sob, vulgus ChristianoB appellabat. Auctor nominis atque ubi deflclsset dies in usum nocturni luminis
ejus Christus, Tiberio imperitante, per procuratorem urerentur. Hortos auos ei spectaculo Nero obtule-
Pontium Pilatum, supplicio affectus erat. Repres- rat, et Oircenee ludicrum edebat, habitu auriga? per
saque in prsesens exitiabilis superstitio rarsus erum- mixtus plebi, vel curriculo insistens. Unde qui r ¦
pebat nen modb per Judseam, originem ejus maii, quam adversus sontes, etnoviasimaexempiameritoS;
sed per urbem etiam qub cuncta undique atrocia aut miseratio oriebatur, tanquam non utilitate publica,
pudenda coniluunt, celebranturque. Igitur primum sed in ssevitiam unius absumerentur." — Tacit., Ann.
eorrepti, qui fatebantur, deinde, indicio eorum multi- xv. 44. — The translation which I have given is aB
tndo ingens, hand perinde in crimine incendii, quam nearly literal as the difference of the two languages
odio human! generis convict! sunt. Et pereuntibus and the sententious brevity of the author w' 11 permit.

XXXI1 PRELIMINARY DISSERTATION.
within the reach of the historian's personal memory. As a child, he might have
seen what he describes so vividly. Forty years had passed, and he was writing
about Nero in the reign of Trajan ; but he did not think it necessary to recon
sider what he had received in childhood as the common opinion about the Chris
tian religion. Any inquiry concerning its principles or practices seemed to him
beneath the dignity of an historian. So, instead of telling us any thing which an
historical inquirer at this day, tracing the greatest of revolutions to its origin,
would be most eager to know, he dismisses the subject with a few bitter and
contemptuous phrases. Christianity — the very name of it was " vulgar : " per
sons of his rank and culture rarely had occasion to mention the "odious" thing;
it was a " deadly superstition." The wretches who in Nero's gardens were torn
to pieces by dogs for the amusement of the public, or were set up on crosses
that bystanders might enjoy the excitement of seeing so exquisite a form of
mortal agony, or were covered with combustible matter, and burned, to give light
as evening came on, deserved what they suffered ; though the populace held fast
the opinion that Nero was the great incendiary, and began to pity the wicked
sufferers, and to deem them the objects not so much of imperial justice as of
imperial cruelty. From this historian, then, we obtain only the scantiest infor
mation which he could give without failing to record what he recognized as a
significant incident in the reign of Nero.
Not far from the time when Tacitus was writing his " Annals," and Suetonius
his " Lives of the Caesars," Pliny, the intimate friend of both, was administering
the government of a province on the southern coast of the Black Sea. He had
been appointed PropraBtor of Bithynia and Pontus by the Emperor Trajan, a.d.
103, — about forty years after the persecution described by Tacitus. The last of
the ten books of his collected epistles contains his correspondence with Trajan,
mostly official. One of his despatches to the emperor gives some of that infor
mation concerning Christianity which the great historians disdained to give ;
and it has been preserved, not because the author thought that distant genera
tions would desire to know what he had happened to learn about that strange
religion, but only because he thought that the letter, like other letters of his about
matters of slight importance, would be valued for its literary merit. It was im
possible for him to conceive, that, of all his epistles, the one which in after-ages
would be most thought of, and which would make him known to millions of
readers, who, but for that, would never hear his name, was his business-like com
munication to the emperor on the question, what to do with Christians.
A close translation, with no attempt to represent the literary merit of the
original, will answer the purpose of laying before the reader just what Pliny

PRELIMINARY DISSERTATION. XXXUl
reported officially to the emperor about Christianity in Pontus and Bithynia,
some time within the first ten years of the second century : 1 —
" It is my custom, sir, to refer every thing about which I am in doubt to you ;
for who can better direct my hesitation, or remove my ignorance ?
" I have never been present at any judicial examination of Christians, so that I
am ignorant in what manner and to what extent it is usual to punish them or
to examine them. I have also been quite unable to decide whether there is
any discrimination on account of difference in age, or those who are of tender
age are treated in the same way with the more robust; whether pardon
is given to those who repent; or, if one has been at any time a Christian,
it is nothing in his favor that he has ceased to be such ; whether the mere
name is punished, or only those shameful practices which are connected with
the name.
" Meanwhile, in the case of those who have been accused before me of being
Christians, I have taken this course, — I have put the question to them, whether
they were Christians. To those who confessed I put the question again, and the
third time, threatening them with punishment. Those who persevered in that
confession I ordered to be taken to execution ; for I did not doubt, that, whatever
the nature of their confession might be, the pertinacity and inflexible obstinacy
ought to be punished. There have been some possessed with that sort of mad
ness, whom, because they were Eoman citizens, I have set down in the list of
persons who must be sent to Eome.2
"Soon, as often happens, the proceedings having caused the accusation to
spread in all directions, there came to be many sorts of cases.8 An anonymous
indictment was offered containing many names. I have thought proper to dis
charge those who deny that they are or have been Christians, when they repeated
after me a prayer to the gods, and offered worship, with incense and wine, to your
statue (which, for that purpose, I had ordered to be brought with the images of
the deities), and, besides all that, reviled Christ ; which things they who are really
Christians cannot, it is said, be forced to do. Others, named by an informer,4
said that they were Christians, and immediately denied, it : they said that they
had been, but had ceased to be, Christians ; some three, some more, and a few even
twenty years ago. These all venerated your statue and the images of the gods
• Plin. Ep. x. 96. The despatch and the empe- > Diffundente se crimine prares species inclde
ror's reply are given at full length in the original, runt.
accompanied with Melmoth's translation, by Dr. • "Indice,"— perhaps the same anonymous ft,
Lyman Coleman, Chr. Antiquities, pp. 26-30. former.
» Compare Acta xvi. 37, xxii. 25-27, xxv. 11, 12,
21,27.

XXXXV PRELIMINARY DISSERTATION.
they also reviled Christ. But they affirmed that the sum whether of their crilne
or of their error was this, — that they used to meet on a stated day before light,
and to sing among themselves, in turn, a hymn to Christ as to a god, and to
bind themselves by an oath, not to any wickedness, but that they would never
commit theft, robbery, nor adultery ; that they would never break their word ;
that they would never deny a trust when called to give it up : and, after these
performances, their way was to separate, and then meet again to partake
of food, but only of an ordinary and harmless kind.1 Even this they said they
had given up after my edict, by which, according to your orders, I had pro
hibited clubs.2
" Having heard so much, I deemed it the more necessary to ascertain the
truth by putting to the torture8 two women-servants who were called dea
conesses ; * but I found nothing more than a perverse and excessive superstition.
Therefore, having postponed the investigation, I betake myself to you for advice ;
for the affair seems to me to require such consultation, especially because of the
number of persons implicated : for many of every age, of every rank, and of
both sexes also, are summoned to trial, and will be summoned ; for the contagion
of that superstition has pervaded not only cities, but villages and also farms. It
can be, I think, resisted and corrected. At least, it is evident enough that the
temples, which a little while ago were forsaken, have begun to be frequented,
and sacred observances long intermitted are renewed ; and the flesh of sacrifices,
for which, of late, a purchaser could rarely be found, is now sold everywhere.6
And this makes it easy to think how many might be reformed if repentance can
gain pardon."
The sententious reply of Trajan to this letter adds nothing to the information
given in the letter itself. The emperor approves what Pliny has done. He
says that no fixed rule of proceeding in such cases can be given. At the same
time, he says that there should be no effort to find out Christians. If any are
accused and convicted, they must be punished ; yet if any man, being accused,
i "Ad caplendum olbum, prgmiscuum tamen et for any other purpose. It will not be difficult to
kmoxium." The word "promiscuum" may signify keep watch over so few." Trajan, in reply, adverted
that the food was distributed to all alike ; yet Taoi- to the factious character of the province, and espe-
tus uses it to signify that which is ordinary. olally of ita cities ; and said that organized societies
» This English word seems to represent fairly there, of whatever name, and for whatever object,
the word " hetajrias." In a former despatch (x. 42), would certainly become in a short time hetserise, or
Pliny, having reported to the emperor a conflagra- sodalities. One characteristic of the Roman sodali-
tion at Nicomedia, which had been very destructive tiea was that they were festive clubs, or lodges, and
for want of a competent flre-departmont, asked his were therefore easily perverted to political or fao-
advice about incorporating a tire-company of at least Uous uses.
a hundred and fifty mechanics. " I will take care," » Compare Acts xxii. 24.
he said, " that none but a mechanic shall be a mem- * " Minlstra."
ber, and that the privilege conceded shall not be used ' Compare 1 Oor. Till. 4-13, Acta xv. 29.

PRELIMINARY DISSERTATION. XXXV
shall deny that he is a Christian, and shall confirm his denial by worshipping
the Eoman gods, however suspected his former conduct may have been, let his
recantation clear him. Anonymous accusations are to be disregarded.
How much information concerning the early history of Christianity can we
gather from this correspondence ? The question, at present, is, not what light
Pliny's letter throws on information derived from other sources, but only how
much we should know if the incidental revelations made in this despatch, to
gether with what Suetonius and Tacitus tell us, were all our knowledge on the
subject. Suppose the statesmanship of Trajan and Pliny had extirpated that
" perverse and excessive superstition," and this correspondence had come down
to tell us about an extinct and forgotten religion : how much information would
it give us ?
1. In the tenth year of the second century, or earlier, the people called Chris
tians had become very numerous in Pontus and Bithynia, — so numerous, that,
by their influence, the resort to the temples of the established religion had been
seriously diminished. Nor had that new religion then for the first time invaded
the region. Some persons are mentioned who had not only accepted it, but had
afterwards apostatized from it, as far back as a.d. 90.
2. The Christian religion was regarded and treated by the Eoman Govern
ment as unlawful. It was a crime to be a Christian. At Eome, there had been,
in times then recent, prosecutions and trials of persons charged with that crime ;
for so much is very distinctly implied when Pliny says, by way of apology
for asking advice, that he had never attended at such trials.
3. It had become well understood that one who was really a Christian might
be expected to die rather than to speak ill of Christ, or to comply with the estab
lished religion in an act of worship. No such notion could have obtained cur
rency, unless the attempt had been made often and unsuccessfully to break
down the obstinacy of Christians in that respect. In this way, it was settled by
the good sense of Pliny, and by the approval of Trajan, that, in the case of any
person accused of Christianity, the question whether he was guilty might be
peremptorily decided by calling upon him to perform an act of worship to the
gods of the established religion, and to pronounce a malediction against Christ.
4. Ample testimony is given to the moral character of the Christians at that
time in Pontus and Bithynia. Eeluctant to punish men for a mere name,
Pliny, when men and women were brought before him charged with being Chris
tians, thought it necessary to prove against them some of the shameful practices
associated with that name in the common belief; but he could find no evidence
to convict them of any thing shameful. He received the testimony of renegades

XXXVI PRELIMINARY DISSERTATION.
who escaped punishment by renouncing their religion ; and th<»ir testimoi y was,
that the Christians were bound by a sacred covenant to do nothing wrong, and
that, in their assemblies, there was nothing worse than innocently eating together.
Not satisfied with this, he used his power as a magistrate to extort the truth
from those who were supposed to be keeping it back. He selected from among
the accused two female slaves who seemed to hold some sort of an office in the
Christian community ; and, having never thought that slaves could have any
rights which Eoman chivalry was bound to respect, he examined them by tor
ture : but they could only tell him the particulars of what he called a perverse
and unbounded superstition.
5. Who would not like to read, at this day, the questions which were put to
those two slave deaconesses on the rack, and the answers which they gave ?
History ought to know what that superstition was. Neither Suetonius nor Taci
tus told what it was : nor does Pliny tell us any thing more than what the rene
gades told him ; which was, that the Christians had a custom of meeting on a
certain day, at a very early hour, and singing a hymn to Christ as if he were a
god. Concerning the beliefs and tenets of the Christians, the origin of their
superstition, the methods in which it had been propagated, and the secret of the
tenacity with which it had maintained itself for more than forty years since
Nero undertook to suppress it at Eome, this correspondence gives no information.
We have been inquiring what the contemporaneous literature of the world
can tell us concerning the origin and early progress of the Christian religion, and
we have found little more than a careless recognition of Christianity as a fact
that was beginning to attract the hostile attention of the Eoman Government
in the latter part of the first century and the beginning of the second. We
learn from one author, that, about one thousand seven hundred and fifty-eight
years ago, it had a great multitude of adherents in that part of Asia Minor
which borders on the Black Sea ; from two others, that it was severely perse
cuted at Eome about forty-six years earlier ; and, from one of the two, that it
had its beginning in Judaea under the reign of Tiberius, whose officer, Pontius
Pilate, punished its author, Christ. By vestiges so few and faint, we trace it
back to about the thirtieth year of the Christian era, with regret that philoso
phers and historians who saw the fact of the new religion did not suspect how
important the fact was. A few years only after the date of Pliny's despatch
to Trajan, the new religion begins to make a larger figure in the literature of
the Eoman Empire ; and at the same time it begins to have a copious literature
of its own, from which we may ascertain, quite satisfactorily, what it then was,
not only in its doctrines and spirit and its morals, but also in its traditions con
cerning its own origin.

PRELIMINARY DISSERTATION. XXXV n
Now, that Christian literature, commencing not long before the middle of the
second century, is full of references to what we may call a more primitive Chris
tian literature, — the writings not indeed of Christ himself, but of his apostles
and earliest disciples. Those writings were held in great veneration, as giving
the original and authentic report of what Christ was, of what he said and did,
of the truth which he brought into the world, of a reconciliation to be effected
through him between human souls and God, and of the plan and hope which he
inaugurated for the- renovation of the world. We may, without any absurdity
or contradiction, suppose those primitive writings to have been lost, and the re
ligion of which they were the original and authentic record to have come down
to us in the living tradition of the Church, in formularies of doctrine or of wor
ship, in rules of government and discipline, and in the writings of the Christian
fathers from about the middle of the second century. But what a loss would that
have been ! what a loss to history ! what a loss to Christianity ! How diligent
ly would old libraries in Europe, and older monasteries in Arabian and Lybian
deserts, be explored and ransacked in the hope of finding those primitive docu
ments of the Christian religion ! History, patiently tracing back the greatest
of all revolutions to its origin, would say, " We can spare the lost books of Livy
and of Tacitus ; but give us those lost books in which the ' perverse, unbounded,
deadly superstition,' as the Eomans called it, portrayed itself at its beginning,
and recorded its own earliest conflicts and victories." Earnest and inquiring
believers would say, " Give us those lost books ; let us have our Christianity,
not from the fathers, but from those apostles and evangelists to whose writings
the fathers are continually referring us, not as defined and wrought into sys
tems by theologians, nor as formulated by councils, but as it was first received
from Christ himself, as it was first revealed in the story of his life and of his
death, as it was first written down by men whom he had personally taught and
commissioned." Suppose now, that, as has happened in respect to other books long lost, those
books, the primitive documents of Christianity, after having been lost for cen
turies, are at last recovered. Only a few years ago, an enthusiastic scholar,
travelling in search of ancient manuscripts, was so happy as to find in a convent
on Mount Sinai a copy of the New Testament, written, as indubitable indica
tions prove, full fifteen hundred years ago, — a volume so ancient, that the eyes
of Constantine or of Athanasius might have looked upon it. If that " Sinaitic
manuscript," when discovered, had been the only extant copy of the primitive
Christian documents, it is not difficult to imagine what would have been tht»
importance of the discovery, both in its relation to the earliest history of Chris-

XXXVHI PRELIMINARY DISSERTATION.
tianity, and in its relation to Christianity itself as a divinelj revealed religion;
Think with what carefulness the precious book would be transcribed and edited
for scholars ! how many translations of it would be made, that Christians every
where might read, every man in his own language, the original and authentic
record concerning Christ and his work and kingdom ! what treasures of learn
ing would be expended in the illustration of it ! what commentaries would be
made for all sorts of readers, and for various uses, historical, doctrinal, practical,
and devotional ! Think how the venerable writings of the fathers, from Justin
Martyr downward, would be compared with these more venerable writings, so
much nearer to the head-spring of the river of the water of life ! how the theo
logical systems of this nineteenth-century Christianity would be brought into
comparison with what Paul and John and Peter and the Master himself taught
concerning God and the way of life! what identities and resemblances would
be traced out, or what contrasts would be shown, between the various fabrics of
church polity now extant, and the societies of " holy persons in Christ Jesus, with
the overseers and servants," when Christianity was new ! how the accepted max
ims of Christian morality, and the ordinary standards of Christian character, would
be tested by comparing them with what was expected and what was demanded of
those who were called Christians in the reigns of Claudius and of Nero ! what
diligence would be employed to ascertain how far the Christian consciousness in
our day, with all that believing souls now experience of the power of godliness,
is accordant with the Christian consciousness of the apostles, and with their
experience of what they preached as the power of God to salvation !
Just such is the actual value, such the use we ought to make, and are making,
of the writings included in the New Testament; for our supposition only help?
us to realize more freshly a very familiar fact. These writings purport to give
us the testimony of personal witnesses concerning the origin of what is to-day
one of the most important elements in the history and condition of the world.
With these writings in our hands, we know how and where the Christian religion
had its beginning ; what obstacles it encountered and overcame ; by what means,
and by what concurrent forces in the providence of God, it was diffused through
the civilized world ; how it happened to attract so early the attention of the
Eoman Government ; and what its relations were to the Jewish people, and to
their immemorial and most peculiar religion. Thus the few documents contained
in the New Testament enable us to fill up what, without them, would have been
a mysterious and hopeless blank in the history of mankind. At the same time,
they have for us another and greater value. They bring us historically nearer to
the nerson of Christ than we can be brought by any possible help without them.

PRELIMINARY DISSERTATION. XXXIX
They give us his words as his nearest friends and daily companions caught them
from his lips. They show us what impression his unique person made on his
immediate disciples, both by all that they heard from him, and by all that they
saw in him ; what place he held in their religious consciousness, and in all their
thinking about the reconciliation between God and men ; what place he held in
their most reverent yet most tender affection, in their self-sacrificing zeal, in their
immortal hope ; what they thought of him, and what they said about him, when
he had passed away from among them. As we read these writings, we find our
selves brought into the circle nearest to Christ, among his earliest disciples.
We sit among those who listened to the Sermon on the Mount. We are with
the twelve as they learn from his parables, so slowly, what he teaches so patiently
concerning the kingdom of God among men. We are with them on the Lake of
Galilee, at Jacob's Well, in the house of the sisters at Bethany, in the grand
porches of the Temple. We sit with them on the Mount of Olives, overlooking
the city while he foretells its destruction. We are with them in the upper
room where he keeps his last passover ; and we go out with them, under the
full moon, into the garden. We look through their eyes upon his cross and his
tomb. We share in their amazement at his resurrection. We stand with them,
gazing upward, while a cloud receives him out of their sight. Then we are with
them in their consultations, waiting and praying, till they are summoned to their
work so humble, and yet so august. As we follow them, we presently lose sight
of them. The work they are doing is greater than they are : it overshadows them,
and they disappear. It is not for their sake that the story is told, but for
Christ's sake. It is of little moment to us that the New Testament gives no
complete biography of any apostle, — never tells us where Paul died, or Peter,
or John, or any of the twelve, save Judas the betrayer, and James the son of
Zebedee ; but, what is of great moment to us, it does tell us what they thought
of Jesus, and what the gospel was which he gave them for the world. We
might like to know all about the apostles, where they severally labored, and how
they died, as apocryphal legends falsely report ; but what the New Testament
tells is far better than any thing could be which it does not tell.
We may use a story as an illustration, without vouching for it as true. Many
years ago, it is said, there was published in Ireland, with the design of making
an impression on Eoman-Catholic readers, a little tract purporting to be "A
Genuine Letter from St. Peter." It was read by many, and heard by many who
could not read, with eager and reverent curiosity. Nor was there any deception
in the case. The little tract was just what it purported to be, " A Genuine Letter
from St. Peter." It was simply the First Epistle of Peter, taken from the New

XL PRELIMINARY DISSERTATION.
Testament ; and the reading or hearing of it was almost like sitting down with
the holy apostle himself to hear him talk to Christians about Christ and salva
tion. Just such is the privilege which we have in reading the primitive docu
ments of Christianity. Would you count it a privilege to hear from John the
apostle ? You have before you three very characteristic letters from him, one
of them quite extended ; and, what is more, he has written down for you in his
old age, and you have received from him, his oft-repeated stories of things which
he remembered about Jesus, but which had not till then been written. In like
manner, you have two letters from Peter, " epistles general," or " catholic," they '
are called, — one of them addressed, comprehensively, to the "strangers" or
sojourners, "chosen," "sanctified," "obedient," and "sprinkled with the blood
of Jesus Christ," who were dispersed through those northern districts of Asia
Minor, where Pliny, forty years afterward, found so many Christians ; the other
inscribed in yet more general terms " to them who have obtained like precious
faith with us." We need not name all the writers whom this one little volume
of the New Testament brings into direct communication with us ; but we can
not refrain from mentioning distinctly the characteristic letters of Paul, that
great apostle, whose labors were so abundant, whose missionary journeys had so
wide a circuit, and whose writings, whether addressed to individual friends or
to communities of Christians, are so full of his individual life, throbbing, as it
were, in every sentence, with the intensity of his Christian thought and feeling.
But are these documents really what they are supposed to be ? Intelligent
readers are aware that this question has been discussed with great learning and
diligence on both sides, and, on the part of some writers, with great audacity of
conjecture and assertion. A full consideration of the evidences which go to
prove that we have in the New Testament the primitive and authentic docu
ments of the Christian religion, and that such documents taken together, as
we find them, could not have come into being otherwise than contemporaneously
with the origin of that religion, would be impracticable within the limits of this
Preliminary Dissertation. Yet a few thoughts may be suggested which the
readers of "The Life and Epistles of St. Paul" will find occasion to appreciate
and to verify.
I. First of all, the remarkable fact, already referred to, that these documents
do not give us the means of tracing the life of any apostle to its end, and that
neither Paul nor any one of the original twelve (save Judas, and James the
brother of John) is mentioned or alluded to in the New Testament as dead,
cannot but impress an unprejudiced mind. The earliest authentic Christian

PRELIMINARY DISSERTATION. XXI
writing, outeide of the New Testament (a letter from the church at Borne to the
church at Corinth, written by Clement, " whose name is in the book of life "),'
mentions the deaths of Paul and Peter in a very natural way.2 How does it hap
pen that neither the death of Paul nor that of Peter is mentioned in any of the
New-Testament writings ? We may raise a more particular question on this point.
It has been said that the historical book called "The Acts of the Apostles" was
not written by Luke, the companion of Paul, but was put together by some
unknown compiler of traditions in the latter part of the second century ; and
that the " most excellent Theophilus," to whom it is inscribed, was none other
than Theophilus, Bishop of Antioch from a.d. 168 to a.d. 183. But, on that
supposition, how does it happen that the book terminates abruptly, leaving Paul
still a prisoner in his own hired house at Rome two years after his arrival there ?
Could not the compiler of traditions, when that apostle had been dead a hundred
years, find some tradition that would enable him to carry on the story ? What
became of the appeal to Caesar ? Did the appellant have a trial ? or did he
remain a prisoner till his death ? Surely such a termination of the story would
have been impossible at any date subsequent to the death of Paul. But if the
book was written, as it purports to have been, by one who was with Paul on the
journey, and arrived with him at Eome ; and if the Gospel according to Luke,
and then this book, its sequel, were written while the prisoner was waiting for
his trial, — there is the best possible reason for such a breaking-off without ending
the story ; and that is the only reason that can be conceived of without violating
all probability. The narrative is brought down to a point very near the date at
which the writing was ended.
May not the fact, then, that in these collected writings the apostles disappear
without our knowing what became of them, be taken as proof that they, were,
in their origin, contemporaneous with the apostles ? Had there been time for
tradition concerning the apostles to grow into fable, and for a halo of myth to
form itself around each saintly name, the story of what they did, and whither
they went, and where and how they died, could not have been left so imperfect
as we have it in the New Testament.
II. The attention of biblical scholars was long ago arrested by a certain
peculiarity of language or style, which, in one degree or another, characterizes
all the New-Testament writings. It can hardly be denied that the entire volume
was written by Hellenist Jews ; that is, by persons who used the Greek language
with Hebrew idioms. Of course, then, it was written when the Christian
community, for whose use at the first these writings were designed, consisted
1 Phil. iv. 8. 2 Clem. Rom. i. 5

XLTI PRELIMINARY DISSERTATION.
largely of Jewish converts, and when its leaders especially were men of JewisL
birth and training. Accordingly, the Hellenistic style or dialect is peculiar to
the New Testament. If we find any thing of it in the fathers, even in the
earliest of them, we cannot but ascribe the phenomenon to a conscious or
unconscious imitation of what is called the biblical or scriptural style, which is
really nothing else than the Hebrew style.
III. Another characteristic of the New Testament is much more to our
purpose. Its contents are an indication of its date. Some of the questions
which the Epistles, especially, touch upon distinctly as the live questions of
their time, are questions which, in a few years after the apostolic age, had
ceased to be controverted or agitated among Christians. In particular, the
question whether a Gentile could be a Christian, partaking in the privileges and
hopes of Christ's kingdom, without first becoming a Jew, was never a contro
verted question in the Christian community for any considerable time after the
fall of Jerusalem. On the contrary, when the separation of the new kingdom
of God from the old Mosaic institutions had been visibly completed, the tables
were turned ; and the question then was, rather, whether a Jew could be a
Christian without renouncing his nationality. But the New Testament was
written, as almost every page of it testifies, at a time when Christianity had not
yet been completely detached from Judaism, but was still, in the view of Syna
gogue and Sanhedrin, of procurators and proconsuls, and of mobs at Philippi,
at Ephesus, and at Jerusalem, a Jewish sect or schism. It shows upon its
surface the slow progress of conviction on that subject in the minds of the
apostles themselves ; how, while their Master was personally teaching them,
they never grasped the breadth of his conception ; how the day of Pentecost did
not quite emancipate them from their Jewish narrowness ; how even Peter's
vision at Joppa, and the interpretation forced upon him at Caesarea, did not
perfectly enlighten them ; and how, at last, the deputation from Antioch, with
their report of what Christianity was doing in the great city where it first
received its name, brought them to commit themselves in the most formal way
for the gospel of a kingdom of heaven in which there is neither Jew nor Gentile.
That " mystery," hid from foregoing ages, but revealed at last, crops out in the
Gospels ; for it underlies them. It gives unity to the story of the Acts of the
Apostles; it shines forth everywhere in the Epistles of Paul, whose "false
brethren," Jews professing to believe in Christ, and trying to make the gospel a
monopoly for Judaism, were his most vexatious adversaries. Can any reader of
those writings believe that the New Testament, so full of that essentially tran
sient question, was forged, or somehow grew, as a myth grows, after that question
had begun to be forgotten ?

PRELIMINARY DISSERTATION. XLHI
IV. We who receive these writings as not only apostolic but divinely inspired
encounter a serious difficulty in our interpretation of them. If they are what
they purport to be, they seem to show that the first Christians, under the
teaching of the apostles who reported to them the words of Christ, were expect
ing what is now called Christ's ¦ second advent, as an event that was to take
place before that generation should have passed away; and that, with that
expected coming of Christ, they generally associated in their thoughts the
resurrection of the dead, the final judgment, and the end of the world. Yet
to-day, at the end of eighteen hundred years, Christ has not come again in
manner and form as he was expected to come in the lifetime of the apostles.
We recognize the difficulty, though we hold, that, in one way or another, it can
be solved without impairing our reverence for these Scriptures. There is no
need of our pausing here to show how it can be solved ; for at present we have to
do with it as a fact rather than with the solution of it. Indeed, if the difficulty
should even be pronounced incapable of any solution consistent with the inspi
ration of these Scriptures, the fact that there is such a difficulty would be only
so much the more conclusive in its bearing on the question now before us. Are
these collected writings, as they purport to be, the primitive records of Chris
tianity, contemporaneous with its origin ? If they are not, but were forged at
some later date (even though it were only a few years later) by writers who
thought that the pious fraud of personating the apostles was a service acceptable
to God, how was it possible for those pious forgers, after the apostles, and, with
them, all the men of the apostolic age, were dead, not to beware of creating such
a difficulty ? Is it less than absurd to suppose that they deliberately put into
the documents they were forging what was likely to pass for evidence that the
apostles were in error about the day of the Lord? Would they not have
distinguished more carefully between Christ's coming to judge all nations, and
his coming in the destruction of Jerusalem and of the Temple ? — between the
end of the world and the end of the Mosaic dispensation ?
V. Any contriver of an hypothesis to account for the existence of the New-
Testament documents, without admitting their historic value as contemporaneous
with the origin of Christianity, ought to show us where or by whom, prior to the
beginning of the third century, such writings could have been produced. Let
him compare them with what genuine remains we have of Christian authorship
in the age immediately following the apostles, — the Epistle of Barnabas, the
Shepherd of Hermas, the Epistles of Ignatius. The man who could write the
fourth Gospel, without having been a personal disciple of Jesus, must have been
r, man of mark in his time. To fabricate that book out of loose and mythical

XLTV PRELIMINARY DISSERTATION.
traditions must have been a much greater achievement of genius than to write
it from long-cherished recollections of a dear and intimate friendship with Jesus,
though it is a wonderful book to be produced even in that simple manner. In
which of three or four generations next after the apostles are we to look for a
Christian author capable of such a work ? Could a man like Ignatius, or like
the author of the epistle which bears the name of Barnabas, or like Hermas, or
even like the literary Justin Martyr, so personate Paul as to produce the Epistle
to the Eomans ? The man with genius enough to do that had a dramatic power
that might have produced a play like one of Shakspeare's. Who was there in
those three or four generations that could have written even the First Epistle of
Peter? We might ask the same question in reference to almost every book
of the collection. But, instead of that, let us ask, once for all, If the age which
produced Christianity was not competent to produce these Scriptures, in what
later generation could they have been produced ?
In brief, this wide difference between the primitive Christian literature which
we find collected and canonized in the New Testament, and the Christian
literature of the next following ages, — apostolical fathers, apostolical canons
and constitutions, apocryphal* gospels, and everything of that sort, — is little
less than demonstration, not only that the Christians of those early ages were
capable of distinguishing the genuine from the spurious, and were careful to
exclude from among their Holy Scriptures every thing not authenticated, but
also, and quite independently of their verdict, that the New Testament is what
it purports to be. Aside from the difference in style and idiom, and in the
bearing on questions peculiar to the apostolic age, there is a difference in tone
and spirit, a difference in respect to plain and sturdy common sense as opposed
to feeble sentimentalism, a difference in respect to healthiness of conscience as
opposed to morbid scrupulousness or enthusiastic exaggerations of self-sacrifice ;
and such differences show us convincingly, that, in the New Testament, we
have not the work of nobody knows who in some post-apostolic age, but the
really primitive documents of the Christian religion.
VI. All the foregoing suggestions will find ample illustration in the study of
these documents, with such aids as are now more and more within the reach,
not of privileged scholars only, but of " the people." This excellent work on
" The Life and Epistles of St. Paul " is eminently valuable for the light which
if throws incidentally upon almost every topic of the evidence given by the
New Testament itself in proof of its own authenticity. But the most copious
illustration of that general argument is on a topic not yet mentioned ; namely,
the coincidences between the historical and geographical references in these

PRELIMINARY DISSERTATION. XXV
writmgu, and that Knowledge of facts which we are enabled to gain from other
sources. One of the most charming as well as convincing books of argumentation in
the English language, or in any other, is Paley's " Horae Paulinae." Taking
that portion of Paul's personal history which is given in the Acts of the Apos
tles, and comparing it with the collection of epistles bearing his name, if we
find, at one point and another, an irreconcilable discrepancy between the two,
we infer with great certainty that either the history is at those points false, and
therefore is generally not worthy of confidence, or the epistles are forgeries. If
we find a close and obviously careful coincidence at every point, we can hardly
avoid the suspicion that either the history was compiled from the letters, or the
letters were composed as imaginary illustrations of the history. But if the
coincidences are of such a sort as to exclude the supposition of their having
been contrived ; if there are seeming and obvious discrepancies, which, upon
closer examination, are reconciled by the discovery of a latent and undesigned
coincidence ; if a fact mentioned in the one is illustrated by some obscure allusion
incidentally occurring in the other ; if these latent and manifestly undesigned
coincidences are multiplied as we proceed in our study of the documents, — the
argument accumulates in its progress, and we arrive at the firmest sort of a
conviction that the history is true, and the letters genuine. Nor shall we be
moved from that conviction if some apparent discrepancies remain. We may
suppose, that, if we had one or two facts not mentioned on either side, the
seeming disagreement would be reconciled. We may even admit, that, just there,
the historian was mistaken, or that the writer of the letters made an inaccurate
allusion ; but the accumulated strength of the argument for the credibility of
the historian and the genuineness of the letters will not be seriously impaired.
Other writers have applied the same method of examination to other portions
of the New Testament. For example, a similar argument has been made by
tracing out the latent coincidences between the four Gospels and the writings of
the Jewish historian Josephus. The field of inquiry and of argument into
which Paley introduces us is wide and fruitful ; and the evidence thus obtained
is always cumulative. Coincidences that might have been contrived, and that
obtrude themselves upon the reader, add little to the argument ; but every
latent and undesigned coincidence which we detect between one portion of the
New Testament and another, or between any book of the New Testament and
any other authentic source of information, is an additional strand twisted into
the cable that holds us to our anchor in the trustworthiness of these documents
as the original records of the Christian faith.

XXVI PRELIMINARY DISSERTATION.
The authors of the work, which, in this edition, is offered to " the people,"
have not made it any part of their design to reproduce or to extend the beauti
ful argumentation of Paley. But the ingenuous reader cannot but be
impressed with the fact, that the Acts of the Apostles and the Epistles of Paul,
while they do by no means repeat each other, are marvellously supplementary to
each other (the history illustrating the epistles, and the epistles illustrating
the history) ; every letter, by perfectly incidental indications of time and
locality, finding its place in the history, and the history often explaining with
great felicity allusions in the letters which would otherwise have been obscure.
But the argument from coincidences is not exhausted by even a complete exhibi
tion of these instances. The principle has a wider reach ; and the work of
Conybeare and Hcwson is one great repository of discovered coincidences
between the New Testament and all that we can learn from other sources con
cerning the age in which it purports to have been written.
Briefly the principle of the argument is this : If the seemingly historical
documents of the New Testament were fictions of the second century, or were
produced, like the apocryphal gospels, by a mythical tendency in the ages fol
lowing the origin of Christianity, they would not be found to harmonize with
the authentic history of the age which they pretend to represent, nor (if they
were composed elsewhere) with the geography of the country or countries in
which the scene is laid. Such is the fact with the apocryphal gospels, as it is
also with the fictitious Book of Judith in the Old-Testament apocrypha. If the
historical documents collected in the New Testament were of that sort, it would
be impossible to make them fit into the known history of the Jewish people
and of the Eoman Empire during the first seventy years of the Christian era.
They could give no illustration to history, nor could history illustrate them.
But what is the fact ? The literature of the Eoman Empire through the first
Christian century knew nothing of Christianity, or alluded to it only with con
tempt. Yet what wealth of illustration is poured upon the New Testament
from the history which that literature gives us, and even from the coins and
monuments of the period ! How is the whole story of Paul, for example, from
his birth and early education at Tarsus to his latest epistle from the prison in
which he was waiting for a martyr's death at Eome, adjusted and fitted into its
place in the history of the Eoman Empire as it then was ! The entire New
Testament, with the account which it gives of Christ, and of the world-move
ment which began in his life and death, finds and fills a gap in the world's
history, and is itself a grand coincidence.
A few years ago, in one of our cities, a trial for murder was in progress. The

PRELIMINARY DISSERTATION. XLVn
accused had able counsel, who had planned for him an ingenious defence. Wit
ness after witness had been examined and cross-examined ; and, though the
probabilities were accumulating against him, it was felt by the spectators, and
it was seen in the countenances of the jury, that as yet there was no conclusive
proof of guilt. At last, a knife was exhibited, which had been taken from the
prisoner's person. If that knife had been bloody, no trace of blood was left
upon it : but there was a gap in the blade ; and to that the attention of the
jury was directed by the prosecutor. Then was exhibited a little flake of steel,
which the physicians who examined the murdered body had discovered in the
fatal wound. The knife and the flake were passed to the jury, that the relation
of the flake to the gap might be seen by them with the aid of a magnifying
glass ; and in the awful silence, as each juror looked through that glass, the
change in his countenance was a verdict of " guilty." Such is the nature, and
such may be the conclusiveness, of an argument from coincidence.

THE

LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL.

CHAPTER I.
Great Men of Great Periods. — Period of Christ's Apostles. — Jews, Greeks, and Romans.
— Religions Civilization of the Jews. — Their History and its Relation to that of the
World. — Heathen Preparation for the Gospel. — Character and Language of the Greeks. —
Alexander. — Antioch and Alexandria. — Growth and Government of the Roman Empire.
— Misery of Italy and the Provinces. — Preparation in the Empire for Christianity. —
Dispersion of the Jews in Asia, Africa, and Europe. — Proselytes. — Provinces of Cilicia
and Judaea. — Their Geography and History. — Cilicia nnder the Romans. — Tarsus. —
Cicero. — Political Changes in Judaea. — Herod and his Family. — The Roman Governors.
— Conclusion.
THE life of a great man, in a great period of the world's history, is a
subject to command the attention of every thoughtful mind.
Alexander on his Eastern expedition, spreading the civilization of Greece
over the Asiatic and African shores of the Mediterranean Sea, — Julius
Caesar contending against the Gauls, and subduing the barbarism of
Western Europe to the order and discipline of Roman government, —
Charlemagne compressing the separating atoms of the feudal world,
and reviving for a time the image of imperial unity, — Columbus sailing
westward over the Atlantic to discover a new world which might receive
the arts and religion of the old, — Napoleon on his rapid campaigns,
shattering the ancient system of European States, and leaving a chasm
between our present and the past : — these are the colossal figures of
history, which stamp with the impress of their personal greatness the
centuries in which they lived.
The interest with which we look upon such men is natural and in
evitable, even when we are deeply conscious that, in their character
and their work, evil was mixed up in large proportions with the good,
and when we find it difficult to discover the providential design which
drew the features of their respective epochs. But tip's natural feeling

2 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap, i
rises into something higher, if we can be assured that the period w»
contemplate was designedly prepared for great results, that the work
we admire was a work of unmixed good, and the man whose actions we
follow was an instrument specially prepared by the hands of God.
Such a period was that in which the civilized world was united under
the first Roman emperors : such a work was the first preaching of the
Gospel : and such a man was Paul of Tarsus.
Before we enter upon the particulars of his life and the history of his
work, it is desirable to say something, in this introductory chapter, con
cerning the general features of the age which was prepared for him.
We shall not attempt any minute delineation of the institutions and
social habits of the period. Many of these will be brought before us
in detail in the course of the present work. We shall only notice here
those circumstances in the state of the world, which seem to bear the
traces of a providential pre-arrangement.
Casting this general view on the age of the first Roman emperors,
which was also the age of Jesus Christ and His Apostles, we find our
attention arrested by three great varieties of national life. The Jew,
the Greek, and the Roman appear to divide the world between them.
The outward condition of Jerusalem itself, at this epoch, might be
taken as a type of the civilized world. Herod the Great, who rebuilt
the Temple, had erected, for Greek and Roman entertainments, a theatre
within the same walls, and an amphitheatre in the neighboring plain.1
His coins, and those of his grandson Agrippa, bore Greek inscriptions :
that piece of money, which was brought to our Saviour (Matt, xxii.,
Mark xii., Luke xx.), was the silver Denarius, the "image" was that
of the emperor, the " superscription " was in Latin : and at the same
time when the common currency consisted of such pieces as these, —
since coins with the images of men or with Heathen symbols would
have been a profanation to the " Treasury," — there might be found on
the tables of the money-changers in the Temple, shekels and half-shekels
with Samaritan letters, minted under the Maccabees. Greek and Roman
names were borne by multitudes of those Jews who came up to worship
at the festivals. Greek and Latin words were current in the popular
" Hebrew " of the day : and while this Syro-Chaldaic dialect was spokeD
by the mass of the people with the tenacious affection of old custom,
Greek had long been well known among the upper classes in the larger
towns, and Latin was used in the courts of law, and in the official

1 Joseph. Ant. xv. 8, 1. War, i. 21, 8. Jewish War, will be very freqnent. Occa-
Our reference to the two great works of sionally also we shall refer to his Life and
Josephus, the Jewish Antiquities, and the his discourse against Apion.

chap. i. JEWS, GREEKS, AND ROMANS. 3
correspondence of magistrates. On a critical occasion of St. Paul's life,1
when he was standing on the stair between the Temple and the fortress,
he first spoke to the commander of the garrison in Greek, and then
turned round and addressed his countrymen in Hebrew ; while the letter 2
of Claudius Lysias was written, and the oration3 of Tertullus spoken,
in Latin. We are told by the historian Josephus,4 that on a parapet of
stone in the Temple area, where a flight of fourteen steps led up from the
outer to the inner court, pillars were placed at equal distances, with
notices, some in Greek and some in Latin, that no alien should enter
the sacred enclosure of the Hebrews. And we are told by two of the
Evangelists,5 that when our blessed Saviour was crucified, " the super
scription of his accusation " was written above His cross " in letters of
Hebrew, and Greek, and Latin."
The condition of the world in general at that period wears a similar
appearance to a Christian's eye. He sees the Greek and Roman ele
ments brought into remarkable union with the older and more sacred
element of Judaism. He sees in the Hebrew people a divinely-laid
foundation for the superstructure of the Church, and in the dispersion
of the Jews a soil made ready in fitting places for the seed of the Gospel.
He sees in the spread of the language and commerce of the Greeks, and
in the high perfection of their poetry and philosophy, appropriate means
for the rapid communication of Christian ideas, and for bringing them
into close connection with the best thoughts of unassisted humanity. And
he sees in the union of so many incoherent provinces under the law and
government of Rome, a strong framework which might keep together for
a sufficient period those masses of social life which the Gospel was in
tended to pervade. The City of God is built at the confluence of three
civilizations. We recognize with gratitude the hand of God in the his
tory of His world : and we turn with devout feeling to trace the course
of these three streams of civilized life, from their early source to the
time of their meeting in the Apostolic age.
We need not linger about the fountains of the national life of the Jews.
We know that they gushed forth at first, and flowed in their appointed
channels, at the command of God. The call of Abraham, when one
family was chosen to keep and hand down the deposit of divine truth,
— the series of providences which brought the ancestors of the Jews into
Egypt, — the long captivity on the banks of the Nile, — the work of Moses,
l Acts xxi. xxii 8 Acts xxiv. Dean Milman (Bampton
2 Acts xxiii. A document of this kind, Lectures, p. 185) has remarked on the peculiar
sent with a prisoner by a subordinate to a ly Latin character of Tertullus's address.
superior officer, would almost certainly be in * War, v. 5, 2. Compare vi. 2, 4.
Latin. 6 Luke xxiii. 38 ; John xix. 20.

i THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap...
whereby the bondsmen were made into a nation, — all these things are
represented in the Old Testament as occurring under the immediate
direction of Almighty power. The people of Israel were taken out of the
midst of an idolatrous world, to become the depositaries of a purer knowl
edge of the one true God than was given to any other people. At a time
when (humanly speaking) the world could hardly have preserved a spirit
ual religion in its highest purity, they received a divine revelation
enshrined in symbols and ceremonies, whereby it might be safely kept
till the time of its development in a purer and more heavenly form.
The peculiarity of the Hebrew civilization did not consist in the cul
ture of the imagination and intellect, like that of the Greeks, nor in the
organization of government, like that of Rome, — but its distinguishing
feature was Religion. To say nothing of the Scriptures, the prophets,
the miracles of the Jews, — their frequent festivals, their constant sacri
fices, — every thing in their collective and private life was connected with
a revealed religion : their wars, their heroes, their poetry, had a sacred
character, — their national code was full of the details of public worship,
— their ordinary employments were touched at every point by divinely-
appointed and significant ceremonies. Nor was this religion, as were the
religions of the Heathen world, a creed which could not be the common
property of the instructed and the ignorant. It was neither a recondite
philosophy which might not be communicated to the masses of the peo
ple, nor a weak superstition, controlling the conduct of the lower classes,
and ridiculed by the higher. The religion of Moses was for the use of
all and the benefit of all. The poorest peasant of Galilee had the same
part in it as the wisest Rabbi of Jerusalem. The children of all families
were taught to claim their share in the privileges of the chosen people.
And how different was the nature of this religion from that of the
contemporary Gentiles ! The pious feelings of the Jew were not dissipated
and distracted by a fantastic mythology, where a thousand different
objects of worship, with contradictory attributes, might claim the
attention of the devout mind. " One God," the Creator and Judge of
the world, and the Author of all good, was the only object of adoration.
And there was nothing of that wide separation between religion and
morality, which among other nations was the road to all impurity. The
will and approbation of Jehovah was the motive and support of all holi
ness : (faith in His word wasjthe_ power which raised men above their
natural weakness :\ while even the divinities of Greece and Rome were
often the personifications of human passions, and the example and sanc
tion of vice. And still further : — the devotional scriptures of the Jews
express that heartfelt sense of infirmity and sin, that peculiar spirit
of nrayer, that real communion with God, with which the Christian, in

chap. i. RELIGIOUS CIVILIZATION OF THE JEWS. 5
his best moments, has the truest sympathy.1 So that, while the best
hymns of Greece2 are only mythological pictures, and the literature of
Heathen Rome hardly produces any thing which can be called a prayer,
the Hebrew psalms have passed into the devotions of the Christian
Church. There is a light on all the mountains of Judaea which never
shone on Olympus or Parnassus : and the " Hill of Zion," in which
" it pleased God to dwell," is the type of " the joy of the whole
earth,"3 while the seven hills of Rome are the symbol of tyranny
and idolatry. " He showed His word unto Jacob, — His statutes and
ordinances unto Israel. He dealt not so with any nation ; neither had
the Heathen knowledge of His laws."4
But not only was a holy religion the characteristic of the civilization
of the Jews, but their religious feelings were directed to something in
the future, and all the circumstances of their national life tended to fix
their thoughts on One that was to come. By types and by promises,
their eyes were continually turned towards a Messiah. Their history
was a continued prophecy. All the great stages of their national exist
ence were accompanied by effusions of prophetic light. Abraham was
called from his father's house, and it was revealed that in him " all fami
lies of the earth should be blessed." Moses formed Abraham's descend
ants into a people, by giving them a law and national institutions ; but
while so doing he spake before of Him who was hereafter to be raised up
" a Prophet like unto himself." David reigned, and during that reign,
which made so deep and lasting an impression on the Jewish mind,
psalms were written which spoke of the future King. And with the
approach of that captivity, the pathetic recollection of which became per
petual, the prophecies took a bolder range, and embraced within their
widening circle the redemption both of Jews and Gentiles. Thus the
pious Hebrew was always, as it were, in the attitude of expectation : and
it has been well remarked that, while the golden age of the Greeks and
Romans was the past, that of the Jews was the future. While other
nations were growing weary of their gods, — without any thing in their
mythology or philosophy to satisfy the deep cravings of their nature, —
with religion operating rather as a barrier than a link between the edu
cated and the ignorant, — with morality divorced from theology, — the
whole Jewish people were united in a feeling of attachment to tlieir
1 Neander observes that it has been justly 350 years before St. Paul was there ; yet it
remarked that the distinctive peculiarity of the breathes the sentiment rather of acquiescence
Hebrew nation from the very first, was, that in the determinations of Fate, than of resigna-
conscience was more alive among them than any tion to the goodness of Providence. See on
other people. Act3 xvii- 28-
* There aresome exceptions, as in the hymn 8 Ps. xlviii. 2, lxviii 16.
of the Stoic Cleanthes. who was born at Assos * Ps. cxlvii. 19, 20.

b THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap. i.
sacred institutions, and found in the facts of their past history a pledge
of the fulfilment of their national hopes.
It is true that the Jewish nation, again and again, during several cen
turies, fell into idolatry. It is true that their superiority to other nations
consisted in the light which they possessed, and not in the use which they
made of it ; and that a carnal life continually dragged them down from
the spiritual eminence on which they might have stood. But the Divine
purposes were not frustrated. The chosen people were subjected to the
chastisement and discipline of severe sufferings : and they were fitted by
a long training for tlie accomplishment of that work, to the conscious per
formance of which they did not willingly rise. They were hard pressed
in their own country by the incursions of their idolatrous neighbors, and
in the end they were carried into a distant captivity. From the time of
their return from Babylon they were no longer idolaters. They presented
to the world the example of a pure Monotheism. And in the active times
which preceded and followed the birth of Christ, those Greeks or Romans
vvho visited the Jews in their own land where they still lingered at the
portals of the East, and those vast numbers of proselytes whom the dis
persed Jews had gathered round them in various countries, were made
familiar with the worship of one God and Father of all.1
The influence of the Jews upon the Heathen world was exercised
mainly through their dispersion : but this subject must be deferred for
a few pages, till we have examined some of the developments of the
Greek and Roman nationalities. A few words, however, may be allowed
in passing, upon the consequences of the geographical position of Judsea.
The situation of this little but eventful country is such, that its in
habitants were brought into contact successively with all the civilized na
tions of antiquity. Not to dwell upon its proximity to Egypt on the one
hand, and to Assyria on the other, and the influences which those ancient
kingdoms may thereby have exercised or received, Palestine lay in the
road of Alexander's Eastern expedition. The Greek conqueror was
there before he founded his mercantile metropolis in Egypt, and thence
went to India, to return and die at Babylon. And again, when his
empire was divided, and Greek kingdoms were erected in Europe, Asia,
and Africa, Palestine lay between the rival monarchies of the Ptolemies
at Alexandria and the Seleucids at Antioch, — too near to both to be
safe from the invasion of their arms or the influence of their customs
and their language. And finally, when the time came for the Romans to
1 Hnmboldt has remarked, in the chapter of Monotheism, and portrays nature, not as
on Poetic Descriptions of Nature (Kosmos, self-subsisting, but ever in relation to a Higher
Sabine's Eng. trans., vol. ii. p. 44), that the Power.
descriptive poetry of the Hebrews is a reflex

chap. I. CHARACTER AND LANGUAGE OF THE GREEKS. 7
embrace the whole of the Mediterranean within the circle of their power,
the coast-line of Judaea was the last remote portion which was needed
to complete the fated circumference.1
The full effect of this geographical position of Judaea can only be
seen by following the course of Greek and Roman life, till they were
brought so remarkably into contact with each other, and with that of
the Jews : and we turn to those other twr nations of antiquity, the
steps of whose progress were successive stages in what is called in the
Epistle to the Ephesians (i. 10) " the dispensation of the fulness of
time." If we think of the civilization of the Greeks, we have no difficulty in
fixing on its chief characteristics. High perfection of the intellect and
imagination, displaying itself in all the various forms of art, poetry, lit
erature, and philosophy — restless activity of mind and body, finding its
exercise in athletic games or in subtle disputations — love of the beauti
ful — quick perception — indefatigable inquiry — all these enter into the
very idea of the Greek race. This is not the place to inquire how far
these qualities were due to an innate peculiarity, or how far they grew up,
by gradual development, amidst the natural influences of their native
country, — the variety of their hills and plains, the clear lights and
warm shadows of their climate, the mingled land and water of their coasts.
We have only to do with this national character so far as, under divine
Providence, it was made subservient to the spread of the Gospel.
We shall see how remarkably it subserved this purpose, if we consider
the tendency of the Greeks to trade and colonization. Their mental ac
tivity was accompanied with a great physical restlessness. This clever
people always exhibited a disposition to spread themselves. Without
aiming at universal conquest, they displayed (if we may use the word) a
remarkable catholicity of character, and a singular power of adaptation
to those whom they called Barbarians.2 In this respect they were
strongly contrasted with the Egyptians, whose immemorial civilization
was confined to the long valley which extends from the cataracts to the
mouths of the Nile. The Hellenic 3 tribes, on the other hand, though
they despised foreigners, were never unwilling to visit them and to cul
tivate their acquaintance. At the earliest period at which history en-
1 For reflections on the geographical posi- who does not speak Greek. See Acts xxviii.
tion of Palestine in relation to its history, see 2, 4 ; Rom. i. 14 ; 1 Cor. xiv. 11 ; Col. iii. 11.
Stanley's Sinai and Palestine, Kurtz's History 8 " Hellenic " and " Hellenistic," corre-
of the Old Covenant (in Clark's "Foreign sponding respectively to the "Greek" and
Theological Library "), and the Quarterly Re- " Grecian " of the Authorized Version, are
view for October, 1859. words which we must often use. See p. 10,
2 In the N. T. the word " barbarian " is n. 3.
used in its strict classical sense, i.e. for a man

8 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap.i.
ables us to discover them, we see them moving about in their ships on
the shores and among the islands of their native seas ; and, three or four
centuries before the Christian era, Asia Minor, beyond which the Per
sians had not been permitted to advance, was bordered by a fringe of
Greek colonies ; and Lower Italy, when the Roman republic was just
beginning to be conscious of its strength, had received the name of
Greece itself.1 To all these places they carried their arts and literature,
their philosophy, their mythology, and their amusements. They carried
also their arms and their trade. The heroic age had passed away, and
fabulous voyages had given place to real expeditions against Sicily and
constant traffic with the Black Sea. They were gradually taking the
place of the Phoenicians in the empire of the Mediterranean. They
were, indeed, less exclusively mercantile than those old discoverers.
Their voyages were not so long. But their influence on general civiliza
tion was greater and more permanent. The earliest ideas of scientific
navigation and geography are due to the Greeks. The later Greek trav
ellers, Strabo and Pausanias, will be our best sources of information on
the topography of St. Paul's journeys.
With this view of the Hellenic character before us, we are prepared
to appreciate the vast results of Alexander's conquests. He took up the
meshes of the net of Greek civilization, which were lying in disorder on
the edges of the Asiatic shore, and spread them over all the countries
which he traversed in his wonderful campaigns. The East and the
West were suddenly brought together. Separated tribes were united
under a common government. New cities were built, as the centres of
political life. New lines of communication were opened, as the channels
of commercial activity. The new culture penetrated the mountain
ranges of Pisidia and Lycaonia. The Tigris and Euphrates became
Greek rivers. The language of Athens was heard among the Jewish
colonies of Babylonia ; and a Grecian Babylon 2 was built by the con
queror in Egypt, and called by his name.
The empire of Alexander was divided, but the effects of his cam
paigns and policy did not cease. The influence of the fresh elements
of social life was rather increased by being brought into independent ac
tion within the spheres of distinct kingdoms. Our attention is particu
larly called to two of the monarchical lines, which descended from Alex
ander's generals, — the Ptolemies, or the Greek kings of Egypt, — and
the Seleucids, or the Greek kings of Syria. Their respective capitals,
Alexandria and Antioch, became the metropolitan centres of commer
cial and civilized life in the East. They rose suddenly ; and their very
1 Magna Gracia. a Alexandria.

ANTIOCH AND ALEXANDRIA 9
appearance marked them as the cities of a new epoch. Like Berlin and
St. Petersburg, they were modern cities built by great kings at a defi
nite time and for a definite purpose. Their histories are no unimportant
chapters in the history of the world. Both of them were connected
with St. Paul : one indirectly, as the birthplace of Apollos ; the other
directly, as the scene of some of the most important passages of the
Apostle's own life. Both abounded in Jews from their first foundation.
Both became the residence of Roman governors, and both afterwards
were patriarchates of the primitive Church. But before they had re
ceived either the Roman discipline or the Christian doctrine, they had
served their appointed purpose of spreading the Greek language and
habits, of creating new lines of commercial intercourse by land and sea,
and of centralizing in themselves the mercantile life of the Levant.
Even the Acts of the Apostles remind us of the traffic of Antioch with
Cyprus and the neighboring coasts, and of the sailing of Alexandrian
corn-ships to the more distant harbors of Malta and Puteoli.
Of all the Greek elements which the cities of Antioch and Alexandria
were the means of circulating, the spread of the language is the most im
portant. Its connection with the whole system of Christian doctrine —
with many of the controversies and divisions of the Church — is very
momentous. That language, which is the richest and most delicate that
the world has seen, became the language of theology. The Greek
tongue became to the Christian more than it had been to the Roman or
the Jew. The mother-tongue of Ignatius at Antioch, was that in which
Philo l composed his treaties at Alexandria, and which Cicero spoke at
Athens. It is difficult to state in a few words the important relation
which Alexandria more especially was destined to bear to the whole
Christian Church. In that city, the representative of the Greeks of the
East, where the most remarkable fusion took place of the peculiarities of
Greek, Jewish, and Oriental life, and at the time when all these had
been brought in contact with the mind of educated Romans, — a, theo
logical language was formed, rich in the phrases of various schools, and
suited to convey Christian ideas to all the world. It was not an acci
dent that the New Testament was written in Greek, the language which
can best express the highest thoughts and worthiest feelings of the in
tellect and heart, and which is adapted to be the instrument of education
for all nations : nor was it an accident that the composition of these
books and the promulgation of the Gospel were delayed, till the instruc
tion of our Lord, and the writings of His Apostles, could be expressed in
the dialect of Alexandria. This, also, must be ascribed to the foreknowl-
1 We shall frequently have occasion to was a contemporary of St. Paul. See
mention this learned Alexandrian Jew. He p. 34.

10 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap.i.
edge of Him, who " winked at the times of ignorance," but who " made
of one blood all nations of men for to dwell on all the face of the earth,
and determined the times before appointed, and the bounds of theii
habitation." J
We do not forget that the social condition of the Greeks had been
falling, during this period, into the lowest corruption. The disastrous
quarrels of Alexander's generals had been continued among their suc
cessors. Political integrity was lost. The Greeks spent their life in
worthless and frivolous amusements. Their religion, though beautiful
beyond expression as giving subjects for art and poetry, was utterly
powerless, and worse than powerless, in checking their bad propensities.
Their philosophers were sophists ; their women might be briefly divided
into two classes, — those who were highly educated and openly profli
gate on the one side, and those who lived in domestic and ignorant
seclusion on the other. And it cannot be denied that all these causes
of degradation spread with the diffusion of the race and the language.
Like Sybaris and Syracuse, Antioch and Alexandria became almost
worse than Athens and Corinth. But the very diffusion and develop
ment of this corruption was preparing the way, because it showed the
necessity, for the interposition of a Gospel. The disease itself seemed
to call for a Healer. And if the prevailing evils of the Greek popula
tion presented obstacles, on a large scale, to the progress of Christianity,
— yet they showed to all future time the weakness of man's highest
powers, if unassisted from above ; and there must have been many who
groaned under the burden of a corruption which they could not shake
off, and who were ready to welcome the voice of Him, who " took our
infirmities, and bare our sicknesses."2 The " Greeks," 3 who are
mentioned by St. John as coming to see Jesus at the feast, were, we
trust, the types of a large class ; and we may conceive His answer to
Andrew and Philip as expressing the fulfilment of the appointed times
in the widest sense — "The hour is come, that the Son of Man should
be glorified."
Such was the civilization and corruption connected with the spread of
the Greek language when the Roman power approached to the eastern
parts of the Mediterranean Sea. For some centuries this irresistible
force had been gathering strength on the western side of the Apennines.
Gradually, but surely, and with ever-increasing rapidity, it made to
1 Acts xvii. 30, 26. for a Hellenist, or Grecizirjg Jew — as in Acts
' Matt. viii. 17. vi. 1, ix. 29 — while the word " Greek" is used
8 John xii. 20. It ought to be observed for one who was by birth a Gentile, and who
here, that the word " Grecian " in the Author- might, oi might not, be a proselyte to Judaism,
ized Version of the New Testament is used or a convert to Christianity

cha*i- GROWTH OP THE ROMAN EMPIRE. 11
itself a wider space — northward into Etruria, southward into Campania.
It passed beyond its Italian boundaries. And six hundred years after
the building of the City, the Roman eagle had seized on Africa at the
point of Carthage, and Greece at the Isthmus of Corinth, and had turned
its eye towards the East. The defenceless prey was made secure, by
craft or by war; and before the birth of our Saviour, all those coasts,
from Ephesus to Tarsus and Antioch, and round by the Holy Land to
Alexandria and Cyrene, were tributary to the city of the Tiber. We
have to describe in a few words the characteristics of this new dominion,
and to point out its providential connection with the spread and consoli
dation of the Church.
In the first place, this dominion was not a pervading influence exerted
by a restless and intellectual people, but it was the grasping power of an
external government. The idea of law had grown up with the growth
of the Romans ; and wherever they went they carried it with them.
Wherever their armies were marching or encamping, there always
attended them, like a mysterious presence, the spirit of the City of
Rome. Universal conquest and permanent occupation were the ends at
which they aimed. Strength and organization were the characteristics
of their sway. We have seen how the Greek science and commerce
were wafted, by irregular winds, from coast to coast : and now we follow
the advance of legions, governors, and judges along the Roman Roads,
which pursued their undeviating course over plains and mountains, and
bound the City to the furthest extremities of the provinces.
There is no better way of obtaining a clear view of the features and a
correct idea of the spirit of the Roman age, than by considering the
material works which still remain as its imperishable monuments.
Whether undertaken by the hands of the government, or for the osten
tation of private luxury, they were marked by vast extent and accom
plished at an enormous expenditure. The gigantic roads of the Empire
have been unrivalled till the present century. Solid structures of all
kinds, for utility, amusement, and worship, were erected in Italy and the
provinces, — amphitheatres of stone, magnificent harbors, bridges, sepul
chres, and temples. The decoration of wealthy houses was celebrated by
the poets of the day. The pomp of buildings in the cities was rivalled
by astonishing villas in the country. The enormous baths, by which
travellers are surprised, belong to a period somewhat later than that of
St. Paul ; but the aqueducts, which still remain in the Campagna, were
some of them new when he visited Rome. Of the metropolis itself it may
be enough to say, that his life is exactly embraced between its two great
times of renovation, that of Augustus on the one hand, who (to use his
own expression) having found it a city of brick left it a city of marble,

12 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap.i.
and that of Nero on the other, when the great conflagration afforded an
opportunity for a new arrangement of its streets and buildings.
These great works may be safely taken as emblems of the magnitude,
strength, grandeur, and solidity of the Empire ; but they are emblems,
no less, of the tyranny and cruelty which had presided over its formation,
and of the general suffering which pervaded it. The statues, with which
the metropolis and the Roman houses were profusely decorated, had been
brought from plundered provinces, and many of them had swelled the
triumphs of conquerors on the Capitol. The amphitheatres were built
for shows of gladiators, and were the scenes of a bloody cruelty, which
had been quite unknown in the licentious exhibitions of the Greek thea
tre. The roads, baths, harbors, aqueducts, had been constructed by
slave-labor. And the country villas, which the Italian traveller lingered
to admire, were themselves vast establishments of slaves.
It is easy to see how much misery followed in the train of Rome's
advancing greatness. Cruel suffering was a characteristic feature of the
close of the Republic. Slave wars, civil wars, wars of conquest, had left
their disastrous results behind them. No country recovers rapidly from
the effects of a war which has been conducted within its frontier ; and
there was no district of the Empire which had not been the scene of
some recent campaign. None had suffered more than Italy herself. Its
old stock of freemen, who had cultivated its fair plains and terraced vine
yards, was utterly worn out. The general depopulation was badly com
pensated by the establishment of military colonies. Inordinate wealth
and slave factories were the prominent features of the desolate prospect.
The words of the great historian may fill up the picture. " As regards
the manners and mode of life of the Romans, their great object at this
time was the acquisition and possession of money. Their moral conduct,
which had been corrupt enough before the Social war, became still more
so by their systematic plunder and rapine. Immense riches were accumu
lated and squandered upon brutal pleasures. The simplicity of the old
manners and mode of living had been abandoned for Greek luxuries and
frivolities, and the whole household arrangements had become altered.
The Roman houses had formerly been quite simple, and were built either
of bricks or peperino, but in most cases of the former material ; now,
on the other hand, every one would live in a splendid house and be sur
rounded by luxuries. The condition of Italy after the Social and Civil
wars was indescribably wretched. Samnium had become almost a des
ert ; and as late as the time of Strabo there was scarcely any town in
that country which was not in ruins. But worse things were yet to
come." 1 1 Nichuhr's Lectures on the History of Some, vol. i. pp. 421, 422.

0HAP-i- MISERY OF ITALY AND THE PROVINCES. 13
This disastrous condition was not confined to Italy. In some respects
the provinces had their own peculiar sufferings. To take the case of
Asia Minor. It had been plundered and ravaged by successive generals,
— by Scipio in the war against Antiochus of Syria, — by Manlius in his
Galatian campaign, — by Pompey in the struggle with Mithridates. The
rapacity of governors and their officials followed that of generals and their
armies. We know what Cilicia suffered under Dolabella and his agent
Verres : and Cicero reveals to us the oppression of his predecessor Ap-
pius in the same province, contrasted with his own boasted clemency.
Some portions of this beautiful and inexhaustible country revived under
the emperors.1 But it was only an outward prosperity. Whatever may
have been the improvement in the external details of provincial govern
ment, we cannot believe that governors were gentle and forbearing, when
Caligula was on the throne, and when Nero was seeking statues for his
golden house. The contempt in which the Greek provincials themselves
were held by the Romans may be learnt from the later correspondence
of the Emperor Trajan with Pliny the governor of Bithynia. We need
not hesitate to take it for granted, that those who were sent from Rome
to dispense justice at Ephesus or Tarsus, were more frequently like Ap-
pius and Verres, than Cicero2 and Flaccus, — more like Pilate and Felix,
than Gallio or Sergius Paulus.
It would be a delusion to imagine that, when the world was reduced
under one sceptre, any real principle of unity held its different parts
together. The emperor was deified,3 because men were enslaved. There
was no true peace when Augustus closed the Temple of Janus. The
Empire was only the order of external government, with a chaos both of
opinions and morals within. The writings of Tacitus and Juvenal remain
to attest the corruption which festered in all ranks, alike in the senate
and the family. The old severity of manners, and the old faith in the
better part of the Roman religion, were gone. The licentious creeds and
practices of Greece and the East had inundated Italy and the West:
and the Pantheon was only the monument of a compromise among a
1 Niebuhr's Led. on Hist, of Rome, vol. i. * The image of the emperor was at that
p. 406, and the note. time the object of religious reverence : he was
2 Much of our best information concerning a deity on earth (Dis aequa potestas, Juv. iv.
the state of the provinces is derived from 71); and the worship paid to him was a real
Cicero's celebrated " Speeches against Verres,'' worship. It is a striking thought, that in
and his own Cilician Correspondence, to which those times (setting aside effete forms of reli
we shall again have occasion to refer. His gion), the only two genuine worships h) the civ-
" Speech in Defence of Flaccus " throws much ilized world were the worship of a Tiberius oi
light on the condition of the Jews under the a Nero on the one hand, and the worship oi
Romans. We must not place too much confi- Cheist on the other.
dence in the picture there given of this Ephe-
sian governor.

14 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap.,
multitude of effete superstitions. It is true that a remarkable religious
toleration was produced by this state of things : and it is probable that
for some short time Christianity itself shared the advantage of it. But
still the temper of the times was essentially both cruel and profane ; and
the Apostles were soon exposed to its bitter persecution. The Roman
Empire was destitute of that unity which the Gospel gives to mankind.
It was a kingdom of this world ; and the human race were groaning for
the better peace of " a kingdom not of this world."
Thus, in the very condition of the Roman Empire, and the miserable
state of its mixed population, we can recognize a negative preparation
for the Gospel of Christ. This tyranny and oppression called for a Con
soler? as much as the moral sickness of the Greeks called for a Healer ;
a Messiah was needed by the whole Empire as much as by the Jews,
though not looked for with the same conscious expectation. But we
have no difficulty in going much farther than this, and we cannot hesitate
to discover in the circumstances of the world at this period, significant
traces of a positive preparation for the Gospel.
It should be remembered, in the first place, that the Romans had
already become Greek to some considerable extent, before they were
the political masters of those eastern countries, where the language,
mythology, and literature of Greece had become more or less familiar.
How early, how widely, and how permanently this Greek influence pre
vailed, and how deeply it entered into the mind of educated Romans, we
know from their surviving writings, and from the biography of eminent
men. Cicero, who was governor of Cilicia about half a century before
the birth of St. Paul, speaks in strong terms of the universal spread of
the Greek tongue among the instructed classes ; and about the time
of the Apostle's martyrdom, Agricola, the conqueror of Britain, was receiv
ing a Greek education at Marseilles. Is it too much to say, that the
general Latin conquest was providentially delayed till the Romans had
been sufficiently imbued with the language and ideas of their predecessors,
and had incorporated many parts of that civilization with their own ?
And if the wisdom of the divine pre-arrangements is illustrated by
the period of the spread of the Greek language, it is illustrated no less
by that of the completion and maturity of the Roman government.
When all parts of the civilized world were bound together in one empire,

1 We may refer here to the apotheosis of contrast will be found in Scheffer's modern
Augustus with Tiberius at his side, as repre- picture — " Christus Consolator,'' — where the
sented on the " Vienna Cameo " in the midst Saviour is seated in the midst of those whG
of figures indicative of the misery and enslave- are miserable, and the eyes of all are turned to
ment of the world. An engraving of this. Him for relief.
Cameo is given in the quarto edition. Its best

CHAP-1- DISPERSION OP THE JEWS. 15
— when one common organization pervaded the whole — when channels
of communication were everywhere opened — when new facilities of
travelling were provided, — then was " the fulness of time" (Gal. iv. 4),
then the Messiah came. The Greek language had already been prepared
as a medium for preserving and transmitting the doctrine ; the Roman
government was now prepared to help the progress even of that religion
which it persecuted. The manner in which it spread through the prov
inces is well exemplified in the life of St. Paul ; his right of citizenship
rescued him in Macedonia1 and in Judaea;2 he converted one governor
in Cyprus,3 was protected by another in Achaia,4 and was sent from
Jerusalem to Rome by a third.5 The time was indeed approaching, when
all the complicated weight of the central tyranny, and of the provincial
governments, was to fall on the new and irresistible religion. But before
this took place, it had begun to grow up in close connection with all
departments of the Empire. When the supreme government itself
became Christian, the ecclesiastical polity was permanently regulated in
conformity with the actual constitution of the state. Nor was the Empire
broken up, till the separate fragments, which have become the nations of
modern Europe, were themselves portions of the Catholic Church.
But in all that we have said of the condition of the Roman world, one
important and widely diffused element of its population has not been
mentioned. We have lost sight for some time of the Jews, and we must
return to the subject of their dispersion, which was purposely deferred
till we had shown how the intellectual civilization of the Greeks, and the
organizing civilization of the Romans, had, through a long series of
remarkable events, been brought in contact with the religious civilization
of the Hebrews. It remains that we point out that one peculiarity of
the Jewish people, which made this contact almost universal in every part
of the Empire.
Their dispersion began early ; though, early and late, their attachment
to Judaea has always been the same. Like the Highlanders of Switzer
land and Scotland, they seem to have combined a tendency to foreign
settlements with the most passionate love of their native land. The first
scattering of the Jews was compulsory, and began with the Assyrian
exile, when, about the time of the building of Rome, natives of Galilee
and Samaria were carried away by the Eastern monarchs ; and this was
followed by the Babylonian exile, when the tribes of Judah and Benjamin
were removed at different epochs, — when Daniel was brought to Babylon,
and Ezekiel to the river Chebar. That this earliest dispersion was not
1 Acts xvi. 37-39. * Acts xviii. 14-17.
1 Acts xxii. 25. 6 Acts xxv. 12, xxvii. 1.
* Acts xiii. 12.

16 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. CHAP. L
without influential results may be inferred from these facts ; — that, about
the time of the battles of Salamis and Marathon, a Jew was the minister,
another Jew the cupbearer, and a Jewess the consort, of a Persian mon
arch. That they enjoyed many privileges in this foreign country, and
that their condition was not always oppressive, may be gathered from
this, — that when Cyrus gave them permission to return, the majority
remained in their new home, in preference to their native land. Thus
that great Jewish colony began in Babylonia, the existence of which
may be traced in Apostolic times,1 and which retained its influence long
after in the Talmudical schools. These Hebrew settlements may be fol
lowed through various parts of the continental East, to the borders of the
Caspian, and even to China. We however are more concerned with the
coasts and islands of Western Asia. Jews had settled in Syria and
Phoenicia before the time of Alexander the Great. But in treating of
this subject, the great stress is to be laid on the policy of Seleucus, who,
in founding Antioch, raised them to the same political position with the
other citizens. One of his successors on the throne, Antiochus the Great,
established two thousand Jewish families in Lydia and Phrygia. From
hence they would spread into Pamphylia and Galatia, and along the
western coasts from Ephesus to Troas. And the ordinary channels of
communication, in conjunction with that tendency to trade which already
began to characterize this wonderful people, would easily bring them to
the islands, such as Cyprus2 and Rhodes.
Their oldest settlement in Africa was that which took place after the
murder of the Babylonian governor of Judaea, and which is connected
with the name of the prophet Jeremiah.3 But, as in the case of Antioch,
our chief attention is called to the great metropolis of the period of the
Greek kings. The Jewish quarter of Alexandria is well known in his
tory ; and the colony of Hellenistic Jews in Lower Egypt is of greater
importance than that of their Aramaic4 brethren in Babylonia. Alex
ander himself brought Jews and Samaritans to his famous city ; the first
Ptolemy brought many more ; and many betook themselves hither of
their free will, that they might escape from the incessant troubles which
disturbed the peace of their fatheiland. Nor was their influence con
fined to Egypt, but they became known on one side in Ethiopia, the
country of Queen Candace,6 and spread on the other in great numbers
to the " parts of Libya about Cyrene."6
1 See 1 Pet. v. 13. 8 See 2 Kings xxv. 22-26, Jer. xliii.
2 The farming of the copper mines in Cy- xliv.
prus by Herod (Jos. Ant. xvi. 4, 5) may have 4 This term is explained in tne next chap-
attracted many Jews. There is a Cyprian ter, see p. 33, note 2.
inscription which seems to refer to one of the 6 Acts viii. 27.
Herods. 6 Acts ii. 10. The second book of Maoca-

I.f! 'Ill
,||l 
(I:! ilj|ffiliii

]'':!'ii;^!sliiiS!iii[

CBAP-1, THE JEWS IN EUROPE. 17
Under what circumstances the Jews made their first appearance in
Europe is unknown ; but it is natural to suppose that those islands of the
Archipelago which, as Humboldt has said, were like a bridge for the pas
sage of civilization, became the means of the advance of Judaism. The
journey of the proselyte Lydia from Thyatira to Philippi (Acts xvi. 14),
and the voyage of Aquila and Priscilla from Corinth to Ephesus (Ibid.
xviii. 18), are only specimens of mercantile excursions which must have
begun at a far earlier period. Philo1 mentions Jews in Thessaly, Boeotia,
Macedonia, ^Etolia, and Attica, in Argos and Corinth, in the other parts
of Peloponnesus, and in the islands of Eubcea and Crete : and St. Luke,
in the Acts of the Apostles, speaks of them in Philippi, Thessalonica, and
Bercea, in Athens, in Corinth, and in Rome. The first Jews came to
Rome to decorate a triumph ; but they were soon set free from captivity,
and gave the name to the " Synagogue of the Libertines "2 in Jerusalem.
They owed to Julius Caesar those privileges in the Western Capital which
they had obtained from Alexander in the Eastern. They became influ
ential, and made proselytes. They spread into other towns of Italy ; and
in the time of St. Paul's boyhood we find them in large numbers in the
island of Sardinia, just as we have previously seen them established in
that of Cyprus.3 With regard to Gaul, we know at least that two sons of
Herod were banished, about this same period, to the banks of the Rhone ;
and if (as seems most probable) St. Paul accomplished that journey to
Spain, of which he speaks in his letters, there is little doubt that he found
there some of the scattered children of his own people. We do not seek
to pursue them further ; but, after a few words on the proselytes, we
must return to the earliest scenes of the Apostle's career.
The subject of the proselytes is sufficiently important to demand a
separate notice. Under this term we include at present all who were
attracted in various degrees of intensity towards Judaism, — from those
who by circumcision had obtained full access to all the privileges of the
temple-worship, to those who only professed a general respect for the
Mosaic religion, and attended as hearers in the synagogues. Many
proselytes were attached to the Jewish communities wherever they were
dispersed.4 Even in their own country and its vicinity, the number, both
in early and later times, was not inconsiderable. The Queen of Sheba,
bees is the abridgment of a work written by gogues mentioned in Acts vi. 9 are discussed
a Hellenistic Jew of Cyrene. A Jew or prose- in the next chapter.
lyte of Cyrene bore our Saviour's cross. And 8 In the case of Sardinia, however, they
the mention of this city occurs more than once were forcibly sent to the island, to die of the
in the Acts of the Apostles. bad climate.
l gee jjofg pt 9. 4 In illustration of this fact, it is easy to
2 ThU body doubtless consisted of manu- adduce abundance of Heathen testimony.
mitted Jewish slaves. The synagogue or syna-
2

18 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap i.
in the Old Testament ; Candace, Queen of ^Ethiopia, in the New ; and
King Izates, with his mother Helena, mentioned by Josephus, are only
royal representatives of a large class. During the time of the Maccabees,
some alien tribes were forcibly incorporated with the Jews. This was the
case with the Ituraeans, and probably with the Moabites, and, above all,
with the Edomites, with whose name that of the Herodian family is his
torically connected. How far Judaism extended among the vague col
lection of tribes called Arabians, we can only conjecture from the curious
history of the Homerites, and from the actions of such chieftains as
Aretas (2 Cor. xi. 32). But as we travel towards the West and North,
into countries better known, we find no lack of evidence of the moral
effect of the synagogues, with their worship of Jehovah, and their
prophecies of the Messiah. " Nicolas of Antioch " (Acts vi. 5) is only
one of that " vast multitude of Greeks " who, according to Josephus,1
were attracted in that city to the Jewish doctrine and ritual. In Damas
cus, we are even told by the same authority that the great majority of the
women were proselytes ; a fact which receives a remarkable illustration
from what happened to Paul at Iconium (Acts iii. 50). But all further
details may be postponed till we follow Paul himself into the synagogues,
where he so often addressed a mingled audience of " Jews of the disper
sion" and " devout" strangers.
This chapter may be suitably concluded by some notice of the provincoi
of Cilicia and Judcea. This will serve as an illustration of what has been
said above, concerning the state of the Roman provinces generally; it
will exemplify the mixture of Jews, Greeks, and Romans in the east of
the Mediterranean, and it will be a fit introduction to what must imme
diately succeed. For these are the two provinces which require our
attention in the early life of the Apostle Paul.
Both these provinces were once under the sceptre of the line of the
Seleucids, or Greek kings of Syria ; and both of them, though originally
inhabited by a "barbarous"2 population, received more or less of the
influence of Greek civilization. If the map is consulted, it will be seen
that Antioch, the capital of the Grasco-Syrian kings, is situated nearly in
the angle where the coast-line of Cilicia, running eastwards, and that of
Judaea, extended northwards, are brought to an abrupt meeting. It will
be seen also, that, more or less parallel to each of these coasts, there is a
line of mountains, not far from the sea, which are brought into contact
with each other in heavy and confused forms, near the same angle ; the
principal break in the continuity of either of them being the valley of
the Orontes, which passes by Antioch. One of these mountain lines is the
1 War, vii. 3, 3. s See p. 7, note.

«=**•!• CILICIA UNDER THE ROMANS. 19
range of Mount Taurus, which is so often mentioned as a great geographi
cal boundary by the writers of Greece and Rome ; and Cilicia extends
partly over the Taurus itself, and partly between it and the sea. The
other range is that of Lebanon — a name made sacred by the scriptures
and poetry of the Jews ; and where its towering eminences subside
towards the south into a land of hills and valleys and level plains, there
is Judcea, once the country of promise and possession to the chosen
people, but a Roman province in the time of the Apostles.
Cilicia, in the sense in which the word was used under the early Roman
emperors, comprehended two districts, of nearly equal extent, but of very
different character. The Western portion, or Rough Cilicia, as it was
called, was a collection of the branches of Mount Taurus, which come
down in large masses to the sea, and form that projection of the coast
which divides the Bay of Issus from that of Pamphylia. The inhabitants
of the whole of this district were notorious for tlieir robberies : the
northern portion, under the name of Isauria, providing innumerable
strongholds for marauders by land ; and the southern, with its excellent
timber, its cliffs, and small harbors, being a natural home for pirates.
The Isaurians maintained their independence with such determined
obstinacy, that in a later period of the Empire, the Romans were willing
to resign all appearance of subduing them, and were content to surround
them with a cordon of forts. The natives of the coast of Rough Cilicia
began to extend their piracies as the strength of the kings of Syria and
Egypt declined. They found in the progress of the Roman power, for
some time, an encouragement rather than a hinderance ; for they were
actively engaged in an extensive and abominable slave-trade, of which
the island of Delos was the great market ; and the opulent families of
Rome were in need of slaves, and were not more scrupulous than some
Christian nations of modern times about the means of obtaining them.
But the expeditions of these buccaneers of the Mediterranean became at
last quite intolerable ; their fleets seemed innumerable ; their connections
were extended far beyond their own coasts ; all commerce was paralyzed ;
and they began to arouse that attention at Rome which the more distant
pirates of the Eastern Archipelago not long ago excited in England. A
vast expedition was fitted out under the command of Pompey the Great ;
thousands of piratic vessels were burnt on the coast of Cilicia, and the
'inhabitants dispersed. A perpetual service was thus done to the cause
of civilization, and the Mediterranean was made safe for the voyages of
merchants and Apostles. The town of Soli, on the borders of the two
divisions of Cilicia, received the name of Pompeiopolis,1 in honor of the
1 A similar case, on a small scale, is that of the French power, since the accession of
of Philippeville in Algeria ; and the progress Louis Philippe, in Northern Africa, is perhaps

20 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap.i,
great conqueror, and the splendid remains of a colonnade which led from
the harbor to the city may be considered a monument of this signal
destruction of the enemies of order and peace.
The Eastern, or Flat Cilicia, was a rich and extensive plain. Its
prolific vegetation is praised both by the earlier and later classical
writers, and, even under the neglectful government of the Turks, is
still noticed by modern travellers.1 From this circumstance, and still
more from its peculiar physical configuration, it was a possession of great
political importance. Walled off from the neighboring countries by a
high barrier of mountains, which sweep irregularly round it from Pom-
peiopolis and Rough Cilicia to the Syrian coast on the North of Antioch,
— with one pass leading up into the interior of Asia Minor, and another
giving access to the valley of the Orontes, — it was naturally the high
road both of trading caravans and of military expeditions. Through this
country Cyrus marched, to depose his brother from the Persian throne.
It was here that the decisive victory was obtained by Alexander over
Darius. This plain has since seen the hosts of Western Crusaders ; and,
in our own day, has been the field of operations of hostile Mohammedan
armies, Turkish and Egyptian. The Greek kings of Egypt endeavored,
long ago, to tear it from the Greek kings of Syria. The Romans left it
at first in the possession of Antiochus : but the line of Mount Taurus
could not permanently arrest them : and the letters of Cicero remain to
us among the most interesting, as they are among the earliest, monu
ments of Roman Cilicia.
Situated near the western border of the Cilician plain, where the river
Cydnus flows in a cold and rapid stream, from the snows of Taurus to the
sea, was the city of Tarsus, the capital of the whole province, and " no
mean city " (Acts xxi. 39) in the history of the ancient world. Its
coins reveal to us its greatness through a long series of years : — alike in
the period which intervened between Xerxes and Alexander, — and
under the Roman sway, when it exulted in the name of Metropolis,
— and long after Hadrian had rebuilt it, and issued his new coinage
with the old mythological types.2 In the intermediate period, which is
the nearest parallel in modern times to the his- Asia Minor contains some luxuriant specimens
tory of a Roman province. As far as regards of the modern vegetation of Tarsus ; but the
the pirates, Lord Exmouth, in 1816, really did banana and the prickly pear were introduced
the work of Pompey the Great. It may be into the Mediterranean long after St. Paul's'
doubted whether Marshal Bugeaud was more day.
lenient to the Arabs, than Cicero to the Eleu- 2 The coin at the end of the chapter was
thero-Cilicians. struck under Hadrian, and is preserved in the
Chrysippus the Stoic, whose father was a British Museum. The word Metropolis is con-
native of Tarsus, and Aratus, whom St. Paul spicuous on it. The same figures of the Lion
quotes, lived at Soli. and the Bull appear in a fine series of silver
1 Laborde's illustrated work on Syria and coins of Tarsus, assigned by the Due de

CHAP- '• TARSUS. 21
that of St. Paul, we have the testimony of a native of this part of Asia
Minor, from which we may infer that Tarsus was in the Eastern basin of
the Mediterranean, almost what Marseilles was in the Western. Strabo
says that, in all that relates to philosophy and general education, it was
even more illustrious than Athens and Alexandria. From his description
it is evident that its main character was that of a Greek city, where the
Greek language was spoken, and Greek literature studiously cultivated.
But we should be wrong in supposing that the general population of the
province was of Greek origin, or spoke the Greek tongue. When Cyrus
came with his army from the Western Coast, and still later, when Alex
ander penetrated into Cilicia, they found the inhabitants " Barbarians.'"
Nor is it likely that the old race would be destroyed, or the old language
obliterated, especially in the mountain districts, during the reign of the
Seleucid kings. We must rather conceive of Tarsus as like Brest, in
Brittany, or like Toulon, in Provence, — a city where the language of
refinement is spoken and written, in the midst of a ruder population, who
use a different language, and possess no literature of their own.
If we turn now to consider the position of this province and city under
the Romans, we are led to notice two different systems of policy which
they adopted in their subject dominions. The purpose of Rome was to
make the world subservient to herself : but this might be accomplished
directly or indirectly. A governor might be sent from Rome to take the
absolute command of a province : or some native chief might have a king
dom, an ethnarchy,1 or a tetrarchy assigned to him, in which he was nomi
nally independent, but really subservient, and often tributary. Some prov
inces were rich and productive, or essentially important in the military
sense, and these were committed to Romans under the Senate or the
Emperor. Others might be worthless or troublesome, and fit only to
reward the services of a useful instrument, or to occupy the energies
of a dangerous ally. Both these systems were adopted in the East and
in the West. We have examples of both — in Spain and in Gaul — in
Cilicia and in Judaea. In Asia Minor they were so irregularly combined,
and the territories of the independent sovereigns were so capriciously
granted or removed, extended or curtailed, that it is often difficult to
ascertain what the actual boundaries of the provinces were at a given
epoch. Not to enter into any minute history in the case of Cilicia, it
will be enough to say, that its rich and level plain in the east was made
a Roman province by Pompey, and so remained, while certain districts in
the western portion were assigned, at different periods, to various native
chieftains. Thus the territories of Amyntas, King of Galatia, were ex-
Luynes to the period between Xerxes and x See note at the end of Ch. HI.
Alexander.

22 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap.i.
tended in this direction ,by Antony, when he was preparing for his greul
struggle with Augustus : just as a modern Rajah may be strengthened
on the banks of the Indus, in connection with wars against Scinde and
the Sikhs. For some time tlie whole of Cilicia was a consolidated prov
ince under the first emperors : but again, in the reign of Claudius, we
find a portion of the same Western district assigned to a king called
Polemo II. It is needless to pursue the history further. In St. Paul's
early life the political state of the inhabitants of Cilicia would be that
of subjects of a Roman governor : and Roman officials, if not Roman
soldiers, would be a familiar sight to the Jews who were settled in
Tarsus.1 We shall have many opportunities of describing the condition of prov
inces under the dominion of Rome ; but it may be interesting here to
allude to the information which may be gathered from the writings of that
distinguished man, who was governor of Cilicia, a few years after its first
reduction by Pompey. He was intrusted with the civil and military
superintendence of a large district in this corner of the Mediterranean,
comprehending not only Cilicia, but Pamphylia, Pisidia, Lycaonia, and
the island of Cyprus ; and he has left a record of all the details of his
policy in a long series of letters, which are a curious monument of the
Roman procedure in the management of conquered provinces, and which
possess a double interest to us, from their frequent allusions to the
same places which St. Paul refers to in his Epistles. This correspond
ence represents to us the governor as surrounded by the adulation of
obsequious Asiatic Greeks. He travels with an interpreter, for Latin is
the official language; he puts down banditti, and is saluted by the
title of Imperator ; letters are written, on various subjects, to the
governors of neighboring provinces, — for instance, Syria, Asia, and
Bithynia ; ceremonious communications take place with the independent
chieftains. The friendly relations of Cicero with Deiotarus, King of
Galatia, and his son, remind us of the interview of Pilate and Herod
in the Gospel, or of Festus and Agrippa in the Acts. Cicero's letters
are rather too full of a boastful commendation of his own integrity ; but
from what he says that he did, we may infer by contrast what was done
by others who were less scrupulous in the discharge of the same re
sponsibilities. He allowed free access to his person ; he refused expen
sive monuments in his honor ; he declined the proffered present of tlie
pauper King of Cappadocia ; 2 he abstained from exacting the customary
expenses from the states which he traversed on his march ; he remitted
1 Tarsus, as a " Free City " ( Urbs Libera), » See Hor. 1 Ep. vi. 39.
would have the privilege of being garrisoned
by its own soldiers. See next chapter.

chap.i. POLITICAL CHANGES IN JXJT>MA 23
to the treasury the moneys which were not expended on his province ;
he would not place in official situations those who were engaged in trade ;
he treated the local Greek magistrates with due consideration, and con
trived at the same time to give satisfaction to the Publicans. From all
this it may be easily inferred with how much corruption, cruelty, and
pride, the Romans usually governed ; and how miserable must have
been the condition of a province under a Verres or an Appius, a Pilate
or a Felix. So far as we remember, the Jews are not mentioned in any
of Cicero's Cilician letters ; but if we may draw conclusions from a
speech which he made at > Rome in defence of a contemporary governor
of Asia,1 he regarded them with much contempt, and would be likely
to treat them with harshness and injustice.2 1
That Polemo II., who has lately been mentioned as a king in Cilicia,
was one of those curious links which the history of those times exhibits
between Heathenism, Judaism, and . Christianity. He became a Jew to
marry Berenice,3 who afterwards forsook him, and whose name, after
once appearing in Sacred History (Acts xxv., xxvi.), is lastly asso
ciated with that of Titus, the destroyer of Jerusalem. The name of
Berenice will at once suggest the family of the Herods, and transport
our thoughts to Judaea.
The same general features may be traced in this province as in that
which we have been attempting to describe. In some respects, indeed,
the details of its history are different. When Cilicia was a province, it
formed a separate jurisdiction, with a governor of its own, immediately
responsible to Rome : but Judaea, in its provincial period, was only an
appendage to Syria. It has been said * that the position of the ruler resi
dent at Caesarea in connection with the supreme authority at Antioch may
bo best understood by comparing it with that of the governor of Madras
or Bombay under the governor-general who resides at Calcutta. The
comparison is in some respects just : and British India might supply a
further parallel. We might say that when Judaea was not strictly a prov
ince, but a monarchy under the protectorate of Rome, it bore the same
relation to the contiguous province of Syria which, before the recent
war, the territories of the king of Oude5 bore to the presidency of Bengal.
1 This was L. Valerius Flaccus, who had Claudius gave him part of Cilicia instead of it.
served in Cilicia, and was afterwards made Joseph. Ant. xx. 7, 3.
Governor of Asia, — that district with which, " See the introduction to Dr. Traill's Jose-
and its capital Ephesus, we are so familiar in phus, a work which was interrupted by the
the Acts of the Apostles. death of the translator during the Irish famine,
2 See especially Cic. Flacc. 28 ; and for the and was continued by Mr. Isaac Taylor.
opinion which educated Romans had of the 6 Another coincidence is, that we made the
Jews see Hor. 1 Sat. iv. 143, v. 100, ix. 69. Nabob of Oude a king. He had previously been
8 He was the last King of Pontus. By Ca- hereditary Vizier of the Mogul.
ligula he was made King of Bosphorus ; but

24 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. cbap.i,
Judaea was twice a monarchy ; and thus its history furnishes illustra
tions of the two systems pursued by the Romans, of direct and indirect
government. Another important contrast must be noticed in the histories of thest,
two provinces. In the Greek period of Judaea, there was a time of noble
and vigorous independence. Antiochus Epiphanes, the eighth of the line
of the Seleucids, in pursuance of a general system of policy, by which he
sought to unite all his different territories through the Greek religion,
endeavored to introduce the worship of Jupiter into Jerusalem.1 Such
an attempt might have been very successful in Syria or Cilicia : but in
Judaea it kindled a flame of religious indignation, which did not cease to
burn till the yoke of the Seleucidae was entirely thrown off : the name of
Antiochus Epiphanes was ever afterwards held in abhorrence by the Jews,
and a special fast was kept up in memory of the time when the " abomi
nation of desolation " stood in the holy place. The champions of the
independence of the Jewish nation and the purity of the Jewish religion
were the family of the Maccabees or Asmonaeans : and a hundred years
before the birth of Christ the first Hyrcanus was reigning over a prosper
ous and independent kingdom. But in the time of the second Hyrcanus
and his brother, the family of the Maccabees was not what it had been,
and Judaea was ripening for the dominion of Rome. Pompey the Great,
the same conqueror who had already subjected Cilicia, appeared in Da
mascus, and there judged the cause of the two brothers. All the country
was full of his fame. In the spring of the year 63 he came down by the
valley of the Jordan, his Roman soldiers occupied the ford where Joshua
had crossed over, and from the Mount of Olives he looked down upon
Jerusalem.2 From that day Judaea was virtually under the government
of Rome. It is true that, after a brief support given to the reigning
family, a new native dynasty was raised to the throne. Antipater, a man
of Idumaean birth, had been minister of the Maccabaean kings : but they
were the Rois FainSants of Palestine, and he was the Maire du Palais.
In the midst of the confusion of the great civil wars, the Herodian family
succeeded to the Asmonaean, as the Carlovingiau line in France succeeded
that of Clovis. As Pepin was followed by Charlemange, so Antipater
prepared a crown for his son Herod.
At first Herod the Great espoused the cause of Antony ; but he cop-
1 Here we may observe that there are ex- from the rei Igious movement alluded to in the
taut coins of Antiochus Epiphanes, where the text.
head of Jupiter appears on the obverse, in 2 Pompey heard of the death of Mithridates
place of the portrait usual in the Alexandrian, at Jericho. His army crossed at Scythopolis,
Seleucid, and Macedonian series. Since such by the ford immediately below the Lake of
emblems on ancient coins have always sacred Tiberias.
meanings, it is very probable that this arose

OHAP.i. HEROD AND HIS FAMILY. 25
trived to remedy his mistake by paying a prompt visit, after the battle
of Actium, to Augustus in the island of Rhodes. This singular inter
view of the Jewish prince with the Roman conqueror in a Greek island
was the beginning of an important period for the Hebrew nation. An
exotic civilization was systematically introduced and extended. Those
Greek influences, which had been begun under the Seleucids, and not dis
continued under the Asmonaeans, were now more widely diffused : and
the Roman customs,1 which had hitherto been comparatively unknown,
were now made familiar. Herod was indeed too wise, and knew the
Jews too well, to attempt, like Antiochus, to introduce foreign institu
tions without any regard to their religious feelings. He endeavord to
ingratiate himself with them by rebuilding and decorating their national
temple ; and a part of that magnificent bridge which was connected with
the great southern colonnade is still believed to exist, — remaining, in its
vast proportions and Roman form, an appropriate monument of the
Herodian period of Judaea.2 The period when Herod was reigning at
Jerusalem under the protectorate of Augustus was chiefly remarkable for
great architectural works, for the promotion of commerce, the influx of
strangers, and the increased diffusion of the two great languages of the
heathen world. The names of places are themselves a monument of
the spirit of the times. As Tarsus was called Juliopolis from Julius
Caesar, and Soli Pompeiopolis from his great rival, so Samaria was called
Sebaste after the Greek name of Augustus, and the new metropolis, which
was built by Herod on the sea-shore, was called Caesarea in honor of the
same Latin emperor : while Antipatris, on the road (Acts xxiii. 31) be
tween the old capital and the new,' still commemorated the name of the
king's Idumaean father. We must not suppose that the internal change in
the minds of the people was proportional to the magnitude of these
outward improvements. They suffered much ; and their hatred grew
towards Rome and towards the Herods. A parallel might be drawn
between the state of Judaea under Herod the Great, and that of Egypt
under Mahomet Ali,4 where great works have been successfully accom-
1 Antiochus Epiphanes (who was called fragment of the great Christian works con-
Epimanes from his mad conduct) is said to structed in this southern part of the Temple-
have made himself ridiculous by adopting Ro- area in the age of Justinian.
man fashions, and walking about the. streets 8 The tracing of the road by which St.
of Antioch in a toga. Fau\ travelled on this occasion is one of the
2 See the woodcut opposite. The arch ex- most interesting geographical questions which
tends about fifty feet along the wall, and its will come before us.
radius must have been about twenty feet. It 4 There are many points of resemblance
is right to say that there is much controversy between the character and fortunes of Herod
about its origin. Dr. Robinson assigns it to and those of Mahomet Ali : the chief differ-
the age of Solomon : Mr. Fergusson to that ences are those of the times. Herod secured
of Herod: Mr Williams holds it to be a his position by the influence of Augustus;

26 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap, i,
plished, where the spread of ideas has been promoted, traffic made busy
and prosperous, and communication with the civilized world wonderfully
increased, — but where the mass of the people has continued to be mis
erable and degraded.
After Herod's death, the same influences still continued to operate in
Judsea. Archelaus persevered in his father's policy, though destitute of
his father's energy. The same may be said of the other sons, Antipas
and Philip, in their contiguous principalities. All the Herods were great
builders, and eager partisans of the Roman emperors : and we are familiar
in the Gospels with that Ccesarea (Caesarea Philippi), which one of them
built in the upper part of the valley of the Jordan, and named in honor
of Augustus, — and with that Tiberias on the banks of the lake of Ge-
nesareth, which bore the name of his wicked successor. But while
Antipas and Philip still retained their dominions under the protectorate
of the emperor, Archelaus had been banished, and the weight of the
Roman power had descended still more heavily on Judaea. It was
placed under the direct jurisdiction of a governor, residing at Caesa
rea by the Sea, and depending, as we have seen above, on the governor
of Syria at Antioch. And now we are made familiar with those features
which might be adduced as characterizing any other province at the same
epoch, — the praetorium,1 — the publicans,2 — the tribute-money,3 — sol
diers and centurions recruited in Italy,4 — Caesar the only king,5 and the
ultimate appeal against the injustice of the governor.6 In this period
the ministry, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ took place, the
first preaching of His Apostles, and the conversion of St. Paul. But
once more a change came over the political fortunes of Judaea. Herod
Agrippa was the friend of Caligula, as Herod the Great had been the
friend of Augustus ; and when Tiberius died, he received the grant of
an independent principality in the north of Palestine.7 He was able to
ingratiate himself with Claudius, the succeeding emperor. Judaea was
added to his dominion, which now embraced the whole circle of the
territory ruled by his grandfather. By this time St. Paul was actively pur
suing his apostolic career. We need not, therefore, advance beyond this
Mahomet Ali secured his by the agreement of (Acts x. 1) will come under our notice in
the European powers. Chap. IV., and the "Augustan Band" (Ibid.
1 Joh. xviii. 28. xxvii. 1 ) in Chap. XXH.
2 Luke iii. 12, xix. 2. 6 Joh. xix. 15.
3 Matt. xxii. 19. 6 Acts xxv. II.
4 Most of the soldiers quartered in Syria ' He obtained under Caligula, first, the te-
were recruited in the province : but the Cohort, trarchy of his uncle Philip, who died; and
to which Cornelius belonged, probably consist- then that of his uncle Antipas, who followed
ed of Italian volunteers. The "Italian Band " his brother Archelaus into banishment.

CHAP- I- CONCLUSION. 27
point, in a chapter which is only intended to be a general introduction
to the Apostle's history.
Our desire has been to give a picture of the condition of the world at
this particular epoch : and we have thought that no grouping would be so
successful as that which should consist of Jews, Greeks, and Romans.
Nor is this an artificial or unnatural arrangement : for these three
nations were the divisions of the civilized world. And in the view of a
religious mind they were more than this. They were " the three peoples
of God's election ; two for things temporal, and one for things eternal.
Yet even in the things eternal they were allowed to minister. Greek
cultivation and Roman polity prepared men for Christianity."1 These
three peoples stand in the closest relation to the whole human race. The
Christian, when he imagines himself among those spectators who stood
round the cross, and gazes in spirit upon that "superscription," which
the Jewish scribe, the Greek proselyte, and the Roman soldier could
read, each in his own tongue, feels that he is among those who are
the representatives of all humanity.2 In the ages which precede the cru
cifixion, these three languages were like threads which guided us through
the labyrinth of history. And they are still among the best guides of
our thought, as we travel through the ages which succeed it. How great
has been the honor of the Greek and Latin tongues ! They followed the
fortunes of a triumphant church. Instead of Heathen languages, they
gradually became Christian. As before they had been employed to
express the best thoughts of unassisted humanity, so afterwards they
became the exponents of Christian doctrine and the channels of Chris
tian devotion. The words of Plato and Cicero fell from the lips and pen of
Chrysostom and Augustine. And still those two languages are associated
together in the work of Christian education, and made the instruments for
training the minds of the young in the greatest nations of the earth.
And how deep and pathetic is the interest which attaches to the Hebrew!
Here the thread seems to be broken. "Jesus, King of the Jews," in
Hebrew characters. It is like the last word of the Jewish Scriptures, —
the last warning of the chosen people. A cloud henceforth is upon the
1 Dr. Arnold, in the journal of his Tour in higher sense. The Roman, powerful but not
1840 (Life, ii. 413, 2d edit.). The passage happy — the Greek, distracted with the inqui-
continues thus : — "As Mahometanism can ries of an unsatisfying philosophy — the Jew,
bear witness ; for the East, when it abandoned bound hand and foot with the chain of a cere-
Greece and Rome, could only reproduce Juda- monial law, all are together round the cross.
ism. Mahometanism, six hundred years after Christ is crucified in the midst of them —
Christ, proving that the Eastern man could crucified for all. The " superscription of His
bear nothing perfect, justifies the wisdom of accusation '' speaks to all the same language
God in Judaism." of peace, pardon, and love.
2 This is true in another, and perhaps a

28

THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL.

CHAP. L

people and the language of Israel. " Blindness in part is happened unto
Israel, till the fulness of the Gentiles be come in." Once again Jesus,
after His ascension, spake openly from Heaven "in the Hebrew tongue"
(Acts xxvi. 14) : but the words were addressed to that Apostle who was
called to preach the Gospel to the philosophers of Greece, and in the
emperor's palace at Rome.1
1 See inscription in the three languages on a Christian tomb in the Roman Catacombs, at the
end of the volume.

CWn ef Tarsu«. Hadrian (Bee p. *>, m. 8.)

CHAPTER n.
Jewish Origin of the Church. — Sects and Parties of the Jews. — Pharisees and Sadducees. —
St. Eaul a Pharisee. — Hellenists and Aramaeans. — St. Paul's Family Hellenistic but not
Hellenizing. — His Infancy at Tarsus. —The Tribe of Benjamin. — His Father's Citizen
ship. — Scenery of the Place. — His Childhood. — He is sent to Jerusalem. — State of
Judsea and Jerusalem. — Rabbinical Schools. — Gamaliel. — Mode of Teaching. — Syna
gogues. — Student-Life of St. Paul. — His Early Manhood. — First Aspect of the Church.
— St. Stephen. — The Sanhedrin. — St. Stephen the Forerunner of St. Paul. — His Martyr
dom and Prayer.
CHRISTIANITY has been represented by some of the modem Jews as.
a mere school of Judaism. Instead of opposing it as a system
antagonistic and subversive of the Mosaic religion, they speak of it as a
phase or development of that religion itself, — as simply one of the rich
outgrowths from the fertile Jewish soil. They point out the causes which
combined in the first century to produce this Christian development of
Judaism. It has even been hinted that Christianity has done a good
work in preparing the world for receiving the pure Mosaic principles
which will, at length, be universal.1
We are not unwilling to accept some of these phrases as expressing a
great and important truth. Christianity is a school of Judaism : but
it is the school which absorbs and interprets the teaching of all others.
It is a development ; but it is that development which was divinely
foreknown and predetermined. It is the grain of which mere Judaism is
now the worthless husk. It is the image of Truth in its full propor
tions ; and the Jewish remnants are now as the shapeless fragments
which remain of the block of marble when the statue is completed.
When we look back at the Apostolic age, we see that growth proceed
ing which separated the husk from the grain. We see the image of
Truth coming out in clear expressiveness, and the useless fragments
falling off like scales, under the careful work of divinely-guided hands.
If we are to realize the earliest appearance of the Church, such as it
1 This notion, that the doctrine of Christ Judaism : but a more powerful spell than this
will be re-absorbed in that of Moses, is a curi- philosophy is needed to charm back the stately
ous phase of the recent Jewish philosophy. river into the narrow, rugged, picturesque
" We are sure," it has been well said, " that ravine, out of which centuries ago it found its
Christianity can never disown its source in way." 88

30 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. ch^p.h.
was when Paul first saw it, we must view it as arisiug in the midst of
Judaism ; and if we are to comprehend all the feelings and principles
of this Apostle, we must consider first the Jewish preparation of his
own younger days. To these two subjects the present chapter will be
devoted. We are very familiar with one division which ran through the Jewish
nation in the first century. The Sadducees and Pharisees are frequently
mentioned in the New Testament, and we are there informed of the
tenets of these two prevailing parties. The belief in a future state may
be said to have been an open question among the Jews, when our Lord
appeared and " brought life and immortality to light." We find the
Sadducees established in the highest office of the priesthood, and pos
sessed of the greatest powers in the Sanhedrin : and yet they did not
believe in any future state, nor in any spiritual existence independent
of the body. The Sadducees said that there was " no resurrection,
neither Angel nor Spirit." They do not appear to have held doctrines
which are commonly called licentious or immoral. On the contrary,
they adhered strictly to the moral tenets of the Law, as opposed to its
mere formal technicalities. They did not overload the Sacred Books
with traditions, or encumber the duties of life with a multitude of
minute observances. They were the disciples of reason without enthusi
asm, — they made few proselytes, — their numbers were not great, and
they were confined principally to the richer members of the nation.2 The
Pharisees, on the other hand, were the enthusiasts of the later Judaism.
They " compassed sea and land to make one proselyte." Their power
and influence with the mass of the people was immense. The loss of
the national independence of the Jews, — the gradual extinction of
their political life, directly by the Romans, and indirectly by the family
of Herod, — caused their feelings to rally round their Law and their
Religion, as the only centre of unity which now remained to them.
Those, therefore, who gave their energies to the interpretation and
exposition of the Law, not curtailing any of the doctrines which were
virtually contained in it and which had been revealed with more or less
clearness, but rather accumulating articles of faith, and multiplying the
requirements of devotion ; — who themselves practised a severe and
ostentatious religion, being liberal in alms-giving, fasting frequently,
making long prayers, and carrying casuistical distinctions into the
smallest details of conduct ; — who consecrated, moreover, their best
zeal and exertions to the spread of the fame of Judaism, and to the in-
1 Acts xxiii. 8. See Matt. xxii. 23-34. Ant. xiii. 10, 6; xviii. 1, 4, comparing the
2 See what Josephus says of the Sadducees : question asked, John vii. 48.

CHAP-n- ST. PAUL A PHARISEE. 31
crease1 of the nation's power in the only way which now was practicable,
— could not fail to command the reverence of great numbers of the
people. It was no longer possible to fortify Jerusalem against the
Heathen: but the Law could be fortified like an impregnable city.
The place of the brave is on the walls and in the front of the battle :
and the hopes of the nation rested on those who defended the sacred
outworks, and made successful inroads on the territories of the Gen
tiles. Such were the Pharisees. And now, before proceeding to other
features of Judaism and their relation to the Church, we can hardly
help glancing at St. Paul. He was " a Pharisee, the son of a Phari
see," 1 and he was educated by Gamaliel,2 " a Pharisee."3 Both his
father and his teacher belonged to this sect. And on three distinct
occasions he tells us that he himself was a member of it. Once when
at his trial, before a mixed assembly of Pharisees and Sadducees, the
words just quoted were spoken, and his connection with the Pharisees
asserted with such effect, that the feelings of this popular party were
immediately enlisted on his side. " And when he had so said, there
arose a dissension between the Pharisees and the Sadducees ; and the
multitude was divided. . . . And there arose a great cry ; and the
Scribes that were of the Pharisees' part arose, and strove, saying, We
find no evil in this man." 4 The second time was, when, on a calmer
occasion, he was pleading before Agrippa, and said to the king in the
presence of Festus : " The Jews knew me from the beginning, if they
would testify, that after the most straitest sect of our religion I lived a
Pharisee." 5 And once more, when writing from Rome to the Philip
pians, he gives force to his argument against the Judaizers, by telling
them that if any other man thought he had whereof he might trust in
the flesh, he himself had more : — " circumcised the eighth day, of the
stock of Israel, of the tribe of Benjamin, a Hebrew of the Hebrews ; as
touching the Law, a Pharisee."6 And not only was he himself a
Pharisee, but his father also. He was " a Pharisee, the son of a Phari
see." This short sentence sums up nearly all we know of St. Paul's
parents. If we think of his earliest life, we are to conceive of him as
born in a Pharisaic family, and as brought up from his infancy in the
" straitest sect of the Jews' religion." His childhood was nurtured
in the strictest belief. The stories of the Old Testament, — the angelic
appearances, — the prophetic visions, — to him were literally true.
They needed no Sadducean explanation. The world of spirits was a
i Acts xxiii. 6. " Acts v. 34. 6 Acts xxvi.
2 Acts xxii. 3. * Acts xxiii. 6 Philip, iii. 4.

32 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap.u.
reality to him. The resurrection of the dead was an article of his faith.
And to exhort him to the practices of religion, he had before him the
example of his father, praying and walking with broad phylacteries,
scrupulous and exact in his legal observances. He had, moreover, as
it seems, the memory and tradition of ancestral piety ; for he tells
us in one of his latest letters,1 that he served God " from his fore
fathers." All influences combined to make him " more exceedingly
zealous of the traditions of his fathers," 2 and " touching the righteous
ness which is in the Law, blameless." 3 Every thing tended to prepare
him to be an eminent member of that theological party, to which so
many of the Jews were looking for the preservation of their national
life, and the extension of their national creed.
But in this mention of the Pharisees and Sadducees, we are far from ex
hausting the subject of Jewish divisions, and far from enumerating all those
phases of opinion which must have had some connection with the growth
of rising Christianity, and all those elements which may have contributed
to form the character of the Apostle of the Heathen. There was a sect
in Judaea which is not mentioned in the Scriptures, but which must have
acquired considerable influence in the time of the Apostles, as may be
inferred from the space devoted to it by Josephus4 and Philo. These
were the Essenes, who retired from the theological and political distrac
tions of Jerusalem and the larger towns, and founded peaceful communi
ties in the desert or in villages, where their life was spent in contempla
tion, and in the practices of ascetic piety. It has been suggested that John
the Baptist was one of them. There is no proof that this was the case:
but we need not doubt that they did represent religious cravings which
Christianity satisfied. Another party was that of the Zealots? who were
as politically fanatical as the Essenes were religiously contemplative, and
whose zeal was kindled with the burning desire to throw off the Roman
yoke from the neck of Israel. Very different from them were the Hero
dians, twice mentioned in the Gospels,6 who held that the hopes of Juda
ism rested on the Herods, and who almost looked to that family for the
fulfilment of the prophecies of the Messiah. And if we were simply
enumerating the divisions and describing the sects of the Jews, it would
be necessary to mention the Therapeutce? a widely-spread community in
Egypt, who lived even in greater seclusion than the Essenes in Judaea.
The Samaritans also would require our attention. But we must turn
* 2 Tim. i. 3. of the Gospel (Luke vi. 15), though the party
a Gal. i. 14. was hardly then matured.
8 Phil. iii. 6. " Mark iii. 6 ; Matt. xxii. 16 : see Mark
* War, ii. 8. xii. 13.
• We have the word in the " Simon Zelotes " 7 Described in great detail by Philo.

«hap.ii. HELLENISTS AND ARAMAEANS. 33
from these sects and parties to a wider division, which arose from that
dispersion of the Hebrew people, to which some space has been devoted
in the preceding chapter.
We have seen that early colonies of the Jews were settled in Babylonia
and Mesopotamia. Their connection with their brethren in Judaea was
continually maintained: and they were bound to them by the link of a
common language. The Jews of Palestine and Syria, with those who
lived on the Tigris and Euphrates, interpreted the Scriptures through the
Targums1 or Clial dee paraphrases, and spoke kindred dialects of the lan
guage of Aram : 2 and hence they were called Aramcean Jews. We have
also had occasion to notice that other dispersion of the nation through
those countries where Greek was spoken. Their settlements began with
Alexander's conquests, and were continued under the successors of those
who partitioned his empire. Alexandria was their capital. They used
the Septuagint translation of the Bible ;3 and they were commonly called
Hellenists, or Jews of the Grecian speech.
The mere difference of language would account in some degree for the
mutual dislike with which we know that these two sections of the Jewish
race regarded one another. We were all aware how closely the use of an
hereditary dialect is bound up with the warmest feelings of the heart.
And in this case the Aramaean language was the sacred tongue of Palestine.
It is true that the tradition of the language of the Jews had been broken,
as the continuity of their political life had been rudely interrupted.
The Hebrew of the time of Christ was not the oldest Hebrew of the
Israelites ; but it was a kindred dialect, and old enough to command a
reverent affection. Though not the language of Moses and David, it was
that of Ezra and Nehemiah. And it is not unnatural that the Aramaeans
should have revolted from the speech of the Greek idolaters and the
tyrant Antiochus,4 — a speech which they associated moreover with
innovating doctrines and dangerous speculations.
For the division went deeper than a mere superficial diversity of speech.
It was not only a division, like the modern one of German and Spanish
1 It is uncertain when the written Targums the western, which is the parent of the Syriac,
came into use, but the practice of paraphrasing now, like the former, almost a dead language.
orally in Chaldee must have begun soon after The first of these dialects began to supplant
the Captivity. tne older Hebrew of Judsea from the time of
2 Aram  the " Highlands " of the Semitic the Captivity, and was the " Hebrew " of the
tribes — comprehended the tract of country New Testament, Luke xxiii. 38 ; John xix.
which extended from Taurus and Lebanon to 20 ; Acts xxi. 40, xxii. 2, xxvi. 14. Arabic,
Mesopotamia and Arabia. There were two the most perfect of the Semitic languages, has
main dialects of the Aramajan stock, the east- now generally overspread those regions.
em or Babylonian, commonly called Chaldee 3 See p. 35, n. 2.
(the " Syrian tongue " of 2 Kings xviii. 26 ; 4 Sec pp. 24, 25, and notes.
lsai. xxxvi. 11 , Ezr. iv. 7 ; Dan. ii. 4) ; and
3

34 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap.ii,
Jews, where those who hold substantially the same doctrines have acci
dentally been led to speak different languages. But there was a diversity
of religious views and opinions. This is not the place for examining thai
system of mystic interpretation called the Cabala,1 and for determining
how far its origin might be due to Alexandria or to Babylon. It is enough
to say, generally, that in the Aramaean theology, Oriental elements pre
vailed rather than Greek, and that the subject of Babylonian influences
has more connection with the life of St. Peter than that of St. Paul.
The Hellenists, on the other hand, or Jews who spoke Greek, who lived
in Greek countries, and were influenced by Greek civilization, are asso
ciated in the closest manner with the Apostle of the Gentiles. They are
more than once mentioned in the Acts, where our English translation
names them " Grecians," to distinguish them from the Heathen or prose
lyte " Greeks."2 Alexandria was the metropolis of their theology. Philo
was their great representative. He was an old man when St. Paul was
in his maturity : his writings were probably known to the Apostles ; and
they have descended with the inspired Epistles to our own day. The
work of the learned Hellenists may be briefly described as this, — to ac
commodate Jewish doctrines to the mind of the Greeks, and to make the
Greek language express the mind of the Jews. The Hebrew principles
were " disengaged .as much as possible from local and national conditions,
and presented in a form adapted to the Hellenic world." All this was
hateful to the zealous Aramaeans. The men of the East rose up against
those of the West. The Greek learning was not more repugnant to the
Roman Cato, than it was to the strict Hebrews. They had a saying,
" Cursed be he who teacheth his son the learning of the Greeks."3 We
could imagine them using the words of the prophet Joel (iii. 6), "The
children of Judah and the children of Jerusalem have ye sold unto the
Grecians, that ye might remove them from their border: " and we cannot
be surprised that, even in the deep peace and charity of the Church's
earliest days, this inveterate division re-appeared, and that, " when the

1 See Ch. XIII. his duty in what language he can." The fol-
2 See Chap. I. p. 10, note. lowing saying is attributed to Rabban Simeon,
8 This repugnance is illustrated by many the son of Gamaliel : " There were a thousand
passages in the Talmudic writings. Rabbi boys in my father's school, of whom fire hun-
Levi Ben Chajathah, going down to Cassarea, dred learned the law, and five hundred the
heard them reciting their phylacteries in wisdom of the Greeks ; and there is not one
Greek, and would have forbidden them ; of the latter now alive, excepting myself here,
which when Rabbi Jose heard, he was very and my uncle's son in Asia." We learn also
angry, and said, " If a man doth not know from Josephus that a knowledge of Greek wai
how to recite in the holy tongue, must lightly regarded by the Jews of Palestine.
he not recite them at all t Let him perform

chap.ii. HELLENISTS AND ARAMAEANS. 35
number of the disciples was multiplied, there arose a murmuring of
the Grecians against the Hebrews."1
It would be an interesting subject of inquiry to ascertain in what
proportions these two parties were distributed in the different countries
where the Jews were dispersed, in what places they came into the
strongest collision, and how far they were fused and united together.
In the city of Alexandria, the emporium of Greek commerce from the
time of its foundation, where, since the earliest Ptolemies, literature,
philosophy, and criticism had never ceased to excite the utmost in
tellectual activity, where the Septuagint translation of the Scripture
had been made,2 and where a Jewish temple and ceremonial worship
had been established in rivalry to that in Jerusalem,3 — there is no
doubt that the Hellenistic element largely prevailed. But although
(strictly speaking) the Alexandrian Jews were nearly all Hellenists,
it does not follow that they were all Hellenizers. In other words,
although their speech and their Scriptures were Greek, the theological
views of many among them undoubtedly remained Hebrew. There
must have been many who were attached to the traditions of Palestine,
and who looked suspiciously on their more speculative brethren : and we
have no difficulty in recognizing the picture presented in a pleasing
German fiction,4 which describes the debates and struggles of the two
tendencies in this city, to be very correct. In Palestine itself, we have
every reason to believe that the native population was entirely Aramaean,
though there was no lack of Hellenistic synagogues5 in Jerusalem,
which at the seasons of the festivals would be crowded with foreign
pilgrims, and become the scene of animated discussions. Syria was
connected by the link of language with Palestine and Babylonia ; but
Antioch, its metropolis, commercially and politically, resembled Alexan
dria : and it is probable that, when Barnabas and Saul were establish
ing the great Christian community in that city,6 the majority of the
Jews were "Grecians" rather than "Hebrews." In Asia Minor we
should at first sight be tempted to imagine that the Grecian tendency
l Acts vi. 1. hy Onias, from whose family the high priest-
2 It is useless here to enter into any of the hood had been transferred to the family of the
legends connected with the number " seventy." Maccabees, and who had fled into Egypt in the
This translation came into existence from 300 time of Ptolemy Philopator. It remained in
to 150 B.C. Its theological importance cannot existence till destroyed by Vespasian. See
be exaggerated. The quotations in the N. T. Josephus, War, i. 1, 1, vii. 10, 3 ; Ant. xiii. 3.
from the 0. T. are generally made from it. 4 Helon's Pilgrimage to Jerusalem, published
Seep. 37. in German in 1 820, translated into English in
3 This temple was not in the city of Alex- 1824.
andria, but at Leontopolis. It was built (or 6 See Acts vi. 9.
rather it was an old Heathen temple repaired) 6 Acts xi. 25, &c.

36 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap.ii.
would predominate ; but when we find that Antiochus brought
Babylonian Jews into Lydia and Phrygia, we must not make too con
fident a conclusion in this direction ; and we have grounds for imagin
ing that many Israelitish families in the remote districts (possibly that
of Timotheus at Lystra) a may have cherished the forms of the tradition
ary faith of the Eastern Jews, and lived uninfluenced by Hellenistic
novelties. The residents in maritime and commercial towns would not
be strangers to the Western developments of religious doctrines : and
when Apollos came from Alexandria to Ephesus,2 he would find himself
in a theological atmosphere not very different from that of his native
city. Tarsus in Cilicia will naturally be included under the same class
of cities of the West, by those who remember Strabo's assertion that, in
literature and philosophy, its fame exceeded that of Athens and Alexan
dria. At the same time, we cannot be sure that the very celebrity of
its Heathen schools might not induce the families of Jewish residents to
retire all the more strictly into a religious Hebrew seclusion.
That such a seclusion of their family from Gentile influences was
maintained by the parents of St. Paul, is highly probable. We have no
means of knowing how long they themselves, or their ancestors, had been
Jews of the dispersion. A tradition is mentioned by Jerome that they
came originally from Giscala, a town in Galilee, when it was stormed by
the Romans. The story involves an anachronism, and contradicts the
Acts of the Apostles.3 Yet it need not be entirely disregarded ; espe
cially when we find St. Paul speaking of himself as " a Hebrew of the
Hebrews," 4 and when we remember that the word " Hebrew " is used
for an Aramaic Jew, as opposed to a " Grecian " or " Hellenist." 5 Nor
is it unlikely in itself that before they settled in Tarsus, the family had
belonged to the Eastern dispersion, or to the Jews of Palestine. But,
however this may be, St. Paul himself must be called an Hellenist;
because the language of his infancy was that idiom of the Grecian Jews
in which all his letters were written. Though, in conformity with the
1 Acts xvi. 1 ; 2 Tim. i. 5, iii. 15. but an Hellenist. . . . St. Paul appeareth to me
2 Acts xviii. 24. to have plainly intimated, that a man might be
8 ^ts xxii. 3. of the stock of Israel and of the tribe of Ben-
4 Phil. iii. 5. Cave sees nothing more in jamin, and yet not be a Hebrew of the He-
this phrase than that " his parents were Jews, brews ; but that, as to himself, he was, both by
and that of the ancient stock, not entering in father and mother, a Hebrew, or of the race
by the gate of proselytism, but originally de- of that sort of Jews which were generally most
scended from the nation." — Life of St. Paul, esteemed by their nation." — History of the
i. 2. Benson, on the other hand, argues, from First Planting of the Christian Religion, vol i.
this passage and from 2 Cor. xi. 22, that p. 117.
there was a difference between a " Hebrew " 6 Acts vi. 1. For the absurd Ebionite
and an " Israelite." — " A person might be story that St. Paul was by birth not a Jew at
descended from Israel, and yet not be a Hebrew, all, but a Greek, see the next chapter.

chap. n. ST. PAUL'S INFANCY AT TARSUS. 37
strong feeling of the Jews of all times, he might learn his earliest
sentences from the Scripture in Hebrew, yet he was familiar with the
Septuagint translation at an early age. For it is observed that, when
he quotes from the Old Testament, his quotations are from that version ;
and that, not only when he cites its very words, but when (as is often the
case) he quotes it from memory.1 Considering the accurate knowledge
of the original Hebrew which he must have acquired under Gamaliel at
Jerusalem, it has been inferred that this can only arise from his having
been thoroughly imbued at an earlier period with the Hellenistic Scrip
tures. The readiness, too, with which he expressed himself in Greek,
even before such an audience as that upon the Areopagus at Athens,
shows a command of the language which a Jew would not, in all proba
bility, have attained, had not Greek been the familiar speech of his
childhood.5 But still the vernacular Hebrew of Palestine would not have been a
foreign tongue to the infant Saul ; on the contrary, he may have heard
it spoken almost as often as the Greek. For no doubt his parents,
proud of their Jewish origin, and living comparatively near to Palestine,
would retain the power of conversing with their friends from thence in
the ancient speech. Mercantile connections from the Syrian coast
would be frequently arriving, whose discourse would be in Aramaic ;
and in all probability there were kinsfolk still settled in Judaea, as we
afterwards find the nephew of St. Paul in Jerusalem.3 We may com
pare the situation of such a family (so far as concerns their language) to
that of the French Huguenots who settled in London after the revoca
tion of the Edict of Nantes. These French families, though they
soon learned to use the English as the medium of their common inter
course and the language of their household, yet, for several generations,
spoke French with equal familiarity and greater affection.4

1 See Tholuck's Essay on the early life of presents the subject under a different view, aa
St. Paul, Eng. Trans, p. 9. Out of eighty- follows : " Certain it is that the groundwork
eight quotations from the Old Testament, of Paul's intellectual and moral training was
Koppe gives grounds for thinking that forty- Jewish : yet he had at least some knowledge
nine were cited from memory. And Bleek of Greek literature, whether he acquired it in
thinks that every one of his citations without Tarsus, or in Jerusalem under Gamaliel, who
exception is from memory. He adds, howev- himself was not altogether averse to the Hel-
er, that the Apostle's memory reverts occasion- lenistic philosophy, or afterwards in his mis-
ally to the Hebrew text, as well as to that of sionary journeyings and his continual inter-
the Septuagint. See an article in the Christian course with Hellenists." — Hist, of the Christian
Remembrancer for April, 1848, on Grinfield's Church.
Hellenistic Ed. of the N. T. 8 Acts xxiii. 16.
2 We must not, however, press these con- 4 St. Paul's ready use of the spoken Ara-
siderations too far, especially when we take maic appears in his speech upon the stairs of
Phil. iii. 5 into consideration. Dr. Schaff the Castle of Antonia at Jerusalem. " in the

38 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap.ii
Moreover, it may be considered as certain that the family of St. Paul,
though Hellenistic in speech, were no Hellenizers in theology ; they were
not at all inclined to adopt Greek habits or Greek opinions. The manner
in which St. Paul speaks of himself, his fatlier, and his ancestors, implies
the most uncontaminated hereditary Judaism. " Are they Hebrews ? so
am I. Are they Israelites ? so am I. Are they the seed of Abraham ? so
am I." 1 — " A Pharisee " and " the son of a Pharisee." 2 — Circumcised
the eighth day, of the stock of Israel, of the tribe of Benjamin, a Hebrew
of the Hebrews.'''' 3
There is therefore little doubt that, though the native of a city filled
with a Greek population and incorporated with the Roman Empire, yet
Saul was born and spent his earliest days in the shelter of a home which
was Hebrew, not in name only but in spirit. The Roman power did not
press upon his infancy : the Greek ideas did not haunt his childhood : but
he grew up an Israelitish boy, nurtured in those histories of the chosen
people which he was destined so often to repeat in the synagogues,4 with
the new and wonderful commentary supplied by the life and resurrection
of a crucified Messiah. " From a child he knew the Scriptures," which
ultimately made him " wise unto salvation through faith which is in Christ
Jesus," as he says of Timothy in the second Epistle (iii. 15). And the
groups around his childhood were such as that which he beautifully
describes in another part of the same letter to that disciple, where he
speaks of " his grandmother Lois, and his mother Eunice " (i. 5).
We should be glad to know something of the mother of St. Paul. But
though he alludes to his father, he does not mention her. He speaks of
himself as set apart by God " from his mother's womb," that the Son of
God should in due time be revealed in him, and by him preached to the
Heathen.5 But this is all. We find notices of his sister and his sister's
son,6 and of some more distant relatives : 7 but we know nothing of her who
was nearer to him than all of them. He tells us of his instructor
Gamaliel ; but of her, who, if she lived, was his earliest and best teacher,
he tells us nothing. Did she die like Rachel, the mother of Benjamin,
the great ancestor of his tribe ; leaving his father to mourn and set a
monument on her grave, like Jacob, by the way of Bethlehem ? 8 Or did
she live to grieve over her son's apostasy from the faith of the Pharisees,
Hebrew tongue." This familiarity, however, » Phil. iii. 5.
he would necessarily have acquired during his * Acts xiii. 16-41 ; see xvii. 2, 3, 10, U,
student-life at Jerusalem, if he had not pos- xxviii. 23.
sessed it before. The difficult question of the 6 Gal. i. 15.
" Gift of Tongues " will be discussed in Chap. 6 Acts xxiii. 16.
XIII. 1 Rom. xvi. 7, 11,21.
1 2 Cor. xi. 22. 6 Gen. xxxv. 16-20, xlviii. 7.
2 Acts xxiii. 6.

chap.ii. ST. PAUL'S INFANCY AT TARSUS. 39
and die herself unreconciled to the obedience of Christ? Or did she
believe and obey the Saviour of her son ? These are questions which we
cannot answer. If we wish to realize the earliest infancy of the Apostle,
we must be content with a simple picture of a Jewish mother and her child.
Such a picture is presented to us in the short history of Elizabeth and
John the Baptist, and what is wanting in one of the inspired Books of
St. Luke may be supplied, in some degree, by the other.
The same feelings which welcomed the birth and celebrated the naming
of a son in the " hill country " of Judaea,1 prevailed also among the Jews
of the dispersion. As the " neighbors and cousins " of Elizabeth " heard
how the Lord had showed great mercy upon her, and rejoiced with her," —
so it would be in the household at Tarsus, when Saul was born. In a
nation to which the birth of a Messiah was promised, and at a period
when the aspirations after the fulfilment of the promise were continually
becoming more conscious and more urgent, the birth of a son was the
fulfilment of a mother's highest happiness : and to the father also (if we
may thus invert the words of Jeremiah) " blessed was the man who
brought tidings, saying, A man child is born unto thee; making him
glad."2 On the eighth day the child was circumcised and named. In
the case of John the Baptist, " they sought to call him Zacharias, after
the name of his father. But his mother answered, and said, Not so ; but
he shall be called John." And when the appeal was made to' his father,
lie signified his assent, in obedience to the vision. It was not unusual, on
the one hand, to call a Jewish child after the name of his father ; and, on
the other hand, it was a common practice, in all ages of Jewish history,
even without a prophetic intimation, to adopt a name expressive of reli
gious feelings. When the infant at Tarsus received the name of Saul, it
might be " after the name of his father ; " and it was a name of tradi
tional celebrity in the tribe of Benjamin, for it was that of the first king
anointed by Samuel.3 Or, when his father said " his name is Saul," it
may have been intended to denote (in conformity with the Hebrew deriva
tion of the word) that he was a son who had long been desired, the first
born of his parents, the child of prayer, who was thenceforth, like Samuel,
to be consecrated to God.4 " For this child I prayed," said the wife of
Elkanah ; " and the Lord hath given me my petition which I asked of
Him : therefore also I have lent him to the Lord ; as long as he liveth he
shall be lent unto the Lord."6
l Luke i. 39. were wont to give their children this name
2 Jer. xx. 15. at their circumcision." — Cave, i. 3; but he
8 " A name frequent and common in the gives no proof.
tribe of Benjamin ever since the first King * This is suggested by Neander.
of Israel, who was of that name, was chosen 6 1 Sam. i. 27, 28.
out of that tribe; in memory whereof they

40 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap.ii.
Admitted into covenant with God by circumcision, the Jewish child had
thenceforward a full claim to all the privileges of the chosen people. His
was the benediction of the 128th Psalm : — " The Lord shall bless thee out
of Zion : thou shalt see the good of Jerusalem all the days of thy life."
From that time, whoever it might be who watched over Saul's infancy,
whether, like king Lemuel,1 he learnt " the prophecy that his mother
taught him," or whether he was under the care of others, like those who
were with the sons of king David and king Ahab,2 — we are at no loss to
learn what the first ideas were, with which his early thought was made
familiar. The rules respecting the diligent education of children, which
were laid down by Moses in the 6th and 11th chapters of Deuteronomy,
were doubtless carefully observed : and he was trained in that peculiarly
historical instruction, spoken of in the 78th Psalm, which implies the
continuance of a chosen people, with glorious recollections of the past, and
great anticipations for the future : " The Lord made a covenant with
Jacob, and gave Israel a law, which He commanded our forefathers to
teach their children ; that their posterity might know it, and the children
which were yet unborn ; to the intent that when they came up, they might
show their children the same : that they might put their trust in God, and
aot to forget the works of the Lord, but to keep his commandments."
(ver. 5-7.) The histories of Abraham and Isaac, of Jacob and his
twelve sons, of Moses among the bulrushes, of Joshua and Samuel, Elijah,
Daniel, and the Maccabees, were the stories of his childhood. The de
struction of Pharaoh in the Red Sea, the thunders of Mount Sinai, the
dreary journeys in the wilderness, the land that flowed with milk and
honey, — this was tho earliest imagery presented to his opening mind.
The triumphant hymns of Zion, the lamentations by the waters of Babylon,
the prophetic praises of the Messiah, were the songs around his cradle.
Above all, he would be familiar with the destinies of his own illustrious
tribe.3 The life of the timid Patriarch, the father of the twelve ; the sad
death of Rachel near the city where the Messiah was to be born ; the
loneliness of Jacob, who sought to comfort himself in Benoni " the son of
1 Prov. xxxi. 1. Cf. Susanna, 3 ; 2 Tim. which the genealogies were kept, and when we
iii. 15, with 1 Tim. i. 5. find the tribe of Barnabas specified (Acts iv.
2 1 Chron. xxvii. 32 ; 2 Kings x. 1, 5. Cf. 36), and also of Anna the prophetess (Luke ii.
Joseph. Life, 76 ; Ant. xvi. 8, 3. 36), and when we find St. Paul alluding in a
8 It may be thought that here, and below, pointed manner to his tribe (see Rom. xi. 1,
p. 50, too much prominence has been given to Phil. iii. 5, and compare Acts xiii. 21, and also
the attachment of « Jew in the Apostolic age xxxvi. 7), it does notseem unnatural to believe
to his own particular tribe. It is difficult to that pious families of so famous a stock as that
ascertain how far the tribe-feeling of early of Benjamin should retain the hereditary en-
times lingered on in combination with the thusiasm of their sacred clanship. See, more-
national feeling, which grew up after the Cap- over, Matt. xix. 28 ; Rev. v. 5, vii. 4-8.
tirity. But when we consider the care with

«hap.ii. THE TRIBE OF BENJAMIN. 41
her sorrow," by calling him Benjamin l " the son of his right hand ; " and
then the youthful days of this youngest of the twelve brethren, the famine,
and the journeys into Egypt, the severity of Joseph, and the wonderful
story of the silver cup in the mouth of the sack ; — these are the narratives
to which he listened with intense and eager interest. How little was it
imagined that, as Benjamin was the youngest and most honored of the
Patriarchs, so this listening child of Benjamin should be associated with
the twelve servants of the Messiah of God, the last and most illustrious of
the Apostles ! But many years of ignorance were yet to pass away, before
that mysterious Providence, which brought Benjamin to Joseph in Egypt,
should bring his descendant to the knowledge and love of Jesus, the Son
of Mary. Some of the early Christian writers 2 see in the dying benediction
of Jacob, when he said that " Benjamin should raven as a wolf, in the
morning devour the prey, and at night divide the spoil," a prophetic inti
mation of him who, in the morning of his life, should tear the sheep of
God, and in its evening feed them, as the teacher of the nations.3 When
St. Paul was a child and learnt the words of this saying, no Christian
thoughts were associated with it, or with that other more peaceful prophecy
of Moses, when he said of Benjamin, " The beloved of the Lord shall dwell
in safety by Him : and the Lord shall cover him all the day long, and he
shall dwell between His shoulders."4 But he was familiar with the
prophetical words, and could follow in imagination the fortunes of the
sons of Benjamin, and knew how they went through the wilderness with
Rachel's other children, the tribes of Ephraim and Manasseh, forming
with them the third of the four companies on the march, and reposing with
them at night on the west of the encampment.5 He heard how their lands
were assigned to them in the promised country along the borders of
Judah:6 and how Saul, whose name he bore, was chosen from the tribe
which was thesmallest,7 when " little Benjamin " 8 became the " ruler " of
Israel. He knew that when the ten tribes revolted, Benjamin was faith
ful : 9 and he learnt to follow its honorable history even into the dismal
years of the Babylonian Captivity, when Mordecai, " a Benjamite who had
been carried away," 10 saved the nation : and when, instead of destruction,
" the Jews," through him, " had light, and gladness, and joy, and honor:
and in every province, and in every city, whithersoever the king's com
mandment and his decree came, the Jews had joy and gladness, a feast
and a good day. And many of the people of the land became Jews ; for
the fear of the Jews fell upon them." u
i Gen. xxxv. 18. 7 1 Sam. ix. 21.
2 Gen. xlix. 27. 8 Ps. lxviii. 27.
8 e.g. Tertullian. 9 2 Chron. xi. . see I Kings xii.
4 Deut. xxxiii. 12. 10 Esther ii. 5, 6.
6 Numb. ii. 18-24; x. 22-24. u Esther viii. 16, 17.
• Joshua xviii. 11.

42 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap ii:
Such were the influences which cradled the infancy of St. Paul ; and
such was the early teaching under which his mind gradually rose to the
realization of his position as a Hebrew child in a city of Gentiles. Of
the exact period of his birth we possess no authentic information.1 From
a passage in a sermon attributed to St. Chrysostom, it has been inferred2
that he was born in the year 2 B.C. of our era. The date is not improba
ble ; but the genuineness of the sermon is suspected ; and if it was the
undoubted work of the eloquent Father, we have no reason to believe
that he possessed any certain means of ascertaining the fact. Nor need
we be anxious to possess the information. We have a better chronology
than that which reckons by years and months. We know that St. Paul
was a young man at the time of St. Stephen's martyrdom,3 and therefore
we know what were the features of the period, and what the circumstan
ces of the world, at the beginning of his eventful life. He must have
been born in the later years of Herod, or the earlier of his son Archelaus.
It was the strongest and most flourishing time of the reign . of Augustus.
The world was at peace ; the pirates of the Levant were dispersed ; and
Cilicia was lying at rest, or in stupor, with other provinces, under the
wide shadow of the Roman power. Many governors had ruled there
since the days of Cicero. Athenodorus, the emperor's tutor, had been
one of them. It was about the time when Horace and Maecenas died,
with others whose names will never be forgotten ; and it was about the
time when Caligula was born, with others who were destined to make
the world miserable. Thus is the epoch fixed in the manner in which
the imagination most easily apprehends it. During this pause in the
world's history St. Paul was born.
It was a pause, too, in the history of the sufferings of the Jews. That
lenient treatment which had been begun by Julius Caesar was continued
by Augustus ; 4 and the days of severity were not yet come, when Tibe
rius and Claudius drove them into banishment, and Caligula oppressed
them with every mark of contumely and scorn. We have good reason
to believe that at the period of the Apostle's birth the Jews were unmo
lested at Tarsus, where his father lived and enjoyed the rights of a Roman
citizen. It is a mistake to suppose that this citizenship was a privilege
which belonged to the members of the family, as being natives of this
city.6 Tarsus was not a municipium, nor was it a colonia, hke Philippi in
1 As regards the chronology of St. Paul's 4 Cassar, like Alexander, treated the Jews
life.it is enough to refer to Ch. IV. and es- with much consideration. Suetonius speaks in
pecially to Appendix HI. strong terms of their grief at his death. Au
2 This is on the supposition that he died gustus permitted the largess, when it fell on a
a.d. 66, at the age of 68. Sabbath, to be put off till the next day.
8 Acts vii. 58. It must be remembered, 6 Some of the older biographers of St.
however, that the term vraviae was applied to Paul assume this without any hesitation : and
all men under 40

«bap.d. CITIZENSHIP OF ST. PAUL'S FATHER. 43
Macedonia,1 or Antioch in Pisidia ; but it was a " free city " 2 (urbs libera),
like the Syrian Antioch and its neighbor-city, Seleucia on the sea. Such
a city had the privilege of being governed by its own magistrates, and
was exempted from the occupation of a Roman garrison, but its citizens
did not necessarily possess the civitas of Rome. Tarsus had received
great benefits both from Julius Caesar and from Augustus, but the father
of St. Paul was not on that account a Roman citizen. This privilege had
been granted to him, or had descended to him, as an individual right ; he
might have purchased it for a "large sum" of money;3 but it is more
probable that it came to him as a reward of services rendered, during the
civil wars, to some influential Roman.4 We should not be in serious
error, if we were to say, in language suggested by the narrative of St.
Stephen's martyrdom (Acts vi. 9), that St. Paul's father was a Cilician
Libertinus.5 That Jews were not unfrequently Roman citizens, we learn
from Josephus, who mentions in the " Jewish War " 6 some even of the
equestrian order who were illegally scourged and crucified by Florus at
Jerusalem ; and (what is more to our present point) enumerates cer
tain of his countrymen who possessed the Roman franchise at Ephesus, in
that important series of decrees relating to the Jev^s, which were issued
in the time of Julius Caesar, and are preserved in the second book of the
" Antiquities." 7 The family of St. Paul were in the same position at
Tarsus as those who were Jews of Asia Minor and yet citizens of Rome
at Ephesus ; and thus it came to pass, that, while many of his contempo
raries were willing to expend " a large sum " in the purchase of " this
freedom," the Apostle himself was " free-born."
The question of the double name of " Saul " and " Paul" will require
our attention hereafter, when we come in the course of our narrative to
that interview with Sergius Paulus in Cyprus, coincidently with which
the appellation in the Acts of the Apostles is suddenly changed. Many
opinions have been held on this subject, both by ancient and modern
the mistake is very frequent still. It is enough pose that the Apostle, with other Cilician Jews,
to notice that the Tribune (Acts xxi. 39, xxii. may have been, like Horace, libertino patre natus,
24) knew that St. Paul was a Tarsian, without (Sat. I. vi. 45.)
being aware that he was a citizen. 6 This suggestion is due to Wieseler, who
l Acts xvi. 12. translates the verse which describes Stephen's
2 It appears that Antony gave Tarsns the great opponents, so as to mean " Libertines "
privileges of an Urbs libera, though it had pre- from " Cyrene, Alexandria, Cilicia, and Asia."
viously taken the side of Augustus, and been We think, as is observed below (p. 56, note),
named Juliopolis. that another view is more natural : but at
8 Acts xxii. 28. lea9t we should observe that we find Saul, a
4 Great numbers of Jews were made slaves Roman citizen, actively co-operating in persecu-
in the Civil Wars, and then manumitted. A tion with those who are called Libertini.
slave manumitted with due formalities became 6 War, ii. 14, 6.
a Roman citizen. Thus it is natural to sup- 7 Ant. xiv. 10, 13.

44 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap.ii,
theologians.1 At present it will be enough to say, that, though we can
not overlook the coincidence, or believe it accidental, yet it is most prob
able that both names were borne by him in his childhood, that " Saul "
was the name of his Hebrew home, and " Paul " that by which he was
known among the Gentiles. It will be observed that "Paulus," the
name by which he is always mentioned after his departure from Cyprus,
and by which he always designates himself in his Epistles, is a Roman,
not a Greek, word. And it will be remembered, that, among those
whom he calls his "kinsmen" in the Epistle to the Romans, two of the
number, Junia and Lucius, have Roman names, while the others are
Greek.2 All this may point to a strong Roman connection. These
names may have something to do with that honorable citizenship
which was an heirloom in the household; and the appellation "Paulus"
may be due to some such feelings as those which induced the historian
Josephus to call himself " Flavius," in honor of Vespasian and the Fla
vian family.
If we turn now to consider the social position of the Apostle's father
and family, we cannot on the one hand confidently argue, from the pos
session of the citizenship, that they were in the enjoyment of affluence
and outward distinction. The civitas of Rome, though at that time it
could not be purchased without heavy expense, did not depend upon any
conditions of wealth, where it was bestowed by authority. On the other
hand, it is certain that the manual trade, which we know that St. Paul
exercised, cannot be adduced as an argument to prove that his circum
stances were narrow and mean ; still less, as some have imagined, that he
lived in absolute poverty. It was a custom among the Jews that all boys
should learn a trade. " What is commanded of a father towards his
son ? " asks a Talmudic writer. " To circumcise him, to teach him the
law, to teach him a trade." Rabbi Judah saith, " He that teacheth not
his son a trade, doth the same as if he taught him to be a thief;" and
Rabban Gamaliel saith, "He that hath a trade in his hand, to what is he
like ? he is like a vineyard that is fenced." And if, in compliance with
this good and useful custom of the Jews, the father of the young Cilician
sought to make choice of a trade, which might fortify his son against idle
ness or against adversity, none would occur to him more naturally than
the profitable occupation of the making of tents, the material of which
was hair-cloth, supplied by the goats of his native province, and sold in
1 Origen says that he had both names from Peter, at his ordination in Antioch. Bede,
the first; that he used one among the Jews, that he did not receive it till the Proconsul wai
and the other afterwards. Augustine, that he converted ; and Jerome, that it was meant W
took the name when he began to preach. commemorate that victory.
Chrysostom, that he received a new title, like 2 Rom. xvi. 7, 11, 21

chap. n. SCENERY OF TARSUS. 45
the markets of the Levant by the well-known name of cilicium.1 The
most reasonable conjecture is that his father's business was concerned with
these markets, and that, like many of his scattered countrymen, he was
actively occupied in the traffic of the Mediterranean coasts : and the
remote dispersion of those relations, whom he mentions in his letter from
Corinth to Rome, is favorable to this opinion. But whatever might be
the station and employment of his father or his kinsmen, whether they
were elevated by wealth above, or depressed by poverty below, the aver
age of the Jews of Asia Minor and Italy, we are disposed to believe that
this family were possessed of that highest respectability which is worthy
of deliberate esteem. The words of Scripture seem to claim for them
the tradition of a good and religious reputation. The strict piety of
St. Paul's ancestors has already been remarked ; some of his kinsmen
embraced Christianity before the Apostle himself,2 and the excellent
discretion of his nephew will be the subject of our admiration, when we
come to consider the dangerous circumstances which led to the nocturnal
journey from Jerusalem to Caesarea.3
But, though a cloud rests on the actual year of St. Paul's birth, and
the circumstances of his father's household must be left to imagination,
we have the great satisfaction of knowing the exact features of the
scenery in the midst of which his childhood was spent. The plain, the
mountains, the river, and the sea still remain to us. The rich har
vests of corn still grow luxuriantly after rains in spring. The- same
tents of goat's hair are still seen covering the plains in the busy harvest.4
There is the same solitude and silence in the intolerable heat and dust of
the summer. Then, as now, the mothers and children of Tarsus went
out in the cool evenings, and looked from the gardens round the city, or
from their terraced roofs, upon the heights of Taurus. The same sunset
lingered on the pointed summits. The same shadows gathered in the
deep ravines. The river Cydnus has suffered some changes in the course
of 1800 years. Instead of rushing, as in the time of Xenophon, like the
Rhone at Geneva, in a stream of two hundred feet broad through the
city, it now flows idly past it on the east. The Channel, which floated
the ships of Antony and Cleopatra, is now filled up ; and wide unhealthy
lagoons occupy the place of the ancient docks.5 But its upper waters
1 Hair-cloth of this kind is manufactured at 4 " The plain presented the appearance of
the present day in Asia Minor, and the word an immense sheet of corn-stubble, dotted with
is still retained in French, Spanish, and Italian. small camps of tents : these tents are made of
2 " Salute Andronicus and Junias, my hair-cloth, apd the peasantry reside in them at
kinsmen, and my fellow-prisoners, who are of this season, while the harvest is reaping and
note among the Apostles, who also were in the corn treading out." — Beaufort's Kararna-
Cfrrist before me." — Rom. xvi. 7. nia, p. 273.
8 Acts xxiii. 6 In Strabo's day there was an inconvenient

46 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap. ii.
still flow, as formerly, cold and clear from the snows of Taurus : and its
waterfalls still break over the same rocks, when the snows are melting,
like the Rhine at Schaffhausen. We find a pleasure in thinking that the
footsteps of the young Apostle often wandered by the side of this stream,
and that his eyes often looked on these falls. We can hardly believe that
he who spoke to the Lystrians of the " rain from heaven," and the " fruit
ful seasons," and of the "living God who made heaven and earth and the
sea,"1 could have looked with indifference on beautiful and impressive
scenery. Gamaliel v^as celebrated for his love of nature : and the young
Jew, who was destined to be his most famous pupil, spent his early days
in the close neighborhood of much that was well adapted to foster such
a taste. Or if it be thought that in attributing such feelings to him we
are writing in the spirit of modern times ; and if it be contended that he
would be more influenced by the realities of human life than by the im
pressions of nature, — then let the youthful Saul be imagined on the banks
of the Cydnus, where it flowed through the city in a stream less clear
and fresh, where the wharves were covered with merchandise, in the
midst of groups of men in various costumes, speaking various dialects.
St. Basil says, that in his day Tarsus was a point of union for Syrians,
Cilicians, Isaurians, and Cappadocians. To these we must add the Greek
merchant, and the agent of Roman luxury. And one more must be
added, — the Jew, — even then the pilgrim of Commerce, trading with
every nation, and blending with none. In this mixed company Saul, at
an early age, might become familiar with the activities of life and the
diversities of human character, and even in his childhood make some
acquaintance with those various races, which in his manhood he was
destined to influence.
We have seen what his infancy was ; we must now glance at his boy
hood. It is usually the case that the features of a strong character
display themselves early. His impetuous fiery disposition would some
times need control. Flashes of indignation would reveal his impatience
and his honesty.2 The affectionate tenderness of his nature would not
be without an object of attachment, if that sister, who was afterwards
married,3 was his playmate at Tarsus. The work of tent-making, rather
an amusement than a trade, might sometimes occupy those young
hands, which were marked with the toil of years when he held them to
" bar" at the mouth of the Cydnus. Here (as edition of this book, which contains views of
in the case of the Pyramus and other rivers on Tarsus and of the falls of the Cydnus.
that coast) the land has since that time en- t Acts xiv. 17, 15.
croached on the sea. The unhealthiness of the 2 See Acts ix. 1, 2, xxiii. 1-5; and com-
sea-coast near the Gulf of Scanderoon is noto- pare Acts xiii. 13, xv. 38, with 2 Tim. iv.
rious, as can be testified by more than one of 11.
those who contributed drawings to the quarto 8 Acts xxiii. 16.

chap.ii. ST. PAUL'S BOYHOOD. 47
the view of the Elders at Miletus.1 His education was conducted at
home rather than at school : for, though Tarsus was celebrated for its
learning, the Hebrew boy would not lightly be exposed to the influence
of Gentile teaching. Or, if he went to a school, it was not a Greek
school, but rather to some room connected with the synagogue, where a
noisy class of Jewish children received the rudiments of instruction,
seated on the ground with their teacher, after the manner of Mohamme^
dan children in the East, who may be seen or heard at their lessons near
the mosque.2 At such a school, it may be, he learnt to read and to
write, going and returning under the care of some attendant, according
to that custom which he afterwards used as an illustration in the Epistle
to the Galatians 3 (and perhaps he remembered his own early days while
he wrote the passage) when he spoke of the Law as the Slave who
conducts us to the School of Christ. His religious knowledge, as his
years advanced, was obtained from hearing the Law read in the syna
gogue, from listening to the arguments and discussions of learned
doctors, and from that habit of questioning and answering, which was
permitted eVen to the children among the Jews. Familiar with the
pathetic history of the Jewish sufferings, he would feel his heart filled
with that love to his own people which breaks out in the Epistle to the
Romans (ix. 4, 5) — to that people " whose were the adoption and the
glory and the covenants, and of whom, as concerning the flesh, Christ
was to come," — a love not then, as it was afterwards, blended with
love towards all mankind, " to the Jew first, and also to the Gentile,"
— but rather united with a bitter hatred to the Gentile children whom
he saw around him. His idea of the Messiah, so far as it was distinct,
would be the carnal notion of a temporal prince — a "Christ known
after the flesh," * — and he looked forward with the hope of a Hebrew
to the restoration of "the kingdom to Israel."5 He would be known
1 Acts xx. 34. " Te yourselves know that sound of voices was unceasing. For pictures
these hands have ministered to my necessities, of an Egyptian and a Turkish school, see the
and to them that were with me." Compare Bible Cyclopoidia, 1841 ; and the Cyclopaedia
xviii. 3; 1 Cor. iv. 12; 1 Thess. ii. 9 ; 2 of Biblical Literature, 1847 '.
Thess. iii. 8. 8 Gal. "i- 24> where the word inaccurately
2 This is written from the recollection of a rendered " Schoolmaster " denotes the attend-
Mohammedan school at Bildah in Algeria, ant slave who accompanied the child to the
where the mosques can now be entered with im- school. A Jewish illustration of a custom
punity. The children, with the teacher, were well known among the Greeks and Romans is
on a, kind of upper story like a shelf, within given by Buxtorf. He describes the child as
the mosque. All were seated on this floor, in taken to the preceptor under the skirt of a
the way described by Maimonides below (p. Rabbi's cloak, and as provided with honey and
57). The children wrote on boards, and re- honey-cakes, symbolizing such passages as
cited what they wrote; the master addressed Deut. xxxii. 13, Cant. iv. 11, Ps. xix. 10.
them in rapid succession ; and the confused 4 2 Cor. v. 16. 6 Acts i. 6.

48 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap.d.
at Tarsus as a child of promise, and as one likely to uphold the honor
of the Law against the half-infidel teaching of the day. But the time
was drawing near, when his training was to become more exact and
systematic. He was destined for the school of Jerusalem. The educa
tional maxim of the Jews, at a later period, was as follows : — "At five
years of age, let children begin the Scripture ; at ten, the Mishna ; at
thirteen, let them be subjects of the Law." l There is no reason to
suppose that the general practice was very different before the floating
maxims of the great doctors were brought together in the Mishna.
It may therefore be concluded, with a strong degree of probability, that
Saul was sent to the Holy City 2 between the ages of ten and thirteen.
Had it been later than the age of thirteen, he could hardly have said
that he had been " brought up " in Jerusalem.
The first time any one leaves the land of his birth to visit a foreign
and distant country, is an important epoch in his life. In the case of
one who has taken this first journey at an early age, and whose character
is enthusiastic and susceptible of lively impressions from without, this
epoch is usually remembered with peculiar distinctness. But when the
country which is thus visited has furnished the imagery for the dreams
of childhood, and is felt to be more truly the young traveller's home
than the land he is leaving, then the journey assumes the sacred charac
ter of a pilgrimage. The nearest parallel which can be found to the
visits of the scattered Jews to Jerusalem, is in the periodical expedition
of the Mohammedan pilgrims to the sanctuary at Mecca. Nor is there
any thing which ought to shock the mind in such a comparison ; for that
localizing spirit was the same thing to the Jews under the highest sanc
tion, which it is to the Mohammedans through the memory of a prophet
who was the enemy and not the forerunner of Christ. As the disciples
of Islam may be seen, at stated seasons, flocking towards Cairo or Da
mascus, the meeting-places of the African and Asiatic caravans, — so
Saul had often seen the Hebrew pilgrims from the interior of Asia Minor
come down through the passes of the mountains, and join others at
Tarsus who were bound for Jerusalem. They returned when the
festivals were over ; and he heard them talk of the Holy City, of Herod
and the New Temple, and of the great teachers and doctors of the Law.
And at length Saul himself was to go, — to see the land of promise and
1 We learn from Buxtorf that at 13 there 2 That he came from Tarsus at an early
was a ceremony something like Christian con- age is implied in Acts xxvi. 4. — " My manner
firmation. The boy was then called a " Child of life from my youth, which was at the frst
of the Law ; " and the father declared in the among mine own nation at Jerusalem, know
presence of the Jews that his son fully under- all the Jews, which knew me from the begin-
itood the Law, and was fully responsible for ning."
his sins.

chap.ii. HE IS SENT TO JERUSALEM. 49
the City of David, and grow up a learned Rabbi " at the feet of
Gamaliel." With his father, or under the care of some other friend older than
himself, he left Tarsus and went to Jerusalern. It is not probable that
they travelled by the long and laborious land-journey which leads from
the Cilician plain through the defiles of Mount Amanus to Antioch, and
thence along the rugged Phoenician shore through Tyre and Sidon to
Judaea. The Jews, when they went to the festivals, or to carry contri
butions, like the Mohammedans of modern days, would follow the lines of
natural traffic:1 and now that the Eastern Sea had been cleared of its
pirates, the obvious course would be to travel by water. The Jews,
though merchants, were not seamen. We may imagine Saul, therefore,
setting sail from the Cydnus on his first voyage, in a Phoenician trader,
under the patronage of the gods of Tyre ; or in company with Greek
mariners in a vessel adorned with some mythological emblem, like that
Alexandrian corn-ship which subsequently brought him to Italy, " whose
sign was Castor and Pollux." 2 Gradually they lost sight of Taurus, and
the heights of Lebanon came into view. The one had sheltered his
early home, but the other had been a familiar form to his Jewish fore
fathers. How histories would crowd into his mind as the vessel moved
on over the waves, and he gazed upon the furrowed flanks of the great
Hebrew mountain ! Had the voyage been taken fifty years earlier, the
vessel would probably have been bound for Ptolemais, which still bore
the name of the Greek kings of Egypt ; 3 but in the reign of Augustus
or Tiberius, it is more likely that she sailed round the headland of
Carmel, and came to anchor in the new harbor of Caesarea, — the hand
some city which Herod had rebuilt, and named in honor of the Emperor.
To imagine incidents when none are recorded, and confidently to lay
down a route without any authority, would be inexcusable in writing on
this subject. But to imagine the feelings of a Hebrew boy on his first
visit to the Holy Land, is neither difficult nor blamable. During this
journey Saul had around him a different scenery and different cultiva
tion from what he had been accustomed to, — not a river and a wide
plain covered with harvests of corn, but a succession of hills and valleys,
with terraced vineyards watered, by artificial irrigation. If it was the
time of a festival, many pilgrims were moving in the same direction,
with music and the songs of Zion. The ordinary road would probably
1 In 1 820, Abd-el-Kader went with his father Ptolemais was still a busy seaport in St. Paul's
on board a French brig to Alexandria, on their day, though Caesarea had become the most im-
way to Mecca. portant harbor, and indeed (politically) the
2 Acts xxviii. 11. most important city, in Palestine. See Acts
* See, for instance 1 Maccab v. 15, x. 1. xxi. 7.
4

60 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap. i,.
he that mentioned in the Acts, which led from Caesarea through the
town of Antipatris1 (Acts xxiii. 31). But neither of these places would
possess much interest for a " Hebrew of the Hebrews." The one was
associated with the thoughts of the Romans and of modern times ; the
other had been built by Herod in memory of Antipater, his Idumaean
fatlier. But objects were not wanting of the deepest interest to a child
of Benjamin. Those far hill-tops on the left were close upon Mount
Gilboa, even if the very place could not be seen where " the Philistines
fought against Israel . . . and the battle went sore against Saul . . .
and he fell on his sword . . . and died, and his three sons, and his
armor-bearer, and all his men, that same day together."2 After passing
through the lots of the tribes of Manasseh and Ephraim, the traveller,
from Caesarea came to the borders of Benjamin: The children of
Rachel were together in Canaan as they had been in the desert. The
lot of Benjamin was entered near Bethel, memorable for the piety of
Jacob, the songs of Deborah, the sin of Jeroboam, and the zeal of
Josiah.3 Onward a short distance was Gibeah, the home of Saul when
he was anointed King,4 and the scene of the crime and desolation of the
tribe, which made it the smallest of the tribes of Israel.5 Might it not
be too truly said concerning the Israelites even of that period : " They
have deeply corrupted themselves, as in the days of Gibeah : tlierefore
the Lord will remember their iniquity, He will visit their sins " ? 6 At a
later stage of his life, such thoughts of the unbelief and iniquity of
Israel accompanied St. Paul wherever he went. At the early age of
twelve years, all his enthusiasm could find an adequate object in the
earthly Jerusalem ; the first view of which would be descried about this
part of the journey. From the time when the line of the city wall was
seen, all else was forgotten. The further border of Benjamin was almost
reached. The Rabbis said that the boundary-line of Benjamin and
Judah, the two faithful tribes, passed through the Temple. And this
City and Temple was the common sanctuary of all Israelites. " Thither
the tribes go up, even the tribes of the Lord : to testify unto Israel, to
give thanks unto the name of the Lord. There is little Benjamin tlieir
ruler, and the princes of Judah their council, the princes of Zebulon
and the princes of Naphtali : for there is the seat of judgment, even
the seat of the house of David." And now the Temple's glittering
roof was seen, with the buildings of Zion crowning the eminence
above it, and the ridge of the Mount of Olives rising high over all.
And now the city gate was passed, with that thrill of the heart which
1 See p. 25, n. 3. 2 1 Sam. xxxi. 1-6. « 1 Sam. x. 26, xv. 34
8 Gen. xxviii. 19 ; Judg. iv. 5 ; 1 Kings xii * Judges xx. 43, &c
89 ; 2 Kings xxiii. 15. e Hosea ix. 9.

CHAP- n- GAMALIEL. 53
die Ages.1 Both were Pharisaic schools : but the former upheld the honor
of tradition as even superior to the law ; the latter despised the tradition-
ists when they clashed with Moses. The antagonism between them was
so great, that it was said that even " Elijah the Tishbite would never be
able to reconcile the disciples of Hillel and Schammai."
Of these two schools, that of Hillel was by far the most influential in
its own day, and its decisions have been held authoritative by the greater
number of later Rabbis. The most eminent ornament of this school was
Gamaliel, whose fame is celebrated in the Talmud. Hillel was the father
of Simeon, and Simeon the father of Gamaliel. It has been imagined
by some that Simeon was the same old man who took the infant Saviour
in his arms, and pronounced the Nunc Dimittis.2 It is difficult to give a
conclusive proof of this ; but there is no doubt that this Gamaliel was the
same who wisely pleaded the cause of St. Peter and the other Apostles,3
and who had previously educated the future Apostle St. Paul.4 His
learning was so eminent, and his character so revered, that he is one of
the seven who alone among Jewish doctors have been honored with the
title of " Rabban." 6 As Aquinas, among the schoolmen, was called Doctor
Angelieus, and Bonaventura Doctor Seraphicus, so Gamaliel was called
the "Beauty of the Law ; " and it is a saying of the Talmud, that "since
Rabban Gamaliel died, the glory of the Law has ceased." He was a
Pharisee; but anecdotes6 are told of him, which show that he was not
trammelled by the narrow bigotry of the sect. He had no antipathy to
the Greek learning. He rose above the prejudices of his party. Our
impulse is to class him with the best of the Pharisees, like Nicodemus and
Joseph of Arimathaea. Candor and wisdom seem to have been features
of his character ; and this agrees with what we read of him in the Acts
of the Apostles,1 that he was " had in reputation of all the people," and
with his honest and intelligent argument when Peter was brought before
the Council. It has been imagined by some that he became a Christian :
and why he did not become so is known only to Him who understands
the secrets of the human heart. But he lived and died a Jew ; and a
well-known prayer against Christian heretics was composed or sanctioned
1 See Prideaux's Connection, part H. pref. cile this with the Jewish law, he replied, that
p. 12, and beginning of book viii. the bath was there before the statue; that the
3 Luke ii. 25-35. bath was not made for the goddess, but the
8 Acts v. 34-40. statue for the bath. Tholuck, Eng. transl.p. 17.
1 Acts xxii. 3. 7 Acts v. 34. Yet Nicodemus and Joseph
6 This title is the same as " Rabboni " ad- declared themselves the friends of Christ,
dressed to our Lord by Mary Magdalene. which Gamaliel never did. And we should
6 He bathed once at Ptolemais in an apart- hardly expect to find a violent persecutor
ment where a statue was erected to a Heathen among the pupils of a really candid and un-
goddess ; and being asked how he could recon- prejudiced man.

52 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap.ii
all the general character of the epoch. Philip,, the tetrarch of Graulonitis,
called Bethsaida, on the north of the lake of Genesareth, by the name
of Julias, in honor of the family who reigned at Rome. Antipas, the
tetrarch of Galilee, built Tiberias on the south of the same lake, in honor
of the emperor who about this time (a.d. 14) succeeded his illustrious
step-father. These political changes had been attended with a gradual alteration
in the national feelings of the Jews with regard to their religion. That
the sentiment of political nationality was not extinguished was proved
too well by all the horrors of Vespasian's and Hadrian's reigns ; but
there was a growing tendency to cling rather to their Law and Religion
as the centre of their unity. The great conquests of the Heathen pow
ers may have been intended by Divine Providence to prepare this change
in the Jewish mind. Even under the Maccabees, the idea of the state
began to give place, in some degree, to the idea of religious life. Under
Herod, the old unity was utterly broken to pieces. The high priests were
set up and put down at his caprice ; and the jurisdiction of the Sanhedrin
was invaded by the most arbitrary interference. Under the governors, the
power of the Sanhedrin was still more abridged ; and high priests were
raised and deposed, as the Christian patriarchs of Constantinople have for
some ages been raised and deposed by the Sultan: so that it is often
a matter of great difficulty to ascertain who was high priest at Jerusalem
in any given year at this period.1 Thus the hearts of the Jews turned
more and more towards the fulfilment of Prophecy, — to the practice of
Religion, — to the interpretation of the Law. All else was now hopeless.
The Pharisees, the Scribes, and the Lawyers were growing into a more
important body even than the Priests and the Levites ; 2 and that system
of " Rabbinism " was beginning, " which, supplanting the original religion
of the Jews, became, after the ruin of the Temple and the extinction of
the public worship, a new bond of national union, the great distinctive
feature in the character of modern Judaism." 3
The Apostolic age was remarkable for the growth of learned Rabbinical
schools ; but of these the most eminent were the rival schools of Hillel
and Schammai. These sages of the law were spoken of by the Jews,
and their proverbs quoted, as the seven wise men were quoted by the
Greeks. Their traditional systems run through all the Talmudical writ
ings, as the doctrines of the Scotists and Thoniists run through the Mid-
1 See Acts xxiii. 5. these schools, some were Levites, as Samuel;
''- In earlier periods of Jewish history, the some belonged to the other tribes, as Saul and
prophets seem often to have been a more influ- David.
ential body than the priests. It is remarkable 8 Milman's History of the Jews, vol. iii
that we do not read of " Schools of the p. 100.
I'rophets " in any of the Levitical cities In

CBAr- u- GAMALIEL. 53
die Ages.1 Both were Pharisaic schools : but the former upheld the honor
of tradition as even superior to the law ; the latter despised the tradition-
ists when they clashed with Moses. The antagonism between them was
so great, that it was said that even " Elijah the Tishbite would never be
able to reconcile the disciples of Hillel and Schammai."
Of these two schools, that of Hillel was by far the most influential in
its own day, and its decisions have been held authoritative by the greater
number of later Rabbis. The most eminent ornament of this school was
Gamaliel, whose fame is celebrated in the Talmud. Hillel was the father
of Simeon, and Simeon the father of Gamaliel. It has been imagined
by some that Simeon was the same old man who took the infant Saviour
in his arms, and pronounced the Nunc Dimittis.2 It is difficult to give a
conclusive proof of this ; but there is no doubt that this Gamaliel was the
same who wisely pleaded the cause of St. Peter and the other Apostles,3
and who had previously educated the future Apostle St. Paul.4 His
learning was so eminent, and his character so revered, that he is one of
the seven who alone among Jewish doctors have been honored with the
title of " Rabban." 6 As Aquinas, among the schoolmen, was called Doctor
Angelicas, and Bonaventura Doctor Seraphicus, so Gamaliel was called
the "Beauty of the Law ; " and it is a saying of the Talmud, that "since
Rabban Gamaliel died, the glory of the Law has ceased." He was a
Pharisee; but anecdotes6 are told of him, which show that he was not
trammelled by the narrow bigotry of the sect. He had no antipathy to
the Greek learning. He rose above the prejudices of his party. Our
impulse is to class him with the best of the Pharisees, like Nicodemus and
Joseph of Arimathaea. Candor and wisdom seem to have been features
of his character ; and this agrees with what we read of him in the Acts
of the Apostles,7 that he was " had in reputation of all the people," and
with his honest and intelligent argument when Peter was brought before
the Council. It has been imagined by some that he became a Christian :
and why he did not become so is known only to Him who understands
the secrets of the human heart. But he lived and died a Jew ; and a
well-known prayer against Christian heretics was composed or sanctioned
1 See Prideaux's Connection, part II. pref. cile this with the Jewish law, he replied, that
p. 12, and beginning of book viii. the bath was there before the statue ; that the
2 Luke ii. 25-35. bath was not made for the goddess, but the
8 Acts v. 34-40. statue for the bath. Tholnck, Eng. transl.p. 17.
1 Acts xxii. 3. 7 Acts v. 34. Yet Nicodemus and Joseph
6 This title is the same as " Rabboni " ad- declared themselves the friends of Christ,
dressed to our Lord by Mary Magdalene. which Gamaliel never did. And wc should
8 He bathed once at Ptolemais in an apart- hardly expect to find a violent persecutor
ment where a statue was erected to a Heathen among the pupils of a really candid and un-
goddess ; and being asked how he could recon- prejudiced man.

54 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap. j,.
by him.1 He died eighteen years before the destruction of Jerusalem,'
about the time of St. Paul's shipwreck at Malta, and was buried with
great honor. Another of his pupils, Onkelos, the author of the cele
brated Targum, raised to him such a funeral-pile of rich materials as had
never before been known, except at the burial of a king.
If we were briefly to specify the three effects which the teaching and
example of Gamaliel may be supposed to have produced on the mind of
St. Paul, they would be as follows : — candor and honesty of judgment,
— a willingness to study and make use of Greek authors, — and a keen
and watchful enthusiasm for the Jewish law. We shall see these traits
of character soon exemplified in his life. But it is time that we should
inquire into the manner of communicating instruction, and learn some
thing concerning the places where instruction was communicated, in the
schools of Jerusalem.
Until the formation of the later Rabbinical colleges, which flourished
after the Jews were driven from Jerusalem, the instruction in the divinity
, schools seems to have been chiefly oral. There was a prejudice against
the use of any book except the Sacred Writings. The system was one of
Scriptural Exegesis. Josephus remarks, at the close of his " Antiqui
ties,"3 that the one thing most prized by his countrymen was power in
the exposition of Scripture. " They give to that man," he says, " the
testimony of being a wise man, who is fully acquainted with our laws,
and is able to interpret their meaning." So far as we are able to learn
from our sources of information, the method of instruction was some
thing of this kind.4 At the meetings of learned men, some passage of the
Old Testament was taken as a text, or some topic for discussion pro
pounded in Hebrew, translated into the vernacular tongue by means of a
Chaldee paraphrase, and made the subject of commentary : various inter
pretations were given: aphorisms were propounded: allegories suggested:
and the opinions of ancient doctors quoted and discussed. At these dis
cussions the younger students were present, to listen or to inquire, — or,
in the sacred words of St. Luke, " both hearing them and asking them
questions : " for it was a peculiarity of the Jewish schools; that the pupil
was encouraged to catechise the teacher. Contradictory opinions were
expressed with the utmost freedom. This is evident from a cursory ex-
1 The prayer is given in Mr. Home's Intro- destroyest the wicked, and bringest dowa the
duction to the Scriptures, 8th ed. vol. iii. p. 261, proud."
as follows : " Let there be no hope to them 2 His son Simeon, who succeeded him as
who apostatize from the true religion ; and let president of the Council, perished in the ruin!
heretics, how many soever they be, ill perish of the city.
as in a moment. And let the kingdom of 8 Ant. xx. 11, 2.
pride be speedily rooted out and broken in our * See Dr. Kitto's Cyclopaedia of Biblicai
d»ys. Blessed art thou, 0 Lord our God, who Literature, art. " Schools and Synagogues."

chap.ii. RABBINICAL SCHOOLS. 55
amination of the Talmud, which gives us the best notions of the scholastic
disputes of the Jews. This remarkable body of Rabbinical jurisprudence
has been compared to the Roman body of civil law : but in one respect
it might suggest a better comparison with our own English common law,
in that it is a vast accumulation of various and often inconsistent prece
dents. The arguments and opinions which it contains, show very plainly
that the Jewish doctors must often have been occupied with the most
frivolous questions; — that the " mint, anise, and cumin" were eagerly
discussed, while the " weightier matters of the law " were neglected : —
but we should not be justified in passing a hasty judgment on ancient
volumes, which are full of acknowledged difficulties. What we read of
the system of the Cabala has often the appearance of an unintelligible
jargon : but in all ages it has been true that " the words of the wise are
as goads, and as nails fastened by the masters of assemblies."1 If we
could look back upon the assemblies of the Rabbis of Jerusalem, with
Gamaliel in the midst, and Saul among the younger speakers, it is pos
sible that the scene would be as strange and as different from a place
of modern education, as the schools now seen by travellers in the East
differ from contemporary schools in England. But the same might be
said of the walks of Plato in the Academy, or the lectures of Aristotle
in the Lyceum. It is certain that these free and public discussions of
the Jews tended to create a high degree of general intelligence among the
people; that the students were trained there in a system of excellent
dialectics ; that they learnt to express themselves in a rapid and senien-
tious style, often with much poetic feeling ; and acquired an admirable
acquaintance with the words of the ancient Scriptures.2
These " Assemblies of the Wise" were possibly a continuation of the
" Schools of the Prophets," which are mentioned in the historical books
of the Old Testament.3 Wherever the earlier meetings were held, whether
at the gate of the city, or in some more secluded place, we read of no
buildings for purposes of worship or instruction before the Captivity.
During that melancholy period, when the Jews mourned over their sep
aration from the Temple, the necessity of assemblies must have been
deeply felt, for united prayer and mutual exhortation, for the singing of
the " Songs of Zion," and for remembering the " Word of the Lord."
When they returned, the public reading of the law became a practice of
universal interest : and from this period we must date the erection of
l Eccles. xii. 11. the punishments were, confinement, floggiug,
2 It seems that half-yearly examinations and excommunication.
were held on four sabbaths of the months Adar 8 1 Sam. x. 5, 6, xix. 20 ; 2 Kings ii. 3, 5,"
and Elul (February and August), when the iv. 3«
scholars made recitations and were promoted :

66 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap. Ir.
Synagogues l in the different towns of Palestine. So that St. James could
say, in the council at Jerusalem : " Moses of old time hath in every city
them that preach him, being read in the synagogues every Sabbath day." 2
To this later period the 74th Psalm may be referred, which laments over
" the burning of all the synagogues of God in the land."3 — These build
ings are not mentioned by Josephus in any of the earlier passages of his
history. But in the time of the Apostles we have the fullest evidence
that they existed in all the small towns in Judaea, and in all the principal
cities where the Jews were dispersed abroad. It seems that the synagogues
often consisted of two apartments, one for prayer, preaching, and the
offices of public worship ; the other for the meetings of learned men, for
discussions concerning questions of religion and discipline, and for purposes
of education.4 Thus the Synagogues and the Schools cannot be con
sidered as two separate subjects. No doubt a distinction must be drawn
between the smaller schools of the country villages, and the great divinity
schools of Jerusalem. The synagogue which was built by the Centurion
at Capernaum 5 was unquestionably a far less important place than those
synagogues in the Holy City, where " the Libertines, and Cyrenians,6 and
Alexandrians, with those of Asia and Cilicia," rose up as one man, and
disputed against St. Stephen.7 We have here five groups of foreign Jews,
— two from Africa, two from Western Asia, and one from Europe ; and
there is no doubt that the Israelites of Syria, Babylonia, and the East were
similarly represented. The Rabbinical writers say that there were 480
synagogues in Jerusalem ; and though this must be an exaggeration, yet
no doubt all shades of Hellenistic and Aramaic opinions found a home in
the common metropolis. It is easy to see that an eager and enthusiastic
student could have had no lack of excitements to stimulate his religious
1 Basnage assigns the erection of synagogues 7 Acts vi. 9. It is difficult to classify with
to the time of the Maccabees. Meuschen says confidence the synagogues mentioned in this
that schools were established by Ezra ; but he passage. According to Wieseler's view, men-
gives no proof. It is probable that they were tioned above, only one synagogue is intended,
nearly contemporaneous. belonging to libertini of certain districts in
2 Acts xv. 21. Northern Africa and Western Asia. Others
8 Ps. xxiv. 8. conceive that five synagogues are intended, viz.
4 The place where the Jews met for wor- the Asian, Cilician, Alexandrian, Cyrenian, and
ship was called Bet-ha-Cneset, as opposed that of Jewish freedmen from Italy. We think
to the Bet-ha-Midrash, where lectures were the most natural view is to resolve the five
given. The latter term is still said to be groups into three, and to suppose three syna-
used in Poland and Germany for the place gogues, one Asiatic, one African, and one
where Jewish lectures are given on the Law. European. An " Alexandrian synagogue,"
6 Luke vii. 5. built by Alexandrian artisans who were cm-
6 The beautiful coins of Cyrene show how ployed about the Temple, is mentioned in the
entirely it was a Greek city, and therefore im- Talmud. We have ventured below to use the
ply that its Jews were Hellenistic, like those phrase " Cilician Synagogue," which cannot
of Alexandria. See above, p. 16, note. involve any serious inaccuracy.

chap.ii. MODE OF TEACHING. 57
and intellectual activity, if he spent the years of his youth in that city " at
the feet of Gamaliel."
It has been contended, that when St. Paul said he was " brought up "
in Jerusalem " at the feet of Gamaliel," he meant that he had lived at the
Rabban's house, and eaten at his table. But the words evidently point to
the customary posture of Jewish students at a school. There is a curious
passage in the Talmud, where it is said, that " from the days of Moses to
Rabban Gamaliel, they stood up to learn the law ; but when Rabban
Gamaliel died, sickness came into the world, and they sat down to learn
the Law." We need not stop to criticise this sentence, and it is not easy
to reconcile it with other authorities on the same subject. " To sit at the
feet of a teacher " was a proverbial expression ; as when Mary is said to
have " sat at Jesus' feet and heard His word." ' But the proverbial ex
pression must have arisen from a well-known custom. The teacher was
seated on an elevated platform, or on the ground, and the pupils around
him on low seats or on the floor. Maimonides says : — " How do the
masters teach ? The doctor sits at the head,- and the disciples surround
him like a crown, that they may all see the doctor and hear his words.
Nor is the doctor seated on a seat, and the disciples on the ground ; but
all are on seats, or all on the floor." St. Ambrose says, in his Commen
tary on the 1st Epistle to the Corinthians (xiv.), that " it is the tradition
of the synagogue that they sit while they dispute ; the elders in dignity on
high chairs, those beneath them on low seats, and the last of all on mats
upon the pavement." And again Philo says, that the children of the
Essenes sat at the feet of the masters, who interpreted the law, and ex
plained its figurative sense. And the same thing is expressed in that
maxim of the Jews — " Place thyself in the dust at the feet of the wise."
In this posture the Apostle of the Gentiles spent his schoolboy days, an
eager and indefatigable student. " He that giveth his mind to the law of
the Most High, and is occupied in the meditation thereof, will seek out the
wisdom of all the ancient, and be occupied in prophecies. He will keep
the sayings of the renowned men ; and where subtle parables are, he will
be there also. He will seek out the secrets of grave sentences, and be con
versant in dark parables. He shall serve among great men, and appear
among princes : he will travel through strange countries ; for he hath
tried the good and the evil among men." 2 Such was the pattern proposed
to himself by an ardent follower of the Rabbis ; and' we cannot wonder
that Saul, with such a standard before him, and with so ardent a tempera
ment, " outran in Judaism many of his own age and nation, being more
exceedingly zealous of the traditions of his Fathers." 3 Intellectually, his
1 Luke x 39: see viii. 35. 2 Ecclus. xxx;x. 1-4. 8 Gal. i. 14.

58 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PA.UL. chap.ii.
mind was trained to logical acuteness, his memory became well stored
with " hard sentences of old," and he acquired the facility of quick and
apt quotation of Scripture. Morally, he was a strict observer of the re
quirements of the Law ; and, while he led a careful conscientious life,
after the example of his ancestors,1 he gradually imbibed the spirit of a
fervent persecuting zeal. Among his fellow-students, who flocked to
Jerusalem from Egypt and Babylonia, from the coasts of Greece and his
native Cilicia, he was known and held in high estimation as a rising light
in Israel. And if we may draw a natural inference from another sentence
of the letter which has just been quoted, he was far from indifferent to
the praise of men.2 Students of the Law were called " the holy people ; "
and we know one occasion when it was said, " This people who knoweth
not the Law are cursed." 3 And we can imagine him saying to himself,
with all the rising pride of a successful Pharisee, in the language of the
Book of Wisdom : " I shall have estimation among the multitude, and
honor with the elders, though I be young. I shall be found of a quick
conceit in judgment, and shall be admired in the sight of great men.
When I hold my tongue, they shall bide my leisure ; and when I speak,
they shall give good ear unto me." 4
While thus he was passing through the busy years of his student-life,
nursing his religious enthusiasm and growing in self-righteousness, others
were advancing towards their manhood, not far from Jerusalem, of whom
then he knew nothing, but for whose cause he was destined to count that
loss which now was his highest gain.5 There was one at Hebron, the
son of a priest " of the course of Abia," who was soon to make his voice
heard throughout Israel as the preacher of repentance ; there were boys by
the Lake of Galilee, mending their fathers' nets, who were hereafter to be
the teachers of the World ; and there was one, at Nazareth, for the sake
of whose love, they, and Saul himself, and thousands of faithful hearts
throughout all future ages, should unite in saying : — " He must increase,
but I must decrease." It is possible that Gamaliel may have been one of
those doctors with whom Jesus was found conversing in the Temple. It
is probable that Saul may have been within the precincts of the Temple at
some festival, when Mary and Joseph came up from Galilee. It is certain
that the eyes of the Saviour and of His future disciple must often have
rested on the same objects, — the same crowd of pilgrims and worshippers,
— the same walls of the Holy City, — the same olives on the other side of
the valley of Jehoshaphat. But at present they were strangers. The
mysterious human life of Jesus was silently advancing towards its great
1 2 Tim. i. 3. once I did) to please men, I should not be the
2 Gal. i. 10. " Am I now seeking to con- servant of Christ." 8 John vii. 49.
ciliate men? . . . Nay, if I still strove (as * Wisdom viii. 10-12. 6 Sec Phil. iii. 5-7

caJir.a. STUDENT LIFE OF ST. PAUL. 59
consummation. Saul was growing more and more familiar with the out
ward observances of the Law, and gaining that experience of the " spirit
of bondage " which should enable him to understand himself, and to teach
toothers, the blessings of the " spirit of adoption." Ho was feeling the
pressure of that yoke, which, in the words of St. Peter, " neither his fathers
nor he were able to bear." He was learning (in proportion as his consci
entiousness increased) to tremble at the slightest deviation from the Law
as jeopardizing salvation : " whence arose that tormenting scrupulosity
which invented a number of limitations, in order (by such self-imposed
restraint) to guard against every possible transgression of the Law." "
The struggles of this period of his life he has himself described in the
seventh chapter of Romans. Meanwhile, year after year passed away.
John the Baptist appeared by the waters of the Jordan. The greatest
event of the world's history was finished on Calvary. The sacrifice for
sin was offered at a time when sin appeared to be the most triumphant.
At the period of the Crucifixion, three of the principal persons who de
mand the historian's attention are — the Emperor Tiberius, spending his
life of shameless lust on the island of Capreas, — his vile minister, Sejanus,
revelling in cruelty at Rome, — and Pontius Pilate at Jerusalem, min
gling with the sacrifices the blood of the Galileans.2 How refreshing is it
to turn from these characters to such scenes as that where St. John re
ceives his Lord's dying words from the cross, or where St. Thomas meets
Him after the resurrection, to have his doubts turned into faith, or where
. St. Stephen sheds the first blood of martyrdom, praying for his murderers !
This first martyrdom has the deepest interest for us ; since it is the first
occasion when Saul comes before us in his early manhood. Where had
he been during these years which we have rapidly passed over in a few
lines, — the years in which the foundations of Christianity were laid ?
We cannot assume that he had remained continuously in Jerusalem.
Many years had elapsed since he came, a boy, from his home at Tarsus.
He must have attained the age of twenty-five or thirty years when our
Lord's public ministry began. His education was completed ; and we
may conjecture, with much probability, that he returned to Tarsus.
When he says, in the first letter to the Corinthians (ix. 1), — " Ht*ve I not
seen the Lord ? " and when he speaks in the second (v. 16) of having
" known Christ after the flesh," he seems only to allude, in the first case,
to his vision on the road to Damascus ; and, in the second, to his carnal
opinions concerning the Messiah. It is hardly conceivable, that if he had
been at Jerusalem during our Lord's public ministration there, he should
never allude to the fact.3 In this case, he would surely have been among
1 Neander. 2 Luke xiii. I. difficult to write with confidence concerning
8 In the absence of more information, it is this part of St. Paul's life. Benson thinks he

60 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. csap. n.
the persecutors of Jesus, and have referred to this as the ground of his
remorse, instead of expressing his repentance for his opposition merely to
the Saviour's followers.1
If he returned to the banks of the Cydnus, he would find that many
changes had taken place among his friends in the interval which had
brought him from boyhood to manhood. But the only change in himself
was that he brought back with him, to gratify the pride of his parents, if
they still were living, a mature knowledge of the Law, a stricter life, a
more fervent zeal. And here, in the schools of Tarsus, he had abundant
opportunity for becoming acquainted with that Greek literature, the taste
for which he had caught from Gamaliel, and for studying the writings of
Philo and the Hellenistic Jews. Supposing him to be thus employed, we
will describe in a few words the first beginnings of the Apostolic Church,
and the appearance presented by it to that Judaism in the midst of which
it rose, and follow its short history to the point where the " young man,
whose name was Saul," re-appears at Jerusalem, in connection with his
friends of the Cilician Synagogue, " disputing with Stephen."
Before our Saviour ascended into heaven, He said to His disciples :,
" Ye shall be witnesses unto me both in Jerusalem, and in all Judaea,
and in Samaria, and unto the uttermost parts of the earth." 2 And
when Matthias had been chosen, and the promised blessing had been re
ceived on the day of Pentecost, this order was strictly followed. First
the Gospel was proclaimed in the City of Jerusalem, and the numbers
of those who believed gradually rose from 120 to 5,000.3 Until the.
disciples were " scattered," 4 " upon the persecution that arose about
Stephen," 5 Jerusalem was the scene of all that took place in the
Church of Christ. We read as yet of no communication of the truth to
the Gentiles, nor to the Samaritans ; no hint even of any Apostolic
preaching in the country parts of Judaea. It providentially happened,
indeed, that the first outburst of the new doctrine, with all its miraculous
evidence, was witnessed by " Jews and proselytes " from all parts of the
world.6 They had come up to the Festival of Pentecost from the banks
of the Tigris and Euphrates, of the Nile and of the Tiber, from the prov
inces of Asia Minor, from the desert of Arabia, and from the islands of
the Greek Sea ; and when they returned to their homes, they carried
with them news which prepared the way for the Glad Tidings about to
issue from Mount Zion to " the uttermost parts of the earth." But as yef
was) a young student during our Lord's minis- i I Cor. xv. 9 ; Acts xxii 20.
try, and places a considerable interval between 2 Acts i. 8.
the Ascension of Christ and the persecution of 8 Acts i. 15 ; ii. 41 ; iv. *
Stephen. Lardner thinks that the restraint and * Acts viii. 1.
retirement of a student might have kept him in ' Acts xi. 19.
ignorance of what was going on in the world. « Acts ii. 9-11.

chap.ii. FIRST ASPECT OF THE CHURCH. 61
the Gospel lingered on the Holy Hill. The first acts of the Apostles
were " prayer and supplication " in the " upper room ; " breaking of
bread " from house to house ; " l miracles in the Temple ; gatherings of
the people in Solomon's cloister ; and the bearing of testimony in the
council chamber of the Sanhedrin.
One of the chief characteristics of the Apostolic Church was the
bountiful charity of its members one towards another. Many of the
Jews of Palestine, and therefore many of the earliest Christian converts,
were extremely poor. The odium incurred by adopting the new doctrine
might undermine the livelihood of some who depended on their trade for
support, and this would make almsgiving necessary. But the Jews of
Palestine were relatively poor, compared with those of the dispersion.
We see this exemplified on later occasions, in the contributions which St.
Paul more than once anxiously promoted.2 And in the very first days
of the Church, we find its wealthier members placing their entire posses
sions at the disposal of the Apostles. Not that there was any abolition
of the rights of property, as the words of St. Peter to Ananias very well
show.3 But those who were rich gave up what God had given them, in
the spirit of generous self-sacrifice, and according to the true principles
of Christian communism, which regards property as intrusted to the
possessor, not for himself, but for the good of the whole community, — to
be distributed according to such methods as his charitable feeling and
conscientious judgment may approve. The Apostolic Church was, in
this respect, in a healthier condition than the Church of modern days.
But even then we find ungenerous and suspicious sentiments growing up
in the midst of the general benevolence. That old jealousy between the
Aramaic and Hellenistic Jews re-appeared. Their party feeling was
excited by some real or apparent unfairness in the distribution of the
fund set apart for the poor. " A murmuring of the Grecians against the
Hebrews," 4 or of the Hebrews against the Grecians, had been a com
mon occurrence for at least two centuries ; and, notwithstanding the
power of the Divine Spirit, none will wonder that it broke out again
even among those who had become obedient to the doctrine of Christ.
That the widows' fund might be carefully distributed, seven almoners or
deacons 6 were appointed, of whom the most eminent was St. Stephen,
described as a man " full of faith, and of the Holy Ghost," and as one
Or rather " at home," Acts ii. 46, — i.e. 8 Acts v. 4.
in their meetings at the private houses of * Acts vi. 1.
Christians, as opposed to the public devotions 6 The general question of the Diaconate in
in the Temple. the primitive Church is considered in Chap,
2 Acts xi. 29, 30 ; and again Rom. xv. 25, XIII.
26, compared with Acts xxiv. 17 ; 1 Cor. xvi.
1-4 ; 2 Cor. viii. 1-4.

62 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap, a
who, " full of faith and power, did great wonders and miracles among
the people." It will be observed that these seven men have Greek
names, and that one was a proselyte from the Greco-Syrian city of
Antioch. It was natural, from the peculiar character of the quarrel,
that Hellenistic Jews should have been appointed to this office. And
this circumstance must be looked on as divinely arranged. For the
introduction of that party, which was most free from local and national
prejudices, into the very ministry of the Church, must have had an
important influence in preparing the way for the admission of the Gen
tiles. Looking back, from our point of view, upon the community at Jerusa
lem, we see in it the beginning of that great society, the Church, which
has continued to our own time, distinct both from Jews and Heathens,
and which will continue till it absorbs both the Heathen and the Jews.
But to the contemporary Jews themselves it wore a very different appear
ance. From the Hebrew point of view, the disciples of Christ would be
regarded as a Jewish sect or synagogue. The synagogues, as we have
seen, were very numerous at Jerusalem.1 There were already the Cilician
Synagogue, the Alexandrian Synagogue, the Synagogue of the Liber
tines,2 — and to these was now added (if we may use so bold an ex
pression) the Nazarene Synagogue, or the Synagogue of the Galileans.
Not that any separate building was erected for the devotions of the Chris
tians ; for they met from house to house for prayer and the breaking of
bread. But they were by no means separated from the nation:3 they
attended the festivals ; they worshipped in the Temple. They were a
new and singular party in the nation, holding peculiar opinions, and
interpreting the Scriptures in a peculiar way. This is the aspect under
which the Church would first present itself to the Jews, and among
others to Saul himself. Many different opinions were expressed in the
synagogues concerning the nature and office of the Messiah. These
Galileans would be distinguished as holding the strange opinion that
the true Messiah was that notorious " malefactor," who had been crucified
at the last Passover. All parties in the nation united to oppose, and if
possible to crush, the monstrous heresy.
The first attempts to put down the new faith came from the Sadducees.
The high priest and his immediate adherents4 belonged to this party.
See p. 56. The fulfilment of the ancient law was thr as-
2 See pp. 17, 43, 56. pect 0f Christianity to which the attention of
3 "The worship of the Temple and the the Church was most directed." — Prof. Stan-
synagogue still went side by side with the ley's Sermon on St. Peter, p. 92 ; see James ii.
prayers, and the breaking of bread from house 2, where the word " synagogue " is applied to
to house. . . . The Jewish family life was the Christian assemblies.
highest expression of Christian unity. . . * Acts iv. I, v. 17.

CHAP-n- THE SANHEDRIN. 63
They hated the doctrine of the resurrection ; and the resurrection of
Jesus Christ was the corner-stone of all St. Peter's teaching. He and
the other Apostles were brought before the Sanhedrin, who in the first
instance were content to enjoin silence on them. The order was dis
obeyed, and they were summoned again. The consequences might have
been fatal : but that the jealousy between the Sadducees and Pharisees
was overruled, and the instrumentality of one man's wisdom was used,
by Almighty God, for the protection of His servants. Gamaliel, the
eminent Pharisee, argued, that if this cause were not of God, it would
come to nothing, like the work of other impostors ; but, if it were of
God, they could not safely resist what must certainly prevail ; and the
Apostles of Jesus Christ were scourged, and allowed to " depart from
the presence of the council, rejoicing that they were counted worthy to
suffer shame for His name." : But it was impossible that those Phari
sees, whom Christ had always rebuked, should long continue to be protects
ors of the Christians. On this occasion we find the teacher, Gamaliel,
taking St. Peter's part: at the next persecution, Saul, the pupil, is
actively concerned in the murder of St. Stephen. It was the same alter
nation of the two prevailing parties, first opposing each other, and then
uniting to oppose the Gospel, of which Saul himself had such intimate
experience when he became St. Paul.2
In many particulars St." Stephen was the forerunner of St. Paul. Up
to this time the conflict had been chiefly maintained with the Aramaic
Jews ; but Stephen carried the war of the Gospel into the territory of the
Hellenists. The learned members of the foreign synagogues endeavored
to refute him by argument or by clamor. The Cilician Synagogue is
particularly mentioned (Acts vi. 9, 10) as having furnished some con
spicuous opponents to Stephen, who " were not able to resist the wisdom
and the spirit with which he spake." We cannot doubt, from what fol
lows, that Saul of Tarsus, already distinguished by his zeal and talents
among the younger champions of Pharisaism, bore a leading part in the
discussions which here took place. He was now, though still " a young
man" (Acts vii. 58), yet no longer in the first opening of youth. This
is evident from the fact that he was appointed to an important ecclesiasti
cal and political office immediately afterwards. Such an appointment he
could hardly have received from the Sanhedrin before the age of thirty,
and probably not so early ; for we must remember that a peculiar respect
for seniority distinguished the Rabbinical authorities. We can imagine
Saul, then, the foremost in the Cilician Synagogue, "disputing" against
tlie new doctrines of the Hellenistic Deacon, in all the energy of vigorous
1 Acts v. 41. 2 See Acts xxiii. 6, 9, 14, 20.

64 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap.ii,
manhood, and with all the vehement logic of the Rabbis. How often
must these scenes have been recalled to his mind, when he himself took
the place of Stephen in many a Synagogue, and bore the brunt of the
like furious assault ; surrounded by " Jews filled with envy, who spake
against those things which were spoken by Paul, contradicting and
blaspheming."1 But this clamor and these arguments were not sufficient
to convince or intimidate St. Stephen. False witnesses were then sub
orned to accuse him of blasphemy against Moses and against God, — who
asserted, when he was dragged before the Sanhedrin, that they had heard
him say that Jesus of Nazareth should destroy the Temple, and change the
Mosaic customs. It is evident, from the nature of this accusation, how
remarkably his doctrine was an anticipation of St. Paul's. As a Helle
nistic Jew, he was less entangled in the prejudices of Hebrew nationality
than his Aramaic brethren ; and he seems to have had a fuller understand
ing of the final intention of the Gospel than St. Peter and the Apostles had
yet attained to. Not doubting the divinity of the Mosaic economy, and
not faithless to the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, he yet saw that
the time was coming, yea, then was, when the "true worshippers " should
worship Him, not in the Temple only or in any one sacred spot, but
everywhere throughout the earth, "in spirit and in truth: " and for this
doctrine he was doomed to die.
When we speak of the Sanhedrin, we are brought into contact with an
important controversy. It is much disputed whether it had at this period
the power of inflicting death.2 On the one hand, we apparently find the
existence of this power denied by the Jews themselves at the trial of our
Lord ;3 and, on the other, we apparently find it assumed and acted on in
the case of St. Stephen. The Sanhedrin at Jerusalem, like the Areopa
gus at Athens, was the highest and most awful court of judicature, es
pecially in matters that pertained to religion ; but, like that Athenian
tribunal, its real power gradually shrunk, though the reverence attached
to its decisions remained. It probably assumed its systematic form under
the second Hyrcanus ; 4 and it became a fixed institution in the Common
wealth under his sons, who would be glad to have their authority nomi
nally limited, but really supported, by such a council.5 Under the Herods,
1 Acts xiii. 45. Sanhedrin, at this period of political change
2 Most of the modern German critics are of and confusion, on this, as well as on other
opinion that they had not at this time the points, was altogether undefined. — History of
power of life and death. A very careful and Christianity, vol. i. p. 340. Compare the nar-
elaborate argument for the opposite view will rativeof the death of St. James. Joseph. Ant-
be found in Biscoe's History of the Acts con- xx. 9.
firmed, ch. vi. Dean Milman says that in his 8 John xviii. 31, xix. 6.
" opinion, formed upon the study of the con- * See p. 24.
temporary Jewish history, the power of the 6 The word from which " Sanhedrin '' is

chap.ii. THE TRIAL OF ST. STEPHEN. 65
and under the Romans, its jurisdiction was curtailed ; x and we are in
formed, on Talmudical authority, that, forty years before the destruction
of Jerusalem, it was formally deprived of the power of inflicting death.
If this is true, we must consider the proceedings at the death of St.
Stephen as tumultuous and irregular. And nothing is more probable
than that Pontius Pilate (if indeed he was not absent at that time) would
willingly connive, in the spirit of Gallio at Corinth, at an act of unauthor
ized cruelty in " a question of words and names and of the Jewish law,"2
and that the Jews would willingly assume as much power as they dared,
when the honor of Moses and the Temple was in jeopardy.
The council assembled in solemn and formal state to try the blas
phemer. There was great and general excitement in Jerusalem. " The
people, the scribes, and the elders " had been " stirred up " by the mem
bers of the Hellenistic Synagogues.3 It is evident, from that vivid ex
pression which is quoted from the accusers' mouths, — " this place" —
this holy place," — that the meeting of the Sanhedrin took place in the
close neighborhood of the Temple. Their ancient and solemn room of
assembly was the hall Gazith,4 or the " Stone-Chamber," partly within the
Temple Court and partly without it. The president sat in the less sacred
portion, and around him, in a semicircle, were the rest of the seventy
judges.5 Before these judges Stephen was made to stand, confronted by his
accusers. The eyes of all were fixed upon his countenance, which grew
bright, as they gazed on it, with a supernatural radiance and serenity. In
the beautiful Jewish expression of the Scripture, " They saw his face as
it had been that of an angel." The judges, when they saw his glorified
countenance, might have remembered the shining on the face of Moses,6
and trembled lest Stephen's voice should be about to speak the will of
Jehovah, like that of the great lawgiver. Instead of being occupied with
the faded glories of the Second Temple, they might, have recognized
in the spectacle before them the Shechinah of the Christian soul, which
derived being Greek, makes it probable that its 6 Selden describes the form in which the
systematic organization dates from the Greco- Sanhedrin sat, and gives a diagram with the
Macedonian (i.e. the Maccabsean) period. "President of the Council" in the middle,
1 We see the beginning of this in the first the " Father of the Council " by his side, and
passage where the council is mentioned by Jo- " Scribes " at the extremities of the semi-
sephus, Antiq. xiv. 9. circle.
2 Acts xviii. 15. 6 Exodus xxxiv. 29-35 ; see 2 Cor. iii. 7,
8 Acts vi. 12. 13. Chrysostom imagines that the angelic
4 It appears that the Talmudical authorities brightness on Stephen's face might be intended
differ as to whether it was on the south or to alarm the judges ; for, as he says, it is pos-
north side of the Temple. But they agree sible for a countenance full of spiritual grace
in placing it to the east of the Most Holy to be awful and terrible to those who are full

Place. 6

of hate.

66 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. CHAr.n.
is the living Sanctuary of God. But the trial proceeded. The judicial
question, to which the accused was required to plead, was put by the
president: "Are these things so?" And then Stephen answered; and
his clear voice was heard in the silent council-hall, as he went through
the history of the chosen people, proving his own deep faith in the
sacredness of the Jewish economy, but suggesting, here and there, that
spiritual interpretation of it which had always been the true one, and
the truth of which was now to be made manifest to all. He began, with
a wise discretion, from the call of Abraham, and travelled historically in
his argument through all the great stages of their national existence,—
from Abraham to Joseph, — from Joseph to Moses, — from Moses to
David and Solomon. And as he went on he selected and glanced at
those points which made for his own cause. He showed that God's bless
ing rested on the faith of Abraham, though he had " not so much as to
set his foot on" in the land of promise (v. 5), on the piety of Joseph,
though he was an exile in Egypt (v. 9), and on the holiness of the Burn
ing Bush, though in the desert of Sinai (v. 30). He dwelt in detail on
the Lawgiver, in such a way as to show his own unquestionable ortho
doxy ; but he quoted the promise concerning " the prophet like unto
Moses" (v. 37), and reminded his hearers that the Law, in which they
trusted, had not kept their forefathers from idolatry (v. 39, <fec). And
so he passed on to the Temple, which had so prominent a reference to
the charge against him: and while he spoke of it, he alluded to the
words of Solomon himself,1 and of the prophet Isaiah,2 who denied
that any temple " made with hands " could be the place of God's
highest worship. And thus far they listened to him. It was the story
of the chosen people, to which every Jew listened with interest and
pride. It is remarkable, as we have said before, how completely St. Stephen is
the forerunner of St. Paul, both in the form and the matter of this defence.
His securing the attention of the Jews by adopting the historical method,
is exactly what the Apostle did in the synagogue at Antioch in Pisidia.3
His assertion of his attachment to the true principles of the Mosaic re
ligion is exactly what was said to Agrippa : " I continue unto this day,
witnessing both to small and great, saying none other things than those
which the prophets and Moses did say should come." 4 It is deeply inter
esting to think of Saul as listening to the martyr's voice, as he anticipated
those very arguments which he himself was destined to reiterate in syna
gogues and before kings. There is no reason to doubt that he was pres
1 1 Kings viii. 27 ; 2 Chron. ii. 6, vi. 18 8 Acts xiii. 16-22.
' Is. lxvi. 1, 2. * Acts xxvi. 22.

chap.ii. MARTYRDOM OF ST. STEPHEN. 67
ent,1 although he may not have been qualified to vote 2 in the Sanhedrin.
And it is evident, from the thoughts which occurred to him in his subse
quent vision within the precincts of the Temple,3 how deep an impression
St. Stephen's death had left on his memory. And there are even verbal
coincidences which may be traced between this address and St. Paul's
speeches or writings. The words used by Stephen of the Temple call to
mind those which were used at Athens.4 When he speaks of the Law
as received " by the disposition of angels," he anticipates a phrase in the
Epistle to the Galatians (iii. 19). His exclamation at the end, "Ye
stiffnecked and uncircumcised in heart . . . who have received the law
. . . and have not kept it," is only an indignant condensation of the
argument in the Epistle to the Romans : " Behold, thou callest thyself
a Jew, and restest in the law, and makest thy boast in God, and knowest
His will. . . . Thou, therefore, that makest thy boast of the law, through
breaking the law dishonorest thou God ? . . . He is not a Jew which is
one outwardly ; neither is that circumcision which is outward in the
flesh : but he is a Jew which is one inwardly ; and circumcision is that of
the heart, in the spirit, and not in the letter ; whose praise is not of man,
but of God." (ii. 17-29.)
The rebuke which Stephen, full of the Divine Spirit, suddenly broke
away from the course of his narrative to pronounce, was the signal for
a general outburst of furious rage on the part of his judges.5 They
" gnashed on him with their teeth " in the same spirit in which they had
said, not long before, to the blind man who was healed — "Thou wast
altogether born in sins, and dost thou teach us ? " 6 But, in contrast with
the malignant hatred which had blinded their eyes, Stephen's serene faith
was supernaturally exalted into a direct vision of the blessedness of the
1 Mr. Humphry, in his accurate and useful were supposed more likely to lean towards
Con mentary on the Acts, remarks, that it is not mercy. If this was the rule when Stephen
improbable we owe to him the defence of St. was tried, and if Saul was one of the judges,
Stenhen as given in the Acts. Besides the re- he must have been married at the time. See
semblances mentioned in the text, he points p. 75, n. 3.
out the similarity between Acts vii. 44, and 8 He said in his trance, "Lord, they know
Heb. viii. 5, between Acts vii. 5-8, and Rom. that I imprisoned and beat in every synagogue
iv. 10-19, and between Acts vii. 60, and 2 them that believed on thee; and when the
Tim. iv. 16. And if the Epistle to the He- blood of thy martyr Stephen was shed, I also
brews was written by St. Paul, may we not was standing by, and consenting unto his
suppose that this scenewas present to his mind death, and kept the raiment of them that slew
when he wrote, "Jesus suffered without the him." Acts xxii. 19,20.
gate : let us go forth therefore unto Him with- 4 Acts xvii. 24.
ont the camp, bearing His reproach " ? (xiii. 12, 6 It is evident that the speech was interrupt
\g\ ed. We may infer what the conclusion would
2 One of the necessary qualifications of have been from the analogy of St. Paul's
mbers of the Sanhedrin was, that they speech at Antioch in Pisidia, Acts xiii.
aid be the fathers of children, because such 6 John ix. 34.

68 THE Ll^E AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap.u.
Redeemed. He, whose face had been like that of an angel on earth, was
made like one of those angels themselves, " who do always behold the face
of our Father which is in Heaven."1 " He being full of the Holy Ghost,
looked up steadfastly into Heaven, and saw the glory of God, and Jesus
standing on the right hand of God." The scene before his eyes was no
longer the council-hall at Jerusalem and the circle of his infuriated
judges ; but he gazed up into the endless courts of the celestial Jerusa
lem, with its " innumerable company of angels," and saw Jesus, in whose
righteous cause he was about to die. In other places, where our Saviour
is spoken of in His glorified state, He is said to be, not standing, but
seated, at the right hand of the Father.2 Here alone He is said to be
standing. It is as if (according to Chrysostom's beautiful thought) He
had risen from His throne, to succor His persecuted servant, and to
receive him to Himself. And when Stephen saw his Lord — perhaps
with the memories of what he had seen on earth crowding into his mind,
— he suddenly exclaimed, in the ecstasy of his vision: " Behold! I see
the Heavens opened and the Son of Man standing on the right hand of
God!" This was too much for the Jews to bear. The blasphemy of Jesus had
been repeated. The follower of Jesus was hurried to destruction. "They
cried out with a loud voice, and stopped their ears, and ran upon him
with one accord." It is evident that it was a savage and disorderly con
demnation.3 They dragged him out of the council-hall, and, making a
sudden rush and tumult through the streets, hurried him to one of the
gates of the city, — and somewhere about the rocky edges of the ravine
of Jehoshaphat, where the Mount of Olives looks down upon Gethsemane
and Siloam, or on the open ground to the north, which travellers cross
when they go towards Samaria or Damascus, — with stones that lay with
out the walls of the Holy City, this heavenly-minded martyr was mur
dered. The exact place of his death is not known. There are two tra
ditions,4 — an ancient one, which places it on the north, beyond the
Damascus gate ; and a modern one, which leads travellers through what
is now called the gate of St. Stephen, to a spot near the brook Kedron,
over against the garden of Gethsemane. But those who look upon
1 Matt, xviii. 10. on the North, can be traced from an early
2 As in Eph. i. 20 ; Col. iii. 1 ; Heb. i. 3, period to the fifteenth century ; and that the
viii. 1, x. 12, xii. 2; compare Rom. viii. 34, modern tradition, which places both the gate
and 1 Pet. iii. 22. and the martyrdom on the East, can be
8 As to whether it was u judicial sentence traced back to the same century. It is prob-
at all, see above, p. 64, a. 2. able that the popular opinion regarding these
• It is well known that the tradition which sacred sites was suddenly changed by some
identifies St. Stephen's gate with the Damas- monks from interested motives
cui gate, and places the scene of martyrdom

chaf-ii. PRATER OF ST. STEPHEN. 69
Jerusalem from an elevated point on the north-east, have both these
positions in view; and any one who stood there on that day might have
Been the crowd rush forth from the gate, and the witnesses (who accord
ing to the law were required to throw the first stones1) cast off their outer
garments, and lay them down at the feet of Saul.
The contrast is striking between the indignant zeal which the martyr2
had just expressed against the> sin of his judges, and the forgiving love
which he showed to themselves, when they became his murderers. He
first uttered a prayer for himself in the words of Jesus Christ, which
he knew were spoken from the cross, and which he may himself have
heard from those holy lips. And then, deliberately kneeling down, in
that posture of humility in which the body most naturally expresses the
supplication of the mind, and which has been consecrated as the attitude
of Christian devotion by Stephen and by Paul himself,3 — he gave the
last few moments of his consciousness to a prayer for the forgiveness of
his enemies ; and the words were scarcely spoken when death seized upon
him, or rather, in the words of Scripture, " he fell asleep."
" And Saul was consenting4 to his death." A Spanish painter,5 in a
picture of Stephen conducted to the place of execution, has represented
Saul as walking by the martyr's side with melancholy calmness. He con
sents to his death from a sincere, though mistaken, conviction of duty ;
and the expression of his countenance is strongly contrasted with the
rage of the baffled Jewish doctors and the ferocity of the crowd who flock
to the scene of bloodshed. Literally considered, such a representation is
scarcely consistent either with Saul's conduct immediately afterwards, or
with his own expressions concerning himself at the later periods of his
life.6 But the picture, though historically incorrect, is poetically true.
The painter has worked according to the true idea of his art in throwing
upon the persecutor's countenance the shadow of his coming repentance.

1 See Deut. xvii. 5-7. The stoning was above (p. 67) that this scene made a deep
always ontside the city, Levit. xxiv. 14 ; 1 impression on St. Paul's mind ; but the power
Kings xxi. 10, 13. of the impression was unfelt or resisted till
2 The Christian use of the word martyr after his conversion.
begins with St. Stephen. See Mr. Hum- 6 Vicente Joannes, the founder of the Va-
phry's note on Acts xxii. 20. See also what lencian school, one of the most austere of the
be says on the Christian use of the word ceme- grave and serious painters of Spain. The pic
iery, in allusion to Acts vii. 60. ture is one of a series on St. Stephen ; it was
8 At Miletus (Acts xx. 36) and at Tyre once in the church of St. Stephen at Valen-
(Acts xxii. 5). See Acts ix. 40. cia, and is now in the Royal Gallery at Madrid
4 The word in Acts viii. 1 expresses far See Stirling's Annals of the Artists of Spain,
more than mere passive consent. St. Paul i. 363.
himself uses the same expression (Ibid. xxii. s See Acts xxii. 4, xxvi. 10 ; Phil. iii. 6 ;
SO) when referring to the occurrence. Com- 1 Tim. i. 13.
{lore ix. I, and xxvi. 11. We have said

70 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap, a
Wo cannot dissociate the martyrdom of Stephen from the conversion of
Paul. The spectacle of so much constancy, so much faith, so much love
could not be lost. It is hardly too much to say with Augustine, that
" the Church owes Paul to the prayer of Stephen."
SI STEPHANUS NON ORASSET
ECCLESIA PAULUM NON HABERET.

CHAPTER m.
Faneral of St. Stephen. — Saul's continued Persecution. — Flight of the Christians. — Philip
and the Samaritans. — Saul's Journey to Damascus. — Aretas, King of Petra. — Roads
from Jerusalem to Damascus. — Neapolis. — History and Description of Damascus. — The
Narratives of the Miracle. — It was a real Vision of Jesus Christ. — Three Days in Damas
cus. — Ananias. — Baptism and first Preaching of Saul. — He retires into Arabia. — Mean
ing of the Term Arabia. — Petra and the Desert. — Motives to Conversion. — Conspiracy at
Damascus. — Escape to Jerusalem. — Barnabas. — Fortnight with St. Peter. — Conspiracy.
— Vision in the Temple. — Saul withdraws to Syria and Cilicia.
THE death of St. Stephen is a bright passage in the earliest history
of the Church. Where, in the annals of the world, can we find so
perfect an image of a pure and blessed saint as that which is drawn in
the concluding verses of the seventh chapter of the Acts of the Apostles?
And the brightness which invests the scene of the martyr's last moments
is the more impressive from its contrast with all that has preceded it since
the Crucifixion of Christ. The first Apostle who died was a traitor. The
first disciples of the Christian Apostles whose deaths are recorded were
liars and hypocrites. The kingdom of the Son of Man was founded in
darkness and gloom. But a heavenly light re-appeared with the martyr
dom of St. Stephen. The revelation of such a character at the moment
of death was the strongest of all evidences, and the highest of all encour
agements. Nothing could more confidently assert the Divine power of
the new religion ; nothing could prophesy more surely the certainty of its
final victory.
To us who have the experience of many centuries of Christian history,
and who can look back, through a long series of martyrdoms, to this,
which was the beginning and example of the rest, these thoughts are
easy and obvious ; but to the friends and associates of the murdered
Saint, such feelings of cheerful and confident assurance were perhaps
more difficult. Though Christ was indeed risen from the dead, His dis
ciples could hardly yet be able to realize the full triumph of the Cross
over death. Even many years afterwards, Paul the Apostle wrote to the
Thessalonians, concerning those who had "fallen asleep"1 more peace
ably than Stephen, that they ought not to sorrow for them as those
without hope ; and now, at the very beginning of the Gospel, the grief
i 1 Thess. iv. 13. See Acts vii. 60. 71

72 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. CHAP.m.
of the Christians must have been great indeed, when the corpse of their
champion and their brother lay at the feet of Saul the murderer. Yet,
amidst the consternation of some and the fury of others, friends of the
martyr were found,1 who gave him all the melancholy honors of a Jewish
funeral, and carefully buried him, as Joseph buried his father, " with
great and sore lamentation."2
After the death and burial of Stephen the persecution still raged in
Jerusalem. That temporary protection which had been extended to the
rising sect by such men as Gamaliel was now at an end. Pharisees and
Sadducees — priests and people — alike indulged the most violent and
ungovernable fury. It does not seem that any check was laid upon
them by the Roman authorities. Either the procurator was absent
from the city, or he was willing to connive at what seemed to him an
ordinary religious quarrel.
The eminent and active agent in this persecution was Saul. There
are strong grounds for believing that, if he was not a member of the
Sanhedrin at the time of St. Stephen's death, he was elected into that
powerful senate soon after ; possibly as a reward for the zeal he had
shown against the heretic. He himself says that in Jerusalem he not
only exercised the power of imprisonment by commission from the High
Priests, but also, when the Christians were put to death, gave his vote
against them.3 From this expression it is natural to infer that he was a
member of that supreme court of judicature. However this might be,
his zeal in conducting the persecution was unbounded. We cannot help
observing how frequently strong expressions concerning his share in the
injustice and cruelty now perpetrated are multiplied in the Scriptures.
In St. Luke's narrative, in St. Paul's own speeches, in his earlier and
later epistles, the subject recurs again and again. He " made havoc of
the Church," invading the sanctuaries of domestic life, " entering into
every house : " 4 and those whom he thus tore from their homes he
" committed to prison ; " or, in his own words at a later period, when
1 Acts viii. 2. Probably they were Helle- it is probable that his wife and children did
nistic Jews impressed in favor of Christian- not long survive ; for otherwise, some notice
ity. It seems hardly likely that they were of them would have occurred in the subsequent
avowed Christians. There is nothing in the narrative, or some allusion to" them in the
expression itself to determine the point. Epistles. And we know that, if ever he had
' See Gen. 1. 10. a wife, she was not living when he wrote his
8 The word " voice " in the Auth. Vers. first letter to the Corinthians. ( 1 Cor. vii.)
should be "vote." Acts xxvi. 10. If this It was customary among the Jews to marry at
inference is well founded, and if the qualifica- a very early age. Baron Bunsen has expressed
tion for a member of the Sanhedrin mentioned his belief in the tradition that St Paul was a
in the last chapter (p. 67, u. 2), was a necessa- widower. Hippol. ii. 344.
ry qualification, Saul must have been a mar- * Acts viii. 3. See ix. 2.
ried man, and the father of a family. If so,

cHAP.m. SAUL'S CONTINUED PERSECUTION. 73
he had recognized as God's people those whom he now imagined to be
His enemies, " thinking that he ought to do many things contrary to the
name of Jesus of Nazareth ... in Jerusalem ... he shut up many
of the saints in prison." • And not only did men thus suffer at his
hands, but women also, — a fact three times repeated as a great aggrava
tion of his cruelty.2 These persecuted people were scourged — " often "
scourged — "in many synagogues."3 Nor was Stephen the only one
who suffered death, as we may infer from the Apostle's own confession.4
And, what was worse than scourging or than death itself, he used every
effort to make them " blasnheme " that Holy Name whereby they were
called.6 His fame as an inquisitor was notorious far and wide. Even at
Damascus Ananias had heard6 " how much evil he had done to Christ's
saints at Jerusalem." He was known there7 as "he that destroyed
them which call on this Name in Jerusalem." It was not without
reason that, in the deep repentance "of his later years, he remembered
how he had "persecuted the Church of God and wasted it,"8 — how
he had been " a blasphemer, a persecutor, and injurious ; " 9 — and that
he felt he was " not meet to be called an Apostle," because he had " per
secuted the Church of God." 10
From such cruelty, and such efforts to make them deny that Name
which they honored above all names, the disciples naturally fled. In
consequence of " the persecution against the Church at Jerusalem, they
were all scattered abroad throughout the regions of Judaea and Samaria."
The Apostles only remained.11 But this dispersion led to great results.
The moment of lowest depression was the very time of the Church's first
missionary triumph. " They that were scattered abroad went everywhere
preaching the Word." 12 First the Samaritans, and then the Gentiles,
received that Gospel, which the Jews attempted to destroy. Thus did
the providence of God begin to accomplish, by unconscious instruments,
the prophecy and command which had been given : — "Ye shall be
witnesses upon Me, both in Jerusalem, and in all Judaea, and in Samaria,
and unto the uttermost part of the earth." 13
1 Acts xxvi. 9, 10. See xxii. 3. the attempt was made; so in Gal. i. 23, alluded
2 Acts viii. 3, ix. 2, xxii. 4. to at the end of this chapter.
8 Acts xxvi. 10. 6 Acts ix. 13.
4 "I persecuted this way unto the death, 7 Acts ix. 21.
binding and delivering into prisons both men 8 Gal. i. 13 ; see also Phil. iii. 6.
and women " (xxii. 4) ; " and when they were 9 1 Tim. i. 13.
put to death, I gave my vote against them" 10 1 Cor. xv. 9. It should be observed that
(xxri. 10). m a" these passages from the Epistles the same
6 (Acts xxvi. 11.) It is not said that he word for "persecution" is used.
succeeded in causing any to blaspheme. It u Acts viii. I.
may be necessary to explain to some readers 12 Acts viii. 4. See xi. 19-21.
that the Greek imperfect merely denotes that 18 Acts i. 8.

74 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap.ui.
The Jew looked upon the Samaritan as he looked upon the Gentile.
His hostility to the Samaritan was probably the greater, in propor
tion as he was nearer. In conformity with the economy which was
observed before the resurrection, Jesus Christ had said to His disciples,
" Go not into the way of the Gentiles, and into any city of the Samaritans
enter ye not : but go rather to the lost sheep of the house of Israel."1
Yet did the Saviour give anticipative hints of His favor to Gentiles and
Samaritans, in His mercy to the Syrophcenician woman, and His interview
with the woman at the well of Sychar. And now the time was come for
both the " middle walls of partition " to be destroyed. The dispersion
brought Philip, the companion of Stephen, tHe second of the seven, to a
city of Samaria.2 He came with the power of miracles and with the
message of salvation. The Samaritans were convinced by what they saw ;
they listened to what he said ; " and there was great joy in that city."
When the news came to Jerusalem, Peter and John were sent by the
Apostles, and the same miraculous testimony attended their presence,
which had been given on the day of Pentecost. The Divine Power in
Peter rebuked the powers of evil, which were working 3 among the Samar
itans in the person of Simon Magus, as Paul afterwards, on his first
preaching to the Gentiles, rebuked in Cyprus Elymas the Sorcerer. The
two Apostles returned to Jerusalem, preaching as they went " in many
villages of the Samaritans" the Gospel which had been welcomed in the
city. Once more we are permitted to see Philip on his labor of love. We
obtain a glimpse of him on the road which leads down by Gaza * to Egypt.
The chamberlain of Queen Candace 6 is passing southwards on his return
from Jerusalem, and reading in his chariot the prophecies of Isaiah.
^Ethiopia is " stretching out her hands unto God," 6 and the suppliant is
not unheard. A teacher is provided at the moment of anxious inquiry.
The stranger goes " on his way rejoicing ; " a proselyte who had found
the Messiah ; a Christian baptized " with water and the Holy Ghost."
The Evangelist, having finished the work for which he had been sent, is
1 Matt. x. 5, 6. (Ant. xx. 7, 2), as connected with Felix and
2 (Acts viii. 5.) This was probably the Drusilla. See Acts xxiv. 24.
ancient capital, at that time called " Sebaste." 4 For Gaza and the phrase " which is des-
The city of Sychar (John iv. 5) had also re- ert" we may refer to the article in Smith's
ceived a Greek name. It was then " Neapo- Diet, of the Bible.
lis," and is still " Nablous." 6 Candace is the name, not of an individual,
8 The original word shows that Simon was but of a dynasty, like Aretas in Arabia, or like
in Samaria before Philip came, as Elymas Pharaoh and Ptolemy. By ./Ethiopia is meant
was with Sergius Paulus before the arrival of Meroe' on the Upper Nile. Queens of Meroe
St. Paul. Compare viii. 9-24 with xiii. 6-12. with the title of Candace are mentioned by
There is good reason for believing that Simon Greek and Roman writers. Probably this
Magus is the person mentioned by Josephus chamberlain was a Jew. 6 Ps. lxviii. 31.

chap. in. ARETAS, KING OF PETRA. 75
called elsewhere by the Spirit of God. He proceeds to Caesarea, and we
hear of him no more, till, after the lapse of more than twenty years, he
received under his roof in that city one who, like himself, had travelled in
obedience to the Divine command " preaching in all the cities." 1
Our attention is now- called to that other traveller. We turn from the
" desert road " on the south of Palestine to the desert road on the north ;
from the border of Arabia near Gaza, to its border near Damascus,.
" From Dan to Beersheba " the Gospel is rapidly spreading. The dispersion
of the Christians had not been 'confined to Judaea and Samaria. " On the
persecution that arose about Stephen " they had " travelled as far as Phoe
nicia and Syria." 2 " Saul, yet breathing out threatenings and slaughter
against the disciples of the Lord," 3 determined to follow them. " Being
exceedingly mad against them, he persecuted them even to strange cities." 4
He went of his own accord to the high priest, and desired of him let
ters to the synagogues in Damascus, where he had reason to believe that
Christians were to be found. And armed with this " authority and com
mission," 5 intending " if he found any of this way, whether they were men
or women," 6 to " bring them bound unto Jerusalem to be punished,"7 he
journeyed to Damascus.
The great Sanhedrin claimed over the Jews in foreign cities the same
power, in religious questions, which they exercised at Jerusalem. The
Jews in Damascus were very numerous ; and there were peculiar circum
stances in the political condition of Damascus at this time, which may have
given facilities to conspiracies or deeds of violence conducted by the Jews.
There was war between Aretas, who reigned at Petra, the desert-metropolis
of Stony Arabia,8 and Herod Antipas, his son-in-law, the Tetrarch of
1 " But Philip was found at Azotus ; and, great mercantile city at Petra, and were ruled
passing through, he preached in all the cities, by a line of kings, who bore the title of " Are-
till he came to Caesarea." (Acts viii. 40.) tas." The Aretas dynasty ceased in the
" And the next day we that were of Paul's second century, when Arabia Petraa became
company departed, and came to Caesarea ; and a Roman province under Trajan. In the
we entered into the house of Philip the Evan- Roman period, a great road united Ailah
gelist, which was one of the seven, and abode on the Red Sea with Petra, and thence di
with him." (Ibid. xxi. 8. ) verged to the left towards Jerusalem and tha
2 AC(;S xi. 19. 8 Acts ix. 1. ports of the Mediterranean; and to the right
'* Acts xxvi. 11. 5 Acts xxvi. 12. towards Damascus, in a direction not very
6 Acts ix. 2. different from that of the modern caravan-road
7 Acts xxii. 5. from Damascus to Mecca. This state of things
8 In this mountainous district of Arabia, did not last very long. The Arabs of this
which had been the scene of the wander- district fell back into their old nomadic state.
ings of the Israelites, and which contained the Petra was long undiscovered. Burckhardt
graves both of Moses and Aaron, the Naba- was the first to see it, and Laborde the first to
thajan Arabs after the time of the Babylonian visit it. Now it is well known to Orients.
captivity (or, possibly, the Edomites before travellers. Its Rock-theatre and other remains
them. See Robinson, Bib. Res. vol. ii. pp. still exist, to show its ancient character of a
557. 573) grew into a civilized nation, built a city of the Roman Empire.

76 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. CHAP.m.
Galilee. A misunderstanding concerning the boundaries of the two
principalities had been aggravated into an inveterate quarrel by Herod's
unfaithfulness to the daughter of the Arabian king, and his shameful
attachment to " his brother Philip's wife." The Jews generally sym
pathized with the cause of Aretas, rejoiced when Herod's army was
cut off, and declared that this disaster was a judgment for the murder of
John the Baptist. Herod wrote to Rome and obtained an order for assist
ance from Vitellius, the Governor of Syria. But when Vitellius was on
his march through Judaea, from Antioch towards Petra, he suddenly heard
of the death of Tiberius (a.d. 37) ; and the Roman army was withdrawn,
before the war was brought to a conclusion. It is evident that the relations
of the neighboring powers must have been for some years in a very un
settled condition along the frontiers of Arabia, Judaea, and Syria ; and the
falling of a rich border-town like Damascus from the hands of the Romans
into those of Aretas would be a natural occurrence of the war. If it
could be proved that the city was placed in the power of the Arabian
Ethnarch1 under these -particular circumstances, and at the time of St.
Paul's journey, good reason would be assigned for believing it probable
that the ends for which he went were assisted by the political relations of
Damascus. And it would indeed be a singular coincidence, if his zeal in
persecuting the Christians were promoted by the sympathy of the Jews
for the fate of John the Baptist.
But there are grave objections to this view of the occupation of Damas
cus by Aretas. Such a liberty taken by a petty chieftain with the Roman
power would have been an act of great audacity ; and it is difficult to
believe that Vitellius would have closed the campaign, if such a city were
in the hands of an enemy. It is more likely that Caligula, — who in
many ways contradicted the policy of his predecessor, — who banished
Herod Antipas and patronized Herod Agrippa, — assigned the city of
Damascus as a free gift to Aretas.2 This supposition, as well as the
former, will perfectly explain the remarkable passage in St. Paul's letter,
where he distinctly says that it was garrisoned by the Ethnarch. of Aretas,
at the time of his escape. Many such changes of territorial occupation
took place under the Emperors,3 which would have been lost to history,
1 2 Cor. xi. 32. On the title "Ethnarch" corded. The strength of Wieseler's argument
see note at the end of this Chapter. consists in this, that his different lines of rea-
2 This is argued with great force by Wiese- soning converge to the same result.
ler, who, so far as we know, is the first to sug- 8 See, for instance, what is said by Josephus
gest this explanation. His argument is not (Ant. xviii. 5, 4), of various arrangements in
quite conclusive ; because it is seldom easy to the East at this very crisis. Similar changes
give a confident opinion on the details of a in Asia Minor have been alluded to before,
campaign, unless its history is minutely re- Ch. I. p. 21.

CHAP.m. JOURNEY FROM JERUSALEM TO DAMASCUS. 77
were it not for the information derived from a coin,1 an inscription, or
the incidental remark of a writer who had different ends in view. Any
attempt to make this escape from Damascus a fixed point of absolute
chronology will be unsuccessful ; but, from what has been said, it may
fairly be collected, that Saul's journey from Jerusalem to Damascus took
place not far from that year which saw the death of Tiberius and the
accession of Caligula.
No journey was ever taken, on which so much interest is concentrated,
as this of St. Paul from Jerusalem to Damascus. It is so critical a pas
sage in the history of God's dealings with man, and we feel it to be so
closely bound up with all our best knowledge and best happiness in this
life, and with all our hopes for the world to come, that the mind is de
lighted to dwell upon it, and we are eager to learn or imagine all its
details. The conversion of Saul was like the call of a second Abraham.
But we know almost more of the Patriarch's journey through this same
district, from the north to the south, tlian we do of the Apostle's in an
opposite direction. It is easy to conceive of Abraham travelling with his
flocks and herds and camels. The primitive features of the East con
tinue still unaltered in the desert ; and the Arabian Sheik still remains
to us a living picture of the Patriarch of Genesis. But before the first
century of the Christian era, the patriarchal life in Palestine had been
modified, not only by the invasions and settlements of Babylonia and Per
sia, but by large influxes of Greek and Roman civilization. It is difficult
to guess what was the appearance of Saul's company on that memorable
occasion.2 We neither know how he travelled, nor who his associates
were, nor where he rested on his way, nor what road he followed from the
Judaean to the Syrian capital.
His journey must have brought him somewhere into the vicinity of
the Sea of Tiberias. But where he approached the nearest to the
shores of this sacred lake, — whether he crossed the Jordan where, in its
lower course, it flows southwards to the Dead Sea, or where its upper
windings enrich the valley at the base of Mount Hermon, — we do not
know. And there is one thought which makes us glad that it should be
so. It is remarkable that Galilee, where Jesus worked so many of His
miracles, is the scene of none of those transactions which are related in
the Acts. The blue waters of Tiberias, with their fishing-boats and
1 Wieseler justly lays some stress on the the reason why Lord Lyttclton, in his obser-
sircumstance that there are coins of Augustus vations on St. Paul's conversion, uses the
and Tiberius, and, again, of Nero and his phrase — " Those in company with him fell
successors, but none of Caligula and Claudius, down from their horses, together with Saul,"
which imply that Damascus was Roman. p. 318. ( Works, 1774.) There is no proof that
2 In pictures, St. Paul is represented as on this was the case, though it is very proba-
horseback on this journey. Probably this is ble.

78 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap.ii;
towns on the brink of the shore, are consecrated to the Gospels. A
greater than Paul was here. When we come to the travels of the
Apostles, the scenery is no longer limited and Jewish, but Catholic and
widely-extended, like the Gospel which they preached : and the Sea,
which will be so often spread before us in the life of St. Paul, is not the
little Lake of Genesareth, but the great Mediterranean, which washed
the shores and carried the ships of the historical nations of antiquity.1
Two principal roads can be mentioned, one of which probably con
ducted the travellers from Jerusalem to Damascus. The track of the
caravans, in ancient and modern times, from Egypt to the Syrian capital,
has always led through Gaza and Ramleh, and then, turning eastwards
about the borders of Galilee and Samaria, has descended near Mount
Tabor towards the Sea of Tiberias ; and so, crossing the Jordan a little
to the north of the Lake by Jacob's Bridge, proceeds through the desert
country which stretches to the base of Antilibanus. A similar track
from Jerusalem falls into this Egyptian road in the neighborhood of
Djenin, at the entrance of Galilee ; and Saul and his company may have
travelled by this route, performing the journey of one hundred and
thirty-six miles, like the modern caravans, in about six days. But at
this period, that great work of Roman road-making, which was actively
going on in all parts of the empire, must have extended, in some degree,
to Syria and Judaea ; and, if the Roman roads were already constructed
here, there is little doubt that they followed the direction indicated by
the later Itineraries. This direction is from Jerusalem to Neapolis (the
ancient Shechem), and thence over the Jordan to the south of the Lake,
near Scythopolis, where the soldiers of Pompey crossed the river, and
where the Galilean pilgrims used to cross it, at the time of the festivals,
to avoid Samaria. From Scythopolis it led to Gadara, a Roman city,
the ruins of which are still remaining, and so to Damascus.2
Whatever road was followed in Saul's journey to Damascus, it is
almost certain that the earlier portion of it brought him to Neapolis,
the Shechem of the Old Testament, and the Nablous of the modern
Samaritans. This city was one of the stages in the Itineraries. Dr.
Robinson followed a Roman pavement for some considerable distance
1 The next historical notice of the Sea of which harbored Christian fugitives. Here,
Tiberias or Lake of Genesareth after that too, he would be in the footsteps of St. Peter;
which occurs in the Gospels is in Josephus. for here the great confession (Matt. xvi. 16)
It is very conceivable that he travelled by seems to have been made ; and this ro:\d also
Caisarea Philippi, tho city which Herod Philip would probably have brought him past Neapolis
had built at the fountains of the Jordan, on It is hardly likely that he would have taken
the natural line of communication between the Petra road (above, p. 75, n. 8), for liotb
Tyre and Damascus, and likely to have been the modern caravans and the ancient itinera-
tie of the "foreign cities" (Acts xxvi. 11) ries cross the Jordan more to the north.

0HAP.ni. DAMASCUS. 79
in the ' neighborhood of Bethel.1 This northern road went over the
elevated ridges which intervene between the valley of the Jordan and
the plain on the Mediterranean coast. As the travellers gained the high
ground, the young Pharisee may have looked back, — and, when he saw
the city in the midst of its hills, with the mountains of Moab in the
distance, — confident in the righteousness of his cause, — he may have
thought proudly of the 125th Psalm : " The hills stand about Jerusalem :
even so standeth the Lord round about his people, from this time forth
forevermore." His present enterprise was undertaken for the honor of
Zion. He was blindly fulfilling the words of One who said : " Whoso
ever killeth you, will think that he doeth God service." 2 Passing
through the hills of Samaria, from which he might occasionally obtain a
glimpse of the Mediterranean on the left, he would come to Jacob's Well,
at the opening of that beautiful valley which lies between Ebal and
Gerizim. This, too, is the scene of a Gospel history. The same woman,
with whom Jesus spoke, might be again at the well as the Inquisitor
passed. But as yet he knew nothing of the breaking-down of the
" middle wall of partition." 3 He could, indeed, have said to the
Samaritans : " Ye worship ye know not what : we know what we wor
ship : for salvation is of the Jews." 4 But he could not have understood
the meaning of those other words : " The hour cometh, when ye shall
neither in Jerusalem, nor yet in this mountain, worship the Father : the
true worshippers shall worship Him in spirit and in truth. " 5 His was
not yet the Spirit of Christ. The zeal which burnt in him was that
of James and John, before their illumination, when they wished (in this
same district) to call down fire from heaven, even as Elias did, on the
inhospitable Samaritan village.6 Philip had already been preaching to
the poor Samaritans, and John had revisited them, in company with
Peter, with feelings wonderfully changed.7 But Saul knew nothing of
the little Church of Samaritan Christians ; or, if he heard of them and
delayed among them, he delayed only to injure and oppress. The
Syrian city was still the great object before him. And now, when he
had passed through Samaria and was entering Galilee, the snowy peak
of Mount Hermon, the highest point of Antilibanus, almost as far to the
north as Damascus, would come into view. This is that tower of " Leba
non which looketh towards Damascus." 8 It is already the great land
mark of his journey, as he passes through Galilee towards the sea of
Tiberias, and the valley of the Jordan.
1 Bib. Res. iii. 77. More will be said on 4 John iv. 22.
this subject, when we come to Acts xxiii. 23- 6 John iv. 21, 23.
31. See p. 25. 6 Luko ix- 51-56.
* John xvi. 2. 8 Eph. ii. 14. 7 See above, p. 74. 8 Song of Sol vii. *

80 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. cnAr.m,
Leaving now the " Sea of Galilee," deep among its hills, as a
sanctuary of the holiest thoughts, and imagining the Jordan to be passed,
we follow the company of travellers over the barren uplands, which
stretch in dreary succession along the base of Antilibanus. All around
are stony hills and thirsty plains, through which the withered stems of
the scanty vegetation hardly penetrate. Over this desert, under the
burning sky, the impetuous Saul holds his course, full of the fiery zeal
with which Elijah travelled of yore, on his mysterious errand, through
the same " wilderness of Damascus." J " The earth in its length and its
breadth, and all the deep universe of sky, is steeped in light and heat."
When some eminence is gained, the vast horizon is seen stretching on
all sides, like the ocean, without a boundary ; except where the steep
sides of Lebanon interrupt it, as the promontories of a mountainous
coast stretch out into a motionless sea. The fiery sun is overhead ; and
that refreshing view is anxiously looked for, — Damascus seen from afar,
within the desert circumference, resting, like an island of Paradise, in
the green enclosure of its beautiful gardens.
This view is so celebrated, and the history of the place is so illustrious,
that we may well be excused if we linger a moment, that we may de
scribe them both. Damascus is the oldest city in the world.2 Its fame
begins with the earliest patriarchs, and continues to modern times. While
other cities of the East have risen and decayed, Damascus is still what it
was. It was founded before Baalbec and Palmyra, and it has outlived
them both. While Babylon is a heap in the desert, and Tyre a ruin
on the shore, it remains what it is called in the prophecies of Isaiah,
" the head of Syria." 3 Abraham's steward was " Eliezer of Damascus,"4
and the limit of his warlike expedition in the rescue of Lot was " Hobah,
which is on the left hand of Damascus." 5 How important a place it
was in the flourishing period of the Jewish monarchy, we know from
the garrisons which David placed there,6 and from the opposition it pre
sented to Solomon.7 The history of Naaman and the Hebrew captive,
Elisha and Gehazi, and of the proud preference of its fresh rivers to the
thirsty waters of Israel, are familiar to every one. And how close its
relations continued to be with the Jews, we know from the chronicles of
Jeroboam and Ahaz, and the prophecies of Isaiah and Amos.8 Its
1 1 Kings xix. 15. 8 Isai. vii. 8.
2 Josephus makes it even older than Abra- 4 Gen. xv. 2.
ham. (Ant. i. 6, 3.) For the traditions of the 6 Gen. xiv. 15.
events in the infancy of the human race, which 6 2 Sam. viii. 6 ; 1 Chron. xviii. 6.
are supposed to have happened in its vicinity, 7 1 Kings xi. 24.
see Pococke, ii. 115, 116. The story that the 8 See 2 Kings xiv. 28, xvi. 9, 10; 2 Chr.
murder of Abel took place here is alluded to xxiv. 23, xxviii. 5, 23 ; Isai. vii. 8 ; Amos t
by Shakspeare, 1 K. Hen. VI. i. 3. 3, 5.

3HAP.ru. DESCRIPTION OF DAMASCUS. 81
mercantile greatness is indicated by Ezekiel in the remarkable words
addressed to Tyre : l — " Syria was thy merchant by reason of the
multitude of the wares of thy making : they occupied in thy fairs with
emeralds, purple, and broidered work, and fine linen, and coral, and
agate. Damascus was thy merchant in the multitude of the wares of
thy making, for the multitude of all riches ; in the wine of Helbon, and
white wool." 2 Leaving the Jewish annals, we might follow its history
through continuous centuries, from the time when Alexander sent Par-
monio to take it, while the conqueror himself was marching from Tarsus
to Tyre — to its occupation by Pompey,3 — to the letters of Julian the
Apostate, who describes it as " the eye of the East," — and onward
through its golden days, when it was the residence of the Ommiad
Caliphs, and the metropolis of the Mohammedan world, — and through
the period when its fame was mingled with that of Saladin and Tamer
lane, — to our own days, when the praise of its beauty is celebrated by
every traveller from Europe. It is evident, to use the words of Lamar-
tine, that, like Constantinople, it was a " predestinated capital." Nor is
it difficult to explain why its freshness has never faded through all this
series of vicissitudes and wars.
Among the rocks and brushwood at the base of Antilibanus are the
fountains of a copious and perennial stream, which, after running a
course of no great distance to the south-east, loses itself in a desert
lake. But before it reaches this dreary boundary, it has distributed its
channels over the intermediate space, and left a wide area behind it,
rich with prolific vegetation. These are the " streams from Lebanon,"
which are known to us in the imagery of Scripture ; 4 — the " rivers
of Damascus," which Naaman not unnaturally preferred to all the
" waters of Israel." 5 By Greek writers the stream is called Chrysor-
rhoas,6 or " the river of gold." And this stream is the inestimable
unexhausted treasure of Damascus. The habitations of men must
always have been gathered round it, as the Nile has inevitably attracted
an immemorial population to its banks. The desert is a fortification
round Damascus. The river is its life. It is drawn out into water
courses, and spread in all directions. For miles around it is a wilder
ness of gardens, — gardens with roses among the tangled shrubberies,
and with fruit on the branches overhead. Everywhere among the trees
1 The port of Beyroot is now to Damascus the Romans ; hence we find it less frequently
what Tyre was of old. mentioned than we might expect in Greek and
2 Ezek. xxvii. 16, 18. Roman writers. This arose from the building
8 See above, Ch. I. p. 24. Its relative im- of Antioch and other cities in Northern Syria.
portance was not so great when it was under 4 Song of Sol. iv. 15.
a Western power like that of the Seleucids or 6 2 Kings v. 12. " Strabo and Ptclemy
6

82 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap.ih.
the murmur of unseen rivulets is heard. Even in the city, which is in
the midst of the garden, the clear rushing of the current k a perpetual
refreshment. Every dwelling has its fountain : and at night, when the
sun has set behind Mount Lebanon, the lights of the city are seen flash
ing on the waters.
It is not to be wondered at that the view of Damascus, when the dim
outline of the gardens has become distinct, and the city is seen gleaming
white in the midst of them, should be universally famous. All travellers
in all ages have paused to feast their eyes with the prospect : and the
prospect has been always the same. It is true that in the Apostle's day
there were no cupolas and no minarets : Justinian had not built St.
Sophia, and the caliphs had erected no mosques. But the white build
ings of the city gleamed then, as they do now, in the centre of a verdant
inexhaustible paradise. The Syrian gardens, with their low walls and
waterwheels, and careless mixture of fruits and flowers, were the same
then as they are now. The same figures would be seen in the green
approaches to the town, camels and mules, horses and asses, with Syrian
peasants, and Arabs from beyond Palmyra. We know the very time of
the day when Saul was entering these shady avenues. It was at mid
day.1 The birds were silent in the trees. The hush of noon was in the
city. The sun was burning fiercely in the sky. The persecutor's
companions were enjoying the cool refreshment of the shade after their
journey: and his eyes rested with satisfaction on those walls which
were the end of his mission, and contained the victims of his righteous
zeal. We have been tempted into some prolixity in describing Damascus,
But, in describing the solemn and miraculous event which took place in
its neighborhood, we hesitate to enlarge upon the words of Scripture.
And Scripture relates its circumstances in minute detail. If the impor
tance we are intended to attach to particular events in early Christianity
is to be measured by the prominence assigned to them in the Sacred
Records, we must confess that, next after the Passion of our blessed
Lord, the event to which our serious attention is especially called is the
1 Acts xxii. 6, xxvi. 13. Notices of the (3) two miles south on the same road; (4) half
traditionary place where the vision was seen a mile from the city : and this he prefers on the
are variously given both by earlier and later strength of earlier authorities, and because it
travellers. The old writer, Quaresmius, men- harmonizes best with what is said of the Apos-
tions four theoretical sites: (1) twelve miles tie being led in by the hand. In one of these
south of Damascus, where there is * stream cases there is an evident blending of the scene
on the right of the road, with the ruins of a of the Conversion and the Escape : and it
church on a rising ground; (2) six miles south would appear from Mr. Stanley's letter (quofr
on the left of the road, where there are traces ed below, p. 93) that this spot is on the east
of a church and stones marked with crosses ; and not the south of the city.

chap. in. THE NARRATIVES OF THE MIRACLE. 83
Conversion of St. Paul. Besides various allusions to it in his own
Epistles, three detailed narratives of the occurrence are found in the
Acts. Once it is related by St. Luke (ix.), — twice by the Apostle him
self, — in his address to his countrymen at Jerusalem (xxii.), — in his
defence before Agrippa at Caesarea (xxvi.). And as, when the same
thing is told in more than one of the Holy Gospels, the accounts do not
verbally agree, so it is here. St. Luke is more brief than St. Paul. And
each of St. Paul's statements supplies something not found in the other.
The peculiar difference of these two statements, in their relation to the
circumstances under which they were given, and as they illustrate the
Apostle's wisdom in pleading the cause of the Gospel and reasoning with
his opponents, will be made the subject of some remarks in the later
chapters of this book. At present it is our natural course simply to
gather the facts from the Apostle's own words, with a careful reference
to the shorter narrative given by St. Luke.
In the twenty-second and twenty-sixth chapters of the Acts we are
told that it was "about noon" — "at mid-day" — when the "great
light" shone " suddenly" from heaven (xxii. 6, xxvi. 13). And those
who have had experience of the glare of a mid-day sun in the East, will
best understand the description of that light, which is said to have been
" a light above the brightness of the sun, shining round about Paul and
them that journeyed with him." All fell to the ground in terror (xxvi.
14), or stood dumb with amazement (ix. 7). Suddenly surrounded by
a light so terrible and incomprehensible, " they were afraid." " They
heard not the voice of Him that spake to Paul" (xxii. 9), or, if they
heard a voice, "they saw no man" (ix. 7).1 The whole scene was
evidently one of the utmost confusion : and the accounts are such as to
express, in the most striking manner, the bewilderment and alarm of the
travellers. But while the others were stunned, stupefied and confused, a clear light
broke in terribly on the soul of one of those who were prostrated on the
ground.2 A voice spoke articulately to him, which to the rest was a
sound mysterious and indistinct. He heard what they did not hear. He
1 It has been thought both more prudent permitted to suppose that the stupefied com-
and more honest to leave these well-known panions of Saul fell to the ground and then
discrepancies exactly as they are found in the rose, and that they heard the voice but did not
Bible. They will be differently explained by understand it. Dr. Wordsworth and Prof.
different readers, according to their views of Hackett point out that the word " stood " in
the inspiration of Scripture. Those who do ix. 7, need only mean that their progress was
not receive the doctrine of Verbal Inspiration arrested.
will find in these discrepancies a confirmation 2 It is evident from Acts ix. 6, 8, xxvi. 16,
of the general truth of the narrative. Those that Saul was prostrate on the ground when
who lay stress on this doctrine may fairly be Jesus spoke to him.

84 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap.ib,
saw what they did not see. To them the awful sound was without a
meaning : he heard the voice of the Son of God. To them it was
a bright light which suddenly surrounded them: he saw Jesus, whom
he was persecuting. The awful dialogue can only be given in the lan
guage of Scripture. Yet we may reverentially observe that the words
which Jesus spoke were " in the Hebrew tongue." The same language,1
in which, during His earthly life, He spoke to Peter and to John, to the
blind man by the walls of Jericho, to the woman who washed His feet
with her tears — the same sacred language was used when He spoke
from heaven to His persecutor on earth. And as on earth He had always
spoken in parables, so it was now. That voice which had drawn lessons
from the lilies that grew in Galilee, and from the birds that flew over the
mountain slopes near the Sea of Tiberias, was now pleased to call His
last Apostle with a figure of the like significance: " Saul, Saul, why per
se cutest thou me ? It is hard for thee to kick against the goad." As the
ox rebels in vain against the goad2 of its master, and as all its struggles
do nought but increase its distress — so is thy rebellion vain against the
power of my grace. I have admonished thee by the word of my truth,
by the death of my saints, by the voice of thy conscience. Struggle no
more against conviction, " lest a worse thing come unto thee."
It is evident that this revelation was not merely an inward impression
made on the mind of Saul during a trance or ecstasy. It was the direct
perception of the visible presence of Jesus Christ. This is asserted in
various passages, both positively and incidentally. In St. Paul's first let
ter to the Corinthians, when he contends for the validity of his own apos-
tleship, his argument is, " Am I not an Apostle ? Have I not seen Jesus
Christ, the Lord ?" (1 Cor. ix. 1.) And when he adduces the evidence
for the truth of the Resurrection, his argument is again, " He was seen
... by Cephas ... by James ... by all the Apostles . . . last of all
by me ... as one born out of due time" (xv. 8). By Cephas and by
James at Jerusalem the reality of Saul's conversion was doubted (Acts
ix. 27) ; but " Barnabas brought him to the Apostles, and related to them
how he had seen the Lord in the way, and had spoken with Him." And
similarly Ananias had said to him at their first meeting in Damascus:
" The Lord hath sent me, even Jesus who appeared to thee in the way as
1 It is only said in one account (xxvi. 14) Ananias (whose name is Aramaic) seems to
that Jesus Christ spoke in Hebrew. But this have addressed Saul in Hebrew, not in Greek
appears incidentally in the other accounts from (ix. 17, xxii. 13).
the Hebrew form of the name " Saul " being 2 The "prick " of Acts xxvi. 14 is the goad
used where our Lord's own words are given or sharp-pointed pole, which in southern Eu-
ix. 4, xxii. 8). In the narrative portion (ix. rope and in the Levant is seen in the hands of
1 , 8, &c.) it is the Greek, a difference which is those who are ploughing or driving cattle.
not noticed in the Authorized Version. So

OHAP.m. REAL VISION OF JESUS CHRIST. 85
thou earnest " (ix. 17). " The God of our fathers hath chosen thee that
thou shouldest see that Just One, and shouldest hear the voice of His
mouth" (xxii. 14). The very words which were spoken by the Saviour,
imply the same important truth. He does not say,1 " I am the Son of
God — the Eternal Word — the Lord of men and of angels:" — but, "1
am Jesus" (ix. 5, xxvi. 15), " Jesus of Nazareth " (xxii. 8). "I am that
man, whom not having seen thou hatest, the despised prophet of Naza
reth, who was mocked and crucified at Jerusalem, who died and was
buried. But now I appear to thee, that thou mayest know the truth of
my Resurrection, that I may convince thee of thy sin, and call thee to be
my Apostle."
The direct and immediate character of this call, without the interven
tion of any human agency, is another point on which St. Paul himself, in
the course of his apostolic life, laid the utmost stress ; and one, therefore,
which it is incumbent on us to notice here. " A called Apostle," " an
Apostle by the will of God,"2 " an Apostle sent not from men, nor by
man, but by Jesus Christ, and God the Father, who raised Him from the
dead;"3 — these are the phrases under which he describes himself, in the
cases where his authority was in danger of being questioned. No human
instrumentality intervened, to throw the slightest doubt upon the reality
of the communication between Christ Himself and the Apostle of the
Heathen. And, as he was directly and miraculously called, so was the
work immediately indicated, to which he was set apart, and in which in
after years he always gloried, — the work of " preaching among the Gen
tiles the unsearchable riches of Christ."4 Unless indeed we are to con
sider the words which he used before Agrippa5 as a condensed statement*
of all that was revealed to him, both in his vision on the way, and after
wards by Ananias in the city : "lam Jesus, whom thou persecutest : but
rise, and stand upon thy feet; for to this end I have appeared unto thee,
to ordain thee a minister and a witness both of these things which thou
hast seen, and of those things wherein I will appear unto thee. And thee
1 Chrysostom. have been sent at the same time. See Phile-
2 See Rom. i. 1 ; 1 Cor. i. 1 ; 2 Cor. i. 1 ; mon, 1.
Eph. i. 1 ; Col. i. 1. These expressions are 8 Gal. i. 1.
not used by St. Peter, St. James, St. Jude, or * Eph. iii. 8. See Rom. xi. 13, xv. 16 ;
St. John. And it is remarkable that they are Gal. ii. 8 ; 1 Tim. ii. 7 ; 2 Tim. i. 11, &c.
not used by St. Paul himself in the Epistles 6 Acts xxvi. 15-18.
addressed to those who were most firmly at- 6 It did not fall in with Paul's plan in his
tached to him. They are found in the letters speech before Agrippa (xxvi.) to mention An-
to the Christians of Achaia, but not in those anias, as, in his speech to the Jews at Jerusa-
to the Christians of Macedonia. (See 1 Thess. lem (xxii.), he avoided any explicit mention
'•iii2 Tness. i. 1 ; Phil. i. 1). And though of the Gentiles, while giving the narrative of
iaflfc letters to the Ephesians and Colossians, his conversion.
nWIn that to Philemon, which is known to

86 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap. in.
have I chosen from the House of Israel, and from among the Gentiles,
unto whom now I send thee, to open their eyes, that they may turn from
darkness to light, and from the power of Satan unto God ; that they may
receive forgiveness of sins, and inlieritance among the sanctified, by faith
in Me."1
But the full intimation of all the labors and sufferings that were before
him was still reserved. He was told to arise and go into the city, and
there it should be told him what it had been ordained2 that he should
do. He arose humbled and subdued, and ready to obey whatever might
be the will of Him who had spoken to him from heaven. But when he
opened his eyes, all was dark around him. The brilliancy of the vision
had made him blind. Those who were with him saw, as before, the trees
and the sky, and the road leading into Damascus. But he was in dark
ness, and they led him by the hand into the city. Thus came Saul into
Damascus ; — not as he had expected, to triumph in an enterprise on
which his soul was set, to brave all difficulties and dangers, to enter into
houses and carry off prisoners to Jerusalem ; — but he passed himself
like a prisoner beneath the gateway ; and through the colonnades3 of the
street called " Straight," where he saw not the crowd of those who gazed
on him, he was led by the hands of others, trembling and helpless, to the
house of Judas,4 his dark and solitary lodging.
Three days the blindness continued. Only one other space of three
days' duration can be mentioned of equal importance in the history of the
world. The conflict of Saul's feelings was so great, and his remorse so
piercing and so deep, that during this time he neither ate nor drank.5
He could have no communion with the Christians, for they had been terri
fied by the news of his approach. And the unconverted Jews could have
no true sympathy with his present state of mind. He fasted and prayed
ih silence. The recollections of his early years, — the passages of the
ancient Scriptures which he had never understood, — the thoughts of his
own cruelty and violence, — the memory of the last looks of Stephen,—
all these crowded into his mind, and made the three days equal to long
years of repentance. And if we may imagine one feeling above all others
to have kept possession of his heart, it would be the feeling suggested by
Christ's expostulation: "Why persecutest thou Me?"6 This feeling

1 See notes on the passage in Chap. XXII. (where a triple Roman archway remains).
2 This is the expression in his own speech. Mr. Porter observes that this arrangement of
(xxii. 10.) See ix. 6, and compare xxvi. 16. the street is a counterpart of those of Palmyra
8 See Mr. Porter's Five Years in Damascus and Jerash. We may perhaps add Antioch.
(1856). Eecent excavations show that a mag- See below, p. 115. ~
nificent street "with a threefold colonnade ex- 4 Acts ix. 11. jjii
tended from the Western gate to the Eastern 5 Acts ix. 9. 6 See Matt. xxv. Hkf*

chap. m. ANANIAS. 87
would be attended with thoughts of peace, with hope, and with faith. He
waited on God : and in his blindness a vision was granted to him. He
seemed to behold one who came in to him, — and he knew by revelation
that his name was Ananias, — and it appeared to him that the stranger
laid his hand on him, that he might receive his sight.1
The economy of visions, by which God revealed and accomplished His
will, is remarkably similar in the case of Ananias and Saul at Damascus,
and in that of Peter and Cornelius at Joppa and Caesarea. The simul
taneous preparation of the hearts of Ananias and Saul, and the simultaneous
preparation of those of Peter and Cornelius, — the questioning and hesita
tion of Peter, and the questioning and hesitation of Ananias, — the one
doubting whether he might make friendship with the Gentiles, the other
doubting whether he might approach the enemy of the Church, — the un
hesitating obedience of each, when the Divine will was made clearly known,
— the state of mind in which both the Pharisee and the Centurion were
found, — each waiting to see what the Lord would say unto him, — this close
analogy will not be forgotten by those who reverently read the two con
secutive chapters, in which the baptism of Saul and the baptism of
Cornelius are narrated in the Acts of the Apostles.2
And in another respect there is a close parallelism between the two
histories. The same exact topography characterizes them both. In the one
case we have the lodging with " Simon the Tanner," and the house " by the
seaside " (x. 6), — in the other we have " the house of Judas," and " the
street called Straight (ix. 11)." And as the shore, where "the saint
beside the ocean prayed," is an unchanging feature of Joppa, which will
ever be dear to the Christian heart ; 3 so are we allowed to bear in mind
that the thoroughfares of Eastern cities do not change,4 and to belie\o that
the " Straight Street," which still extends through Damascus in long per
spective from the Eastern Gate, is the street where Ananias spoke to
Saul. More than this we do not venture to say. In the first days of the
Church, and for some time afterwards, the local knowledge of the Chris
tians at Damascus might be cherished and vividly retained. But now
that through long ages Christianity in the East has been weak and de-
1 Acts ix. 12. covered over, a mile long ana as straight as an
2 Acts ix. and x. Compare also xi. 5-1 8 arrow. He adds that there the house of Judas
with xxii. 12-16. is shown, a commodious dwelling, with traces
8 See The Christian Year ; Monday in Eas- of having been once a church, and then a
ter week. mosque. The place of Baptism, he says, is a
4 See Lord Nugent's remarks on the Jeru- fountain not far off, near the beginning of the
salem Bazaar, in his Sacred and Classical Lands, street, where a handsome church has been
vol. ii. pp. 40, 41. Quaresmius says that the turned into a mosque. He enters also very
Straight Street at Damascus is the bazaar, fully into the description of the traditionary
Thich he describes as a street darkened and house of Ananias, and gives a ground plan of it

?>£ THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap.iu,
graded, and Mohammedanism strong and tyrannical, we can only say
that the spots still shown to travellers as the sites of the house of Ananias,
and the house of Judas, and the place of baptism, may possibly be true.1
We know nothing concerning Ananias, except what we learn from St.
Luke or from St. Paul. He was a Jew who had become a " disciple " of
Christ (ix. 10), and he was well reputed and held to be " devout accord
ing to the Law," among " all the Jews who dwelt at Damascus" (xxii. 12).
He is never mentioned by St Paul in his Epistles ; and the later stories
respecting his history are unsupported by proof.2 Though he was not
ignorant of the new convert's previous character, it seems evident that he
had no personal acquaintance with him ; or he would hardly have been
described as " one called Saul, of Tarsus," lodging in the house of Judas.
He was not an Apostle, nor one of the conspicuous members of the Church.
And it was not without a deep significance,3 that he, who was called to be
an Apostle, should be baptized by one of whom the Church knows nothing,
except that he was a Christian " disciple," and had been a " devout " Jew.
Ananias came into the house where Saul, faint and exhausted * with
three days' abstinence, still remained in darkness. When he laid his
hands on his head, as the vision had foretold, immediately he would be
recognized as the messenger of God, even before the words were spoken,
" Brother Saul, the Lord, even Jesus, that appeared unto thee in the way
as thou earnest, hath sent me, that thou mightest receive thy sight, and
be filled with the Holy Ghost." These words were followed, as were the
words of Jesus Himself when He spoke to the blind, with an instantaneous
dissipation of darkness : " There fell from his eyes as it had been scales : {
and he received sight forthwith (ix. 18) : " or, in his own more vivid ex
pression, " the same hour he looked up on the face of Ananias (xxii. 13)."
1 Compare, among the older travellers, attached by God to baptism. Olshansen, after
Thevenot, parts i. and ii. ; Maundrell (1714), remarking that Paul was made a member of
p. 36 ; Pococke, ii. 119. Mr. Stanley says, in the Church not by his Divine Call, but by
a letter to the writer, that there is no street simple baptism, adds that this baptism of Paul
now called Straight except by the Christians, by Ananias did not imply any inferiority or
and that the street so called by them does not dependence, more than in the case of our Lord
contain the traditional house of Judas or of and John the Baptist. Observe the strong
Ananias, which are both shown elsewhere. expression in Acts xxii. 16.
See below, p. 93, n. 8. * See Acts ix. 19.
2 Tradition says that he was one of the 6 It is difficult to see why the words " there
seventy disciples, that he was afterwards fell from his eyes as it had been scales," should
Bishop of Damascus, and stoned after many be considered merely descriptive by Olshausen
tortures under Licinius (or Lucianus) the and others. One of the arguments for taking
Governor. them literally is the peculiar exactness of St
8 Ananias, as Chrysostom says, was not Luke in speaking on such subjects. See a
one of the leading Apostles, because Paul was paper on the medical style of St. Luke in the
not to be taught of men. On the other hand, Gentleman's Magazine for June, 1841.
this very circumstance shows the importance

CBAP.m. BAPTISM AND FIRST PREACHIN G OF SAUL. 89
It was a face he had never seen before. But the expression of Christian
love assured him of reconciliation with God. He learnt that " the God of
. his fathers " had chosen him " to know His will," — " to see that Just
One," — " to hear the voice of His mouth," — to be " His witness unto
all men." l He was baptized, and " the rivers of Damascus " became
more to him than " all the waters of Judah " 2 had been. His body was
strengthened with food ; and his soul was made strong to " suffer great
things " for the name of Jesus, and to bear that Name " before the Gen
tiles, and kings, and the children of Israel." 3
He began by proclaiming the honor of that name to the children of
Israel in Damascus. He was " not disobedient to the heavenly vision "
(xxvi. 19), but " straightway preached in the synagogues that Jesus was the
Son of God,"4 — and " showed unto them that they should repent aud turn
to God, and do works meet for repentance." His Rabbinical and Pharisaic
learning was now used to uphold the cause which he came to destroy.
The Jews were astounded. They knew what he had been at Jerusalem.
They knew why he had come to Damascus. And now they saw him con
tradicting the whole previous course of his life, and utterly discarding
that " commission of the high priests," which had been the authority of
his journey. Yet it was evident that his conduct was not the result of a
wayward and irregular impulse. His convictions never hesitated ; his
energy grew continually stronger, as he strove in the synagogues, main
taining the truth against the Jews, and " arguing and proving that Jesus
was indeed the Messiah." 5
The period of his first teaching at Damascus does not seem to have
lasted long. Indeed it is evident that his life could not have been safe,
had he remained. The fury of the Jews when they had recovered from
their first surprise must have been excited to the utmost pitch ; and they
would soon have received a new commissioner from Jerusalem armed with
full .powers to supersede and punish one whom they must have regarded
as the most faithless of apostates. Saul left tlie city, but not to return
to Jerusalem. Conscious of his Divine mission, he never felt that it was
necessary to consult " those who were Apostles before him, but he went
into Arabia, and returned again into Damascus." 6
Many questions have been raised concerning this journey into Arabia.
The first question relates to the meaning of the word. From the time
when the word " Arabia " was first used by any of the writers of Greece
or Rome, it has always been a term of vague and uncertain import.
1 Acts xxii. 14, 15. " Christ " is the true reading. Verse 28
3 See 2 Kings v. 12. -would make this probable, if the authority of
* See Acts ix. 15, 16. the MSS. were not decisive. v
* Acts ix. 20. Where "Jesus" and not 6 Acts ix. 22. 6 Gal. i. 17.

90 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap.iii.
Sometimes it includes Damascus ; sometimes it ranges over the Lebanon
itself, and extends even to the borders of Cilicia. The native geographers
usually reckon that stony district, of which Petra was the capital, as
belonging to Egypt, — and that wide desert towards the Euphrates, where
the Bedouins of all ages have lived in tents, as belonging to Syria, — and
have limited the name to the Peninsula between the Red Sea and the
Persian Gulf, where Jemen, or " Araby the Blest," is secluded on the
south. In the threefold division of Ptolemy, which remains in our
popular language when we speak of this still untravelled region, both the
first and second of these districts were included under the name of the
third. And we must suppose St. Paul to have gone into one of the former,
either that which touched Syria and Mesopotamia, or that which touched
Palestine and Egypt. If he went into the first, we need not suppose him
to have travelled far from Damascus. For though the strong powers of
Syria and Mesopotamia might check the Arabian tribes, and retrench
the Arabian name in this direction, yet the Gardens of Damascus were on
the verge of the desert, and Damascus was almost as much an Arabian as
a Syrian town.
And if he went into Petraean Arabia, there still remains the question
of his motive for the journey, and his employment when there. Eithei
retiring before the opposition at Damascus, he went to preach the Gospel,
and then, in the synagogues of that singular capital, which was built
amidst the rocks of Edom,1 whence " Arabians" came to the festivals al
Jerusalem,2 he testified of Jesus : — or he went for the purpose of con
templation and solitary communion with God, to deepen his repentance
and fortify his soul with prayer ; and then perhaps his steps were
turned to those mountain heights by the Red Sea, which Moses and Elijah
had trodden before him. We cannot attempt to decide the question.
The views which different inquirers take of it will probably depend on
their own tendency to the practical or the ascetic life. On the one hand
it may be argued that such zeal could not be restrained, that Saul could
not be silent, but that he would rejoice in carrying into the metropolis of
King Aretas the Gospel which his Ethnarch could afterwards hinder at
Damascus.3 On the other hand, it may be said that, with such convic
tions recently worked in his mind, he would yearn for solitude, — that a
time of austere meditation before the beginning of a great work is in con
formity with the economy of God, — that we find it quite natural, if Paul
followed the example of the Great Lawgiver and the Great Prophet, and
1 Strabo, in his description of Petra, says he says that it was distant three or four days'
that his friend A thenodorus found great num- journey from Jericho. See above, p. 75. n. 8.
bers of strangers there. In the same paragraph, 2 Acts ii. 11.
after describing its cliffs and peculiar situation, 8 See 2 Cor. xi. 32.

chap. ra. SAUL RETIRES INTO ARABIA. 91
of one greater than Moses and Elijah, who, after His baptism and before
His ministry, " returned from Jordan and was led by the Spirit into the
wilderness." 1
While Saul is in Arabia, preaching the Gospel in obscurity, or prepar
ing for his varied work by the intuition of Sacred Truth, — it seems the
natural place for some reflections on the reality and the momentous sig
nificance of his conversion. It has already been remarked, in what we
nave drawn from the statements of Scripture, that he was called directly
by Christ without the intervention of any other Apostle, and that the pur
pose of his call was clearly indicated, when Ananias baptized him. He
was an Apostle " not of men, neither by man,"2 and the Divine will was
" to work among the Gentiles by his ministry."3 But the unbeliever may
still say that there are other questions of primary importance. He may
suggest that this apparent change in the current of Saul's thoughts, and
this actual revolution in the manner of his life, was either the contrivance
of deep and deliberate imposture, or the result of (wild and extravgant
fanaticism. Both in ancient and modern times, some have been found
who have resolved this great occurrence into the promptings of self-
interest, or have ventured to call it the offspring of delusion. There is
an old story mentioned by Epiphanius, from which it appears that the
Ebionites were content to find a motive for the change, in an idle story
that he first became a Jew that he might marry the High Priest's daugh
ter, and then became the antagonist of Judaism because the High Priest
deceived him.4 And there are modern Jews, who are satisfied with saying
that he changed rapidly from one passion to another, like those impetuous
souls who cannot hate or love by halves. Can we then say that St. Paul
was simply a fanatic or an impostor ? The question has been so well
answered in a celebrated English book,5 that we are content to refer to it.
It will never be possible for any one to believe St. Paul to have been a mere
fanatic, who duly considers his calmness, his wisdom, his prudence, and,
above all, his humility, a virtue which is not less inconsistent with fanati
cism than with imposture. And how can we suppose that he was an im
postor who changed his religion for selfish purposes ? Was he influenced
by the ostentation of learning ? He suddenly cast aside all that he had
been taught by Gamaliel, or acquired through long years of study, and
took up the opinions of fishermen of Galilee, whom he had scarcely ever
1 Luke iv. 1 . Jii. and 2 Cor. xi. Barnabas, though a Cypri-
2 Gal. i. 1. This retirement into Arabia an, was a Levite, and why not Paul a Jew,
is itself an indication of his independent call. though a Tarsian 1 And are we to believe,
See Prof. Ellicott on Gal. i. 17. he adds, what Ebion says of Paul, or what
8 Acts xxi. 9. Peter says of him? (2 Pet. iii.)
* Epiphanius, after telling the story, argues 6 Lord Lyttelton's Observations on the Con-
its impossibility from its contradiction to Phil. version and Apostleship cf St. Paul.

92 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. CHAP.m
seen, and who had never been educated in the schools. Was it the love
of power which prompted the change ? He abdicated in a moment the
authority which he possessed, for power "over a flock of sheep driven to
the slaughter, whose Shepherd himself had been murdered a little
before ; " and " all he could hope from that power was to be marked
out in a particular manner for the same knife, which he had seen so
bloodily drawn against them." Was it the love of wealth ? Whatever
might be his own worldly possessions at the time, he joined himself to
those who were certainly poor, and the prospect before him was that
which was actually realized, of ministering to his necessities with the
labor of his hands.1 Was it the love of fame ? His prophetic power
must have been miraculous, if he could look beyond the shame and
scorn which then rested on the servants of a crucified Master, to that
glory with which Christendom now surrounds the memory of St. Paul.
And if the conversion of St. Paul was not the act of a fanatic or an
impostor, then it ought to be considered how much this wonderful occur
rence involves. As Lord Lyttelton observes, "the conversion and apostle-
ship of St. Paul alone, duly considered, is of itself a demonstration
sufficient to prove Christianity to be a Divine revelation." Saul was
arrested at the height of his zeal, and in the midst of his fury. In the
words of Chrysostom, " Christ, like a skilful physician, healed him when
his fever was at the worst : " and he proceeds to remark, in the same elo
quent sermon, that the truth of Christ's resurrection, and the present
power of Him who had been crucified, were shown far more forcibly
than they could have been if Paul had been otherwise called. Nor
ought we to forget the great religious lessons we are taught to gather
from this event. We see the value set by God upon honesty and integ
rity, when we find that he, "who was before a blasphemer and a perse
cutor and injurious, obtained mercy because he did it ignorantly in
unbelief."2 And we learn the encouragement given to all sinners who
repent, when we are told that " for this cause he obtained mercy, that in
him first Jesus Christ might show forth all long-suffering, for a pattern
to them which should hereafter believe on Him to life everlasting. " '
We return to the narrative. Saul's time of retirement in Arabia was
1 Acts xx. 33, 34 ; 1 Cor. iv. 12 ; 1 Thess. verted state was like a sick man who through
ii. 9, &c. madness tries to kill his physician.
2 1 Tim. i. 13. See Luke xii. 48, xxiii. a A. Monod's " Cinq Discours " on St. Paul
34; Acta iii. 17; 1 Cor. ii. 8. On the other (Paris, 1852) were published shortly before
hand, " unbelieving ignorance " is often men- the completion of the first edition of this work.
tioned in Scripture as an aggravation of sin : We have much pleasure here in referring to
e. g. Eph. iv. 18, 19; 2 Thess. i. 7, 8. A man the third of these eloquent and instructive
is deeply wretched who sins through ignorance ; sermons, on the character and results of St
and, as Augustine says, Paul in his uncon- Paul's conversion.

chap. m. CONSPIRACY AT DAMASCUS. 93
not of long continuance. He was not destined to be the Evangelist of the
East. In the Epistle to the Galatians (i. 18) ,J the time, from his conver
sion t<> his final departure from Damascus, is said to have been " three
years," which, according to the Jewish way of reckoning, may have been
throe entire years, or only one year with parts of two others. Meantime
Saul had " returned to Damascus, preaching boldly in the name of Jesus."
(Acts ix. 27.) The Jews, being no longer able to meet him in contro
versy, resorted to that which is the last argument of a desperate cause : 2
they resolved to assassinate him. Saul became acquainted with the con
spiracy : and all due precautions were taken to evade the danger. But
the political circumstances of Damascus at the time made escape very
difficult. Either in the course of the hostilities which prevailed along the
Syrian frontiers between Herod Antipas and the Romans, on one side, and
Aretas, King of Petra, on the other, — and possibly in consequence of that
absence of Vitellius,3 which was caused by the Emperor's death, — the
Arabian monarch had made himself master of Damascus, and the Jews,
who sympathized with Aretas, were high in the favor of his officer, the
Ethnarch.4 Or Tiberius had ceased to reign, and his successor had as
signed Damascus to the King of Petra, and the Jews had gained over
his officer and his soldiers, as Pilate's soldiers had once been gained over
at Jerusalem. St. Paul at least expressly informs us,5»that " the Ethnarch
kept watch over the city, with a garrison, purposing to apprehend him."
St. Luke says,? that the Jews " watched the city-gates day and night,
with the intention of killing him." The Jews furnished the motive, the
Ethnarch the military force. The anxiety of the " disciples " was doubt
less great, as when Peter was imprisoned by Herod, " and prayer was
made without ceasing of the Church unto God for him." 7 Their anxiety
became the instrument of his safety. From an unguarded part of the
wall,8 in the darkness of the night, probably where some overhanging
1 In Acts ix. 23, the time is said to have imagines that he was an officer of Aretas acci-
been " many days." Dr. Paley has observed dentally residing in Damascus, who induced
in a note on the Horce Paulina a similar in- the Roman government to aid in the conspira-
stance in the Old Testament (1 Kings ii. 38, cy of the Jews. Neither hypothesis seems
39), where "many days" is used to denote a very probable. Schrader suggests that the
space of " three years : " — " And Shimei Ethnarch's wife might, perhaps, be a Jewish
dwelt at Jerusalem many days ; and it came to proselyte, as we know was the case with a vast
pass, at the end of three years, that two of the number of the women of Damascus.
servants of Shimei ran away.'' 6 2 Cor. xi. 32.
2 Chrysostom. 3 See above, p. 76. 6 Acts ix. 24. 7 Acts xii. 5.
4 Some have supposed that this Ethnarch 8 Quaresmius leaves the place in doubt.
was merely an officer who regulated the affairs We conclude our notices of these traditional
of the Jews themselves, such as we know to sites, by an extract from a letter received from
have existed under this title in cities with the Rev. A. P. Stanley, shortly before the pub-
many Jewish residents (p. 100). See Joseph. lication of his Sinai and Palestine. "The
Ant. xix. 7, 2, and 8, 5 ; War, ii. 6, 3. Anger only spot now pointed out is a few hundred

94

THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL.

chap, ni

houses, as is usual in Eastern cities, opened upon the outer country, they
let him down from a window l in a basket. There was something of
humiliation in this mode of escape ; and this, perhaps, is the reason why,
in a letter written " fourteen years " afterwards, he specifies the details,
" glorying in his infirmities," when he is about to speak of " his visions
and revelations of the Lord." 2
Thus already the Apostle had experience of " perils by his own country
men, and perils in the city." Already " in journeyings often, in weariness
and painfulness," 3 he began to learn " how great things he was to suffer"
for the name of Christ.4 Preserved from destruction at Damascus, he
turned his steps towards Jerusalem. His motive for the journey, as he tells
us in the Epistle to the Galatians, was a desire to become acquainted
with Peter.5 Not that he was ignorant of the true principles of the Gospel.
He expressly tells us that he neither needed nor received any instruction
in Christianity from those who were " Apostles before him." But he
must have heard much from the Christians at Damascus of the Galilean
fisherman. Can we wonder that he should desire to see the Chief of the
Twelve, — the brother with whom now he was consciously united in the
bonds of a common apostleship, — and who had long on earth been
the constant companion of his Lord ?

yards from the town walls, on the eastern side
of the city, near the traditional scene of the
Escape over the wall. It is only marked by a
mass of cement in the ground, with a hollow
underneath, which the Damascus guides repre
sent as a >hole in which after his escape the
Apostle concealed himself — and this is the
only tradition which in the popular mind at
taches to the place. All knowledge or imagi
nation of the Conversion or of its locality has
entirely passed away. But the French monks
in the Latin convent maintain (and no doubt
truly) that this was the spot in earlier times
believed to be the scene of that event, and
that the remains of cement and masonry round
about are the ruins of a Christian church or
chapel built in memorial. It is, if I remember
right, the fourth of the four places mentioned
by Quaresmius. It is highly improbable that
it can be the true place [of the Conversion],
because there is no reason to believe that the
road from Jerusalem should have fetched such
a compass as to enter Damascus on the cast,
instead of (as at present) on the west or
south." Mr. Porter (p. 43) says that it is only
within the last century that the scene of the
Conversion has been transferred, from inter

ested motives, to the east from the west side
of the city. His plan of Damascus now gives
the means of seeing the traditionary localities
very clearly.
1 2 Cor. xi. 33. So Rahab let down the
Bpies ; and so David escaped from Saul. St.
Paul's word is used in the LXX in both
instances. The preposition " through " being
used both in Acts and 1 Cor., it is possiblo
that the most exact explanation is that sug
gested by Prof. Hackett. He observed al
Damascus " windows in the external face of
the wall, opening into houses on the inside
of the city." ( Comm. on Acts.) In the largei
editions is a view of a portion of the wall of
modern Damascus, supporting houses which
project and face the open country.
2 2 Cor. xi. 30, xii. 1-5. Both Schrader
and Wiescler are of opinion that the vision
mentioned here is that which he saw at Jeru
salem on his return from Damascus (Acts
xxii. 17 ; see below, p. 97), and which was
naturally associated in his mind with the rec
ollection of his escape.
8 2 Cor. xi. 26, 27.
4 Acts ix. 16.
» Gal. i. 18.

chap. in. HIS EMOTIONS ON RETURNING TO JERUSALEM. 95
How changed was every thing since he had last travelled this road be
tween Damascus and Jerusalem ! If, when the day broke, he looked back
upon that city from which he had escaped under the shelter of night, as
his eye ranged over the fresh gardens and the wide desert, how the
remembrance of that first terrible vision would call forth a deep thanks
giving to Him, who had called him to be a " partaker of His sufferings ! " 1
And what feelings must have attended his approach to Jerusalem ! " He
was returning to it from a spiritual, as Ezra had from a bodily, captivity,
and to his renewed mind all things appeared new. What an emotion
smote his heart at the first distant view of the Temple, that house of
sacrifice, that edifice of prophecy ! Its sacrifices had been realized, the
Lamb of God had been offered : its prophecies had been fulfilled, the Lord
had come unto it. As he approached the gates, he might have trodden
the very spot where he had so exultingly assisted in the death of
Stephen, and he entered them perfectly content, were it God's will, to be
dragged out through them to the same fate. He would feel a peculiar tie
of brotherhood to that martyr, for he could not be now ignorant that the
same Jesus who in such glory had called him, had but a little while before
appeared in the same glory to assure the expiring Stephen. The ecstatic
. . . look and words of the dying saint now came fresh upon his memory with
their real meaning. When he entered into the city, what deep thoughts
were suggested by the haunts of his youth, and by the sight of the spots
where he had so eagerly sought that knowledge which he had now so
eagerly abandoned ! What an intolerable burden had he cast off! He
felt as a glorified spirit may be supposed to feel on revisiting the scenes of
its fleshly sojourn." 2
Yet not without grief and awe could he look upon that city of his fore
fathers, over which he now knew that the judgment of God was impending.
And not without sad emotions could one of so tender a nature think of
the alienation of those who had once been his warmest associates. The
grief of Gamaliel, the indignation of the Pharisees, the fury of the Hellenis
tic Synagogues, all this, he knew, was before him. The sanguine hopes,
however, springing from his own honest convictions, and his fervent zeal
to communicate the truth to others, predominated in his mind. He
thought that they would believe as he had believed. He argued thus
with himself, — that they well knew that he had " imprisoned and beaten
in every synagogue them that believed in Jesus Christ," — and that " when
,,,;.the blood of His martyr Stephen was shed, he also was standing by and
consenting unto his death, and kept the raiment of them that slew him," 8
1 1 Pet. iv. 13. Temple (Acts xxii. 17-21), when it was re-
2 Scripture Biography, by Archdeacon Ev- vealed to him that those in Jerusalem would
ans, second series, p. 337. not receive his testimony.
8 The argument used in his ecstasy in the

96 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. GHAp.m.
— and that when they saw the change which had been produced in him,
and heard the miraculous history he could tell them, they would not
refuse to " receive his testimony."
Thus, with fervent zeal, and sanguine expectations, " he attempted to
join himself to the disciples " of Christ.1 But, as the Jews hated him, so
the Christians suspected him. His escape had been too hurried to allow
of his bringing " letters of commendation." Whatever distant rumor
might have reached them of an apparition on his journey, of his conduct
at Damascus, of his retirement in Arabia, they could not believe that he
was really a disciple. And then it was that Barnabas, already known to us
as a generous contributor of his wealth to the poor,2 came forward again as
the " Son of Consolation," — " took him by the hand," and brought him to
the Apostles.3 It is probable that Barnabas and Saul were acquainted
with each other before. Cyprus is within a few hours' sail from Cilicia.
The schools of Tarsus may naturally have attracted one who, though a
Levite, was an Hellenist : and there the friendship may have begun, which
lasted through many vicissitudes, till it was rudely interrupted in the dis
pute at Antioch.4 When Barnabas related how " the Lord " Jesus Christ
had personally appeared to Saul, and had even spoken to him, and how
he had boldly maintained the Christian cause in the synagogues of Damas
cus, then the Apostles laid aside their hesitation. Peter's argument must
have been what it was on another occasion : " Forasmuch as God hath given
unto him the like gift as He did unto me, who am I that I should with
stand God ? " s He and James, the Lord's brother, the only other Apostle '
who was in Jerusalem at the time, gave to him " the right hands of fellow
ship." And he was with them, " coming in and going out," more than
forgiven for Christ's sake, welcomed and beloved as a friend and a brother.
This first meeting of the fisherman of Bethsaida and the tent -maker of
Tarsus, the chosen companion of Jesus on earth, and the chosen Pharisee
who saw Jesus in the heavens, the Apostle of the circumcision and the
Apostles of the Gentiles, is passed over in Scripture in a few words. The
Divine record does not linger in dramatic description on those passages
which a mere human writing would labor to embellish. What took place
in the intercourse of these two Saints, — what was said of Jesus of Naza
reth who suffered, died, and was buried, — aud of Jesus, the glorified
Lord, who had risen and ascended, and become " head over all tilings to
1 Acts ix. 26. Apostles . . . and he was with them coming
2 Acts iv. 36. in and going out at Jerusalem." (Acts ix.
8 Acts ix. 27. 26-28.) "After three years I went up to
* Acts xv. 39. Jerusalem to see Peter, und abode with him
6 Acts xi. 17. fifteen days. But other of the Apostles saw I
0 " When Saul was come to Jerusalem . . . none, save James the Lord's brother." (Gal,
Barnabas took him and brought him to the i. 18, 19.)

CHAP.m. SAUL WITHDRAWN FROM THE HOLY CITY. 97
the Church," — what was felt of Christian love and devotion, — what was
learnt, under the Spirit's teaching, of Christian truth, has not been re
vealed, and cannot be known. The intercourse was full of present com
fort, and full of great consequences. But it did not last long. Fifteen
days passed away, and the Apostles were compelled to part. The same
zeal which had caused his voice to be heard in the Hellenistic Synagogues
in the persecution against Stephen, now led Saul in the same Syna
gogues to declare fearlessly his adherence to Stephen's cause. The same
fury which had caused the murder of Stephen, now brought the murderer
of Stephen to the verge of assassination. Once more, as at Damascus,
the Jews made a conspiracy to put Saul to death : and once more he was
rescued by the anxiety of the brethren.1
Reluctantly, and not without a direct intimation from on high, he re
tired from the work of preaching the Gospel in Jerusalem. As he was
praying one day in the Temple, it came to pass that he fell into a trance,2
and in his ecstasy he saw Jesus, who spoke to him, and said, " Make
haste and get thee quickly out of Jerusalem : for they will not receive
thy testimony concerning me." He hesitated to obey the command, his
desire to do God's will leading him to struggle against the hinderances of
God's providence — and the memory of Stephen, which haunted him even
in his trance, furnishing him with an argument.3 But the command was
more peremptory than before : " Depart ; for I will send thee far hence
unto the Gentiles." The scene of his apostolic victories was not to be
Jerusalem. For the third time it was declared to him that the field of
his labors was among the Gentiles. This secret revelation to his soul
conspired with the outward difficulties of his situation. The care of
God gave the highest sanction to the anxiety of the brethren. And he
suffered himself to be withdrawn from the Holy City.
They brought him down to Caesarea by the sea,4 and from Caesarea they
sent him to Tarsus.6 His own expression in the Epistle to the Galatians

1 Acts ix. 29, 30. posing that Caesarea Philippi is meant. When-
a See Acts xxii. 17-21. Though Schrader ever "Cassarea" is spoken of absolutely, it
is sometimes laboriously unsuccessful in ex- always means Caesarea Stratonis. And even
plaining the miraculous, yet we need not if it is assumed that Saul travelled by land
entirely disregard what he says concerning the through Syria to Tarsus, this would not have
oppression of spirit, under the sense of being been the natural course. It is true enougli
mistrusted and opposed, with which Saul came that this Caesarea is nearer the Syrian frontier
to pray in the Temple. And we may compare than the other ; but the physical character of
the preparation for St. Peter's vision, before the country is such that the Apostle would
the conversion of Cornelius. naturally go by the other Caesarea, unless,
8 Compare the similar expostulations of indeed, he travelled by Damascus to Antioch,
Ananias, ix. 13, and of Peter, x. 14. which is highly improbable.
4 Olshausen is certainly mistaken in sup- 6 Acts ix. 30.
7

98 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap.ui.
(i. 21) is that he went " into the regions of Syria and Cilicia." Prom
this it has been inferred that he went first from Caesarea to Antioch, aud
then from Antioch to Tarsus. And such a course would have been per
fectly natural ; for the communication of the city of Caesar and the
Herods with the metropolis of Syria, either by sea and the harbor of
Seleucia, or by the great coast-road through Tyre and Sidon, was easy
and frequent. But the supposition is unnecessary. In consequence of the
range of Mount Taurus (p. 19), Cilicia has a greater geographical affinity
with Syria than with Asia Minor. Hence it has existed in frequent politi
cal combination with it from the time of the old Persian satrapies to the
modern pachalics of the Sultan : and " Syria and Cilicia " appears in
history almost as a generic geographical term, the more important district
being mentioned first.1 Within the limits of this region Saul's activities
were now exercised in studying and in teaching at Tarsus, — or in found
ing those Churches 2 which were afterwards greeted in the Apostolic lette:'
from Jerusalem, as the brethren " in Antioch, and Syria, and Cilicia,"
and which Paul himself confirmed after his separation from Barnabas,
travelling through "Syria and Cilicia."
Whatever might be the extent of his journeys within these limits, we
know at least that he was at Tarsus. Once more we find him in the home
of his childhood. It is the last time we are distinctly told that he was
there. Now at least, if not before, we may be sure that he would come
into active intercourse with the Heathen philosophers of the place.3 In
his last residence at Tarsus, a few years before, he was a Jew, and not
only a Jew but a Pharisee, and he looked on the Gentiles around him as
outcasts from the favor of God. Now he was a Christian, and not only

1 This is well illustrated by the hopeless every place that could be mentioned, where
feeling of the Greek soldiers in the Anabasis, schools of philosophers are found. And the
when Cyrus had drawn them into Cilicia ; by difference amounts to this. Here, those who
various passages in the history of the Seleu- are fond of learning are all natives, and stran-
cids ; by the arrangements of the Romans gers do not willingly reside here . and they
with Antiochus ; by the division of provinces themselves do not remain, but finish their
in the Later Empire ; and by the course of the education abroad, and gladly take up their
Mohammedan conquests. residence elsewhere, and few return. Where-
2 Acts xv. 23, 41. When we find the ex- as, in the other cities which I have just men-
istence of Cilician Churches mentioned, the tioned, except Alexandria, the contrary takes
obvious inference is that St. Paul founded place : for many come to them and live there
them during this period. willingly ; but you will see few of the natives
8 The passage in Strabo, referred to above, either going abroad for the sake of philosophy,
Ch. I. p. 21, is so important that we give a or caring to study it at home. The Alexan-
free translation of it here. " The men of this drians have both characters ; for they receire
place are so zealous in the study of philosophy many strangers, and send out of their own
and the whole circle of education, that they people not a few."
surpass both Athens and Alexandria and

cBAP.m. SAUL IN SYRIA AND CILICIA. 99
a Christian, but conscious of his mission as the Apostle of the Gentiles.
Therefore he would surely meet the philosophers, and prepare to argue
with them on their own ground, as afterwards in the "market" at Athens
with " the Epicureans and the Stoics."1 Many Stoics of Tarsus were men
of celebrity in the Roman Empire. Athenodorus, the tutor of Augustus,
has already been mentioned.2 He was probably by this time deceased,
and receiving those divine honors, which, as Lucian informs us, were paid
to him after his death. The tutor of Tiberius also was a Tarsian and a
Stoic. His name was Nestor. He was probably at this time alive : for
he lingered to the age of ninety-two, and, in all likelihood, survived his
wicked pupil, whose death we have recently noticed. Now among these
eminent sages and instructors of Heathen Emperors was one whose teach
ing was destined to survive, when the Stoic philosophy should have per
ished, and whose words still instruct the rulers of every civilized nation.
How far Saul's arguments had any success in this quarter we cannot even
guess ; and we must not anticipate the conversion of Cornelius. At least,
he was preparing for the future. In the Synagogue we cannot believe
that he was silent or unsuccessful. In his own family, we may well im
agine that some of those Christian "kinsmen,"3 whose names are handed
down to us, — possibly his sister, the playmate of his childhood, and his
sister's son,4 who afterwards saved his life, — were at this time by his
exertions gathered into the fold of Christ.
Here this chapter must close, while Saul is in exile from the earthly
Jerusalem, but diligently occupied in building up the walls of the
" Jerusalem which is above." And it was not without one great and
important consequence that that short fortnight had been spent in
Jerusalem. He was now known to Peter and to James. His vocation
was fully ascertained and recognized by the heads of the Judsean
Christians. It is true that he was yet " unknown by face " to the
scattered Churches of Judaea.5 But they honored him of whom they
had heard so much. And when the news came to them at intervals of
all that he was doing for the cause of Christ, they praised God and

1 Acts xvii. 17, 18. 6 See Gal. i. 21-24. The form of the Greek
2 See p. 42. words seems to imply a continued preaching of
8 Rom. xvi. See p. 44. the Gospel, the intelligence of which came now
4 About twenty years after this time (Acts and then to Judasa. From what follows, how-
xxiii. 17, 23) he is called " a young man," the ever (" Then fourteen years afterwards "), St.
very word which is used of Saul himself (Acts Paul appears to describe in i. 23, 24. the effect
vii. 58) at the stoning of Stephen. It is justly produced by the tidings not only of his labors
remarked by Hemsen that the young man's in Tarsus, but of his subsequent and more
anxiety for his uncle (xxiii. 16-23) seems to extensive labors as a missionary to the Hea-
imply a closer affection than that resulting then. It should be added, that Wieseler thinks
from relationship alone he staid only half a year at Tarsus.

100

THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL.

CHAP.ln,

said, " Behold ! he who was once our persecutor is now bearing the glad
tidings of that faith which formerly he labored to root out ; " " and they
glorified God in him."

Coin of Aretas, Xing of Damascus.1

1 Three members of this dynasty come
prominently before us in history. The first
is mentioned in the annals of the Maccabees.
The second was contemporary with the last of
the Seleucids. Damascus was once in his
power (Joseph. Ant. xiii. 13, 3 ; War, i. 6, 2),
and it is his submission to the Roman Scaurus
which is represented in the coin. The third
is that of St. Paul.
As to the Aretas, who is mentioned in 2
Mace. v. 8, the words used there of the inno
vating high priest Jason are so curiously appli
cable to the case of St. Paul, that we cannot
forbear quoting them. " In the end, therefore,
he had an unhappy return, being accused be
fore Aretas the king of the Arabians, fleeing
from city to city, pursued of all men, hated
as a forsaker of the laws, and being had in
abomination as an open enemy of his country."

A few words concerning the meaning of
the word Ethnarch may fitly conclude this
note. It properly denoted the governor of a
dependent district, like Simon the high priest
under Syria (1 Mace. xiv. 47), or Herod's son
Archelaus under Rome (Joseph. Ant. xvii 11,
4). But it was also used as the designation
of a magistrate or consul allowed to Jewish
residents living under their own laws in Alex
andria and other cities. (See Strabo, as quot
ed by Josephus, Ant. xiv. 7, 2.) Some wri
ters (and among them Mr. Lewin, Life and
Epistles of St. Paul, vol. i. p. 70) think that
the word is used in that sense here. But such
a magistrate would hardly have been called
" the Ethnarch of Aretas," and (as Dean Al
ford observes on 2 Cor. xi. 32) he would not
have had the power of guarding the city.

CHAPTER IV.
Wider Diffusion o>T Christianity. - Antioch. — Chronology of the Acts. — Reign of Caligula.
— Claudius and Herod Agrippa I. — The Year 44. — Conversion of the Gentiles. — St.
Peter and Cornelius. — Joppa and Caesarea. — St. Peter's Vision. — Baptism of Cornelius. —
Intelligence from Antioch. — Mission of Barnabas. — Saul with Barnabas at Antioch. — The
Name " Christian." — Description and History of Antioch. — Character of its Inhabitants.
— Earthquakes. — Famine. — Barnabas and Saul at Jerusalem. — Death of St. James and
of Herod Agrippa. — Return with Mark to Antioch. — Providential Preparation of St. Paul.
— Results of his Mission to Jerusalem.
HITHERTO the history of the Christian Church has been confined
within Jewish limits. We have followed its progress beyond the
walls of Jerusalem, but hardly yet beyond the boundaries of Palestine. If
any traveller from a distant country has been admitted into the commu
nity of believers, the place of his baptism has not been more remote than
the " desert " of Gaza. If any " aliens from the commonwealth of Israel "
have been admitted to the citizenship of the spiritual Israelites, they have
been " strangers " who dwell among the hills of Samaria. But the time
is rapidly approaching when the knowledge of Christ must spread more
rapidly, — when those who possess not that Book, which caused perplex
ity on the road to ^Ethiopia, will hear and adore His name, — and greater
strangers than those who drew water from the well of Sychar will come
nigh to the Fountain of Life. The same dispersion which gathered in
the Samaritans, will gather in the Gentiles also. The " middle wall of
partition " being utterly broken down, all will be called by the new and
glorious name of " Christian."
And as we follow the progress of events, and find that all movements
in the Church begin to have more and more reference to the Heathen, we
observe that these movements begin to circulate more and more round a
new centre of activity. Not Jerusalem, but Antioch, — not the Holy
City of God's ancient people, but the profane city of the Greeks and
Romans, — is the place to which the student of sacred history is now
directed. During the remainder of the Acts of the Apostles our atten
tion is at least divided between Jerusalem and Antioch, until at last,
after following St. Paul's many journeys, we come with him to Rome.
For some time Constantinople must remain a city of the future ; but we
101

102 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap.iv.
are more than once reminded of the greatness of Alexandria : l and thus
even in the life of the Apostle we find prophetic intimations of four of
the five great centres of the early Catholic Church.2
At present we are occupied with Antioch, and the point before us is
that particular moment in the Church's history, when it was first called
" Christian." Both the plaee and the event are remarkable : and the
time, if we are able to determine it, is worthy of our attention. Though
we are following the course of an individual biography, it is necessary to
pause, on critical occasions, to look around on what is passing in the
Empire at large. And, happily, we are now arrived at a point where we
are able distinctly to see the path of the Apostle's life intersecting the
general history of the period. This, therefore, is the right place for
a few chronological remarks. A few such remarks, made once for all,
may justify what has gone before, and prepare the way for subsequent
chapters. Some readers may be surprised that up to this point we have made no
attempts to ascertain or to state exact chronological details.3 But theo
logians are well aware of the difficulties with which such inquiries are
attended, in the beginnings of St. Paul's biography. The early chapters
in the Acts are like the narratives in the Gospels. It is often hardly
possible to learn how far the events related were contemporary or consecu
tive. We should endeavor in vain to determine the relations of time,
which subsist between Paul's retirement into Arabia and Peter' 'j visit to
the converted Samaritans,4 or between the journey of one Apostle from
Joppa to Caesarea and the journey of the other from Jerusalem to
Tarsus.5 Still less have we sufficient data for pronouncing upon the
absolute chronology of the earliest transactions in the Church. No one
can tell what particular folly or crime was engaging Caligula's attention,
when Paul was first made a Christian at Damascus. No one can tell on
what work of love the Christians were occupied when the emperor was
inaugurating his bridge at Puteoli,6 or exhibiting his fantastic pride oa
the shores of the British Sea.7 In a work of this kind it is better to
place the events of the Apostle's life in the broad light cast by the lead
ing features of the period, than to attempt to illustrate them by the help
of dates, which, after all, can be only conjectural. Thus we have

1 See Acts vi. 9 (with ii. 10), xxvii. 6, 6 Acts ix. and Acts x.
xxviii. 11 ; and compare Acts xviii. 24, xix. 1, 6 Where St. Paul afterwards landed, Acts
with 1 Cor. i. 12, iii. 4-6, and Tit. iii. 13. xxviii. 13.
2 The allusion is to the Patriarchates of 7 Herod was with Caligula in this progress.
Jerusalem, Alexandria, Antioch, Rome, and This emperor's triumph had no more meaning
Constantinople. than Napoleon's column at Boulogne ; but in
8 See above, pp. 42, 76, 77, and 93. the next reign Britain was really conquered
4 Acts viii. and Acts ix. (with Gal. i.) See below.

chap. rv. REIGNS OF CALIGULA AND CLAUDIUS. 103
content to say, that he was born in the strongest and most flourishing
period of the reign of Augustus ; and that he was converted from the
religion of the Pharisees about the time when Caligula succeeded
Tiberius. But soon after we enter on the reign of Claudius we encounter
a coincidence which arrests our attention. We must first take a rapid
glance at the reign of his predecessor. Though the cruelty of that
reign stung the Jews in every part of the empire, and produced an
indignation which never subsided, one short paragraph will be enough
for all that need be said concerning the abominable tyrant.1
In the early part of the year 37 Tiberius died, and at the close of the
same year Nero was born. Between the reigns of these two emperors
are those of Caligula and Claudius. The four years during which
Caligula sat on the throne of the world were miserable for all the prov-
1 inces, both in the west and in the east.2 In Gaul his insults were aggra
vated by his personal presence. In Syria his caprices were felt more
remotely, but not less keenly. The changes of administration were
rapid and various. In the year 36, the two great actors in the crime of
the crucifixion had disappeared from the public places of JudaBa. Pon
tius Pilate3 had been dismissed by Vitellius to Rome, and Marcellus sent
to govern in his stead. Caiaphas had been deposed by the same secular
authority, and succeeded by Jonathan. Now, in the year 37, Vitellius
was recalled from Syria, and Petronius came to occupy the governor's
residence at Antioch. Marcellus at Caesarea made way for Marullus :
and Theophilus was appointed high priest at Jerusalem in place of his
brother Jonathan. Agrippa, the grandson of Herod the Great, was
brought out of the prison where Tiberius had confined him, and Caligula
gave a royal crown,4 with the tetrarchies of two of his uncles, to the
frivolous friend of his youth. And as this reign began with restless
change, so it ended in cruelty and impiety. The emperor, in the career
of his blasphemous arrogance, attempted to force the Jews to worship
him as God.5 One universal feeling of horror pervaded the scattered
Israelites, who, though they had scorned the Messiah promised to
their fathers, were unable to degrade themselves by a return to idolatry.
1 The reader is here requested to refer to 4 Tiberius had imprisoned him, because of
pp. 26, 27, 42, 43, 51, 52, 59, 65, and the a conversation overheard by a slave, when Ca-
notes. ligula and Herod Agrippa were together in a
3 The best portraits of this emperor are on carriage. Agrippa was much at Rome both at
the large copper imperial coins. the beginning and end of Caligula's reign
8 He did not arrive at Rome till after the See p. 26, n. 7.
death of Tiberius. Like his predecessor, he 6 It appears from Dio Cassius and Sueto-
had governed Judaea during ten or eleven nius that this was part of a general system for
years, the emperor having a great dislike to extending the worship of himself through the
frequent changes in the provinces. empire.

104 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap.iv
Petronius, who foresaw what the struggle must be, wrote letters of
expostulation to his master : Agrippa, who was then in Italy, implored
his patron to pause in what he did : an embassy was sent from Alexan
dria, and the venerable and learned Philo * was himself commissioned to
state the inexorable requirements of the Jewish religion. Every thing
appeared to be hopeless, when the murder of Caligula, on the 24th
of January, in the year 41, gave a sudden relief to the persecuted
people. With the accession of Claudius (a.d. 41) the Holy Land had a king
once more. Judaea was added to the tetrarchies of Philip and Antipas, and
Herod Agrippa I. ruled over the wide territory which had been governed
by his grandfather. With the alleviation of the distress of the Jews, pro
portionate suffering came upon the Christians. The " rest " which, in the
distractions of Caligula's reign, the Churches had enjoyed " throughout all
Judaea, and Galilee, and Samaria," was now at an end. " About this time
Herod the king stretched forth his hands to vex certain of the Church."
He slew one Apostle, and " because he saw it pleased the Jews," he pro
ceeded to imprison another. But he was not long spared to seek popularity
among the Jews, or to murder and oppress the Christians. In the year 44
he perished by that sudden and dreadful death which is recorded in detail
by Josephus and St. Luke.2 In close coincidence with this event we have
the mention of a certain journey of St. Paul to Jerusalem. Here, then,
we have one of those lines of intersection between the sacred history and
the general history of the world, on which the attention of intelligent
Christians ought to be fixed. This year, 44 a.d., and another year, the
year 60 a.d. (in which Felix ceased to be the governor of Judaea, and,
leaving St. Paul bound at Caesarea, was succeeded by Festus), are the
two chronological pivots of the apostolic history.3 By help of them we
find its exact place in the wider history of the world. Between these
1 See above, pp. 9, 34, and 60. Philo's ac- (see below, p. 117). Anger has shown that
count of this embassy is, next after Josephus, this famine must be assigned to the interval
the most important writing of the period for between 44 and 47 ; and Wieseler has fixed
throwing light on the condition of the Jews in it more closely to the year 45. See the Chron-
Caligula's reign. The Jewish envoys had ological Table at the end of the volume.
their interview with the emperor at Puteoli, in 3 It ought to be stated, that the latter date
tlie autumn of the same year (40 a.d.) in cannot be established by the same exact proof
which he had made his progress through Gaul as the former; but, as a political fact, it must
to the shore of the ocean. always be a cardinal point of reference in any
2 Ant. xix. 8. Acts xii. The proof that his system of Scripture chronology. Anger and
death took place in 44 may be seen in Anger Wieseler, by a careful induction of particulars,
and Wieseler ; and, indeed, it is hardly doubted have made it Mghly probable that Festus sue-
by any. A coincident and corroborative proof ceeded Felix in the year 60. More will be
of the time of St. Paul's journey to Jerusalem said on this subject when we come to Acts
is afforded by the mention of the Famine, xxiv. 27.
which is doubtless that recorded by Josephus

chap.it. DATE OF ST. PAUL'S CONVERSION. 105
two limits the greater part of what we are told of St. Paul is situated and
included. Using the year 44 as a starting-point for the future, we gain a new light
for tracing the Apostle's steps. It is evident that we have only to ascer
tain the successive intervals of his life, in order to see him at every point,
in his connection with the transactions of the Empire. Wo shall observe
this often as we proceed. At present it is more important to remark that
the same date throws some light on that earlier part of the Apostle's path
which is confessedly obscure. Reckoning backwards, we remember that
" three years " intervened between his conversion and return to Jerusa
lem.1 Those who assign the former event to 39 or 40, and those who fix
on 37 or some earlier year, differ as to the length of time he spent at
Tarsus, or in " Syria and Cilicia." 2 All that we can say with certainty
is, that St. Paul was converted more than three years before the year 44.3
The date thus important for all students of Bible chronology is worthy
of special regard by the Christians of Britain. For in that year the
Emperor Claudius returned from the shores of this island to the metropo
lis of his empire. He came here in command of a military expedition, to
complete the work which the landing of Caesar, a century before, had
begun, or at least predicted.4 When Claudius was in Britain, its inhabit
ants were not Christian. They could hardly in any sense be said to
have been civilized. He came, as he thought, to add a barbarous province
to his already gigantic empire ; but lie really came to prepare the way for
the silent progress of the Christian Church. His troops were the instru
ments of bringing among our barbarous ancestors those charities which
were just then beginning to display themselves 5 in Antioch and Jerusalem.
A " new name " was faintly rising on the Syrian shore, which was destined
to spread like the cloud seen by the Prophet's servant from the brow of
Mount Carmel. A better civilization, a better citizenship, than that of
the Roman Empire, was preparing for us and for many. One Apostle at
Tarsus was waiting for his call to proclaim the Gospel of Christ to the
Gentiles. Another Apostle at Joppa was receiving a divine intimation
that/' God is no respecter of persons, but that in every nation he that
feareth Him and worketh righteousness, is accepted with Him." 6
1 Gal. i. 18. very early, is forced to allow nine or ten years
2 Acts ix. 30; Gal. i. 21. Wieseler, with for the time spent in Syria and Cilicia.
Schrader, thinks that he staid at Tarsus only * Wieseler places the Conversion in the
half a year or a year ; Anger, that he was there year 39 or 40.
two years, between 41 and 43; Hemsen, that 4 It may be gathered from Dio Cassius,
he spent there the years 40, 41, and 42. Among that the emperor left Rome in July, 43, and
the English writers, Bp. Pearson imagines that returned in January, 45.
great part of the interval after 39 was passed 6 See Acts xi. 22-24, and 27-30.
in Syria ; Burton, who places the conversion 6 Acts x. 34, 35.

106 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap.i,
If we could ascertain the exact chronological arrangement of these
passages of Apostolical history, great light would be thrown on the circum
stantial details of the admission of Gentiles to the Church, and on the
growth of the Church's conviction on this momentous subject. We should
then be able to form some idea of the meaning and results of the fortnight
spent by Paul and Peter together at Jerusalem (p. 97). But it is not
permitted to us to know the manner and degree in which the different
Apostles were illuminated. We have not been informed whether Paul
ever felt the difficulty of Peter, — whether he knew from the first the full
significance of his call, — whether he learnt the truth by visions, or by the
gradual workings of his mind under the teaching of the Holy Spirit.1 All
we can confidently assert is, that he did not learn from St. Peter the
mystery " which in other ages was not made known unto the sons of men,
as it was now revealed unto God's holy Apostles by the Spirit ; that the
Gentiles should be fellow-heirs, and of the same body, and partakers of
His promise in Christ by the Gospel." 2
If St. Paul was converted in 39 or 40, and if the above-mentioned rest
of the Churches was in the last years of Caligula (a.d. 39-41), and if
this rest was the occasion of that journey to Lydda and Joppa which ulti
mately brought St. Peter to Caesarea, then it is evident that St. Paul was
at Damascus or in Arabia when Cornelius was baptized.3 Paul was sum
moned to evangelize the Heathen, and Peter began the work, almost
simultaneously. The great transaction of admitting the Gentiles to the
Church was already accomplished when the two Apostles met at Jerusa
lem. St. Paul would thus learn that the door had been opened for him
by the hand of another ; and when he went to Tarsus, the later agree
ment4 might then have been partially adopted, that he should "go
to the Heathen," while Peter remained as the Apostle of " the Circum
cision." If we are to bring down the conversion of Cornelius nearer to the year
44, and to place it in that interval of time which St. Paul spent at Tarsus,6
then it is natural to suppose that his conversations prepared Peter's mind
for the change which was at hand, and sowed the seeds of that revolution
of opinion, of which the vision at Joppa was the crisis and completion.
Paul might learn from Peter (as possibly also from Barnabas) many oi the
1 The question touched on here, viz. when 8 This is Wieseler's view ; but his argu-
thc complete truth of Christ was communicat- ments are not conclusive. By some (as bj
ed to St. Paul, evidently opens a wide field Schradcr) it is hastily taken for granted that
for speculation. It is well treated by Dr. St. Paul preached the Gospel to Gentiles at
Davidson (Introd. vol. ii. pp. 75-80), who Damascus.
believes that the full disclosures of the gospel * Gal. ii. 9.
were made to him in Arabia. 5 On the duration of this interval see aboTe,
2 Eph. iii. 4-6. See Col. i. 26, 27. p. 105, n. 2.

SHAP.rv. ST. PETER AND CORNELIUS. 107
details of our blessed Saviour's life. And Peter, meanwhile, might gather
from Paul some of those higher views concerning the Gospel which pre
pared him for the miracles which he afterwards saw in the household of
the Roman centurion. Whatever might be the obscurity of St. Paul's
early knowledge, whether it was revealed to him or not that the Gentile
converts would be called to overleap the ceremonies of Judaism on their
entrance into the Church of Christ, — he could not fail to have a clear
understanding that his own work was to lie among the Gentiles. This
had been announced to him at his first conversion (Acts xxvi. 17, 18), in
the words of Ananias (Acts ix. 15) : and in the vision preceding his re
tirement to Tarsus (Acts xxii. 21), the words which commanded him to
go were, " Depart, for I will send thee far hence to the Gentiles."
In considering, then, the conversion of Cornelius to have happened
after this journey from Jerusalem to Tarsus, and before the mission of
Barnabas to Antioch, we are adopting the opinion most in accordance
with the independent standing-point occupied by St. Paul. And this,
moreover, is the view which harmonizes best with the narrative of Scrip
ture, where the order ought to be reverently regarded as well as the
words. In the order of Scripture narration, if it cannot be proved that
the preaching of Peter at Caesarea was chronologically earlier than the
preaching of Paul at Antioch, it is at least brought before us theologi
cally, as the beginning of the Gospel made known to the Heathen.
When an important change is at hand, God usually causes a silent
preparation in the minds of men, and some great fact occurs, which may
be taken as a type and symbol of the general movement. Such a fact
was the conversion of Cornelius, and so we must consider it.
The whole transaction is related and reiterated with so much minute
ness,1 that, if we were writing a history of the Church, we should be
required to dwell upon it at length. But here we have only to do with it
as the point of union between Jews and Gentiles, and as the bright start
ing-point of St. Paul's career. A few words may be allowed, which are
suggested by this view of the transaction as a typical fact in the progress
of God's dispensations. The two men to whom the revelations were made,
and even the places where the Divine interferences occurred, were charac
teristic of the event. Cornelius was in Caesarea and St. Peter in Joppa ;
— the Roman soldier in the modern city, which was built and named in
the Emperor's honor, — the Jewish Apostle in the ancient seaport which
associates its name with the early passages of Hebrew history, — with the
voyage of Jonah, the building of the Temple, the wars of the Maccabees.2
1 See the whole narrative, Acts x. 1-xi. 19. the Apocrypha, 1 Esd. v. 55 ; 1 Mace. x. 75,
2 Jonah i. 3; 2 Chr ii. 16. See Josh. xiv. 5; 2 Mace. xii. 3, &c.
xix. 46 ; Ezra iii. 7, and various passages in

108 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap.iv,
All the splendor of Caesarea, its buildings and its ships, and the Temple
of Rome and the Emperor, which the sailors saw far out at sea,1 all has
long since vanished. Herod's magnificent city is a wreck on1 the shore,
A few ruins are all that remain of the harbor. Joppa lingers on, like the
Jewish people, dejected but not destroyed. Caesarea has perished, like
the Roman Empire which called it into existence.
And no men could well be more contrasted with each other than those
two men, in whom the Heathen and Jewish worlds met and were recon
ciled. We know what Peter was — a Galilean fisherman, brought up in
the rudest district of an obscure province, with no learning but such as
he might have gathered in the synagogue of his native town. All his
early days he had dragged his nets in the lake of Genesareth. And
now he was at Joppa, lodging in the house of Simon the Tanner, the
Apostle of a religion that was to change the world. Cornelius was an
officer in the Roman army. No name was more honorable at Rome than
that of the Cornelian House. It was the name borne by the Scipios, and
by Sulla, and the mother of the Gracchi. In the Roman army, as in the
army of modern Austria, the soldiers were drawn from different countries
and spoke different languages. Along the coast of which we are speak
ing, many of them were recruited from Syria and Judaea.2 But the corps
to which Cornelius belonged seems to have been a cohort of Italians sep
arate from the legionary soldiers,3 and hence called the " Italian cohort."
He was no doubt a true-born Italian. Educated in Rome, or some pro
vincial town, he had entered upon a soldier's life, dreaming perhaps of
military glory, but dreaming as little of that better glory which now sur
rounds the Cornelian name, — as Peter dreamed at the lake of Genesa
reth of becoming the chosen companion of the Messiah of Israel, and of
throwing open the doors of the Catholic Church to the dwellers in Asia
and Africa, to the barbarians on the remote and unvisited shores of Europe,
and to the undiscovered countries of the West.
But to return to our proper narrative. When intelligence camt to
Jerusalem that Peter had broken through the restraints of the Jewish
Law, and had even " eaten " at the table of the Gentiles,4 there was gen
eral surprise and displeasure among " those of the circumcision." But
when he explained to them all the transaction, they approved his conduct,
and praised God for His mercy to the Heathen.5 And soon news came
1 A full account of Caesarea will be given, be certain " Italian volunteers," mentioned in
when we come to the period of St. Paul's an inscription as serving in Syria. Akermann'i
imprisonment there. Numismatic III. of Hie New Test. p. 34.
2 Joseph. Ant. xiv. 15, 10 ; War, i. 17, 1. * Acts xi. 3. See x. 48. No such freedom
3 Not a cohort of the " Legio Italica," and of intercourse took place in his own reception
which was raised by Nero. See above, p. 26, of his Gentile guests, x. 23.
note. Possibly the corps of Cornelius might 6 Acts xi. 18.

chap. iv. ' MISSION OF BARNABAS. 109
from a greater distance, which showed that the same unexpected change
was operating more widely. We have seen that the persecution, in which
Stephen was killed, resulted in a general dispersion of the Christians.
Wherever they went, they spoke to their Jewish brethren of their faith
that the promises had been fulfilled in the life and resurrection of Jesus
Christ. This dispersion and preaching of the Gospel extended even to
the island of Cyprus, aud along the Phoenician coast as far as Antioch.
For some time the glad tidings were made known only to the scattered
children of Israel.1 But at length some of the Hellenistic Jews, natives
of Cyprus and Cyrene, spoke to the Greeks2 themselves at Antioch; and
the Divine Spirit gave such power to the Word, that a vast number
" believed and turned to the Lord." The news was not long in travelling
to Jerusalem. Perhaps some message was sent in haste to the Apostles of
the Church. The Jewish Christians in Antioch might be perplexed how
to deal with their new Gentile converts : and it is not unnatural to sup
pose that the presence of Barnabas might be anxiously desired by the
fellow-missionaries of his native island.
We ought to observe the honorable place which the island of Cyprus
was permitted to occupy in the first work of Christianity. We shall soon
trace the footsteps of the Apostle of the Heathen in the beginning of his
travels over the length of this island ; and see here the first earthly
potentate converted, and linking his name forever with that of St. Paul.3
Now, while Saul is yet at Tarsus, men of Cyprus are made the instru
ments of awakening the Gentiles ; one of them might be that " Miiason
of Cyprus," who afterwards (then " a disciple of old standing") was his
host at Jerusalem;4 and Joses the Levite of Cyprus,5 whom the Apostles
had long ago called " the Son of Consolation," and who had removed all
the prejudice which looked suspiciously on Saul's conversion,6 is the first
teacher sent by the Mother-Church to the new disciples at Antioch. " He
was a good man, and full of the Holy Ghost and of faith." He rejoiced
when he saw what God's grace was doing ; he exhorted 7 all to cling fast
to the Saviour whom they had found ; and he labored himself with abun-
1 See xi. 19, 20. nearly simultaneous, that of Cornelius being
2 Acts xi. 20. We are strongly of opinion the great typical transaction on which our
that the correct reading here is not " Grecians " attention is to be fixed.
(A. V.), but Greeks, probably in the sense of 8 Acts xiii. 6-9.
proselytes of the Gate. Thus they were in 4 Acts xxi. 16.
the same jjosition as Cornelius. It has been 6 Acts iv. 36. See, however, the next note
doubted which case was prior in point of time. but one.
Some are of opinion that the events at Antioch 6 Acts ix. 27.
took place first. Others believe that those who 7 Acts xi. 23. The " Son of Consolation,"
jpoke to the Greeks at Antioch had previously of iv. 36, ought rather to be translated " Son
heard of the conversion of Cornelius. There of Exhortation " or " Son of Prophecy." See
seems no objection to supposing the two cases xiii. 1 .

110 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap.iv
dant success. But feeling the greatness of the work, and remembering
the zeal and strong character of his friend, whose vocation to this par
ticular task of instructing the Heathen was doubtless well known to him,
" he departed to Tarsus to seek Saul."
Whatever length of time had elapsed since Saul came from Jerusalem
to Tarsus, and however that time had been employed by him, — whether
he had already founded any of those churches in his native Cilicia, which
we read of soon after (Acts xv. 41), — whether (as is highly probable)
he had there undergone any of those manifold labors and sufferings
recorded by himself (2 Cor. xi.) but omitted by St. Luke, — whether
by active intercourse with the Gentiles, by study of their literature, by
travelling, by discoursing with the philosophers, he had been making
himself acquainted with their opinions and their prejudices, and so pre
paring his mind for the work that was before him, — or whether he had
been waiting in silence for the call of God's providence, praying for guid
ance from above, reflecting on the condition of the Gentiles, and gazing
more and more closely on the plan of the world's redemption, — how
ever this may be, it must have been an eventful day when Barnabas,
having come across the sea from Seleucia, or round by the defiles of
Mount Amanus, suddenly appeared in the streets of Tarsus. The last
time the two friends had met was in Jerusalem. All that they then
hoped, and probably more than they then thought possible, had occurred.
" God had granted to the Gentiles repentance unto life " (xi. 18).
Barnabas had " seen the grace of God " (xi. 23) with his owr eyes at
Antioch ; and under his own teaching " a great multitude " (xi. 24) had
been " added to the Lord." But he needed assistance. He needed the
presence of one whose wisdom was higher than his own, whose zeal was
an example to all, and whose peculiar mission had been miraculously
declared. Saul recognized the voice of God in the words of Barnabas:
and the two friends travelled in all haste to the Syrian metropolis.
There they continued " a whole year," actively prosecuting the sacred
work, teaching and confirming those who joined themselves to the assem
blies1 of the ever-increasing Church. As new converts, in vast numbers,
came in from the ranks of the Gentiles, the Church began to lose its
ancient appearance of a Jewish sect,2 and to stand out in relief, as a
great self-existent community, iii the face both of Jews and Gentiles.
Hitherto it had been possible, and even natural, that the Christians
should be considered, by the Jews themselves, and by the Heathen whose
notice they attracted, as only one among the many theological parties,
which prevailed in Jerusalem and in the Dispersion. But when Gen-
1 See Acts xi. 26. a See above, pp. 29 and 62.

chap. iv. THE NAME "CHRISTIAN." Ill
tiles began to listen to what was preached concerning Christ, — when
they were united as brethren on equal terms, and admitted to baptism
without the necessity of previous circumcision, — when the Mosaic
features of this society were lost in the wider character of the New
Covenant, — then it became evident that these men were something more
than the Pharisees or Sadducees, the Essenes 1 or Herodians, or any sect
or party among the Jews. Thus a new term in the vocabulary of the
human race came into existence at Antioch about the year 44. Thus
Jews and Gentiles, who, under the teaching of St. Paul, believed that
Jesus of Nazareth was the Saviour of the world, " were first called
Christians." It is not likely that they received this name from the Jews. The
" Children of Abraham " 2 employed a term much more expressive of
hatred and contempt. They called them " the sect of the Nazarenes." 3
These disciples of Jesus traced their origin to Nazareth in Galilee : and
it was a proverb, that nothing good could come from Nazareth.4 Besides
this, there was a further reason why the Jews would not have called the
disciples of Jesus by' the name of " Christians." The word " Christ "
has the same meaning with " Messiah ; " and the Jews, however blinded
and prejudiced on this subject, would never have used so sacred a word
to point an expression of mockery and derision ; and they could not
have used it in grave and serious earnest to designate those whom they
held to be the followers of a false Messiah, a fictitious Christ. Nor is it
likely that the " Christians " gave this name to themselves. In the Acts
of the Apostles, and in their own letters, we find them designating them
selves as " brethren," " disciples," " believers," " saints." 5 Only in two
places 6 do we find the term " Christians ; " and in both instances it is
implied to be a term used by those who are without. There is little
doubt that the name originated with the Gentiles, who began now to see
that this new sect was so far distinct from the Jews, that they might
naturally receive a new designation. And the form of the word implies
that it came from the Romans,7 not from the Greeks. The word
" Christ " was often in the conversation of the believers, as we know it to
have been constantly in their letters. " Christ " was the title of Him,
whom they avowed as their leader and their chief. They confessed that
1 See above, p. 32. 7 So we read in the Civil Wars of " Mari-
2 Matt. iii. 9 ; Luke iii. 8 ; John viii. 39. ans " and " Pompeians " for the partisans of
8 Acts xxiv. 5. Marius and Pompey ; and, under the Empire,
1 John i 46. See John vii. 41, 52 ; Luke of " Othonians" and " Vitcllians " for the par-
xiii. 2, &c. tisans of Otho and Vitellius. The word " He-
6 Acts xv. 23, ix. 26, v. 14, ix. 32 ; Rom. radians " (Matt. xxii. 16 ; Mark iii. 6, xil 131
xv. 25 ; Col. i. 2, &c. is formed exactly in the same way.
" Acts xxvi. 28, and 1 Pet. iv. 16.

112 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap.iv.
this Christ had been crucified ; but they asserted that He was risen from
the dead, and that He guided them by His invisible power. Thus
" Christian " was the name which naturally found its place in the
reproachful language of their enemies.1 In the first instance, we have
every reason to believe that it was a term of ridicule and derision.2 And
it is remarkable that the people of Antioch were notorious for inventing
names of derision, and for turning their wit into the channels of ridi
cule.3 In every way there is something very significant in the place
where we first received the name we bear. Not in Jerusalem, the city
of the Old Covenant, the city of the people who were chosen to the
exclusion of all others, but in a Heathen city, the Eastern centre of
Greek fashion and Roman luxury ; and not till it was shown that the
New Covenant was inclusive of all others ; then and there we were first
called Christians, and the Church received from the world its true and
honorable name.
In narrating the journeys of St. Paul, it will now be our duty to speak
of Antioch, not Jerusalem, as his point of departure and return. Let
us look, more closely than has hitherto been necessary, at its character.
its history, and its appearance. The position which it occupied near the
abrupt angle formed by the coasts of Syria and Asia Minor, and in the
opening where the Orontes passes between the ranges of Lebanon and
Taurus, has already been noticed.4 And we have mentioned the numer
ous colony of Jews which Seleucus introduced into his capital, and
raised to an equality of civil rights with the Greeks.5 There was everj
thing in the situation and circumstances of this city, to make it a place
of concourse for all classes and kinds of people. By its harbor of Se-
leucia it was in communication with all the trade of the Mediterranean;
and, through the open country behind the Lebanon, it was conveniently
approached by the caravans from Mesopotamia and Arabia. It united
the inland advantages of Aleppo with the maritime opportunities of
Smyrna. It was almost an oriental Rome, in which all the forms of the
civilized life of the Empire found some representative. Through the
1 It is s Latin derivative from the Greek " Christian " is used so proverbially for aU
term for the Messiah of the Jews. It is con- that is good, that it has been applied to benev-
nected with the office, not the name, o» our olent actions in which Jews have participated.
Saviour ; which harmonizes with the impor- 2 It is needless to remark that it soon
tant fact, that in the Epistles He is usually became a title of glory. Julian tried to sab-
called not " Jesus " but " Christ." The word stitutc the term " Galilean " for " Christian."
"Jesuit" (which, by the way, is rather Greek 3 Apollonius of Tyana wa< driven out of
than Latin) did not come into the vocabulary the city by their insults, and sailed away (lifcs
of the Church till after the lapse of 1,500 years. St. Paul) from Seleucia to Cyprus, where he
It is not a little remarkable that the word " Jes- visited Paphos. See Ch. X.
uit " is a proverbial term of reproach, even in * P. 19.
Roman-Catholic countries ; while the word 6 P. IB.

chap. rv. ANTIOCH. liii
first two centuries of the Christian era, it was what Constantinople
became afterwards, " the Gate of the East." And, indeed, the glory of
the city of Ignatius was only gradually eclipsed by that of the city of
Chrysostom. That great preacher and commentator himself, who knew
them both by familiar residence, always speaks of Antioch with peculiar
reverence,1 as the patriarchal city of the Christian name.
There is something curiously prophetic in the stories which are told
of the first founding of this city. Like Romulus on the Palatine,
Seleucus is said to have watched the flight of birds from the summit of
Mount Casius. An eagle took a fragment of the flesh of his sacrifice,
and carried it to a point on the seashore, a little' to the north of the
mouth of the Orontes. There he founded a city, and called it Seleucia2
after his own name. This was on the 23d of April. Again, on the 1st
of May, he sacrificed on the hill Silpius ; and then repeated the cere
mony and watched the auguries at the city of Antigonia, which his
vanquished rival, Antigonus, had begun and left unfinished. An eagle
again decided that this was not to be his own metropolis, and carried the
flesh to the hill Silpius, which is on the south side of the river, about
the place where it turns from a northerly to a westerly direction. Five
or six thousand Athenians and Macedonians were ordered to convey the
stones and timber of Antigonia down the river ; and Antioch was founded
by Seleucus, and called after his father's name.3
This fable, invented perhaps to give a mythological sanction to what
was really an act of sagacious prudence and princely ambition, is well
worth remembering. Seleucus was not slow to recognize the wisdom
of Antigonus in choosing a site for his capital, which should place it in
ready communication both with the shores of Greece and with his eastern
territories on the Tigris and Euphrates ; and he followed the example
promptly, and completed his work with sumptuous magnificence. Few
princes have ever lived with so great a passion for the building of cities ;
and this is a feature of his character which ought not to be unnoticed in
this narrative. Two at least of his cities in Asia Minor have a close
connection with the life of St. Paul. These are the Pisidian Antioch4
and the Phrygian Laodicaea,5 one called by the name of his father, the
other of his mother. He is said to have built in all nine Seleucias, six
teen Antiochs, and six Laodicaeas. This love of commemorating the
1 In his homilies on St. M tthew he tells 2 See Acts xiii. 4.
the people of Antioch, that though they boasted 8 Some say that Seleucus called the city
of their city's pre-eminence in having first en- after his son.
ioyed the Christian name, they were willing * Acts xiii. 14, xiv. 21 ; 2 Tim. iii. 11.
enough to be surpassed in Christian virtue by 5 Coloss. iv. 13, 15, 16. See Rev. i. 11,
wore homely cities. iii. 14.

114 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap.iv,
members of his family was conspicuous in his works by the Orontes.
Besides Seleucia and Antioch, he built, in the immediate neighborhood,
a Laodicaea in honor of his mother, and an Apamea in honor of his
wife. But by far the most famous of these four cities was the Syrian
Antioch. We must allude to its edifices and ornaments only so far as they are
due to the Greek kings of Syria and the first five Caesars of Rome.1 If
we were to allow our description to wander to the times of Justinian or
the Crusaders, though these are the times of Antioch' s greatest gloryj we
should be trespassing on a period of history which does not belong to us
Strabo, in the time of Augustus, describes the city as a Tetrapolis, or
union of four cities. The two first were erected by Seleucus Nicator
himself, in the situation already described, between Mount Silpius and
the river, on that wide space of level ground where a few poor habita
tions still remain by the banks of the Orontes. The river has gradually
changed its course and appearance, as the city has decayed. Once it
flowed round an island which, like the island in the Seine,2 by its thor
oughfares and bridges, and its own noble buildings, became part of a
magnificent whole. But, in Paris, the Old City is on the island ; in
Antioch, it was the New City, built by the second Seleucus and the third
Antiochus. Its chief features were a palace, and an arch like that of
Napoleon. The fourth and last part of the Tetrapolis was built by
Antiochus Epiphanes, where Mount Silpius rises abruptly on the south.
On one of its craggy summits he placed, in the fervor of his Romanizing
mania,3 a temple dedicated to Jupiter Capitolinus ; and on another, a
strong citadel, which dwindled to the Saracen Castle of 'the first Crusade.
At the rugged bases of the mountain, the ground was levelled for a
glorious street, which extended for four miles across the length of the
city, and where sheltered crowds could walk through continuous colon
nades from the eastern to the western suburb.4 The whole was
surrounded by a wall, which, ascending to the heights and returning to
the river, does not deviate very widely in its course from the wall of the
Middle Ages, which can still be traced by the fragments of ruined tow
ers. This wall is assigned by a Byzantine writer to Tiberius, but it
seems more probable that the Emperor only repaired what Antiochus
Epiphanes had built.5 Turning now to the period of the Empire, we find
1 In our larger editions is a plan of the 8 See above, p. 25, n. 1.
ancient city, adopted (with some modifications) * A comparison has been instituted above
from the plan in the work mentioned below, u. between Paris and Antioch : and it is hardly
5. See a fuller account of Antioch in Dr. possible now (1860) to revise this paragraph
Smith's Diet, of Geog. for the press without alluding to the Bue de
2 Julian the Apostate suggests a parallel Rivoli.
between Paris and Antioch. See Gibbon's « See Miiller, Antiq. Antioch. pp. 54 and
'9th and 23d chapters. 81.

chap. iv. CHARACTER OF INHABITANTS OF ANTIOCH. 115
that Antioch had memorials of all the great Romans whose names have
been mentioned as yet in this biography. When Pompey was defeated
by Caesar, the conqueror's name was perpetuated in this Eastern city by
an aqueduct and by baths, and by a basilica called Csesarium. In the
reign of Augustus, Agrippa x built in all cities of the Empire, and Herod
of Judaea followed the example to the utmost of his power. Both found
employment for their munificence at Antioch. A gay suburb rose under
the patronage of the one, and the other contributed a road and a portico.
The reign of Tiberius was less remarkable for great architectural works ;
but the Syrians by the Orontes had to thank him for many improvements
and restorations in their city. Even the four years of his successor left
behind them the aqueduct and the baths of Caligula.
The character of the inhabitants is easily inferred from the influences
which presided over the city's growth. Its successive enlargement by the
Seleucids proves that their numbers rapidly increased from the first.
The population swelled still further, when, instead of the metropolis
of the Greek kings of Syria, it became the residence of Roman gov
ernors. The mixed multitude received new and important additions
in the officials who were connected with the details of provincial admin
istration. Luxurious Romans were attracted by its beautiful climate.
New wants continually multiplied the business of its commerce. Its
gardens and houses grew and extended on the north side of the river.
Many are the allusions to Antioch, in the history of those times, as a place
of singular pleasure and enjoyment. Here and there, an elevating
thought is associated with its name. Poets have spent their young days
at Antioch,2 great generals have died there,3 emperors have visited and
admired it.4 But, for the most part, its population was a worthless rab
ble of Greeks and Orientals. The frivolous amusements of the theatre
were the occupation of tlieir life. Their passion for races, and the ridic
ulous party quarrels5 connected with them, were the patterns of those
which afterwards became the disgrace of Byzantium. The oriental cle
ment of superstition and imposture was not less active. The Chaldean
astrologers found their most credulous disciples in Antioch.6 Jewish
1 This friend of Augustus and Maecenas to Germanicus and his noble-minded wife
must be carefully distinguished from that And yet they were the parents of Caligula.
grandson of Herod who bore the same name, 4 For all that long series of emperors whose
and whose death is one of the subjects of this names are connected with Antioch, see Miiller.
chapter. For the works of Herod the Great 6 The Blue Faction and the Green Faction
at Antioch, see Joseph. Ant. xvi. 5, 3 ; War, were notorious under the reigns of Caligula
i. 21, 11. and Claudius. Both emperors patronized the
2 See Cic. pro Archia Poeta. latter.
8 All readers of Tacitus will recognize the 6 Chrysostom complains that even Chris-
allusion. (See Ann. ii. 72.) It is not possible tians, in his day, were led away by this passion
to write about Antioch without some allusion for horoscopes. Juvenal traces the supersti-

116 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap.h.
impostors,1 sufficiently common throughout the East, found their best
opportunities here. It is probable that no populations have ever ken
more abandoned than those of oriental Greek cities under the Roman
Empire, and of these cities Antioch was the greatest and the worist.2
If we wish to realize the appearance and reality of the complicated
Heathenism of the first Christian century, we must endeavor to in>
agine the scene of that suburb, the famous Daphne,3 with its fountains
and groves of bay-trees, its bright buildings, its crowds of licentious
votaries, its statue of Apollo, — where, under the climate of Syria and
the wealthy patronage of Rome, all that was beautiful in nature aud in
art had created a sanctuary for a perpetual festival of vice.
Thus, if any city, in the first century, was worthy to be called the
Heathen Queen and Metropolis of the East, that city was Antioch. She
was represented, in a famous allegorical statue, as a female figure, stated
on a rock and crowned, with the river Orontes at her feet.4 With this
image, which art has made perpetual, we conclude our description.
There is no excuse for continuing it to the age of Vespasian and Titus,
when Judaea was taken, and the Western Gate, decorated with the spoils,
was called the " Gate of the Cherubim,"5 — or to the Saracen age, when,
after many years of Christian history and Christian mythology, we find
the " Gate of St. Paul " placed opposite the " Gate of St. George," and
when Duke Godfrey pitched his camp between the river and the city-
wall. And there is reason to believe that earthquakes, the constant
enemy of the people of Antioch, have so altered the very appearance of its
site, that such description would be of little use. As the Vesuvius of
Virgil or Pliny would hardly be recognized in the angry neighbor of mod
ern Naples, so it is more than probable that the dislocated crags, which
still rise above the Orontes, are greatly altered in form from the fort-
crowned heights of Seleucus or Tiberius, Justinian or Tancred.
Earthquakes occurred in each of the reigns of Caligula and Claudius.6
And it is likely that, when Saul and Barnabas were engaged in their
tions of Heathen Rome to Antioch. "In * For this celebrated statue of the Tin
Tiberim defluxit Orontes." 'Av-ioxeiac-, or Genius of Antioch, so constantly
1 Compare the cases of Simon Magus (Acts represented on coins, see Miiller, Antiq. Anti-
viii.), Elymas the Sorcerer (Acts xiii.), and och. pp. 35-41. The engraving here given is
the sons of Sceva (Acts xix.). Weshall have from Pistolesi's Vaticano.
occasion to return to this subject again. 5 The Byzantine writer Malalas says, that
2 Ausonius hesitates between Antioch and Titus built a theatre at Antioch where a syna
Alexandria, as to the rank they occupied in gogue had been.
eminence and vice. o One earthquake, according to Malalas,
3 Gibbon's description of Daphne (ch. occurred on the morning of March 23, in the
xxiii.) is well known. The sanctuary was on year 37, and another soon afterwards.
the high ground, four or five miles to the
S W. of Antioch. See Smith's Die. of the Bible.

Allegorical Statue of Antioch in Syria.

OHAP.rv. FAMINE. — MISSION TO JERUSALEM. 117
apostolic work, parts of the city had something of that appearance which
still makes Lisbon dreary, new and handsome buildings being raised in
close proximity to the ruins left by the iate calamity. It is remarkable
how often great physical calamities are permitted by God to follow in
close succession to each other. That age, which, as we have seen, had
been visited by earthquakes, was presently visited by famine. The reign
of Claudius, from bad harvests or other causes, was a period of general
distress and scarcity " over the whole world."1 In the fourth year of his
reign, we are told by Josephus that the famine was so severe, that the
price of food became enormous, and great numbers perished.2 At this
time it happened that Helena, the mother of Izates, king of Adiabene, and
a recent convert to Judaism, came to worship at Jerusalem. Moved with
compassion for the misery she saw around her, she sent to purchase corn
from Alexandria and figs from Cyprus, for distribution among the poor.
Izates himself (who had also been converted by one who bore the same
name 3 with him who baptized St. Paul) shared the charitable feelings of
his mother, and sent large sums of money to Jerusalem.
While this relief came from Assyria, from Cyprus, and from Africa to
the Jewish sufferers in Judaea, God did not suffer His own Christian
people, probably the poorest and certainly the most disregarded in that
country, to perish in the general distress. And their relief also came from
nearly the same quarters. While Barnabas and Saul were evangelizing
the Syrian capital, and gathering in the harvest, the first seeds of which
had been sown by " men of Cyprus and Cyrene," certain prophets came
down from Jerusalem to Antioch, and one of them named Agabus an
nounced that a time of famine was at hand.4 The Gentile disciples felt
that they were bound by the closest link to those Jewish brethren whom
though they had never seen they loved. " For if the Gentiles had been
made partakers of their spiritual things, their duty was also to minister
unto them in carnal things." 5 No time was lost in preparing for the
coming distress. All the members of the Christian community, according
to their means, " determined to send relief," Saul and Barnabas being
chosen to take the contribution to the elders at Jerusalem.6
About the time when these messengers came to the Holy City on tlieir
errand of love, a worse calamity than that of famine had fallen upon the
1 Besides the famine in Judasa, we read of the court of Adiabene, and thus obtained influ-
three others in the reign of Claudius; one in ence with the king. (Joseph. Ant. xx. 2, 3.)
Greece, mentioned by Eusebius, and two in See what has been said above (pp. 18, and 93,
Rome, the first mentioned by Dio Cassius, the n". 4) about the female proselytes at Damascus
second by Tacitus. and Iconium.
2 Ant. iii. 15, 3, xx. 2, 5, and 5, 2. * Acts xi. 28.
8 This Ananias was a Jewish merchant, 6 Rom. xv. 27.
who made proselytes among the women about 6 Acts xi. 29, 30.

118 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap.iv.
Church. One Apostle had been murdered, and another was in prison.
There is something touching in the contrast between the two brothers,
James and John. One died before the middle of the first Christian cen
tury; the other lived on to its close. One was removed just when his
Master's kingdom, concerning which he had so eagerly inquired,1 was be
ginning to show its real character; he probably never heard the word
" Christian " pronounced. Zebedee's other son remained till the anti-
Christian2 enemies of the faith were " already come," and was laboring
against them when his brother had been fifty years at rest in the Lord.
He who had foretold the long service of St. John revealed to St. Peter
that he should die by a violent death.3 But the time was not yet come.
Herod had bound him with two chains. Besides the soldiers who watched
his sleep, guards were placed before the door of the prison.4 And " after
the passover " 5 the king intended to bring him out and gratify the people
with his death. But Herod's death was nearer than St. Peter's. For a
moment we see the Apostle in captivity and the king in the plenitude of
his power. But before the autumn a dreadful change had taken place.
On the 1st of August (we follow a probable calculation,6 and borrow some
circumstances from the Jewish historian) 7 there was a great commemora
tion in Caesarea. Some say it was in honor of the Emperor's safe return
from the island of Britain. However this might be, the city was crowded,
and Herod was there. On the second day of the festival he came into the
theatre. That theatre had been erected by his grandfather,8 who had
murdered the Innocents ; and now the grandson was there, who had mur
dered an Apostle. The stone seats, rising in a great semicircle, tier above
tier, were covered with an excited multitude. The king came in, clothed
in magnificent robes, of which silver was the costly and brilliant material.
It was early in the day, and the sun's rays fell upon the king, so that the
eyes of the beholders were dazzled with the brightness which surrounded
him. Voices from the crowd, here and there, exclaimed that it was the
apparition of something divine. And when he spoke and made an oration
to the people, they gave a shout, saying, " It is the voice of a God and not

1 See Mark x. 35-45 ; Acts i. 6. 8 See Joseph. Ant. xv. 9, 6. It is from
¦ 2 1 John ii. 18, iv. 3 ; 2 John 7. his narrative (xix. 8, 2) that we know the
8 John xxi. 18-22. See 2 Pet. i. 14. theatre to have been the scene of Agrippa's
4 For the question of the distribution of death-stroke. The "throne" (Acts xii. 21)
soldiers on this occasion, we may refer to is the official " tribunal," as in Acts xviii. 12,
Hackctt's notes on v. 4 and v. 40. 16, 17. Josephus says nothing of the quarrel
5 Inadvertently translated "after Easter" with the Tyrians and Sidonians. Probably
in the A. V. Acts xii. 4. it arose simply from mercantile relations (see
6 That of Wieseler. 1 Kings v. 11 ; Ezek. xxvii. 17), and their
7 Compare Acts xii. 20-24 with Josephus, desire for reconciliation (Acts xii. 2U) would
Ant. xix. 8. a naturally be increased by the existing faraiuo.

CHAP.iY. DEATH OF HEROD AGRIPPA I. 119
of a man." But in the midst of this idolatrous ostentation the angel of
God suddenly smote him. He was carried out of the theatre a dying man,
and on the 6th of August he was dead.
This was that year, 44,1 on which we have already said so much. The
country was placed again under Eoman governors, and hard times were
at hand for the Jews. Herod Agrippa had courted their favor. He had
done much for them, and was preparing to do more. Josephus tells us,
that " he had begun to encompass Jerusalem with a wall, which, had it
been brought to perfection, would have made it impracticable for the
Romans to take the city by siege : but his death, which happened at
Caesarea, before he had raised the walls to tlieir due height, prevented
him." 2 That part of the city, which this boundary was intended to enclose,
was a suburb when St. Paul was converted. The work was not completed
till the Jews were preparing for their final struggle with the Romans : and
the Apostle, when he came from Antioch to Jerusalem, must have noticed
the unfinished wall to the north and west of the old Damascus gate. We
cannot determine the season of the year when he passed this way. We
are not sure whether the year itself was 44 or 45. It is not probable that
he was in Jerusalem at the passover, when St. Peter was in prison, or that
he was praying with those anxious disciples at the " house of Mary the
mother of John, whose surname was Mark." 3 But there is this link of
interesting connection between that house and St. Paul, that it was the
familiar home of one who was afterwards (not always 4 without cause for
anxiety or reproof) a companion of his journeys. When Barnabas and
Saul returned to Antioch, they were attended by " John, whose surname
was Mark." With the affection of Abraham towards Lot, his kinsman 5
Barnabas withdrew him from the scene of persecution. We need not
doubt that higher motives were added, — that at the first, as at tho last,6 •
St. Paul regarded him as " profitable to him for the ministry."
Thus attended, the Apostle willingly retraced his steps towards Antioch.
A field of noble enterprise was before him. He could not doubt that God,
who had so prepared him, would work by his means great conversions
among the Heathen. At this point of his life, we cannot avoid noticing
those circumstances of inward and outward preparation, which fitted him
for his peculiar position of standing between the Jews and Gentiles. He
1 Roman-Catholic writers here insert vari- to have held the See of Antioch for seven years
ous passages of the traditionary life of St. before that of Rome.
Peter; his journey from Antioch through 2 War, ii. 11, 6.
Asia Minor to Rome ; his meeting with Simon 8 Acts xii. 12.
Magus, &c, and the other Apostles ; their 4 See Acts xiii. 13, xv. 37-39.
general separation to preach the Gospel to the 6 Not necessarily " nephew." See i future
Gentiles in all parts of the world; the formation note on Col. iv. 10.
of the Apostles' Creed, &c. St. Peter is alleged 6 2 Tim. iv. 11. See below.

120 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap.it.
was not a Sadducee, he had never Hellenized, — he had been educated at
Jerusalem, — everything conspired to give him authority, when he ad-
dressed his countrymen as a " Hebrew of the Hebrews." At the same
time, in his apostolical relation to Christ, he was quite disconnected with
the other Apostles ; he had come in silence to a conviction of the truth at
a distance from the Judaizing Christians, and had early overcome those
prejudices which impeded so many, in their approaches to the Heathen.
He had just been long enough at Jerusalem to be recognized and welcomed
by the apostolic college,1 but not long enough even to be known by face
" unto the churches in Judaea."2 He had been withdrawn into Cilicia
till the baptism of Gentiles was a notorious and familiar fact to those very
churches.3 He could hardly be blamed for continuing what St. Peter had
already begun.
And if the Spirit of God had prepared him for building up the United
Church of Jews and Gentiles, and the Providence of God had directed all
the steps of his life to this one result, we are called on to notice the
singular fitness of this last employment, on which we have seen him
engaged, for assuaging the suspicious feeling which separated the two
great branches of the Church. In quitting for a time his Gentile converts
at Antioch, and carrying a contribution of money to the Jewish Chris
tians at Jerusalem, he was by no means leaving the higher work for the
lower. He was building for aftertimes. The interchange of mutual
benevolence was a safe foundation for future confidence. Temporal com
fort was given in gratitude for spiritual good received. The Church's
first days were christened with charity. No sooner was its new name
received, in token of the union of Jews and Gentiles, than the sympa
thy of its members was asserted by the work of practical benevolence.
We need not hesitate to apply to that work the words which St. Paul
used, after many years, of another collection for the poor Christians in
Judaea : — " The administration of this service not only supplies the need
of the Saints, but overflows in many thanksgivings unto God ; while they
praise God for this proof of your obedience to the Glad Tidings of
Christ."4

Coin of Claudius and Agrippa I.6
1 Acts ix. 27. 2 Gal. i. 22. * 2 Cor. ix. 12-14.
8 These were the churches of Lydda, Saron, 5 From the British Museum. See p. 130.
Joppa, &c, which Peter had been visiting when We may refer here to Dr. Wordsworth's useful
he was summoned to Cassarea. Acts ix. 32-43. note on Acts xii. 1 .

CHAPTER V.
Second Part of the Acts of the Apostles. — Revelation at Antioch. — Public Devotions. — De
parture of Barnabas and Saul. — The Orontes. — History and Description of Seleucia. —
Voyage to Cyprus. — Salamis. — Roman Provincial System. — Proconsuls and Proprastors .
— Sergius Paulus. — Oriental Impostors at Rome and in the Provinces. — Elymas Bar-
jesus. — History of Jewish Names. — Saul and Paul.
THE second part of the Acts of the Apostles is generally reckoned to
begin with the thirteenth chapter. At this point St. Paul begins
to appear as the principal character ; and the narrative, gradually widen
ing and expanding with his travels, seems intended to describe to us, in
minute detail, the communication of the Gospel to the Gentiles. The
thirteenth and fourteenth chapters embrace a definite and separate sub
ject : and this subject is the first journey of the first Christian missiona
ries to the Heathen. These two chapters of the inspired record are the
authorities for the present and the succeeding chapters of this work, in
which we intend to follow the steps of Paul and Barnabas, in their cir
cuit through Cyprus and the southern part of Lesser Asia.
The history opens suddenly and abruptly. We are told that there
were, in the Church at Antioch,1 " prophets and teachers," and among
the rest " Barnabas," with whom we are already familiar. The others
were " Simeon, who was surnamed Niger," and " Lucius of Cyrene " and
" Manaen, the foster-brother of Herod the Tetrarch," — and " Saul ' who
still .appears under his Hebrew name. We observe, moreover, not only
that he is mentioned after Barnabas, but that he occupies the lowest place
in this enumeration of "prophets and teachers." The distinction between
these two offices in the Apostolic Church will be discussed hereafter.'
kt present it is sufficient to remark that the "prophecy" of the New
Testament does not necessarily imply a knowledge of things to come, but
rather a gift of exhorting with a peculiar force of inspiration. In the
Church's early miraculous days the " prophet " appears to have been
ranked higher than the " teacher."3 And we may perhaps infer that,
up to this point of the history, Barnabas had belonged to the rank of
" prophets," and Saul to that of " teachers : " which would be in strict
i Acts xiii. 1. 2 See Ch. XIII.
8 Compare Acts xiii. I with 1 Cor. xii. 28, 29 ; Eph. iv. 11. 121

122 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap.t.
conformity with the inferiority of the latter to the former, which, as wo
have seen, has been hitherto observed.
Of the other three, who are grouped with these two chosen missiona
ries, we do not know enough to justify any long disquisition. But we
may remark in passing that there is a certain interest attaching to each
one of them. Simeon is one of those Jews who bore a Latin surname
in addition to their Hebrew name, like " John whose surname was
Mark," mentioned in the last verse of the preceding chapter, and like
Saul himself, whose change of appellation will presently be brought
under notice.1 Lucius, probably the same who is referred to in the
Epistle to the Romans,2 is a native of Cyrene, that African city which has
already been noticed as abounding in Jews, and which sent to Jerusalem
our Saviour's cross-bearer.3 Manaen is spoken of as the foster-brother
of Herod the Tetrarch: this was Herod Antipas, the Tetrarch of Galilee;
and since we learn from Josephus4 that this Herod and his brother Arche
laus were children of the same mother, and afterwards educated together
at Rome, it is probable that this Christian prophet or teacher had spent
his early childhood with those two princes, who were now both banished
from Palestine to the banks of the Rhone.5
These, were the most conspicuous persons in the Church of Antioch,
when a revelation was received of the utmost importance. The occasion
on which the revelation was made seems to have been a fit preparation
for it. The Christians were engaged in religious services of peculiar
solemnity. The Holy Ghost spoke to them " as they ministered unto the
Lord and fasted." The word here translated " ministered," has been
taken by opposite controversialists to denote the celebration of the
" sacrifice of the mass " on the one hand, or the exercise of the office of
" preaching " on the other. It will be safer if we say simply that the
Christian community at Antioch was engaged in one united act of
prayer and humiliation. That this solemnity would be accompanied by
words of exhortation, and that it would be crowned and completed by
the Holy Communion, is more than probable ; that it was accompanied
1 See Acts xiii. 9. Compare Col. iv. 11. of his obscurity, both his future power and
2 Rom. xvi. 21. There is no reason what- future wickedness. The historian adds, that
ever for supposing that St. Luke is meant. Herod afterwards treated the Essenes with
The Latin form of his name would be " Luca- great kindness. Nothing is more likely that
nus," not " Lucius." that this Manaen was the father of the com-
3 See above, p. 16, n. 6. panion of Herod's children. Another Jew of
* Their mother's name was Malthace, a the same name is mentioned, at a later period
Samaritan. PFar, i. 28, 4. See Ant. xvii. 1, 3. ( War, ii. 17, 8, 9 ; Life, 5), as having encour-
One of the sect of the Essenes (see p. 32), aged robberies, and come to a violent end.
who bore the name of Manaen or Manaem, is The name is the same with that of the King
mentioned by Josephus (Ant. xv. 10, 5) as of Israel. 2 Kings xv. 14-22.
having foretold to Herod the Great, in the days 6 See above, pp. 26 and 51.

chap. v. DEPARTURE OF BARNABAS AND SAUL. 123
with Pasting ! we are expressly told. These religious services might
have had a special reference to the means which were to be adopted for
the spread of the Gospel now evidently intended for all ; and the words
" separate me now 2 Barnabas and Saul for the work whereunto I have
called them," may have been an answer to specific prayers. How this
revelation was made, whether by the mouth of some of the prophets
who were present, or by the impulse of a simultaneous and general
inspiration, — whether the route to be taken by Barnabas and Saul was
at this time precisely indicated,3 — and whether they had previously
received a conscious personal call, of which this was the public ratifi
cation,4 — it is useless to inquire. A definite work was pointed out, as
now about to be begun under the counsel of God ; two definite agents
in this work were publicly singled out: and we soon see them sent
forth to their arduous undertaking, with the sanction of the Church at
Antioch. Their final consecration and departure was the occasion of another
religious solemnity. A fast was appointed, and prayers were offered up ;
and, with that simple ceremony of ordination 5 which we trace through
the earlier periods of Jewish history, and which we here see adopted
under the highest authority in the Christian Church, " they laid tlieir
hands on them, and sent them away." The words are wonderfully simple ;
but those who devoutly reflect on this great occasion, and on the posi
tion of the first Christians at Antioch, will not find it difficult to imagine
the thoughts which occupied the hearts of the Disciples during these
first " Ember Days of the Church 6 — their deep sense of the importance
of the work which was now beginning, — their faith in God, on whom
they could rely in the midst of such difficulties, — their suspense du
ring the absence of those by whom their own faith had been forti
fied, — their anxiety for the intelligence they might bring on their
return. Their first point of destination was the island of Cyprus. It is not
necessary, though quite allowable, to suppose that this particular course
was divinely indicated in the original revelation at Antioch. Four
1 For the association of Fasting with Ordi- ¦ * St. Paul at least had long been conscious
nation, see Bingham's Antiq. of the Christ. Ch. of his own vocation, and could only be waiting
it. vi. 6, xxi. ii. 8. to be summoned to his work.
2 This little word is important, and should 6 It forms no part of the plan of this work
have been in the A. V. to enter into ecclesiastical controversies. It is
" It is evident that the course of St. Paul's sufficient to refer to Acts vi. 6 ; 1 Tim. iv 14.
journeys was often indeterminate, and regu- v. 22 ; 2 Tim. i. 6 ; Heb. vi. 2.
lated either by convenient opportunities (as in 6 See Bingham, as above.
Acts xxi. 2, xxviii. 11), or by compulsion (as
in xiv. 6, xvii. 14), or by supernatural admo
nitions (xxii. 21, xvi. 6-10).

124 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap.v,
reasons at least can be stated, which may have induced the Apostles, in
the exercise of a wise discretion, to turn in the first instance to this
island. It is separated by no great distance from the mainland of
Syria ; its high mountain-summits are easily seen } in clear weather from
the coast near the mouth of the Orontes ; and in the summer season
many vessels must often have been passing and repassing between
Salamis and Seleucia. Besides this, it was the native-place of Barnabas.2
Since the time when " Andrew found his brother Simon, and brought him
to Jesus," 3 and the Saviour was beloved in the house of " Martha and
her sister and Lazarus," 4 the ties of family relationship had not been
without effect on the progress of the Gospel.5 It could not be unnat
ural to suppose that the truth would be welcomed in Cyprus, when it
was brought by Barnabas and his kinsman Mark 6 to their own connec
tions or friends. Moreover, the Jews were numerous in Salamis.1 By
sailing to that city they were following the track of the synagogues.
Their mission, it is true, was chiefly to the Gentiles ; but their
surest course for reaching them was through the medium of the Prose
lytes and the Hellenistic Jews. To these considerations we must
add, in the fourth place, that some of the Cypriotes were already
Christians. No one place out of Palestine, with the exception of
Antioch, had been so honorably associated with the work of successful
evangelization.8 The palaces of Antioch were connected with the sea by the river
Orontes. Strabo says that in his time they sailed up the stream in one
day ; and Pausanias speaks of great Roman works which had improved
the navigation of the channel. Probably it was navigable by vessels of
some considerable size, aud goods and passengers were conveyed by
water between the city and the sea. Even in our own day, though there
is now a bar at the mouth of the river, there has been a serious project
of uniting it by a canal with the Euphrates, and so of re-establishing one
of the old lines of commercial intercourse between the Mediterranean
and the Indian Sea. The Orontes comes from the valley between
Lebanon and Anti-Lebanon, and does not, like many rivers, vary
capriciously between a winter-torrent and a thirsty watercourse, but
flows on continually to the sea. Its waters are not clear, but they are
deep and rapid. Tlieir course has been compared to that of the Wye.
They wind round the bases of high and precipitous cliffs, or by richly
1 Colonel Chesney speaks of "the lofty Paul himself. Acts xxiii. 16-33. Compare
island of Cyprus as seen to the S. W. in the 1 Cor. vii. 16.
distant horizon," from the bay of Antioch. 6 Acts xiii. 5. See xii. 25, and p. 120, o>
2 Acts iv. 36. 4; above.
8 John i. 41, 42. * John xi. 5. t Acts xiii. 5. See below, pp. 129, 130.
6 See an instance of this in the life of St. 8 See Acts iv. 36, xi. 19, 20, xxi. 16.

chap. v. DESCRIPTION OF SELEUCIA. 12&
cultivated banks, where the vegetation of the south, — the vine and the
fig-tree, the myrtle, the bay, the ilex, and the arbutus, — is mingled with
dwarf oak and English sycamore.1 If Barnabas and Saul came down by
water from Antioch, this was the course of the boat which conveved
them. If they travelled the five or six leagues2 by land, they crossed
the river at the north side of Antioch, and came along the base of the
Pierian hills by a route which is now roughly covered with fragrant and
picturesque shrubs, but which then doubtless was a track well worn by
travellers, like the road from the Piraeus to Athens, or from Ostia to Rome.3
Seleucia united the two characters of a fortress and a seaport. It was
situated on a rocky eminence, which is the southern extremity of an
elevated range of hills projecting from Mount Amanus. From the south
east, where the ruins of the Antioch Gate are still conspicuous, the
ground rose towards the north-east into high and craggy summits ; and
round the greater part of its circumference of four miles the city was
protected by its natural position. The harbor and mercantile suburb
were on level ground towards the west; but here, as on the only weak
point at Gibraltar, strong artificial defences had made compensation for
the deficiency of nature. Seleucus, who had named his metropolis in
his father's honor (p. 113), gave his own name to this maritime fortress ;
and here, around his tomb,4 his successors contended for the key of
Syria.5 " Seleucia by the sea " was a place of great importance under
the Seleucids and the Ptolemies ; and so it remained under the sway of
the Romans. In consequence of its bold resistance to Tigranes, when he
was in possession of all the neighboring country, Pompey gave it the
privileges of a " Free City ; " 6 and a contemporary of St. Paul speaks of
it as having those privileges still.1
The most remarkable work among the extant remains of Seleucia is
an immense excavation, — probably the same with that which is mentioned
by Polybius, — leading from the upper part of the ancient city to the sea.
It consists alternately of tunnels and deep open cuttings. It is difficult
to give a confident opinion as to the uses for which it was intended. But

1 For views, with descriptions, see Fisher's * Seleucus was buried here.
Syria, i. 5, 19, 77, n. 28. 6 We may refer especially to the chapters
2 Colonel Chesney says, " The windings in which Polybius gives an account of the
give a distance of about forty-one miles, whilst siege of Seleucia in the war of Antiochus the
the journey by land is only sixteen miles and Great with Ptolemy. In these chapters we
a half " — R. G. J. viii. p. 230. find the clearest descriptioTi both of its military
3 Dr. Yates observed traces of Roman pave- importance and of its topography.
ment on the line of road between Antioch and 6 Strabo. See p. 43. Compare p. 22, n. 1.
Seleucia. See his comprehensive paper on 7 Pliny.
Seleucia, in the Museum of Classical Antiquities
for June, 1852.

126 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap.v
the best conjecture seems to be that it was constructed for the purpose of
drawing off the water, which might otherwise have done mischief to the
houses and shipping in the lower part of the town ; and so arranged at
the same time, as, when needful, to supply a rush of water to clear out
the port. The inner basin, or dock, is now a morass ; but its dimensions
can be measured, and the walls that surrounded it can be distinctly
traced.1 The position of the ancient flood-gates, and the passage through
which the vessels were moved from the inner to the outer harbor, can be
accurately marked. The very piers of the outer harbor are still to be
seen under the water. The southern jetty takes the wider sweep, and
overlaps the northern, forming a secure entrance and a well-protected
basin. The stones are of great size, " some of them twenty feet long,
five feet deep, and six feet wide ; " 2 and they were fastened to each other
with iron cramps. The masonry of ancient Seleucia is still so good, that
not long since a Turkish Pacha 3 conceived the idea of clearing out and
repairing the harbor.
These piers 4 were unbroken when Saul and Barnabas came down to
Seleucia, and the large stones fastened by their iron cramps protected the
vessels in the harbor from the swell of the western sea. Here, in the
midst of unsympathizing sailors, the two missionary Apostles, with their
younger companion, stepped on board the vessel which was to convey
them to Salamis. As they cleared the port, the whole sweep of the bay
of Antioch opened on their left, — the low ground by the mouth of the
Orontes, — the wild and woody country beyond it, — and then the peak of
Mount Casius, rising symmetrically from the very edge of the sea to a
height of five thousand feet.5 On the right, in the south-west horizon, if
the day was clear, they saw the island of Cyprus from the first.6 The
current sets north-east and northerly between the island and the Syrian
coast.7 But with a fair wind, a few hours would enable them to run down
1 Pococke gives a rude plan of Seleucia, tiful feature of this bay. St. Paul must have
with the harbor, &c. A more exact and seen it in all his voyages to and from Antioch.
complete one will be found in the memoir of 6 See above, p. 124, n. 2.
Dr. Yates. 7 " In sailing from the southern shores of
2 Pocpcke, p. 183. Cyprus, with the winds adverse, you should
3 Ali Pasha, governor of Bagdad in 1835, endeavor to obtain the advantage of the set
once governor of Aleppo. of the current, which between Cyprus and the
4 It seems that the names of the piers still mouths of the Nile always runs to the cast-
retain the memory of this occasion. Dr. ward, changing its direction to the N. E. and
Yates says that thf southern pier is called N. as you near the coast of Syria." — Norie,
after the Apostle Paul, in contradistinction to p. 149. " The current, in general, continued
its fellow, the pier of St. Barnabas. easterly along the Libyan coast, and E. N. E
6 "The lofty Jcbel-el-Akrab, rising 5,318 off Alexandria ; thence advancing to tlie coasl
feet above the sea, with its abutments extend- of Syria, it sets N. E. and more northerly ; so
ing to Antioch." — Chcsney, p. 228. This that country vessels bound from Damietta to
mountain is, however, a conspicuous and beau- an eastern port of Cyprus have been carried

chap. v. SALAMIS. 127
from Seleucia to Salamis ; and the land would rapidly rise in forms well
known and familiar to Barnabas and Mark.
The coast of nearly every island of the Mediterranean has been
minutely surveyed and described by British naval officers. The two
islands which were most intimately connected with St. Paul's voyages
have been among the latest to receive this kind of illustration. The
soundings of the coast of Crete are now proved to furnish a valuable
commentary on the twenty-seventh chapter of the Acts : and the chart of
Cyprus should at least be consulted when we read the thirteenth chapter.
From Cape St. Andrea, the north-eastern point of the island, the coast
trends rapidly to the west, till it reaches Cape Grego,1 the south-eastern
extremity. The wretched modern town of Famagousta is nearer the
latter point than the former, and the ancient Salamis was situated a short
distance to the north of Famagousta. Near Cape St. Andrea are two or
three small islands, anciently called " The Keys." These, if they were
seen at all, would soon be lost to view. Cape Grego is distinguished by
a singular promontory of table land, which is very familiar to the sailors
of our merchantmen and ships of war : and there is little doubt that the
woodcut given in one of their manuals of sailing directions 2 represents
that very " rougn, lofty, table-shaped eminence " which Strabo mentions
in his description of the coast, and which has been identified with the
Idalium of the classical poets.
The ground lies low in the neighborhood of Salamis ; and tho town
was situated on a bight of the coast to the north of the river Pedneus.
This low land is the largest plain in Cyprus, and the Pediaeus is the only
true river in the island, the rest being merely winter-torrents, flowing in
the wet season from the two mountain ranges which intersect it from east
to west. This plain probably represents the kingdom of Teucer, which is
familiar to us in the early stories of legendary Greece. It stretches in
wards between the two mountain ranges to the very heart of the country,
where the modern Turkish capital, Nicosia, is situated.3 In the days of
historical Greece, Salamis was the capital. Under the Roman Empire, if
not the seat of government, it was at least the most important mercantile
by the current past the island." — Purdy, p. Cyprus, if the vessel which conveyed the news
276. After leaving the Gulf of Scanderoon, could not cross to Antioch.
the current sets to the westward along the 1 The Pedalium of Strabo and Ptolemy.
south coast of Asia Minor, as we shall have 2 See the sketch of Cape Grego " N. W.
occasion to notice hereafter. A curious illus- by W., six miles," in Purdy, Pt. ii. p. 253.
tration of the difficulty sometimes experienced 3 See Pococke's description, vol. ii. pp
in making this passage will be found in Meur- 214-217. He gives a rude plan of ancient
sius, Cyprus, Src, p. 158 ; where the decree of Salamis. The ruined aqueduct which he
an early council is cited, directing the course mentions appears to be subsequent to the
to he adopted on the death of a bishop in time of St. Paul.

128 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap.,,
town. We have the best reasons for believing that the harbor was con
venient and capacious.1 Thus we can form to ourselves some idea of the
appearance of the place in the reign of Claudius. A large city by the
seashore, a wide-spread plain with corn-fields and orchards, and the blue
distance of mountains beyond, composed the view on which the eyes
of Barnabas and Saul rested when they came to anchor in the bay of
Salamis. The Jews, as we should have been prepared to expect, were numerous
in Salamis. This fact is indicated to us in the sacred narrative ; for we
learn that this city had several synagogues, while other cities had often
only one.2 The Jews had doubtless been established here hi considerable
numbers in the active period which succeeded the death of Alexander.3
The unparalleled productiveness of Cyprus, and its trade in fruit, wine,
flax, and honey, would naturally attract them to the mercantile port. The
farming of the copper mines by Augustus to Herod may probably have
swelled their numbers.4 One of the most conspicuous passages in the
history of Salamis was the insurrection of the Jews in the reign of
Trajan, when great part of the city was destroyed.5 Its demolition was
completed by an earthquake. It was rebuilt by a Christina emperor, from
whom it received its mediaeval name of Constantia.6
It appears that the proclamation of the Gospel was confined by
Barnabas and Saul to the Jews and the synagogues. We have no in
formation of the length of their stay, or the success of their labors.
Some stress seems to be laid on the fact that John (i. e. Mark) " was their
minister." Perhaps we are to infer from this, that his hands baptized
the Jews and Proselytes, who were convinced by the preaching of the
Apostles. From Salamis they travelled to Paphos, at the other extremity of the

1 See especially the account in Diodorus on the island, and marched to the assistance
Siculus of the great naval victory off Salamis, of the few inhabitants who had been able to
won by Demetrius Poliorcetes over Ptolemy. act on the defensive. He defeated the Jews,
Scylax also says that Salamis had a good expelled them from the island, to whose bean-
harbor, tiful coasts no Jew was ever after permitted to
2 Acts xiii. 5. Compare vi. 9, ix. 20, and approach. If one were accidentally wrecked on
contrast xvii. 1, xviii. 4. the inhospitable shore, he was instantly put to
" Philo speaks of the Jews of Cyprus. death '' — Milman, iii. Ill, 112. The author
4 See above, p. 16, n. 2. says above (p. 104), that the Rabbinical tradi-
5 " The flame spread to Cyprus, where the tions are full of the sufferings of the Jews in
Jews were numerous and wealthy. One Arte- this period. In this island there was a massa-
mio placed himself at their head. They rose ere before the time of the rebellion, " and the
and massacred 240,000 of their fellow-citizens; sea that broke upon the shores of Cyprus ins
the whole populous city of Salamis became a tinged with the red hue of carnage."
desert. The revolt of Cyprus was first sup- 6 Jerome speaks of it under this nams.
pressed ; Hadrian, afterwards emperor, landed

chap.t. ROMAN PROVINCIAL SYSTEM. 129
island. The two towns were probably connected together by a well-
travelled and frequented road.1 It is indeed likely that, even under the
Empire, the islands of the Greek part of the Mediterranean, as Crete and
Cyprus, were not so completely provided with lines of internal commu
nication as those which were nearer the metropolis, and had been longer
under Roman occupation, such as Corsica and Sardinia. But we cannot
help believing that Roman roads were laid down in Cyprus and Crete,
after the manner of the modern English roads in Corfu and the other
Ionian islands, which islands, in their social and political condition, pre
sent many points of resemblance to those which were under the Roman
sway in the time of St. Paul. On the whole, there is little doubt that his
journey from Salamis to Paphos, a distance from east to west of not more
than a hundred miles, was accomplished in a short time and without
difficulty. Paphos was the residence of the Roman governor. The appearance of
the place (if due allowance is made for the differences of the nineteenth
century and the first) may be compared with that of the town of Corfu in
the present day, with its strong garrison of imperial soldiers in the midst
of a Greek population, with its mixture of two languages, with its symbols
of a strong and steady power side by side with frivolous amusements, and
with something of the style of a court about the residence of its governor.
All the occurrences, which are mentioned at Paphos as taking place on
the arrival of Barnabas and Saul, are grouped so entirely round the
governor's person, that our attention must be turned for a time to the
condition of Cyprus as a Roman province, and the position and character
of Sergius Paulus.
From the time when Augustus united the world under his own power,
the provinces were divided into two different classes. The business of the
first Emperor's life was to consolidate the imperial system under the show
of administering a republic. He retained the names and semblances of
those liberties and rights which Rome had once enjoyed. He found two
names in existence, the one of which was henceforth inseparably blended
with the Imperial dignity and Military command, the other with the
authority of the Senate and its Civil administration. The first of these
names was "Praetor," the second was "Consul." Both of them 'were
retained in Italy ; and both were reproduced in tho Provinces as " Proprae
tor " and " Proconsul." 2 He told the senate and people that he would
1 On the west of Salamis, in the direction marked between Salamis and Paphos in the
of Paphos, Pococke saw a church and monas- Peutingerian Table.
tery dedicated to Barnabas, and a grotto where 2 It is important, as we shall see presently,
he is said to have been buried, after suffering to notice Dio Cassius's further statement, that
martyrdom in the reign of Nero. A road is all governors of the Senate's provinces were to
»

130 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap. v.
relieve them of all the anxiety of military proceedings, and that he would
resign to them those provinces where soldiers were unnecessary to secure
the fruits of a peaceful administration.1 He would take upon himself all
the care and risk of governing the other provinces, where rebellion might
be apprehended, and where the proximity of warlike tribes made the
presence of the legions perpetually needful. These were his professions
to the Senate : but the real purpose of this ingenious arrangement was the
disarming of the Republic, and the securing to himself the absolute con
trol of the whole standing army of the Empire.2 The scheme was suf
ficiently transparent ; but there was no sturdy national life in Italy to
resist his despotic innovations, and no foreign civilized powers to arrest
the advance of imperial aggrandizement ; and thus it came to pass that
Augustus, though totally destitute of the military genius either of Crom
well or Napoleon, transmitted to his successors a throne guarded by an
invincible army, and a system of government destined to endure through
several centuries.
Hence we find in the reign, not only of Augustus, but of each of his
successors, from Tiberius to Nero, the provinces divided into these two
classes. On the one side we have those which are supposed to be under
the Senate and people. The governor is appointed by lot, as in the times
of the old republic. He carries with him the lictors and fasces, the
insignia of a Consul ; but he is destitute of military power. His office
must be resigned at the expiration of a year. He is styled " Proconsul,"
and the Greeks, translating the term, call him ' AvOvnaxog? On the other
side are the provinces of Caesar. The Governor may be styled " Proprie
tor," or 'u4vuaTgdT7]yog; but he is more properly " Legatus," or nosapmrjg,
— the representative or " Commissioner " of the Emperor. He goes out
from Italy with all the pomp of a military commander, and he does not
return till the Emperor recalls him.4 And to complete the symmetry and
consistency of the system, the subordinate districts of these imperial
provinces are regulated by the Emperor's " Procurator " CEnhoonog), or
" High Steward." The New Testament, in the strictest conformity with

be called Proconsuls, whatever their previous Acts xiii. 7. " The deputy of the country,
office might have been, and all governors of Sergius Paulus." " Gallio was the deputy of
the Emperor's provinces were to be styled Achaia," Ibid, xviii. 1 2. " There are deputies,"
Legati or Propraetors, even if they had been Ibid. xix. 38.
Consuls. * All these details are stated, and the two
1 The " unarmed provinces " of Tacitus, kinds of governors very accurately distin-
in his account of the state of the Empire at guished, in the 53d Book of Dio Cassius, ch.
the death of Nero. Hist. i. 11. 13. It should be remarked that tnapxia (the
2 Suetonius and Dio Cassius. word still used for the subdivisions of the
8 Which our English translators have ren- modern Greek Kingdom) is applied indiscrimi-
dered by the ambiguous word " deputy." nately to both kinds of provinces.

OTtAP.v. SERGIUS PAULUS. 131
the other historical authorities of the period, gives us examples of both
kinds of provincial administration. We are told by Strabo, and by Dio
Cassius, that " Asia" and " Achaia" were assigned to the Senate ; and
the title, which in each case is given to the Governor in the Acts of the
Apostles, is " Proconsul." 1 The same authorities inform us that Syria
was an imperial province,2 and no such title as " Proconsul " is assigned
by the sacred writers to " Cyrenius Governor of Syria," 3 or to Pilate,
Festus, and Felix,4 the Procurators of Judaea, which, as we have seen
(p. 23), was a dependency of that great and unsettled province.
Dio Cassius informs us, in the same passage where he tells us that
Asia and Achaia were provinces of the Senate, that Cyprus was retained
by the Emperor for himself.5 If we stop here, we naturally ask the
question, — and some have asked the question rather hastily, — how it
comes to pass that St. Luke speaks of Sergius Paulus by the style of " Pro
consul " ? But any hesitation concerning the strict accuracy of the sacred
historian's language is immediately set at rest by the very next sentence
of the secular historian,6 — in which he informs us that Augustus restored
Cyprus to the Senate in exchange for another district of the Empire, — a
statement which he again repeats in a later passage of his work.7 It is
evident, then, that the governor's style and title from this time forward
would be "Proconsul." But this evidence, however satisfactory, is not
all that we possess. The coin, which is engraved at the end of the chap
ter, distinctly presents to us a Cyprian Proconsul of the reign of Claudius.
And inscriptions, which could easily be adduced,8 supply us with the
names of additional governors,9 who were among the predecessors or
successors of Sergius Paulus.
It is remarkable that two men called Sergius Paulus are described in
very similar terms by two physicians who wrote in Greek, the one a
Heathen, the other a Christian. The Heathen writer is Galen. He
speaks of his contemporary as a man interested and well versed in philos
ophy.10 The Christian writer is St. Luke, who tells us here that the
1 'kvOimaroc, xviii. 12, xix. 38. 6 Along with Syria and Cilicia.
2 Strabo and Dio. 6 Dio Cass. liii. 12.
8 Luke ii. 2. ' Ibid. liv. 4.
* The word invariably used in the New 8 One is given in the larger editions of this
Testament is 'Hyeuuv. This is a general work.
term, like the Roman " Praeses " and the Eng- 9 When we find, either on coins and inscrip-
lish " Governor ; " as may be seen by compar- tions, or in Scripture, detached notices of
ing Luke ii. 2 with iii. 1 , and observing that provincial governors not mentioned elsewhere,
the very same wowl is applied to the offices we should bear in mind what has been said
of the Procurator of Judaea, the Legatus of above (p. 131), that the Proconsul was ap-
Syria, and the Emperor himself. Josephus pointed annually.
generally uses 'Eirlrpoiroc for the Procurator of 10 The two were separated by an interval of
Judaea, and 'Hyeuiiv for the Legatus of Syria. a hundred years.

132 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap. ,,
governor of Cyprus was a "prudent" man, who "desired to hear the
Word of God." This governor seems to have been of a candid and in
quiring mind ; nor will this philosophical disposition be thought inconsis
tent with his connection with the Jewish impostor, whom Saul and
Barnabas found at the Paphian court, by those who are acquainted with
the intellectual and religious tendencies of the age.
For many years before this time, and many years after, impostors from
the East, pretending to magical powers, had great influence over the
Roman mind. All the Greek and Latin literature of the empire, from
Horace to Lucian, abounds in proof of the prevalent credulity of tffis
sceptical period. Unbelief, when it has become conscious of its weakness,
is often glad to give its hand to superstition. The faith of educated
Romans was utterly gone. We can hardly wonder, when the East was
thrown open, — the land of mystery, — the fountain of the earliest migra
tions, — the cradle of the earliest religions, — that the imagination both
of the populace and the aristocracy of Rome became fanatically excited,
and that they greedily welcomed the most absurd and degrading super
stitions. Not only was the metropolis of the empire crowded with " hungry
Greeks," but " Syrian fortune-tellers " flocked into all the haunts of public
amusement. Athens and Corinth did not now contribute the greatest or
the worst part of the " dregs " of Rome ; but (to adopt Juvenal's use of
that river of Antioch we have lately been describing) " the Orontes itself
flowed into the Tiber."
Every part of the East contributed its share to the general superstition.
The gods of Egypt and Phrygia found unfailing votaries. Before the close
of the republic, the temples of Isis and Serapis had been more than once
erected, destroyed, and renewed. Josephus tells us that certain disgrace
ful priests of Isis l were crucified at Rome by the second Emperor ; but
this punishment was only a momentary check to their sway over the
Roman mind. The more remote districts of Asia Minor sent their
itinerant soothsayers ; Syria sent her music and her medicines ; Chaldaea
her " Babylonian numbers " and " mathematical calculations." 2 To
these corrupters of the people of Romulus we must add one more Asiatic
nation, — the nation of the Israelites ; — and it is an instructive employ
ment to observe that, while some members of the Jewish people were
rising, by the Divine power, to the highest position ever occupied by
1 Ant. xviii. 3, 4. Gellius, i. 9. " Vulgus, quos gentilitio vocab-
2 Babylonii Numeri, Hor. i. Od. xi. 2. ulo Chaldseos dicere oportet, mathemnticos-
Chaldaicae rationes, Cic. Div. ii. 47. See the dicit." There is some account of their pro-
whole passage 42-47. The Chaldean astrol- ceedings at the beginning of the fburteentb
ngers were called " Mathematici " (Juv. vi. book of the Nodes Atticce.
562, xiv. 248). See the definition in Aulus

obap.t. ORIENTAL IMPOSTORS. 133
men on earth, others were sinking themselves, and others along with them,
to the lowest and most contemptible degradation. The treatment and
influence of the Jews at Rome were often too similar to those of other
Orientals. One year we find them banished ; 1 another year we see them
quietly re-established.2 The Jewish beggar-woman was the gypsy of the
first century, shivering and crouching in the outskirts of the city, and
telling fortunes,8 as Ezekiel said of old, " for handfuls of barley, and for
pieces of bread." 4 All this catalogue of Oriental impostors, whose influx
into Rome was a characteristic of the period, we can gather from that re
volting satire of Juvenal, in which he scourges the follies and vices of the
Roman women. But not only were the women of Rome drawn aside into
this varied and multiplied fanaticism ; but the eminent men of the declin
ing republic, and the absolute sovereigns of the early Empire, were tainted
and enslaved by the same superstitions. The great Marius had in (his
camp a Syrian, probably a Jewish,5 prophetess, by whose divinations he
regulated the progress of his campaigns. As Brutus, at the beginning of
the republic, had visited the oracle of Delphi, so Pompey, Crassus, and
Caesar, at the close of the republic, when the oracles were silent,6 sought
information from Oriental astrology. No picture in the great Latin
satirist is more powerfully drawn than that in which he shows us the
Emperor Tiberius " sitting on the rock of Capri, with his flock of Chal-
daeans round him." 7 No sentence in the great Latin historian is more
bitterly emphatic than that in which he says that the astrologers and
sorcerers are a class of men who " will always be discarded and always
cherished." 8
What we know, from the literature of the period, to have been the case
in Rome and in the Empire at large, we see exemplified in a province in
the case of Sergius Paulus. He had attached himself to " a certain sor
cerer, a false prophet, a Jew, whose name was Barjesus, and who had
given himself the Arabic name of " Elymas," or " The Wise." But the
Proconsul was not so deluded by the false prophet,9 as to be unable, or
unwilling, to listen to the true. " He sent for Barnabas and Saul," of
whose arrival he was informed, and whose free and public declaration
of the " Word of God " attracted his inquiring mind. Elymas used
every exertion to resist them, and to hinder the Proconsul's mind from
falling under the influence of their Divine doctrine. Truth and falsehood
1 Acts xviii. 2. 8 Tac. Hist. i. 22.
2 Acts xxviii. 17. 9 For the good and bad senses in which the
* Juv. Sat. iii. 13-16, vi. 542-546. word Mayoc was used, see Professor Trench's
4 Ezek. xiii. 19. recent book on the Second Chapter of St.
6 Niebuhr thinks she was a Jewess. Her Matthew. It is worth observing, that Simon
name was Martha. Magus was a Cyprian, if he is the person
8 Cic. Div. ii. 47. ' Juv. Sat. z. 93. mentioned by Josephus. Ant. xx. 5, 2.

134 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chat.,,
were brought into visible conflict with each other. It is evident, from the
graphic character of the narrative, — the description of Paul " setting
his eyes " 1 on the sorcerer, — " the mist and the darkness " which fell
on Barjesus, — the "groping about for some one to lead him,"2 — that the
opposing wonder-workers stood face to face in the presence of the Pro
consul, — as Moses and Aaron withstood the magicians at the Egyptian
court. — Sergius Paulus being in this respect different from Pharaoh, thai
he did not " harden his heart."
The miracles of the New Testament are generally distinguished from
those of the Old by being for the most part works of mercy and restora
tion, not of punishment and destruction. Two only of our Lord's mira
cles were inflictions of severity, and these were attended with no harm to
the bodies of men. The same law of mercy pervades most of those
interruptions of the course of nature which He gave His servants, the
Apostles, power to effect. One miracle of wrath is mentioned as worked
in His name by each of the great Apostles, Peter and Paul ; and we can
see sufficient reasons why liars and hypocrites, like Ananias and Sapphira,
and powerful impostors, like Elymas Barjesus, should be publicly pun
ished in the face of the Jewish and Gentile worlds, and made the exam
ples and warnings of overy subsequent age of the Church.3 A different
passage in the life of St. Peter presents a parallel which is closer in some
respects with this interview of St. Paul with the sorcerer in Cyprus. As
Simon Magus, — who had " long time bewitched the people of Samaria
with his sorceries," — was denounced by St. Peter "as still in the gall
of bitterness and bond of iniquity," and solemnly told that " his heart was
not right in the sight of God ; " 4 — so St. Paul, conscious of his apostolic
power, and under the impulse of immediate inspiration, rebuked Bar
jesus, as a child of that Devil who is the father of lies,5 as a worker
1 The word in Acts xiii. 9 is the same thought that " the thorn in his flesh," 2 Cor.
which is used in xxiii. 1 for " to look in- xii. 7, was an affection of the eyes. Hence,
tently." Our first impression is, that there perhaps, the statement in Gal. iv. 14-16, and
was something searching and commanding in the allusion to his large handwriting, Gal. vi.
St. Paul's eye. But if the opinion is correct 11. ( See our Preface. )
that he suffered from an affection of the eyes, 2 It may be added that these phrases seem
this word may express a peculiarity connected to imply that the person from whence they
with his defective vision. See the Bishop of came was an eye-witness. Some have mferced
Winchester's note (Ministerial Character of that Luke himself was present.
Christ, p. 555), who compares the LXX. in a It is not necessary to infer from these
Numb, xxxiii. 55, Josh, xxiii. 13, and applies passages, or from 1 Cor. v. 3-5, 1 Tim. i. 20,
this view to the explanation of the difficulty that Peter and Paul had power to inflict these
in Acts xxiii. 1-5. And it is remarkable, that, judgments at their will. Though, even if they
in both the traditional accounts of Paul's per- had this power, they had also the spirit of love
sonal appearance which we possess (viz. those and supernatural knowledge to guide them "
of Malalas and Nicephorus), he is said to the use of it.
have had contracted eyebrows. Many have 4 Acts viii. 21-23. 6 John viii. 44

chat. v. ELYMAS BARJESUS. 135
of deceit and mischief,1 and as one who sought to pervert and distort that
which God saw and approved as right.2 He proceeded to denounce an
instantaneous judgment ; and, according to his prophetic word, the " hand
of the Lord " struck the sorcerer, as it had once struck the Apostle him
self on the way to Damascus ; — the sight of Elymas began to waver,3
and presently a darkness settled on it so thick, that he ceased to behold
the sun's light. This blinding of the false prophet opened the eyes of
Sergius Paulus. That which had been intended as an opposition to the
Gospel, proved the means of its extension. We are ignorant of the
degree of this extension in the island of Cyprus. But we cannot doubt
that when the Proconsul was converted, his influence would make Chris
tianity reputable ; and that from this moment the Gentiles of the island,
as well as the Jews, had the news of salvation brought home to them.
And now, from this point of the Apostolical history, Paul appears as the
great figure in every picture. Barnabas, henceforward, is always in the
background. The great Apostle now enters on his work as the preacher to
the Gentiles ; and simultaneously with his active occupation of the field
in which he was called to labor, his name is suddenly changed. As
" Abram " was changed into " Abraham," when God promised that he
should be the " father of many nations ; " — as " Simon " was changed
into " Peter," when it was said, " On this rock I will build my church ; "
— so " Saul " is changed into " Paul," at the moment of his first great
victory among the Heathen. What " the plains of Mamre by Hebron "
were to the patriarch, — what " Caesarea Philippi,"4 by the fountains of
the Jordan, was to the fisherman of Galilee, — that was the city of
" Paphos," on the coast of Cyprus, to the tent-maker of Tarsus. Are we
to suppose that the name was now really given him for the first time, —
that he adopted it himself as significant of his own feelings, — or that
Sergius Paulus conferred it on him in grateful commemoration of the
benefits he had received, — or that " Paul," having been a Gentile form of
the Apostle's name in early life conjointly with the Hebrew " Saul," was
now used to the exclusion of the other, to indicate that he had receded
from his position as a Jewish Christian, to become the friend and teacher
of the Gentiles ? All these opinions have found their supporters both in
ancient and modern times. The question has been alluded to before in
this work (p. 43). It will be well to devote some further space to it
now, once for all.
1 The word in Acts xiii. 10 expresses the of the blindness. Compare the account of the
cleverness of a successful imposture. recovery of the lame man in iii. 8.
2 With Acts xiii. 10 compare viii. 21. * See Gen. xiii. 18, xvii. 5 ; Matt. xvi. 13-
8 Acts xiii. 11. This may be used, in 18; and Prof. Stanley's Sermon on St. Peter.
Luke's medical manner, to express the stages

136 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap.t.
It cannot be denied that the words in Acts xiii. 9 — " Saul who is also
Paul " — are the line of separation between two very distinct portions of
St. Luke's biography of the Apostle, in the former of which he is uniformly
called " Saul," while in the latter he receives, with equal consistency, the
name of " Paul." It must also be observed that the Apostle always speaks
of himself under the latter designation in every one of his Epistles, with
out any exception ; and not only so, but the Apostle St. Peter, in the only
passage where he has occasion to allude to him,1 speaks of him as " our
beloved brother Paul." We are, however, inclined to adopt the opinion
that the Cilician Apostle had this Roman name, as well as his other Hebrew
name, in his earlier days, and even before he was a Christian. This adop
tion of a Gentile name is so far from being alien to the spirit of a Jewish
family, that a similar practice may be traced through all the periods
of Hebrew History. Beginning with the Persian epoch (B.C. 550-350)
we find such names as "Nehemiah," " Schammai," " Belteshazzar," which
betray an Oriental origin, and show that Jewish appellatives followed
the growth of the living language. In the Greek period we encounter the
names of " Philip," 2 and his sou " Alexander," 3 and of Alexander's suc
cessors, " Antiochus," " Lysimachus," " Ptolemy," " Antipater ; " 4 the
names of Greek philosophers, such as " Zeno," and " Epicurus ; " s even
Greek mythological names, as " Jason " and " Menelaus." 6 Some of these
words will have been recognized as occurring in the New Testament itself.
When we mention Roman names adopted by the Jews, the coincidence is
still more striking. " Crispus," 7 " Justus," 8 " Niger," 9 are found in
Josephus 10 as well as in the Acts. " Drusilla " and " Priscilla " might
have been Roman matrons. The " Aquila " of St. Paul is the counter
part of the " Apella " of Horace.11 Nor need we end our survey of Jewish
names with the early Roman empire ; for, passing by the destruction of
Jerusalem, we see Jews, in the earlier part of the Middle Ages, calling
themselves, " Basil," " Leo," " Theodosius," " Sophia ; " and, in the latter
part, " Albert," " Benedict," " Crispin," " Denys." We might pursue
1 2 Pet. iii. 15. • Jason, Joseph. Ant. xii. 10, 6 ; perhaps
2 Matt. x. 3 ; Acts vi. 5, xxi. 8 ; Joseph. Acts xvii. 5-9 ; Rom. xvi. 21 ; Menelaus,
Ant. xiv. 10, 22. Joseph. Ant. xii. 5, 1. See 2 Mace. iv. 5.
8 Acts xix. 33, 34. See 2 Tim. iv. 14. ' Acts xviii. 8.
Alexander was a common name among the 8 Acts i. 23.
Asmonreans. It is said that when the great 9 Acts xiii. 1.
conqueror passed through Judaea, a promise 10 Joseph. Life, 68, 65, War, iv. 6, 1.
was made to him that all the Jewish children Compare 1 Cor. i. 14 ; Acts xviii. 7 ; Col.
born that year should be called " Alexander." iv. 11.
4 1 Mace. xii. 16, xvi. 11 ; 2 Mace. iv. 29; " Hor. i. Sat. v. 100. Priscilla appears
Joseph. Ant. xiv. 10. under the abbreviated form " Prisca," 2 Tim.
6 These names are in the Mischna and the iv. 19.
Berenice Inscription.

chap. v. HISTORY OF JEWISH NAMES. 137
our inquiry into the nations of modern Europe ; but enough has been said
to show, that as the Jews have successively learnt to speak Chaldee, Greek,
Latin, or German, so they have adopted into their families the appellations
of those Gentile families among whom they have lived. It is indeed
remarkable that the Separated Nation should bear, in the very names
recorded in its annals, the trace of every nation with whom it has come
in contact and never united.
It is important to our present purpose to remark that double names
often occur in combination, the one national, the other foreign. The
earliest instances are " Belteshazzar-Daniel," and " Esther-Hadasa." '
Frequently there was no resemblance or natural connection between the
two words, as in " Herod-Agrippa," " Salome-Alexandra," " Juda-Aristo-
bulus," "Simon-Peter." Sometimes the meaning was reproduced, as in
" Malich-Kleodemus." At other times an alliterating resemblance of
sound seems to have dictated the choice, as in " Jose-Jason," " Hillel-
Julus," " Saul-Paulus " — " Saul, who is also Paul."
Thus it seems to us that satisfactory reasons can be adduced for the
double name borne by the Apostle, — without having recourse2 to the
hypothesis of Jerome, who suggests that, as Scipio was called Africanus
from the conquest of Africa, and Metellus called Creticus from the con
quest of Crete, so Saul carried away his new name as a trophy of his
victory over the Heathenism of the Proconsul Paulus — or to that
notion, which Augustine applies with much rhetorical effect in various
parts of his writings, where he alludes to the literal meaning of the word
'¦'¦Paulus" and contrasts Saul, the unbridled king, the proud self-confi
dent persecutor of David, with Paul, the lowly, the penitent, — who delib
erately wished to indicate by his very name, that he was " the least of
the Apostles,"3 and " less than the least of all Saints."4 Yet we must not
neglect the coincident occurrence of these two names in this narrative of
the events which happened in Cyprus. We need not hesitate to dwell on
the associations which are connected with the name of " Paulus," — or
on the thoughts which are naturally called up, when we notice the criti
cal passage in the sacred history, where it is first given to Saul of Taisus.
It is surely not unworthy of notice that, as Peter's first Gentile convert
was a member of the Cornelian House (p. 108), so the surname of the
noblest family of the JEmilian House11 was the link between the Apostle
1 Dan. x. 1 ; Esther ii. 7. So Zerubabbel 8 1 Cor. xv. 9.
was called Sheshbazzar. Compare Ezra v. 16 4 Eph. iii. 8.
with Zech. iv. 9. The Oriental practice of 6 Paulus was the cognomen of a family or
adopting names which were significant must the Gens ./Emilia. The stemma is given in
not be left out of view. Smith's Dictionary of Classical Biography,
See p. 43, n. 7. under Paulus JEmilius. The name must of

138

THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL.

CHAP. v.

of the Gentiles and his convert at Paphos. Nor can we find a nobler
Christian version of any line of a Heathen poet, than by comparing what
Horace says of him who fell at Cannae, — " animai magnce prodigum
Paulum" — with the words of him who said at Miletus, " I count not
my life dear unto myself, so that J might finish my course with joy, and
the ministry which I have received of the Lord Jesus."1
And though we imagine, as we have said above, that Saul had the
name of Paul at an earlier period of his life, — and should be inclined to
conjecture that the appellation came from some connection of his ances
tors (perhaps as manumitted slaves) with some member of the Roman
family of the JSmilian Pauli ;2 — yet we cannot believe it accidental that
the words,3 which have led to this discussion, occur at this particular
point of the inspired narrative. The Heathen name rises to the surface
at the moment when St. Paul visibly enters on his office as the Apostle
of the Heathen. The Roman name is stereotyped at the moment when
he converts the Roman governor. And the place where this occurs is
Paphos, the favorite sanctuary of a shameful idolatry. At the very spot
which was notorious throughout the world for that which the Gospel for
bids and destroys, — there, before he sailed for Perga, having achieved
his victory, the Apostle erected his trophy,4 — as Moses, when Amalek
was discomfited, " built an altar, and called the name of it Jehovah-
Nissi, — the Lord my Banner."5

Proconsular coin of Cyprus. 6

course have been given to the first individual
who bore it from the smallness of his stature.
It should be observed, that both Malalas and
Nicephorus (quoted above) speak of St. Paul
as short of stature.
1 Hor. i. Od. xii. 37 ; Acts xx. 24. Com
pare Phil. iii. 8.
2 Compare the case of Josephus, alluded
to above, p. 43.
8 Acts xiii. 9.
4 The words of Jerome alluded to above
are : " Victorias su» tropcea retulit, erexitqne
vexillum."

6 Exod. xvii. 15.
6 The woodcut is from Akerman's Numis
matic Illustrations, p. 41. Specimens of the
coin are in the Imperial Cabinet at Vienna,
and in the Bibliotheque du Roi. There are
other Cyprian coins of the Imperial age, with
PROCOS in Roman characters. Many Cyp
rian coins of the reign of Claudius are of
the red copper of the island : a fact peculiarly
interesting to us, if the notion, mentioned
p. 16, n. 2, and p. 128, be correct.

CHAPTER VI.

Old and New Paphos. — Departure from Cyprus. — Coast of Pamphylia. — Perga. — Mark's
Return to Jerusalem. — Mountain Scenery of Pisidia. — Situation of Antioch. — The Syna
gogue. — Address to the Jews. — Preaching to the Gentiles. — Persecution by the Jews. —
History and Description of Iconium. — Lycaonia. — Derbe and Lystra. — Healing of the
Cripple. — Idolatrous Worship offered to Paul and Barnabas. — Address to the Gentiles.
— St. Paul stoned. — Timotheus. — The Apostles retrace their Journey. — Perga and
Attaleia. — Return to Syria.
THE banner of the Gospel was now displayed on the coasts of the
Heathen. The Glad Tidings had " passed over to the isles of Chit-
tim,"1 and had found a willing audience in that island, which, in the
vocabulary of the Jewish Prophets, is the representative of the trade and
civilization of the Mediterranean Sea. Cyprus was the early meeting-
place of the Oriental and Greek forms of social life. Originally colon
ized from Phoenicia, it was successively subject to Egypt, to Assyria, and
to Persia. The settlements of the Greeks on its shores had begun in a
remote period, and their influence gradually advanced, till the older links
of connection were entirely broken by Alexander and his successors.
But not only in political and social relations, by the progress of conquest
and commerce, was Cyprus the meeting-place of Greece and the East.
Here also their forms of idolatrous worship met and became blended
together. Paphos was, indeed, a sanctuary of Greek religion : on this
shore the fabled goddess first landed, when she rose from the sea : this
was the scene of a worship celebrated in the classical poets, from the age
of Homer, down to the time when Titus, the son of Vespasian, visited
the spot in the spirit of a Heathen pilgrim, on his way to subjugate
Judaea.2 But the polluted worship was originally introduced from
Assyria or Phoenicia : the Oriental form under which the goddess was
worshipped is represented on Greek coins : 3 the Temple bore a curious
1 The. general notion intended by the Citium, which was a Phoenician colony in
phrases " isles" and " coasts " of " Chittim " Cyprus.
seems to have been " the islands and coasts 2 Tac. Hist. ii. 2-4. Compare Suet. Tit. 5.
of the Mediterranean to the west and north- Tacitus speaks of magnificent offerings pre-
west of Judaea." Numb. xxiv. 24 ; Jer. ii. sented by kings and others to the Temple at
10 ; Ezek. xxvii. 6. See Gen. x. 4, 5 ; Isai. Old Paphos.
xxiii. 1 ; Dan. xi. 30. But primarily the 8 A specimen is given in the larger edi-
name is believed to have been connected with tions. 139

140 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap. n.
resemblance to those of Astarte at Carthage or Tyre : and Tacitus pauses
to describe the singularity of the altar and the ceremonies, before he pro
ceeds to narrate the campaign of Titus. And here it was that we have
seen Christianity firmly established by St. Paul, — in the very spot where
the superstition of Syria had perverted man's natural veneration and love
of mystery, and where the beautiful creations of Greek thought had
administered to what Athanasius, when speaking of Paphos, well de
scribes as the " deification of lust."
The Paphos of the poets, or Old Paphos, as it was afterwards called,
was situated on an eminence at a distance of nearly two miles from the
sea. New Paphos was on the seashore, about ten miles to the north.1
But the old town still remained as the sanctuary which was visited by
Heathen pilgrims ; profligate processions, at stated seasons, crowded the
road between the two towns, as they crowded the road between Antioch
and Daphne (p. 116) ; and small models of the mysterious image were
sought as eagerly by strangers as the little " silver shrines " of Diana at
Ephesus. (Acts xix. 24.) Doubtless the position of the old town was
an illustration of the early custom, mentioned by Thucydides, of building
at a safe distance from the shore, at a time when the sea was infested by
pirates ; and the new town had been established in a place convenient for
commerce, when navigation had become more secure. It was situated
on the verge of a plain, smaller than that of Salamis, and watered by a
scantier stream than the Pediaeus.2 Not long before the visit of Paul
and Barnabas it had been destroyed by an earthquake. Augustus had
rebuilt it ; and from him it had received the name of Augusta, or
Sebaste.3 But the old name still retained its place in popular usage, and
has descended to modern times. The " Paphos " of Strabo, Ptolemy,
and St. Luke, became the " Papho " of the Venetians and the " Baffa"
of the Turks. A second series of Latin architecture has crumbled into
decay. Mixed up with the ruins of palaces and churches are the poor
dwellings of the Greek and Mohammedan inhabitants, partly on the beach
but chiefly on a low ridge of sandstone rock, about two miles 4 from the
1 Or rather the north-west. See the Admi- ancient remains ; but when so many towns
ralty Chart. have existed, and so many have severally been
2 See p. 127. destroyed, all must be left to conjecture. A
8 The Greek form Sebaste, instead of Au- number of columns broken and much muti-
gusta, occurs in an inscription found on the lated are lying about, and some substantial
spot, which is further interesting as containing and well-built vaults, or rather subterraneous
the name of another Paulus. communications, under a hill of slight eleva-
4 This is the distance between the Ktema tion, are pointed out by the guides as the
and the Marina given by Captain Graves. In remains of a temple dedicated to Venus. Then
Purdy's Sailing Directions (p. 251), it is stated there are numerous excavations in the sand-
to be only "half a mile. Captain Graves says : stone hills, which probably served at varioua
" In the vicinity are numerous ruins and periods the double purpose of habitations and

chap. vi. COAST OF PAMPHYLIA. 141
ancient port ; for the marsh, which once formed the limit of the port,
makes the shore unhealthy during the heats of summer by its noxious
exhalations. One of the most singular features of the neighborhood
consists of the curious caverns excavated in the rocks, which have been
used both for tombs and for dwellings. The harbor is now almost
blocked up, and affords only shelter for boats. " The Venetian strong
hold, at the extremity of the Western mole, is fast crumbling into ruins.
The mole itself is broken up, and every year the massive stones of which
it was constructed are rolled over from their original position into the
port." ! The approaches to the harbor can never have been very safe, in
consequence of the ledge of rocks 2 which extends some distance into the
sea. At present, the eastern entrance to the anchorage is said to be the
safer of the two. The western, under ordinary circumstances, would be
more convenient for a vessel clearing out of the port, and about to sail
for the Gulf of Pamphylia.
We have remarked in the last chapter, that it is not difficult to imagine
the reasons which induced Paul and Barnabas, on their departure from
Seleucia, to visit first the island of Cyprus. It is not quite so easy to
give an opinion upon the motives which directed their course to the coast
of Pamphylia, when they had passed through the native island of
Barnabas, from Salamis to Paphos. It might be one of those circum
stances which we call accidents, and which, as they never influence the
actions of ordinary men without the predetermining direction of Divine
Providence, so were doubtless used by the same Providence to determine
the course even of Apostles. As St. Paul, many years afterwards, joined
at Myra that vessel in which he was shipwrecked,3 and then was con
veyed to Puteoli in a ship which had accidentally wintered at Malta 4 —
so on this occasion there might be some small craft in the harbor at
Paphos, bound for the opposite gulf of Attaleia, when Paul and Barnabas
were thinking of their future progress. The distance is not great, and
frequent communication, both political and commercial, must have taken
place between the towns of Pamphylia and those of Cyprus.5 It is

tombs. Several monasteries and churches sail in either to the eastward or westward of
now in ruins, of a low Gothic architecture, it, but the eastern passage is the widest and
are more easily identified ; but the crumbling best." — Purdy, p. 251. The soundings may
fragments of the sandstone with which they be seen in the Admiralty Chart.
were constructed, only add to the incongruous 8 Acts xxvii. 5, 6. 4 Acts xxviii. 11-13.
heap around, that now covers the palace of 6 And perhaps Paphos more especially, as
the Paphian Venus." — MS note by Captain the seat of government. At present Khalan-
Graves, R.N. dri (Gulnar), to the south-east of Attaleia and
1 Captain Graves, MS. Perga, is the port from which the Tatars
2 "A great ledge of rocks lies in the entrance from Constantinople, conveying government
to Papho, extending about a league ; you may despatches, usually cross to Cyprus.

142 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chat. vi.
possible that St. Paul, having already preached the Gospel in Cilicia,1
might wish now to extend it among those districts which lay more im
mediately contiguous, and the population of which was, in some respects,
similar to that of his native province.2 He might also reflect that the
natives of a comparatively unsophisticated district might be more likely
to receive the message of salvation, than the inhabitants of those
provinces which were more completely penetrated with the corrupt
civilization of Greece and Rome. Or his thoughts might be turning to
those numerous families of Jews, whom he well knew to be settled in the
great towns beyond Mount Taurus, such as Antioch in Pisidia, and
Iconium in Lycaonia, with the hope that his Master's cause would be
most successfully advanced among those Gentiles, who flocked there, as
everywhere, to the worship of the Synagogue. Or, finally, he may have
had a direct revelation from on high, and a vision, like that which had
already appeared to him in the Temple,3 or like that which he afterwards
saw on the confines of Europe and Asia,4 may have directed the course
of his voyage. Whatever may have been the calculations of his own
wisdom and prudence, or whatever supernatural intimations may have
reached him, he sailed, with his companions Barnabas and John, in some
vessel, of which the size, the cargo, and the crew, are unknown to us,
past the promontories of Drepanum and Acamas, and then across the
waters of the Pamphylian Sea, leaving on the right the cliffs 5 which are
the western boundary of Cilicia, to the innermost bend of the bay of
Attaleia. This bay is a remarkable feature in the shore of Asia Minor ; and it is
not without some important relations with the history of this part of the
world. It forms a deep indentation in the general coast-line, and is
bordered by a plain, which retreats itself like a bay into the mountains.
From the shore to the mountains, across the widest part of the plain,
the distance is a journey of eight or nine hours. Three principal rivers
intersect this level space : the Catarrhactes, which falls over sea-cliffs
near Attaleia, in the waterfalls which suggested its name ; and farther to
the east the Cestrus and Eurymedon, which flow by Perga and Aspen-
dus to a low and sandy shore. About the banks of these rivers, and on
the open waters of the bay, whence the eye ranges freely over the ragged
mountain summits which enclose the scene, armies and fleets had engaged
in some of those battles of which the results were still felt in the day of
St. Paul. From the base of that steep shore on the west, where a
1 See pp. 98-100. 6 About C. Anamour (Anemurium, the
2 Strabo states this distinctly. southernmost point of Asia Minor), and Alaya
8 Acts xxii. 17-21. See p. 97. (the ancient Coracesium), there are cliffs of
1 Acts xvi. 9. 500 and 600 feet high.

chap. vi. THE CITY OF PERGA. 143
rugged knot of mountains is piled up into snowy heights above the rocks
of Phaselis, the united squadron of the Romans and Rhodians sailed
across the bay in the year 190 B. C. ; and it was in rounding that
promontory near Side on the east, that they caught sight of the ships of
Antiochus, as they came on by the shore with the dreadful Hannibal on
board. And close to the same spot where the Latin power then defeated
the Greek king of Syria, another battle had been fought at an earlier
period, in which the Greeks gave one of their last blows to the retreating
force of Persia, and the Athenian Cimon gained a victory both by land
and sea ; thus winning, according to the boast of Plutarch, in one day
the laurels of Plataea and Salamis. On that occasion a large navy
sailed up the river Eurymedon as far as Aspendus. Now, the bar at the
mouth of the river would make this impossible. The same is the case
with the river Cestrus, which, Strabo says, was navigable in his day for
sixty stadia, or seven miles, to the city of Perga. Ptolemy calls this
city an inland town of Pamphylia ; but so he speaks of Tarsus in Cilicia.
And we have seen that Tarsus, though truly called an inland town, as
being some distance from the coast, was nevertheless a mercantile har
bor. Its relation with the Cydnus was similar to that of Perga with the
Cestrus ; and the vessel which brought St. Paul to win more glorious
victories than those of the Greek and Roman battles of the Eurymedon
came up the course of the Cestrus to her moorings near the Temple of
Diana. All that Strabo tells us of this city is that the Temple of Diana was on
an eminence at some short distance, and that an annual festival was held
in honor of the goddess. The chief associations of Perga are with the
Greek rather than the Roman period : and its existing remains are
described as being " purely Greek, there being no trace of any later
inhabitants." ' Its prosperity was probably arrested by the building of
Attaleia2 after the death of Alexander, in a more favorable situation on the
shore of the bay. Attaleia has never ceased to be an important town since
the day of its foundation by Attalus Philadelphus. But when the traveller
pitches his tent at Perga, he finds only the encampments of shepherds,
who pasture their cattle amidst the ruins. These ruins are walls and
towers, columns and cornices, a theatre and a stadium, a broken aque
duct incrusted with the calcareous deposit of the Pamphylian streams,
and tombs scattered on both sides of the site of the town. Nothing
else remains of Perga, but the beauty of its natural situation, " be
tween and upon the sides of two hills, with an extensive valley in front,
1 Perhaps some modification is requisite tural details of the theatre and stadium are
here. Mr. Falkener noticed that the architec- Roman. 2 Acts xiv. 25.

144 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. ceap.vi
watered by the river Cestrus, and backed by the mountains of the
Taurus." 1
The coins of Perga are a lively illustration of its character as a city
of the Greeks.2 We have no memorial of its condition as a city of the
Romans ; nor does our narrative require us to delay any longer in
describing it. The Apostles made no long stay in Perga. This seems
evident, not only from the words used at this point of the history,3 but
from the marked manner in which we are told that they did stay,4 on
their return from the interior. One event, however, is mentioned as
occurring at Perga, which, though noticed incidentally and in few words,
was attended with painful feelings at the time, and involved the most
serious consequences. It must have occasioned deep sorrow to Paul and
Barnabas, and possibly even then some mutual estrangement: and
afterwards it became the cause of their quarrel and separation.5 Mark
" departed from them from Pamphylia, and went not with them to the
work." He came with them up the Cestrus as far as Perga ; but there
he forsook them, and, taking advantage of some vessel which was sailing
towards Palestine, he " returned to Jerusalem," 6 which had been his
home in earlier years.7 We are not to suppose that this implied an
absolute rejection of Christianity. A soldier who has wavered in one
battle may live to obtain a glorious victory. Mark was afterwards not
unwilling to accompany the Apostles on a second missionary journey ; 8
and actually did accompany Barnabas again to Cyprus.9 Nor did St.
Paul always retain his unfavorable judgment of him (Acts xv. 38), but
long afterwards, in his Roman imprisonment, commended him to the
Colossians, as one who was " a fellow-worker unto the Kingdom of God,"
and " a comfort" to himself:10 and in his latest letter, just before his
death, he speaks of him again as one " profitable to him for the
ministry." u Yet if we consider all the circumstances of his life, we
shall not find it difficult to blame his conduct in Pamphylia, and to see
good reasons why Paul should afterwards, at Antioch, distrust the
steadiness of his- character. The child of a religious mother, who had
sheltered in her house the Christian Disciples in a fierce persecution, he
had joined himself to Barnabas and Saul, when they travelled from
1 This description is quoted or borrowed Perga, they went down, &c.'- — Acts xiv.
from Sir C. Fellows's Asia Minor, 1839, pp. 25.
190-193. 6 Acts xv. 37-39.
2 One of them, with Diana and the stag, is ° Acts xiii. 13.
given in the larger edition. 7 Acts xii. 12, 25.
8 This will be seen by comparing the Greek 8 Acts xv. 37.
of Acts xiii. 14 with xiv. 24. Similarly, a 9 Acts xv. 39. 10 Col. iv. 10.
rapid journey is implied in xvii. 1. n Or rather, "profitable to minister" to
4 " When they had preached the Word in him. 2 Tim. iv. 11.

chap.yi. PERILS OF TRAVEL IN PISIDIA. 145
Jerusalem to Antioch, on their return from a mission of charity. He
had been a close spectator of the wonderful power of the religion of
Christ, — he had seen the strength of faith under trial in his mother's
home, — he had attended his kinsman Barnabas in his labors of zeal and
love, — he had seen the word of Paul sanctioned and fulfilled by
miracles, — he had even been the " minister " of Apostles in their suc
cessful enterprise ; 1 and now he forsook them, when they were about
to proceed through greater difficulties to more glorious success. We
are not left in doubt as to the real character of his departure. He was
drawn from the work of God by the attraction of an earthly home.2 As
he looked up from Perga to the Gentile mountains, his heart failed him,
and he turned back with desire towards Jerusalem. He could not
resolve to continue persevering, " in journeyings often, in perils of rivers,
in perils of robbers."3
"Perils of rivers" and "perils of robbers" — these words express
the very dangers which St. Paul would be most likely to encounter on
his journey from Perga in Pamphylia to Antioch in Pisidia. The law
less and marauding habits of the population of those mountains which
separate the table-land in the interior of Asia Minor from the plains on
the south coast, were notorious in all parts of ancient history. Strabo
uses the same strong language both of the Isaurians4 who separated
Cappadocia from Cilicia, and of their neighbors the Pisidians, whose
native fortresses were the barrier between Phrygia and Pamphylia. We
have the same character of the latter of these robber-tribes in Xenophon,
who is the first to mention them; and in Zosimus, who relieves the
history of the later empire by telling us of the adventures of a robber-
chief, who defied the Romans, and died a desperate death in these
mountains.5 Alexander the Great, when he heard that Memnon's fleet
was in the JEgean, and marched from Perga to rejoin Parmenio in
Phrygia, found some of the worst difficulties of his whole campaign in
penetrating through this district. The scene of one of the roughest
campaigns connected with the wars of Antiochus the Great was among
the hill-forts near the upper waters of the Cestrus and Eurymedon. No
population through the midst of which St. Paul ever travelled, abounded
more in those " perils of robbers," of which he himself speaks, than the
wild and lawless clans of the Pisidian Highlanders.
1 See Acts xiii. 5. 6 The beautiful story of St. John and the
2 Matthew Henry pithily remarks: "Ei- robber (Euseb. Eccl. Hist. iii. 23) will natn-
ther he did not like the work, or he wanted to rally occur to the reader. See also the fre-
ro and see his mother." quent mention of Isaurian robbers in the
8 2 Cor. xi. 26. latter part of the life of Chrysostom, prefixed
* See p. 19. to the Benedictine edition of his works.
10

146 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap.vi.
And if on this journey he was exposed to dangers from the attacks of
men, there might be other dangers, not less imminent, arising from the
natural character of the country itself. To travellers in the East there is
a reality in " perils of rivers," which we in England are hardly able to
understand. Unfamiliar with the sudden flooding of thirsty watercourses,
we seldom comprehend the full force of some of the most striking images
in the Old and New Testaments.1 The rivers of Asia Minor, like all the
rivers in the Levant, are liable to violent and sudden changes.2 And no
district in Asia Minor is more singularly characterized by its " water
floods " than the mountainous tract of Pisidia, where rivers burst out at
the bases of huge cliffs, or dash down wildly through narrow ravines.
The very notice of the bridges in Strabo, when he tells us how the Cestrus
and Eurjmedon tumble down from the heights and precipices of Seige to
the Pamphylian Sea, is more expressive than any elaborate description.
We cannot determine the position of any bridges which the Apostle may
have crossed ; but his course was never far from the channels of these two
rivers : and it is an interesting fact, that his name is still traditionally
connected with one of them, as we learn from the information recently
given to an English traveller by the Archbishop of Pisidia.3
Such considerations respecting the physical peculiarities of the country
now traversed by St. Paul, naturally lead us into various trains of thought
concerning the scenery, the climate, and the seasons.4 And there are
certain probabilities in relation to the time of the year when the Apostle
may be supposed to have journeyed this way, which may well excuse some
remarks on these subjects. And this is all the more allowable, because
we are absolutely without any data for determining the year in which
this first missionary expedition was undertaken. All that we can assert
with confidence is that it must have taken place somewhere in the interval
between the years 45 and 50.8 But this makes us all the more desirous
1 Thus the true meaning of 2 Cor. xi. 26 had continued its course so far, is lost in the
is lost in the English translation. Similarly, mountains, &c." — Arundell's Asia Minor, vol.
in the Sermon on the Mount (Matt. vii. 25, ii. p. 31. The river is probably the Euryme-
27), the word for "rivers" is translated don.
" floods," and the image confused. See Ps. 4 The descriptive passages which follow
xxxii. 6. are chiefly borrowed from "Asia Minor, 1839,"
2 The crossing of the Halys by Croesus, as and " Lycia, 1841," by Sir C. Fellows, and
told by Herodotus, is an illustration of the " Travels in Lycia, 1847," by Lieutenant Spratt,
difficulties presented by the larger rivers of R.N., and Professor E. Forbes. The writer
Asia Minor. desires also to acknowledge his obligations to
8 " About two hours and a half from Is- various travellers, especially to the lamented
barta, towards the south-east, is the village of Professor Forbes, also to Mr. Falkener, and
Sav, where is the source of a river called the Dr. Wolff.
Sav-Sou. Five hours and a half beyond, and 6 See the Chronological Table in Ap-
itill towards the south-east, is the village of pendix III.
Paoli (St. Paul) ; and here the river, which

ihap.ti. MOUNTAIN-SCENERY OF PISIDIA. 147
to determine, by any reasonable conjectures, the movements of the Apostle
in reference to a better chronology than that which reckons by successive
years, — the chronology which furnishes us with the real imagery round
his path, — the chronology of the seasons.
Now we ma) well suppose that he might sail from Seleucia to Salamis
at the beginning, of spring. In that age and in those waters, the com
mencement of a voyage was usually determined by the advance of the
season. The sea was technically said to be " open " in the month of
March. If St. Paul began his journey in that month, the lapse of two
months might easily bring him to Perga, and allow sufficient time for all
that we are told of his proceedings at Salamis and Paphos. If we suppose
him to have been at Perga in May, this would have been exactly the most
natural time for a journey to the mountains. Earlier in the spring, the
passes would have been filled with snow.1 In the heat of summer the
weather would have been less favorable for the journey. In the autumn
the disadvantages would have been still greater, from the approaching
difficulties of winter. But again, if St. Paul was at Perga in May, a
further reason may be given why he did not stay there, but seized all the
advantages of the season for prosecuting his journey to the interior. The
habits of a people are always determined or modified by the physical pe
culiarities of their country ; and a custom prevails among the inhabitants
of this part of Asia Minor, which there is every reason to believe has been
unbroken for centuries. At the beginning of the hot season they move up
from the plains to the cool basin-like hollows on the mountains. These
yailahs or summer retreats are always spoken of with pride and satisfac
tion, and the time of the journey anticipated with eager delight. When
the time arrives, the people may be seen ascending to the upper grounds,
men, women, and children, with flocks and herds, camels and asses, like
the patriarchs of old.2 If then St. Paul was at Perga in May, he would
i " March 4. — The passes to the Yailahs seer make of such a pilgrimage ! The snowy
from the upper part of the valley being still tops of the mountains were seen through the
shut up by snow, we have no alternative but lofty and dark-green fir-trees, terminating in
to prosecute our researches amongst the low abrupt cliffs. . . . From clefts in these gushed
country and valleys which border the coast." out cascades . . . and the waters were carried
— Sp. and F. i. p. 48. The valley referred to away by the wind in spray ove*the green
is that of the Xanthus, in Lycia. woods. . . In a zigzag course up the wood
2 "April 30. — We passed many families en lay the track leading to the cool places. In
route from Adalia to the mountain plains far advance of tho pastoral groups were the strag-
the summer." — Sp. and F. i. p. 242. Again, gling goats, browsing on the fresh blossoms of
p. 248 (May 3). See p. 64. During a halt the wild almond as they passed. In more
in the valley of the Xanthus (May 10), Sir steady courses followed the small black cattle
C. Fellows says that an almost uninterrupted . . . then came the flocks of sheep, and the
train of cattle and people (nearly twenty fami- camels . . . bearing piled loads of ploughs,
lies) passed by. " What a picture would Land- tent-poles, kettles . . . and amidst tuis rustic

/
148 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap. ...
find the inhabitants deserting its hot and silent streets. They would be
moving in the direction of his own intended journey. He would be under
no temptation to stay. And if we imagine him as joining 1 some such
company of Pamphylian families on his way to the Pisidian mountains, it
gives much interest and animation to the thought of this part of his prog
ress. Perhaps it was in such company that the Apostle entered the first passes
of the mountainous district, along some road formed partly by artificial
pavement, and partly by the native marble, with high cliffs frowning on
either hand, with tombs and inscriptions, even then ancient, on the pro
jecting rocks around, and with copious fountains bursting out " among
thickets of pomegranates and oleanders."2 The oleander, " the favorite
flower of the Levantine midsummer," abounds in the lower watercourses;
and in the month of May it borders all the banks with a line of brilliant
crimson.3 As the path ascends, the rocks begin to assume the wilder
grandeur of mountains, the richer fruit-trees begin to disappear, and the
pine and walnut succeed ; though the plane-tree still stretches its wide
leaves over the stream which dashes wildly down the ravine, crossing and
recrossing the dangerous road. The alteration of climate which attends
on the traveller's progress is soon perceptible. A few hours will make the
difference of weeks, or even months. When the corn is in the ear on the
lowlands, ploughing and sowing are hardly well begun upon the highlands.
Spring flowers may be seen in the mountains by the very edge of the
load was always seen the rich Turkey carpet which had been perfected with large stones at
and damask cushions, the pride even of the a very remote age ; the deep ruts of chariot-
tented Turk." — Lycia, pp. 238, 239. wheels were apparent in many places. The
1 It has always been customary for travel- road is much worn by time ; and the people
lers in Asia Minor, as in the patriarchal East, of a later age, diverging from the track, have
to join caravans, if possible. formed a road with stones very inferior both
2 In ascending from Limyra, a small plain in size and arrangement. About half an hour
on the coast not far from Phaselis, Spratt and before I reached the plain ... a view burst
Forbes mention "a rock-tablet with a long upon me through the cliffs. ... I looked
Greek inscription ... by the side of an an- down from the rocky steps of the throne of
cient paved road, at » spot where numerous winter upon the rich and verdant plain of
and copious springs gush out among thickets summer, with the blue sea in the distance. . . .
of pomegranates and oleanders." (i. p. 160.) Nor was the foreground without its interest;
Fellows^fti coming to Attaleia from the north, on each projecting rock stood an ancient sar-
" suddenly entered a pass between the moun- cophagus, and the trees half concealed the lids
tains, which diminished in width until cliffs and broken sculptures of innumerable tombs."
almost perpendicular enclosed us on either — A. M. pp. 174, 175. This may very proba-
side. The descent became so abrupt that we bly have been the pass and road by which
were compelled to dismount and walk for two St. Paul ascended.
hours, during which time we continued rapidly 8 See the excellent Chapter on the "Bota-
descending an ancient paved road, formed ny of Lycia " in Spratt and Forbes, to! n-
principally of the native marble rock, but ch. xiii.

chap. vi. TABLE-LAND OF ASIA MINOR. 149
snow,1 when the anemone is withered in the plain, and the pink veins in
the white asphodel flower are shrivelled by the heat. When the cottages
are closed and the grass is parched, and every thing is silent below in the
purple haze and stillness of midsummer, clouds are seen drifting among
the Pisidian precipices, and the cavern is often a welcome shelter from a
cold and penetrating wind.2 The upper part of this district is a wild
region of cliffs, often isolated and bare, and separated from each other by
valleys of sand, which the storm drives with blinding violence among the
shivered points. The trees become fewer and smaller at every step.
Three belts of vegetation are successively passed through in ascending
from the coast : first the oak-woods, then the forests of pine, and lastly
the dark scattered patches of the cedar-juniper : and then we reach the
treeless plains of the interior, which stretch in dreary extension to the
north and the east.
After such a journey as this, separating, we know not where, from the
companions they may have joined, and often thinking of that Christian
companion who had withdrawn himself from their society when they needed
him most, Paul and Barnabas emerged from the rugged mountain-
passes, and came upon the central table-land of Asia Minor. The whole
interior region of the peninsula may be correctly described by this term ;
for, though intersected in various directions by mountain-ranges, it is, on
the whole, a vast plateau, elevated higher than the summit of Ben Nevis
above the level of the sea.3 This is its general character, though a long
journey across the district brings the traveller through many varieties of
scenery. Sometimes he moves for hours along the dreary margin of an
inland sea of salt,4 — sometimes he rests in a cheerful hospitable town
1 " May 9. — Ascending through a winterly Sp. and F. I. p. 242. Again, p. 293, " Every
climate, with snow by the side of our path, step led us from spring into summer ; " and
and only the crocus and anemones in bloom . . . the following pages. See also Fellows : " Two
we beheld a new series of cultivated plains to months since at Syria the corn was beginning
the west, being in fact table-lands, nearly upon to show the>ear, whilst here they have only in
a level with the tops of the mountains which a few places now begun to plough and sow. "
form the eastern boundary of the valley of — A. M. 158. "The corn, which we had the
the Xanthus. . . .Descending to the plain, day before seen changing color for the har-
probably 1,000 feet, we pitched our tent, after vest, was here not an inch above the ground,
a ride of 7J hours. . . . Upon boiling the and the buds of the bushes were not yet burst-
thermometer, I found that we were more than ing." — Lycia, p. 226.
4,000 feet above the sea, and, cutting down 8 The yailah of Adalia is 3,500 feet above
some dead trees, we provided against the the sea : Sp. and F. I. p. 244. The vast plain,
coming cold of the evening by lighting three "at least 50 miles long and 20 wide," south
large fires around our encampment." — Fell. of Kiutayah in Phrygia, is about 6,000 feet
Lycia, p. 234. This was in descending from above the sea. Fell. A. M. p. 155. This may
Almalee, in the great Lycian yailah, to the be overstated, but the plain of Erzeroum is
south-east of Cibyra. quite as much.
2 For farther illustrations of the change of 4 We shall have occasion to mention the
season caused by difference of elevation, see salt lakes hereafter.

150 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap.vi
by the shore of a fresh-water lake.1 In some places the ground is burnt
and volcanic, in others green and fruitful. Sometimes it is depressed
into watery hollows, where wild swans visit the pools, and storks are seen
fishing and feeding among the weeds : 2 more frequently it is spread out
into broad open downs, like Salisbury Plain, which afford an inter
minable pasture for flocks of sheep.3 To the north of Pamphylia, the
elevated plain stretches through Phrygia for a hundred miles from Mount
Taurus to Mount Olympus.4 The southern portion of these bleak up
lands was crossed by St. Paul's track, immediately before his arrival at
Antioch in Pisidia. The features of human life which he had around
him are probably almost as unaltered as the scenery of the country, —
dreary villages with flat-roofed huts and cattle-sheds in the day, and at
night an encampment of tents of goat's hair, — tents of cilieium (see
p. 45), — a blazing fire in the midst, — horses fastened around, — and in
the distance the moon shining on the snowy summits of Taurus.5
The Sultan Tareek, or Turkish Royal Road from Adalia to Kiutayah
and Constantinople, passes nearly due north by the beautiful lake of
Buldur.6 The direction of Antioch in Pisidia bears more to the east.
After passing somewhere near Seige and Sagalassus, St. Paul approached
by the margin of the much larger, though perhaps not less beautiful, lake
of Eyerdir.7 The position of the city is not far from the northern shore
of this lake, at the base of a mountain-range which stretches through
Phrygia in a south-easterly direction. It is, however, not many years
since this statement could be confidently made. Strabo, indeed, de
scribes its position with remarkable clearness and precision. His words
are as follows: — "In the district of Phrygia called Paroreia, there is a
certain mountain-ridge, stretching from east to west. On each side
there is a large plain below this ridge : and it has two cities in its neigh
borhood ; Philomelium on the north, and on the other side Antioch, called
Antioch near Pisidia. The former lies entirely in the plain, the latter
(which has a Roman colony) is on a height." With this description
1 The two lakes of Buldur and Eyerdir many stately wild swans (near Almalee, 3,000
are mentioned below. Both are described as feet above the sea)." — Fell. Lycia, p. 228.
very beautiful. 3 We shall have occasion to return pres-
2 " March 27 (near Kiutayah). — I counted ently to this character of much of the interior
180 storks fishing or feeding in one small of Asia Minor when we come to the mention
swampy place not an acre in extent. The of Lycaonia (Acts xiv. 6).
land here is used- principally for breeding and 4 Fellows's Asia Minor, p. 155, &c.
grazing cattle, which are to be seen in herds 6 See Fellows's Asia Minor, p. 177, and es-
of many hundreds." Fell. Asia Minor, p. 155. pecially the mention of the goat's-hair tents.
" May 8. — The shrubs are the rose, the bar- 6 See above, n. 1.
bary, and wild almond ; but all are at present 7 See the descriptions in Arundell's Asia
fully six weeks later than those in the country Minor, ch. xiii., and especially ch. xv.
we have lately passed. I observed on the lake

chap. vi. SITUATION OF ANTIOCH. 151
before him, and taking into account certain indications of distance
furnished by ancient authorities, Colonel Leake, who has perhaps done
more for the elucidation of Classical Topography than any other man,
felt that Ak-Sher, the position assigned to Antioch by D'Anville and
other geographers, could not be the true place : Ak-Sher is on the north
of the ridge, and the position could not be made to harmonize with the
Tables.1 But he. was not in possession of any information which could
lead him to the true position ; and the problem remained unsolved till
Mr. Arundell started from Smyrna, in 1833, with the deliberate purpose
of discovering the scene of St. Paul's labors. He successfully proved
that Ak-Sher is Philomelium, and that Antioch is at Yalobatch, on the
other side of the ridge. The narrative of his successful journey is very
interesting : and every Christian ought to sympathize in the pleasure with
which, knowing that Antioch was seventy .miles from Apamea, and forty-
five miles from Apollonia, he first succeeded in identifying Apollonia ;
and then, exactly at the right distance, perceived, in the tombs near a
fountain, and the vestiges of an ancient road, sure indications of his ap
proach to a ruined city ; and then saw, across the plain, the remains of
an aqueduct at the base of the mountain ; and, finally, arrived at
Jalobatch, ascended to the elevation described by Strabo, and felt, as he
looked on the superb ruins around, that he was "really on the spot con
secrated by the labors and persecution of the Apostles Paul and
Barnabas." 2
The position of the Pisidian Antioch being thus determined by the con
vergence of ancient authority and modern research, we perceive that it
lay on an important line of communication, westward by Apamea with
the valley of the Maeander, and eastward by Iconium with the country
behind the Taurus. In this general direction, between Smyrna and
Ephesus on the one hand, and the Cilician Gates which lead down to
Tarsus on the other, conquering armies and trading caravans, Persian
satraps, Roman proconsuls, and Turkish pachas, have travelled for cen
turies.3 The Pisidian Antioch was situated about half way between these
extreme points. It was built (as we have seen in an earlier chapter, IV.
1 See Leake's Asia Minor, p. 41.' The 8 In illustration of this we may refer to the
same difficulties were perceived by Mannert. caravan routes and Persian military roads as
2 See Arundell's Asia Minor, ch. xii., xiii., indicated in Kiepert's Hellas, to Xenophon's
xiv., and the view as given in our quarto edi- Anabasis, to Alexander's campaign and Cice-
tion. There is also a view in Laborde. The ro's progress, to the invasion of Tamerlane,
opinion of Mr. Arundell is fully confirmed by and the movements of the Turkish and Egyp-
Mr. Hamilton, Researches in Asia Minor, vol. tian armies in 1832 and 1833.
I. ch. xxvii. The aqueduct conveyed water
to the town from the Sultan Dagh ( Strabo'B
"mountain ridge").

15S THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL.

CHAP. vt.

p. 113) by the founder of the Syrian Antioch ; and in the age of the
Greek kings of the line of Seleucus it was a town of considerable impor
tance. But its appearance had been modified, since the campaigns of
Scipio and Manlius, and the defeat of Mithridates,1 by the introduction
of Roman usages, and the Roman style of building. This was true, to
a certain extent, of all the larger towns of Asia Minor : but this change
had probably taken place in the Pisidian Antioch more than in many
cities of greater importance ; for, like Philippi,2 it was a Roman Colonia.
Without delaying, at present, to explain the full meaning of this term,
we may say that the character impressed on any town in the Empire
which had been made subject to military colonization was particularly
Roman, and that all such towns were bound by a tie of peculiar closeness
to the Mother City. The insignia of Roman power were displayed more
conspicuously than in other towns in the same province. In the prov
inces where Greek was spoken, while other towns had Greek letters on
their coins, the money of the colonies was distinguished by Latin super
scriptions. Antioch must have had some eminence among the eastern
colonies, for it was founded by Augustus, and called Caesarea.3 Such
coins as that represented at the end of this chapter were in circulation
here, though not at Perga or Iconium, when St. Paul visited these cities :
and, more than at any other city visited on this journey, he would hear
Latin spoken side by side with the Greek and the ruder Pisidian
dialect.4 Along with this population of Greeks, Romans, and native Pisidians,
a greater or smaller number of Jews was intermixed. They may not
have been a very numerous body, for only one synagogue5 is mentioned
in the narrative. • But it is evident, from the events recorded, that they
were an influential body, that they had made many proselytes, and that
they had obtained some considerable dominion (as in the parallel cases
of Damascus recorded by Josephus,6 and Bercea and Thessalonica in the
Acts of the Apostles)7 over the minds of the Gentile women.
On the Sabbath days the Jews and the proselytes met in the synagogue.
1 See p. 13. oxen, which illustrate the Roman mode of
2 Acts xvi. 12. The constitution of a Co- marking out by a plough the colonial limits.
Ionia will be explained when we come to this 4 We shall have to return to this subject
passage. of language again, in speaking of the " speech
8 We should learn this from the inscription of Lycaonia." Acts xiv. 11.
on the coins, COL. 02ES. ANTIOCHIJE, if 6 See remarks on Salamis, p. 127.
we did not learn it from Strabo and Pliny. 6 The people of Damascus were obliged tu
Mr. Hamilton found an inscription at Yalo- use caution in their scheme of assassinating
batch, with the letters ANTIOCH EAE the Jews ; — "through fear of their womeu,
CAESARE. Another coin of this colony, all of whom, except a few, were attached te
exhibiting the wolf with Romulus and Remus, the Jewish worshippers." — War, ii. 20, 2.
is engraved in this volume. Others exhibit two 7 Acts xvii. 4, 12.

chap. vi. THE SYNAGOGUE. 153
It is evident that at this time full liberty of public worship was permitted
to the Jewish people in all parts of the Roman Empire, whatever limita
tions might have been enacted by law or compelled by local opposition,
as relates to the form and situation of the synagogues. We infer from
Epiphanius that the Jewish places of worship were often erected in open
and conspicuous positions.1 This natural wish may frequently have been
checked by the influence of the Heathen priests, who would not will
ingly see the votaries of an ancient idolatry forsaking the temple for the
synagogue : and feelings of the same kind may probably have hindered
the Jews, even if they had the ability or desire, from erecting religious
edifices of any remarkable grandeur and solidity. No ruins of the
synagogues of imperial times have remained to us, like those of the tem
ples in every province, from which we are able to convince ourselves of
the very form and size of the sanctuaries of Jupiter, Apollo, and Diana.
There is little doubt that the sacred edifices of the Jews have been modi
fied by the architecture of the remote countries through which they have
been dispersed, and the successive centuries through which they have con
tinued a separated people. Under the Roman Empire it is natural to
suppose that they must have varied, according to circumstances, through
all gradations of magnitude and decoration, from the simple proseucha
at Philippi2 to the magnificent prayer-houses at Alexandria.3 Yet there
are certain traditional peculiarities which have doubtless united together
by a common resemblance the Jewish synagogues of all ages aud coun
tries.4 The arrangement for the women's places in a separate gallery, or
behind a partition of lattice- work, — the desk in the centre, where the
Reader, like Ezra in ancient days, from his " pulpit of wood," may " open
the Book in the sight of all the people . . . and read in the Book the
Law of God distinctly, and give the sense, and cause them to under
stand the reading," 5 — the carefully closed Ark on the side of the build
ing nearest to Jerusalem, for the preservation of the rolls or manuscripts
of the Law — the seats all round the building, whence " the eyes of all
them that are in the synagogue " may be " fastened" on him who speaks,'
— the "chief seats,"7 which were appropriated to the "ruler" or
•
1 He is speaking of the synagogue at Na- 4 Besides the works referred to in the notes
blous. Such buildings were frequently placed to Ch. II., Allen's Modern Judaism and Ber-
by the water-side for the sake of ablution. nard's Synagogue and Church may be consulted
Compare Acts xvi. 13, with Joseph. Ant. xiv. with advantage on subjects connected with
10, 23. the synagogue.
2 Acts xvi. 13. The question of the iden- 6 Nehem. viii. 4-8.
tity or difference of the proseucha and synagogue 6 See Luke iv. 20.
will be considered hereafter. Probably the 7 These chief seats (Matt, xxiii. 6> seem to
former is a general term. have faced the rest of the congregation. See
8 Mentioned by Philo. Jam. ii. 3.

154 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap.vi.
"rulers" of the synagogue, according as its organization might be
more or less complete,1 and which were so dear to the hearts of those
who professed to be peculiarly learned or peculiarly devout, — these are
some of the features of a synagogue, which agree at once with the notices
of Scripture, the descriptions in the Talmud, and the practice of modern
Judaism. The meeting of the congregations in the ancient synagogues may be
easily realized, if due allowance be made for the change of costume, by
those who have seen the Jews at their worship in the large towns of
Modern Europe. On their entrance into the building, the four-cornered
Tallith2 was first placed like a veil over the head, or like a scarf over the
shoulders.3 The prayers were then recited by an officer called the
" Angel," or " Apostle," of the assembly.4 These prayers were doubtless
many of them identically the same with those which are found in the
present service-books of the German and Spanish Jews, though their
liturgies, in the course of ages, have undergone successive developments,
the steps of which are not easily ascertained. It seems that the prayers
were sometimes read in the vernacular language of the country where
the synagogue was built ; but the Law was always read in Hebrew. The
sacred roll s of manuscript was handed from the Ark to the Reader by
the Chazan, or " Minister ; " 6 and then certain portions were read
according to a fixed cycle, first from the Law and then from the Proph
ets. It is impossible to determine the period when the sections from
these two divisions of the Old Testament were arranged as in use at
present ; 7 but the same necessity for translation aud explanation existed
then as now. The Hebrew and English are now printed in parallel
columns. Then, the reading of the Hebrew was elucidated by the
Targum or the Septuagint, or followed by a paraphrase in the spoken

1 With Luke xiii. 14, Acts xviii. 8, 17, veil their heads during their exhortations in
compare Luke vii. 3, Mark v. 22, and Acts the synagogues." It is quite possible that the
xiii. 15. Some are of opinion that the smaller Tallith, though generally worn in the congre-
synagogues had one " ruler," the larger many. gation, might be removed by any one who
It is more probable that the " chief ruler " rose to speak or who prayed aloud.
with the "elders" formed a congregational * Vitringa, who compares Rev. ii. 1.
council, like the kirk-session in Scotland. 6 The words in Luke iv. 17, 20, imply
2 The use of the Tallith is said to have the acts of rolling and unrolling. See 1
arisen from the Mosaic commandment direct- Mace. iii. 48.
ing that fringes should be worn on the four 6 Luke iv.. 17, 20.
corners of the garment. 7 A full account both of the Paraschioth or
3 When we read 1 Cor. xi. 4, 7, we must Sections of the Law, and the Haphtaroth or
feel some doubt concerning the wearing of the Sections of the Prophets, as used both by the
Tallith on the head during worship at that Portuguese and German Jews, may be seen m
period. De Wette says that " it is certain Home's Introduction, vol. iii. pp. 254-258.
that in the Apostolic age the Jews did not

fHAP.vi. THE SYNAGOGUE. 155
language of the country.1 The Reader stood2 while thus employed, and
all the congregation sat around. The manuscript was rolled up and
returned to the Chazan.3 Then followed a pause, during which strangers
or learned men, who had " any word of consolation " or exhortation, rose
and addressed the meeting. And thus, after a pathetic enumeration of
the sufferings of the chosen people 4 or an allegorical exposition 5 of some
dark passage of Holy Writ, the worship was closed with a benediction
and a solemn " Amen." 6
To such a worship in such a building a congregation came together at
Antioch in Pisidia, on the Sabbath which immediately succeeded the
arrival of Paul and Barnabas. Proselytes came and seated themselves
with the Jews : and among the Jewesses behind the lattice were " honor
able women " ' of the colony. The two strangers entered the synagogue,
and, wearing the Tallith, which was the badge of an Israelite,8 " sat
down " 9 with the rest. The prayers were recited, the extracts from " the
Law and the Prophets " were read ; 10 the " Book " returned to the
" Minister," u and then we are told that " the rulers of the synagogue "
sent to the new-comers, on whom many eyes had already been fixed, and
invited them to address the assembly, if they had words of comfort or
instruction to speak to their fellow-Israelites. 12 The very attitude of St.
Paul, as he answered the invitation, is described to us. He " rose " from
his seat, and, with the animated and emphatic gesture which he used on
other occasions,13 " beckoned with his hand." 14
After thus graphically bringing the scene before our eyes, St. Luke
gives us, if not the whole speech delivered by St. Paul, yet at least the
substance of what he said. For into however short a space he may have
condensed the speeches which he reports, yet it is no mere outline, no dry
analysis of them, which he gives. He has evidently preserved, if not all
the words, yet the very words uttered by the Apostle ; nor can we fail to
1 See p. 34. In Palestine the Syro-Chal- 6 See Neh. viii. 6 ; 1 Cor. xiv. 16.
daic language would be used ; in the Disper- 7 Acts xiii. 50.
sion, usually the Greek. Lightfoot seems to 8 " As I entered the synagogue [at Blidah
think that the Pisidian language was used in Algeria], they offered me a Tallith, saying
here. Strabo speaks of a dialect as peculiar in French, ' Etes-vous Israelite ' ' I could not
to this district. wear the Tallith, but I opened my English
2 Acts xiii. 16. On the other hand, our Bible and sat down, thinking of Paul and
Lord was seated during solemn teaching, Barnabas at Antioch in Pisidia.'- — Extract
Luke iv. 20. from a private journal.
8 See Luke iv. 20. 8 Acts xiii. 14.
4 The sermon in the synagogue in '' He- 10 Acts xiii. 15. u Luke iv. 20.
Ion's Pilgrimage " is conceived in the true Jew- 12 Acts xiii. 15. The word is the same as
ish feeling. Compare the address of St. that which is used in the descriptive title of
Stephen Barnabas, p. 115.
6 We see how an inspired Apostle uses al- 18 Acts xxvi. 1, xxi. 40. See xx. 34
legory. Gal. iv. 21-31. M Acts xiii. 16.

156 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap. vi.
recognize in all these speeches a tone of thought, and even of expres
sion, which stamps them with the individuality of the speaker.
On the present occasion we find St. Paul beginning his address by
connecting the Messiah whom he preached with the preparatory dis
pensation which ushered in His advent. He dwells upon the previous
history of the Jewish people, for the same reasons ' which had led St.
Stephen to do the like in his defence before the Sanhedrin. He endeav
ors to conciliate the minds of his Jewish audience by proving to them
that the Messiah whom he proclaimed was the same whereto their
own prophets bare witness ; come, not to destroy the Law, but to fulfil ;
and that His advent had been duly heralded by His predicted messenger.
He then proceeds to remove the prejudice which the rejection of
Jesus by the authorities at Jerusalem (the metropolis of their faith)
would naturally raise in the minds of the Pisidian Jews against His
divine mission. He shows that Christ's death and resurrection had
accomplished the ancient prophecies, and declares this to be the
" Glad Tidings " which the Apostles were charged to proclaim. Thus
far the speech contains nothing which could offend the exclusive spirit of
Jewish nationality. On the contrary, St. Paul has endeavored to carry his
hearers with him by the topics on which he has dwelt ; the Saviour whom
he declares is " a Saviour unto Israel ; " the Messiah whom he announces
is the fulfiller of the Law and the Prophets. But having thus concili
ated their feelings, and won their favorable attention, he proceeds in a
bolder tone to declare the Catholicity of Christ's salvation, and the
antithesis between the Gospel and the Law. His concluding words, as
St. Luke relates them, might stand as a summary representing in outline
the early chapters of the Epistle to the Romans ; and therefore, con
versely, those chapters will enable us to realize the manner in which St.
Paul would have expanded the heads of argument which his disciple here
records. The speech ends with a warning against that bigoted rejection
of Christ's doctrine, which this latter portion of the address was so likely
to call forth.
The following were the words (so far as they have been preserved to
us) spoken by St. Paul on this memorable occasion : —
*£J» " Men of Israel, and ye, proselytes of the Gentiles, who j^fand0
ifi worship the God of Abraham, give audience.
r God's choice
17 " The God of this people Israel chose our fathers, and raised ^^'"eopie,
up His people, when they dwelt as strangers in the land of tooe^iSpro' cenitor of tM
Egypt ; and with an high arm brought He them out therefrom. Messiah.
18 And about the time of forty years, even as a nurse beareth her child,

chap. vi. ADDRESS TO THE JEWS. 157
so bare He them1 through the wilderness. And He destroyed seven 19
nations in the land of Canaan, and gave their land as a portion unto
His people. And after that He gave unto them Judges about the 20
space 2 of four hundred and fifty years, until Samuel the Prophet ;
then desired they a king, and He gave unto them Saul, the son of 21
Cis, a man of the tribe of Benjamin,3 to rule them for forty years.
Aud when He had removed Saul, He raised up unto them David to be 22
their king ; to whom also He gave testimony, and said : J( Jjaȣ fnmtb"
j§abiir, tjje son of Jf&jse, a man after mg aam {jeari, fo(rix{j sjjall
fulfil all mg foill.4 Of this man's seed hath God, according to His 23
. promise, raised unto Israel a Saviour Jesus.
&tTwMems" " And Jonn was % vatBBtngtx taiga tomt hdaxz His fate 5 24
predicted . ™*. , i r qfif
forerunner, fjj ^xt^lXXt JpiS wag ottOXt $XOX, and he preached the bap
tism of repentance to all the people of Israel. And as John fulfilled his
course 6 his saying was, ' Whom think ye that I am ? I am not He. But 25
behold there cometh one after me whose shoes' latchet I am not worthy to
loose.' '
The rulers of " Men and Brethren,8 whether ye be children of the stock of 26
Jerusalem rul-
pheta'bycau* Abraham, or proselytes of the Gentiles, to you have been sent
ofgjesu6.eilt the tidings of this salvation : for the inhabitants of Jerusalem, 27
and their rulers, because they knew Him not, nor yet the voices of the
prophets which are read in their synagogues every Sabbath day, have ful
filled the Scriptures in condemning Him. And though they found in Him 28
no cause of death, yet besought they Pilate that He should be slain. And
1 The beauty of this metaphor has been the tribe of Benjamin, see pp. 41, 42, and
lost to the Authorized Version on account of 49. — H.]
the reading adopted in the Received Text. 4 Compare Ps. lxxxix. 20, with 1 Sam.
There is an evident allusion to Deut. i. 31. xiii. 14. The quotation is from the LXX.,
2 We need not trouble our readers with the but not verbatim, being apparently made from
difficulties which have been raised concerning memory.
the chronology of this passage. Supposing 6 Mai. iii. 1, as quoted Matt. xi. 10, not
it could be proved that St. Paul's knowledge exactly after the LXX., but rather according
of ancient chronology was imperfect, this need to the literal translation of the Hebrew.
not surprise us ; for there seems no reason to 6 [Here, and in the speech at Miletus (xiii.
suppose (and we have certainly no right to 25), it is worthy of notice that St. Paul uses
assume a priori) that Divine inspiration would one of his favorite and characteristic metaphors
instruct the Apostles in truth discoverable by drawn from the foot-race. — H.]
uninspired research, and non-essential to their ' The imperfect is used here.
religious mission. See note on Galatians iii. 8 Literally " men that are my brethren." So
17. in Acts xvii. 22, — "men of Athens.'' It might
8 [For the speaker's own connection with be rendered simply " Brethren.''

158 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap.vi.
29 when they had fulfilled all which was written of Him, they took Him
down from the tree, and laid Him in a sepulchre.
30 " But God raised Him from the dead. his resub-
RECTION.
SI " And He was seen for many days by them who came up with Attestedb
Him from Galilee to Jerusalem, who are now * His witnesses to neS.mt"
the people of Israel.2 t
82 " And while they 3 proclaim it in Jerusalem, we declare unto 2J?. Glad
' r ' Tidings of the
you the same Glad Tidings concerning the promise which was Announ«£the
made to our fathers ; even that God hath fulfilled the same unto Christ's mw
rection had
us their children, in that He hath raised up Jesus from the ^mfces!™1'8
33 dead ; 4 as it is also written in the second psalm, @D jjOn" art tng j§fftt,
34 ijris bag {rate J) hzQOttm %C.5 And whereas He hath raised Him from
the grave, no more to return unto corruption, He hath said on this wise,
C{j£ Hissings of gabifr Jfcorill Jf gibe gou, tam % blessings tojjitfr
35 sianb fast in {jfllhtess.6 Wherefore it is written also in another psalm,
36 ^{rou sjralt not suffer ffjine Jfolg #ne ia ut caxxuxjtian-7 Now David,
after he had ministered in his own generation8 to the will of God, fell
37 asleep, and was laid unto his fathers, and saw corruption ; but He whom
God raised from the dead saw no corruption.9
88 " Be it known unto you, therefore, men and brethren, that catholicity of
through this Jesus is declared unto you the forgiveness of sins, est" between1"
39 And in Him all who have faith are justified from all transgres- the Law.
sions, v* herefrom in the Law of Moses ye could not be justified.
40 " Beware, therefore, lest that come upon you which is spoken Fiaai warning.
1 The word for "now/' evidently very ' Ps. xvi. 10 (LXX.).
important here, is erroneously omitted by the " David's ministration was performed (like
Textus Receptus. that of other men) in his own generation ,- but
2 " The people " always means the Jewish the ministration of Christ extended to all
people. generations. The thought is similar to Heb.
8 Observe, " we preach to yon " emphati- vii. 23, 24. We depart here from the Author-
cally contrasted with .ue preceding " they to iaed Version, because the use of the Grreek
the Jewish nation " (Humphry). words, for " to serve one's own generation,''
1 " Raised up from the dead." We cannot does not accord with the analogy of the N. T.
agree with Mr. Humphry that the word can 9 We are here reminded of the arguments
here (consistently with the context) have the of St. Peter on the day of Pentecost, just as
same meaning as in vii. 37. the beginning of the speech recalls that of
6 Ps. ii. 7, according to LXX. trans. St. Stephen before the Sanhedrin. Possibly,
6 Isaiah lv. 3 (LXX.). The verbal connec- St Paul himself had been an auditor of the
tion (holy — Holy One) between w. 34 and first, as he certainly was of the last.
35 should be carefully noticed.

chap. vi. ADDRESS TO THE JEWS 159
in the Prophets, §*{joIb, g* bfsnisws, anb toonbar, anb pmsfr ; for 40
| toorh a foorb in gonr bags, a toorh tojjfrff ge sjjrall in no tois*
bditat, fyotxafy a man atthxt it ttnto gon."1
This address made a deep and thrilling impression on the audience.
While the congregation were pouring out of the synagogue, many of them 2
crowded round the speaker, begging that " these words," which had moved
their deepest feelings, might be repeated to them on their next occasion
of assembling together.3 And when at length the mass of the people had
dispersed, singly or in groups, to their homes, many of the Jews and
proselytes still clung to Paul and Barnabas, who earnestly exhorted them
(in the form of expression which we could almost recognize as St. Paul's,
from its resemblance to the phraseology of his Epistles) " to abide in the
grace of God." 4
" With what pleasure can we fancy the Apostles to have observed these
bearers of the Word, who seemed to have heard it in such earnest ! How
gladly must they have talked with them, — entered into various points more
fully than was possible in any public address, — appealed to them in various
ways which no one can touch upon who is speaking to a mixed multitude !
Yet with all their pleasure and their hope, their knowledge of man's heart
must have taught them not to be over-confident ; and therefore they would
earnestly urge them to continue in the grace of God ; to keep up the im
pression which had already outlasted their stay within the synagogue ; —
to feed it, and keep it alive, and make it deeper and deeper, that it should
remain with them forever. What the issue was we know not, — nor does
that concern us, — only we may be sure that here, as in other instances,
there were some in whom their hopes and endeavors were disappointed ;
there were some in whom they were to their fullest extent realized." 6
The intervening week between this Sabbath and the next had not only
its days of meeting in the synagogue,6 but would give many opportunities
for exhortation and instruction in private houses ; the doctrine would be
noised abroad, and, through the proselytes, would come to the hearing of
the Gentiles. So that " on the following Sabbath almost the whole city
' Habak. i. 5 (LXX.). meeting during the week. The Jews were
3 The words rendered " Gentiles " ( Auth. accustomed to meet in the synagogues on
Vers.) in the Textus Receptus have caused a Monday and Thursday as well as on Saturday.
great confusion in this passage. They are * Acts xiii. 43. Compare Acts xx. 24 ; 1
omitted in the best MSS. See below, p. 164, Cor. xv. 10 ; 2 Cor. vi. 1 ; Gal. ii. 21.
n. 2. , 6 Dr_ Arnold's Twenty-fourth Sermon on
8 It is not quite certain whether we are to the Interpretation of Scripture.
understand the words in v. 42 to mean " the 6 See n. 3 on this page.
next Sabbath " or some intermediate days of

160 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap. n.
came together to hear the Word of God." The synagogue was crowded.1
Multitudes of Gentiles were there in addition to the Proselytes. This was
more than the Jews could bear. Their spiritual pride and exclusive
bigotry was immediately roused. They could not endure the notion of
others being freely admitted to the same religious privileges with them
selves. This was always the sin of the Jewish people. Instead of realizing
their position in the world as the prophetic nation for the good of the whole
earth, they indulged the self-exalting opinion, that God's highest blessings
were only for themselves. Their oppressions and their dispersions had
not destroyed this deeply-rooted prejudice ; but they rather found comfort
under the yoke, in brooding over their religious isolation : and even in
their remote and scattered settlements, they clung with the utmost tenacity
to the feeling of their exclusive nationality. Thus, in the Pisidian
Antioch, they who on one Sabbath had listened with breathless interest to
the teachers who spoke to them of the promised Messiah, were on the next
Sabbath filled with the most excited indignation, when they found that
this Messiah was " a light to lighten the Gentiles," as well as '" the glory
of His people Israel." They made an uproar, and opposed the words of
Paul 2 with all manner of calumnious expressions, " contradicting and
blaspheming." Then the Apostles, promptly recognizing in the willingness of the Gentiles
and the unbelief of the Jews the clear indications of the path of duty,
followed that bold 3 course which was alien to all the prejudices of a Jewish
education. They turned at once and without reserve to the Gentiles.
St. Paul was not unprepared for the events which called for this decision.
The prophetic intimations at his first conversion, his vision in the Temple
at Jerusalem, his experience at the Syrian Antioch, his recent success in
the island of Cyprus, must have led him to expect the Gentiles to listen
to that message which the Jews were too ready to scorn. The words with
which he turned from his unbelieving countrymen were these : " It was
needful that the Word of God should first be spoken unto you : but inas
much as ye reject it, and deem yourselves unworthy of eternal life, lo ! we
turn to the Gentiles." And then he quotes a prophetical passage from
their own sacred writings. " For thus hath the Lord commanded us,
saying, I have set thee for a light to the Gentiles, that thou shouldst be for
salvation to the ends of the earth." 4 This is the first recorded instance
of a scene which was often re-enacted. It is the course which St. Paul
himself defines in his Epistle to the Romans, when he describes the Gospel
1 Acts xiii. 44. 8 Compare 1 Thess. ii. 2, where the cireuro
2 The words in Acts xiii. 45 imply indi- stances appear to have been very similar.
rectly that Paul was the "chief speaker,'' as * Isai. xlix. 6, quoted with a slight variatioi
we are told, xiv. 12. from the LXX. See Isai. xiii. 6 ; Luke ii. 32

ohap.vi. PREACHING TO THE GENTILES. 161
as coming first to the Jew, and then to the Gentile ; 1 and it is the course
which he followed himself on various occasions of his life, at Corinth,2 at
Ephesus,3 and at Rome.4
That which was often obscurely foretold in the Old Testament, — that
those should " seek after God who knew Him not," and that He should be
honored by " those who were not a people ; " 5 — that which had already
seen its first fulfilment in isolated cases during our Lord's life, as in the
centurion and the Syrophcenician woman, whose faith had no parallel in
all the people of " Israel ; " 6 — that which had received an express ac
complishment through the agency of two of the chiefest of the Apostles, in
Cornelius, the Roman officer at Caesarea, and in Sergius Paulus, the
Roman governor at Paphos, — began now to be realized on a large scale
in a whole community. While the Jews blasphemed and rejected Christ,
the Gentiles " rejoiced, and glorified the Word of God." The counsels of
God were not frustrated by the unbelief of His chosen people. A new
" Israel," a new " election," succeeded to the former.7 A Church was
formed of united Jews and Gentiles ; and all who were destined to enter
the path of eternal life 8 were gathered into the Catholic brotherhood of
the hitherto separated races. The synagogue had rejected the inspired
missionaries, but the apostolic instruction went on in some private house
or public building belonging to the Heathen. And gradually the knowl
edge of Christianity began to be disseminated through the whole vicinity.9
The enmity of the Jews, however, was not satisfied by the expulsion
of the Apostles from their synagogue. What they could not accomplish
by violence and calumny, they succeeded in effecting by a pious intrigue.
That influence of women in religious questions, to which our attention
will be repeatedly called hereafter, is here for the first time brought
before our notice in the sacred narrative of St. Paul's life. Strabo, who
was intimately acquainted with the social position of the female sex in
the towns of Western Asia, speaks in strong terms of the power which
they possessed and exercised in controlling and modifying the religious
opinions of the men. This general fact received one of its most striking
illustrations in the case of Judaism. We have already more than once
alluded to the influence of the female proselytes at Damascus : 10 and the
good service which women contributed towards the early progress of
1 Rom. i. 16, ii. 9. Compare xi. 12, 25. passage has been made the subject of much
2 Acts xviii. 6. 8 Acts xix. 9. controversy with reference to the doctrine of
* Acts xxviii. 28. predestination. Its bearing on the question is
6 See Hosea, i. 10, ii. 23, as quoted in Rom. very doubtful. The same participle is used in
ix. 25, 26. Acts xx. 13, and also in Luke iii. 13, and
8 Matt. viii. 5-10, xv. 21-28. Rom. xiii. 1.
7 See Rom xi. 7 ; and Gal. vi. 16. 8 Acts xiii. 49.
! Acts xiii. 48. It is well known that this 10 See above, p. 18, and p. 152, n. 6.
11

162 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL.

CHAP. VI,

Christianity is abundantly known both from the Acts and the Epistles.1
Here they appear in a position less honorable, but not less influential.
The Jews contrived, through the female proselytes at Antioch, to win
over to their cause some influential members of their sex, and through
them to gain the ear of men who occupied a position of eminence in the
city. Thus a systematic persecution was excited against Paul and
Barnabas. Whether the supreme magistrates of the colony were in
duced by this unfair agitation to pass a sentence of formal banishment,
we are not informed ; 3 but for the present the Apostles were compelled to
retire from the colonial limits.
In cases such as these, instructions had been given by our Lord himself
how His Apostles were to act. During His life on earth, He had said to
the Twelve, " Whosoever shall not receive you, nor hear you, when ye
depart thence, shake off the dust under your feet for a testimony against
them. Verily, I say unto you, it shall be more tolerable for Sodom and
Gomorrah in the day of judgment, than for that city." 3 And while Paul
and Barnabas thus fulfilled our Lord's words, shaking off from their feet
the dust of the dry and sunburnt road,4 in token of God's judgment on
wilful unbelievers, and turning their steps eastwards in the direction of
Lycaonia, another of the sayings of Christ was fulfilled, in the midst of
those who had been obedient to the faith : " Blessed are ye when men shall
revile you and persecute you, and shall say all manner of evil against
you falsely, for my sake. Rejoice and be exceeding glad : for great is
your reward in heaven ; for so persecuted they the prophets which were
before you." 6 Even while their faithful teachers were removed from them,
and travelling across the bare uplands6 which separate Antioch from the
plain of Iconium, the disciples of the former city received such manifest
1 See Acts xvi. 14, xviii. 2; Philipp. iv. 3 ; 6 Matt. v. 11, 12.'
1 Cor. vii. 16. 6 Leake approached Iconium from the
2 We should rather infer the contrary, northern side of the mountains which separate
since they revisited the place on their return Antioch from Philomelium (see p. 204). He
from Derbe (xiv. 21 ). says : " On the descent from a ridge branching
8 Mark vi. 11 ; Matt. x. 14, 15 ; Luke ix. 5. eastward from these mountains, we came in
For other symbolical acts expressing the same sight of the vast plain around Konieh, and of
thing, see Nehem. v. 13 ; Acts xviii. 6. It the lake which occupies the middle of it ; and
was taught in the schools of the Scribes that we saw the city with its mosques and ancient
the dust of a Heathen land defiled by the walls, still at the distance of twelve or fourteen
touch. Hence the shaking of the dust off the miles from us," p. 45. Ainsworth travelled
feet implied that the city was regarded as in the same direction, and says : " We trav-
profane. elled three hours along the plain of Konieh,
4 " Literally may they have shaken off the always in sight of the city of the Sultans of
dust of their feet, for even now (Nov. 9) the Roum, before we reached it." — Trav. in Asia
roads abound with it, and in the summer Minor, ii. p. 58.
months it must be a plain of dust." — Arun-
dell's Asia Minor, vol. i. p. 319.

chap. vi. ICONIUM. 163
tokens of the love of God, and the power of the " Holy Ghost," that they
were " filled with joy " in the midst of persecution.
Iconium has obtained a place in history far more distinguished than
that of the Pisidian Antioch. It is famous as the cradle of the rising
power of the conquering Turks.1 And the remains of its Mohammedan
architecture still bear a conspicuous testimony to the victories and strong
government of a tribe of Tatar invaders. But there are other features in
the view of modern Konieh which to us are far more interesting. To the
traveller in the footsteps of St. Paul, it is not the armorial bearings of the
Knights of St. John, carved over the gateways in the streets of Rhodes,
which arrest the attention, but the ancient harbor and the view across
the sea to the opposite coast. And at Konieh his interest is awakened, not
by minarets and palaces and Saracenic gateways, but by the vast plain
and the distant mountains.2
These features remain what they were in the first century, while the
town has been repeatedly destroyed and rebuilt, and its architectural
character entirely altered. Little, if any thing, remains of Greek or Roman
Iconium, if we except the ancient inscriptions and the fragments of sculp
tures which are built into the Turkish walls.3 At a late period of the
Empire it was made a Colonia, like its neighbor, Antioch ; but it was
not so in the time of St. Paul. These is no reason to suppose that its
character was different from that of the other important towns on the
principal lines of communication through Asia Minor. The elements of
its population would be as follows: — a large number of trifling and frivo
lous Greeks, whose principal places of resort would be the theatre and the
market-place ; some remains of a still older population, coming in occa
sionally from the country, or residing in a separate quarter of the town ;
some few Roman officials, civil or military, holding themselves proudly
aloof from the inhabitants of the subjugated province ; and an old
established colony of Jews, who exercised their trade during the week,
and met on the Sabbath to read the Law in the Synagogue.
The same kind of events took place here as in Antioch, and almost in
1 Iconium was the capital of the Seljukian have been built from the ruins of more an-
Sultans, and had a great part in the growth cient buildings, as broken columns, capitals,
of the Ottoman empire. pedestals, bass-reliefs, and other pieces of
* "Konieh extends to the east and south sculpture, contribute towards its construction.
over the plain far beyond the walls, which are It has eighty gates, of a square form, each
about two miles in circumference. . . . Moun- known by a separate name, and, as well as
tains covered with snow rise on every side, most of the towers, embellished with Arabic
excepting towards the east, where a plain, as inscriptions. ... I observed a few Greek
flat as the desert ot Arabia, extends far be- characters on the walls, but they were in so
yond the reach of the eye." — Capt. Kinneir. elevated » situation that I cnuld not de>-
8 "The city wall is said to have been cipher them." — Capt. Kinneir.
erected by the Seljukian Sultans : it seems te

164 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL chap.vi
the same order.1 The Apostles went first to the Synagogue, and the
effect of their discourses there was such, that great numbers both of
the Jews and Greeks (i. e. Proselytes or Heathens, or both) 2 believed the
Gospel. The unbelieving Jews raised up an indirect persecution by
exciting the minds of the Gentile population against those who received
the Christian doctrine. But the Apostles persevered and remained in the
city some considerable time, having their confidence strengthened by the
miracles which God worked through their instrumentality, in attestation
of the truth of His Word. There is an apocryphal narrative of certain
events assigned to this residence at Iconium : 3 and we may innocently
adopt so much of the legendary story, as to imagine St. Paul preaching
long and late to crowded congregations, as he did afterwards at Assos,4
and his enemies bringing him before the civil authorities, with the cry
that he was disturbing their households by his sorcery, or with complaints
like those at Philippi and Ephesus, that he was " exceedingly troubling
their city," and " turning away much people." 8 We learn from an in
spired source6 that the whole population of Iconium was ultimately
divided into two great factions (a common occurrence, on far less impor
tant occasions, in these cities of Oriental Greeks), and that one party
took the side of the Apostles, the other that of the Jews. But here, as
at Antioch, the influential classes were on the side of the Jews. A
determined attempt was at last made to crush the Apostles, by loading
them with insult and actually stoning them. Learning this wicked con
spiracy, in which the magistrates themselves were involved,7 they fled to
some of the neighboring districts of Lycaonia, where they might be more
secure, and have more liberty in preaching the Gospel.
It would be a very natural course for the Apostles, after the cruel
treatment they had experienced in the great towns on a frequented route,
to retire into a wilder region and among a ruder population. In any
country, the political circumstances of which resemble those of Asia
Minor under the early emperors, there must be many districts, into
which the civilization of the conquering and governing people has hardly
penetrated. An obvious instance is furnished by our Eastern presi
dencies, in the Hindoo villages, which have retained their character with
out alteration, notwithstanding the successive occupations by Moham
medans and English. Thus, in the Eastern provinces of the Roman
1 See Acts xiv. 1-5. * Acts xx. 7-11.
2 Perhaps " Greeks " (v. 1 ) may mean B Acts xvi. 20, xix. 26.
" proselytes," as opposed to the " Gentiles " of 8 Acts xiv. 4.
T. 2. ' It is impossible to determine exactly the
8 The legend of Paul and Thecla. The meaning of the word rendered " rulers."
story will be found in Jones on the Canon (vol.
ii. pp. 353-403).

chat. yi. LYCAONIA. 165
Empire there must have been many towns and villages where local customs
were untouched, and where Greek, though certainly understood, was not
commonly spoken. Such, perhaps, were the places which now come
before our notice in the Acts of the Apostles, — small towns, with a rude
dialect and primitive superstition l — " Lystra and Derbe, cities of
Lycaonia." 2
The district of Lycaonia extends from the ridges of Mount Taurus and
the borders of Cilicia, on the south, to the Cappadocian hills, on the
north. It is a bare and dreary region, unwatered by streams, though in
parts liable to occasional inundations. Strabo mentions one place where
water was even sold for money. In this respect there must be a close
resemblance between this country and large tracts of Australia. Nor is
this the only particular in which the resemblance may be traced. Both
regions afford excellent pasture for flocks of sheep, and give opportunities
for obtaining large possessions by trade in wool. It was here, on the
downs of Lycaonia, that Amyntas, while he yet led the life of a nomad
chief, before the time of his political elevation,3 fed his three hundred
flocks. Of the whole district Iconium 4 was properly the capital : and
the plain round Iconium may be reckoned as its great central space,
situated midway between Cilicia and Cappadocia. This plain is spoken
of as the largest in Asia Minor.5 It is almost like the steppes of Great
Asia, of which the Turkish invaders must often have been reminded,6
when they came to these level spaces in the west ; and the camels which
convey modern travellers to and from Konieh, find by the side of their
path tufts of salt and prickly herbage, not very dissimilar to that which
grows in their native deserts.7
Across some portion of this plain Paul and Barnabas travelled before
as well as after their residence in Iconium. After leaving the high land
to the north-west,8 during a journey of several hours before arriving at
the city, the eye ranges freely over a vast expanse of level ground to the
south and the east. The two most eminent objects in the view are cer
tain snowy summits,9 which rise high above all the intervening hills in
the direction of Armenia, — and, in the nearer horizon, the singular
1 Acts xiv. 11, 12, &c. as he crossed this plain, eagerly eating the tufts
2 Acts xiv. 6. of Mesembryanthemum and Salicornia, " re-
8 See above, Ch. I. p. 21. minding them of plains with which they were
4 Xenophon, who is the first to mention probably more familiar than those of Asia
Iconium, calls it " the last city of Phrygia," Minor." The plain, however, is naturally
in the direction of " Lycaonia." rich.
6 See Leake, p. 93. 8 See above, p. 150.
6 The remark is made by Texier in his B Leake supposed these summits to be those
" Asie Mineure." of Mount Argssus, but Hamilton thinks he
' Ainsworth (ii. p. 68) describes the camels, was in error.

166

THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL.

chap. vi.

mountain mass called the " Kara-Dagh," or " Black Mount," south-
eastwards in the direction of Cilicia.1 And still these features continue
to be conspicuous after Iconium is left behind, and the traveller moves
on over the plain towards Lystra and Derbe. Mount Argaeus still rises
far to the north-east, at the distance of one hundred and fifty miles. The
Black Mountain is gradually approached, and discovered to be an
isolated mass, with reaches of the plain extending round it like channels
of the sea.2 The cities of Lystra and Derbe were somewhere about the
bases of the Black Mountain. We have dwelt thus minutely on the
physical characteristics of this part of Lycaonia, because the positions of
its ancient towns have not been determined. We are only acquainted
with the general features of the scene. While the site of Iconium has
never been forgotten, and that of Antioch in Pisidia has now been clearly
identified, those of Lystra and Derbe remain unknown, or at best are
extremely uncertain.3 No conclusive coins or inscriptions have been
discovered ; nor has there been any such convergence of modern investi
gation and ancient authority as leads to an infallible result. Of the

1 See Leake, p. 45. " To the south-east the
same plains extend as far as the mountains of
Karaman (Laranda). At the south-east ex
tremity of the plains beyond Konieh, we are
much struck with the appearance of a remark
able insulated mountain, called Kara-Dagh
(Black Mountain), rising to a great height,
covered at the top with snow [Jan. 31], and
appearing like a lofty island in the midst of
the sea. It is about sixty miles distant.'' The
lines marked on the Map are the Roman roads
mentioned in the Itineraries.
A view of the Kara-Dagh is given in Ch.
vm.
2 See Leake, pp. 93-97. "(Feb. 1. From
Konieh to Tshumra.) — Our road pursues a
perfect level for upwards of twenty miles.
(Feb. 2. From Tshumra to Kassaba.) — Nine
hours over the same uninterrupted level of the
finest soil, but quite uncultivated, except in
the immediate neighborhood of a few widely
dispersed villages. It is painful to behold
such desolation in the midst of a region so
highly favored by nature. Another character
istic of these Asiatic plains is the exactness of
the level, and the peculiarity of their extend
ing, without any previous slope, to the foot of
the mountains, which rise from them like lofty
islands out of the surface of the ocean. The
Karamanian ridge seems to recede as we ap
proach it, and the snowy summits of Argseus

[?] are still to be seen to the north-east. . .
At three or four miles short of Kassaba, we
are abreast of the middle of the veiy lofty
insulated mountain already mentioned, called
Kara-Dagh. It is said to be chiefly inhabited
by Greek Christians, and to contain 1,001
churches ; but we afterwards learnt that these
1,001 churches (Bin-bir-Kilisseh) was a name
given to the extensive ruins of an ancient city
at the foot of the mountain. (Feb. 3. From
Kassaba to Karaman.) — Four hours ; the road
still passing over a plain, which towards the
mountains begins to be a little intersected with
low ridges and ravines. . . Between these
mountains and the Kara-Dagli there is a
kind of strait, which forms the communica
tion between the plain of Karaman and the
great levels lying eastward of Konieh. . . .
Advancing towards Karaman, I perceive a
passage into the plains to the north-west, round
the northern end of Kara-Dagh, similar to that
on the south, so that this mountain is com
pletely insulated. We still see to the north
east the great snowy summit of Argseus, [?]
which is probably the highest point of Asia
Minor." See a similar description of the iso
lation of the Kara-Dagh in Hamilton (n. 315,
320), who approached it from the east.
8 Col Leake wrote thus in 1824: "Noth
ing can more strongly snow the little progress
that has hitherto been made in a knowledge

ST. PAUL AT LYSTRA.

167

different hypotheses which have been proposed, we have been content in
the accompanying map to indicate those 1 which appear the most probable.
We resume the thread of our narrative with the arrival of Paul
and Barnabas at Lystra. One peculiar circumstance strikes us immedi
ately in what we read of the events in this town; that no mention occurs
of any synagogue or of any Jews. It is natural to infer that there were
few Israelites in the place, though (as we shall see hereafter) it would be
a mistake to imagine that there were none. We are instantly brought
in contact with a totally new subject, — with Heathen superstition and
mythology ; yet not the superstition of an educated mind, as that of Ser
gius Paulus, — nor the mythology of a refined and cultivated taste, like
that of the Athenians, — but the mythology and superstition of a rude
and unsophisticated people. Thus does the Gospel, in the person of St.
Paul, successively clash with opposing powers, with sorcerers and philoso
phers, cruel magistrates and false divinities. Now it is the rabbinical
master of the Synagogue, now the listening proselyte from the Greeks,

of the ancient geography of Asia Minor, than
that, of the cities which the journey of St.
Paul has made so interesting to us, the site
of one only (Iconium) is yet certainly known.
Perga, Antioch of Pisidia, Lystra, and Derbe,
remain to be discovered." — P. 103. . We have
seen that two of these four towns have been
fully identified, — Perga by Sir C. Fellows,
and Antioch by Mr. Arundell. It is to be
hoped that the other two will yet be clearly
ascertained. 1 The general features of the map here
given are copied from Kiepert's large map of
Asia Minor, and his positions for Lystra and
Derbe are adopted. Lystra is marked near the
place where Leake conjectured that it might
be, some twenty miles S. of Iconium. It does
not appear, however, that he saw any ruins on
the spot. There are very remarkable Chris
tian ruins on the N. side of the Kara-Dagh,
at Bin-bir-Kilisseh ("the 1,001 churches"),
and Leake thinks that they may mark the site
of Derbe. We think Mr. Hamilton's conjec
ture much more probable, that they mark the
Bite of Lystra, which has a more eminent ec
clesiastical reputation than Derbe.
While this was passing through the press,
the writer received an indirect communication
from Mr. Hamilton, which will be the best
commentary on the map. " There are ruins
(though slight) at the spot where Derbe
is marked on Kiepert's map, ana as this spot

is certainly on a line of Roman road, it is not
unlikely that it may represent Derbe. He did
not actually visit Divle", but the coincidence
of name led him to think it might be Derbe.
He does not know of any ruins at the place
where Kiepert writes Lystra, but was not on
that spot. There may be ruins there, but he
thinks they cannot be of importance, as he did
not hear of them, though in the neighbor
hood; and he prefers Bin-bir-Kilisseh as the
site of Lystra."
The following description of the Bin-bir-
Kilisseh is supplied by a letter from Mr. E.
Falkener. " The principal group of the Bin-
bir-Kilisseh lies at the foot of Kara-Dagh. . . .
Perceiving ruins on the slope of the mountain,
I began to ascend, and on reaching these dis
covered they were churches; and, looking
upwards, descried others yet above me, and
climbing from one to the other I at length
gained the summit, where I found two church
es. On looking down, I perceived churches
on all sides of the mountain, scattered about
in various positions. The number ascribed to
them by the Turks is of course metaphorical ;
but including those in the plain below, there
are about two dozen in tolerable preservation,
and the remains of perhaps forty may be
traced altogether. . . . The mountain must
have been considered sacred ; all the ruins are
of Christian epoch, and, with the exception of
a huge palaee, every building is a church.'-

168 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap.vl
that is resisted or convinced, — now the honest inquiry of a Roman
officer, now the wild fanaticism of a rustic credulity, that is addressed
with bold and persuasive eloquence.
It was a common belief among the ancients that the gods occasionally
visited the earth in the form of men. Such a belief with regard to Jupi
ter, " the father of gods and men," would be natural in any rural dis
trict : but nowhere should we be prepared to find the traces of it more
than at Lystra ; for Lystra, as it appears from St. Luke's narrative,1 was
under the tutelage of Jupiter, and tutelary divinities were imagined to
haunt the cities under their protection, though elsewhere invisible.
The temple of Jupiter was a conspicuous object in front of the city-
gates :* what wonder if the citizens should be prone to believe that their
" Jupiter, which was before the city," would willingly visit his favorite
people ? Again, the expeditions of Jupiter were usually represented as
attended by Mercury. He was the companion, the messenger, the ser
vant of the gods.3 Thus the notion of these two divinities appearing
together in Lycaonia is quite in conformity with what we know of the
popular belief. But their appearance in that particular district would be
welcomed with more than usual credulity. Those who are acquainted
with the literature of the Roman poets are familiar with a beautiful tra
dition of Jupiter and Mercury visiting in human form these very regions4
in the interior of Asia Minor. And it is not without a singular interest
that we find one of Ovid's stories re-appearing in the sacred pages of the
Acts of the Apostles. In this instance, as in so many others, the Scrip
ture, in its incidental descriptions of the Heathen world, presents
"undesigned coincidences" with the facts ascertained from Heathen
memorials. These introductory remarks prepare us for considering the miracle
recorded in the Acts. We must suppose that Paul gathered groups of
the Lystrians about him, and addressed them in places of public resort, as
a modern missionary might address the natives of a Hindoo village.8
1 It is more likely that a temple than a always used the nearest Latin equivalents for the
statue of Jupiter is alluded to. The temple Greek divinities, i. e. Jupiter, Mercury, Diana,
of the tutelary divinity was outside the walls Minerva, for Zeus, Hermes, Artemis, Athene.
at Perga (see p. 143) and at Ephesus, as we * See the story of Baucis and Philemon,
learn from the story in Herodotus (i. 26), who Ovid. Met. viii. 611, &c. Even if the Lycao-
tells us that in a time of danger the citizens nians were a Semitic tribe, it is not unnatural
put themselves under the protection of Diana, to suppose them familiar with Greek mytholo-
by attaching her temple by a rope to the city gy. An identification of classical and " bar-
wall, barian " divinities had taken place in innumer,
2 Acts xiv. 13. able instances, as in the case of the Tynan
8 See the references in Smith's Dictionary Hercules and Papluan Venus.
of Classical Biography and Mythology, under 6 See for instance Fox's Chapters on Missions.
'Hermes." We may remark here that we have p. 153, &c.

chap.ti. HEALING OF THE CRIPPLE. 169
But it would not be necessary in his case, as in that of Schwartz or Mar-
tyn, to have learnt the primitive language of those to whom he spoke.
He addressed them in Greek, for Greek was well understood in this
border-country of the Lystrians, though their own dialect was either a
barbarous corruption of that noble language, or the surviving remainder
of some older tongue. He used the language of general civilization, as
English may be used now in a Welsh country-town like Dolgelly or Car
marthen. The subjects he brought before these illiterate idolaters of
Lycaonia were doubtless such as would lead them, by the most natural
steps, to the knowledge of the true God, and the belief in His Son's
resurrection. He told them, as he told the educated Athenians,1 of Him
whose worship they had ignorantly corrupted ; whose unity, power, and
goodness they might have discerned through the operations of nature ;
whose displeasure against sin had been revealed to them by the admoni
tions of their natural conscience.
On one of these occasions2 St. Paul observed a cripple, who was
earnestly listening to his discourse. He was seated on the ground, for
he had an infirmity in his feet, and had never walked from the hour of
his birth. St. Paul looked at him attentively, with that remarkable
expression of the eye which we have already noticed (p. 134). The
same Greek word is used as when the Apostle is described as " ear
nestly beholding the council," and " as setting his eyes on Elymas the
sorcerer."3 On this occasion that penetrating glance saw, by the power
of the Divine Spirit, into the very secrets of the cripple's soul. Paul
perceived " that he had faith to be saved."4 These words, implying so
much of moral preparation in the heart of this poor Heathen, rise above
all that is told us of the lame Jew, whom Peter, " fastening his eyes upon
him with John," had once healed at the temple gate in Jerusalem.5 In
other respects the parallel between the two cases is complete. As Peter
said in the presence of the Jews, " In the name of Jesus Christ of Naza
reth, rise up and walk," so Paul said before his idolatrous audience at
Lystra, " Stand upright on thy feet." And in this case, also, the word
which had been suggested to the speaker by a supernatural intuition was
followed by a supernatural result. The obedient alacrity in the spirit,
and the new strength in the body, rushed together simultaneously. The
lame man sprang up in the joyful consciousness of a power he had
never felt before, and walked like those who had never had experience
of infirmity.
1 It is very important to compare together 4 Acts xiv. 9. The word is the same as in
the speeches at Lystra and Athens, and both xvi. 30.
with the first chapter of the Romans. See 6 Acts iii. Wetstein remarks on the greater
pp. 171, 172. faith manifested by the Heathen at Lystra than
2 Acts xiv. 8, &c. Acts xxiii. 1, xiii. 9. the Jew at Jerusalem.

170 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL.

CHAP. vt.

And now arose a great tumult of voices from the crowd. Such a cure
of a congenital disease, so sudden and so complete, would have con
founded the most skilful and sceptical physicians. An illiterate people
would be filled with astonishment, and rush immediately to the conclu
sion that supernatural powers were present among them. These Lyca-
onians thought at once of their native traditions, and crying out vocifer
ously in their mother-tongue,1 — and we all know how the strongest feel
ings of an excited people find vent in the language of childhood, — they
exclaimed that the gods had again visited them in the likeness of men,
— that Jupiter and Mercury were again in Lycaonia, — that the persua
sive speaker was Mercury, and his companion Jupiter. They identified
Paul with Mercury, because his eloquence corresponded with one of that
divinity's attributes. Paul was the " chief speaker," and Mercury was
the god of eloquence. And if it be asked why they identified Barnabas
with Jupiter, it is evidently a sufficient answer to say that these two
divinities were always represented as companions2 in their terrestrial
expeditions, though we may well believe (with Chrysostom and others)
that there was something majestically benignant in his appearance, while
the personal aspect of St. Paul (and for this we can quote his own state
ments)3 was comparatively insignificant.
How truthful and how vivid is the scene brought before us ! and how
many thoughts it suggests to those who are at once conversant with
Heathen mythology and disciples of Christian theology ! Barnabas,
identified with the Father of Gods and Men, seems like a personification
of mild beneficence and provident care;4 while Paul appears invested
with more active attributes, flying over the world on the wings of faith
and love, with quick words of warning and persuasion, and ever carry
ing in his hand the purse of the " unsearchable riches."5
The news of a wonderful occurrence is never long in spreading through
a small country town. At Lystra the whole population was presently
in an uproar. They would lose no time in paying due honor to their
heavenly visitants. The priest attached to that temple of Jupiter before
the city gates, to which we have before alluded,6 was summoned to do
sacrifice to the god whom he served. Bulls and garlands, and whatever
1 Some are of opinion that the " speech of 4 See Acts iv. 36, 37, ix. 27, xi. 22-25, 30.
Lycaonia " was a Semitic language ; others It is also very possible that Barnabas was older,
that it was a corrupt dialect of Greek. See and therefore more venerable in appearance,
the Dissertations of Jablonski and Giihling in than St. Paul.
Iken's Thesaurus. 6 The winged heels and the purse are the
2 See, for instance, Ovid. Fast. v. 495. well-known insignia of Mercury.
8 See 2 Cor. x. 1, 10, where, however, we 6 P. 168.
must remember that he is quoting the state
ments of his adversaries.

chap.ti. ADDRESS TO THE GENTILES. 171
else was requisite to the performance of the ceremony, were duly pre
pared, and the procession moved amidst crowds of people to the residence
of the Apostles. They, hearing the approach of the multitude, and learn
ing their idolatrous intention, were filled with the utmost horror. They
" rent their clothes," and rushed out1 of the house in which they lodged,
and met the idolaters approaching the vestibule.2 There, standing at the
doorway, they opposed the entrance of the crowd ; and Paul expressed
his abhorrence of their intention, and earnestly tried to prevent their
fulfilling it, in a speech of which only the following short outline is
recorded by St. Luke : —
" Sirs, why do ye these things ? We also are men, of like pas- ^'
sions with you ; and we are come to preach to you the Glad Tidings, 15
that you may turn from these vain idols to the living God, who
made the heavens, and the earth, and the sea, and all things that
are therein. For in the generations that are past, He suffered all 16
the nations of the Gentiles to walk in their own ways. Never
theless He left not Himself without witness, in that He blessed n
you, and gave you rain from heaven, and fruitful seasons, filling
your hearts with food and gladness."3
This address held tnem listening, but they listened impatiently. Even
with this energetic disavowal of his divinity and this strong appeal to
their reason, St. Paul found it difficult to dissuade the Lycaonians from
offering to him and Barnabas an idolatrous worship.4 There is no doubt
that St. Paul was the speaker, and, before we proceed further in the
narrative, we cannot help pausing to observe the essentially Pauline
character which this speech manifests, even in so condensed a summary
of its contents. It is full of undesigned coincidences in argument, and
even in the expressions employed, with St. Paul's language in other
parts of the Acts, and in his own Epistles. Thus, as here he declares
the object of his preaching to be that the idolatrous Lystrians should
1 " Ban out," not " ran in," is the reading lodged at Joppa ; Acts xii. 13, of the house
sanctioned by the later critics on full manu- of Mary the mother of John Mark. It is
icript authority. See Tischendorf. nowhere used for the gate of a city except in
2 The word used here does not mean the the Apocalypse. Moreover, it seems obvious
gate of the city, but the vestibule or gate that if the priest had only brought the victims
which gave admission from the public street to sacrifice them at the city gates, it would
into the court of the house. So it is used, have been no offering to Paul and Barnabas.
Matt. xxvi. 71, for the vestibule of the high 8 "You" and "your" are the correct
priest's palace ; Luke xvi. 20, for that of readings, not " us " and " our."
Dives; Acts *.. 17, of the house where Peter * Acts xiv. 18.

172 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chaj.vi.
" turn from these vain idols to the living God," so he reminds the
Thessalonians how they, at his preaching, had " turned from idols to
serve the living and true God." l Again, as he tells the Lystrians that
" God had, in the generations that were past, suffered the nations of the
Gentiles to walk in their own ways," so he tells the Romans that " God
in His forbearance had passed over the former sins of men, in the times
that were gone by;"2 and so he tells the Athenians,3 that "the past
times of ignorance God had overlooked." Lastly, how striking is the
similarity between the natural theology with which the present speech
concludes, and that in the Epistle to the Romans, where, speaking of the
Heathen, he says that atheists are without excuse ; " for that which can
be known of God is manifested in their hearts, God himself having shown
it to them. For His eternal power and Godhead, though they be invisi
ble, yet are seen ever since the world was made, being understood by the
works which He hath wrought."
The crowd reluctantly retired, and led the victims away without
offering them in sacrifice to the Apostles. It might be supposed that at
least a command had been obtained over their gratitude and reverence,
which would not easily be destroyed ; but we have to record here one of
those sudden changes of feeling, which are humiliating proofs of the
weakness of human nature and of the superficial character of religious
excitement. The Lycaonians were proverbially fickle and faithless ; but
we may not too hastily decide that they were worse than many others
might have been under the same circumstances. It would not be diffi
cult to find a parallel to their conduct among the modern converts from
idolatry to Christianity. And certainly no later missionaries have had
more assiduous enemies than the Jews whom the Apostles had every
where to oppose. Certain Jews from Iconium, and even from Antioch,4
followed in the footsteps of Paul and Barnabas, and endeavored to
excite the hostility of the Lystrians against them. When they heard of
the miracle worked on the lame man, and found how great an effect it
had produced on the people of Lystra, they would be ready with a new
interpretation of this occurrence. They would say that it had been
accomplished, not by Divine agency, but by some diabolical magic ; as
once they had said at Jerusalem, that He who came " to destroy the
works of the Devil" cast out devils " by Beelzebub the prince of the
devils." 5 And this is probably the true explanation of that sudden
1 1 Thess. i. 9. The coincidence is more in the Authorized Version entirely alters its
striking in the Greek, because the very same meaning.
verb is used in each passage, and is intransi- 8 Acts xvii. 30.
tive in both. 4 Acta xiv. 19.
2 Rom. iii. 25 : the mistranslation of which * Matt. xii. 24.

chap. vi. ST. PAUL STONED. 173
change of feeling among the Lystrians, which at first sight is very
surprising. Their own interpretation of what they had witnessed having
been disavowed by the authors of the miracle themselves, they would
readily adopt a new interpretation, suggested by those who appeared to
be well acquainted with the strangers, and who had followed them from
distant cities. Their feelings changed with a revulsion as violent as that
which afterwards took place among the " barbarous people " of Malta,1
who first thought St. Paul was a murderer, and then a God. The Jews,
taking advantage of the credulity of a rude tribe, were able to accom
plish at Lystra the design they had meditated at Iconium.2 St. Paul was
stoned, — not hurried out of the city to execution like St. Stephen,3 the
memory of whose death must have come over St. Paul at this moment
with impressive force, — but stoned somewhere in the streets of Lystra,
and then dragged through the city-gate, and cast outside the walls, under
the belief that he was dead. This is that occasion to which the Apostle
afterwards alluded in the words, " once I was stoned,"4 in that long
catalogue of sufferings, to which we have already referred in this
chapter.5 Thus was he " in perils by his own countrymen, in perils by
the Heathen," — " in deaths oft," — " always bearing about in the body
the dying of the Lord Jesus, that the life also of Jesus might be
made manifest in his body. . . . Alway delivered unto death for
Jesus' sake, that the life also of Jesus might be made manifest in his
mortal flesh." 6
On the present occasion these last words were literally realized, for by
the power and goodness of God he rose from a state of apparent death as
if by a sudden resurrection.1 Though " persecuted," he was not " for
saken," — though " cast down," he was " not destroyed." " As the disciples
1 Acts xxviii. 4-6. that Paul and his companions were ' aware of
2 Acts xiv. 5. the danger and fled,' a contradiction between
8 See the end of Ch. IL At Jerusalem the history and the epistles would have ensued.
the law required that these executions should Truth is necessarily consistent ; but it is
take place outside the city. It must be re- scarcely possible that independent accounts,
membered that stoning was a Jewish punish- not having truth to guide them, should thus
ment, and that it was proposed by Jews at advance to the very brink of contradiction
Iconium, and instigated and begun by Jews without falling into it." — Horce Paulina;,
at Lystra. p. 69.
4 See Paley's remark on the expression 6 See pp. 145, 146.
"once I was stoned," in reference to the pre- 6 Compare 2 CorinthianB iv. 8-12 and xi.
vious design of stoning St. Paul at Iconium. 23-27.
" Had the assault been completed, had the ' The natural inference from the narrative
history related that a stone was thrown, as it is, that the recovery was miraculous ; and it is
relates that preparations were made both by evident that such a recovery must have pro
Jews and Gentiles to stone Paul and his com- duced a strong effect on the minds of the
panions, or even had the account of this trans- Christians who witnessed it.
action stopped, without going on to inform us

174 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap. vi.
stood about him, he rose up, and came into the city." l We see from this
expression that his labors in Lystra had not been in vain. He had found
some willing listeners to the truth, some " disciples " who did not hesitate
to show their attachment to their teacher by remaining near his body,
which the rest of their fellow-citizens had wounded and cast out. These
courageous disciples were left for the present in the midst of the enemies
of the truth. Jesus Christ had said,2 " when they persecute you in one
city, flee to another ; " and the very " next day " 3 Paul " departed with
Barnabas to Derbe."
But before we leave Lystra, we must say a few words on one spectator
of St. Paul's sufferings, who is not yet mentioned by St. Luke, but who
was destined to be the constant companion of his after-years, the zealous
follower of his doctrine, the faithful partner of his danger and distress.
St. Paul came to Lystra again after the interval of one or two years, and
on that occasion we are told 4 that he found a certain Christian there,
" whose name was Timotheus, whose mother was a Jewess, while his
father was a Greek," and whose excellent character was highly esteemed
by his fellow-Christians of Lystra and Iconium. It is distinctly stated
that at the time of this second visit Timothy was already a Christian ; and
since we know from St. Paul's own expression, — " my own son in the
faith,"5 — that he was converted by St. Paul himself, we must suppose
this change to have taken place at the time of the first visit. And the
reader will remember that St. Paul in the second Epistle to Timothy
(iii. 10, 11) reminds him of his own intimate and personal knowledge of
the sufferings he had endured, " at Antioch, at Iconium, at Lystra," —
the places (it will be observed) being mentioned in the exact order in
which they were visited, and in which the successive persecutions took
place. We have thus the strongest reasons for believing that Timothy
was a witness of St. Paul's injurious treatment, and this too at a time of
life when the mind receives its deepest impressions from the spectacle of
innocent suffering and undaunted courage. And it is far from impossible
that the generous and warm-hearted youth was standing in that group of
disciples, who surrounded the apparently lifeless body of the Apostle at the
outside of the walls of Lystra.
We are called on to observe at this point, with a thankful acknowledg-
1 Acts xiv. 20. through the recollection of St. Paul's suffer
2 Matt. x. 23. ings ; but the common view is the most natu-
8 Acts xiv. 20. * Ibid. xvi. 1. ral. See what is said 1 Cor. iv. 14, 15 : " As
6 1 Tim i. 2. Compare i. 18 and 2 Tim. my beloved sons I warn you; for though ye
ii. 1 . It is indeed possible that these expres- have ten thousand instructors in Christ, yet
sions might be used, if Timothy became a have ye not many fathers ; for in Christ Jesui
Christian by his mother's influence, and I have begotten you through the Gospel."

chap. vi. TIMOTHEUS. — DERBE. 175
ment of God's providence, that the flight from Iconium, and the cruel per
secution at Lystra, were events which involved the most important and
beneficial consequences to universal Christianity. It was here, in the
midst of barbarous idolaters, that the Apostle of the Gentiles found an
associate, who became to him and the Church far more than Barnabas,
the companion of his first mission. As we have observed above,1 there
appears to have been at Lystra no synagogue, no community of Jews and
proselytes, among whom such an associate might naturally have been ex
pected. Perhaps Timotheus and his relations may have been almost the
only persons of Jewish origin in the town. And his " grandmother
Lois " and " mother Eunice " 2 may have been brought there originally by
some accidental circumstance, as Lydia 3 was brought from Thyatira to
Philippi.4 And, though there was no synagogue at Lystra, this family
may have met with a few others in some proseucha, like that in which
Lydia and her fellow-worshippers met " by the river-side." 6 Whatever
we conjecture concerning the congregational life to which Timotheus may
have been accustomed, we are accurately informed of the nature of that
domestic life which nurtured him for his future labors. The good soil of
his heart was well prepared before Paul came, by the instructions6 of
Lois and Eunice, to receive the seed of Christian truth, sown at the
Apostle's first visit, and to produce a rich harvest of faith and good works
before the time of his second visit.
Derbe, as we have seen, is somewhere not far from the " Black Moun
tain," which rises like an island in the south-eastern part of the plain of
Lycaonia. A few hours would suffice for the journey between Lystra and
its neighbor-city. We may, perhaps, infer from the fact that Derbe is
not mentioned in the list of places which St. Paul ' brings to the recollec
tion of Timothy as scenes of past suffering and distress, that in this town
the Apostles were exposed to no persecution. It may have been a quiet
resting-place after a journey full of toil and danger. It does not appear
that they were hindered in " evangelizing " the city : and the fruit of
their labors was the conversion of " many disciples." 8
And now we have reached the limit of St. Paul's first missionary
journey. About this part of the Lycaonian plain, where it approaches,
through gradual undulations,8 to the northern bases of Mount Taurus, he

1 Seep. 167. T 2 Tim. iii. 11.
2 2 Tim. i. 5. 8 Acts xiv. 21.
* Acts xvi. 14. • So Leake describes the neighborhood of
* See also the remarks on the Jews settled Karaman (Laranda), pp. 96, 97. Hamilton,
in Asia Minor, Ch. I. p. 16 ; and on the Hel- speaking of the same district, mentions " low
lenistic and Aramean Jews, Ch. II. p- 35. ridges of cretaceous limestone, extending into
6 Acte xvi. 13. 6 2 Tim. i. 5. the plain from the mountains." n. 324.

176 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap. vi.
was not far from that well-known pass1 which leads down from the
central table-land to Cilicia and Tarsus. But bis thoughts did not centre
in an earthly home. He turned back upon his footsteps ; and revisited
the places, Lystra, Iconium, and Antioch,2 where he himself had been
reviled and persecuted, but where he had left, as sheep in the desert, the
disciples whom his Master had enabled him to gather. They needed
building up and strengthening in the faith,3 comforting in the midst of
their inevitable sufferings, and fencing round by permanent institutions.
Therefore Paul and Barnabas revisited the scenes of their labors, un
daunted by the dangers which awaited them, and using words of
encouragement, which none but the founders of a true religion would
have ventured to address to their earliest converts, that " we can only
enter the* kingdom of God by passing through much tribulation." But
not only did they fortify their faith by passing words of encouragement ;
they ordained elders in every church after the pattern of the first
Christian communities in Palestine,4 and with that solemn observance
which had attended their own consecration,5 and which has been trans
mitted to later ages in connection with ordination, — " with fasting and
prayer," — they "made choice of fit persons to serve in the sacred
ministry of the Church." 6
Thus, having consigned their disciples to Him " in whom they had
believed," and who was " able to keep that which was intrusted to
Him,"7 Paul and Barnabas descended through the Pisidian mountains to
the plain of Pamphylia. If our conjecture is correct (see pp. 147, 148),
that they went up from Perga in spring, and returned at the close of
autumn,8 and spent all the hotter months of the year in the elevated dis
tricts, they would again pass in a few days through a great change of
seasons, and almost from winter to summer. The people of Pamphylia
would have returned from their cold residences to the warm shelter of the
plain by the seaside ; and Perga would be full of its inhabitants. The
Gospel was preached within the walls of this city, through which the
Apostles had merely passed 9 on their journey to the interior. But from

i The " Cilician Gates," to which we shall 6 Ch. V. p. 123.
return at the beginning of the second mission- 9 The First Collect for the Ember Weeks.
ary journey (Acts xv. 41). See the Map. 7 Acts xiv. 23. Compare 2 Tim. i. 12.
2 Mentioned (Acts xiv. 21) in the inverse s Wieseler thinks the events on this journey
order from that in which they had been visited must have occupied more than one year. It
before (xiii. 14, 51, xiv. 6). is evident that the case does not admit of any
3 Acts xiv. 22. thing more than conjecture.
4 The first mention of presbyters in the 9 See above, p. 143, and notes.
Christian, opposed to the Jewish sense, occurs
Acts xi. 30, in reference to the church at Jeru
salem. See Chapter XTTI.

ohap.vi. PERGA AND ATTALEIA. v 177
St. Luke's silence it appears that the preaching was attended with no
marked results. We read neither of conversions nor persecutions. The
Jews, if any Jews resided there, were less inquisitive and less tyrannical
than those at Antioch and Iconium ; and the votaries of " Diana before
the city " at Perga (see p. 143) were less excitable than those who
worshipped " Jupiter before the city " at Lystra.1 When the time came
for returning to Syria, they did not sail down the Cestrus, up the channel
of which river they had come on their arrival from Cyprus,2 but travelled
across the plain to Attaleia,3 which was situated on the edge of the
Pamphylian gulf.
Attaleia had something of the same relation to Perga which Cadiz has
to Seville. In each case the latter city is approached by a river-voyage,
and the former is more conveniently placed on the open sea. Attalus
Philadelphus, king of Pergamus, whose dominions extended from the
north-western corner of Asia Minor to the Sea of Pamphylia, had built
this city in a convenient position for commanding the trade of Syria or
Egypt. When Alexander the Great passed this way, no such city was in
existence : but since the days of the kings of Pergamus, who inherited a
fragment of his vast empire, Attaleia has always existed and flourished,
retaining the name of the monarch who built it.4 Behind it is the plain
through which the calcareous waters of the Catarrhactes flow, perpetually
constructing and destroying and reconstructing their fantastic channels.5
In front of it, and along the shore on each side, are long lines of cliffs,6
over which the river finds its way in waterfalls to the sea, and which
conceal the plain from those who look toward the land from the inner
waters of the bay, and even encroach on the prospect of the mountains
themselves. When this scene is before us, the mind reverts to another band of
Christian warriors, who once sailed from the bay of Satalia to the Syrian
Antioch. Certain passages, in which the movements of the Crusaders
and Apostles may be compared with each other, are among the striking
contrasts of history. Conrad and Louis, each with an army consisting
at first of 70,000 men, marched through part of the same districts which
were traversed by Paul and Barnabas alone and unprotected. The
shattered remains of the French host had come down to Attaleia through
1 Acts xiv. 13. 2 Pp. 143, 144. 4 Its modern name is Satalia.
8 A view may be seen in the work of Ad- 6 See Spratt and Forbes for a full account
miral Beaufort, who describes the city as of the irregular deposits and variations of
" beautifully situated round a small harbor, channel observable in this river.
the streets appearing to rise behind each other "• There are also ancient sea-cliffs at some
like the seats of a theatre . . . with a double distance behind the present coast-line.
wall and a series of square towers on the level
summit of the hill." 12

178

THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL.

chap. vi.

" the abrupt mountain-passes and the deep valleys " which are so well
described by the contemporary historian.1 They came to fight the battle
of the Cross with a great multitude, and with the armor of human
power : their journey was encompassed with defeat and death ; their
arrival at Attaleia was disastrous and disgraceful ; and they sailed to
Antioch a broken and dispirited army. But the Crusaders of the first
century, the Apostles of Christ, though they too passed " through much
tribulation," advanced from victory to victory. Their return to the
place " whence they had been recommended to the grace of God for the
work which they fulfilled," 2 was triumphant and joyful, for the weapons
of their warfare were " not carnal." 3 The Lord Himself was their
tower and their shield.

Coin of Antioch in Pisidia.4

1 William of Tyre. s Acts xiv. 26. 8 See 2 Cot. x. 4. * See note, p. 158.

CHAPTER VII.
Controversy in the Church. — Separation of Jews and Gentiles. — Difficulty in the Narrative. —
Discontent at Jerusalem. — Intrigues of the Judaizers at Antioch. — Mission of Paul and
Barnabas to Jerusalem. — Divine Revelation to St. Paul. — Titus. — Private Conferences.
— Public Meeting. — Speech of St. Peter. — Narrative of Barnabas and Paul. — Speech of
St. James. — The Decree. — Public Recognition of St. Paul's Mission to the Heathen. — St.
John. — Return to Antioch with Judas, Silas, and Mark. — Reading of the Letter. — Weak
Conduct of St. Peter at Antioch. — He is rebuked by St. Paul. — Personal Appearance of
the two Apostles. — Their Reconciliation.
IF, when we contrast the voyage of Paul and Barnabas across the bay
of Attaleia with the voyage of those who sailed over the same
waters in the same direction, eleven centuries later, our minds are power
fully drawn towards the pure age of early Christianity, when the power
of faith made human weakness irresistibly strong ; — the same thoughts
are not less forcibly presented to us, when we contrast the reception of
the Crusaders at Antioch, with the reception of the Apostles in the
same city. We are told by the chroniclers, that Raymond, " Prince
of Antioch," waited with much expectation for the arrival of the
French king ; and that when he heard of his landing at Seleucia, he
gathered together all the nobles and chief men of the people, and went
out to meet him, and brought him into Antioch with much pomp and
magnificence, showing him all reverence and homage, in the midst of a
great assemblage of the clergy and people. All that St. Luke tells us
of the reception of the Apostles after their victorious campaign, is, that
they entered into the city and " gathered together the Church, aud told
them how God had worked with them, and how He had opened a door
of faith to the Gentiles." 1 Thus the kingdom of God came at the first
"without observation,"2 — with the humble acknowledgment that all
power is given from above, — and with a thankful recognition of our
Father's merciful love to all mankind.
No age, however, of Christianity, not even the earliest, has been with
out its difficulties, controversies, and corruptions. The presence of Judas
among the Apostles, and of Ananias and Sapphira among the first dis
ciples,3 were proofs of the power which moral evil possesses to combine
' Acts xiv. 27 " Luke xvii. 20. 8 Acts v.
179

180 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap. vn.
itself with the holiest works. The misunderstanding of "the Grecians
and Hebrews " in the days of Stephen,1 the suspicion of the Apostles
when Paul came from Damascus to Jerusalem,2 the secession of Mark at
the beginning of the first missionary journey,3 were symptoms of the preju
dice, ignorance, and infirmity, in the midst of which the Gospel was to
win its way in the hearts of men. And the arrival of the Apostles at
Antioch at the close of their journey was presently followed by a troubled
controversy, which involved the most momentous consequences to all
future ages of the Church ; and led to that visit to Jerusalem which,
next after his conversion, is perhaps the most important passage in St.
Paul's life.
We have seen (Ch. I.) that great numbers of Jews had long been
dispersed beyond the limits of their own land, and were at this time
distributed over every part of the Roman Empire. " Moses had of old
time, in every city, them that preached him, being read in the syna
gogues every Sabbath day." 4 In every considerable city, both of the
East and West, were established some members of that mysterious peo
ple, — who had a written Law, which they read and re-read, in the midst
of the contempt of those who surrounded them, week by week, and year
by year, — who were bound everywhere by a secret link of affection to
one City in the world, where alone their religious sacrifices could be
offered, — whose whole life was utterly abhorrent from the temples and
images which crowded the neighborhood of their Synagogues, and from
the gay and licentious festivities of the Greek and Roman worship.
In the same way it might be said that Plato and Aristotle, Zeno
and Epicurus,6 " had in every city those that preached them." Side by
side with the doctrines of Judaism, the speculations of Greek philoso
phers were — not indeed read in connection with religious worthip — but
orally taught and publicly discussed in the schools. Hence the Jews, in
their foreign settlements, were surrounded, not only by an idolatry which
shocked all their deepest feelings, and by a shameless profligacy unfor
bidden by, and even associated with, that which the Gentiles called
religion, — but also by a proud and contemptuous philosophy that
alienated the more educated classes of society to as great a distance as
the unthinking multitude.
Thus a strong line of demarcation between the Jews and Gentiles ran
through the whole Roman Empire. Though their dwellings were often
contiguous, they were separated from each other by deep-rooted feelings
of aversion and contempt. The " middle wall of partition " 6 was built
i P. 61. 8 P. 145. 6 See Acts xvii. 18.
2 P. 98. 4 Acts xv. 21. 6 Eph. ii. 14.

ohap.th. SEPARATION OF JEWS AND GENTILES. 181
up by diligent hands on both sides. This mutual alienation existed, not
withstanding the vast number of proselytes, who were attracted to the
Jewish doctrine and worship, and who, as we have already observed
(Ch. I.), were silently preparing the way for the ultimate union of the
two races. The breach was even widened, in many cases, in consequence
of this work of proselytism : for those who went over to the Jewish
camp, or hesitated on the neutral ground, were looked on with some
suspicion by the Jews themselves, and thoroughly hated and despised by
the Gentiles.
It must be remembered that the separation of which we speak was both
religious and social. The Jews had a divine Law, which sanctioned the
principle, and enforced the practice, of national isolation. They could
not easily believe that this Law, with which all the glorious passages of
their history were associated, was meant only to endure for a limited
period: and we cannot but sympathize in the difficulty they felt in
accepting the notion of a cordial union with the uncircumcised, even
after idolatry was abandoned and morality observed. And again, the
peculiar character of the religion which isolated the Jews was such as
to place insuperable obstacles in the way of social union with other men.
Their ceremonial observances precluded the possibility of their eating
with the Gentiles. The nearest parallel we can find to this barrier be
tween the Jew and Gentile, is the institution of caste among the ancient
populations of India, which presents itself to our politicians as a perplex
ing fact in the government of the presidencies, and to our missionaries
as the great obstacle to the progress of Christianity in the East.1 A
Hindoo cannot eat with a Parsee, or a Mohammedan, — and among the
Hindoos themselves the meals of a Brahmin are polluted by the presence
of a Pariah, — though they meet and have free intercourse in the ordinary
transaction of business. So it was in the patriarchal age. It was " an
abomination for the Egyptians to eat bread with the Hebrews."2 The
same principle was divinely sanctioned for a time in the Mosaic In
stitutions. The Israelites, who lived among the Gentiles, met them
freely in the places of public resort, buying and selling, conversing and
disputing : but their families were separate : in the relations of domestic
life, it was " unlawful," as St. Peter said to Cornelius, " for a man that
was a Jew to keep company or come unto one of another nation."3
When St. Peter returned from the centurion at Caesarea to his brother-
Christians at Jerusalem, their great charge against him was that he had
1 See for instance the Memoir of the Rev. cerning the slaughtering of animals for food
H. W. Fox (1850), pp. 123-125. A short and the sale of the meat, is given in Allen's
tfatement of the strict regulations of the mod- Modern Judaism, ch. xxii.
ern Jews, in their present dispersed state, con- 2 Gen. xliii. 32. 8 Acts x. 28

182 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap.vii.
" gone in to men un circumcised, and had eaten with them: ?u and the
weak compliance of which he was guilty, after the true principle of social
unity had been publicly recognized, and which called forth the stern
rebuke of his brother-apostle, was that, after eating with the Gentiles,
he " withdrew and separated himself, fearing them which were of the
circumcision."2 How these two difficulties, which seem to forbid the formation of a
united Church on earth, were ever to be overcome, — how the Jews and
Gentiles were to be religiously united, without the enforced obliga
tion of the whole Mosaic Law, — how they were to be socially united as
equal brethren in the family of a common Father, — the solution of this
problem must in that day have appeared impossible. And without the
direct intervention of Divine grace it _ would have been impossible. We
now proceed to consider how that grace gave to the minds of the Apostles
the wisdom, discretion, forbearance, and firmness which were required ;
and how St. Paul was used as the great instrument in accomplishing a
work necessary to the very existence of the Christian Church.
We encounter here a difficulty, well known to all who have examined
this subject, in combining into one continuous narrative the statements
in the Epistle to the Galatians and in the Acts of the Apostles. In the
latter book we are informed of five distinct journeys made by the Apostle
to Jerusalem after the time of his conversion ; — first, when he escaped
from Damascus, and spent a fortnight with Peter ; 3 secondly, when he
took the collection from Antioch with Barnabas in the time of the famine;4
thirdly, on the occasion of the Council, which is now before us in the
fifteenth chapter of the Acts ; fourthly, in the interval between his sec
ond and third missionary journeys ;5 and, fifthly, when the uproar was
made in the Temple, and he was taken into the custody of the Roman
garrison.6 In the Epistle to the Galatians, St. Paul speaks of two jour
neys to Jerusalem, — the first being "three years" after his conversion,'
the second " fourteen years " later,8 when his own Apostleship was
asserted and recognized in a public meeting of the other Apostles.8
Now, while we have no difficulty in stating, as we have done (p. 95),
that the first journey of one account is the first journey of the other,
theologians have been variously divided in opinion, as to whether the sec
ond journey of the Epistle must be identified with the second, third, or
1 Acts xi. 3. 6 Acts xviii. 22. conversion. This question, as well as that
2 Gal. ii. 12. 6 Acts xxi. &c. of the reading " four," is discussed in Appes-
8 P. 95. 7 Gal. i. 18. dix I. See also the Chronological Table in
4 P. 117. Appendix III.
8 We take the "fourteen" (Gal. ii. 1) to 9 Gal. ii. 1-10.
refer to the preceding journey, and not to the

chap. vn. DIFFICULTY IN THE NARRATIVE. 188
fourth of the Acts ; or whether it is a separate journey, distinct from any
of them. It is agreed by all that the fifth cannot possibly be intended.1
The view we have adopted, that the second journey of the Epistle is the
third of the Acts, is that of the majority of the best critics and commen
tators. For the arguments by which it is justified, and for a full discus
sion of the whole subject, we must refer the reader to Appendix I.
Some of the arguments will be indirectly presented in the following nar
rative. So far as the circumstances combined together in the present
chapter appear natural, consecutive and coherent, so far some reason will
be given for believing that we are not following an arbitrary assumption
or a fanciful theory.
It is desirable to recur at the outset to the first instance of a Gentile's
conversion to Christianity.2 After the preceding remarks, we are prepared
to recognize the full significance of the emblematical3 vision which St.
Peter saw at Joppa. The trance into which he fell at the moment of his
hunger, — the vast sheet descending from heaven, — the promiscuous
assemblage of clean and unclean animals,4 — the voice from heaven
which said, " Arise, Peter, kill and eat," — the whole of this imagery is
invested with the deepest meaning, when we recollect all the details of
religious and social life, which separated, up to that moment, the Gentile
from the Jew. The words heard by St. Peter in his trance came like a
shock on all the prejudices of his Jewish education.5 He had never so
broken the Law of his forefathers as to eat any thing it condemned as
unclean. And though the same voice spoke to him " a second time, '6
and " answered him from heaven," ' — " What God has made clean that
call not thou common," — it required a wonderful combination of natu
ral8 and supernatural evidence to convince him that God is "no respecter
of persons," but " in every nation " accepts him that " feareth Him and

1 Some writers, e. g. Paley and Schrader, consequently lay no longer a claim to holiness ;
have contended that an entirely different jour- for the term ' holiness,' applied to mortals,
ney, not mentioned in the Acts, is alluded to. means only a framing of our desires by the
This also is discussed in Appendix I. will of God. . . . Have we not enough
2 Acts x., xi. to eat without touching forbidden things ?
8 The last emblematical visions (properly Let me beseech my dear fellow-believers not to
so called) were those seen by the prophet deceive themselves by saying, 'there is no sin
Zachariah. in eating of aught that lives ; ' on the con-
4 See Levit. xi. trary, there is sin and contamination too." —
6 The feeling of the Jews in all ages is Leeser's Jews and the Mosaic Law; ch. on
well illustrated by the following extract from a " The forbidden Meats." Philadelphia, 5594.
modern Jewish work : "If we disregard this 6 Acts x. 15. 7 Actsxi. 9.
precept, and say, ' What difference can it make s The coincidence of outward events and
to God if I eat the meat of an ox or swine ? ' inward admonitions was very similar to the cir-
we offend against His will, we pollute our- cumstances connected with St. Paul's baptism
selves by what goes into the mouth, and can by Ananias at Damascus. See above, p. 87.

181 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap.vu.
worketh righteousness," ' — that all such distinctions as depend on
" meat and drink," on " holydays, new moons, and sabbaths," were to
pass away, — that these things were only " a shadow of things to come,"
— that " the body is of Christ," — and that " in Him we are complete
. . . circumcised with a circumcision not made with hands . . . buried
with Him in baptism," and risen with Him through faith.2
The Christians " of the circumcision,"3 who travelled with Peter from
Joppa to Caesarea, were " astonished " when they saw " the gift of the
Holy Ghost poured out " on uncircumcised Gentiles : and much dissatis
faction was created in the Church, when intelligence of the whole trans
action came to Jerusalem. On Peter's arrival, his having " gone in to
men uncircumcised, and eaten with them," was arraigned as a serious
violation of religious duty. When St. Peter " rehearsed the matter from
the beginning, and expounded it by order," appealing to the evidence
of the " six brethren" who had accompanied him, — his accusers were
silent ; and so much conviction was produced at the time, that they
expressed their gratitude to God, for His mercy in " granting to the
Gentiles repentance unto life." * But subsequent events too surely
proved that the discontent at Jerusalem was only partially allayed.
Hesitation and perplexity began to arise in the minds of the Jewish
Christians, with scrupulous misgivings concerning the rectitude of St.
Peter's conduct, and an uncomfortable jealousy of the new converts.
And nothing could be more natural than all this jealousy and perplexity.
To us, with our present knowledge, it seems that the slightest relaxation
of a ceremonial law should have been willingly and eagerly welcomed.
But the view from the Jewish standing-point was very different. The
religious difficulty in the mind of a Jew was greater than we can easily
imagine. We can well believe that the minds of many may have been'
perplexed by the words and the conduct of our Lord Himself: for He
had not been sent " save to the lost sheep of the house of Israel," and
He had said that it was " not meet to take the children's bread and cast
it to dogs."6 Until St. Paul appeared before the Church in his true
character as the Apostle of the uncircumcision, few' understood that
" the law of the commandments contained in ordinances " had been
abolished by the cross of Christ;6 and that the "other sheep," not of
the Jewish fold, should be freely united to the " one flock " by the
"One Shepherd.'"
The smouldering feeling of discontent, which had existed from the first,
increased and became more evident as new Gentile converts were admitted
i Acts x. 34, 35. 2 See Col. ii. 8-23. » Matt. xv. 24, 26.
8 Acts x. 45 with xi. 12. 6 Eph. ii. 15.
4 Acts xi. 1-18. ' Not literally " one fold." John x. 1«.

chap, vn. DISCONTENT AT JERUSALEM. 185
into the Church. To pass over all the other events of the interval which
had elapsed since the baptism of Cornelius, the results of the recent
journey of Paul and Barnabas through the cities of Asia Minor must
have excited a great commotion among the Jewish Christians. " A door
of faith" had been opened "unto the Gentiles."1 "He that wrought
effectually in Peter to the Apostleship of the circumcision, the same had
been mighty in Paul toward the Gentiles." 2 And we cannot well doubt
that both he and Barnabas had freely joined in social intercourse with
the Gentile Christians, at Antioch in Pisidia, at Iconium, Lystra, and
Derbe, as Peter " at the first " 3 "a good while ago " 4 had eaten with
Cornelius at Caesarea. At Antioch in Syria, it seems evident that both
parties lived together in amicable intercourse and in much "freedom."5
Nor, indeed, is this the city where we should have expected the Jewish
controversy to have come to a crisis : for it was from Antioch that Paul
and Barnabas had first been sent as missionaries to the Heathen : 6 and it
was at Antioch that Greek proselytes had first accepted the truth,7
and that the united body of believers had first been called " Chris
tians."8 Jerusalem was the metropolis of the Jewish world. The exclusive
feelings which the Jews carried with them wherever they were diffused,
were concentrated in Jerusalem in their most intense degree. It was there,
in the sight of the Temple, and with all the recollections of their ancestors
surrounding their daily life, that the impatience of the Jewish Christians
kindled into burning indignation. They saw that Christianity, instead of
being the purest and holiest form of Judaism, was rapidly becoming a
universal and indiscriminating religion, in which the Jewish element
would be absorbed and lost. This revolution could not appear to them
in any other light than as a rebellion against all they had been taught to
hold inviolably sacred. And since there was no doubt that the great
instigator of this change of opinion was that Saul of Tarsus whom they
had once known as a young Pharisee at the " feet of Gamaliel," the con
test took the form of an attack made by " certain of the sect of the
Pharisees " upon St. Paul. The battle which had been, fought and lost
in the " Cilician synagogue '* was now to be renewed within the Church
itself. Some of the " false brethren" (for such is the name which St. Paul
gives to the Judaizers) 9 went down " from Judaea " to Antioch.10 The
course they adopted, in the first instance, was not that of open antagonism
to St. Paul, but rather of clandestine intrigue. They came as " spies "

'Acts xiv. 27. 8 Acts xv 14. 6 See Gal. ii. 4. ' Acts xi. 19-21. » Gal. ii. 4.
" Gal. ii. 8. * Acts xv 7. 8 Acts xiii. 1, &c. 8 Acts xi. 26. 10 Acts xv 1.

186 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. cHAp.vn.
into an enemy's.camp, creeping in " unawares," ' that they might ascertain
how far the Jewish Law had been relaxed by the Christians at Antioch ¦
their purpose being to bring the whole Church, if possible, under the
"bondage" of the Mosaic yoke. It appears that they remained some
considerable time at Antioch,2 gradually insinuating, or openly inculcat
ing, their opinion that the observance of the Jewish Law was necessary to
salvation. It is very important to observe the exact form which their
teaching assumed. They did not merely recommend or enjoin, for
prudential reasons, the continuance of certain ceremonies in themselves
indifferent : but they said, " Except ye be circumcised after the manner
of Moses, ye cannot be saved." Such a doctrine must have been instantly
opposed by St. Paul with his utmost energy. He was always ready to go
to the extreme verge of charitable concession, when the question was one
of peace and mutual understanding : but when the very foundations of
Christianity were in danger of being undermined, when the very con
tinuance of " the truth of the Gospel " 3 was in jeopardy, it was impossible
that he should " give place by subjection," even " for an hour."
The "dissension and disputation,"4 which arose between Paul and
Barnabas and the false brethren from Judaea, resulted in a general anxiety
and perplexity among the Syrian Christians. The minds of " those who
from among the Gentiles were turned unto God " were " troubled " and
unsettled.5 Those "words" which "perverted the Gospel of Christ"
tended also to " subvert the souls " of those who heard them.6 It was
determined, therefore, " that Paul and Barnabas, with certain others,
should go up to Jerusalem unto the Apostles and elders about this ques
tion." It was well known that those who were disturbing the peace of
the Church had their headquarters in Judaea. Such a theological party
could only be successfully met in the stronghold of Jewish nationality.
Moreover, the residence of the principal Apostles was at Jerusalem, and
the community over which " James " presided was still regarded as the
Mother Church of Christendom.
In addition to this mission with which St. Paul was intrusted by the
Church at Antioch, he received an intimation of the Divine Will, com
municated by direct revelation. Such a revelation at so momentous a
crisis must appear perfectly natural to all who believe that Christianity
was introduced into the world by the immediate power of God. If " a
man of Macedonia " appeared to Paul in the visions of the night, when
he was about to carry the Gospel from Asia into Europe : 7 if " the angel
1 Gal. ii. 4. 4 Acts xv. 2.
2 This may be inferred from the imperfect 6 Acts xv. 19.
in the Greek. Compare xiv. 28. e Gal. i. 7. Acts xv. 24.
8 Gal. ii. 5. 7 Acts xvi. 9

chap. vn. DIVINE REVELATION TO ST. PAUL. 187
of God " stood by him in the night, when the ship thai was conveying
him to Rome was in danger of sinking ; 1 we cannot wonder when he tells
us that, on this occasion, when he " went up to Jerusalem with Barna
bas," he went " by revelation." 2 And we need not be surprised, if we
find that St. Paul's path was determined by two different causes; that he
went to Jerusalem partly because the Church deputed him, and partly
because he was divinely admonished. Such a combination and co-opera
tion of the natural and the supernatural we have observed above,3 in the
case of that vision which induced St. Peter to go from Joppa to Caesarea.
Nor in adopting . this view of St. Paul's journey from Antioch to
Jerusalem, need we feel any great difficulty — from this circumstance,
that the two motives which conspired to direct him are separately men
tioned in different parts of Scripture. It is true that we are told in the
Acts4 simply that it was " determined " at Antioch that Paul should go
to Jerusalem ; and that in Galatians 5 we are informed by himself that
he went " by revelation." But we have an exact parallel in an earlier
journey, already related,6 from Jerusalem to Tarsus. In St. Luke's
narrative7 it is stated that "the brethren," knowing the conspiracy
against his hfe, " brought him down to Caesarea and sent him forth ; "
while in the speech of St. Paul himself,8 we are told that in a trance he
saw Jesus Christ, and received from Him a command to depart " quickly
out of Jerusalem."
Similarly directed from without and from within, he travelled to
Jerusalem on the occasion before us. It would seem that his companions
were carefully chosen with reference to the question in dispute. On the
one hand was Barnabas,9 a Jew and " a Levite " by birth,10 a good repre
sentative of the church of the circumcision. On the other hand was
Titus,11 now first mentioned 12 in the course of our narrative, a convert
from Heathenism, an uncircumcised " Greek." From the expression
used of the departure of this company it seems evident that the majority
of the Christians at Antioch were still faithful to the truth of the Gospel.
Had the Judaizers triumphed, it would hardly have been said that Paul
and his fellow-travellers were " brought on their way by the Church." ls
1 Ibid, xxvii. 23. 8 Acts xxii. 17, 18.
2 Gal. ii. 2. Schrader (who does not, how- 9 Acts xv. 2.
ever, identify this journey with that in Acts 10 Acts iv. 36. n Gal. ii. 1-5.
xv.) translates thus — " to make a revelation," B Titus is not mentioned at all in the Acts
which is a meaning the words can scarcely of the Apostles, and besides the present Epistle
bear. and that to Titus himself, he is only mentioned
8 Pp. 183, 184. in 2 Cor. and 2 Tim. In a later part of this
4 Acts xv. 2. work he will be noticed more particularly as
6 Gal. ii. 2. St. Paul's "fellow-laborer" (2 Cor. viii. 23).
* Ch. IH. p. 97. ' Acts ix. 30. 1B Acts xv. 3. So the phrase in xv. 40 may

188 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL.

chap. vn.

Their course was along the great Roman Road, which followed the
Phoenician coast-line, and traces of which are still seen on the cliffs over
hanging the sea : l and thence through the midland districts of Samaria
and Judaea. When last we had occasion to mention Phcenice,2 we were
alluding to those who were dispersed on the death of Stephen, and
preached the Gospel " to Jews only " on this part of the Syrian coast,
Now, it seems evident that many of the heathen Syro-Phceiiicians had
been converted to Christianity : for, as Paul and Barnabas passed through,
" declaring the conversion of the Gentiles, they caused great joy unto all
the brethren." As regards the Samaritans,3 we cannot be surprised that
they who, when Philip first " preached Christ unto them," had received
the Glad Tidings with " great joy," should be ready to express their
sympathy in the happiness of those who, like themselves, had recently
been " aliens from the commonwealth of Israel."
Fifteen years 4 had now elapsed since that memorable journey, when
St. Paul left Jerusalem, with all the zeal of a Pharisee, to persecute and
destroy. the Christians in Damascus.5 He had twice entered, as a Chris
tian, the Holy City again. Both visits had been short and hurried, and
surrounded with danger. The first was three years after his conversion,
when he spent a fortnight with Peter, and escaped assassination by a pre
cipitate flight to Tarsus.6 The second was in the year 44, when Peter
himself was in imminent danger, and when the messengers who brought
the charitable contribution from Antioch were probably compelled to
be reasonably adduced as a proof that the hence is Beyrut. The principal of its 50
feeling of the majority was with Paul rather Jewish inhabitants are R. Solomon, R. Oba-
than Barnabas. diah, and R. Joseph. It is hence one day's
1 Dr. Robinson passed two Roman mile- journey to Saida, which is Sidon of Scripture
stones between Tyre and Sidon (iii. 415), and [Acts xxvii. 3], a large city, with about 20
observed traces of a Roman road between Sidon Jewish families. . . . One day's journey to
and Beyrout. See also Fisher's Syria (i. 40) New Sur [Tyre, Acts xxi. 3], a very beautiful
for a notice of the Via Antonina between city. . . . The Jews of Sur are ship-owners
Beyrout and Tripoli. and manufacturers of the celebrated Tyriau
2 P. 109. Acts xi. 19, 20. It may be glass. . . . It is one day hence to Acre [Ptole-
interesting here to allude to the journey of a mais, Acts xxi. 7]. It is the frontier town
Jew in the Middle Ages from Antioch to of Palestine ; and, in consequence of its situa-
Jerusalem. It is probable that the stations, tion on the shore of the Mediterranean, and
the road, and the rate of travelling, were the of its large port, it is the principal place of
same, and the distribution of the Jews not disembarkation of all pilgrims who visit Jeru-
very different. We find the following passage salem by sea." — Early Travels to Palestine,
in the Itinerary of Benjamin of Tudela, who pp. 78-81.
travelled in 1163. " Two days bring us from 8 See p. 74.
Antioch to Lega, which is Latachia, and con- 4 Gal. ii. 1, where we ought probably to
tains about 200 Jews, the principal of whom reckon inclusively. See Appendix I.
are R. Chiia and R. Joseph  One day's 6 See Ch. HI.
journey to Gebal of the children of Ammon ; 6 P. 94. Compare p. 182.
it contains about 150 Jews. . . . Two days

chap. vii. JOURNEY TO JERUSALEM. 189
return immediately.1 Now St. Paul came, at a more peaceful period of
the Church's history, to be received as the successful champion of the
Gospel, and as the leader of the greatest revolution which the world has
seen. It was now undeniable that Christianity had spread to a wide
extent in the Gentile world, and that he had been the great instrument
in advancing its progress. He came to defend his own principles and
practice against an increasing torrent of opposition, which had disturbed
him in his distant ministrations at Antioch, but the fountain-head of
which was among the Pharisees at Jerusalem.
The Pharisees had been the companions of St. Paul's younger days.
Death had made many changes in the course of fifteen years ; but some
must have been there who had studied with him " at the feet of
Gamaliel." Their opposition was doubtless imbittered by remembering
what he had been before his conversion. Nor do we allude here to those
Pharisees who opposed Christianity. These were not the enemies whom
St. Paul came to resist. The time was past when the Jews, unassisted
by the Roman power, could exercise a cruel tyranny over the Church.
Its safety was no longer dependent on the wisdom or caution of Gamaliel.
The great debates at Jerusalem are no longer between Jews and Chris
tians in the Hellenistic synagogues, but between the Judaizing and
spiritual parties of the Christians themselves. Many of the Pharisees,
after the example of St. Paul, had believed that Jesus was Christ.2 But
they had not followed the example of their school-companion in the
surrender of Jewish bigotry. The battle, therefore, which had once been
fought without, was now to be renewed within, the Church. It seems
that, at the very first reception of Paul and Barnabas at Jerusalem, some
of these Pharisaic Christians " rose up," and insisted that the observance
of Judaism was necessary to salvation. They said that it was absolutely
" needful to circumcise " the new converts, and to " command them to
keep the Law of Moses." The whole course of St. Paul's procedure
among the Gentiles was here openly attacked. Barnabas was involved
in the same suspicion and reproach ; and with regard to Titus, who was
with them as the representative of the Gentile Church, it was asserted
that, without circumcision, he could not hope to be partaker of the bless
ings of the Gospel.
But far more was involved than any mere opposition, however factious,,
to individual missionaries, or than the severity of any conditions imposed
on individual converts. The question of liberty or bondage for all future
ages was to be decided ; and a convention of the whole Church at Jeru
salem was evidently called for. In the mean time, before " the Apostles
1 P. 117. Compare p. 182. 2 Acts xv. 5.

190 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap.v,,
and elders came together to consider of this matter,"1 St. Paul had
private conferences with the more influential members of the Christian
community,2 and especially with James, Peter, and John,3 the Great
Apostles and " Pillars " of the Church. Extreme caution and manage
ment were required, in consequence of the intrigues of the " false
brethren," both in Jerusalem and Antioch. He was, moreover, himself
the great object of suspicion ; and it was his duty to use every effort to
remove the growing prejudice. Thus, though conscious of his own in
spiration, and tenaciously holding the truth which he knew to be
essential, he yet acted with that prudence which was characteristic of his
whole life,4 and which he honestly avows in the Epistle to the Galatians.
If we may compare our own feeble imitations of Apostolic zeal and
prudence with the proceedings of the first founders of the Church of
Christ, we may say that these preliminary conferences were like the pri
vate meetings which prepare the way for a great religious assembly in Eng
land. Paul and Barnabas had been deputed from Antioch ; Titus wa>
with them as a sample of Gentile conversions, and a living proof of
their reality ; and the great end in view was to produce full conviction iD
the Church at large. At length the great meeting was summoned,5 which
was to settle the principles of missionary action among the Gentiles. It
was a scene of earnest debate, and perhaps, in its earlier portion, of angry
" disputing : " 6 but the passages which the Holy Spirit has caused to be
recorded for our instruction are those which relate to the Apostles them
selves, — the address of St. Peter, the narrative of Barnabas and Paul,
and the concluding speech of St. James. These three passages must be
separately considered in the order of Scripture.
St. Peter was the first of the Apostles who rose to address the
assembly.1 He gave his decision against the Judaizers, and in favor of
St. Paul. He reminded his hearers of the part which he himself had
taken in admitting the Gentiles into the Christian Church. They were
well aware, he said, that these recent converts in Syria and Cilicia were

1 Acts xv. 6. however, in this verse, is disputed. See nott
2 Gal. ii. 2. below, on the superscription of the decree, p.
8 Gal. ii. 9. 197.] Hence we must suppose, either that
4 See, for instance, the sixth and seventeenth the decision was made by the synod of the
verses of Acts xxiii. Apostles and Elders, and afterwards ratified
6 This meeting is described (Acts xv. 6) as by another larger meeting of the whole
consisting of the " Apostles and Elders ; " but Church, or that there was only one meeting,
the decision afterwards given is said to be the in which the whole Church took part, although
decision of " the Apostles and Elders with the only the " Apostles and Elders " are men-
whole Church " (ver. 22), and the decree was tioned.
sent in the names of " the Apostles, and Eld- 6 Acts xv. 7.
ers, and Brethren " (ver. 23). [The reading, i Acts xv. 7-11.

chap.vd. PUBLIC MEETING. 191
not the first Heathens -who had believed the Gospel, and that he himself
had been chosen by God to begin the work which St. Paul had only been
continuing. The communication of the Holy Ghost was the true test of
God's acceptance : and God had shown that He was no respecter of per
sons, by shedding abroad the same miraculous gifts on Jew and Gentile,
and purifying by faith the hearts of both alike. And then St. Peter
went on to speak, in touching language, of the yoke of the Jewish Law.
Its weight had pressed heavily on many generations of Jews, and was
well known to the Pharisees who were listening at that moment. They
had been relieved from legal bondage by the salvation offered through
faith ; and it would be tempting God, to impose on others a burden which
neither they nor their fathers had ever been able to bear.
The next speakers were Paul and Barnabas. There was great silence
through all the multitude,1 and every eye was turned on the missionaries,
while they gave the narrative of their journeys. Though Barnabas is
mentioned here before Paul,2 it is most likely that the latter was " the
chief speaker. But both of them appear to have addressed the audience.3
They had much to relate of what they had done and seen together : and
especially they made appeal to the miracles which God had worked among
the Gentiles by them. Such an appeal must have been a persuasive argu
ment to the Jew, who was familiar, in his ancient Scriptures, with many
Divine interruptions of the course of nature. These interferences had
signalized all the great passages of Jewish history. Jesus Christ had
proved His Divine mission in the same manner. And the events at
Paphos,4 at Iconium,6 and Lystra,6 could not well be regarded in any
other light than as a proof that the same Power had been with Paul and
Barnabas, which accompanied the words of Peter and John in Jerusalem
and Judaea.1 »
But the opinion of another speaker still remained to be given. This
was James, the brother of the Lord,8 who, from the austere sanctity of his
character, was commonly called, both by Jews and Christians, " James
the Just." No judgment could have such weight with the Judaizing party
as his. Not only in the vehement language in which he denounced the
1 Acts xv. 12. The imperfect, which is * Acts xiii. 11.
here used, implies attention to a continued 6 Acts xiv. 3.
uarrative. • Acts xiv. 8.
2 This order of the names in the narrative, ' Acts ii., v ., ix.
xv. 12, and in the letter below, ver. 25 (not in 8 See Acts xv. 13-22. It is well known
ver. 22), is a remarkable exception to the that there is much perplexity connected with
. phrase " Paul and Barnabas," which has been those apostles who bore the name of James.
usual since Acts xiii. See below, p. 197, We are not required here to enter into the
n. 4. investigation, and are content to adopt the
* See ver. 13, " after they were silent." opinion which is most probable.

192 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap.vu,
sins of the age, but even in garb and appearance, he resembled John the
Baptist, or one of the older prophets, rather than the other Apostles of
the new dispensation. " Like the ancient saints, even in outward aspect
with the austere features, the linen ephod, the bare feet, the long locks
and unshorn head of the Nazarite," l — such, according to tradition, was
the man who now came forward, and solemnly pronounced that Mosaic
rites were not of eternal obligation. After alluding to the argument of
Peter (whose name we find him characteristically quoting in its Jewish
form),2 he turns to the ancient prophets, and adduces a passage from
Amos 3 to prove that Christianity is the fulfilment of Judaism. And then
he passes to the historical aspect of the subject, contending that this ful-
filmeni was predetermined by God Himself, and that the Jewish dispen
sation was in truth the preparation for the Christian.4 Such a decision,
pronounced by one who stood emphatically on the confines of the two
dispensations, came with great force on all who heard it, and carried with
it the general opinion of the assembly to the conclusion that those " who
from among the Gentiles had turned unto God " should not be " trou
bled" with any Jewish obligations, except such as were necessary for
peace and the mutual good understanding of the two parties.
The spirit of charity and mutual forbearance is very evident in the
decree which was finally enacted. Its spirit was that expressed by St.
Paul in his Epistles to the Romans and Corinthians. He knew, and was
persuaded by the Lord Jesus, that nothing is unclean of itself: but to
him that esteemeth any thing to be unclean, to him it is unclean. He
knew that an idol is nothing in the world, and that there is none other God
but one. But all men have not this knowledge : some could not eat that
which had been offered in sacrifice to an idol without defiling their con
science. It is good to abstain from every thing whereby a weaker brother
may be led to stumble. To sin thus against our brethren is to sin against
Christ.5 In accordance with these principles it was enacted that the Gen
tile converts should be required to abstain from that which had been
polluted by being offered in sacrifice to idols, from the flesh of animals
which had been strangled, and generally from the eating of blood. The
reason for these conditions is stated in the verse to which particular
1 Stanley's Sermons and Essays, &c, p. ecy to the future destiny of the Jews; but we
295. We must refer here to the whole of the must observe, that the Apostles themselves ap-
Sermon on the Epistle of St. James, and of the ply such prophecies as this to the Christian
Essay on the Traditions of James the Just, espe- Dispensation. See Acts ii. 17.
cially pp. 292, 302, 327. * " Known from the beginning," &C-, 18
2 Acts xv. 14. So St. Peter names himself Compare Acts xvii. 26; Bom. i. 2; Eph. i. 10,
at the beginning of his Second Epistle. iii. 9, 10 ; Col. i. 26.
8 Amos ix. 11, 12. We are not required to 6 Rom. xiv ; 1 Cor. viii
express any opinion on the application of proph-

chap. vu. THE DECREE. 193
allusion has been made at the beginning of the present chapter.1 The
Law of Moses was read every Sabbath in all the cities where the Jews
were dispersed.2 A due consideration for the prejudices of the Jews made
it reasonable for the Gentile converts to comply with some of the restric
tions which the Mosaic Law and ancient custom had imposed on every
Jewish meal. In no other way could social intercourse be built up and
cemented between the two parties. If some forbearance were requisite
on the part of the Gentiles in complying with such conditions, not less
forbearance was required from the Jews in exacting no more. And to
the Gentiles themselves the restrictions were a merciful condition : for it
helped them to disentangle themselves more easily from the pollutions
connected with their idolatrous life. We are not merely concerned here
with the question of social separation, the food which was a delicacy3 to
the Gentile being abominated by the Jew, — nor with the difficulties of
weak and scrupulous consciences, who might fear too close a contact
between "the table of the Lord " and." the table of Demons," 4 — but
this controversy had an intimate connection with the principles of univer
sal morality. The most shameless violations of purity took place in con
nection with the sacrifices and feasts celebrated in honor of Heathen
divinities.5 Every thing, therefore, which tended to keep the Gentile
converts even from accidental or apparent association with these scenes
of vice, made their own recovery from pollution more easy, and enabled
the Jewish converts to look on their new Christian brethren with less
suspicion and antipathy. This seems to be the reason why we find an
acknowledged sin mentioned in the decree along with ceremonial observ
ances which were meant to be only temporary6 and perhaps local.1 We
1 Above, p. 180. There is some difference 2 Acts xv. 21.
of opinion as to the connection of this verse 8 We learn from Athena?us that the meat
with the context. Some consider it to imply from " things strangled " was regarded as a
that, while it was necessary to urge these con- delicacy among the Greeks.
ditions on the Gentiles, it was needless to say 4 1 Cor. x. 21 .
any thing to the Jews on the subject, since they s See Tholuck in his Nature and Moral In-
had the Law of Moses, and knew its require- fluence of Heathenism, part iii.
ments. Dean Milman infers that the regula- * We cannot, however, be surprised that one
tions were made because the Christians in gene- great branch of the Christian Church takes a
ral met in the same places of religious worship different view. The doctrine of the Greek
with the Jews. " These provisions were neces- Church, both Ancient and Modern, is in har-
sary, because the Mosaic Law was universally mony with the letter, as well as the spirit, of
read, and from immemorial usage, in the the Apostolic council.
synagogue. The direct violation of its most 7 At least the decree (Acts xv. 23) is ad-
vital principles by any of those who joined in dressed only to the churches of " Syria and
the common worship would be incongruous, Cilicia ; " and we do not see the subject alluded
»nd of course highly offensive to the more to again after xvi. 4.
zealous Mosaists." — Hist, of Christianity, vol.
i. p. 426, n. 13

194 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. cnAr.vu
must look on the whole subject from the Jewish point of view, and con
sider how violations of morality and contradictions of the ceremonial law
were associated together in the Gentile world. It is hardly necessary to
remark that much additional emphasis is given to the moral part of the
decree, when we remember that it was addressed to those who lived hi
close proximity to the profligate sanctuaries of Antioch and Paphos.1
We have said that the ceremonial part of the decree was intended for
a temporary and perhaps only a local observance. It is not for a moment
implied that any Jewish ceremony is necessary to salvation. On the con
trary, the great principle was asserted, once for all, that man is justified,
not by the law, but by faith : one immediate result was that Titus, the
companion of Paul and Barnabas, " was not compelled to be circum
cised."2 His case was not like that of Timothy at a later period,3 whose
circumcision was a prudential accommodation to circumstances, without
endangering the truth of the Gospel. To have circumcised Titus at the
time of the meeting in Jerusalem, would have been to have asserted that
he was "bound to keep the whole law."4 And when the alternative was
between " the liberty wherewith Christ has made us free," and the re-
imposition of " the yoke of bondage," St. Paul's language always was,5
that if Gentile converts were circumcised, Christ could "profit them
nothing." By seeking to be justified in the law, they fell from grace.6
In this firm refusal to comply with the demand of the Judaizers, the case
of all future converts from Heathenism was virtually involved. It was
asserted once for all, that in the Christian Church there is "neither Greek
nor Jew, circumcision nor uncircumcision, barbarian, Scythian, bond, nor
free : but that Christ is all and in all." 7 And St. Paul obtained the vic
tory for that principle, which, we cannot doubt, will hereafter destroy the
distinctions that are connected with the institutions of slavery in America
and of caste in India.
Certain other points decided in this meeting had a more direct personal
reference to St. Paul himself. His own independent mission had been
called in question. Some, perhaps, said that he was antagonistic to the
Apostles at Jerusalem, others that he was entirely dependent on them.8
All the Judaizers agreed in blaming his course of procedure among the
Gentiles. This course was now entirely approved by the other Apostles.
His independence was fully recognized. Those who were universally
regarded as " pillars of the truth," James, Peter, and John,9 gave to him
1 See above, pp. 116 and 140. 8 The charges brought against St. Paul by
2 Gal. ii. 3. 8 Acts xvi. 8. the Judaizers were very various at different
4 Gal. v. 3. ' Gal. v. 2. times.
8 Gal. v. 4. 9 It should be carefully observed here that
* Col. iii. 11. James is mentioned first of these Apostles who

CHAP.vn. RECOGNITION OF ST. PAUL'S MISSION. 195
and Barnabas the right hand of fellowship, and agreed that they should
be to the Heathen what themselves were to the" Jews. Thus was St. Paul
publicly acknowledged as the Apostle of the Gentiles, and openly placed
in that position from which " he shall never more go out," as a pillar of
the Temple of the " New Jerusalem," inscribed with the " New Name "
which proclaims the union of all mankind in one Saviour.1
One of those who gave the right hand of fellowship to St. Paul was
the " beloved disciple " of that Saviour.2 This is the only meeting of St.
Paul and St. John recorded in Scripture. It is, moreover, the last notice
which we find there of the life of St. John, until the time of the apoca
lyptic vision in the island of Patmos. For both these reasons the mind
seizes eagerly on the incident, though it is only casually mentioned in the
Epistle to the Galatians. Like other incidental notices contained in Scrip
ture, it is very suggestive of religious thoughts. St. John had been silent
during the discussion in the public assembly ; but at the close of it he
expressed his cordial union with St. Paul in " the truth of the Gospel."3
That union has been made visible to all ages by the juxtaposition of their
Epistles in the same Sacred Volume. They stand together among the
pillars of the Holy Temple ; and the Church of God is thankful to learn
how Contemplation may be united with Action, and Faith with Love,
in the spiritual life.
To the decree with which Paul and Barnabas were charged, one con
dition was annexed, with which they gladly promised to comply. We
have already had occasion to observe (p. 61) that the Hebrews of Judaea
were relatively poor, compared with those of the dispersion, and that the
Jewish Christians in Jerusalem were exposed to peculiar sufferings from
poverty ; and we have seen Paul and Barnabas once before the bearers
of a contribution from a foreign city for their relief (p. 118). They
were exhorted now to continue the same charitable work, and in their
journeys among the Gentiles and the dispersed Jews, " to remember the
poor" at Jerusalem.4 In proof of St. Paul's faithful discharge of this
were " pillars," and that Peter is mentioned by in the passage quoted from Revelation : " I
the name of Cephas, as in 1 Cor. i. 12. will write upon him . . . my new name."
1 See Rev. iii. 12. The same metaphor is 2 Gal. ii. 9.
found in 1 Tim. iii. 15, where Timothy is called 8 Gal ii. 5.
(for this seems the natural interpretation) 4 " Only that we should remember the poor ;
"a pillar and support of the truth." In these which also I was forward to do." Gal. ii. 10,
passages it is important to bear in mind the where the change from the plural to the singu-
peculiarity of ancient architecture, which was lar should be noticed. Is this because Barnabas
characterized by vertical columns, supporting was soon afterwards separated from St. Paul
horizontal entablatures. Inscriptions were often (Acts xv. 39), who had thenceforth to prose-
engraved on these columns. Hence the words cute the charitable work alone '

196 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap.vu.
promise, we need only allude to his zeal in making "the contribution for
the poor saints at Jerusalem " in Galatia, Macedonia, and Achaia,1 and
to that last journey to the Holy Land, when he went, " after many years,"
to take " alms to his nation."2 It is more important here to consider
(what indeed we have mentioned before) the effect which this charitable
exertion would have in binding together the divided parties in the
Church. There cannot be a doubt that the Apostles had this result
in view. Their anxiety on this subject is the best commentary on the
spirit in which they had met on this great occasion ; and we may rest
assured that the union of the Gentile and Jewish Christians was largely
promoted by the benevolent efforts which attended the diffusion of the
Apostolic Decree.
Thus the controversy being settled, Paul's mission to the Gentiles
being fully recognized, and his method of communicating the Gospel
approved by the other Apostles, and the promise being given, that, in
their journeys among the Heathen, they would remember the necessities
of the Hebrew Christians in Judaea, the two missionaries returned from
Jerusalem to Antioch. They carried with them the decree which was to
give peace to the consciences that had been troubled by the Judaizing
agitators ; and the two companions, Judas and Silas,3 who travelled with
them, were empowered to accredit their commission and character. It
seems also that Mark was another companion of Paul and Barnabas on
this journey ; for the last time we had occasion to mention his name was
when he withdrew from Pamphylia to Jerusalem (p. 144), and presently
we see him once more with his kinsman at Antioch.4
The reception of the travellers at Antioch was full of joy and satis
faction.6 The whole body of the Church was summoned together to hear
the reading of the letter ; and we can well imagine the eagerness with
which they crowded to listen, and the thankfulness and " consolation "
with which such a communication was received, after so much anxiety
and perplexity. The letter indeed is almost as interesting to us as to
them, not only because of the principle asserted and the results secured,
but also because it is the first document preserved to us from the acts of
the Primitive Church. The words of the original document, literally
translated, are as follows : —

1 "As I have given order to the Churches a Acts xxiv. 17.
of Galatia," &c, 1 Cor. xvi. 1-4. " It hath 8 Acts xv. 22, 27, 32.
pleased them of Macedonia and Achaia," &c * Acts xv. 37. • Act* XT. 31.
Rom. xv. 25, 26. See 2 Cor. viii., ix.

chap. vii. THE LETTER. 197
"The Apostles, and the Elders, and the Brethren,1 to the Gen- -*££¦
tile Brethren in Antioch, and Stria, and Cilicia, Greeting.2 23
. " Whereas we have heard that certain men who went out from us have 24
troubled you with words, and unsettled your souls 3 by telling you to cir
cumcise yourselves and keep the Law, although we gave them no such
commission :
" It has been determined by us,' being assembled with one accord, to 25
choose some from amongst ourselves and send them to you with our
beloved 4 Barnabas and Saul, men that have offered up their lives for the 26
name of our Lord Jesus Christ. We have sent therefore Judas and Silas, 27
who themselves also 5 will tell you by word the same which we tell you
by letter.
" For it has been determined by the Holy Spirit and by us, to lay upon 28
you no greater burden than these necessary things : that ye abstain from 29
meats offered to idols, and from blood, and from things strangled, and
from fornication. Wherefrom if ye keep yourselves it shall be well with
you. Farewell."
The encouragement inspired by this letter would be increased by the
sight of Judas and Silas, who were ready to confirm its contents by word
of mouth. These two disciples remained some short time at Antioch.
They were possessed of that power of " prophecy " which was one of the
forms in which the Holy Spirit made His presence known : and the
i We adhere to the Textus Receptus, al- 8 Although the best MSS. omit the words
though the" and" before "Brethren" is omit- "by telling. . .Law," yet we think they
ted in many weighty MSS. But it is supported cannot possibly be an interpolation.
by Chrysostom, by several of the uncial MSS., 4 It is another undesigned coincidence that
and by many of the most ancient versions. Its the names of these two Apostles are here in the
omission might have been caused by hierarchi- reverse order to that which, in St. Luke's nar-
eal tendencies. It should be observed that the rative (except when he speaks of Jerusalem),
phrase without the conjunction is entirely un- they have assumed since chap. xiii. In the
known elsewhere, which is a strong argument view of the Church at Jerusalem, Paul's name
against its being the correct reading here. would naturally come after that of Barnabas.
Also the omission appears to render the super- See above, p. 191, n. 2.
scription of this document inconsistent with the 6 The present participle may be explained
enumeration of the three distinct parties to it by the ancient idiom of letter-writing, by which
in verse 22. the writer transferred himself into the time of
2 " Greeting." The only other place where the reader.
this salutation occurs is James i. 1 ; an unde
signed coincidence tending to prove the genu
ineness of this document.

198 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. OHAp.vn
Syrian Christians were " exhorted and confirmed " by the exercise of this
miraculous gift.1 The minds of all were in great tranquillity when the
time came for the return of these messengers " to the Apostles " at Jeru
salem. Silas, however, either remained at Antioch, or soon came back
thither.2 He was destined, as we shall see, to become the companion of
St. Paul, and to be at the beginning of the second missionary journey
what Barnabas had been at the beginning of the first.
Two painful scenes were witnessed at Antioch before the Apostle
started on that second journey. We are informed 3 that Paul and Barna
bas protracted tlieir stay in this city, and were dilligently occupied, with
many others, in making the glad tidings of the Gospel known, and in the
general work of Christian instruction. It is in this interval of time that
we must place that visit of St. Peter to Antioch,4 which St. Paul men
tions in the Epistle to the Galatians,5 immediately after his notice of
the affairs of the Council. It appears that Peter, having come to Antioch
for some reason which is unknown to us,6 lived at first in free and unre
strained intercourse with the Gentile converts, meeting them in social
friendship, and eating with them, in full consistency with the spirit of the
recent decree, and with his own conduct in the case of Cornelius. At
this time certain Jewish brethren came " from James," who presided over
the Church at Jerusalem. Whether they were really sent on some
mission by the Apostle James, or we are merely to understand that they
came from Jerusalem, they brought with them their old Hebrew repug
nance against social intercourse with the uncircumcised ; and Peter in
their society began to vacillate. In weak compliance with their preju
dices, he " withdrew and separated himself" from those whom he had
lately treated as brethren and equals in Christ. Just as in an earlier
1 Acts xv. 32. Compare xiii. 1. objection to say that his conduct here was
2 Acts xv. 34. The reading here is doubt- equally inconsistent with his own previous con-
ful. The question, however, is immaterial. If duct in the case of Cornelius.
the verse is genuine, it modifies the phrase Abp. Whately (in the work quoted below, p.
" they were let go " in the preceding verse ; if 201, n. 1) assumes that Peter went to meet
not, we have merely to suppose that Silas went Paul at Jerusalem after the scene at Antioch,
to Jerusalem and then returned. and sees a close resemblance between Peter s
3 Acts xv. 35. words (Acts xv. 11) and those of Paul (Gal. ii.
* Neander places this meeting of Peter and 14-16).
Paul later ; but his reasons are far from satis- B Gal. ii. 11, &c.
factory. From the order of narration in the 6 The tradition which represents Peter as
Epistle to the Galatians, it is most natural to having held the See of Antioch before that of
infer that the meeting at Antioch took place Rome has been mentioned before, p. 119, "• !¦
soon after the Council at Jerusalem. Some Tillemont places the period of this episcopate
writers wish to make it anterior to the Council, about 36-42, a. d. He says it is " une chose
from an unwillingness to believe that St. Peter assez embarrassee ; " and it is certainly difficult
would have acted in this manner after the de- to reconcile it with Scripture.
cree. But it is a sufficient answer to this

chap. vii. ST. PETER REBUKED BY ST. PAUL. 199
part of his life he had first asserted his readiness to follow his Master to
death, and then denied Him through fear of a maid-servant, — so now,
after publicly protesting against the notion of making any difference
between the Jew and the Gentile, and against laying on the neck of the
latter a yoke which the former had never been able to bear,1 we find
him contradicting his own principles, and " through fear of those who
were of the circumcision " 2 giving all the sanction of his example to
the introduction of caste into the Church of Christ.
Such conduct could not fail to excite in St. Paul the utmost indigna
tion. St. Peter was not simply yielding a non-essential point, through a
tender consideration for the consciences of others. This would have
been quite in accordance with the principle so often asserted by his
brother-Apostle, that " it is good neither to eat flesh nor to drink wine,
nor any thing whereby thy brother stumbleth, or is made weak." Nor
was this proceeding a prudent and innocent accommodation to circum
stances, for the sake of furthering the Gospel, like St. Paul's conduct in
circumcising Timothy at Iconium ; 3 or, indeed, like the Apostolic Decree
itself. St. Peter was acting under the influence of a contemptible and
sinful motive, — the fear of man : and his behavior was giving a strong
sanction to the very heresy which was threatening the existence of the
Church ; namely, the opinion that the observance of Jewish ceremonies
was necessary to salvation. Nor was this all. Other Jewish Christians,
as was naturally to be expected, were led away by his example : and
even Barnabas, the chosen companion of the Apostle of the Gentiles,
who had been a witness and an actor in all the great transactions in
Cyprus, in Pisidia, and Lycaonia, — even Barnabas, the missionary, was
" carried away " with the dissimulation of the rest.4 When St. Paul was
a spectator of such inconsistency, and perceived both the motive in which
it originated and the results to which it was leading, he would have been
a traitor to his Master's cause, if he had hesitated (to use his own
emphatic words) to rebuke Peter " before all," and to " withstand him to
the face."5
It is evident from1 St. Paul's expression, that it was on some public
occasion that this open rebuke took place. The scene, though slightly
mentioned, is one of the most remarkable in Sacred History : and the
mind naturally labors to picture to itself the appearance of the two men.
It is, therefore, at least allowable to mention here that general notion of
the forms and features of the two Apostles, which has been handed
1 Acts xv. 9, 10. 2 Gal. ii. 12. early writers, that the whole scene was pre-
8 Acts xvi. 3. 4 Gal. ii. 13. arranged between Peter and Paul, and that
6 Gal. ii. 14, 11. there was no real misunderstanding. Even
We can only allude to the opinion of some Chrysostom advocates this unchristian view,

200 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL.

CHAP. VU.

down in tradition, and was represented by the early artists.1 St. Paul3
is set before us as having the strongly marked and prominent features
of a Jew, yet not without some of the finer lines indicative of Greek
thought. His stature was diminutive, and his body disfigured by some
lameness or distortion, which may have provoked the contemptuous
expressions of his enemies.3 His beard was long and thin. His head
was bald. The characteristics of his face were, a transparent complexion
which visibly betrayed the quick changes of his feelings, a bright gray
eye under thickly overhanging united eyebrows,4 a cheerful and winning
expression of countenance, which invited the approach and inspired the
confidence of strangers. It would be natural to infer,5 from his contin
ual journeys and manual labor, that he was possessed of great strength
of constitution. But men of delicate health have often gone through the
greatest exertions : 6 and his own words on more than one occasion show
that he suffered much from bodily infirmity.7 St. Peter is represented to
us as a man of larger and stronger form, as his character was harsher
and more abrupt. The quick impulses of his soul revealed themselves
in the flashes of a dark eye. The complexion of his face was pale and
sallow : and the short hair, which is described as entirely gray at the
time of his death, curled black and thick round his temples and his chin,
when the two Apostles stood together at Antioch, twenty years before
their martyrdom.
Believing, as we do, that these traditionary pictures have probably
some foundation in truth, we gladly take them as helps to the imagina
tion. And they certainly assist us in realizing a remarkable scene,
1 For the representations of St. Peter and all which the sturdy dignity and broad rustic
St. Paul in early pictures and mosaics, see the features of St. Peter, and the elegant contem-
first volume of Mrs. Jameson's Sacred and plative head of St. Paul, who looks like a Greek
Legendary Art, especially pp. 145, 159, 161, 162, philosopher, form a most interesting and sugf
201. They correspond with the traditionary gestive contrast." The dispute at Antioch is
descriptions referred to in the next note. " St. the subject of a picture by Guido. See p. 187.
Peter is a robust old man, with a broad fore- 2 The descriptions of St. Paul's appearance
head, and rather coarse features, an open un- by Malalas and Nicephorus are given at length
daunted countenance, short gray hair, and short in the larger editions.
thick beard, curled, and of a silvery white. 8 See above, p. 170.
Paul was a man of small and meagre stature, 4 See above, p. 134, n. I.
with an aquiline nose, and sparkling eyes : in 6 See Acts xx. 7 ; 1 Thess. ii. 9 ; 2 Thess.
the Greek type the face is long and oval, the iii. 8 ; 2 Cor. xi. 23-28. See Tholuck's Essay
forehead high and bald ; the hair brown, the on St. Paul's early Life, for some speculations
beard long, flowing, and pointed. . . . These on the Apostle's temperament.
traditional characteristic types of the features 6 The instance of Alfred the Great may be
and person of the two greatest Apostles were rightly alluded to. His biographer, Asser,
long adhered to. We find them most strictly says that from his youth to his death he was
followed in the old Greek mosaics, in the early always either suffering pain or expecting it.
Christian sculpture, and the early pictures, in ' See 2 Cor. xii. 7 ; Gal. iv. 13, 14.

chap. Tn. THEIR RECONCILIATION. 201
where Judaism and Christianity, in the persons of two Apostles, are
for a moment brought before us in strong antagonism. The words
addressed by St. Paul to St. Peter before the assembled Christians at
Antioch, contain the full statement of the Gospel as opposed to the Law.
" If thou, being born a Jew, art wont to live l according to the customs
of the Gentiles and not of the Jews, why wouldest thou now constrain the
Gentiles to keep the ordinances of the Jews ? We are Jews by birth, and
not unhallowed Gentiles ; yet, knowing that a man is not justified by the
works of the law, but by the faith of Jesus Christ, we ourselves also
have put our faith in Christ Jesus, that we might be justified by the
faith of Christ, and not by the works of the law. For by the works of
tho law gjjall 110 fl«S^ bt jtt&txfxtb." 2 These sentences contain in a
condensed form the whole argument of the Epistles to the Galatians and
Romans. Though the sternest indignation is expressed in this rebuke, we have
no reason to suppose that any actual quarrel took place between the two
Apostles. It is not improbable that St. Peter was immediately convinced
of his fault, and melted at once into repentance. His mind was easily
susceptible of quick and sudden changes ; his disposition was loving and
generous : and we should expect his contrition, as well as his weakness,
at Antioch, to be what it was in the high priest's house at Jerusalem.
Yet, when we read the narrative of this rebuke in St. Paul's epistle, it is
a relief to turn to that passage at the conclusion of one of St. Peter's
letters, where, in speaking of the "long-suffering of our Lord" and of
the prospect of sinless happiness in the world to come, he alludes, in
touching words, to the Epistles of "our beloved brother Paul." 3 We see
how entirely all past differences are forgotten, — how all earthly misun-
1 A spiritual sense is assigned to the word — " If thou art in the habit of living with the
" live," in this passage, by Abp. Whately (Lee- freedom of a Gentile, and not the strictness of a
lures on the Characters of our Lord's Apostles, Jew, why dost thou attempt to coerce the Gen-
1853, p. 193), and by Bp. Hinds (Scripture and tiles into Judaism ? "
the Authorized Version, 1853, p. 18). The 2 The quotation is from Psalm cxliii. 2,
Archbishop says, rather strongly, that he be- which is also quoted in the same connection,
lieves that " any competent judge, who care- Rom. iii. 20. There is much difference of
fully examines the original," will acknowledge opinion among commentators on Gal. ii. as to
the following to be the true sense of the passage : the point where Paul's address to Peter termi-
" If thou, though a Jew by birth, yet hast life nates. Many writers think it continues to the
(i. e. spiritual life) on the same terms as the end of the chapter. We are inclined to believe
Gentiles, and not by virtue of thy being a Jew, that it ends at v. 16 ; and that the words which
why dost thou urge the Gentiles to Judaize ? " follow are intended to meet doctrinal objec-
It is, however, certain that many competent tions (similar to those in Rom. iii. 3, 5, vi. 1,
persons have examined the passage carefully 15, vii. 7, 13) which the Galatians might natu-
without coming to this conclusion ; and we rally be supposed to make.
cannot seij that there is any real difficulty in . 8 2 Pet. iii. 15, 16.
following the natural translation of the words :

202

THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL.

CHAP. vii.

derstandings are absorbed and lost in the contemplation of Christ and
eternal life. Not only did the Holy Spirit overrule all contrarieties, so
that the writings of both Apostles teach the Church the same doctrine:
but the Apostle who was rebuked " is not ashamed to call the attention of
the Church to epistles in one page of which his own censure is recorded."1
It is an eminent triumph of Christian humility and love. We shall not
again have occasion to mention St. Peter and St. Paul together, until we
come to the last scene of all.2 But, though they might seldom meet
whilst laboring in their Master's cause, their lives were united, " and in
their deaths they were not divided."

Coin of Antioch.8

1 Dr. Vanghan's Harrow Sermons (1846),
p. 410. 2 The martyrdom at Rome. See Mrs.
Jameson's Work, especially pp. 180-183, 193-
195.

8 From the British Museum. See Mr.
Scharfs drawing above, p. 116, and what ii
said there of the emblematical representation
of Antioch. On this coin the seated figure bean
a palm-branch, as the emblem of victory.

CHAPTER Vm
Political Divisions of Asia Minor. — Difficulties of the Subject. — Provinces in the Reigns of
Claudius and Nero. — I. ASIA. — II. BITHYNIA. — HI. PAMPHYLIA. — IV. GALA
TIA.— V. PONTUS. — VI. CAPPADOCIA. — VH. — CILICIA. — Visitation of the
Churches proposed. — Quarrel and Separation of Paul and Barnabas. — Paul and Silas in
Cilicia. — They cross the Taurus. — Lystra. — Timothy. — His Circumcision. — Journey
through Phrygia. — Sickness of St. Paul. — His Reception in Galatia. — Journey to the
JEgean. — Alexandria Troas. — St. Paul's Vision.
TT1HE life of St. Paul being that of a traveller, and our purpose being
JL to give a picture of the circumstances by which he was surrounded,
it is often necessary to refer to the geography, both physical and political,
of the countries through which he passed. This is the more needful in
the case of Asia Minor, not only because it was the scene of a very great
portion of his journeys, but because it is less known to ordinary readers
than Palestine, Italy, or Greece. We have already described, at some
length, the physical geography of those southern districts which are in
the immediate neighborhood of Mount Taurus.1 And now that the
Apostle's travels take a wider range, and cross the Asiatic peninsula from
Syria to the frontiers of Europe, it is important to take a general view of
the political geography of this part of the Roman Empire. Unless such
a view is obtained in the first place, it is impossible to understand the
topographical expressions employed in the narrative, or to conjecture the
social relations into which St. Paul was brought in the course of his jour
neys 2 through Asia Minor.
It is, however, no easy task to ascertain the exact boundaries of the
Eoman provinces in this part of the world at any given date between
Augustus and Constantine. In the first place, these boundaries were con
tinually changing. The area of the different political districts was liable
to sudden and arbitrary alterations. Such terms as " Asia," 3 " Pam
phylia,"4 <fec, though denoting the extent of a true political jurisdiction,
implied a larger or smaller territory at one time than another. And
again, we find the names of earlier and later periods of history mixed
1 Ch. I. pp. 19-21. Ch. VI. pp. 141, 8 Acts ii. 9, vi. 9, xvi. 6, xix. 10, 27, 31,
142. xx. 16, 18, xxvii. 2 ; 1 Cor. xvi. 19 ; 2 Cor. i
2 i. e. the journeys in Acts xvi. and Acts 8 ; 2 Tim. i. 15 ; 1 Pet. i. 1.
fviii. * Acts ii. 10, xiii. 13, xv. 38, xxvii. 5.
203

204 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. cuap.vui,
up together in inextricable confusion. Some of the oldest geographical
terms, such as " iEolis," " Ionia," " Caria," " Lydia," were disappearing
from ordinary use in the time of the Apostles : l but others, such as
" Mysia " '¦ and " Lycaonia," 3 still remained. Obsolete and existing
divisions are presented to us together : and the common maps of Asia
Minor * are as unsatisfactory as if a map of France were set before us,
distributed half into provinces and half into departments. And in the third
place, some of the names have no political significance at all, but express
rather the ethnographical relations of ancient tribes. Thus, " Pisidia " s
denotes a district which might partly be in one province and partly in
another; and "Phrygia"6 reminds us of the diffusion of an ancient
people, the broken portions of whose territory were now under the juris
diction of three or four distinct governors. Cases of this kind are, at
first sight, more embarrassing than the others. They are not merely
similar to the twofold subdivision of Ireland, where a province, like
Ulster, may contain several definite counties : but a nearer parallel is to
be found in Scotland, where a geographical district, associated with many
historical recollections,-^ such as Galloway or Lothian, — maybe partly
in one county and partly in another.
Our purpose is to elucidate the political subdivisions of Asia Minor as
they were in the reigns of Claudius and Nero, — or, in other words, to
enumerate the provinces which existed, and to describe the boundaries
which were assigned to them, in the middle of the first century of the
Christian era. The order we shall follow is from West to East, and in so
doing we shall not deviate widely from the order in which the provinces
were successively incorporated as substantive parts of the Roman Empire.
We are not, indeed, to suppose that St. Luke and St. Paul used all their
topographical expressions in the strict political sense, even when such a
sense was more or less customary. There was an exact usage and a
popular usage of all these terms. But the first step towards fixing our
geographical ideas of Asia Minor, must be to trace the boundaries of the
provinces. When this is done, we shall be better able to distinguish
those terms which, about the year 50 a.d., had ceased to have any true
political significance, and to discriminate between the technical and the
popular language of the sacred writers.

1 Tacitus, Vitruvius, Justin, &c., speak of political divisions of three or four different
Pergamus, Ephesus, Cnidus, Thyatira, &c, as periods are confused together. In some of
towns of Asia, not of -<Eolis, Ionia, Caria, the more recent, the Roman provincial diYis-
Lydia, &c., respectively. See Acts xxvii. 2, ions are indicated, and the emperor's and sen-
Rev, i. 1 1 . ate's provinces distinguished.
2 Acts xvi. 7, 8. 3 Acts xiv. 6, 11. 6 Acts xiii. 14, xiv. 24.
4 In the ordinary maps, ethnographical and 6 Acts ii. 10, xvi. 6, xviii. 23.

CHAP.vm. ASIA. 205
I. Asia. — There is sometimes a remarkable interest associated with
the history of a geographical term. One case of this kind is suggested
by the allusion which has just been made to the British islands. Early
writers speak of Ireland under the appellation of " Scotia." Certain of
its inhabitants crossed over to the opposite coast : J their name spread along
with their influence : and at length the title of Scotland was entirely trans
ferred from one island to the other. In classical history we have a simi
lar instance in the name of " Italy," which at first only denoted the
southernmost extremity of the peninsula : then it was extended so as to
include the whole with the exception of Cisalpine Gaul : and finally,
crossing the Rubicon, it advanced to the Alps ; while the name of " Gaul "
retreated beyond them. Another instance, on a larger scale, is presented
to us on the south of the Mediterranean. The " Africa " of the Romans
spread from a limited territory on the shore of that sea, till it embraced
the whole continent which was circumnavigated by Vasco di Gama. And
similarly the term, by which we are accustomed to designate the larger
and more famous continent of the ancient world, traces its derivation to
the " Asian meadow by the streams of the Cayster," 2 celebrated in the
poems of Homer.
This is the earliest occurrence of the word " Asia." We find, how
ever, even in the older poets,3 the word used in its widest sense to denote
all the countries in the far East. Either the Greeks, made familiar with
the original Asia by the settlement of their kindred in its neighborhood,
applied it as a generic appellation to all the regions beyond it : 4 or the
extension of the kingdom of Lydia from the banks of the Cayster to the
Halys as its eastern boundary, diffused the name of Asia as far as that
river, and thus suggested the division of Herodotus into " Asia within
the Halys " and " Asia beyond the Halys." 5 However this might be, the
term retained, through the Greek and Roman periods, both a wider and a
narrower sense ; of which senses we are concerned only with the latter
The Asia of the New Testament is not the continent which stretches into
the remote East from the Black Sea and the Red Sea, but simply the
western portion of that peninsula which, in modern times, has received
the name of " Asia Minor." 6 What extent of country, and what political
i
1 See beginning of Bede's History. Minor) have come into use in the same
2 Virgil adopts the phrase from Homer. It way.
does not appear that the Roman prose writers 6 We may compare the case of " Pates-
ever used the word in its primitive and nar- tine," which at first meant only the country
rawest sense. of the Philistines, and then was used by the
3 As in JEschylus. Greeks and Romans to designate the whole of
* Having the same general meaning as our the land of Canaan.
phrase " The East." The. words " Levant " 8 The peninsula which we call Asia Minor
and "Anadoli" (the modern name of Asia was never treated by the ancients as a geo-

206 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. cHAP.vm.
significance, we are to assign to the term, will be shown by a statement of
a few historical changes.
The fall of Croesus reduced the Lydian kingdom to a Persian satrapy,
With the rest of the Persian empire, this region west of the Halys fell
before the armies of Alexander. In the confusion which followed the
conqueror's death, an independent dynasty established itself at Pergamus,
not far from the site of ancient Troy. At first their territory was nar
row, and Attalus I. had to struggle with the Gauls who had invaded the
peninsula, and with the neighboring chieftains of Bithynia, who had
invited them.1 Antagonists still more formidable were the Greek kings
of Syria, who claimed to be " Kings of Asia," and aimed at the possession
of the whole peninsula.2 But the Romans appeared in the East, and
ordered Antiochus to retire beyond the Taurus, and then conferred
substantial rewards on their faithful allies. Rhodes became the mistress
of Caria and Lycia, on the opposite coast ; and Eumenes, the son of Attalus,
received, in the West and North-west, Lydia and Mysia, and a good
portion of that vague region in the interior which was usually denominat
ed "Phrygia,"3 — stretching in one direction over the district of
Lycaonia.4 Then it was that, as 150 years since the Margraves of Bran
denburg became Kings of Prussia, so the Princes of Pergamus became
" Kings of Asia." For a time they reigned over a highly-civilized
territory, which extended from sea to sea. The library of Pergamus was
the rival of that of Alexandria : and Attaleia, from whence we have
lately seen the Apostle sailing to Syria5 (Acts xiv. 25, 26) and Troas,
from whence we shall presently see him sailing to Europe (Acts xvi. IPi,
were the southern and northern (or rather the eastern and western)
harbors of King Attalus H. At length the debt of gratitude to the
Romans was paid by King Attalus III. ,x who died in the year 133 B.C.,
and left by testament the whole of his dominions to the benefactors of
graphical whole. The common divisions were, driven beyond the Taurus by the Romans, we
" Asia within the Halys " and " Asia be- see it retained by them, as the title of " King
yond the Halys " (as above) ; or, " Asia with- of France " was retained by our own mon-
in the Taurus " and " Asia beyond the Tau- archs until a very recent period. See 1 Mace.
rus." It is very important to bear this in xi. 13, xii. 39, xiii. 32 ; 2 Mace. iii. 3.
mind for some interpreters of the New Tes- » The case of Mysia, in consequence of
tament imagine that the Asia there spoken of the difficulties of Acts xvi. 7, 8, will be ex-
is the peninsula of Lesser Asia. The term amined particularly, when we come to this
"Asia Minor " is first found in Orosius, a writer part of St. Paul's journey.
of the fourth century, though " Asia Major " 4 Thus Iconium, Lystra, and Derbe were
is used by Justin to denote the remote and probably once in ¦' Asia." See below, under
eastern parts of the continent. Galatia.
i See below, p. 207. 6 Pp. 177, 178. Another Scripture city,
9 In the first book of Maccabees (viii. 6) the Philadelphia of Rev. i. 11, iii. 7, was also
we find Antiochus tlje Great called by this built by Attalus II. (Philadelphus).
title. And even after his successors were

chap. Trn. BITHYNIA. 207
his house. And now the " Province of Asia " appears for the first time
as a new and significant term in the history of the world. The newly-
acquired possession was placed under a praetor, and ultimately a pro
consul.1 The letters and speeches of Cicero make us familiar with the
names of more than one who enjoyed this distinction. One was the
orator's brother, Quintus ; another was Flaccus, whose conduct as
governor he defended before the Senate. Some slight changes in the
extent of the province may be traced. Pamphylia was withdrawn from
this jurisdiction. Rhodes lost her continental possessions, and Caria was
added to Asia, while Lycia was declared independent. The boundary
on the side of Phrygia is not easily determined, and was probably
variable.2 But enough has been said to give a general idea of what is
meant in the New Testament by that uAsia" which St. Paul attempted
to enter (Acts xvi. 6), after passing through Phrygia and Galatia ; which
St. Peter addressed in his First Epistle (1 Pet. i. 1), along with Pontus,
Cappadocia, Galatia, and Bithynia ; and which embraced the " seven
churches " (Rev. i. 11) whose angels are mentioned in the Revelation of
St. John.
II. Bithynia. — Next to Asia, both in proximity of situation and in the
order of its establishment, was the province of Bithynia. Nor were the
circumstances very different under which these two provinces passed
under the Roman sceptre. As a new dynasty established itself after the
death of Alexander on the north-eastern shores of the iEgean, so an older
dynasty secured its independence at the western edge of the Black Sea.
Nicomedes I. was the king who invited the Gauls with whom Attalus I.
had to contend : and as Attalus III., the last of the House of Pergamus,
paid his debt to the Romans by making them his heirs, so the last of the
Bithynian House, Nicomedes IH., left his kingdom as a legacy to the
same power in the year 75. It received some accessions on the east
after the defeat of Mithridates ; and in this condition we find it in the list
given by Dio of the provinces of Augustus ; the debatable land between it
and Asia being the district of Mysia, through which it is neither easy nor
necessary to draw the exact frontier-line.8 Stretching inland from the
1 We learn from Acts xix. 38 — " there are 2 Hence we find both the sacred and heathen
proconsuls (deputies) " — that it was a pro- writers of the period sometimes including
consular or senatorial province. The impor- Phrygia in Asia and sometimes excluding it.
tant distinction between the emperor's and the In 1 Pet. i. 1 it seems to be included ; in Acts
senate's provinces has been carefully stated in ii. 9, 10, xvi. 6, it is expressly excluded.
Ch. V. pp. 129-31. The incidental proof in 8 See below, on Acts xvi. 7, 8,
the Acts is confirmed by Strabo and Dio, who
tell us that Augustus made Asia a proconsular
province.

208 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. CHAP.vm.
shores of the Propontis and Bosphorus, beyond the lakes near the cities of
Nicaea and Nicomedia, to the upper ravines of the Sangarius, and the
snowy range of Mount Olympus, it was a province rich in all the changes
of beauty and grandeur. Its history is as varied as its scenery, if we trace
it from the time when Hannibal was an exile at the court of Prusias,1 to
the establishment of Othman's Mohammedan capital in the city which
still bears that monarch's name. It was Hadrian's favorite province, and
many monuments remain of that emperor's partiality.2 But we cannot
say more of it without leaving our proper subject. We have no reason to
believe that St. Paul ever entered it, though once he made the attempt.8
Except the passing mention of Bithynia in this and one other place,4 it
has no connection with the apostolic writings. The first great passage of
its ecclesiastical history is found in the correspondence of Trajan with its
governor Pliny, concerning the persecution of the Christians. The second
is the meeting of the first general council, when the Nicene Creed was
drawn up on the banks of the Lake Ascanius.
III. Pamphylia. — This province has been already mentioned (Chap.
VI.) as one of the regions traversed by St. Paul in his first missionary
journey. But though its physical features have been described, its
political limits have not been determined. The true Pamphylia of the
earliest writers is simply the plain which borders the Bay of Attaleia, and
which, as we have said (p. 142), retreats itself like a bay into the moun
tains. How small and insignificant this territory was, may be seen from
the records of the Persian war, to which Herodotus says that it sent only
thirty ships ; while Lycia, on one side, contributed fifty, and Cilicia, on
the other, a hundred. Nor do we find the name invested with any wider
significance, till we approach the frontier of .the Roman period. A
singular dispute between Antiochus and the king of Pergamus, as to
whether Pamphylia was really within or beyond Mount Taurus, was de
cided by the Romans in favor of their ally.5 This could only be effected
by a generous inclusion of a good portion of the mountainous country
within the range of this geographical term. Henceforward, if not before,
Pamphylia comprehended some considerable part of what was anciently
called Pisidia. We have seen that the Romans united it to the kingdom

1 The town of Broussa reminds us of this feeling. Hadrian took it from tne senate,
another illustrious African exile, Abd-el-Kader, and placed it under his own jurisdiction. But
who since the earthquake (after visiting Paris) when St. Paul passed this way, it was under
has been permitted to withdraw to Damascus the senate, as may be proved by coins both of
(1855). the reign of Claudius and subsequent dates.
2 It was the birthplace of his favorite An- 8 Acts xvi. 7.
tinous ; and coins are extant which illustrate * 1 Pet. i. 1 . 6 See p. 206.

chap.vhi. PAMPHYLIA. — GALATIA. 209
of Asia. It was, therefore, part of the province of Asia at the death of
Attalus. It is difficult to trace the steps by which it was detached from
that province. We find it (along with certain districts of Asia) included
in the military jurisdiction of Cicero, when he was governor of Cilicia.1
It is spoken of as a separate province in the reign of Augustus.2 Its
boundary on the Pisidian side, or in the direction of Phrygia,3 must be
left indeterminate. Pisidia was included in this province : but, again,
Pisidia is itself indeterminate : and we have good reasons for believing
that Antioch in Pisidia was really under the governor of Galatia. Cilicia
was contiguous to Pamphylia on the east. Lycia was a separate region
on the west, first as an appendage to Rhodes 4 in the time of the republic,
and then as a free state under the earliest emperors ; but about the very
time when Paul was travelling in these countries, Claudius brought it
within the provincial system, and united it to Pamphylia:5 and inscrip
tions make us acquainted with a public officer who bore the title of
" Proconsul of Lycia and Pamphylia."
IV. Galatia. — We now come to a political division of Asia Minor,
which demands a more careful attention. Its sacred interest is greater
than that of all the others, and its history is more peculiar. The Chris
tians of Galatia were they who received the Apostle " as if he had been
an angel," — who, " if it had been possible, would have plucked out their
eyes and given them to him," — and then were " so soon removed " by
new teachers "from him that called them, to another Gospel," — who
began to " run well," and then were hindered, — who were " bewitched "
by that zeal which compassed sea and land to make one proselyte, — and
who were as ready, in the fervor of their party spirit, to " bite and de
vour one another," as they were willing to change their teachers and
their gospels.7 It is no mere fancy which discovers, in these expressions
of St. Paul's Epistle, indications of the character of that remarkable
race of mankind, which all writers, from Caesar to Thierry, have de
scribed as susceptible of quick impressions and sudden changes, with a
fickleness equal to their courage and enthusiasm, and a constant liability
1 Ep. adAtt. v. 21. 6 This we have on the authority of Dio
2 Dio Cassius tells us that the Pamphylian Cassius and Suetonius. The latter writer says,
districts bestowed on Amyntas were restored that about the same time Claudius made over
by Augustus to their own province. The to the senate the provinces of Macedonia and
same author is referred to below (n. 5) for a Achaia. Hence we fine a proconsul at Corinth.
change in the reign of Claudius. Acts xviii. 12.
3 Pisidia was often reckoned as a part of 6 At a later period Lycia was a distinct
Phrygia, under the name of " Pisidian Phry- province, with Myra as its capital. See Ch.
gia." XXIII.
4 See above, p. 206. 7 Gal. iv. 15, i. 6, v. 7, iii. 1, i. 7, v 15.
U

210 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap.vih.
to that disunion which is the fruit of excessive vanity, — that race, which
has not only produced one of the greatest nations of modern times,1 but
which, long before the Christian era, wandering forth from their early
European seats, burnt Rome and pillaged Delphi, founded an empire in
Northern Italy more than co-extensive with Austrian Lombardy,2 and
another in Asia Minor, equal in importance to one of the largest
pachalics. For the " Q-alatia" of the New Testament was really the " Craul" of
the East. The " Epistle to the Galatians " would more literally and more
correctly be called the " Epistle to the Gauls." When Livy, in his
account of the Roman campaigns in Galatia, speaks of its inhabitants, he
always calls them " Gauls." 3 When the Greek historians speak of the
inhabitants of ancient France, the word they use is " Galatians." 4 The
two terms are merely the Greek and Latin forms of the same " bar
barian " appellation.5
That emigration of the Gauls, which ended in the settlement in Asia
Minor, is less famous than those which led to the disasters in Italy and
Greece : but it is, in fact, identical with the latter of these two emigra
tions, and its results were more permanent. The warriors who roamed
over the Cevennes, or by the banks of the Garonne, re-appear on the
Halys and at the base of Mount Dindymus. They exchange the super
stitions of Druidism for the ceremonies of the worship of Cybele. The
very name of the chief Galatian tribe is one with which we are familiar in
the earliest history of France ; and Jerome says that, in his own day, the
language spoken at Ancyra was almost identical with that of Treves.*
The Galatians were a stream from that torrent of barbarians which poured
into Greece in the third century before our era, and which recoiled in
confusion from the cliffs of Delphi. Some tribes had previously separated
from the main army, and penetrated into Thrace. There they were
joined by certain of the fugitives, and together they appeared on the
coasts, which are separated by a narrow arm of the sea from the rich
plains and valleys of Bithynia. The wars with which that kingdom wai
1 The French travellers (as ToHrnefort and " Eeltsa " are the same word. See Arnold'*
Texicr) seem to write with patriotic enthusi- Rome, i. 522.
asm when they touch Galatia ; and we have 6 It is very likely that there was somo Ten
found our best materials in Thierry's history. tonic element in these emigrating tribes, but i<
2 This was written before 1859. is hardly possible now to distinguish it from
8 The country of the Galatians was some- the Keltic. The converging lines of distincl
times called Gallogrsecia. nationalities become more faint as we ascend
4 Some have even thought that the word towards the point where they meet. Thierrj
translated " Galatia " in 2 Tim. iv. 10, means considers the Tolistoboii, whose leader was
the country commonly called Gaul Lutarius (Luther or Clothair?), to have been
6 And we may add that " Galatse " and a Teutonic tribe.

«hap. vm. GALATIA. 21 1
harassed, made their presence acceptable. Nicomedes was the Vortigern
of Asia Minor : and the two Gaulish chieftains, Leonor and Lutar, may
be fitly compared to the two legendary heroes of the Anglo-Saxon in
vasion. Some difficulties occurred in the passage of the Bosphorus,
which curiously contrast with the easy voyages of our piratic ancestors.
But once established in Asia Minor, the Gauls lost no time in spreading
over the whole peninsula with their arms and devastation. In their first
crossing over we have compared them to the Saxons. In their first occu
pation they may be more fitly compared to the Danes. For they were a
movable army rather than a nation, — encamping, marching, and plun
dering at will. They stationed themselves on the site of ancient Troy,
and drove their chariots in the plain of the Cayster. They divided nearly
the whole peninsula among their three tribes. They levied tribute on
cities, and even on kings. The wars of the East found them various
occupation. They hired themselves out as mercenary soldiers. They
were the royal guards of the kings of Syria, and the mamelukes of the
Ptolemies in Egypt.1
The surrounding monarchs gradually curtailed their power, and re
pressed them within narrower limits. First Antiochus Soter drove the
Tectosages,2 and then Eumenes drove the Trocmi and Tolistobii, into the
central district which afterwards became Galatia. Their territory was
definitely marked out and surrounded by the other states of Asia Minor,
and they retained a geographical position similar to that of Hungary in
the midst of its German and Sclavonic neighbors. By degrees they
coalesced into a number of small confederate states, and ultimately into
one united kingdom.8 Successive circumstances brought them into con
tact with the Romans in various ways : first,' by a religious embassy sent
from Rome to obtain peaceful possession of the sacred image of Cybele ;
secondly, by the campaign of Manlius, who reduced their power and left
them a nominal independence. ; and then through the period of hazardous
alliance with the rival combatants in the Civil Wars. The first Deiotarus
was made king by Pompey, fled before Caesar at the battle of Pharsalia,
and was defended before the conqueror by Cicero, in a speech which still
remains to us. The second Deiotarus, like his father, was Cicero's friend,
and took charge of his son and nephew during the Cilician campaign.

1 Even in the time of Julius Csesar, we 8 This does not seem to have been effectu-
find four hundred Gadls (Galatians), who had ally the case till after the campaign of Manlius.
previously been part of Cleopatra's body- The nation was for some time divided into
guard, given for the same purpose to Herod. four tetrarchies. Deiotarus was the first sole
Joseph. War, xx. 3. ruler ; first as tetrarch, then as king.
2 His appellation of Soter or " the Sa
viour " was derived from this victory.

212 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. CHAp.vrn.
Amyntas, who succeeded him, owed his power to Antony,1 but prudently
went over to Augustus in the battle of Actium. At the death of
Amyntas, Augustus made some modifications in the extent of Galatia
and placed it under a governor. It was now a province, reaching from
the borders of Asia and Bithynia to the neighborhood of Iconium
Lystra, and Derbe, " cities of Lycaonia." 2
Henceforward, like the Western Gaul, this territory was a part of the
Roman empire, though retaining the traces of its history in the character
and language of its principal inhabitants. There was this difference,
however, between the Eastern and the Western Gaul, that the latter was
more rapidly and more completely assimilated to Italy. It passed from
its barbarian to its Roman state, without being subjected to any interme
diate civilization.3 The Gauls of the East, on the other hand, had long
been familiar with the Greek language and the Greek culture. St.
Paul's Epistle was written in Greek. The contemporary inscriptions of
the province are usually in the same language. The Galatians them
selves are frequently called Gallo-Graecians ; * and many of the inhab
itants of the province must have been of pure Grecian origin. Another
section of the population, the early Phrygians, were probably numerous,
but in a lower and more degraded position. The presence of great num
bers of Jews5 in the province, implies that it was, in some respects, fa
vorable for traffic ; and it is evident that the district must have been
constantly intersected by the course of caravans from Armenia, the Hel
lespont, and the South.6 The Roman itineraries inform us of the lines
of communication between the great towns near the Halys and the other
parts of Asia Minor. These circumstances are closely connected with the

1 He received some parts of Lycaonia and knowledge of Greek, must of course be
Pamphylia in addition to Galatia Proper. See excepted.
above, Ch. I. p. 22. i See above, p. 210, n. 3.
2 The Pamphylian portion was removed 6 See in Josephus (Ant. xvi. 6) the letter
(see above), but the Lycaonian remained. Thus which Augustus wrote in favor of the Jews of
we find Pliny reckoning the Lystreni in Gala- Ancyra, and which was inscribed on a pillar
tia, though he seems to imply elsewhere that in the temple of Csesar. We shall have occa-
the immediate neighborhood of Iconium was sion hereafter to mention the " Monumentum
in Asia. It is therefore quite possible, so far Ancyranum."
as geographical difficulties are concerned, that 6 Gordium, one of the minor towns near
the Christian communities in the neighbor- the western frontier, was o considerable enrpo-
hood of Lystra might be called " Churches of rium. So was Tavium, the capital of the
Galatia." We think, however, as will be Eastern Galatians, the Trocmi, who dwelt
shown in the Appendix, that other difficul- beyond the Halys. The Tolistoboii were the
ties are decisive against the view there men- western tribe, near the Sangarius, with Pessi-
tioned. nus as their capital. The chief town of the
8 The immediate neighborhood of Mar- Tectosages in the centre, and the metropohs
seilles, which was thoroughly imbued with a of the nation, was Ancyra.

CHAP. vin.

PONTUS. 213

spread of the Gospel, and we shall return to them again when we describe
St. Paul's first reception in Galatia.
V. Pontus. — The last independent dynasties in the north of the Pen
insula have hitherto appeared as friendly or subservient to the Roman
power. Asia and Bithynia were voluntarily ceded by Attalus and Nico
medes ; and Galatia, on the death of Amyntas, quietly fell into the station
of a province. But when we advance still farther to the East, we are
reminded of a monarch who presented a formidable and protracted
opposition to Rome. The war with Mithridates was one of the most
serious wars in which the Republic was ever engaged ; and it was not till
after a long struggle that Pompey brought the kingdom of Pontus under
the Roman yoke. In placing Pontus among the provinces of Asia Minor
at this exact point of St. Paul's life, we are (strictly speaking) guilty of
an anachronism. For long after the western portion of the empire of
Mithridates was united partly with Bithynia and partly with Galatia,1 the
region properly called Pontus8 remained under the government of inde
pendent chieftains. Before the Apostle's death, however, it was really
made a province by Nero.3 Its last king was that Polemo II. who was
alluded to at the beginning of this work, as the contemptible husband of
one of Herod's grand-daughters.4 In himself he is quite unworthy of
such particular notice, but he demands our attention, not only because,
as the last independent king in Asia Minor, he stands at one of the turn
ing-points of history, but also because, through his marriage with Bere
nice, he must have had some connection with the Jewish population of
Pontus, and therefore probably with the spread of the Gospel on the
shores of the Euxine. We cannot forget that Jews of Pontus were at
Jerusalem on the day of Pentecost,5 that the Jewish Christians of Pontus
were addressed by St. Peter in his first epistle,6 and that " a Jew born in
1 See above, under Pamphylia, for the independent monarchs had ceased to reign. In
addition to that province. A tract of country, the division of Constantine, Pontus formed
near the Halys, henceforward called Pontus two provinces, one called Helenopontus in
Galaticus, was added to the kingdom of honor of his mother, the other still retaining
Deiotarus. the name of Pontus Polemoniacus.
2 Originally, this district near the Euxine 4 P. 22, and p. 23, u. 3. In or about tne
was considered a part of Cappadocia, and called year 60 a.d. we find Berenice again with
docia on the sea (Pontus)." The Agrippa in Judaea, on the occasion of St.

name Pontus gradually came into use, with Paul's defence at Caesarea. Acts xxv., xxvi.
therisingpowerof the ancestors of Mithridates It is probable that she was with Polemo in
the Great. Pontus about the year 52, when St. Paul was
8 It is probably impossible to determine travelling in the neighborhood.
the boundary which was ultimately arranged 6 Acts ii. 9.
between the two contiguous provinces of Pon- 8 1 Pet. i. 1.
tus and Cappadocia, when the last of the

214 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. CHAp.vm.
Pontus "* became one of the best and most useful associates of the Apos
tle of the Gentiles.
VI. Cappadocia. — Crossing the country southwards from the birth
place of Aquila towards that of St. Paul, we traverse the wide and varied
region which formed the province of Cappadocia, intermediate between
Pontus and Cilicia. The period of its provincial existence began in the
reign of Tiberius. Its last king was Archelaus,2 the contemporary of the
Jewish tetrarch of the same name.' Extending from the frontier of
Galatia to the river Euphrates, and bounded on the south by the chain
of Taurus, it was the largest province of Asia Minor. Some of its cities
are celebrated in ecclesiastical history.4 But in the New Testament it is
only twice alluded to, once in the Acts,5 and once in the Epistles.6
VII. Cilicia. — A single province yet remains, in one respect the most
interesting of all, for its chief city was the Apostle's native town. For
this reason the reader's attention was invited long ago to its geography
and history.7 It is therefore unnecessary to dwell upon them further.
We need not go back to the time when Servilius destroyed the robbers in
the mountains, aud Pompey the pirates on the coast.8 And enough has
been said of the conspicuous period of its provincial condition, when Cicero
came down from Cappadocia through the great pass of Mount Taurus,'
and the letters of his correspondents in Rome were forwarded from Tarsus
to his camp on the Pyramus. Nearly all the light we possess concerning
the fortunes of Roman Cilicia is concentrated on that particular time. We
know the names of hardly any of its later governors. One of the few al
lusions to its provincial condition about the time of Claudius and Nero,
which we can adduce from any ancient writer, is that passage in the Acts,
where Felix is described as inquiring " of what province " St. Paul was.
The use of the strict political term 10 informs us that it was a separate
province ; but the term itself is not so explicit as to enable us to state
whether the province was under the jurisdiction of the Senate or the Em
peror.11 1 Acts xviii. 2. 6 Acts ii. 9.
2 He was made king by Antony, and fifty 6 1 Pet. i. 1.
years afterwards was summoned to Eome by ' Pp. 19-23. See also 45, 46.
Tiberius, who had been offended by some " Pp. 19, 20.
disrespect shown to himself in the island of 9 See below, pp. 222, 223.
Rhodes. 10 'TZnapxia. Acts xxiii. 34, the only pas-
8 Matt. ii. 22. sage where the word occurs in the New Tester
4 Especially Nyssa, Nazianzus, and NeocaBS- ment. For the technical meaning of the term,
area, the cities of the three Gregories, and see above, p. 130, n. 4.
Caesarea, the city of Basil, — to say nothing n We should be disposed to infer from a
•jf Tyana and Samosata. passage in Agrippa's speech to the Jews 'Je

chap. via. VISITATION OF THE CHURCHES PROPOSES.. 215
With this last division of the Heptarchy of Asia Minor we are brought
to the starting-point of St. Paul's second missionary journey. Cilicia is
contiguous to Syria, and indeed is more naturally connected with it than
with the rest of Asia Minor.1 We might illustrate this connection from
the letters of Cicero ; but it is more to our purpose to remark that the
Apostolic Decree, recently enacted at Jerusalem, was addressed to the
Gentile Christians " in Antioch, and Syria, and Cilicia," 2 and that Paul
and Silas travelled " through Syria and Cilicia " 3 in the early part of their
progress. This second missionary journey originated in a desire expressed by
Paul to Barnabas, that they should revisit all the cities where they had
preached the Gospel and founded churches.4 He felt that he was not
called to spend a peaceful, though laborious, life at Antioch, but that his
true work was " far off among the Gentiles." 5 He knew that his cam
paigns were not ended, — that, as the soldier of Jesus Christ, he must
not rest from his warfare, but must " endure hardness," that he might ,
please Him who had called him.6 As a careful physician, he remembered
that they, whose recovery from sin had been begun, might be in danger
of relapse ; or, to use another metaphor, and to adopt the poetical lan
guage of the Old Testament, he said, — " Come, let us get up early to
the vineyards: let us see if the vine flourish."7 The words actually re
corded as used by St. Paul on this occasion are these : — " Come, let us
turn back and visit our brethren in every city, where we have announced
the word of the Lord, and let us see how they fare."8 We notice here,
for the first time, a trace of that tender solicitude concerning his con
verts, that earnest longing to behold their faces, which appears in the
letters which he wrote afterwards, as one of the most remarkable, and
one of the most attractive, features of his character. Paul was the
speaker, and not Barnabas. The feelings of Barnabas might not be so
deep, nor his anxiety so urgent.9 Paul thought doubtless of the
seph. War, ii. 16, 4), where he says that See his excellent remarks on the whole
Cilicia, as well as Bithynia, Pamphylia, &c., passage.
was " kept tributary to the Romans without 8 " Let us go now at last " would be a
an army," that it was one of the Senate's correct translation. The words seem to ex-
provinces. Other evidence, however, tends press something like impatience, especially
the other way, especially an inscription found when we compare it with the words " after
at Caerleon in Monmouthshire. For fuller some days " which precede. The tender feel-
details we must refer to the larger editions. ing implied in the phrase rendered " how they
1 See p. 98, comparing Acts ix. 30 with do " fully justifies what we have said in the
Gal. i. 21. text.
2 Acts xv. 23. 8 Acts xv. 41. * We might almost be inclined tD suspect
1 Acts xv. 36. 6 Acts xxii. 21. that Paul had previously urged the same pro-
6 2 Tim ii. 3, 4. posal on Barnabas, and that he had hesitated
7 Cant. vii. 12, quoted by Matthew Henry. to comply.

216 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. CHAP.vm.
Pisidians and Lycaonians, as he thought afterwards at Athens and
Corinth of the Thessalonians, from whom he had been lately " taken —
in presence not in heart, — endeavoring to see their face with great
desire, — night and day praying exceedingly that he might see their face
and might perfect that which was lacking in their faith." 1 He was " not
ignorant of Satan's devices."2 He feared lest by any means the Tempt
er had tempted them, and his labor had been in vain.3 He " stood in
doubt of them," and desired to be " present with them " once more.4
His w;sh was to revisit every city where converts had been made. We
are reminded here of the importance of continuing a religious work when
once ot^gun. We have had the institution of presbyters,5 and of coun
cils,6 brought before us in the sacred narrative ; and now we have an
example of that system of church visitation, of the happy effects of which
we have still some experience, when we see weak resolutions strength
ened, and expiring faith rekindled, in confirmations at home, or in mis
sionary settlements abroad.
This plan, however, of a combined visitation of the churches was
marred by an outbreak of human infirmity. The two apostolic friends
were separated from each other by a quarrel, which proved that they
were indeed, as they had lately told the Lystrians, " men of like passions"
with others.7 Barnabas was unwilling to undertake the journey unless
he were accompanied by his relation Mark. Paul could not consent to
the companionship of one who " departed from them from Pamphylia,
and went not with them to the work : " 8 and neither of them could
yield his opinion to the other. This quarrel was much more closely
connected with personal feelings than that which had recently occurred
between St. Peter and St. Paul,9 and it was proportionally more violent.
There is little doubt that severe words were spoken on the occasion. It
is unwise to be over-anxious to dilute the words of Scripture, and to
exempt even Apostles from blame. By such criticism we lose much of
the instruction which the honest record of their lives was intended to
convey. We are taught by this scene at Antioch, that a good work may
be blessed by God, though its agents are encompassed with infirmity, and
that changes, which are violent in their beginnings, may be overruled for
the best results. Without attempting to balance too nicely the faults on
either side, our simplest course is to believe that, as in most quarrels,
there was blame with both. Paul's natural disposition was impetuous
1 1 Thess. ii. 17, iii. 10. 6 Acts xv. See Chap. VII.
2 2 Cor. ii. 11. i Acts xiv. 15.
8 1 Thess. iii. 5. 8 Acts xv. 38 with xiii. 13. See pp.
* Gal. iv. 20. 144, 145.
» Acts xiv. 23. See p. 176, and Chap. XIH. 9 Pp. 198-200.

CHAP.vm. SEPARATION OF PAUL AND BARNABAS. 217
and impatient, easily kindled to indignation, and (possibly) overbearing.
Barnabas had shown his weakness when he yielded to the influence of
Peter and the Judaizers.1 The remembrance of the indirect censure he
then received may have been perpetually irritated by the consciousness
that his position was becoming daily more and more subordinate to that
of the friend who rebuked him. Once he was spoken of as chief of those
" prophets at Antioch," 2 among whom Saul was the last : now his name
was scarcely heard, except when he was mentioned as the companion of
Paul.3 In short, this is one of those quarrels in which, by placing our
selves in imagination on the' one side and the other, we can alternately
justify both, and easily see that the purest Christian zeal, when combined
with human weakness and partiality, may have led to the misunder
standing. How could Paul consent to take with him a companion who
would really prove an embarrassment and a hinderance ? Such a task as
that of spreading the Gospel of God in a hostile world needs a resolute
will and an undaunted courage. And the work is too sacred to be put in
jeopardy by any experiments.4 Mark had been tried once and found
wanting. " No man, having put his hand to the plough, and looking
back, is fit for the kingdom of God." 5 And Barnabas would not be
without strong arguments to defend the justice of his claims. It was
hard to expect him to resign his interest in one who had cost him much
anxiety and many prayers. His dearest wish was to see his young kins
man approving himself as a missionary of Christ. Now, too, he had been
won back to a willing obedience, — he had come from his home at Jeru
salem, — he was ready now to face all the difficulties and dangers of the
enterprise. To repel him in the moment of his repentance was surely
" to break a bruised reed " and to " quench the smoking flax." 6
It is not difficult to understand the obstinacy with which each of the
disputants, when his feelings were once excited, clung to his opinion as
to a sacred truth. The only course which now remained was to choose
two different paths and to labor independently ; and the Church saw
the humiliating spectacle of the separation of its two great missionaries
to the Heathen. We cannot, however, suppose that Paul and Barnabas
parted, like enemies, in anger and hatred. It is very likely that they
made a deliberate and amicable arrangement to divide the region of their

1 Gal. ii. 13. P. 199. 8 See p. 135.
2 Acts xiii. Pp. 121, 122. Moreover, as 4 A timid companion in the hour of danger
a friena suggests, St. Paul was under personal is one of the greatest evih. Matthew Henry
obligations to Barnabas for introducing him quotes Prov. xxv. 19 : " Confidence in an
to the Apostles (Acts ix. 27), and the feelings unfaithful man, in time of trouble, is like n
of Barnabas would be deeply hurt if he thought broken tooth and like a foot out of joint."
his friendship slighted. f Luke ix. 62. 5 Matt. xii. 20.

218 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap, via
first mission between them, Paul taking the continental, and Barnabas
the insular, part of the proposed visitation.1 Of this at least we are
certain, that the quarrel was overruled by Divine Providence to a good
result. One stream of missionary labor had been divided, and the
regions blessed by the waters of life were proportionally multiplied. St.
Paul speaks of Barnabas afterwards 2 as of an Apostle actively engaged
in his Master's service. We know nothing of the details of his life
beyond the moment of his sailing for Cyprus ; but we may reasonably
attribute to him not only the confirming of the first converts,3 but the
full establishment of the Church iu his native island. At Paphos the
impure idolatry gradually retreated before the presence of Christianity ;
and Salamis, where the tomb of the Christian Levite 4 is shown,5 has
earned an eminent place in Christian history, through the writings of its
bishop, Epiphanius.6 Mark, too, who began his career as a "minister"
of the Gospel in this island,7 justified the good opinion of his kinsman.
Yet the severity of Paul may have been of eventual service to his
character, in leading him to feel more deeply the serious importance of
the work he had undertaken. And the time came when Paul himself
acknowledged, with affectionate tenderness, not only that he had again
become his " fellow-laborer," 8 but that he was " profitable to the minis
try," 9 and one of the causes of his own " comfort." 10
It seems that Barnabas was the first to take his departure. The
feeling of the majority of the Church was evidently with St. Paul, for
when he had chosen Silas for his companion, and was ready to begin his
journey, he was specially " commended by the brethren to the grace of
God." u The visitation of Cyprus having now been undertaken by
others, his obvious course was not to go by sea in the direction of Perga
or Attaleia,12 but to travel by the Eastern passes directly to the neighbor
hood of Iconium. It appears, moreover, that he had an important work
1 If Barnabas visited Salamis and Paphos, relation to him as a witness in which Silas did
and if Paul, after passing through Derbe, Lys- to Paul.
tra, and Iconium, went as far as Antioch in 4 Acts iv. 36.
Pisidia (see below), the whole circuit of the 6 MS. note from Capt. Graves, R.N.
proposed visitation was actually accomplished, 6 The name of this celebrated father has
for it does not appear that any converts had been given to one of the promontories of the
been made at Perga and Attaleia. island, the ancient Acamas.
2 1 Cor. ix. 6 : whence also it appears that 7 Acts xiii. 5.
Barnabas, like St Paul, supported himself by 8 Philemon 24.
the labor of his hands. 9 2 Tim. iv. 11. See p. 144, u. 11.
3 Paul took the copy of the Apostolic 10 Col. iv 10, 11.
Decree into Cilicia. If the Judaizing tendency " Acts xv. 40.
had shown itself in Cyprus, Barnabas would M If no other causes had occurred to deter
still be able to refer to the decision of the mine the direction of his journey, there might
!ouucil. and Mark would stand in the same be no vessel at Antioch or Seleucia bound for

chap. vm. SYRIA AND CILICIA. 219
to accomplish in Cilicia. The early fortunes of Christianity in that
province were closely bound up with the city of Antioch and the per
sonal labors of St. Paul. When he withdrew from Jerusalem, " three
years " after his conversion, his residence for some time was in " the
regions of Syria and Cilicia." • He was at Tarsus in the course of that
residence, when Barnabas first brought him to Antioch.2 The churches
founded by the Apostle in his native province must often have been
visited by him ; for it is far easier to travel from Antioch to Tarsus, than
from Antioch to Jerusalem, or even from Tarsus to Iconium. Thus the
religions movements in the Syrian metropolis penetrated into Cilicia.
The same great " prophet " had been given to both, and the Christians
in both were bound together by the same feelings and the same doc
trines. When the Judaizing agitators came to Antioch, the result was
anxiety and perplexity, not only in Syria, but also in Cilicia. This is
nowhere literally stated ; but it can be legitimately inferred. We are,
indeed, only told that certain men came down with false teaching from
Judaea to Antioch.3 But the Apostolic Decree is addressed to " the
Gentiles of Cilicia " 4 as well as those of Antioch, thus implying that the
Judaizing spirit, with its mischievous consequences, had been at work
beyond the frontier of Syria. And, doubtless, the attacks on St. Paul's
apostolic character had accompanied the attack on apostolic truth,5 and a
uew fulfilment of the proverb was nearly realized, that a prophet in his
own country is without honor. He had, therefore, no ordinary work
to accomplish as he went " through Syria and Cilicia confirming the
churches ; " 6 and it must have been with much comfort and joy that he
was able to carry with him a document, emanating from the Apostles at
Jerusalem, which justified the doctrine he had taught, and accredited
his personal character. Nor was he alone as the bearer of this letter,
but Silas was with him also, ready " to tell the same things by mouth." ''
It is a cause for thankfulness that God put it into the heart of Silas to
" abide still at Antioch " 8 when Judas returned to Jerusalem, and to
accompany St. Paul9 on his northward journey. For when the Cilician
Christians saw their countryman arrive without his companion Barnabas,
whose name was coupled with his own in the apostolic letter,10 their confi-
Pamphylia; a circumstance not always suffi- time. Much might be accomplished during
ciently taken into account by those who have the residence at Antioch (xv. 36), which might
written on St. Paul's voyages. very well include journeys to Tarsus. But we
1 Gal. i. 21 ; Acts ix. 30. See pp. 97-99. are distinctly told that the churches of Cilicia
2 Acts xi. 25, See p. 110. were "confirmed " by St. Paul, when he was
8 Acts xv. 1. on his way to those of Lycaonia.
* Acts xv. 23. 6 Pp. 185, 194. 7 Acts xv. 27.
6 Acts xv. 41. The work of allaying the 8 Or to return thither. See p. 198, a. 2.
Judaizing spirit in Cilicia would require some 9 Acts xv. 40. 10 Acts xv. 25.

220 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. CHAP.vm.
deuce might have been shaken, occasion might have been given to the
enemies of the truth to slander St. Paul, had not Silas been present, as
one of those who were authorized to testify that both Paul and Barnabas
were " men who had hazarded their lives for the name of our Lord
Jesus Christ." '
Where "the churches" were, which he "confirmed" on his journey,
— in what particular cities of " Syria and Cilicia," — we are not in
formed. After leaving Antioch by the bridge over the Orontes,2 he
would cross Mount Amanus by the gorge which was anciently called the
" Syrian Gates," and is now known as the Beilan Pass.8 Then he would
come to Alexandria and Issus, two cities that were monuments of the
Macedonian conqueror ; one as retaining his name, the other as the
scene of his victory. After entering the Cilician plain, he may have
visited Adana, iEgae, or Mopsuetia, three of the conspicuous cities on the
old Roman roads.4 With all these places St. Paul must have been more
or less familiar : probably there were Christians in all of them, anxiously
waiting for the decree, and ready to receive the consolation it was
intended to bring. And one other city must certainly have been visited.
If there were churches anywhere in Cilicia, there must have been one at
Tarsus. It was the metropolis of the province ; Paul had resided there,
perhaps for some years, since the time of his conversion ; and if he
loved his native place well enough to speak of it with something like
pride to the Roman officer at Jerusalem,5 he could not be indifferent to
its religious welfare. Among the " Gentiles of Cilicia," to whom the
letter which he carried was addressed, the Gentiles of Tarsus had no
mean place in his affections. And his heart must have overflowed dth
thankfulness, if, as he passed through the streets which had been familiar
to him since his childhood, he knew that many households were around
him where the Gospel had come " not in word only but in power," aud
the relations between husband and wife, parent and child, master and
slave, had been purified and sanctified by Christian love. No doubt the
1 Acts xv. 26. 4 If the itineraries are examined and com-
2 See the description of ancient Antioch pared together, the Roman roads will bt
above, Chap. IV. p. 113; also p. 124. observed to diffuse themselves among thest
0 The " Syrian Gates " are the entrance in- different towns in the Cilician plain, and then
to Cilicia from Syria, as the " Cilician Gates " to come together again at the bend of the bay,
are from Cappadocia. The latter pass, how- before they enter the Syrian Gates. Mopsiie
ever, is by far the grander and more important tia and Adana were in the direct road froni
of the two. Intermediate between these two, Issus to Tarsus ; iEgae was on the coast-road
in the angle where Taurus and Amanus meet, to Soli. Baise also was an important town,
is the pass into Syria by which Darius fled situated to the S. of Issus.
after the battle of Issus. Both entrances from 6 Acts xxi. 39.
Syria into Cilicia are alluded to by Cicero, as
well as the great entrance from Cappadocia.

chap, vnj PAUL AND SILAS IN CILICIA. 221
city still retained all the aspect of the cities of that day, where art and
amusement were consecrated to a false religion. The symbols of idolatry
remained in the public places, — statues, temples, and altars, — and
the various " objects of devotion," which in all Greek towns, as well as
in Athens (Acts xvii. 23), were conspicuous on every side! But the
silent revolution was begun. Some families had already turned " from
idols to serve the living and true God." 1 The " dumb idols " to which,
as Gentiles, they had been " carried away even as they were led," 2 had
been recognized as " nothing in the world," 3 and been " cast to the moles
and to the bats." 4 The homes which had once been decorated with the
emblems of a vain mythology, were now bright with the better ornaments
of faith, hope, and love. And the Apostle of the Gentiles rejoiced in
looking forward to the time when the grace which had been triumphant
in the household should prevail against principalities and powers, —
when " every knee should bow at the name of Jesus, and every tongue
confess that He is Lord, to the glory of God the Father." 5
But it has pleased God that we should know more of the details of
early Christianity in the wilder and remoter regions of Asia Minor. To
these regions the footsteps of St. Paul were turned after he had accom
plished the work of confirming the churches in Syria and Cilicia. The
task now before him was the visitation of the churches he had formed in

1 1 Thess. i. 9. symbols of general or local mythology. There
2 1 Cor. xii. 2. are, moreover, some ears, legs, &c., which
8 1 Cor. viii. 4. seem to have been votive offerings, and which,
4 Isai. ii. 20. These remarks have been therefore, it would have been sacrilege to
suggested by a recent discovery of much inter- remove ; and a great number of lamps or
est at Tarsus. In a mound which had formerly incense-burners, with a carbonaceous stain on
rested against a portion of the city wall, since them.
removed, was discovered a large collection of The date when these things were thrown
terra-cotta figures and lamps. At first these were "to the moles and bats "seems to be ascer-
thought to be a sherd-wreck, or the refuse of tained by the dressing of the hair in one of
some Ceramicus or pottery-work. But, on ob- the female figures, which is that of the period
serving that the lamps had been used, and that of the early emperors, as shown in busts of
the earthenware gods (Difictiles) bore no trace Domitia, or Julia, the wife of Titus, the same
ol having been rejected because of defective that is censured by the Roman satirist and by
workmanship, but, on the contrary, had evi- the Christian Apostle. Some of them are
dently been used, it has been imagined that undoubtedly of an earlier period.
these terra-cottas must have been thrown away, We owe the opportunity of seeing these
as connected with idolatry, on the occasion of remains, and the foregoing criticisms on them
some conversion to Christianity. The figures (by Mr. Abington, of Hanley, in Stafford-
are such as these, — a head of Pan, still show- shire), to the kindness of W. B. Barker, Esq.,
ing the mortar by which it was set up in some who was for many years a resident at Tarsus,
garden or vineyard; the boy Mercury; Cybe- and who has recently given much information
le, Jupiter, Ceres crowned with corn, Apollo on the history of Cilicia in his wirk entitled
with rays, a lion devouring a bull (precisely Lares and Penates.
similar to that engraved, p. 28), with other 6 Phil. ii. 10, 11.

222 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap.vtu.
conjunction with Barnabas. We proceed to follow him in his second
journey across Mount Taurus.
The vast mountain-barrier which separates the sunny plains of Cilicia
and Pamphylia from the central table-land has frequently been men
tioned.1 On the former journey2 St. Paul travelled from the Pamphylia
plain to Antioch in Pisidia, and thence by Iconium to Lystra and Derbe
His present course across the mountains was more to the eastward ; and
the last-mentioned cities were visited first. More passes than one lead up
into Lycaonia and Cappadocia through the chain of Taurus from Cilicia.3
And it has been supposed4 that the Apostle travelled through one of the
minor passes, which quits the lower plain at Pompeiopolis,5 and enters the
upland plain of Iconium, not far from the conjectural site of Derbe. But
there is no sufficient reason to suppose that he went by any other than
the ordinary road. A traveller wishing to reach the Valais conveniently
from the banks of the Lago Maggiore would rather go by the Simplon,
than by tho difficult path across the Monte Moro ; and there is one great
pass in Asia Minor which may be called the Simplon 6 of Mount Taurus,
described as a rent or fissure in the mountain-chain, extending from
north to south through a distance of eighty miles,7 and known in ancient
days by the name of the " Cilician Gates," — which has been, in all ages,
the easiest and most convenient entrance from the northern and central
parts of the peninsula -to the level by the seashore, where the traveller
pauses before he enters Syria. The securing of this pass was the great
est cause of anxiety to Cyrus, when he marched into Babylonia to de
throne his brother.8 Through this gorge Alexander descended to that
Cilician plain, which has been finally described by a Greek historian as a
theatre made by Nature's hand for the drama of great battles. Cicero
followed in the steps of Alexander, as he tells his friend Atticus in a

1 Especially pp. 19, 45, 98, 145-151, 165, 6 Mr. Ainsworth points out some interest
175-177. ing particulars of resemblance and contrast
2 Acts xiii. 14. between the Alps and this part of the Taurus
8 The principal passes are enumerated in Travels and Researches in Asia Minor, frc.
the Modern Traveller. (1842), n. 80.
4 Wieseler thinks that this would be the 7 Gen. Chesney in the Euphrates Expedition,
route adopted, because it leads most directly to i. 353.
Derbe (Divle). But, in the first place, the 8 Mannert and Forbiger both think that he
site of this town is very doubtful ; and, sec- went by a pass more to the east ; but the ar-
ondly, the shortest road across a mountain- guments of Mr. Ainsworth for the identity of
chain is not necessarily the best. The road Dana with Tyana, and the coincidence of the
by the Cilician Gates was carefully made and route of Cyrus with the " Cilician Gates,
kept up, and enters the Lycaonian plain near appear to be conclusive. Travels in the Track
where Derbe must have been situated. Src., p. 40.
6 For Pompeiopolis or Soli, see p. 20, and
the note.

cuAP.vni. THEY CROSS THE TAURUS. 223
letter written with characteristic vanity. And to turn to the centuries
which have elapsed since the time of the Apostles and the first Roman
emperors : twice, at least, this pass has been the pivot on which the
struggle for the throne of the East seemed to turn, — once, in the war
described by obscure historians,1 when a pretender at Antioch made the
Taurus his defence against the Emperor of Rome ; and once in a war
which we remember, when a pretender at Alexandria fortified it and
advanced beyond it in his attempt to dethrone the Sultan.2 In the wars
between the Crescent and the Cross, which have filled up much of the
intervening period, this defile has decided the fate of many an army.
The Greek historians of the first Saracen invasions describe it by a word,
unknown to classical Greek, which denotes that when this passage
(between Cappadocia and Cilicia) was secure, the frontier was closed.
The Crusaders, shrinking from the remembrance of its precipices and
dangers, called it by the more awful name of the " Gates of Judas."
Through this pass we conceive St. Paul to have travelled on his way
from Cilicia to Lycaonia. And if we say that the journey was made in
the spring of the year 51, we shall not deviate very far from the actual
date.3 By those who have never followed the Apostle's footsteps, the suc
cessive features of the scenery through which he passed may be compiled
frDm the accounts of recent travellers, and arranged in the following
order.4 — After leaving Tarsus, the way ascends the valley of the Cydnus,
which, for some distance, is nothing more than an ordinary mountain
valley, with wooded eminences and tributary streams. Beyond the point
where the road from Adana comes in from the right, the hills suddenly
draw together and form a narrow pass, which has always been guarded
by precipitous cliffs, and is now crowned by the ruins of a mediaeval castle.

1 The war between Severns and Pescennius Tarsus, in 1833, with notices of the surround
Niger. ing'country.
2 This was emphatically the case in the 8 We have no means of exactly determin-
first war between Mahomet Ali and the Sui- ing either the year or the season. He left
tan, when Ibrahim Pasha crossed the Taurus Corinth in the spring (Acts xviii. 21 ) after
and fought the 'battle of Konieh, in December, staying there a year and a half (Acts xviii.
1832. In the second war, the decisive battle 11). He arrived, therefore, at Corinth in the
was fought at Nizib, in June, 1839, further to autumn ; and probably, as we shall see, in the
the East: but even then, while the negotia- autumn of the year 52. Wieseler calculates that
tions were pending, this pass was the military a year might be occupied in the whole journey
boundary between the opposing powers. See from Antioch through Asia Minor and Macedo-
Mr. Ainsworth's Travels and Researches, quoted nia to Corinth. Perhaps it is better to allow
below. He was arrested in his journey by a year and a half ; and the spring is the more
the battle of Nizib. For a slight notice of the likely season to have been chosen for the corn-
two campaigns, see Yates's Egypt, i. xv. In mencement of the journey. See p. 146.
the second volume (ch. v.) is a curious ac- 4 Very full descriptions may be seen in
eount of an interview with Ibrahim Pasha at Ainsworth and Kinneir.

224 TnE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap. vm.
In some places the ravine contracts to a width of ten or twelve paces,
leaving room for only one chariot to pass. It is an anxious place to any
one in command of a military expedition. To one who is unburdened by
such responsibility, the scene around is striking and impressive. A
canopy of fir-trees is high overhead. Bare limestone cliffs rise above on
either hand to an elevation of many hundred feet. The streams which
descend towards the Cydnus are close by the wayside, and here and there
andermine it or wash over it. When the higher and more distant of
these streams are left behind, the road emerges upon an open and
elevated region, 4,000 feet above the level of the sea. This space of high
land may be considered as dividing the whole mountain journey into two
parts. For when it is passed, the streams are seen to flow in a new direc
tion. Not that we have attained the point where the highest land of Asia
Minor ' turns the waters north and south. The torrents which are seen
descending to the right are merely the tributaries of the Sarus, another
river of Cilicia. The road is conducted northwards through this new
ravine ; and again the rocks close in upon it, with steep naked cliffs,
among cedars and pines, forming " an intricate defile, which a handful of
men might convert into another Thermopylae." When the highest peaks
of Taurus are left behind, the road to Tyaiia is continued in the same
northerly direction ; 2 while that to Iconium takes a turn to the left, and
passes among wooded slopes with rocky projections, and over ground com
paratively level, to the great Lycaonian plain.
The whole journey from Tarsus to Konieh is enough, in modern times,
to occupy four laborious days ; 3 and, from the nature of the ground, the
time required can never have been much less. The road, however, was
doubtless more carefully maintained in the time of St. Paul than at the
present day, when it is only needed for Tatar couriers and occasional
traders. Antioch and Ephesus had a more systematic civilization then
than Aleppo or Smyrna has now ; and the governors of Cilicia, Cap
padocia, and Galatia, were more concerned than a modern Pacha in keep
ing up the lines of internal communication.4 At various parts of the
1 This is the Anti-Taurus, which, though to Adana. Major Rennell, who enters very
far less striking in appearance than the Tau- fully into all questions relating to distances
rus, is really higher, as is proved by the course and rates of travelling, says that more than
of the Sarus and other streams. forty hours are occupied in crossing the Tau-
2 The roads towards Syria from Csesarea rus from Eregli to Adana, though the distance
in Cappadocia, and Angora in Galatia, both is only 78 miles ; and he adds, that fourteen
meet at Tyana. The place is worthy of notice more would be done on common ground in
as the native city of Apollonius, the notorious the same time. Geog. of Western Asia.
philosopher and traveller. See the beginning * Inscriptions in Asia Minor, relating te
of Chap. X. the repairing of roads by tho governors of
8 Mr. Ainsworth, in the month of Novem- provinces and other officials, are not infre-
her, was six days in travelling from Iconium quent.

cHAP.vm. APPROACH TO LYSTRA. 225
journey from Tarsus to Iconium traces of the old military way are visible,
marks of ancient chiselling, substructions, and pavement ; stones that
have fallen over into the rugged river-bed, and sepulchres hewn out in
the cliffs, or erected on the level ground.1 Some such traces still follow
the ancient line of road where it enters the plain of Lycaonia, beyond
Cybistra,2 near the spot where we conceive the town of Derbe to have
been formerly situated.3
As St. Paul emerged from the mountain-parses, and came among the
lower heights through which the Taurus recedes to the Lycaonian levels,
the heart which had been full of affection and anxiety all through the
journey would beat more quickly at the sight of the well-known objects
before him. The thought of his disciples would come with new force
upon his mind, with a warm thanksgiving that he was at length allowed
to revisit them, and to "see how they fared."4 The recollection of
friends, from whom we have parted with emotion, is often strongly asso
ciated with natural scenery, especially when the scenery is remarkable.
And here the tender-hearted Apostle was approaching the home of his
Lycaonian converts. On his first visit, when he came as a stranger, he,
had travelled in the opposite direction : 5 but the same objects were again
before his eyes, the same wide-spreading plain, the same black summit of
the Kara-Dagh. In the farther reach of the plain, beyond the " Black
Mount," was the city of Iconium ; nearer to its base was Lystra ; and
nearer, still to the traveller himself was Derbe,6 the last point of his pre
vious journey. Here was his first meeting now with the disciples he
had then been enabled to gather. The incidents of such a meeting, — the
inquiries after Barnabas, — the welcome given to Silas, — the exhorta
tions, instructions, encouragements, warnings, of St. Paul, — may be left
to the imagination of those who have pleasure in picturing to themselves
the features of the Apostolic age, when Christianity was new.
1 See Ainsworth and Kinneir. where he saw ruins, inscriptions, or tombs.
2 See the map with the line of Roman He heard of Divle when he was in a yailah on
road, p. 166. Cybistra (Eregli) was one of the mountains, but did not visit it in conse-
Cicero's military stations. Its relation to the quence of the want of water. There was
Taurus is very clearly pointed out in his let- none within eight hours. Compare what is
ters. Writing from this place, he was very said of the drought of Lycaonia by Strabo, as
near Derbe. He had come from Iconium, referred to above, p. 165.
and afterwards went through the pass to Tar- Texier is of opinion that the true site of
sus ; so that his route must have nearly coin- Derbe is Divle, which he describes as a vil-
cided with that of St. Paul. The bandit lage in a wild valley among the mountains,
chief, Antipater of Derbe, is one of the per- with Byzantine remains. Asie Mineure, ii.
sonages who play a considerable part in this 129, 130.
passage of Cicero's life. 4 See above, p. 216.'
3 See above, p. 167, n. 1, and p. 175. Mr. 6 Compare Acts xiv. with 2 Tim. iii. 10, 11.
Hamilton gives a detailed account of his 6 See the account of the topography of
journey in this direction, and of the spots this district, Ch. VI. pp. 163, &c.
16

226 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap.viu
This is all we can say of Derbe, for we know no details either of the
former or present visit to the place. But when we come to Lystra, we
are at once in the midst of all the interest of St. Paul's public ministry
and private relations. Here it was that Paul and Barnabas were regarded
as Heathen divinities ; 1 that the Jews, who had first cried " Hosanna "
and then crucified the Saviour, turned the barbarians from homage to
insult ; 2 and that the little Church of Christ had been fortified by the
assurance that the kingdom of heaven can only be entered through " much
tribulation." 3 Here too it was that the child of Lois and Eunice, taught
the Holy Scriptures from his earliest years, had been trained to a religious
life, and prepared, through the Providence of God, by the sight of the
Apostle's sufferings, to be his comfort, support, and companion.4
Spring and summer had passed over Lystra since the Apostles had
preached there. God had continued to " bless" them, and given them
" rain from heaven and fruitful seasons, filling their hearts with food and
gladness." 6 But still " the living God, who made the heavens, and the
earth, and the sea, and all things that are therein," was recognized only
by a few. The temple of the Lystrian Jupiter still stood before the
gate, and the priest still offered the people sacrifices to the imaginary
protector of the city.6 Heathenism was invaded, but not yet destroyed.
Some votaries had been withdrawn from that polytheistic religion, which
wrote and sculptured in stone its dim ideas of " present deities ; "7 crowd
ing its thoroughfares with statues and altars,8 ascribing to the King of the
gods the attributes of beneficent protection and the government of atmos
pheric changes,8 and vaguely recognizing Mercury as the dispenser of
fruitful seasons and the patron of public happiness.10 But many years of
difficulty and persecution were yet to elapse before Greeks and Barbarians
fully learnt, that the God whom St. Paul preached was a Father every
where present to His children, and the One Author of every " good and
perfect gift."
Lystra, however, contributed one of the principal agents in the accom-
1 Acts xiv. 12-18, pp. 170, &c. 6 Some think that a statue, not a temple, of
2 Acts xiv. 19, pp. 172, 173. Jupiter is meant.
8 Acts xiv. 22, p. 176. 7 See note in the larger editions.
4 See pp. 174, 175. 8 See the remarks on Tarsus above, p. 221,
6 See the words used in St. Paul's address and the note.
to the Lystrians, Acts xiv., and the remarks 9 Jupiter was often spoken of to this effect
made, pp. 171, 172. New emphasis is given in poetry and inscriptions. Compare St
to the Apostle's words, if we remember what Paul's words, Acts xiv. 17.
Strabo says of the absence of water in the 10 Such were the attributes of Mercury a;
pastures of Lycaonia. Mr. Weston found that represented in works of art.
water was dearer than milk at Bin-bir-Kilisseh,
and that there was only one spring, high up
the Kara-Dagh.

chap. vm. TIMOTHY. 227
plishment of this result. We have seen how the seeds of Gospel truth
were sown in the heart of Timotheus.1 The instruction received in
childhood, — the sight of St. Paul's sufferings, — the hearing of his
words, — the example of the "unfeigned faith, which first dwelt in his
grandmother Lois and his mother Eunice," 2 — and whatever other influ
ences the Holy Spirit had used for his soul's good, — had resulted in the
full conviction that Jesus was the Messiah. And if we may draw an
obvious inference from the various passages of Scripture, which describe
the subsequent relation of Paul and Timothy, we may assert that natural
qualities of an engaging character were combined with the Christian faith
of this young disciple. The Apostle's heart seems to have been drawn
towards him with peculiar tenderness. He singled him out from the
other disciples. " Him would Paul have to go forth with him." 3 This
feeling is in harmony with all that we read, in the Acts and the Epistles,
of St. Paul's affectionate and confiding disposition. He had no relative
ties which were of service in his apostolic work ; his companions were few
aud changing ; and though Silas may well be supposed to have supplied
the place of Barnabas, it was no weakness to yearn for the society of one
who might become, what Mark had once appeared to be, a son in the Gos
pel.4 Yet how could he consistently take an untried youth on so difficult
an enterprise ? How could he receive Timothy into " the glorious com
pany of Apostles," when he had rejected Mark ? Such questions might
be raised, if we were not distinctly told that the highest testimony was
given to Timothy's Christian character, not only at Lystra, but at Iconium
also.5 We infer from this, that diligent inquiry was made concerning his
fitness for the work to which he was willing to devote himself. To omit,
at present, all notice of the prophetic intimations which sanctioned the ap
pointment of Timothy,6 we have the best proof that he united in himself
those outward and inward qualifications which a careful prudence would
require. One other point must be alluded to, which was of the utmost
moment at that particular crisis of the Church. The meeting of the
Council at Jerusalem had lately taken place. And, though it had been
'Pp. 174, 175. It is well known that com- father, he has served with me in the Gospel."
•nentators are not agreed whether Lystra or Philip, ii. 22. Compare also the phrases "my
Derbe was the birthplace of Timothy. But son," " my own son in the faith." 1 Tim.
the former opinion is by far the more probable. i. 2, 18, and 2 Tim. ii. 1.
The latter rests on the view which some critics 5 Acts xvi. 2.
take of Acts xx. 4. The whole aspect of 6 1 Tim. i. 18. See iv. 14 We ought to
Acts xvi. 1, 2, is in favor of Lystra. add, that " the brethren " who gave testimony
2 2 Tim. i. 5. in praise of Timothy were the very converts
8 Acts xvi. 3. The wish was spontaneous, of St. Paul himself, and, therefore, witnesses
not suggested by others. in whom he had good reason to place the ut-
4 This is literally what he afterwards said most confidence.
of Timothy : " Ye know that, as a son with the

228 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap. via.
decided that the Gentiles were not to be forced into Judaism on embra
cing Christianity, and though St. Paul carried with him 1 the decree, to be
delivered " to all the churches," — yet still he was in a delicate and diffi
cult position. The Jewish Christians had naturally a great jealousy on
the subject of their ancient divine Law ; and in dealing with the two
parties the Apostle had need of the utmost caution and discretion. We
see, then, that in choosing a fellow-worker for his future labors, there was
a peculiar fitness in selecting one " whose mother was a Jewess, while
his father was a Greek." 2
We may be permitted here to take a short retrospect of the childhood
and education of St. Paul's new associate. The hand of the Apostle him
self has drawn for us the picture of his early years..3 That picture rep
resents to us a mother and a grandmother, full of tenderness and faith,
piously instructing the young Timotheus in the ancient Scriptures, making
his memory familiar with that " cloud of witnesses" which encompassed
all the history of the chosen people, and training his hopes to expect the
Messiah of Israel.4 It is not allowed to us to trace the previous his
tory of these godly women of the dispersion. It is highly probable that
they may have been connected with those Babylonian Jews whom Anti
ochus settled in Phrygia three centuries before : 5 or they may have been
conducted into Lycaonia by some of those mercantile and other changes
which affected the movements of so many families at the epoch we are
writing of; such, for instance, as those which brought the household of
the Corinthian Chloe into relations with Ephesus,6 and caused the prose
lyte Lydia to remove from Thyatira to Philippi.7 There is one difficulty
which, at first sight, seems considerable ; viz. the fact that a religious
Jewess, like Eunice, should have been married to a Greek. Such a mar
riage was scarcely in harmony with the stricter spirit of early Judaism,
and in Palestine itself it could hardly have taken place.8 But among the
Jews of the dispersion, and especially in remote districts, where but few
of the scattered people were established, the case was rather different.
Mixed marriages, under such circumstances, were doubtless very frequent.
We are at liberty to suppose that in this case the husband was a prose
lyte. We hear of no objections raised to the circumcision of Timothy,
and we may reasonably conclude that the father was himself inclined to
1 Acts xvi. 4. The authority for the statement made there is
2 Acts xvi. 1. Joseph. Ant. xii. 3, 4.
3 2 Tim. i. 5. iii. 15, &c. 6 1 Cor. i. II. ' Acts xvi. 14.
4 If it is allowable to allude to an actual R Learned men (Selden and Michaelis for
picture of a scene of this kind, we may mention instance) take different views of the lawfulness
tbe drawing of "Jewish women reading the of such marriages. The cases of Esther and of
Scriptures," in Wilkie's Oriental Sketches. various members of the Herodian family olm-
6 See Ch. II. p. 36, also Ch. I. pp. 15, 16. ously occur to us.

ohap.vtii. CIRCUMCISION OF TIMOTHY. 229
Judaism : J if, indeed, he were not already deceased, and Eunice a widow.
This very circumstance, however, of his mixed origin gave to Timothy an
intimate connection with both the Jewish and Gentile worlds. Though
far removed from the larger colonies of Israelitish families, he was
brought up in a thoroughly Jewish atmosphere : his heart was at Jeru
salem while hit footsteps were in the level fields near Lystra, or on the
volcanic crags of the Black Mount : and his mind was stored with the
Hebrew or Greek 2 words of inspired men of old in the midst of the rude
idolaters, whose language was " the speech of Lycaonia." And yet he
could hardly be called a Jewish boy, for he had not been admitted within
the pale of God's ancient covenant by the rite of circumcision. He was
in the same position, with respect to the Jewish Church, as those, with
respect to the Christian Church, who, in various ages, and for various
reasons, have deferred their baptism to the period of mature life. And
" the Jews which were in those quarters," 3 however much they may have
respected him, yet, knowing " that his father was a Greek," and that he
himself was uncircumcised, must have considered him all but an " alien
from the commonwealth of Israel."
Now, for St. Paul to travel among the Synagogues with a companion
in this condition, — and to attempt to convince the Jews that Jesus was
the Messiah, when his associate and assistant in the work was an uncir
cumcised Heathen, — would evidently have been to encumber his prog
ress and embarrass his work. We see in the first aspect of the case a
complete explanation of what to many has seemed inconsistent, and what
some have ventured to pronounce as culpable, in the conduct of St. Paul.
" He took and circumcised Timotheus." How could he do otherwise, if
he acted with his usual far-sighted caution and deliberation ? Had
Timothy not been circumcised, a storm would have gathered round the
Apostle in his further progress. The Jews, who were ever ready to per
secute him from city to city, would have denounced him still more
violently in every Synagogue, when they saw in his personal preferences,
and in the co-operation he most valued, a visible revolt against the law
of his forefathers. To imagine that they could have overlooked the
absence of circumcision in Timothy's case, as a matter of no essential
importance, is to suppose they had already become enlightened Chris-
1 The expression in the original (xvi. 3) But the Hellenistic element would be likely to
means, "he was a born Greek." The most predominate. In reference to this subject, Mr.
natural inference is, that his father was living, Grinfield, in his recent work on the Septuagint,
andmost probably not a proselyte of righteous- p. 53, notices the two quotations from that
ness, if a proselyte at all. version in St. Paul's letters to Timothy. 1
2 We cannot tell how far this family is to be Tim. v. 18 ; 2 Tim. ii. 19.
reckoned Hellenistic or Aramaic ( see Ch. II.). 8 Acts xvi. 3.

280 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap.vhi.
tians. Even in the bosom of the Church we have seen Y the difficulties
which had recently been raised by scrupulousness and bigotry on this
very subject. And the difficulties would have been increased tenfold in
the untrodden field before St. Paul by proclaiming everywhere on his
very arrival that circumcision was abolished. His fixed line of procedure
was to act on the cities through the synagogues, and to preach the Gospel
first to the Jew, and then to the Gentile.2 He had no intention of
abandoning this method, and we know that he continued it for many
years.3 But such a course would have been impossible had not Timothy
been circumcised. Ho must necessarily have been repelled by that people
who endeavored once (as we shall see hereafter) to murder St. Paul,
because they imagined he had taken a Greek into the Temple.4 The very
intercourse of social life would have been hindered, and made almost im
possible, by the presence of a half-heathen companion : for, however far
the stricter practice may have been relaxed among the Hellenizing Jews
of the dispersion, the general principle of exclusiveness everywhere
remained, and it was still " an abomination " for the circumcised to eat
with the uncircumcised.5
It may be thought, however, that St. Paul's conduct in circumcising
Timothy was inconsistent with the principle and practice he maintained
at Jerusalem when he refused to circumcise Titus.6 But the two cases
were entirely different. Then there was an attempt to enforce circum
cision as necessary to salvation : now it was performed as a voluntary act,
and simply on prudential grounds. Those who insisted on the ceremony
in the case of Titus were Christians, who were endeavoring to burden the
Gospel with the yoke of the Law : those for whose sakes Timothy became
obedient to one provision of the Law were Jews, whom it was desirable
not to provoke, that they might more easily be delivered from bondage.
By conceding in the present case, prejudice was conciliated and the
Gospel furthered : the results of yielding in the former case would have
been disastrous, and perhaps ruinous, to the cause of pure Christianity.
If it be said that even in this case there was danger lest serious results
should follow, — that doubt might be thrown on the freedom of the
Gospel, and that color might be given to the Judaizing propensity; —
it is enough to answer that indifferent actions become right or wrong
according to our knowledge of their probable consequences, — and that
St. Paul was a better judge of the consequences likely to follow from
Timothy's circumcision than we can possibly be. Are we concerned
1 Ch. VII. 4 Acts xxi. 29 with xxii. 22.
2 Acts xiii. 5, 14, xiv. 1, xvii. 1, 2, 10, xviii. 6 See pp. 181, 182.
4,19,xix.8,9; andcompareRom. i. 16, ii. 9, 10. 6 Gal. ii. 3. See p. 194.
8 See Acts xxviii.

CHAP.vni. PLACE OF TIMOTHY'S ORDINATION. 231
about the effects likely to have been produced on the mind of Timotheus
himself? There was no risk, at least, lest he should think that circum
cision was necessary to salvation, for he had been publicly recognized as
a Christian before he was circumcised ; 1 and the companion, disciple,
and minister of St. Paul was in no danger, we should suppose, of becom
ing a Judaizer. And as for the moral results which might be expected
to follow in the minds of the other Lycaonian Christians, — it must be
remembered that at this very moment St. Paul was carrying with him
and publishing the decree which announced to all Gentiles that they were
not to be burdened with a yoke which the Jews had never been able to
bear. St. Luke notices this circumstance in the very next verse after the
mention of Timothy's circumcision, as if to call our attention to the con
tiguity of the two facts.2 It would seem, indeed, that the very best
arrangements were adopted which a divinely enlightened prudence could
suggest. Paul carried with him the letter of the Apostles and elders,
that no Gentile Christian might be enslaved to Judaism. He circum
cised his minister and companion, that no Jewish Christian might have
his prejudices shocked. His language was that which he always used, —
" Circumcision is nothing, and uncircumcision is nothing. The renova
tion of the heart in Christ is every thing.3 Let every man be persuaded
in his own mind."4 No innocent prejudice was ever treated roughly by
St. Paul. To the Jew he became a Jew, to the Gentile a Gentile : " he
was all things to all men, if by any means he might save some." 5
Iconium appears to have been the place where Timothy was circumcised.
The opinion of the Christians at Iconium, as well as those at Lystra, had
been obtained before the Apostle took him as his companion. These
towns were separated only by the distance of a few miles ; 6 and constant
communication must have been going on between the residents in the two
places, whether Gentile, Jewish, or Christian. Iconium was by far the
more populous and important city of the two, — and it was the point of
intersection of all the great roads in the neighborhood.7 For these
reasons we conceive that St. Paul's stay in Iconium was of greater mo-
1 xvi. 1-3. for 5J hours, when we reached a small Turco-
2 Seew. 3, 4. man village. . . . Oct 7. — At 11.30 we ap-
8 Gal. v. 6, vi. 15. St. Paul's own conduct proached the Kara-Dagh, and in about an hour
on the confines of Galatia is a commentary on began to ascend its slopes. We were thus
the words he uses to the Galatians. about 11 hours crossing the plain from Konieh.
* Rom. xiv. 5. This, with 2 on the other side, made in all 13
5 1 Cor. ix. 20-22. hours. We were heartily tired of the plain."
6 To what has been said before (pp. 163, 7 Roads from Iconium to Tarsus in Cilicia,
165, &c), add the following note from a MS. Side in Pamphylia, Ephesus in Asia, Angora
Journal already quoted. " Oct. 6. — Left in Galatia, Caesarea in Cappadocia, &c , are all
Konieh at 12. Traversed the enormous plains mentioned in the ancient authorities.

232 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. CHAP.vm.
ment than his visits to the smaller towns, such as Lystra. Whether the
ordination of Timothy, as well as his circumcision, took place at this par
ticular place and time, is a point not easy to determine. But this view
is at least as probable as any other that can be suggested : and it gives a
new and solemn emphasis to this occasion, if we consider it as that to
which reference is made in the tender allusions of the pastoral letters,—
where St. Paul reminds Timothy of his good confession before " many
witnesses," ] of the " prophecies " which sanctioned his dedication to God's
service,2 and of the " gifts " received by the laying-on of " the hands of the
presbyters"3 and the Apostle's " own hands."4 Such references to the
day of ordination, with all its well-remembered details, not only were full
of serious admonition to Timothy, but possess the deepest interest for us.5
And this interest becomes still greater if we bear in mind that the " wit
nesses " who stood by were St. Paul's own converts, and the very " brethren "
who gave testimony to Timothy's high character at Lystra and Iconium;*
— that the " prophecy " which designated him to his office was the same
spiritual gift which had attested the commission of Barnabas and Saul at
Antioch,1 — and that the College of Presbyters,8 who, in conjunction with
the Apostle, ordained the new minister of the Gospel, consisted of those
who had been " ordained in every Church" 9 at the close of that first
journey. On quitting Iconium St. Paul left the route of his previous expedition ;
unless indeed he went in the first place to Antioch in Pisidia, — a journey
to which city was necessary in order to complete a full visitation of the
churches founded on the continent in conjunction with Barnabas. It is
certainly most in harmony with our first impressions, to believe that this
city was not unvisited. No mention, however, is made of the place, and
it is enough to remark that a residence of a few weeks at Iconium as his
headquarters would enable the Apostle to see more than once all the
Christians at Antioch, Lystra, and Derbe.10 It is highly probable that he
did so : for the whole aspect of the departure from Iconium, as it is related

1 1 Tim. vi. 12. pointed out the offices to which individuals were
2 1 Tim. i. 18. specially called. Compare together the three
8 1 Tim. iv. 14. * 2 Tim. i. 6. important passages : Rom. xii. 6-8; 1 Cor. xii.
6 This is equally true, if the ordination is to 28-30 ; Eph. iv. 11, 12 ; also 1 Pet. iv. 10, 11.
be considered coincident with the " laying-on 6 Compare Acts xvi. 2 with Acts xiii. 51-
of hands," by which the miraculous gifts of the xiv. 21.
Holy Ghost were first communicated, as in the 7 Compare I Tim. i. 18 with Acts xiii. 1-3.
case of Cornelius (Acts x. 44), the Samaritans 8 1 Tim. iv. 14. See 2 Tim. i. 6.
(viii. 17), the disciples at Ephesus (xix. 6), and 9 Acts xiv. 23.
St. Paul himself (ix. 17). See the Essay on 10 It would also be very easy for St. Paul to
the Apostolical Office in Stanley's Sermons and visit Antioch on his route from Iconium throngl
Essays, especially p. 71. These gifts doubtless Phrygia and Galatia. See below, p. 234

obap.viii. DEPARTURE FROM ICONIUM. 233
do us in the Bible, is that of a new missionary enterprise, undertaken after
the work of visitation was concluded. St. Paul leaves Iconium, as for
merly he left the Syrian Antioch, to evangelize the Heathen in new
countries. Silas is his companion in place of Barnabas, and Timothy is
with him " for his minister," as Mark was with him then. Many roads
were before him. By travelling westwards he would soon cross the fron
tier of the province of Asia,1 and he might descend by the valley of the
Maeander to Ephesus, its metropolis : 2 or the roads to the south 3 might
have conducted him to Perga and Attaleia, and the other cities on the
coast of Pamphylia. But neither of these routes was chosen. Guided
by the ordinary indications of Providence, or consciously taught by the
Spirit of God, he advanced in a northerly direction, through what is called,
in the general language of Scripture, " Phrygia and the region of Galatia."
We have seen 4 that the term "Phrygia" had no political significance
in the time of St. Paul. It was merely a geographical expression, denot
ing a debatable country of doubtful extent, diffused over the frontiers of
the provinces of Asia and Galatia, but mainly belonging to the former.
We believe that this part of the Apostle's journey might be described
under various forms of expression, according as the narrator might speak
politically or popularly. A traveller proceeding from Cologne to Hano
ver might be described as going through Westphalia or through Prussia.
The course of the railroad would be the best indication of his real path.
So we imagine that our best guide in conjecturing St. Paul's path through
this part of Asia Minor is obtained by examining the direction of the
ancient and modern roads. We have marked his route in our map along
the general course of the Roman military way, and the track of Turkish
caravans, which leads by Laodicea, Philomelium, and Synnada, — or, to
use the existing terms, by Ladik, Ak-Sher, and Eski-Karahissar. This
road follows the northern side of that ridge which Strabo describes as sepa
rating Philomelium and Antioch in Pisidia, and which, as we have seen,5
materially assisted Mr. Arundell in discovering the latter city. If St.
Paul revisited Antioch on his way,6 — and we cannot be sure that he did
not, — he would follow the course of his former journey,7 and then regain
1 It is impossible, as we have seen (p. 207), to Perga, and goes thence across Western
to determine the exact frontier. Pisidia to the valley of the Maeander. None of
2 The great road from Ephesus to the Eu- the Itineraries mention any direct road from
phrates ascended the valley of the Maeander to Antioch in Pisidia to Perga and Attaleia,
the neighborhood of Laodicea, Hierapolis, and corresponding to the journeys of Paul and
Colossse (Col. iv. 13-16), and thence passed by Barnabas. Side was a harbor of considerable
Apamea to Iconium. This was Cicero's route, importance.
when he travelled from Ephesus to Cilicia. 4 Pp. 204, 206, 207, 209, &c., and the notes.
8 The Peutinger Table has » direct road 6 See pp. 150, 151.
from Iconium to Side, on the coast of Pam- 6 See above, p. 232, n. 10.
phylia. Thence another road follows the coast ' Acts xiv.

234 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. CHAP.vm.
the road to Synnada by crossing the ridge to Philomelium. We must
again repeat that the path marked down here is conjectural. We have
nothing either in St. Luke's narrative or in St. Paul's own letters to lead
us to any place in Phrygia, as certainly visited by him on this ocoasion
and as the home of the converts he then made. One city indeed, which
is commonly reckoned among the Phrygian cities, has a great place in
St. Paul's biography, and it lay on the line of an important Roman road.1
But it was situated far within the province of Asia, and for several reasons
we think it highly improbable that he visited Colossae on this journey, if
indeed he ever visited it at all. The most probable route is that which
lies more to the northwards in the direction of the true Galatia.
The remarks which have been made on Phrygia, must be repeated,
with some modification, concerning Galatia. It is true that Galatia was
a province : but we can plainly see that the term is used here in its
popular sense, — not as denoting the whole territory which was governed
by the Galatian propraetor, but rather the primitive region of the te-
trarchs and kings, without including those districts of Phrygia or Lycao
nia which were now politically united with it.2 There is absolutely no
city in true Galatia which is mentioned by the Sacred Writers in connec
tion with the first spread of Christianity. From the peculiar form of
expression 3 with which the Christians of this part of Asia Minor are
addressed by St. Paul in the Epistle which he wrote to them,4 and
alluded to in another of his Epistles,5 — we infer that " the churches of
Galatia" were not confined to any one city, but distributed through
various parts of the country. If we were to mention two cities, which,
both from their intrinsic importance, and from their connection with the
leading roads,6 are likely to have been visited and revisited by the
Apostle, we should be inclined to select Pessinus and Ancyra. The first
of these cities retained some importance as the former capital of one of
the Galatian tribes,7 and its trade was considerable under the early Emper-

1 Xenophon reckons Colossae in Phrygia. 4 Gal. i. 2.
So Strabo. It was on the great road mentioned 6 1 Cor. xvi. 1.
above, from Iconium to Ephesus. We come 8 The route is conjecturally laitf down in
here upon a question which we need not antici- the map from Synnada to Pessinus and Ancyra.
pate ; viz. whether St. Paul was ever at Colossae. Mr. Hamilton travelled exactly along this line,
2 See p. 211, and the notes. and describes the bare and dreary country at
8 " The churches of Galatia," in the plural. length. Near Pessinus he found an inscription
The occurrence of this term in the salutation relating to the repairing of the Roman road,
gives the Epistle to the Galatians the form of a on a column which had probably been a mile
circular letter. The same phrase, in the Sec- stone. Both the Antonine and Jerusalem
ond Epistle to the Corinthians, conveys the Itineraries give the road between Pessinus and
impression that there was no great central Ancyra, with the intermediate stages.
church in Galatia, like that of Corinth in ' The Tolistoboii, or Western Galatians.
Achaia, or that of Ephesus in Asia.

chap.vtii. SICKNESS OF ST. PAUL. 235
ors. Moreover, it had an ancient and wide-spread renown, as the seat
of the primitive worship of Cybele, the Great Mother.1 Though her
oldest and most sacred image (which, like that of Diana at Ephesus,2
had "fallen down from heaven") had been removed to Rome, — her
worship continued to thrive in Galatia, under the superintendence of her
effeminate and fanatical priests or Galli,3 and Pessinus was the object of
one of Julian's pilgrimages, when Heathenism was on the decline.4
Ancyra was a place of still greater moment : for it was the capital of the
province.5 The time of its highest eminence was not under the Gaulish
but the Roman government. Augustus built there a magnificent temple
of marble,6 and inscribed there a history of his deeds, almost in the style
of an Asiatic sovereign.7 This city was the meeting-place of all the
great roads in the north of the peninsula.8 And, when we add that Jews
had been established there from the time of Augustus,9 and probably
earlier, we can hardly avoid the conclusion that the Temple and Inscrip
tion at Angora, which successive travellers have described and copied
during the last three hundred years, were once seen by the Apostle of
the .Gentiles.
However this may have been, we have some information from his own
pen, concerning his first journey through " the region of Galatia." We
know that he was delayed there by sickness, and we know in what spirit
the Galatians received him.
St. Paul affectionately reminds the Galatians 10 that it was " bodily sick
ness which caused him to preach the Glad Tidings to them at the first."
The allusion is to his first visit : and the obvious inference is, that he was
passing through Galatia to some other district (possibly Pontus,11 where
we know that many Jews were established), when the state of his bodily
health arrested his progress.12 Thus he became, as it were, the Evangelist
of Galatia against his will. But his zeal to discharge the duty that was
1 See above, p. 210. the recently deciphered record of the victories
2 Herodian's expression concerning this of Darius Hystaspes on the rock at Behistoun.
image is identical with that in Acts xix. 35. See Vaux's Nineveh and Persepolis.
8 Jerome connects this term with the name 8 Colonel Leake's map shows at one glance
of the Galatians. See, however, Smith's Die- what we learn from the Itineraries. We see
tionary of Antiquities, under the word. See there the roads radiating from it in every
also under " Megalesia." direction.
4 Ammian. Marc. xxii. 9. 9 See the reference to Josephus, p. 212, n. 5.
6 This appears from its coins at this period. 10 Gal. iv. 13.
It was also called " Sebaste," from the favor u See above, p. 213.
of Augustus. w There can be no doubt that the literal
6 This temple has been described by a long translation is, "on account of bodily weakness."
series of travellers, from Lucas and Tournefort And there seems no good reason why we
to Hamilton and Texier. should translate it differently, though most
7 Full comments on this inscription will be of the English commentators take a different
found in Hamilton. We may compare it with view. Bottger, in harmony with his hypothesis

236 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap.vih.
laid on him did not allow him to be silent. He was instant " in season
and out of season." " Woe " was on him if he did not preach the Gospel.
The same Providence detained him among the Gauls, which would not
allow him to enter Asia or Bithynia : L and in the midst of his weakness
he made the Glad Tidings known to all who would listen to him. We
cannot say what this sickness was, or with absolute certainty identify H
with that " thorn in the flesh " 2 to which he feelingly alludes in his
Epistles, as a discipline which God had laid on him. But the remembrance
of what he suffered in Galatia seems so much to color all the phrases in
this part of the Epistle, that a deep personal interest is connected with
the circumstance. Sickness in a foreign country has a peculiarly depress
ing effect on a sensitive mind. And though doubtless Timotheus watched
over the Apostle's weakness with the most affectionate solicitude, — yet
those who have experienced what fever is in a land of strangers will know
how to sympathize, even with St. Paul, iu this human trial. The climate
and the prevailing maladies of Asia Minor may have been modified with
the lapse of centuries : and we are without the guidance of St. Luke's
medical language,3 which sometimes throws a light on diseases alluded to
in Scripture: but two Christian sufferers, in widely different ages of the
Church, occur to the memory as we look on the map of Galatia. We
could hardly mention any two men more thoroughly imbued with the
spirit of St. Paul than John Chrysostom and Henry Martyn.4 And when
we read how these two saints suffered in their last hours from fatigue, pain,
rudeness, and cruelty, among the mountains of Asia Minor which sur
round the place 5 where they rest, — we can well enter into the meaning
of St. Paul's expressions of gratitude to those who received him kindly
in the hour of his weakness.
The Apostle's reception among the frank and warm-hearted Gauls was
peculiarly kind and disinterested. No Church is reminded by the Apostle
so tenderly of the time of their first meeting.6 The recollection is used
by him to strengthen his reproaches of their mutability, and to enforce
the pleading with which he urges them to return to the true Gospel.
that St. Luke's Galatia means the neighbor- ent weather, and the same cruelty on the part
hood of Lystra and Derbe, thinks that the of those who urged on the journey. In the
bodily weakness here alluded to was the result larger editions, the details of Martyn's last
of the stoning at Lystra. Acts xiv. journal are compared with similar passages in
1 Acts xvi. 6, 7. the Benedictine life of Chrysostom.
2 2 Cor. xii. 7-10. Paley (on Gal. iv. 5 It is remarkable that Chrysostom and
11-16) assumes the identity, and he is probably Martyn are buried in the same place. They
right. both died on a journey, at Tocat or ComaM
8 See the paper alluded to, p. 88, n. 5. in Pontus.
4 There was a great similarity in the last 6 The references have been given above id
sufferings of these apostolic men ; — the same the account of Galatia, p. 209.
intolerable pain in the head, the same inclem-

chap, vin JOURNEY TO THE iEGEAN. 237
That Gospel had been received in the first place with the same affection
which they extended to the Apostle himself. And the subject, the manner,
and the results of his preaching are not obscurely indicated in the Epistle
itself. The great topic there, as at Corinth and everywhere, was " the
cross of Christ " — " Christ crucified" set forth among them.1 The Divine
evidence of the Spirit followed the word, spoken by the mouth of the
Apostle, and received by " the hearing of the ear." 2 Many were con
verted, both Greeks and Jews, men and women, free men aud slaves.8
The worship of false divinities, whether connected with the old supersti
tion at Pessinus, or the Roman idolatry at Ancyra, was forsaken for that
of the true and living God.4 And before St. Paul left the " region of
Galatia " on his onward progress, various Christian communities 5 were
added to those of Cilicia, Lycaonia, and Phrygia.
In following St. Paul on his departure from Galatia, we come to a pas
sage of acknowledged difficulty in the Acts of the Apostles.6 Not that the
words themselves are obscure. The difficulty relates, not to grammatical
construction, but to geographical details. The statement contained in
St. Luke's words is as follows : — After preaching the Gospel in Phrygia
and Galatia they were hindered from preaching it\in Asia; accordingly,
when in Mysia or its neighborhood, they attempted to penetrate into
Bithynia ; and this also being forbidden by the Divine Spirit, they passed
by Mysia, and came down to Troas. Now every thing depends here on the
sense we assign to the geographical terms. What is meant by the words
" Mysia," " Asia," and " Bithynia " ? It will be remembered that all
these words had a wider and a more restricted sense.7 They might be
used popularly and vaguely ; or they might be taken in their exacter
political meaning. It seems to us that the whole difficulty disappears by
understanding them in the former sense, and by believing (what is much
the more probable, a priori) that St. Luke wrote in the usual popular
language, without any precise reference to the provincial boundaries. We
need hardly mention Bithynia ; for, whether we speak of it traditionally or
politically, it was exclusive both of Asia and Mysia.8 In this place it is

1 Compare Gal. iii. 1 with 1 Cor. i. 13, 17, ' See above, p. 204.
ii. 2, &c. . 8 Mysia was at one time an apple of discord
2 Gal. iii. 2. So at Thessalonica. 1 between the kings of Pergamus and Bithynia ;
Thess. ii. 13. and the latter were for a certain period masters
3 Gal. iii. 27, 28. of a considerable tract on the shore of the
4 See the remarks above (p. 221), in refer- Propontis. But this was at an end when the
ence to Tarsus. Romans began to interfere in the affairs of
6 The plural (Gal. i. 2 and 1 Cor. xvi. 1) the East.
implies this. See p. 234. It may be well to add a few words on the his-
6 Acts xvi. 6, 7. For a similar accumula- tory of Mysia, which was purposely deferred to
tion of participles, see Acts xxv. 6-8. this place. See p. 206, n. 3. Under the Persians

238 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. cHAP.vm
evident that Mysia is excluded also from Asia, just as Phrygia is above •'
not beoause those two districts were not parts of it in its political character
of a province, but because they had a history and a traditional character
of their own sufficiently independent to give them a name in popular
usage. As regards Asia, it is simply viewed as the western portion of Asia
Minor. Its relation to the peninsula has been very well described by say
ing that it occupied the same relative position which Portugal occupies
with regard to Spain.2 The comparison would be peculiarly just in the
passage before us. For the Mysia of St. Luke is to Asia what Gallicia is
to Portugal ; and the journey from Galatia and Phrygia to the city of
Troas has its European parallel in a journey from Castile to Vigo.
We are evidently destitute of materials for laying down the route of
St. Paul and his companions. All that relates to Phrygia and Galatia
must be left vague and blank, like an unexplored country in a map (as
in fact this region itself is in the maps of Asia Minor),3 where we are at
liberty to imagine mountains and plains, rivers and cities, but are unable
to furnish any proofs. As the path of the Apostle, however, approaches
the JEgean, it comes out into comparative light : the names of places are
again mentioned, and the country and the coast have been explored and
described. The early part of the route then must be left indistinct.
Thus much, however, we may venture to say, — that since the Apostle
usually turned his steps towards the large towns, where many Jews were
established, it is most likely that Ephesus, Smyrna, or Pergamus was the
point at which he aimed, when he sought " to preach the Word in Asia."
There is nothing else to guide our conjectures, except the boundaries of
the provinces and the lines of the principal roads. If he moved from
Angora 4 in the general direction above pointed out, he would cross the
river Sangarius near Kiutaya,5 which is a great modern thoroughfare, and
has been mentioned before (Ch. VI. p. 150) in connection with the
route from Adalia to Constantinople ; and a little farther to the west,
near Aizani, he would be about the place where the boundaries of Asia,

this corner of Asia Minor formed the satrapy 2 Paley's Horos Paulinos. (1 Cor. No. 2.)
of Little Phrygia : under the Christian Emper- 8 Kiepert's map, which is the best, shows
ors it was the province of The Hellespont. In this. Hardly any region in the peninsula has
the intermediate period we find it called " Mys- been less explored than Galatia and Northern
ia," and often divided into two parts : viz. Phrygia.
Little Mysia on the north, called also Mysia on 4 Mr. Ainsworth mentions a hill near
the Hellespont, or Mysia Olympene, because it Angora in this direction, the Baulos-Dagk,
lay to the north of Mount Olympus ; and which is named after the Apostle.
Great Mysia, or Mysia Pergamene, to the 6 Kiutaya (the ancient Cotyseum) is now
south and east, containing the three districts one of the most important towns in the penin-
of Troas, jEolis, and Teuthrania. sula. It lies too on the ordinary road between
1 Acts xvi. 6. Broussa and Konieh.

chap. vm. JOURNEY TO THE uEGEAN. 239
Bithynia, and Mysia meet together, and on the water-shed which separates
the waters flowing northwards to the Propontis, and those which feed the
rivers of the iEgean.
Here then we may imagine the Apostle and his three companions to
pause, — uncertain of their future progress, — on the chalk downs which
lie between the fountains of the Rhyndacus and those of the Hermus, —
in the midst of scenery not very unlike what is familiar to us in Eng
land.1 The long range of the Mysian Olympus to the north is the
boundary of Bithynia. The summits" of the Phrygian Dindymus on the
south are on the frontier of Galatia and Asia. The Hermus flows
through the province of Asia to the islands of the iEgean. The Rhyn
dacus flows to the Propontis, and separates Mysia from Bithynia. By
following the road near the former river they would easily arrive at
Smyrna or Pergamus. By descending the valley of the latter and then
crossing Olympus,2 they would be in the richest and most prosperous
part of Bithynia. In which direction shall their footsteps be turned ?
Some Divine intimation, into the nature of which we do not presume to
inquire, told the Apostle that the Gospel was not yet to be preached in
the populous cities of Asia.3 The time was not yet come for Christ to be
made known to the Greeks and Jews of Ephesus, — and for the churches
of Sardis, Pergamus, Philadelphia, Smyrna, Thyatira, and Laodicea, to
be admitted to their period of privilege and trial, for the warning of
future generations. Shall they turn, then, in the direction of Bithynia?4
This also is forbidden. St. Paul (so far as we know) never crossed the
1 See Mr. Hamilton's account of the course Galatia till their arrival at Troas. On the
of the Rhyndacus, his comparison of the dis- other hand, they were not allowed to enter
trict of Azanitis to the chalk scenery of Eng- Bithynia at all. Meyer's view of the word
land, and his notice of Dindymus, which seems " Asia " in this passage is surprising. He
to be part of the water-shed that crosses the holds it to mean the eastern continent as
country from the Taurus towards Ida, and opposed to " Europe." (See p. 205, &c.) He
separates the waters of the Mediterranean and says that the travellers, being uncertain
iEgean from those of the Euxine and Propon- whether Asia in the more limited sense were
tia. In the course of his progress up the not intended, made a vain attempt to enter
Rhyndacus he frequently mentions the aspect Bithynia, and finally learned at Troas that
of Olympus, the summit of which could not Europe was their destination.
be reached at the end of March in consequence 4 The route is drawn in the map past
of the snow. Aizani into the valley of the Hermus, and
2 The ordinary road from Broussa to then northwards towards Hadriani on the
Kiutayah crosses » part of the range of Rhyndacus. This is merely an imaginary
Olympus. The Peut. Table has a road join- line, to express to the eye the changes of
ing Broussa with Pergamus. plan which occurred successively to St. Paul.
3 It will be observed that they were merely The scenery of the Rhyndacus, which is
forbidden to preach the Gospel in Asia. We interesting as the frontier river, has been fully
are not told that they did not enter Asia. explored and described by Mr. Hamilton, who
Their road lay entirely through Asia (politi- ascended the river to its source, and then
cally speaking) from the momaut of leaving crossed over to the fountains of the Hermus

240 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. CHAp.vrn.
Mysian Olympus, or entered the cities of Nicaea and Chalcedon, illus
trious places in the Christian history of a later age. By revelations
which were anticipative of the fuller and clearer communication at
Troas, the destined path of the Apostolic Company was pointed out,
through the intermediate country, directly to the West. Leaving the
greater part of what was popularly called Mysia to the right,1 they came
to the shores of the JEgean, about the place where the deep gulf of
Adramyttium, over against the island of Lesbos, washes the very base of
Mount Ida.2
At Adramyttium, if not before, St. Paul is on the line of a great
Roman road.' We recognize the place as one which is mentioned again
in the description of the voyage to Rome. (Acts xxvii. 2.) It was a
mercantile town, with important relations both with foreign harbors, and
the cities of the interior of Asia Minor.4 Prom this point the road
follows the northern shore of the gulf, — crossing a succession of the
streams which flow from Ida,5 — and alternately descending to the pebbly
beach and rising among the rocks and evergreen brushwood, — while
Lesbos appears and re-appears through the branches of the rich forest-
trees,6 — till the sea is left behind at the city of Assos. This also is a
city of St. Paul. The nineteen miles of road7 which lie between it and
Troas is the distance which he travelled by land before he rejoined the
ship which had brought him from Philippi (Acts xx. 13) : and the town
across the strait, on the shore of Lesbos, is Mytilene,8 whither the vessel
proceeded when the Apostle and his companions met on board.
and Maeander, near which he saw an ancient ceeds by Assos to Alexandria Troas, and so
road, probably connecting Smyrna and Phila- to the Hellespont.
delphia with Angora. * Fellows says that there are no traces of
1 The phrase in Acts xvi. 8 need not be antiquities to be found there now, except a few
pressed too closely. They passed along the coins. He travelled in the direction just men-
frontier of Mysia, as it was popularly under- tioned, from Pergamus by Adramyttium ana
stood, and they passed by the whole district, Assos to Alexandria Troas.
without staying to evangelize it. Or, as a 6 Poets of all ages — Homer, Ovid, Ten-
German writer puts it, they hurried through nyson — have celebrated the streams which
Mysia, because they knew that they were not flow from the " many-fountained " cliffs of
to preach the Gospel in Asia. Ida.
2 Hence it was sometimes called the Gulf 6 See the description in 1 ellows. He was
of Ida. two days in travelling from Adramit to Assos.
3 The characteristics of this bay, as seen He says that the hills arc clothed with ever-
from the water, will be mentioned hereafter greens to the top, aud therefore vary httle with
when we come to the voyage from Assos to the season ; and he particularly mentions the
Mytilene (Actsxx. 14). At present we allude flat stones of the shingle, and the woods of
only to tho roads along the coast. Two roads large trees, especially planes.
converge at Adramyttium : one which follows 7 This is the distance given in the Antonme
the shore from the south, mentioned in the Itinerary.
Peutingcrian Tabic ; the other from Pergamus 8 The strait between Assos and Methymna
and the interior, mentioned also in the Anto- is narrow. Strabo calls it 60 stadia ; PUny 7
nine Itinerary. The united route then pro- miles. Mytilene is farther to the south

chap. vm.

ALEXANDRIA TROAS. 241

But to return to the present journey. Troas is the name either of a
district or a town. As a district it had a history of its own. Though
geographically a part of Mysia, and politically a part of the province of
Asia, it was yet usually spoken of as distinguished from both. This
small region,1 extending from Mount Ida to the plain watered by the
Simois and Scamander, was the scene of the Trojan war ; and it was due
to the poetry of Homer that the ancient name of Priam's kingdom
should be retained. This shore has been visited on many memorable oc
casions by the great men of this world. Xerxes passed this way when
he undertook to conquer Greece. Julius Caesar was here after the battle
of Pharsalia. But, above all, we associate the spot with a European con
queror of Asia, and an Asiatic conqueror of Europe ; with Alexander of
Macedon and Paul of Tarsus. Por here it was that the enthusiasm of
Alexander was kindled at the tomb of Achilles, by the memory of his
heroic ancestors; here he girded on their armor; and from this goal he
started to overthrow the august dynasties of the East. And now the
great Apostle rests in his triumphal progress upon the same poetic shore :
here he is armed by heavenly visitants with the weapons of a warfare
that is not carnal ; and hence he is sent forth to subdue all the powers of
the West, and bring the civilization of the world into captivity to the
obedience of Christ.
Turning now from the district to the city of Troas, we must remember
that its full and correct name was Alexandria Troas. Sometimes, as in
the New Testament, it is simply called Troas ; 2 sometimes, as by Pliny
and Strabo, simply Alexandria. It was not, however, one of those cities
(amounting in number to nearly twenty) which were built and named by
the conqueror of Darius. This Alexandria received its population and
its name under * the successors of Alexander. It was an instance of that
centralization of small scattered towns into one great mercantile city,
which was characteristic of the period. Its history was as follows : —
Antigonus, who wished to leave a monument of his name on this classical
ground, brought together the inhabitants of the neighboring towns to one
point on the coast, where he erected a city, and called it Antigonia Troas.
Lysimachus, who succeeded to his power on the Dardanelles, increased
and adorned the city, but altered its name, calling it, in honor of " the
man of Macedonia " 3 (if we may make this application of a phrase which

1 If we are not needlessly multiplying ing, a district which has retained a distinctive
topographical illustrations, we may compare name, and has found its own historian.
the three principal districts of the province of 2 Acts xvi. 8, 11, xx. 5; 2 Cor. ii. 12;
Asia, viz. Phrygia, Lydia, and Mysia, to the 2 Tim. iv. 13.
three Ridings of Yorkshire. Troas will then 8 Not the Vir Macedo of Horace (Od. m.
be in Mysia what Craven is in the West Rid-
1B

242 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap.vm.
Holy Writ1 has associated with the place), Alexandria Troas. This
name was retained ever afterwards. When the Romans began their
eastern wars, the Greeks of Troas espoused their cause, and were thence
forward regarded with favor at Rome. But this willingness to recom
pense useful service was combined with other feelings, half poetical
half political, which about this time took possession of the mind of the
Romans. They fancied they saw a primeval Rome on the Asiatic shore.
The story of ^Eneas in Virgil, who relates in twelve books how the glory
of Troy was transferred to Italy,2 — the warning of Horace, who ad
monishes his fellow-citizens that their greatness was gone if they rebuilt
the ancient walls,3 — reveal to us the fancies of the past and the future,
which were popular at Rome. Alexandria Troas was a recollection of
the city of Priam, and a prophecy of the city of Constantine. The Ro
mans regarded it in its best days as a "New Troy: " * and the Turks even
now call its ruius " Old Constantinople." 5 It is said that Julius Caesar,
in his dreams of a monarchy which should embrace the East and the
West, turned his eyes to this city as his intended capital : and there is no
doubt that Constantine, " before he gave a just preference to the situation
of Byzantium, had conceived the design of erecting the seat of empire
on this celebrated spot, from whence the Romans derived their fabulous
origin." 6 Augustus brought the town into close and honorable connec
tion with Rome by making it a colonia,1 and assimilated its land to that
of Italy by giving it the jus Italicum? When St. Paul was there, it had
xvi. 14), the Macedonian Man of Demosthenes attracted the notice of all who sailed through
(Phil, i.), but his more eminent son. the Hellespont."
1 See Acts xvi. 9. 7 Its full name on coins of the Antonines
2 See especially Book vi. is, " Col. Alexandria Augusta Troas."
8 " Ne murium pii 8 Deferring the consideration of colonial
Tecta velint reparare Trojse." privileges to its proper place, in connection
Od. m. iii. with Philippi (Acts xvi. 12), we may state
4 This name applies more strictly to New here the general notion of the Jus Italicum.
Ilium, which, after many vicissitudes, was It was a privilege entirely relating to the land.
made a place of some importance by the Ro- The maxim of the Roman law was : " Ager
mans, and exempted from all imposts. The Italicus immunis est : ager provincialis vecti-
strong feeling of Julius Caesar for the people galis est." " Italian land is free : provincial
of Ilium, his sympathy with Alexander, and land is taxed." The Jus Italicum raised pro
file influence of the tradition which traced the vincial land to the same state of immunity from
origin of his nation, and especially his own taxation which belonged to land in Italy. But
family, to Troy, are described by Strabo. this privilege could only be enjoyed by those
New Ilium, however, gradually sank into in- who were citizens. Therefore it would have
significance, and Alexandria Troas remained been an idle gift to any community not pos
es the representative of the Roman partiality sessing the civitas ; and we never find it given
for the Troad. except to a colonia. Conversely, however, all
6 Eski-Stamboul. colonies did not possess the Jus Italicum.
0 Gibbon, ch. xvu. He adds that, " though Carthage was a colony for two centuries before
the undertaking was soon relinquished, the it received it.
stately remains of unfinished walls and towers

cHAP.vm. ST. PAUL'S VISION. 243
not attained its utmost growth as a city of the Romans. The great
aqueduct was not yet built, by which Herodes Atticus brought water from
the fountains of Ida, and the piers of which are still standing.1 The
enclosure of the walls, extending above a mile from east to west, and
near a mile from north to south, may represent the limits of the city in
the age of Claudius. The ancient harbor, even yet distinctly traceable,
and not without a certain desolate beauty, when it is the foreground of a
picture with the hills of Imbros and the higher peak of Samothrace in
the distance,3 is an object of greater interest than the aqueduct and the
walls. All further allusions to the topography of the place may be de
ferred till we describe the Apostle's subsequent and repeated visits.4 At
present he is hastening towards Europe. Every thing in this part of our
narrative turns our eyes to the West.
When St. Paul's eyes were turned towards the West, he saw that
remarkable view of Samothrace over Imbros, which has just been
mentioned. And what were the thoughts in his mind when he looked
towards Europe across the iEgean? Though ignorant of the precise
nature of the supernatural intimations which had guided his recent
journey, we are led irresistibly to think that he associated his future
work with the distant prospect of the Macedonian hills. We are re
minded of another journey, when the Prophetic Spirit gave him partial
revelations on his departure from Corinth, and on his way to Jerusalem.
" After I have been there I must also see Rome s — I have no more place
in these parts 6 — I know not what shall befall me, save that the Holy
Ghost witnesseth that bonds and afflictions abide me." 7
Such thoughts, it may be, had been in the Apostle's mind at Troas,
when the sun set beyond Athos and Samothrace,8 and the shadows fell
1 See Clarke's Travels. the Epistle to the Romans was written just
2 See Pococke's Travels. before this departure from Corinth.
8 The author of Eothen was much struck 7 Acts xx. 22, 23.
by the appearance of Samothrace seen aloft 8 Athos and Samothrace are the highest
o\ta Imbros, when he recollected how Jupiter points in this part of the iEgean. They are
is described in the Iliad as watching from thence the conspicuous points from the summit of Ida,
the scene of action before Troy. " Now I along with Imbros, which is nearer. (Wal-
knew," he says, "that Homer had passed pole's Memoirs, p. 122.) See the notes at the
along here, — that this vision of Samothrace beginning of the next chapter. "Mount
over-towering the nearer island was common Athos is plainly visible from the Asiatic coast
to him and to me." — P. 64. The same train at sunset, but not at other times. Its distance
of thought may be extended to our present hence is about 80 miles. Reflecting the red
subject, and we may find a sacred pleasure in rays of the sun, it appears from that coast
looking at any view which has been common like a huge mass of burnished gold. . . . Mr.
to St. Paul and to us. Turner, being off the N. W. end of Mytilene
4 Acts xvi., xx ; 2 Cor. ii. ; 2 Tim. iv. (Lesbos) 22d June, 1814, says, ' The evening
6 Acts xix. 21. being clear, we plainly saw the immense
9 Rom. xv. 23,. It will be remembered that Mount Athos, which appeared in the form of

244 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap. vm.
on Ida and settled dark on Tenedos and the deep. With the view of the
distant land of Macedonia imprinted on his memory, and the thought of
Europe's miserable Heathenism deep in his heart, he was prepared, like
Peter at Joppa,1 to receive the full meaning of the voice which spoke to
him in a dream. In the visions of the night, a form appeared to come
and stand by him ; 2 and he recognized in the supernatural visitant " a
man of Macedonia," 3 who came to plead the spiritual wants of hia
country. It was the voice of the sick inquiring for a physician, — of the
ignorant seeking for wisdom, — the voice which ever since has been call
ing on the Church to extend the Gospel to Heathendom, — " Come over
and help us."
Virgil has described an evening 4 and a sunrise 5 on this coast, before
and after an eventful night. That night was indeed eventful in which
St. Paul received his commission to proceed to Macedonia. The com
mission was promptly executed.6 The morning-star appeared over the
cliffs of Ida. The sun rose and spread the day over the sea and the islands
as far as Athos and Samothrace. The men of Troas awoke to their trade
and their labor. Among those who were busy about the shipping in the
harbor were the newly-arrived Christian travellers, seeking for a passage
to Europe, — Paul, and Silas, and Timotheus, — and that new companion,
" Luke7 the beloved Physician," who, whether by pre-arrangement, or by
a providential meeting, or (it may be) even in consequence of the
Apostle's delicate health,8 now joined the mission, of which he afterwards
wrote the history. God provided a ship for the messengers He had
chosen : and (to use the language of a more sacred poetry than thai
an equilateral triangle.'" Sailing Directory, on the significance of this vision are well
p. 150. In the same page a sketch is given of worth considering. Apostelgesch., ii. p. 199.
Mount Athos, N. by W. { W., 45 miles. Com- (Eng. Trans, ii. 110.)
pare Mr. Bowen's recent work, p. 26. " At 4 j3£n. ii. 250.
sunset we were half way between Tenedos and 6 ^En. n. 801.
the rugged Imbros. In the disk of the setting 6 Acts xvi. 10.
sun I distinguished the pyramidal form of 7 We should notice here not only the
Mount Athos." change of person from the third to the first,
1 See the remarks on St. Peter's vision, p. but the simultaneous transition (as it has been
87. See also p. 97, n. 2, and p. 183. well expressed) from the historical to the au-
2 Acts xvi. 9. toptical style, as shown by the fuller enumera-
8 St. Paul may have known, by his dress, or tion of details. We shall return to this sub-
by his words, or by an immediate intuition, ject again, when we come to the point where
that he was " a man of Macedonia." Grotius St. Luke parts from St. Paul at Philippi:
suggests the notion of a representative or meantime we may remark that it is highly prob-
guardian angel of Macedonia, as the " prince able that they had already met and labored
of Persia," &c, in Dan. x. The words " help together at Antioch.
us," imply that the man who appeared to St. 8 We must remember the recent sickness in
Paul was a representative of many. This is Galatia, p. 235. See below, p. 288.
remarked by Baumgarten, whose observations

chap. Tint.

CROSSING OVER TO EUROPE.

245

which has made these coasts illustrious) l " He brought the wind out of
His treasuries, and by His power He brought in the south wind," 2 and
prospered the voyage of His servants. ,

Coin of Tarsus.'

1 The classical reader will remember that
tne throne of Neptune in Homer, whence he
looks over Ida and the scene of the Trojan
war, is on the peak of Samothrace (II. xiii.
10-14), and his cave deep under the water be
tween Imbros and Tenedos (//. xiii. 32-35).
' Ps. cxxxv. 7, lxxviii. 26. For arguments
to prove that the wind was literally a south

wind in this case, see the beginning of the
next chapter.
8 From the British Museum. It may be
observed that this coin illustrates the mode of
strengthening sails by rope-bands, mentioned
in Mr. Smith's important work on the Voyage
and Shipwreck of St. Paul, 1848, p. 163.

CHAPTER IX.

Voyage by Samothrace to Neapolis. — Philippi. — Constitution of a Colony. — Lydia. — The
Demoniac Slave. — Paul and Silas arrested. — The Prison and the Jailer. — The Magis
trates. — Departure from Philippi. — St. Luke. — Macedonia described. — Its Condition as a
Province. — The Via Egnatia. — St. Paul's Journey through Amphipolis and Apollonia. —
Thessalonica. — The Synagogue. — Subjects of St. Paul's Preaching. — Persecution, Tumult,
and Flight. — The Jews at Beroea. — St. Paul again persecuted. — Proceeds to Athens.
THE weather itself was propitious to the voyage from Asia to
Europe. It is evident that Paul and his companions sailed from
Troas with a fair wind. On a later occasion we are told that five days
were spent on the passage from Philippi to Troas.1 On the present
occasion the same voyage, in the opposite direction, was made in two.
If we attend to St. Luke's technical expression,2 which literally means
that they " sailed before the wind," and take into account that the pas
sage to the west, between Tenedos and Lemnos, is attended with some
risk,3 we may infer that the wind blew from the southward.4 Tlie
southerly winds in this part of the Archipelago do not usually last long,
but they often blow with considerable force. Sometimes they are
sufficiently strong to counteract the current which sets to the southward
from the mouth of the Dardanelles.5 However this might be on the day
1 Compare Acts xvi. 11,12, with xx. 6. anywhere. If you go outside of Tenedos, and
For the expression, " sailed from Philippi " it falls calm, the current sets you towards the
(xx. 6), and the relation of Philippi with its shoal off Lemnos." (The writer has heard
harbor, Neapolis, see below, p. 249, n. 4. this and what follows confirmed by those who
2 It occurs again in Acts xxi. I, evidently have had practical experience in the merchant-
in the same sense. service in the Levant.)
8 " All ships should pass to the eastward 4 The same inference may be drawn from
of Tenedos. . . . Ships that go to the west- the fact of their going to Samothrace at all.
ward in calms may drift on the shoals of Lem- Had the wind blown from the northward or
nos, and the S. E. end of that island being the eastward, they probahly would not have
very low is not seen above nine miles off. . . . done so. Had it blown from the westward,
It is also to be recollected, that very dangerous they could not have made the passage m two
shoals extend from the N. W. and W. ends of days, especially as the currents are contrary.
Tenedos." — Purdy's Sailing Directory, pp. This consistency in minute details sho -ii' be
158,189. Captain Stewart says (p. 63) :" To carefully noticed, as tending to confirm the
work up to the Dardanelles, I prefer going in- veracity of the narrative.
side of Tenedos . . . you can go by your 6 " The current from the Dardanelles S ijms
lead, and, during light winds, you may anchor to run strongly to the southward at Tenedos,
246

chap. n. SAMOTHRACE. 247
when St. Paul passed over these waters, the vessel in which he sailed
would soon cleave her way through the strait between Tenedos and the
main, past the Dardanelles, and near the eastern shore of Imbros. On
rounding the northern end of this island, they would open Samothrace,
which had hitherto appeared as a higher and more distant summit over
the lower mountains of Imbros.1 The distance between the two islands
is about twelve miles/ Leaving Imbros, and bearing now a little to the
west, and having the wind still (as our sailors say) two or three points
abaft the beam, the helmsman steered for Samothrace ; and, under the
shelter of its high shore, they anchored for the night.3
Samothrace is the highest land in the north of the Archipelago, with
the exception of Mount Athos.4 These two eminences have been in all
ages the familiar landmarks of the Greek mariners of the iEgean.
Even from the neighborhood of Troas, Mount Athos is seen towering
over Lemnos, like Samothrace over Imbros.5 And what Mount Athos is,
in another sense, to the superstitious Christian of the Levant,6 the peak
of Samothrace was, in the days of Heathenism, to his Greek ancestors in
the same seas. It was the " Monte Santo," on which the Greek mariner
looked with awe, as he gazed on it in the distant horizon, or came to
anchor under the shelter of its coast. It was the sanctuary of an ancient
superstition, which was widely spread over the neighboring continents,
and the history of which was vainly investigated by Greek and Roman
writers. If St. Paul had staid here even a few days, we might be
justified in saying something of the " Cabiri ; " but we have no reason
to suppose that he even landed on the island. At present it possesses
but there is no difficulty in turning over it (p. 243, u. 4). The following is a morning
with a breeze." — Purdy, p. 159. "The cur- view. "Nov. 26, 1828, 8, a. m. — Morning
rent in the Archipelago sets almost contin- beautifully clear. Lemnos just opening.
ually to the southward, and is increased or re- Mount Athos was at first taken for an island
tarded according to the winds. In lying at about five leagues distant, the outline and
Tenedos, near the north of the Dardanelles, I shades appearing so perfectly distinct, though
have observed a, strong south wind entirely nearly fifty miles off. The base of it was
stop it; but it came strong to the southward covered with haze, as was the summit soon
the moment the gale from that point ceased." afterward ; but toward sunset it became clear
— Captain Stewart, ib. p. 62. For the winds, again. It is immensely high ; and, as there is
see pp. 63 and 163. no other mountain like it to the northward of
1 " The island Imbro is separated from Negropont, it is an excellent guide for this
' Samothraki by a channel twelve miles in part of the coast." — Purdy, p. 150.
breadth. It is much longer and larger, but not 6 See the account of Mount Athos (Monte
so high, as that island." Purdy, p. 152. Santo) in Curzon's Monasteries of the Levant,
2 See the preceding note. Pt. iv., and the view, p. 327. In his sail from
8 Acts xvi. 11. the Dardanelles to the mountain, — the breeze,
4 " Samothraki is the highest land in the the shelter and smooth water on the shore of
Archipelago, except Candia and Mount Athos." Lemnos, &c, — there are points of resem-
— Purdy, p. 152. blance with St. Paul's voyage.

6

An evening view has been quoted before

248 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap.h
no good harbor, though many places of safe anchorage : L and if the wind
was from the southward, there would be smooth water anywhere on the
north shore. The island was, doubtless, better supplied with artificial
advantages in an age not removed by many centuries from the flourishing
period of that mercantile empire which the Phoenicians founded, and the
Athenians inherited, in the ^Egean Sea. The relations of Samothrace
with the opposite coast were close and frequent, when the merchants of
Tyre had their miners at work in Mount Pangaeus,2 and when Athens
diffused her citizens as colonists or exiles on all the neighboring shores.3
Nor can those relations have been materially altered when both the
Phoenician and Greek settlements on the sea were absorbed in the wider
and continental dominion of Rome. Ever since the day when Perseus
fled to Samothrace from the Roman conqueror,4 frequent vessels had
been passing and repassing between the island and the coasts of Mace
donia and Thrace.
The Macedonian harbor at which St. Paul landed was Neapolis. Its
direction from Samothrace is a little to the north of west. But a
southerly breeze would still be a fair wind, though they could not
literally " run before it." A run of seven or eight hours, notwithstand
ing the easterly current,5 would bring the vessel under the lea of the
island of Thasos, and within a few miles of the coast of Macedonia.
The shore of the mainland in this part is low, but mountains rise to a
considerable height behind.6 To the westward of the channel which
separates it from Thasos, the coast recedes and forms a bay, within
which, on a promontory with a port on each side,7 the ancient Neapolis
was situated.
Some difference of opinion has existed concerning the true position of
this harbor : 8 but the traces of paved military roads approaching the
promontory we have described, in two directions corresponding with those
1 See Purdy, p. 152. Santo (Athos), from the S. W., strong toward
2 Herod, vii. 112. Thasos was the head- the eastward, by Thasso." — p. 152.
quarters of the Phoenician mining operations 6 See Purdy, p. 152, and the accurate
in this part of the iEgean. Herodotus visited delineation of the coast in the Admiralty
the island, and was much struck with the traces charts.
of their work (vi. 47). 7 Clarke's Travels, ch. xii. and xiii. An
3 It is hardly necessary to refer to the for- important paper on Neapolis and Philippi has •
matioo of the commercial empire of Athens been written (after a recent visit to these
before the Pelopounesian war, to the mines of places) by Prof. Hackett, in the Bib. Sacra for
Scapte Hyle, and the exile of Thucydides. October, 1860.
See Grote's Greece, ch. xxvi., xlvii., &c. 8 Cousinery, in his Voyage dans la Had-
4 Liv. xiv. 6. doine, identifies Neapolis with Eski-Cavallo, a
6 " Inside of Thasso, and past Samothraki, harbor more to the west ; but his arguments
the current sets to the eastward." — Purdy, p. are quite inconclusive. Colonel Leake, whose
62. " The current at times turns by Monte opinion is of great weight, though he did not

chap. ix. NEAPOLlb. 249
indicated in the ancient itineraries ; the Latin inscriptions which have
been found on the spot ; the remains of a great aqueduct on two tiers of
Roman arches, and of ,cisterns like those at Baiae near the other Neapolis
on tlie Campanian shore, seem to leave little doubt that the small Turkish
village of Cavallo is the Naples of Macedonia, the " Neapolis " at which
St. Paul landed, and the seaport of Philippi, — the " first city " x which
the traveller reached on entering this " part of Macedonia," and a city of
no little importance as a Roman military " colony." 2
A ridge of elevated land, which connects the range of Pangaeus with the
higher mountains in the interior of, Thrace, is crossed between Neapolis
and Philippi. The whole distance is about ten miles.3 The ascent of the
ridge is begun immediately from the town, through a defile formed by
some precipices almost close upon the sea. When the higher ground is
attained, an extensive and magnificent sea-view is opened towards the
south. Samothrace is seen to the east ; Thasos to the south-east ; and,
more distant and farther to the right, the towering summit of Athos.4
When the descent on the opposite side begins and the sea is lost to view,
another prospect succeeds, less extensive, but not less worthy of our notice.
We look down on a plain, which is level as an inland sea, and which, if
the eye could range over its remoter spaces, would be seen winding far
within its mountain-enclosure, to the west and the north.5 Its appearance
is either exuberantly green, — for its fertility has been always famous, —
or cold and dreary, — for the streams which water it are often diffused
into marshes, — according to the season when we visit this corner of Mace-
personally visit Philippi and Neapolis, agrees enough to enjoy the fine prospect of the sea
with Dr. Clarke. and the town of Cavallo upon » promontory.
1 Acts xvi. 12. At some distance lies the isle of Thasos, now
2 For the meaning of these terms see p. called Tasso. It was indistinctly discerned
251, &c. by us ; but every other object, excepting the
8 Hence it was unnecessary for Meyer to town, began to disappear as we descended
deride Olshausen's remark, that Philippi was toward Cavallo." — Ch. xii. " Upon quitting
the "first city " in Macedonia visited by the the town, we ascended a part of Mount Pan-
Apostle, because Neapolis was its harbor. gams by a paved road, and had a fine view of
Olshausen was quite right. The distance of the bay of Neapolis. The top of the hill,
Neapolis from Philippi is only twice as great towards the left, was covered with ruined
as that from the Piraeus to Athens, not much walls, and with the ancient aqueduct, which
greater than that from Cenchrea to Corinth, here crosses the road. From hence we de-
and less than that from Seleucia to Antioch, scended by a paved road as before ... the
or from Ostia to Rome. isle of Thasos being in view towards the S. E.
4 We may quote here two passages from Looking to the E., we saw the high top of
Dr. Clarke, one describing this approach to Samothrace, which makes such a conspicuous
Neapolis from the neighborhood, the other figure from the plains of Troy. To the S.,
his departure in the direction of Constantino- towering above a region of clouds, appeared
pie. " Ascending the mountainous boundary the loftier summit of Mount Athos." —
of the plain on its north-eastern side by a Ch. xiii.
broad ancient paved way, we had not daylight 6 See the very full descriptions of the plain

250 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap.ix.
donia ; whether it be when the snows are white and chill on the summits
of the Thracian Haemus,1 or when the roses, of which Theophrastus and
Pliny speak, are displaying their bloom on the warmer slopes of the
Pangtean hills.2
This plain, between Haemus and Pangaeus, is the plain of Philippi,
where the last battle was lost by the republicans of Rome. The whole
region around is eloquent of the history of this battle. Among the moun
tains on the right was the difficult path by which the republican army
penetrated into Macedonia ; on some part of the very ridge on which we
stand were the camps of Brutus and Cassius ; 3 the stream before us is the
river which passed in front of them ; 4 below us, " upon the left hand of
the even field," 5 is the marsh6 by which Antony crossed as he approached
his antagonist ; directly opposite is the hill of Philippi, where Cassius died ;
behind us is the narrow strait of the sea, across which Brutus sent his
body to the island of Thasos, lest the army should be disheartened before
the final struggle.7 The city of Philippi was itself a monument of the
termination of that struggle. It had been founded by the father of
Alexander, in a place called, from its numerous streams, " The Place of
Fountains," to commemorate the addition of a new province to his king
dom, and to protect the frontier against the Thracian mountaineers. For
similar reasons the city of Philip was gifted by Augustus with the privi
leges of a colonia. It thus became at once a border-garrison of the prov
ince of Macedonia, and a perpetual memorial of his victory over Brutus.'
And now a Jewish Apostle came to the same place, to win a greater vic
tory than that of Philippi, and to found a more durable empire than that
of Augustus. It is a fact of deep significance, that the " first city" at
which St. Paul arrived,9 on his entrance into Europe, should be that

of Set-re's, in the various parts of its extension, 7 Plutarch's Life of Brutus.
given by Leake and Cousinery. 8 The full and proper Roman name wan
1 Lucan's view is very winterly. Phars. Colonia Augusta Julia Philippensis. See the
i. 680. coin engraved at the end of Ch. XXVI.
2 The "Rosa centifolia," which the latter Cousine'ry (ch. x.) enters fully into the pres-
mentions as cultivated in Campania and in ent condition of Philippi, and gives coins and
Greece, near Philippi. inscriptions.
8 The republicans were so placed as to be 9 We regard the phrase in Acts xvi. 12 as
in communication with the sea. The triremes meaning the first city in its geographical rela-
were at Neapolis. tion to St. Paul's journey ; not the first politi-
4 The Gangas or Gangites. Leake, p. 217. cally ("chief city," Auth. Vers.), either of
6 Julius Ccesar, act v. sc. i. The topogra- Macedonia or a part of it. The chief city of
phy of Shakspeare is perfectly accurate. In the province was Thessalonica ; and, evee if
this passage Octavius and Antony are looking we suppose the subdivisions of Macedonia
at the field from the opposite side. Prima, Secunda, &c, to have subsisted at this
8 The battle took place in autumn, when time, the chief city of Macedonia Prima ras
fbe nlain would nrobably be inundated. not Philippi, but Amphipolis.

CHAP. IX.

PHILIPPI. 251

" colony," wh'ch was more fit than any other in the empire to be con
sidered the representative of Imperial Rome.
The characteristic of a colonia was, that it was a miniature resemblance
of Rome. Philippi is not the first city of this kind to which we have
traced the foosteps of St. Paul ; Antioch in Pisidia (p. 152), and Alex
andria Troas (p. 242), both possessed the same character : but this is the
first place where Scripture calls our attention to the distinction ; and the
events which befell the Apostle at Philippi were directly connected with
the privileges of the place as a Roman colony, and with his own privileges
as a Roman citizen. It will be convenient to consider these two subjects
together. A glance at some of the differences which subsisted among
individuals and communities in the provincial system will enable us to see
very clearly the position of the citizen and of the colony.
We have had occasion (Ch. I. p. 21) to speak of the combination of
actual provinces and nominally independent states through which the
power of the Roman emperor was variously diffused ; and again (Ch. V.
p. 129), we have described the division of the provinces by Augustus into
those of the Senate, and those of the Emperor. Descending now to ex
amine the component population of any one prov' nee, and to inquire into
the political condition of individuals and communities, we find here again
a complicated system of rules and exceptions. As regards individuals,
the broad distinction we must notice is that between those who were
citizens and those who were not citizens. When the Greeks spoke of the
inhabitants of the world, they divided them into " Greeks " and " Bar
barians,"1 according as the language in which poets and philosophers had
written was native to them or foreign. Among the Romans the phrase
was different. The classes into which they divided mankind consisted of
those who were politically " Romans," 2 and those who had no link (except
that of subjection) with the City of Rome. The technical words were Gives
and Peregrini, — " citizens " and " strangers." The inhabitants of Italy
were " citizens ; " the inhabitants of all other parts of the Empire (until
Caracalla extended to the provinces 3 the same privileges which Julius
Caesar had granted to the peninsula) 4 were naturally and essentially
"strangers." Italy was the Holy Land of the kingdom of this world.
We may carry the parallel further, in order to illustrate the difference
which existed among the citizens themselves. Those true-born Italians,
who were diffused in vast numbers through the provinces, might be called
1 Thus St. Paul, in writing his Greek epis- politically in the New Testament. John xi.
ties, uses this distinction. Rom. i. 14; Col. 48; A.cts xvi., xxii., xxiii., xxviii.
Hi. 11. Hence, also, Acts xxviii. 2, t ; 1 Cor. 8 See Milman's Gibbon, i. p. 281 and note.
riv. n. 4 By the Julia Lex de Civitate (b c. 90),
2 The word "Roman" is always used supplemented by other laws.

252 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap.ii
Citizens of the Dispersion ; while those strangers who, at various times
and for various reasons, had received the gift of citizenship, were in the
condition of political Proselytes. Such were Paul and Silas,1 in their re
lation to the empire, among their fellow-Romans in the colony of Philippi,
Botli these classes of citizens, however, were in full possession of the same
privileges ; the most important of which were exemption from scourging
and freedom from arrest, except in extreme cases ; and in all cases the
right of appeal from the magistrate to the Emperor.2
The remarks which have been made concerning individuals may be
extended, in some degree, to communities in the provinces. The City of
Rome might be transplanted, as it were, into various parts of the empire,
and reproduced as a colonia ; or an alien city might be adopted, under the
title of a municipium,3 into a close political communion with Rome. Leav
ing out of view all cities of the latter kind (and indeed they were limited
entirely to the western provinces), we will confine ourselves to what was
called a colonia. A Roman colony was very different from any thing which
we usually intend by the term. It was no mere mercantile factory, such
as those which the Phoenicians established in Spain,4 or on those very
shores of Macedonia with which we are now engaged ; 5 or such as modern
nations have founded in the Hudson's Bay territory or on the coast of
India. Still less was it like those incoherent aggregates of human beings
which we have thrown, without care or system, on distant islands and
continents. It did not even go forth, as a young Greek republic left its
parent state, carrying with it, indeed, the respect of a daughter for a
mother, but entering upon a new and independent existence. The
Roman colonies were primarily intended as military safeguards of the fron
tiers, and as checks upon insurgent provincials. Like the military roads,
they were part of the great system of fortification by which the Empire

1 We can hardly help inferring, from the accused citizen could only be imprisoned
narrative of what happened at Philippi, that before trial for a very heinous offence, or when
Silas was a Roruun citizen as well as St. Paul, evidently guilty. Bail was generally allowed.
As to the mode in which he obtaiued the citi- or retention in a magistrate's house was held
zenship. we are more ignorant than in the sufficient.
case of St. Paul himself, whose father was a 3 The privilege of a colonia was transplanted
citizen (Acts xxii. 28). All that we are able citizenship, that of a municipium was ingrafted
to say on this subject has been given before, citizenship. We have nothing to do, however,
pp. 42-44. with municipia in the history of St. Paul. We
2 Two of these privileges will come more are more concerned with libera civitutes, and
particularly before us, when we rpacb tho mr- we shall presently come to one of them in the
rative of St. Paul's arrest at Jerusalem. Tt case of Thessalonica.
appears that Paul and Silas were treated with 4 Especially in the mountains on the coast
a cruelty which was only justifiable in the case between Cartagena and Almeria.
of a slave, and was not usually allowed in the 6 See above p. 248, n. 2.
case of any freeman. It would seem, that an

chap. b. CONSTITUTION OP A COLONY. 253
was made safe. They served also as convenient possessions for rewarding
veterans who had served in the wars, and for establishing freedmen and
other Italians whom it was desirable to remove to a distance. The colo
nists went out with all the pride of Roman citizens, to represent and re
produce the City in the midst of an alien population. They proceeded to
their destination like an army with its standards ; l and the limits of the
new city were marked out by the plough. Their names were still enrolled
in one of the Roman tribes. Every traveller who passed through a colonia
saw there'the insignia of Rome. He heard the Latin language, and was
amenable, in the strictest sense, to the Roman law. The coinage of the
city, even if it were in a Greek province, had Latin inscriptions.2 Cyprian
tells us that in his own episcopal city, which once had been Rome's
greatest enemy, the Laws of the XII Tables were inscribed on brazen
tablets in the market-place.3 Though the colonists, in addition to the
poll-tax, which they paid as citizens, were compelled to pay a ground-tax
(for the land on which their city stood was provincial land, and therefore
tributary, unless it were assimilated to Italy by a special exemption) ; 4
yet they were entirely free from any intrusion by the governor of the prov
ince. Their affairs were regulated by their own magistrates. These
officers were named Duumviri ; and they took a pride in calling them
selves by the Roman title of Praetors (atQarriyoi).b The primary settlers
in the colony were, as we have seen, real Italians ; but a state of things
seems to have taken place, in many instances, very similar to what hap-
.pened in the early history of Rome itself. A number of the native pro
vincials grew up in the same city with the governing body ; and thus two
(or sometimes three) co-ordinate communities were formed, which ulti
mately coalesced into one, like the Patricians and Plebeians. Instances
of this state of things might be given from Corinth and Carthage, and from
the colonies of Spain and Gaul ; and we have no reason to suppose that
Philippi was different from the rest.
Whatever the relative proportion of Greeks and Romans at Philippi
may have been, the number of Jews was small. This is sufficiently
accounted for, when we remember that it was a military, and not a
mercantile, city. There was no synagogue in Philippi, but only one of
those buildings called Proseuchee, which were distinguished from the
1 See the standards on one of the coins of a contrast with the coins of Philippi we may
Antioch in Pisidia, p. 178. The wolf, with mention those of Thessalonica.
Itomulus and Remus, which will be observed 8 De Grat. Dei, 10.
on the other coin, was common on colonial 4 Philippi had the Jus Italicum, like Alex-
moneys. Philippi was in the strictest sense a andria Troas. This is explained above, p. 242.
military colony, formed by the establishment 5 An instance of this is mentioned by Cice
of a cohers proztoria emerita. ro in the case of Capua. See Hor. Sat. 1
3 This has been noticed before, p. 152. As vi.

251

THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL.

chap. h.

regular places of Jewish worship by being of a more slight and tem
porary structure, and frequently open to the sky.1 For the sake of
greater quietness, and freedom from interruption, this place of prayer
was " outside the gate;" and, in consequence of the ablutions 2 which
were connected with the worship, it was " by the river-side," on the
bank of the Gaggitas,3 the fountains of which gave the name to the city
before the time of Philip of Macedon,4 and which, in the great battle of
the Romans, had been polluted by the footsteps and blood of the contend
ing armies. >
The congregation, which met here for worship on the Sabbath, con
sisted chiefly, if not entirely, of a few women ; 6 and these were not all
of Jewish birth, and not all residents at Philippi. Lydia, who is men
tioned by name, was a proselyte ; 6 and Thyatira, her native place, was a

1 Extracts to this effect might be quoted
from Epiphanius. A Proseucha may be con
sidered as a place of prayer, as opposed to a
Synagogue, or a house of prayer. It appears,
however, that the words were more or less
convertible, and some consider them nearly
equivalent. Josephus (Life, § 54) describes a
Proseucha as " a large building, capable of
holding a considerable crowd : " and Philo
mentions, under the same denomination, build
ings at Alexandria, which were so strong that
it was difficult to destroy them. Probably, it
was the usual name of the meeting-place of
Jewish congregations in Greek cities.
Other passages in ancient writers, which
bear upon the subject, are alluded to in the
following extract from Biscoe : " The seashore
was esteemed by the Jews a place most pure,
and therefore proper to offer up their prayers
and thanksgiving to Almighty God. Philo
tells us that the Jews of Alexandria, when
Flaccus the governor of Egypt, who had been
their great enemy, was arrested by order of
the Emperor Caius, not being able to assemble
at their synagogues, which had been taken
from them, crowded out at the gates of the
city early in the morning, went to the neigh
boring shores, and standing in a most pure
place, with one accord lifted up their voices in
praising God. Tertulhan says, that the Jews
in his time, when they kept their great fast,
left their synagogues, and on every shore sent
forth their prayers to heaven : and in another
place, among the ceremonies used by the Jews,
mentions orationes littorales, the prayers they
made upon the shores. And long before Ter-

tullian's time there was a decree made at Hali-
carnassus in favor of the Jews, which, among
other privileges, allows them to say their
prayers near the shore, according to the custom
of their country. (Joseph. Ant. xiv. 10, 23.)
It is hence abundantly evident, that it was
common with the Jews to choose the shore as
a place highly fitting to offer up their prayers."
P. 251. He adds that the words in Acts rvi.
13 " may signify nothing more than that the
Jews of Philippi were wont to go and offer up
their prayers at a certain place by the river
side, as other Jews who lived near the sea
were accustomed to do upon the seashore."
See Acts xxi. 5.
2 See the passage adduced by Biscoe from
Josephus. 8 Many eminent German commentators
make a mistake here in saying that the rivet
was the Strymon. The nearest point on the
Strymon was many miles distant. This mis
take is the more marked when we find that
" out of the gate " and not " out of the city " is
probably the right reading. No one would
describe the Strymon as a stream outside the
gate of Philippi. We may add that the men
tion of the gate is an instance of St. Luke's
autoptical style in this part of the narrative.
It is possible that the Jews worshipped outside
the gate at Philippi, because the people would
not allow them to worship within. Compare
what Juvenal says of the Jews by the fountain
outside the Porta Capena at Rome (iii. 11).
4 Crenides was the ancient name.
6 Acts xvi. 13.
6 Acts xvi. 14

chap. rx.

LYDIA. , 255

city of the province of Asia.1 The business which brought her to
Philipp; was connected with the dyeing trade, which had flourished from
a very early period, as we learn from Homer,2 in the neighborhood of
Thyatira, and is permanently commemorated in inscriptions which relate
to the " guild of dyers " in that city, and incidentally give a singular
confirmation of the veracity of St. Luke in his casual allusions.3
In this unpretending place, and to this congregation of pious women,
the Gospel was first preached by an Apostle within the limits of Europe.4
St. Paul and his companions seem to have arrived in the early part of
the week ; for " some days " elapsed before " the sabbath." On that day
the strangers went and joined the little company of worshippers at their
prayer by the river-side. Assuming at once the attitude of teachers,
they " sat down," 5 and spoke to the women who were assembled together.
The Lord, who had summoned His servants from Troas to preach the
Gospel in Macedonia,6 now vouchsafed to them the signs of His presence,
by giving Divine energy to the words which they spoke in His name.
Lydia " was one of the listeners," 7 and the Lord " opened her heart, that
whe took heed to the things that were spoken of Paul." 8
Lydia, being convinced that Jesus was the Messiah, and having made a
profession of her faith, was forthwith baptized. The place of her
baptism was doubtless the stream which flowed by the proseucha. The
waters of Europe were " sanctified to the mystical washing-away of sin."
With the baptism of Lydia that of her " household " was associated.
Whether we are to understand by this term her children, her slaves, or
the work-people engaged in the manual employment connected with her
trade, or all these collectively, cannot easily be decided.9 But we may
1 See Rev. i. 11. 8 Acts xvi. 10.
2 II. iv. 141. 7 The verb is in the imperfect. Acts. xvi. 14.
3 We may observe that the communication From the words used here we infer that Lydia
at this period between Thyatira and Philippi was listening to conversation rather than preach-
was very easy, either directly from the harbor ing. The whole narrative gives us the impres-
of Pergamus, or by the road mentioned in the sion of the utmost modesty and simplicity in
last chapter, which led through Adramyttium Lydia's character.
to Troas. Another point should be noticed, which
4 At least this is the first historical account exemplifies St. Luke's abnegation of self, and
of the preaching of an apostle in Europe. harmonizes with the rest of the Acts; viz.
The traditions concerning St. Peter rest on no that, after saying " we spake " (v. 13), ho sinks
real proof. We do not here inquire into the his own person, and says that Lydia took heed
knowledge of Christianity which may have "to what was spoken by Paul" (v. 14). Paul
spread, even to Rome, through those who was the chief speaker. The phrase and the
returned from Pentecost (Acts ii.), or those inference are the same at Antioch in Pisidia
who were dispersed in Stephen's persecution (Acts xiii. 45), when Barnabas was with St,
(Acts viii.), or other travellers from Syria to Paul. See p. 160, n. 2.
the West. 8 v. 14.
6 Acts xvi. 13. Compare Acts xiii. 14, " Meyer thinks they were female assistants
and Luke iv. 20. in the business connected with her trade. Il

256 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL.

chap, a.

observe that it is the first passage in the life of St. Paul where we
have an example of that family religion to which he often alludes in his
Epistles. The " connections of Chloe," l the " household of Stephanas "2
the " Church in the house " of Aquila and Priscilla,3 are parallel cases
to which we shall come in the course of the narrative. It may also be
rightly added, that we have here the first example of that Christian
hospitality which was so emphatically enjoined,4 and so lovingly prac
tised, in the Apostolic Church. The frequent mention of the " hosts "
who gave shelter to the Apostles,5 reminds us that they led a life of hard
ship and poverty, and were the followers of Him " for whom there was
no room in the inn." The Lord had said to His Apostles, that, when
they entered into a city, they were to seek out " those who were worthy,"
and with them to abide. The search at Philippi was not difficult.
Lydia voluntarily presented herself to her spiritual benefactors, and
said to them, earnestly and humbly,6 that, " since they had regarded her
as a believer on the Lord," her house should be their home. She
admitted of no refusal to her request, and " their peace was on that
house."7 Thus the Gospel had obtained a home in Europe. It is true that the
family with whom the Apostles lodged was Asiatic rather than European ;
and the direct influence of Lydia may be supposed to have contributed
more to the establishment of the church of Thyatira, addressed by St.
John,8 than to that of Philippi, which received the letter of St. Paul.
But still the doctrine and practice of Christianity were established in
Europe ; and nothing could be more calm and tranquil than its first
beginnings on the shore of that continent, which it has long overspread.
The scenes by the river-side, and in the house of Lydia, are beautiful
prophecies of the holy influence which women,' elevated by Christianity
to their true position, and enabled by Divine grace to wear " the orna
ment of a meek and quiet spirit," have now for centuries exerted over
domestic happiness and the growth of piety and peace. If we wish to
see this in a forcible light, we may contrast the picture which is drawn
is well known that this is one of the passages 8 Rev. ii.
often adduced in the controversy concerning 9 Observe the frequent mention of women
infant baptism. We need not urge this view in the salutations in St. Paul's epistles, and
of it : for the belief that infant baptism is more particularly in that to the Philippians,
" most agreeable with the institution of Christ " Rilliet, in his Commentary, makes a just
(Art. xxvii.) does not rest on this text. remark on the peculiar importance of female
1 1 Cor. i. 11. agency in th< ihen state of society: — "L'or-
2 1 Cor. i. 16, xvi. 15. ganisation ie la societe civile faisait des
8 Rom. xvi. 5. Compare Philem. 2. femmes un interme'diaire necessaire pour que
4 Heb. xiii. 2. 1 Tim. v. 10, &c. la predication de I'Evangile parvint jusqu'am
* Rom. xvi. 23, &c. personncs de leur sexe." See Quarterly R*
5 See above, p 255, u. 7. ' Matt x. 13. mew, for Oct. 1860

chap. a. BELIEF IN EVIL SPIRITS. 257
for us by St. Luke — with another representation of women in the same
neighborhood given by the Heathen poets, who tell us of the frantic
excitement of the Edonian matrons, wandering, under the name of
religion, with dishevelled hair and violent cries, on the banks of the
Strymon.1 Thus far all was peaceful apd hopeful in the work of preaching the
Gospel to Macedonia : the congregation met in the house or by the river
side ; souls were converted and instructed ; and a Church, consisting
both of men and women,2 was gradually built up. This continued for
" many days." It was difficult to foresee the storm which was to over
cast so fair a prospect. A bitter persecution, however, was unexpectedly
provoked : and the Apostles were brought into collision with heathen
superstition in one of its worst forms, and with the rough violence
of the colonial authorities. As if to show that the work of Divine
grace is advanced by difficulties and discouragements, rather than
by ease and prosperity, the Apostles, who had been supernaturally
summoned to a new field of labor, and who were patiently cultivating
it with good success, were suddenly called away from it, silenced, and
imprisoned. In tracing the life of St. Paul we have not as yet seen Christianity
directly brought into conflict with Heathenism. The sorcerer who had
obtained influence over Sergius Paulus in Cyprus was a Jew, like the
Apostle himself.3 The first impulse of the idolaters of Lystra was to
worship Paul and Barnabas ; and it was only after the Jews had per
verted their minds, that they began to persecute them.4 But as we
travel farther from the East, and especially through countries where the
Israelites were thinly scattered, we must expect to find Pagan creeds in
immediate antagonism with the Gospel ; and not merely Pagan creeds,
but the evil powers themselves which give Paganism its supremacy over
the minds of men. The questions which relate to evil spirits, false
divinities, and demoniacal possession, are far too difficult and extensive
to be entered on here.5 We are content to express our belief, that in
1 Hor. Od. n. vii. 27, &c. modation to popular belief; the other that
2 This is almost necessarily implied in " the these unhappy sufferers were really possessed
brethren " (v. 40) whom Paul and Silas vis- by evil spirits — may be seen in a series of
ited and exhorted in the house of Lydia, after pamphlets (partly anonymous) published in
their release from prison. London in 1737 and 1738. For a candid state-
8 Ch. V. p. 133. ment of both views, see the article on " Demo-
4 Ch. VI. pp. 170, &c. niacs " in Dr. Kitto's Cyclopaedia of Biblical
6 The arguments on the two sides of this Literature. Compare that on the word " Bes-
question — one party contending that the essene," in Winer's Real -WSrterbuch ; and,
demoniacs of Scripture were men afflicted with above all, Dean Trench's profound remarks in
insanity, melancholy, and epilepsy, and that his work on the Miracles, pp. 150, &c.
the language used of them is merely an accom-
17

258 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL.

chap. a.

the demoniacs of the New Testament allusion is really made to personal
spirits who exercised power for evil purposes on the human will. The
unregenerate world is represented to us in Scripture as a realm of darkness
in which the invisible agents of wickedness are permitted to hold sway
under conditions and limitations which we are not able to define. The
degrees and modes in which their presence is made visibly apparent mav
vary widely in different countries and in different ages.1 In the time of
Jesus Christ and His Apostles, we are justified in saying that their
workings in one particular mode were made peculiarly manifest.2 As ii
was in the life of our Great Master, so it was in that of His imme
diate followers. The demons recognized Jesus as " the Holy One of
God ; " and they recognized His Apostles as the " bondsmen of the Most
High God, who preach the way of salvation." Jesus " cast out de
mons ; " and, by virtue of the power which He gave, the Apostles were
able to do in His name what He did in His own.
If in any region of Heathendom the evil spirits had pre-eminent sway,
it was in the mythological system of Greece, which, with all its beautiful
imagery and all its ministrations to poetry and art, left man powerless
against his passions, and only amused him while it helped him to be
unholy. In the lively imagination of the Greeks, the whole visible and
invisible world was peopled with spiritual powers or demons. The same
terms were often used on this subject by Pagans and by Christians. But
in the language of the Pagan the demon might be either a beneficent or
a malignant power ; in the language of the Christian it always denoted
what was evil.3 When the Athenians said * that St. Paul was introdu
cing " new demons " among them, they did not necessarily mean that he
was in league with evil spirits ; but when St. Paul told the Corinthians8
that though " idols " in themselves were nothing, yet the sacrifices
offered to them were, in reality, offered to " demons," he spoke of those
false divinities which were the enemies of the True.6
1 For some suggestions as to the probable interlinked ; and it is nothing wonderful that
reasons why demoniacal possession is seldom they should have abounded at that time." —
witnessed now, see Trench, p. 162. P. 162. Neander and Trench, however, both
2 Trench says, that " if there was any thing refer to modern missionary accounts of some-
that marked the period of the Lord's coming thing like the same possession among heathen
in the flesh, and that immediately succeeding, nations, and of their cessation on conversion
it was the wreck and confusion of men's spir- to Christianity.
itual life . . . the sense of utter disharmony. 8 This is expressly stated by Origen and
. . The whole period was the hour and Augustine ; and we find the same view in
power of darkness ; of a darkness which then, Josephus.
immediately before the dawn of a new day, 4 Acts xvii. 18.
was the thickest. It was exactly the crisis 5 1 Cor. x. 20.
for such soul-maladies as these, in which the 6 It is very important to distinguish the
spiritual and bodily should be thus strangely word Atd/3oAOf ("Devil"), which is only used

chap. ix. PRETERNATURAL AGENCY, 259
Again, the language concerning physical changes, especially in the
human frame, is very similar in the sacred and profane writers. Some
times it contents itself with stating merely the facts and symptoms of
disease ; sometimes it refers the facts and symptoms to invisible personal
agency.1 One class of phenomena, affecting the mind as well as the
body, was mon particularly referred to preternatural agency. These
were the prophetic conditions of mind, showing themselves in stated
oracles or in more irregular manifestations, and accompanied with con
vulsions and violent excitement, which are described or alluded to by
almost all Heathen authors. Here again we are brought to a subject which
is surrounded with difficulties. How far, in such cases, imposture was
combined with real possession ; how we may disentangle the one from
the other ; how far the sup/eme will of God made use of these prophetic
powers and overruled the rn to good ends ; such questions inevitably
suggest themselves, but we a,re not concerned to answer them here. It
is enough to say that we sue no reason to blame the opinion of those
writers, who believe that a wicked spiritual agency was really exerted
in the prophetic sanctuaries and prophetic personages of the Heathen
world. The heathens themselves attributed these phenomena to the
agency of Apollo,2 the deity of Pythonic spirits ; and such phenomena
were of very frequent occurrence, and displayed themselves under many
varieties of place and circumstance. Sometimes those who were pos
sessed were of the highest condition ; sometimes they went about the
streets like insane impostors of the lowest rank. It was usual for the
prophetic spirit to make itself known by an internal muttering or ven
triloquism.3 We read of persons in this miserable condition used by
others for the purpose of gain. Frequently they were slaves ; and there
were cases of joint proprietorship in these unhappy ministers of public
superstition. In the case before us it was a " female slave " * who was possessed with
" a spirit of divination : " 6 and she was the property of more than one
in the singular, from Saiuuv or daiuovinv lepsy as the result of supernatural possession.
(" demon "), which may be singular or plural. Some symptoms, he says, were popularly attrib-
The former word is used, for instance, in Matt. uted to Apollo, some to the Mother of the
xxv. 41 ; John viii. 44 ; Acts xiii. 10 ; I Pet. Gods, some to Neptune, &c.
v. 8, &c. ; the latter in John vii. 20 ; Luke x. 2 Python is the name of Apollo in his
17 ; 1 Tim. iv. 1 ; Rev. ix. 20 ; also James oracular character.
iii. 15. For further remarks on this subject, 8 Such persons spoke with the mouth
see below on Acts xvii. 18. closed, and were called Pythons (the very
1 This will be observed in the Gospels, if word used here by St. Luke, Acts xvi. 16,.
we carefully compare the different accounts of 4 Acts xvi. 16. The word is the same in
our Lord's miracles. Among heathen writers xii. 13.
we may allude particularly to Hippocrates, 6 Literally "a spirit of Python" or "«
since he wrote against those who treated epi- Pythonic spirit."

260 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL.

CHAP.Dt,

master, who kept her for the purpose of practising on the credulity of
the Philippians, and realized " much profit " in this way. We all know
the kind of sacredness with which the ravings of common insanity are
apt to be invested by the ignorant ; and we can easily understand the
notoriety which the gestures and words of this demoniac would obtain in
Philippi. It was far from a matter of indifference, when she met the
members of the Christian congregation on the road to the proseucha, and
began to follow St. Paul, and to exclaim (either because the words she
had overheard mingled with her diseased imaginations, or because the
evil spirit in her was compelled ' to speak the truth) : " These men are
the bondsmen of the Most High God, who are come to announce unto
you the way of salvation." This was continued for " several days," and
the whole city must soon have been familiar with her words. Paul was
well aware of this ; and he could not bear the thought that the credit
even of the Gospel should be enhanced by such unholy means. Possibly
one reason why our Blessed Lord Himself forbade the demoniacs to make
Him known was, that His holy cause would be polluted by resting on
such evidence. And another of our Saviour's feelings must have found
an imitation in St. Paul's breast, — that of deep compassion for the poor
victim of demoniac power. At length he could bear this Satanic inter
ruption no longer, and, " being grieved, he commanded the evil spirit to
come out of her." It would be profaneness to suppose that the Apostle
spoke in mere irritation, as it would be ridiculous to imagine that Divine
help would have been vouchsafed to gratify such a feeling. No doubt
there was grief and indignation, but the grief and indignation of an
Apostle may be the impulses of Divine inspiration. He spoke, not in his
own name, but in that of Jesus Christ, and power from above attended
his words. The prophecy and command of Jesus concerning His
Apostles were fulfilled : that " in His name they should cast out demons."
It was as it had been at Jericho and by the Lake of Genesareth. The
demoniac at Philippi was restored " to her right mind." Her natural
powers resumed their course ; and the gains of her masters were gone.
Violent rage on the part of these men was the immediate result. They
saw that their influence with the people, and with it " all hope " of any
1 See what Trench says on the demoniacs His state is, in the truest sense, 'a possession;'
in the country of the Gadarenes. "We find another is ruling in the high places of his soul,
in the demoniac the sense of a misery in which and has cast down the rightful lord from his
he does not acquiesce, the deep feeling of inward seat ; and he knows this : and out of his con-
discord, of the true life utterly shattered, of sciousness of it there goes forth from him a
an alien power which has mastered him wholly, cry for redemption, so soon as ever a glimpse
and now is cruelly lording over him, and ever of hope is afforded, an unlooked-for Redeemer
drawing farther away from him in whom only draws near." — p. 159.
any created intelligence can find rest and peace.

chap. ix. PAUL AND SILAS ARRESTED. 261
future profit, was at end. They proceeded therefore to take a summary
revenge. Laying violent hold of Paul and Silas (for Timotheus and
Luke were not so evidently concerned in what had happened), they
dragged them into the forum ¦ before the city authorities. The case was
brought before the Praetors (so we may venture to call them, since this
was the title which colonial Duumviri were fond of assuming ;) 2 but the
complainants must have felt some difficulty in stating their grievance.
The slave that had lately been a lucrative possession had suddenly be
come valueless ; but the law had nq remedy for property depreciated by
exorcism. The true state of the case was therefore concealed, and an ac
cusation was laid before the Praetors in the following form. " These men
are throwing the whole city into confusion ; moreover they are Jews ; 3
and they are attempting to introduce new religious observances,4 which
we, being Roman citizens, cannot legally receive and adopt." The accu
sation was partly true and partly false. It was quite false that Paul and
Silas were disturbing the colony ; for nothing could have been more calm
and orderly than their worship and teaching at the house of Lydia, or in
the proseucha by the water-side. In the other part of the indictment
there was a certain amount of truth. The letter of' the Roman law, even
under the Republic, was opposed to the introduction of foreign religions ;
and though exceptions were allowed, as in the case of the Jews them
selves, yet the spirit of the law entirely condemned such changes in
worship as were likely to unsettle the minds of the citizens, or to produce
any tumultuous uproar ; and the advice given to Augustus, which both
he and his successors had studiously followed, was, to check religious in
novations as promptly as possible, lest in the end they should undermine
the Monarchy. Thus Paul and Silas had undoubtedly been doing what
in some degree exposed them to legal penalties ; and were beginning a
change which tended to bring down, and which ultimately did bring
down, the whole weight of the Roman law on the martyrs of Chris
tianity.5 The force of another part of the accusation, which was adroitly
introduced, namely, that the men were " Jews to begin with," will be
fully apprehended, if we remember, not only that the Jews were general-
1 Acts xvi. 19. * The word is similarly used Acts vi. 14,
2 See above, p. 253, n. 5. The word xxvi. 3, xxviii. 17.
arpanyydc is the usual Greek translation of 6 See the account of the martyrs of Gaul
prator. It is, however, often used generally in EuseD>us> v- 1- The governor, learning
for the supreme magistrates of Greek towns. that Attalus was a Roman citizen, ordered him
Wetstein tells us that the mayor in Messina to be remanded to prison till he should learn
was in his time still called stradigo. the emperor's commands. Those who had the
8 " Being Jews to begin with," is the mqst citizenship were beheaded. The rest were sent
exact translation. The verb is the same as in to the wild beasts.
Gal. ii. 14, "being bora a Jew, ' p. 201.

262 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL.

CHAP, u,

ly hated, suspected, and despised,1 but that they had lately been driven
out of Rome in consequence of an uproar,2 and that it was incumbent
on Philippi, as a colony, to copy the indignation of the mother city.
Thus we can enter into the feelings which caused the mob to rise
against Paul and Silas,3 and tempted the Praetors to dispense with legal
formalities and consign the offenders to immediate punishment. The
mere loss of the slave's prophetic powers, so far as it was generally
known, was enough to cause a violent agitation : for mobs are always
more fond of excitement and wonder than of truth and holiness. The
Philippians had been willing to pay money for the demoniac's revelations,
and now strangers had come and deprived them of that which gratified
their superstitious curiosity. And when they learned, moreover, that
these strangers were Jews, and were breaking the laws of Rome, their
discontent became fanatical. It seems that the praetors had no time to
hesitate, if they would retain their popularity. The rough words were
spoken:4 Gro, lictors : strip off their garments : let them be scourged."*
The order was promptly obeyed, and the heavy blows descended. It is
happy for us that few modern countries know, by the example of a simi
lar punishment, what the severity of a Roman scourging was. The Apos
tles received " many stripes ; " and when they were consigned to prison,
bleeding and faint from the rod, the jailer received a strict injunction " to
keep them safe." Well might St. Paul, when at Corinth, look back to
this day of cruelty, and remind the Thessalonians how he and Silas had
" suffered before, and were shamefully treated at Philippi." 6
The jailer fulfilled the directions of the magistrates with rigorous and
conscientious cruelty. Not content with placing the Apostles among
such other offenders against the law as were in custody at Philippi,
he " thrust them into the inner prison," 7 and then forced their limbs,
lacerated as they were, and bleeding from the rod, into a painful and
constrained posture, by means of an instrument employed to confine and
torture the bodies of the worst malefactors.8 Though we are ignorant of
1 Cicero calls them " suspiciosa ac maledica cessary. It is quite a mistake to imagine that
civitas." — Flac. 28. Other authors could be they rent their own garments, like the high-
quoted to the same effect. priest at Jerusalem.
2 Acts xviii. 2; which is probably the same 6 The original word strictly denotes "to
occurrence as that which is alluded to by beat with rods,'' as it is translated in 2 Cor.
Suetonius, Claud. 25 : — " Judseos impulsore xi. 25.
Christo assidue tumultuantes Roma expulit. 8 1 Thess. ii. 2.
Sec pp. 287, 335. 7 Acts xvi. 24.
8 Acts xvi. 22. 8 The %vkov was what the Romans called
4 The official order is given by Seneca. nervus. See the note in the Pictorial Bible
Some commentators suppose that the duumviri on Job xiii. 27. and the woodcut of stocks
tore off the garments of Paul and Silas with used in India from Roberts's Oriental Rlvstra
their own hands ; but this supposition is unne- tions.

ohap.ix. PAUL AND SILAS IN PRISON. 263
the exact rc>ation of the outer and inner prisons,1 and of the connection
of the jailor's " house" with both, we are not without very good notions
of the mist ry endured in the Roman places of captivity. We must
picture to ourselves something very different from the austere comfort of
an English jail. It is only since that Christianity for which the Apostles
bled has bid influence on the hearts of men, that the treatment of felons
has been a distinct subject of philanthropic inquiry, and that we have
learnt to pray " for all prisoners and captives." The inner prisons of
which we read in the ancient world were like that " dungeon in the
jourt of the prison," into which Jeremiah was let down with cords, and
where " he sank in the mire." 2 They were pestilential cells, damp and
cold, from which the light was excluded, and where the chains rusted
on the limbs of the prisoners. One such place may be seen to this
day on the slope of the Capitol at Rome.3 It is known to the readers
of Cicero and Sallust as the place where certain notorious conspirators
were executed. The Tullianum (for so it was called) is a type of the
dungeons in the provinces; and we find the very name applied, in one
instance, to a dungeon in the province of Macedonia.4 What kind of
torture was inflicted by the " stocks," in which the arms and legs, and
even the necks, of offenders were confined and stretched, we are suffi
ciently informed by the allusions to the punishment of slaves in the
Greek and Roman writers ; 5 and to show how far the cruelty of
Heathen persecution, which may be said to have begun at Philippi, was
afterwards carried in this peculiar kind of torture, we may refer to the
sufferings " which Origen endured under an iron collar, and in the
deepest recesses of the prison, when, for many days, he was extended
and stretched to the distance of four holes on the rack." 6
A few hours had made a serious change from the quiet scene by the
water-side to the interior of a stifling dungeon. But Paul and Silas had
1 A writer on the subject (Walch) says that 2 " Then took they Jeremiah and cast him
in a Roman prison there were usually three into the dungeon of Malchiah, the son of Ham-
distinct parts : (1) the communiora, where the melech, which was in the court of 'the prison; and
prisoners had light and fresh air ; (2) the inte- they let down Jeremiah with cords. And in
tiara, shut off by iron gates with strong bars the dungeon there was no water, but mire ; so
and locks; (3) the Tullianum, or dungeon. Jeremiah sunk in the mire." — Jer. xxxviii. 6.
If this was the case at Philippi, Paul and Silas See the note in the Pictorial Bible.
were perhaps in the second, and the other pris- 8 For an account of it see Sir W. Gell's
oners in the first part. The third was rather work on Rome, also Rich's Diet, of Greek and
a place of execution than imprisonment. Walch Roman Antiquities, from which the woodcut at
Bays that in the provinces the prisons were not the end of this chapter is taken.
so systematically divided into three parts. He 4 In Apuleius, where the allusion is to
adds that the jailer or commentariensis had Thessaly.
usually optiones to assist him In Acts xvi. 6 Especially in Plautus.
only one jailer is mentioned. 6 Euseb. Hist. Eccl. vi 39.

264 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. CHAP.rx.
learnt, " in whatever state they were, therewith to be content." : They
were even able to " rejoice " that they were " counted worthy to suffer"
for the name of Christ.2 And if some thoughts of discouragement came
over their minds, not for their own sufferings, but for the cause of their
Master ; and if it seemed " a strange thing " that a work to which they had
been beckoned by God should be arrested in its very beginning ; yet they
had faith to believe that His arm would be revealed at the appointed time.
Joseph's feet, too, had been " hurt in the stocks," 3 and he became a
prince in Egypt. Daniel had been cast into the lions' den, and he was
made ruler of Babylon. Thus Paul and Silas remembered with joy the
" Lord our Maker, who giveth songs in the night." * Racked as they were
with pain, sleepless and weary, they were heard, " about midnight," from
the depth of their prison-house, " praying and singing hymns to God." 8
What it was that they sang, we know not ; but the Psalms of David have
ever been dear to those who suffer ; they have instructed both Jew and
Christian in the language of prayer and praise. And the Psalms abound
in such sentences as these : — " The Lord looketh down from His sanc
tuary : out of heaven the Lord beholdeth the earth : that He might hear
the mournings of such as are in captivity, and deliver the children
appointed unto death." — " Oh ! let the sorrowful sighing of the prisoners
come before thee : according to the greatness of thy power, preserve thou
those that are appointed to die." — " The Lord helpeth them to right that
suffer wrong : the Lord looseth men out of prison : the Lord helpeth
them that are fallen : the Lord careth for the righteous." 6 Such sounds
as these were new in a Roman dungeon. Whoever the other prisoners
might be, whether they were the victims of oppression, or were suffering
the punishment of guilt, — debtors, slaves, robbers, or murderers, — they
listened with surprise to the voices of those who filled the midnight of
the prison with sounds of cheerfulness and joy. Still the Apostles con
tinued their praises, and the prisoners listened.7 " They that sit in dark
ness, and in the shadow of death ; being fast bound in misery and iron ;
when they cried unto the Lord in their trouble, He delivered them out
of their distress. For He brought them out of darkness, and out of the
1 Phil. iv. 11. for the word, see Matt. xxvi. 30, Mark xiv. 26.
2 Acts v. 41. The psalms sung on that occasion are believed
8 Ps. cv. 18, Prayer-Book Version. Philo, to be Ps. cxiii.-cxviii. Compare Eph. v. 19;
writing on the history of Joseph (Gen. xxxix. Col. iii. 16. Also Heb. ii. 12.
21), has some striking remarks on the cruel 6 Ps. cii. 19, 20, lxxix. 12, cxlvi. 6-8. See
character of jailers, who live among thieves, also Ps. cxlii. 8, 9, lxix. 34, cxvi. 14, lxviii. 6.
robbers, and murderers, and never see any 7 The imperfects used in this passage imply
thing that is good. continuance. The Apostles were singing, and
4 Job xxxv. 10. the prisoners were listening, when the earth-
6 Acts xvi. 25. The tense is imperfect : quake came.

CHAP.rx. THE JAILER. 265
shadow of death, and brake their bonds in sunder. Oh that men would
therefore praise the Lord for His goodness, and declare the wonders that
Ho doeth for the children of men : for He hath broken the gates of brass,
and smitten the bars of iron in sunder." ] When suddenly, as if in direct
answer to the prayer of His servants, an earthquake shook the very foun
dations of the prison,2 the gates were broken, the bars smitten asunder,
and the bands of the prisoners loosed. Without striving to draw a line
between, the natural and supernatural in this occurrence, and still less
endeavoring to resolve what was evidently miraculous into the results
of ordinary causes, we turn again to the thought suggested by that
single but expressive phrase of Scripture, " the prisoners were listening." 3
When we reflect on their knowledge of the Apostles' sufferings (for
they were doubtless aware of the manner in which they had been
brought in and thrust into the dungeon),4 and on the wonder they must
have experienced on hearing sounds of joy from those who were in pain,
and on the awe which must have overpowered them when they felt the
prison shaken and the chains fall from their limbs ; and when to all this
we add the effect produced on their minds by all that happened on the
following day, and especially the fact that the jailer himself became a
Christian ; we can hardly avoid the conclusion that the hearts of many
of those unhappy bondsmen were prepared that night to receive the
Gospel, that the tidings of spiritual liberty came to those whom, but for
the captivity of the Apostles, it would never have reached, and that the
jailer himself was their evangelist and teacher.
The effect produced by that night on the jailer's own mind has been
fully related to us. Awakened in a moment by the earthquake, his first
thought was of his prisoners : 5 and in the shock of surprise and alarm,
— " seeing the doors of the prison open, and supposing that tho prisoners
were fled," — aware that inevitable death awaited him,6 with the stern
and desperate resignation of a Roman official, he resolved that suicide
was better than disgrace, and " drew his sword."
Philippi is famous in the annals of suicide. Here Cassius, unable to
survive defeat, covered his face in the empty tent, and ordered his freed-
men to strike the blow.7 His messenger Titinius held it to be " a Ro
man's part " 8 to follow the stern example. Here Brutus bade adieu to
his friends, exclaiming, " Certainly we must fly, yet not with the feet, but
1 Ps. cvii. 10-16. 2 Acts xvi. 26. undergo the same punishment which the male-
8 See above. factors who escaped by his negligence were to
4 See above, on the form of ancient prisons. have suffered. Biscoe, p. 380.
s Acts xvi. 27. 7 Plut. Brutus, 43.
6 By the Roman law, the jailer was to * Julius Ccesar, act v. sc. iii.

266 THE LIFE AND, EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap.u.
with the hands ; " 1 and many, whose names have never reached us, ended
their last struggle for the republic by self-inflicted death.2 Here, too
another despairing man would have committed the same crime, had not
his hand been arrested by an Apostle's voice. Instead of a sudden and
hopeless death, the jailer received at the hands of his prisoner the gift
both of temporal and spiritual life.
The loud exclamation 3 of St. Paul, " Do thyself no harm ; for we are
all here," gave immediate re-assurance to the terrified jailer. He laid
aside his sword, and called for lights, aud rushed 4 to the " inner prison "
where Paul and Silas were confined. But now a new fear of a higher
kind took possession of his soul. The recollection of all he had heard
before concerning these prisoners and all that he had observed of their
demeanor when he brought them into the dungeon, the shuddering
thought of the earthquake, the burst of his gratitude towards them as the
preservers of his life, and the consciousness that even in the darkness
of midnight they had seen his intention of suicide, — all these mingling
and conflicting emotions made him feel that he was in the presence of a
higher power. He fell down before them, and brought them out, as
men whom he had deeply injured and insulted, to a place of greater
freedom and comfort ; 5 and then he asked them, with earnest anxiety,
what he must do to be saved. We see the Apostle here self-possessed in
the earthquake, as afterwards in the storm at sea,6 able to overawe and
control those who were placed over him, and calmly turning the occa
sion to a spiritual end. It is surely, however, a mistake to imagine that
the jailer's inquiry had reference merely to temporal and immediate
danger. The awakening of his conscience, the presence of the unseen
world, the miraculous visitation, the nearness of death, — coupled per
haps with some confused recollection of the " way of salvation" which
these strangers were said to have been proclaiming, — were enough to
suggest that inquiry which is the most momentous that any human soul
can make : " What must I do to le saved? " 7 Their answer was that of
faithful Apostles. They preached " not themselves, but Christ Jesus the
Lord."8 "Believe, not in us, but in the Lord Jesus, and thou shalt be
1 Plut. Brutus, 52. the entrance to the jailer's dwelling, if indeed
2 " The majority of the proscribed who sur- they were not identical.
vived the battles of Philippi put an end to their 6 Acts xxvii. 20-25.
own lives, as they despaired of being par- ' We should compare v. 30 with v. 17.
doned." — Niebuhr's Lectures, ii. 118. The words "save" and "salvation" must
8 Acts xvi. 28. have been frequently in the mouth of St. Paul.
4 The whole phraseology seems to imply It is probable that the demoniac, and possible
that the dungeon was subterraneous. Prof. that the jailer, might have heard them. See
Hackett, however, takes a different view. p. 260.
6 Either the outer prison or the space about 8 2 Cor. iv. 5

chap. a. THE MAGISTRATES. 267
saved; and not only thou, but the like faith shall bring salvation to all
thy house." Prom this last expression, and from the words which follow,
we infer that the members of the jailer's family had crowded round him
and the Apostles.1 No time was lost in making known to them " the
word of the Lord." All thought of bodily comfort and repose was
postponed to the work of saving the soul. The meaning of " faith in
Jesus " was explained, and the Gospel was preached to the jailer's
family at midnight, while the prisoners were silent around, and the light
was thrown on anxious faces and the dungeon-wall.
And now we have an instance of that sympathetic care, that inter
change of temporal and spiritual service, which has ever attended the
steps of true Christianity. As it was in the miracles of our Lord and
Saviour, where the soul and the body were regarded together, so has it
always been in His Church. "In the same hour of the night"2 the
jailer took the Apostles to the well or fountain of water which was
within or near the precincts of the prison, and there he washed their
wounds, and there also he and his household were baptized. He did
what he could to assuage the bodily pain of Paul and Silas, and they
admitted him and his, by the " laver of regeneration," 3 to the spiritual
citizenship of the kingdom of God. The prisoners of the jailer were
now become his guests. His cruelty was changed into hospitality
and love. " He took them up 4 into his house," and, placing them in a
posture of repose, set food before them,5 and refreshed their exhausted
strength. It was a night of happiness for all. They praised God that
His power had been made effectual in their weakness ; and the jailer's
family had their first experience of that joy which is the fruit of believ
ing in God.
At length morning broke on the eventful night. In the course of that
night the greatest of all changes had been wrought in the jailer's rela
tions to this world and the next. From being the ignorant slave of a
Heathen magistracy he had become the religious head of a Christian
family. A change, also, in the same interval of time, had come over the
minds of the magistrates themselves. Either from reflecting that they
1 The preaching of the Gospel to the jailer 2 Acts xvi. 33. Here and in v. 34, a change
and his family seems to have taken place imme- of place is implied. 8 Tit. iii. 5.
diately on coming out of the prison (w. 30- 4 Acts xvi. 34. The word implies at least
32) ; then the baptism of the converts, and the that the house was higher than the prison.
washing of the Apostles' stripes (v. 33) ; and See p. 266, n. 4.
the going-up into the house, and the 6 The custom of Greek and Roman meals

hospitable refreshment there affoidcd. It does must be borne in mind. Guests were placed
not appear certain that they returned from the on couches, and tables, with the different
jailer's house into the dungeon before they courses of food, were brought and removed ia
were taken out of custody (v. 40). succession.

268 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL.

CHAP. IX.

had acted more harshly than the case had warranted, or from hearing a
more accurate statement of facts, or through alarm caused by the earth
quake, or through that vague misgiving which sometimes, as in the case
of Pilate and his wife,1 haunts the minds of those who have no distinct
religious convictions, they sent new orders in the morning to the jailer.
The message conveyed by the lictors was expressed in a somewhat con
temptuous form, "Let those men go."2 But the jailer received it with
the utmost joy. He felt his infinite debt of gratitude to the Apostles, not
only for his preservation from a violent death, but for the tidings they
had given him of eternal life. He would willingly have seen them freed
from their bondage ; but he was dependent on the will of the magistrates,
and could do nothing without tlieir sanction. When, therefore, the
lictors brought the order, he went with them3 to announce the intelli
gence to the prisoners, and joyfully told them to leave their dungeon and
" go in peace."
But Paul, not from any fanatical love of braving the authorities, but
calmly looking to the ends of justice and the establishment of Chris
tianity, refused to accept his liberty without some public acknowledgment
of the wrong he had suffered. He now proclaimed a fact which had
hitherto been unknown, — that he and Silas were Roman citizens. Two
Roman laws had been violated by the magistrates of the colony in the
scourging inflicted the day before.4 And this, too, with signal aggrava
tions. They were " uncondemned." There had been no form of trial,
without which, in the case of a citizen, even a slighter punishment would
have been illegal. And it had beeii done " publicly." In the face of the
colonial population, an outrage had been committed on the majesty of the
name in which they boasted, and Rome had been insulted in her citizens.
" No," said St. Paul ; " they have oppressed the innocent and violated
the law. Do they seek to satisfy justice by conniving at a secret escape?
Let them come themselves and take us out of prison. They have pub
licly treated us as guilty ; let them publicly declare that we are in
nocent." 5
" How often," says Cicero, " has this exclamation, I am a Roman citi
zen, brought aid and safety even among barbarians in the remotest parts
of the earth ! " — The lictors returned to the praetors, and the praetors
were alarmed. They felt that they had committed an act which, if di-
1 Matt, xxvii. 19. for St. Paul spoke " to them ; " on which they
2 Or, as it might be translated, " Let those went and told the magistrates (v. 38).
fellows go." 4 The Lex Valeria (b. c. 508) and the Lei
8 It is evident from v. 37 that they came Porcia (b. o. 300).
into the prison with the jailer, or found the 6 v. 37.
prisoners in the jailer's house (p. 267, n. 11

chap. ix. ST. LUKE. 269
vulged at Rome, would place them in the utmost jeopardy. They had
good reason to fear even for their authority in the colony ; for the people
of Philippi, " being Romans," might be expected to resent such a viola
tion of the law. They hastened, therefore, immediately to the prisoners,
and became the suppliants of those whom they had persecuted. They
brought them at once out of the dungeon, and earnestly " besought them
to depart from the city." ]
The whole narrative of St. Paul's imprisonment at Philippi sets before
us in striking colors his clear judgment and presence of mind. He might
have escaped by help of the earthquake and under the shelter of the dark
ness ; but this would have been to depart as a runaway slave. He would
not do secretly what he knew he ought to be allowed to do openly. By
such a course his own character and that of the Gospel would have been
disgraced, the jailer would have been cruelly left to destruction, and all
religious influence over the other prisoners would have been gone. As
regards these prisoners, his influence over them was like the sway he ob
tained over the crew in the sinking vessel.2 It was so great, that not one
of them attempted to escape. And not only in the prison, but in the
whole town of Philippi, Christianity was placed on a high vantage-ground
by the Apostle's conduct that night. It now appeared that these per
secuted Jews were thetnselves sharers in the vaunted Roman privilege.
Those very laws had been violated in their treatment which they them
selves had been accused of violating. That no appeal was made against
this treatment, might be set down to the generous forbearance of the
Apostles. Their cause was now, for a time at least, under the protection
of the law, and they themselves were felt to have a claim on general
sympathy and respect.
They complied with the request of the magistrates. Yet, even in their
departure, they were not unmindful of the dignity and self-possession
which ought always to be maintained by innocent men in a righteous
cause. They did not retire in any hasty or precipitate flight, but pro
ceeded " from the prison to the house of Lydia ; " 3 and there they met
the Christian brethren, who were assembled to hear their farewell words
of exhortation ; and so they departed from the city. It was not, how
ever, deemed sufficient that this infant church at Philippi should be left
alone with the mere remembrance of words of exhortation. Two of the
Apostolic company remained behind: Timotheus, of whom the Philip
pians " learned the proof" that he honestly cared for their state, that he
was truly like-minded with St. Paul, " serving him in the Gospel as a son
serves his father ;" 4 and " Luke the Evangelist, whose praise is in the
1 w. 38, 39. 2 Acts xxvii. 8 Acts xvi. 40. * Phil. ii. 19-25.

270 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL.

CHAP.II

Gospel," though he never praises himself, or relates his own labors, and
though we only trace his movements in connection with St. Paul by the
change of a pronoun,1 or the unconscious variation of his style.
Timotheus seems to have rejoined Paul and Silas, if not at Thessa
lonica, at least at Beroea.2 But we do not see St. Luke again in the Apos
tle's company till the third missionary journey and the second visit to
Macedonia.3 At this exact point of separation, we observe that he drops
the style of an eye-witness and resumes that of an historian, until the
second time of meeting, after which he writes as an eye-witness till the
arrival at Rome, and the very close of the Acts. To explain and justify
the remark here made, we need only ask the reader to contrast the de
tailed narrative of events at Philippi with the more general account of
what happened at Thessalonica.4 It might be inferred that the writer
of the Acts was an eye-witness in the former city and not in the latter,
even if the pronoun did not show us when he was present and when he
was absent. We shall trace him a second time, in the same manner, when
he rejoins St. Paul in the same neighborhood. He appears again on a
voyage from Philippi to Troas (Acts xx. 56), as now he has appeared on
a voyage from Troas to Philippi. It is not an improbable conjecture that
his vocation as a physician 5 may have brought him into connection with
these contiguous coasts of Asia and Europe. It has even been imagined,
on reasonable grounds,6 that he may have been in the habit of exercising
his professional skill as a surgeon at sea. However this may have been,
we see no reason to question the ancient opinion, stated by Eusebius and
Jerome, that St. Luke was a native of Antioch. Such a city was a likely
place for the education of a physician.1 It is also natural to suppose
1 In ch. xvii. the narrative is again in the Acts, and we shall return to the subject again.
third person ; and the pronoun is not changed A careful attention to this difference of style is
again till we come to xx. 5. The modesty enough to refute a theory lately advanced (Dr.
with which St. Luke leaves out all mention of Kitto's Journal of Sacred Literature, Sept.
his own labors need hardly be pointed out. 1850), that Silas was the author of the Acts.
2 Acts xvii. 14. He is not mentioned in Silas was at Thessalonica as well as Philippi.
the journey to Thessalonica, nor in the ac- Why did he write so differently concerning
count of what happened there. the two places ?
3 Acts xx. 4-6. 6 See Tate's Continuous History, p. 41
4 Observe, for instance, his mention of run- Compare the end of the preceding chapter.
ning before the wind, and staying for the night 6 This suggestion is made by Mr. Smith
at Samothrace. Again, he says that Philippi in his work on the Shipwreck, Src, p. 8. It n
was the first city they came to, and that it was justly remarked, that the ancient ships were
a colony. He tells us that the place of prayer often so large that they may reasonably be
was outside the gate and near a river-side. supposed to have sometimes had surgeons on
There is no such particularity in the account board. See p. 244.
of what took place at Thessalonica. See 7 Alexandria was famous for the education
above, p. 134, n. 2. Similar remarks might of physicians, and Antioch was in manv re
be made on the other autoptic passages of the spects a second Alexandria

ohap.ix. MACEDONIA DESCRIBED. 271
that he may have met with St. Paul there, and been converted at an
earlier period of the history of the Church. His medical calling, or his
zeal for Christianity, or both combined (and the combination has ever
been beneficial to the cause of the Gospel), may account for his visits to
the North of the Archipelago : L or St. Paul may himself have directed
his movements, as he afterwards directed those of Timothy and Titus.2
All these suggestions, though more or less conjectural, are worthy of our
thoughts, when we remember the debt of gratitude which the Church
owes to this Evangelist, not only as the historian of the Acts of the
Apostles, but as an example of long-continued devotion to tho truth, and
of unshaken constancy to that one Apostle, who said with sorrow, in his
latest trial, that others had forsaken him, and that " only Luke " was
with him.3
Leaving their first Macedonian converts to the care of Timotheus and
Luke, aided by the co-operation of godly men and women raised up
among the Philippians themselves,4 Paul and Silas set forth on their
journey. Before we follow them to Thessalonica, we may pause to take
a general survey of the condition and extent of Macedonia, in the sense
in which the term was understood in the language of the day. It has
been well said that the Acts of the Apostles have made Macedonia a kind
of Holy Land ; 5 and it is satisfactory that the places there visited and
revisited by St. Paul and his companions are so well known, that we
have no difBculty in representing to the mind their position and their
relation to the surrounding country.
Macedonia, in its popular sense, may be described as a region bounded
by a great semicircle of mountains, beyond which the streams flow
westward to the Adriatic, or northward and eastward to the Danube and
the Euxine.6 This mountain barrier sends down branches to the sea on
the eastern or Thracian frontier, over against Thasos and Samothrace ; 7
1 Compare the case of Democedes in He- 6 " The whole of Macedonia, and in par-
adotus, who was established first in -35gina, ticular the route from Bercea to Thessalonica
then in Athens, and finally in Samos. At a and Philippi, being so remarkably distin-
period even later than St. Luke, Galen speaks guished by St. Paul's sufferings and adven-
of the medical schools of Cos and Cnidus, of tures, becomes as a portion of Holy Land."
Rhodes and of Asia. — Clarke's Travels, ch. xi.
2 1 Tim. i. 3 ; 2 Tim. iv. 9, 21 ; Tit. i. 5, 6 The mountains on the north, under the
iii. 12. names of Scomius, Scordus, &c, are connected
8 2 Tim. iv. 11. See the Christian Year: with the Haemus or Balkan. Those on the
St. Luke's Day. west run in a southerly direction, and are con-
4 The Christian women at Philippi have tinuous with the chain of Pindus.
been alluded to before, p. 256. See especially 7 These are the mountains near the river
Phil. iv. 2, 3. We cannot well doubt that Nestus, which, after the time of Philip, was
presbyters also were appointed, as at TheBSa- considered the boundary of Macedonia and
lonica. See below. Compare Phil. i. 1. Thrace.

272 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap. a.
and on the south shuts out the plain of Thessaly, and rises near the shore
to the high summits of Pelion, Ossa, and the snowy Olympus.1 The
space thus enclosed is intersected by two great rivers. One of these is
Homer's " wide-flowing Axius," which directs its course past Pella, the
ancient metroplis of the Macedonian kings, aud the birthplace of Alexan
der, to the low levels in the neighborhood of Thessalonica, where other
rivers2 flow near it into the Thermaic gulf. The other is the Strymon,
which brings the produce of the great inland level of Serres 3 by Lake
Cercinus to the sea at Amphipolis, and beyond which was Philippi, the
military outpost that commemorated the successful conquests of Alexan
der's father. Between the mouths of these two rivers a remarkable
tract of country, which is insular rather than continental,4 projects into
the Archipelago, and divides itself into three points, on the farthest of
which Mount Athos rises nearly into the region of perpetual snow.5
Part of St. Paul's path between Philippi and Bercea lay across the neck
of this peninsula. The whole of his route was over historical ground.
At Philippi he was close to the confines of Thracian barbarism, and on
the spot where the last battle was fought in defence of the Republic. At
Boroea he came near the mountains, beyond which is the region of Clas
sical Greece, and close to the spot where the battle was fought which
reduced Macedonia to a province.6
If we wish to view Macedonia as a province, some modifications must
be introduced into the preceding description. It applies, indeed, with
sufficient exactness to the country on its first conquest by the Romans.'
The rivers already alluded to define the four districts into which it was
divided. Macedonia Prima was the region east of the Strymon, of which
1 The natural boundary between Macedonia s This is the great inland plain at one ex-
and Thessaly is formed by the Cambunian tremity of which Philippi was situated, and
hills, running in an easterly direction from the which has been mentioned above (p. 250). Its
central chain af Pindus. The Cambunian principal town at present is Serres, the resi-
range is vividly described in the following dence of the governor of the whole district,
view from the " giddy height " of Olympus, and a placf of considerable importance, often
which rises near the coast. " I seemed to mentioned by Cousinery, Leake, and other
stand perpendicularly over the sea, at the travellers.
height of 10,000 feet. Salonica was quite dis- 4 The peninsula anciently called Chalcidice
tinguishable, lying North-East. Larissa [in 6 The elevation of Mount Athos is between
Thessaly] appeared under my very feet. The 4,000 and 5,000 feet. The writer has heard
whole horizon from North to South -West was English sailors say that there is almost always
occupied by mountains, hanging on, as it were, snow on Athos and Olympus, and that,
to Olympus. This is the range that runs West though the land generally is higher in this
ward along the North of Thessaly, ending i:, part of the iEgcan, these mountains are by
Pindus." — Urquhart's Spirit of the East, vol. far the most conspicuous.
i. p. 429. c Pydna is within a few miles of BeroB*,
2 The Haliacmon, which flows near Beroea, on the other side of the Haliacmon.
is the most important of them 7 See Liv. xiv. 29.

chap. ix. ROMAN MACEDONIA. 273
Amphipolis was the capital ; l Macedonia Secunda lay between the Strymon
and the Axius, and Thessalonica was its metropolis ; and the other two re
gions were situated to the south towards Thessaly, and on the mountains to
the west.2 This was the division adopted by Paulus ^Emilius after the
battle of Pydna. But the arrangement was only temporary. The whole of
Macedonia, along with some adjacent territories, was made one province,3
and centralized under the jurisdiction of a proconsul,4 who resided at
Thessalonica. This province included Thessaly,5 and extended over the
mountain-chain which had been the western boundary of ancient Mace
donia, so as to embrace a seaboard of considerable length on the shore
of the Adriatic. The political limits, in this part of the Empire, are far
more easily discriminated than those with which we have been lately
occupied (Chap. VIII.). Three provinces divided the whole surface
which extends from the basin of the Danube to Cape Matapan. All of
them are familiar to us in the writings of St. Paul. The extent of
Macedonia has just been defined. Its relations with the other provinces
were as follows. On the north-west it was contiguous to Illyricum,*
which was spread down the shore of the Adriatic nearly to the same
point to which the Austrian territory now extends, fringing the Moham
medan empire with a Christian border.7 A hundred miles to the south
ward, at the Acroceraunian promontory, it touched Achaia, the boundary
of which province ran thence in an irregular line to the bay of Ther
mopylae and the north of Eubcea, including Epirus, and excluding
Thessaly.8 Achaia and Macedonia were traversed many times by the
Apostle ; 9 and he could say, when he was hoping to travel to Rome, that
he had preached the Gospel " round about unto Illyricum." 10
1 See above. series of wars which gradually reduced It to a
2 Macedonia Tertia was between the Axius province.
and Peneus, with Pella for its capital. Pela- 7 The border town was Lissus, the modern
gonia was the capital of Macedonia Quarta. It Alessio, not far from Scutari.
is remarkable that no coins of the third division 8 Except in the western portion, the bound-
have been found, but only of the first, second, ary nearly coincided with that of the modern
and fourth. kingdom of Greece. The provincial arrauge-
8 By Metellus. ments of Achaia will be alluded to more par-
4 At first it was one of the Emperor's prov- ticularly hereafter.
inces, but afterwards it was placed under the 9 Observe how these provinces are men-
Senate, tioned together, Rom. xv. 26 ; 2 Cor. ix. 2, xi.
5 Thessaly was subject to Macedonia when 9, 10 ; also 1 Thess. i. 7, 8.
the Roman wars began. At the close of the 10 Rom. xv. 19. Dalmatia (2 Tim. iv. 10)
first war, under Flaminius, it was declared was a district in this province. See ch. XVII.
free; but ultimately it was incorporated with Nicopolis (Tit. iii. 12) was in Epirus, which,
the province. as we have seen, was a district in the province
6 At first the wars of Rome with the peo- of Achaia, but it was connected by a branch
pie of this coast merely led to mercantile road with the Via Egnatia from Dyrrhachium,
treaties for the free navigation of the Adriatic. which is mentioned below.
Julius Caesar and Augustus concluded the
18

274 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap.h.
When we allude to Rome, and think of the relation of the City to the
provinces, we are inevitably reminded of the military roads ; and here
across the breadth of Macedonia, was one of the greatest roads of the
Empire. It is evident that, after Constantinople was founded, a line of
communication between the Eastern and Western capitals was of the
utmost moment ; but the Via Egnatia was constructed long before that
period. Strabo, in the reign of Augustus, informs us that it was regu
larly made and marked out by milestones, from Dyrrhachium on the
Adriatic, to Cypselus on the Hebrus in Thrace ; and, even before the
close of the republic, we find Cicero speaking, in one of his orations, of
' ¦ that military way of ours, which connects us with the Hellespont."
Certain districts on the European side of the Hellespont had been part
of the legacy of King Attalus,1 and the simultaneous possession of
Macedonia, Asia, and Bithynia, with the prospect of further conquests in
the East, made this line of communication absolutely necessary. When
St. Paul was on the Roman road at Troas2 or Philippi, he was on a road
which led to the gates of Rome. It was the same pavement which he
afterwards trod at Appii Forum and the Three Taverns.3 The nearest
parallel which the world has seen of the imperial roads is the present
European railway system. The Hellespont and the Bosphorus, in the
reign of Claudius, were what the Straits of Dover and Holyhead are
now ; and even the passage from Brundusium in Italy, to Dyrrhachkm
and Apollonia4 in Macedonia, was only a tempestuous ferry, — only one
of those difficulties of nature which the Romans would have overcome if
they could, and which the boldest of the Romans dared to defy.6 From
Dyrrhachium and Apollonia, the Via Egnatia, strictly so called, extended
a distance of five hundred miles, to the Hebrus, in Thrace.6 Thes-
1 See the preceding chapter, under "Asia." ceedings between Brundusium and the oppo-
2 See what is said of the road between site side of the sea in Plutarch. The same
Troas and Pergamus, &c, p. 240. writer tells us that Cicero, when departing on
8 Acts xxviii. 15. For notices of the his exile, was driven back by a storm into
Via Appia, where it approaches the Adriatic, Brundusium. See below, p. 278, u. 3. The
in the neighborhood of Egnatia (" Gnatia lym- great landing-place on the Macedonian side
phis iratis extructa"), whence, according to was Dyrrhachium, the ancient Epidamnus,
some writers, the Macedonian continuation called by Catullus " Adriae Tabernae."
received its name, see Horace's journey, Sat. 6 The roads from Dyrrhachium and Apollo-
i. v. Dean Milman's Horace contains an ex- nia met together at a place called Clodiana,
pressive representation of Brundusium, the and thence the Via Egnatia passed over
harbor on the Italian side of the water. the mountains to Heraclea in Macedonia. It
4 i. e. Apollonia on the Adriatic, which entered the plain at Edessa (see below), and
must be carefully distinguished from the other thence passed by Pella to Thessalonica. The
town of the same name, and on the same road, stations, as given by the Antonine and Jeru-
between Thessalonica and Amphipolis (Acts salem Itineraries and the Peutinger Table,
xvii. 1 ). will be found in Cramer's Ancient Greece, v. i.
6 See the anecdotes of Cassar's bold pro- pp. 81-84.

CHAP. Ii-

THE VIA EGNATIA. 275

salonica was about half way between these remote points, and Philippi
was the last l important town in the province of Macedonia. Our con
cern is only with that part of the Via Egnatia which lay between the two
last-mentioned cities.
The intermediate stages mentioned in the Acts of the Apostles are
Amphipolis and Apollonia. The distances laid down in the Itineraries
are as follows : — Philippi to Amphipolis, thirty-three miles ; Amphipolis
to Apollonia, thirty miles ; Apollonia to Thessalonica, thirty-seven miles.
These distances are evidently such as might have been traversed each' in
one day ; and since nothing is said of any delay on the road, but every
thing to imply that the journey was rapid, we conclude (unless, indeed,
their recent sufferings made rapid travelling impossible) that Paul and
Silas rested one night at each of the intermediate places, and thus our
notice of their journey is divided into three parts.
From Philippi to Amphipolis, the Roman way passed across the plain
to the north of Mount Pangaeus. A traveller, going direct from Neapolis
to the mouth of the Strymon, might make his way through an opening in
the mountains 2 nearer the coast. This is the route by which Xerxes
brought his army,3 and by which modern journeys are usually made.4
But Philippi was not built in the time of the Persian war, and now,
under the Turks, it is a ruined village. Under the Roman emperors, the
position of this colony determined the direction of the road. The very
productiveness of the soil,5 and its liability to inundations,6 must have
caused this road to be carefully constructed. The surface of the plain,
which is intersected by multitudes of streams, is covered now with
plantations of cotton and fields of Indian corn,7 and the villages are so
numerous, that, when seen from the summits of the neighboring moun
tains, they appear to form one continued town.8 Not far from the coast,
1 See above, p. 249, u. 3, and p. 250, n. 9. yielding abundant harvests of cotton, wheat,
2 This opening is the Pieric valley. See barley, and maize, contains extensive pastures
Leake, p. 180. " Though the modern route peopled with oxen, horses, and sheep. No
from Cairalla to Orphano and Saloniki, leading part of the land is neglected ; and the district,
by Pravista through the Pieric valley along in its general appearance, is not inferior to
the southern side of Mount Pangaeum, exactly any part of Europe." — Leake, p. 201.
in the line of that of Xerxes, is the most 6 See Leake.
direct, it does not coincide with the Roman 7 " Des plantes de coton, des rizieres im-
road or the Via Egnatia, which passed along menses, de grandes plantations de tabac, des
the northern base of that mountain, probably vignes entrecoupe'es de terres a ble, formaient
for the sake of connecting both these impor- sous nos yeux le plus agreable spectacle. . . .
tant cities, the former of which was a Roman Les produits de cette plaiue seraient immenses,
colony." si l'activite et l'industrie des habitans re-
8 Herod, rii. 112. pondaient & la liberalite" de la nature.'' — Cou-
4 Dr. Clarke and Cousinery both took this emery, ii. 4, 5.
route. 8 Clarke, ch. xii. At the head of the ehap-

5 <

' The plain is very fertile, and besides

276 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL.

CHAP.K.

the Strymon spreads out into a lake as large as Windermere ; x and be
tween the lower end of this lake and the inner reach of the Strymonic
gulf, where the mountains leave a narrow opening, Amphipolis was
situated on a bend of the river.
" The position of Amphipolis is one of the most important in Greece.
It stands in a pass which traverses the mountains bordering the Strymonic
gulf, and it commands the only easy communication from the coast of
that gulf into the great Macedonian plains, which extend, for sixty miles
from beyond Meleniko to Philippi."2 The ancient name of the place was
" Nine Ways," from the great number of Thracian and Macedonian
roads which met at this point.3 The Athenians saw the importance of
the position, and established a colony there, which they called Amphipo
lis, because the river surrounded it. Some of the deepest interest in
the history of Thucydides, not only as regards military and political
movements,4 but in reference to the personal experience of the historian.
himself,5 is concentrated on this spot. And again, Amphipolis appears in
the speeches of Demosthenes as a great stake in the later struggle be
tween Philip of Macedon and the citizens of Athens.6 It was also the
scene of one striking passage in the history of Roman conquest : here
Paulus ^Emilius, after the battle of Pydna, publicly proclaimed that the
Macedonians should be free ; 7 and now another Paulus was here, whose
message to the Macedonians was au honest proclamation of a better
liberty, without conditions and without reserve.
St. Paul's next stage was to the city of Apollonia. After leaving
Amphipolis, the road passes along the edge of the Strymonic gulf, first
between cliffs and the sea, and then across a well-wooded maritime plain,
whence the peak of Athos is seen far across the bay to the left.8 We
quit the seashore at the narrow gorge of Aulon, or Arethusa,9 and there
enter the valley which crosses the neck of the Chalcidic peninsula. Up
to this point we have frequent historical landmarks reminding us of
ter he gives a view of the plain as seen from 6 It was his failure in an expedition against
the hills on the south. Amphipolis that caused the exile of Thucyd-
1 Anciently the lake Cercinitis. ides.
2 Leake. For other notices of the impor- 6 See the passages in the speeches which re-
tance of this position, see Bp. Thirlwall's late to Pliilip's encroachment on the Athenian
Greece, iii. 284, and especially Mr. Grote's power in the North of the JEgean.
Greece, vi. 554-562, and 625-647. A view of 7 Livy's words (xiv. 30) show that the
Amphipolis is given in our larger editions. Romans fully appreciated the importance of
3 See Herod, vii. 114. Here Xerxes the position.
crossed the Strymon, and offered a sacrifice 8 Dr. Clarke.
of white horses to the river, and buried alive ' Dr. Clarke, ch. xii., devotes several
nine youths and maidens. pages to this tomb. The Jerusalem Itinerary,
4 See especially all that relates to Cleon besides another intermediate station at Pen-
and Brasidas in the fourth and fifth books. nana, mentions that at the tomb of Euripides.

chap. rx. AMPHIPOLIS AND APOLLONIA. 277
Athens. Thucydides has just been mentioned in connection with Am
phipolis and the Strymon. As we leave the sea, we have before us,
or. the opposite coast, Stagirus,1 the birthplace of Aristotle ; and in the
pass, where the mountains close on the road, is the tomb of Euripides.
Thus the steps of our progress, as we leave the East and begin to draw
near to Athens, are already among her historians, philosophers, and
poets. Apollonia is somewhere in the inland part of the journey, where the
Via Egnatia crosses from the gulf of the Strymon to that of Thessaloni
ca ; but its exact position has not been ascertained. We will, therefore,
merely allude to the scenery through which the traveller moves, in going
from sea to sea. The pass of Arethusa is beautiful and picturesque. A
river flows through it in a sinuous course, and abundant oaks and plane-
trees are on the rocks around.3 Presently this stream is seen to emerge
from an inland lake, whose promontories and villages, with the high
mountains rising to the south-west, have reminded travellers of Switzer
land.4 As we journey towards the west, we come to a second lake.
Between the two is the modern post-station of Klisali, which may
possibly be Apollonia,5 though it is generally believed to be on the moun
tain slope to the south of the easternmost lake. The whole region of
these two lakes is a long valley, or rather a succession of plains, where
the level spaces are richly wooded with forest-trees, and the nearer hills
are covered to their summits with olives.6 Beyond the second lake, tho
road passes over some rising ground, and presently, after emerging froni
a narrow glen, we obtain a sight of the sea once more, the eye ranges
freely over the plain of the Axius, and the city of Thessalonica is imme
diately before us.
Once arrived in this city, St. Paul no longer follows the course of the
Via Egnatia. He may have done so at a later period, when he says
that he had preached the Gospel " round about unto Illyricum." ' But
at present he had reached the point most favorable for the glad procla
mation. The direction of the Roman road was of course determined
by important geographical positions ; and along the whole line from
1 Leake identifies Stagirus with Stavros, Cousine'ry both agree in placing it to the
a little to the south of Aulon, p. 167. south of Lake Bolbe. We ought to add, that
2 See the last note but one. the Antonine and Jerusalem Itineraries appear
8 See Dr. Clarke. Cousine'ry writes with to give two distinct roads between Apollonia
great enthusiasm concerning this glen. and Thessalonica. See Leake, p. 46.
4 See Dr. Clarke. Both he and Cousine'ry 6 See Clarke's Travels.
make mention of the two villages, the Little 7 See above, pp. 274, 275. This expreir
Bechik and Great Bechik, on its north bank, sion, however, might be need if nothing more
along which the modern road passes. were meant than a progress to the very
6 This is Tafel's opinion ; but Leake and frontier of Illyricum.

278 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST PAUL. chap, a
Dyrrhachium to the Hebrus, no city was so large and influential as
Thessalonica. The Apostolic city at which we are now arrived was known in the
earliest periods of its history under various names. Under that of
Therma it is associated with some interesting recollections. It was the
resting-place of Xerxes on his march ; it is not unmentioned in the
Peloponnesian war ; and it was a frequent subject of debate in the last
independent assemblies of Athens. When the Macedonian power began
to overshadow all the countries where Greek was spoken, this city re
ceived its new name, and began a new and more distinguished period of
its history. A sister of Alexander the Great was called Thessalonica,
and her name was given to the city of Therma, when rebuilt and em
bellished by her husband, Cassander the son of Antipater.1 This name,
under a form slightly modified, has continued to the present day. The
Salneck of the early German poets has become the Saloniki of the mod
ern Levant. Its history can be followed as continuously as its name.
When Macedonia was partitioned into four provincial divisions by Paulus
zEmilius, Thessalonica was the capital of that which lay between the
Axius and the Strymon.2 When the four regions were united into one
Roman province, this city was chosen as the metropolis of the whole.
Its name appears more than once in the annals of the Civil Wars. It
was the scene of the exile of Cicero,3 and one of the stages of his
journey between Rome and his province in the East.4 Antony and
Octavius were here after the battle of Philippi ; and coins are still extant
which allude to the " freedom" granted by the victorious leaders to the
city of the Thermaic gulf. Strabo, in the first century, speaks of
Thessalonica as the most populous town in Macedonia. Lucian, in the
second century, uses similar language. Before the founding of Constan
tinople, it was virtually the capital of Greece and Illyricum, as well as
of Macedonia, and shared the trade of the Mge&n with Ephesus and
Corinth. Even after the Eastern Rome was built and reigned over the
Levant, we find both Pagan and Christian writers speaking of Thessalo-
nica as the metropolis of Macedonia and a place of great magnitude.
1 The first author in which the new name the Victory on the coins of the city. See
occurs is Polybius. Some say that the name below.
was given by Philip in honor of his daughter, 2 See above, pp. 272, 273.
and others that it directly commemorated a 8 Both in going out and returning he
victory over the Thessalians. But the opinion crossed the Adriatic, between Brundusium
stated above appears the most probable. and Dyrrhachium. See p. 274, n. 5. In
Philip's daughter was called Thessalonica, in travelling through Macedonia, he would follow
commemoration of a victory obtained by her the Via Egnatia.
father on the day when he heard of her 4 Several of his letters were written from
birth. Cousinery sees an allusion to this in Thessalonica on this journey.

ohap. rx. THESSALONICA. 279
Through the Middle Ages it never ceased to be important : and it is, at
the present day, the second city in European Turkey.1 The reason of
this continued pre-eminence is to be found in its geographical position.
Situated on the inner bend of the Thermaic Gulf, — half way between
the Adriatic and the Hellespont,2 — on the sea-margin of a vast plain
watered by several rivers, — and at the entrance of the pass 4 which
commands the approach to the other great Macedonian level, — it was
evidently destined for a mercantile emporium. Its relation with the
inland trade of Macedonia was as close as that of Amphipolis ; and its
maritime advantages were perhaps even greater. Thus, while Amphipo
lis decayed under the Byzantine emperors, Thessalonica continued to
prosper.5 There probably never was a time, from the day when it first
received its name, that this city has not had the aspect of a busy com
mercial town.6 We see at once how appropriate a place it was for one of
the starting-points of the Gospel in Europe ; and we can appreciate the
force of the expression used by St. Paul within a few months of his
departure from the Thessalonians,7 when he says, that " from them the
Word of the Lord had sounded forth like a trumpet,8 not only in Mace
donia and Achaia, but in every place."
No city, which we have yet had occasion to describe, has had so dis
tinguished a Christian history, with the single exception of the Syrian
Antioch ; and the Christian glory of the Patriarchal city gradually faded
before that of the Macedonian metropolis. The heroic age of Thessalonica
was the third century.9 It was the bulwark of Constantinople in the
shock of the barbarians ; and it held up the torch of the truth to the suc
cessive tribes who overspread the country between the Danube and the
jEgean, — the Goths and the Sclaves, the Bulgarians of the Greek
Church, and the Wallachians,10 whose language still seems to connect them
1 For a very full account of its modern con- 7 1 Thess. i. 8. The Epistle was written
dition see Dr. [Sir Henry] Holland's Travels. from Corinth very soon after the departure
2 See above, p. 273. from Thessalonica. See Ch. XI.
8 The chief of these are the Axius and 8 Chrysostom employs this image in com-
Haliacmon. The whole region near the sea menting on 1 Cor. i.
consists of low alluvial soil. See below, on the 9 Tafel traces the history of Thessalonica,
journey from Thessalonica to Berosa. in great detail, through the Middle Ages ;
4 This is the pass mentioned above, through and shows how, after the invasion of the
which the road to Amphipolis passed, and in Goths, it was the means of converting the
which Apollonia was situated. Sclaves, and through them the Bulgarians, to
5 Notices of its mercantile relations in the the Christian faith. The peasant population to
Middle Ages are given by Tafel. For an ac- the east of Thessalonica is Bulgarian, to the
count of its modern trade, and the way in west it is Greek (Cousine'ry, p. 52). Both
which it was affected by the last war, see Hoi- belong to the Greek Church.
land's Travels. 10 See what Cousine'ry says (ch. i.) of the
8 A view of the place, as seen from the sea, Wallachians, who are intermixed among the
is given in the larger editions. other tribes of Modern Macedonia. They

280

THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL.

CHAP. Is

with Philippi and the Roman colonies. Thus, in the mediaeval chroni
clers, it has deserved the name of " the Orthodox City." : The remains
of its Hippodrome, which is forever associated with the history of Theo-
dosius and Ambrose,2 can yet be traced among the Turkish houses, Its
bishops have sat in great councils.3 The writings of its great preacher
and scholar Eustathius 4 are still preserved to us. It is true that the
Christianity of Thessalonica, both mediaeval and modern, has been de
based by humiliating superstition. The glory of its patron saint, Deme
trius, has eclipsed that of St. Paul, the founder of its Church. But the
same Divine Providence, which causes us to be thankful for the past,
commands us to be hopeful for the future ; and we may look forward to
the time when a new harvest of the " work of faith, and labor of love,
and patience of hope," s shall spring up from the seeds of Divine Truth,
which were first sown on the shore of the Thermaic Gulf by the Apostle
of the Gentiles.
If Thessalonica can boast of a series of Christian annals, unbroken
since the day of St. Paul's arrival, its relations with the Jewish people
have continued for a still longer period. In our own day it contains a
multitude of Jews 6 commanding an influential position, many of whom
are occupied (not very differently from St. Paul himself) in the manu-

speak a corrupt Latin, and he thinks they are
descended from the ancient colonies. They
are a fierce and bold race, living chiefly in the
mountains ; and when trading caravans have
to go through dangerous places they are
posted in the front.
1 One Byzantine writer who uses this
phrase is Cameniata. His history is curious.
He was crozier-bearer to the archbishop, and
was carried off by the Arabs, and landed at
Tarsus, where he wrote his book.
* Some accounts say that 15,000 persons
were involved in the massacre, for which the
archbishop of Milan exacted penance from the
Emperor. See Gibbon, ch. xxvii. For some
notice of the remains of the Hippodrome, which
still retains its name, see Cousine'ry, ch. ii.
8 We find the bishop of Thessalonica in the
Council of Sardis, a. d. 347 ; and a decree of
the council relates to the place.
4 Eustathius preached and wrote there in
the twelfth century. He was highly esteemed
by the Comneni, and is held to have been
" beyond all dispute the most learned man of
his age."
6 1 Thess. i. 3.
B Paul Lucas, in his later journey, says : —

" Les Chretiens y sont environ au nombre de
10,000. On y eompte 30,000 Juifs, qui y ont
22 synagogues, et ce sont eux qui y font tout
le commerce. Comme ila sont fort indus-
trieux, deux grand-vizirs se sont mis succes-
sivement en tete de les faire travailler anx
manufactures du draps de France, pour mettre
la Turquie en e'tat de se passer des e"trangers ;
mais ils n'ont jamais pu rdussir : cependant
ils vendent assez bien leurs gros draps au
grand seigneur, qui en fait habiller ses troupes."
— p. 37. In the 17th century a Turkish au
thority speaks of them as carpet and cloth
makers, of their liberality to the poor, and of
their schools, with more than 1,000 children.
Cousine'ry reckons them at 20,000, many of
them from Spain. He adds : " Chaque syna
gogue a Salonique porte le nom de la province
d'ou sont originaires les families qui la compc-
sent." — p. 19. In the " Jewish Intelligence"
for 1849, the Jews at Salonica are reckoned at
35,000, being half the whole population, and
having the chief trade in their hands. They
are said to have thirty-six synagogues, " none
of them remarkable for their neatness or ele
gance of «tyle."

otap.ix. THE SYNAGOGUE. 281
facture of cloth. A considerable number of them are refugees from
Spain, and speak the Spanish language. There are materials for tracing
similar settlements of the same scattered and persecuted people in this
city, at intervals, during the Middle Ages ; J and even before the destruc
tion of Jerusalem we find them here, numerous and influential, as at
Antioch and Iconium. Here, doubtless, was the chief colony of those
Jews of Macedonia of whom Philo speaks ; 2 for while there was only a
proseucha at Philippi, and while Amphipolis and Apollonia had no
Israelite communities to detain the Apostles, " the synagogue " * of the
neighborhood was at Thessalonica.
The first scene to which we are introduced in this city is entirely
Jewish. It is not a small meeting of proselyte women by the river-side,
but a crowded assembly of true-born Jews, intent on their religious
worship, among whom Paul and Silas now make their appearance. If
the traces of their recent hardships were manifest in their very aspect,
and if they related to their Israelitish brethren how they had " suffered
before and been cruelly treated at Philippi" (1 Thess. ii. 2), their en
trance in among them must have created a strong impression of indigna
tion and sympathy, which explains the allusion in St. Paul's Epistle. He
spoke, however, to the Thessalonian Jews with the earnestness of a man
who has no time to lose and no thought to waste on his own sufferings.
He preached, not himself, but Christ crucified. The Jewish Scriptures
were the ground of his argument. He recurred to the same subject again
and again. On three successive Sabbaths 4 he argued with them ; and
the whole body of Jews resident in Thessalonica were interested and ex
cited with the new doctrine, and were preparing either to adopt or
Oppose it.
The three points on which he insisted were these : — that He who was
foretold in prophecy was to be a suffering Messiah, — that after death He
was to rise again, — and that the crucified Jesus of Nazareth was indeed
the Messiah who was to come. Such is the distinct and concise state
ment in the Acts of the Apostles (xvii. 3) : and the same topics of teach
ing are implied in the first Epistle, where the Thessalonians are appealed
to as men who had been taught to " believe that Jesus had really died
aud risen again " (iv. 14), and who had " turned to serve the true God,
and to wait for His Son from heaven, whom He raised from the dead,
1 They are alluded to in the 7th century, it, still the phrase would imply that there was
and again in considerable numbers in the 12th. no synagogue in the towns recently passed
See Tafel. through. There was another synagogue at
2 See Ch. I. p. 17. Beroea. Acts xvii. 10.
8 The best MSS. here have the definite 4 Acts ivii. 2.
article. If authority preponderated against

282 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. CHAP„
even Jesus ." (i. 10). Of the mode in which these subjects would be pre
sented to his hearers we can form some idea from what was said at
Antioch in Pisidia. The very aspect of the worshippers was the same ¦ '
proselytes were equally attached to the congregation* in Pisidia and
Macedonia,2 and the " devout and honorable women " in one city found
their parallel in the " chief women " in the other.3 The impression too
produced by the address, was not very different here from what it had
been there. At first it was favorably received,4 the interest of novelty
having more influence than the seriousness of conviction. Even from
the first some of the topics must have contained matter for perplexity or
cavilling. Many would be indisposed to believe the fact of Christ's
resurrection : and many more who, in their exile from Jerusalem, were
looking intently for the restoration of an earthly kingdom,5 must have
heard incredulously and unwillingly of the humiliation of Messiah.
That St. Paul did speak of Messiah's glorious kingdom, the kingdom
foretold in the Prophetic Scriptures themselves, may be gathered by com
paring together the Acts and the Epistles to the Thessalonians. The ac
cusation brought against him (Acts xvii. 7) was, that he was proclaiming
another king, and virtually rebelling against the emperor. And in strict
conformity to this the Thessalonians are reminded of the exhortations
and entreaties he gave them, when among them, that they would " walk
worthily of the God who had called them to His kingdom and glory "
(1 Thess. ii. 12), and they are addressed as those who had "suffered
affliction for the sake of that kingdom" (2 Thess. i. 5). Indeed, the
royal state of Christ's second advent was one chief topic which was
urgently enforced, and deeply impressed, on the minds of the Thes
salonian converts. This subject tinges the whole atmosphere through
which the aspect of this church is presented to us. It may be said that
in each of the primitive churches, which are depicted in the apostolic
epistles, there is some peculiar feature which gives it an individual char
acter. In Corinth it is the spirit of party,6 in Galatia the rapid declension
into Judaism,7 in Philippi it is a steady and self-denying generosity.8 And
if we were asked for the distinguishing characteristic of the first Chris
tians of Thessalonica, we should point to their overwhelming sense of the
nearness of the second advent, accompanied with melancholy thoughts
1 See the account of the synagogue-wor- the synagogues was in a separate gallery or
ship, — the desk, the ark, the manuscripts, behind a lattice, p. 153.
the prayers, the Scripture-reading, the Tallith, * Acts xvii. 4 compared with xiii. 42-44.
&c, — given in pp. 152-155. 6 Acts i. 6.
2 Compare Acts xiii. 16, 26, with xvii. 4. 6 1 Cor. i. 10, &c.
See Paley on 1 Thess. ' Gal. i. 6, &c.
8 Compare Acts xiii. 50 with xvii. 4. It 8 Phil. iv. 10-16.
will be remembered that the women's place in

ohap.q. ST. PAUL AMONG THE THESSALONIANS. 283
concerning those who might die before it, and with gloomy and unprac
tical views of the shortness of life and the vanity of the world. Each
chapter in the first Epistle to the Thessalonians ends with an allusion to
this subject ; and it was evidently the topic of frequent conversations,
when the Apostle was in Macedonia. But St. Paul never spoke or wrote
of the future as though the present was to be forgotten. When the
Thessalonians were admonished of Christ's advent, he told them also of
other coming events, full of practical warning to all ages, though to our
eyes still they are shrouded in mystery, — of " the falling-away," and of
" the man of sin." l " These awful revelations," he said, " must precede
the revelation of the Son of God. Do you not remember," he adds with
emphasis in his letter, " that when I was still with you I often 2 told you
this ? You know, therefore, the hinderance why he is not revealed, as he
will be in his own season." He told them, in the words of Christ himself,
that " the times and the seasons" of the coming revelations were known
only to God ; 3 and he warned them, as the first disciples had been warned
in Judaea, that the great day would come suddenly on men unprepared,
" as the pangs of travail on her whose time is full," and " as a thief in
the night ; " and he showed them, both by precept and example, that
though it be true that life is short and the world is vanity, yet God's work
must be done diligently and to the last.
The whole demeanor of St. Paul among the Thessalonians may be
traced, by means of these Epistles, with singular minuteness. We see
there, not only what success he had on his first entrance among them,4
not only how the Gospel came " with power and with full conviction of
its truth," 5 but also " what manner of man he was among them for their
sakes." 6 We see him proclaiming the truth with unflinching courage,7
endeavoring to win no converts by flattering words,8 but warning his
hearers of all the danger of the sins and pollution to which they were
tempted ; 9 manifestly showing that his work was not intended to gratify
1 2 Thess. ii. 6 " You know the manner in which I behaved
2 The verb is in the imperfect. myself among you," &c. 1 Thess. i. 5.
8 " But of the times and seasons, brethren, ("What manner of men we were." — Auth
when these things shall be you need no warn- Vers.) Though the words are in the plural,
• ing. For yourselves know perfectly that the the allusion is to himself only. See the notes
day of the Lord will come as a thief in the on the Epistle itself.
night ; and while men say, Peace and safety, 7 " After I had borne suffering and outrage,
destruction shall come upon them in a moment, as you know, at Philippi, I boldly declared to
as the pangs of travail on her whose time is you God's Glad Tidings, though its adversa-
fiill." — 1 Thess. v. 1-3. See Acts i. 7 ; Matt. ries contended mightily against me." — 1 Thess.
xxiv. 43 ; Luke xii. 39 ; 2 Pet. iii. 10. ii. 2.
4 " You know yourselves, brethren, that my 8 " Neither did I use flattering words, as
coming amongst you was not fruitless." — 1 you know." — 1 Thess. i. 5.
Thess. ii. 1. S] Thess. i. 5. 9 " This is the will of God, even your

284 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap.ix,
any desire of self-advancement,1 but scrupulously maintaining an honor
able and unblamable character.2 We see him rebuking and admonishing
his converts with all the faithfulness of a father to his children,3 and
cherishing them with all the affection of a mother for the infant of her
bosom.4 We see in this Apostle at Thessalonica all the devotion of a
friend who is ready to devote his life for those whom he loves,5 all the
watchfulness of the faithful pastor, to whom " each one" of his flock is
the separate object of individual care.6
And from these Epistles we obtain further some information concern
ing what may be called the outward incidents of St. Paul's residence in
this city. He might when there, consistently with the Lord's institution7
and with the practice of the other Apostles,8 have been " burdensome " to
those whom he taught, so as to receive from them the means of his tem
poral support. But that he might place his disinterestedness above all
suspicion, and that he might set an example to those who were too much
inclined to live by the labor of others, he declined to avail himself of that
which was an undoubted right. He was enabled to maintain this indepen
dent position partly by the liberality of his friends at Philippi, who once
and again, on this first visit to Macedonia, sent relief to his necessities
(Phil. iv. 15, 16). And the journeys of those pious men who followed
the footsteps of the persecuted Apostles along the Via Egnatia by Amphip
olis and Apollonia, bringing the alms which had been collected at Phil
ippi, are among the most touching incidents of the Apostolic history.
And not less touching «is that description which St. Paul himself gives us
of that other means of support — " his own labor night and day, that he
might not be burdensome to any of them " (1 Thess. ii. 9). He did not
merely "rob other churches,"9 that he might do the Thessalonians ser
vice, but the trade he had learnt when a boy in Cilicia 10 justified the old
sanctification ; that you should keep yourselves ness and forbearance ; and as a nurse cherishes
from fornication . . . not in lustful passions, her own children, so," &c. — 1 Thess. ii. 7.
like the heathen, who know not God. . . . All The Authorized Version is defective. St.
such the Lord will punish, as I have forewarned Paul compares himself to a mother who is
you by my testimony." — 1 Thess. iv. 4-6. It nursing her own child.
is needless to add that such temptations must 6 " It was my joy to give you, not only
have abounded in a city like Thessalonica. the Gospel of Christ, but my own life also,
We know from Lucian that the place had a bad because ye were dear unto me." — 1 Thess, ii..
character. 8.
1 1 Thess. ii. 5. 6 " You know how I exhorted eacA one
2 " You are yourselves witnesses how holy, among you to walk worthy of God." — 1
and just, and unblamable, were my dealings Thess. ii. 11.
towards you." — I Thess. ii. 10. t Matt. x. 10; Luke x. 7; See 1 Tim v
8 " You know how earnestly, as a father his 18.
own children, I exhorted, and entreated, and ad- 8 1 Cor. ix. 4, &c.
jured," &c. — 1 Thess. ii. 1 1 . "2 Cor. xi. 8.
4 " I behaved myself among you with mild- 10 Ch. H. p. 44.

chap. rx. THE THESSALONIAN LETTERS. 285
Jewish maxim ; 1 "he was like a vineyard that is fenced : " and he was
able to show an example, not only to the " disorderly busy-bodies " of
Thessalonica (1 Thess. iv. 11), but to all, in every age of the Church,
who are apt to neglect their proper business (2 Thess. iii. 11), and
ready to eat other men's bread for nought (2 Thess. iii. 8). Late at
night, when the sun had long set on the incessant spiritual labors of the
day, the Apostle might be seen by lamplight laboring at the rough hair
cloth,2 "that he might be chargeable to none." It was au emphatic
enforcement of the "commands"3 which he found it necessary to give
when he was among them, that they should " study to be quiet and to
work with their own hands" (1 Thess. iv. 11), and the stern principle
he laid down, that " if a man will not work, neither should he eat."
(2 Thess. iii. 10.)
In these same Epistles, St. Paul speaks of his work at Thessalonica as
having been encompassed with afflictions,4 and of the Gospel as having
advanced by a painful struggle.5 What these afflictions and struggles
were, we can gather from the slight notices of events which are contained
in the Acts. The Apostle's success among the Gentiles roused the
enmity of his own countrymen. Even in the Synagogue the Proselytes
attached themselves to him more readily than the Jews.6 But he did not
merely obtain an influence over the Gentile mind by the indirect means
of his disputations on the Sabbath in the Synagogue, and through the
medium of the Proselytes ; but on the intermediate days7 he was doubt
less in frequent and direct communication with the Heathen. We need
not be surprised at the results, even if his stay was limited to the period
corresponding to three Sabbaths. No one can say what effects might fol
low from three weeks, of an Apostle's teaching. But we are by no means
forced to adopt the supposition that the time was limited to three weeks.
It is highly probable that St. Paul remained at Thessalonica for a longer
period.8 At other cities,9 when he was repelled by the Jews, he became
the evangelist of the Gentiles, and remained till he was compelled to
depart. The Thessalonian Letters throw great light on the rupture which
i " He that hath * trade in his hand, to 7 As at Athens. Acts xvii. 17.
what is he like *. He is like a vineyard that is " Paley, among others, argues for a longer
fenced." Ibid. residence than three weeks. Horce Paulinos,
2 gee note, p. 45. on x Thess. No. vi. Benson lays stress on
8 Note the phrases, — "as I commanded the coming of repeated contributions from
you," and " even when I was with you I gave you Philippi : to which it may be replied, on the
this precept." other hand, that they might have come within
4 1 Thess. i. 6. 6 1 Thess. ii. 2. three weeks, if they were sent by different
6 " Some of them [the Jews] believed and contributors.
consorted with Paul and Silas ; and of the 9 Acts xiii., xviii., xix., &c.
devout Greeks u. great multitude, and of the
chief women not a few." — Acts xvii. 4.

286 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap.ix.
certainly took place with the Jews on this occasion, and which is implied
in that one word in the Acts which speaks of their jealousy1 against the
Gentiles. The whole aspect of the Letters shows that the main body of
the Thessalonian Church was not Jewish, but Gentile. The Jews are
spoken of as an extraneous body, as the enemies of Christianity and of
all men, not as the elements out of which the Church was composed.2
The ancient Jewish Scriptures are not once quoted in either of these
Epistles.3 The converts are addressed as those who had turned, not from
Hebrew fables and traditions, but from the practices of Heathen idolatry.4
How new and how comforting to them must have been the doctrine of the
resurrection from the dead ! What a contrast must this revelation of " life
and immortality " have been to the hopeless lamentations of their own
pagan funerals, and to the dismal teaching which we can still read in the
sepulchral inscriptions 5 of Heathen Thessalonica, — such as told the by
stander that after death there is no revival, after the grave no meeting of
those who have loved each other on earth ! How ought the truth taught
by the Apostle to have comforted the new disciples at the thought of inev
itable, though only temporary, separation from their Christian brethren !
And yet how difficult was the truth to realize, when they saw those
brethren sink into lifeless forms, and after they had committed them to
the earth which had received all their heathen ancestors ! How eagerly
can we imagine them to have read the new assurances of comfort which
came in the letter from Corinth, and which told them " not to sorrow
like other men who have no hope " ! 6
But we are anticipating the events which occurred between the Apos
tle's departure from Thessalonica and the time when he wrote the letter
from Corinth. We must return to the persecution that led him to un
dertake that journey, which brought him from the capitol of Macedonia
to that of Achaia.
When the Jews saw Proselytes and Gentiles, and many of the leading
women 7 of the city, convinced by St. Paul's teaching, they must have
felt that his influence was silently undermining theirs. In proportion to
his success in spreading Christianity, their power of spreading Judaism
declined. Their sensitiveness would be increased in consequence of the
1 Acts xvii. 5. 8 The Epistles to Titus and Philemon, if
2 " You have suffered the like persecution we mistake not, are the only other instances.
from your own countrymen which they [the 4 1 Thess. i. 9.
churches in Judsea] endured from the Jews, 6 Here and there in such inscriptions is a
who killed both the Lord Jesus and the hint of immortality; but the general feeling
prophets ... a people displeasing to God, of the Greek world concerning the dead is that
and enemies to all mankind ; who would hin- of utter hopelessness.
der me from speaking to the Gentiles," &c. — 6 1 Thess. iv. 13.
I Thess. ii. Contrast Bom. ix. ' Acts xvii. 4. See above.

chap. ix. PERSECUTION. 287
peculiar dislike with which they were viewed at this time by the Roman
power.1 Thus they adopted the tactics which had been used with some
success before at Iconium and Lystra,2 and turned against St. Paul and
his companions those weapons which are the readiest instruments of vul
gar bigotry. They excited the mob of Thessalonica, gathering together
a multitude of those worthless idlers about the markets and landing-
places3 which abound in every such city, and are always ready for any
evil work. With this multitude they assaulted the house of Jason (per
haps some Hellenistic Jew,4 whose name had been moulded into Gentile
form, and possibly one of St. Paul's relations, who is mentioned in the
Epistle to the Romans),5 with whom Paul and Silas seem to have been
lodging. Their wish was to bring Paul and Silas out to the demus, or
assembly of the people. But they were absent from the house ; and
Jason and some other Christians were dragged before the city magis
trates. The accusation vociferously brought against them was to the fol
lowing effect : " These Christians, who are setting the whole world in
confusion, are come hither at last ; and Jason has received them into his
house ; and they are all acting in the face of the Emperor's decrees, for
they assert that there is another king, whom they call Jesus." We have
seen6 how some of the parts of St. Paul's teaching at Thessalonica may
have given occasion to the latter phrase in this indictment ; and we ob
tain a deeper insight into the cause why the whole indictment was
brought forward with so much vehemence, and why it was so likely to
produce an effect on the magistrates, if we bear in mind the circumstance
alluded to in reference to Philippi,7 that the Jews were under the ban of
the Roman authorities about this time, for having raised a tumult in the
metropolis, at the instigation (as was alleged) of one Chrestus, or Chris-
tus ; 8 and that they must have been glad, in the provincial cities, to be
able to show their loyalty and gratify their malice, by throwing the odium
off themselves upon a sect whose very name might be interpreted to im
ply a rebellion against the Emperor.
Such were the circumstances under which Jason and his companions
were brought before the politarahs. We use the Greek term advisedly ;
1 See next page. a Above, p. 283.
s Acts xiv. See pp. 164, 172, &c. ; also ' P. 335.
pp. 161, 162. 8 The words of Suetonius are quoted p.
8 Like the Lazzaroni at Naples. 262, n. 2. We shall return to them again
4 Jason is the form which the name Joshua when we come to Acts xviii. 2. At present
seems sometimes to have taken. See p. 137. we need only point out their probable connec-
It occurs 1 Mace. viii. 17, 2 Mace. ii. 23 ; also tion with the word " Christian." See pp. Ill,
in Josephus, referred to p. 136, n. 6. 112, and the notes. We should observe that
6 Rom. xvi. 21. Tradition says that he St. Paul had proclaimed at Thessalonica that
became Bishop of Tarsus. For some remarks Jesus was the Christ. Acts xvii. 3.
on St. Paul's kinsmen, see p. 44.

288 THF LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap.ix.
for it illustrates the political constitution of Thessalonica, and its contrast
with that of Philippi, which has lately been noticed. Thessalonica was
not a colony, like Philippi, Troas, or the Pisidian Antioch, but a, free city
( Urbs libera}, like tlie Syrian Antioch, or like Tarsus l and Athens. The
privilege of what was technically called " freedom " was given to certain
cities of the Empire for good service in the Civil Wars, or as a tribute of
respect to the old celebrity of the place, or for other reasons of conve
nient policy. There were few such cities in the western provinces,2 as
there were no municipia in the eastern. The free towns were most nu
merous in those parts of the Empire where the Greek language had long
prevailed ; and we are generally able to trace the reasons why this privi
lege was bestowed upon them. At Athens, it was the fame of its ancient
eminence, and the evident policy of paying a compliment to the Greeks.
At Thessalonica it was the part which its inhabitants had prudently taken
in the great struggle of Augustus and Antony against Brutus and Cas
sius.3 When the decisive battle had been fought, Philippi was made a
military colony, and Thessalonica became free.
The privilege of such a city consisted in this, — that it was entirely
self-governed in all its internal affairs, within the territory that might be
assigned to it. The governor of the province had no right, under ordinary
circumstances, to interfere with these affairs.4 The local magistrates had
the power of life and death over the citizens of the place. No stationary
garrison of Roman soldiers was quartered within its territory.5 No
insignia of Roman office were displayed in its streets. An instance of
the care with which this rule was observed is recorded by Tacitus, who tells
us, that Germanicus, whose progress was usually distinguished by the
presence of twelve lictors, declined to enter Athens attended with more
than one. There is no doubt that the magistracies of such cities would
be very careful to show their loyalty to the Emperor on all suitable occa
sions, and to avoid every disorder which might compromise their valued
dignity, and cause it to be withdrawn. And on the other hand, the Roman
1 See p. 42. under the Republic, the governor of Asia
2 There were a few in Gaul and Spain, directed to administer justice to free commu-
none in Sardinia. On the other hand, they nities ; but usually he did not interfere with
were very numerous in Greece, the Greek the local magistrates. Even his financial of-
islands, and Asia Minor. Such compliment- ficers did not enter the territory to collect the
ary privileges would have had little meaning taxes, but the imposts were sent to Rome in
if bestowed on a rude people, which had no some other way. We may add that a free
ancient traditions. city might have libertas cum immunitate, i. e.
8 See the coins alluded to above, p. 278. freedom from taxation, as a Colonia might
Some have the word EAETOEPIA2 with the have the Jus Italicum.
head of Octavia. 6 Hence such cities were sometimes called
4 He might, however, have his residence " ungarrisoned."
there, as at Antioch and Tarsus. We find,

aur.ix. THE MAGISTRACY OF THESSALONICA. 289
State did wisely to rely on the Greek love of empty distinction ; and it
secured its dominion as effectually in the East by means of these privileged
towns, as by the stricter political annexation of the municipia in the West.
The form of government in the free cities was very various.' In some
cases the old magistracies and customs were continued without any
material modification. In others, a senate, or an assembly, was allowed to
exist where none had existed before. Here, at Thessalonica, we find an
assembly of the people (Demus,2 Acts xvii. 5) and supreme magistrates,
who are called politarchs (Acts xvii. 8) . It becomes an interesting inquiry,
whether the existence of this title of the Thessalonian magistracy can be
traced in any other source of information. This question is immediately
answered in the affirmative, by one of those passages of monumental
history which we have made it our business to cite as often as possible
in the course of this biography. An inscription which is still legible
on an archway in Thessalonica gives this title to the magistrates of the
place, informs us of their number, and mentions the very names of some
who bore the office not long before the day of St. Paul.
A long street intersects the city from east to west.3 This is doubtless
the very direction which the ancient road took in its course from the
Adriatic to the Hellespont ; for though the houses of ancient cities are
destroyed and renewed, the lines of the great thoroughfares are usually
unchanged.4 If there were any doubt of the fact at Thessalonica, the
question is set at rest by two triumphal arches which still, though disfig
ured by time and injury, and partly concealed by Turkish houses, span
the breadth of this street, and define a space which must have been one
of the public parts of the city in the apostolic age. One of these arches
is at the western extremity, near the entrance from Rome, and is thought
to have been built by the grateful Thessalonians to commemorate the
victory of Augustus and Antony.6 The other is farther to the east, and
records the triumph of some later emperor (most probably Constantine)
over enemies subdued near the Danube or beyond. The second of these
1 The degree of libertas was various also. s A view of the arch is given in Cousine'ry,
It was settled by a distinct concordat (fosdus). p. 26. See his description. He believes Oc-
The granting and withdrawing of this privi- tavius and Antony to have staid here some
lege, as well as its amount, was capricious and time after the victory. The arch is also de-
irregular under the Republic, and especially scribed by Sir H. Holland and Dr. Clarke,
during the Civil Wars. Under the Emperors who take the same view of its origin. The
it became more regulated, like all the other latter traveller says that its span is 12 feet,
details of provincial administration. and its present height 18 feet, the lower part
2 Tafel seems to think it had also a senate. being buried to the depth of 27 feet more. It
8 See Cousine'ry, ch. ii., and Leake, ch. is now part of the modern walls, and is called
XXTj the Vardar Gate, because it leads towards that
4 See a traveller's just remark, quoted in river (the Axius).
rererence to Damascus, p. 87, n. 4.
19

290 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap. rx.
arches, with its sculptured camels,1 has altogether an Asiatic aspect, and
belongs to a period of the Empire much later than that of St. Paul. The
first has the representation of consuls with the toga, and corresponds in
appearance with that condition of the arts which marks the passing of the
Republic into the Empire. If erected at that epoch, it was undoubtedly
existing when the Apostle was in Macedonia. The inscription in Greek
letters,2 which is given on the opposite page, is engraved on this arch of
marble,3 and informs us still of the magistracy which the Romans recog
nized and allowed to subsist in the " free city " of Thessalonica. We learn
from this source that the magistrates of the city were called politarchs*
and that they were seven in number ; and it is perhaps worth observing
(though it is only a curious coincidence) that three of the names are
identical with three of St. Paul's friends in this region, — Sopater of
Bercea,6 Qaius the Macedonian,6 and Secundus of Thessalonica.1
It is at least well worth our while to notice, as a mere matter of
Christian evidence, how accurately St. Luke writes concerning the
political characteristics of the cities and provinces which he mentions.
He takes notice, in the most artless and incidental manner, of minute
details which a fraudulent composer would judiciously avoid, and which
in the mythical result of mere oral tradition would surely be loose and
inexact. Cyprus is a " proconsular" province.8 Philippi is a " colony." 9
The magistrates of Thessalonica have an unusual title, unmentioned in
ancient literature ; but it appears, from a monument of a different kind,
that the title is perfectly correct. And the whole aspect of what hap
pened at Thessalonica, as compared with the events at Philippi, is in
perfect harmony with the ascertained difference in the political condition
of the two places. There is no mention of the rights and privileges of
Roman citizenship ; 10 but we are presented with the spectacle of a mixed
mob of Greeks and Jews, who are anxious to show themselves to be
" Ccesar's friends." n No lictors™ with rods and fasces, appear upon the
1 There is also a view of this arch in Cou- 8 The masonry consists of square blocks
sinery, p. 29. He refers its origin to one of of marble, six feet thick.
Constantiue's expeditions, mentioned by Zosi- 4 Nor is this the only ancient inscription in
mus. The whole structure formerly consisted Thessalonica, on which the same techinical
of three arches ; it is built of brick, and seems term occurs. 6Actsxx. 4. b Acts xix. 29.
to have been faced with marble. 7 Acts xx. 4. 8 See Ch. V. p. 131.
2 From Boeckh, No. 1,967. The inscrip- 9 See above, p. 251, &c.
tion is given by Leake (p. 236), with a slight 10 Compare Acts xvi. 21.
difference in one of the names. It goes on to u The conduct and language of the Jews
mention the to/uoc 7% ¦nokeaq and the in Acts xvii. 7, should, by all means, be com-
¦yvuvaoMpxorv. The names being chiefly Ro- pared with what was said to Pilate at Jerusa-
man, Leake argues for a later date than that lem : " If thou let this man go, thou art not
which is suggested by Cousinery. In either Caesar's friend: whosoever maketh himself a
case the confirmation of St. Luke's accuracy king speaketh against Cassar." — John xix. 12.
remains the same. i2 TapMxoi. Acts xvi. 35, 38.

riOAEITAPXOYNTnN ZflZlllATPOY TOY KAEO
nATPAZ KAI AOYKIOY flONTlOY ZEKOYNAOY
nOYBAlOY 4>AAOYIOY ZABEINOY AHMHTPIOY
TOY OAYZTOY AHMHTPIOY TOY NIKOIlOAEnZ
ZftlAOY TOY nAPMENIflNOZ TOY KAI MENIZKOY
TAIOY AriAAHlOY nOTEITOY. 
• Inscription from Thessalonica,

chap.ix. DEPARTURE FROM THESSALONICA. 291
scene , but we hear something distinctly of a demus,1 or free assembly of
the people. Nothing is. "said of religious ceremonies 2 which the citizens,
" being Romans," may not lawfully adopt ; all the anxiety, both of
people and magistrates, is turned to the one point of showing their loy
alty to the Emperor? And those magistrates by whom the question at
issue is ultimately decided are not Roman prartors,* but Greek poli-
tarchs.6 It is evident that the magistrates were excited and unsettled 6 as well
as the multitude. No doubt they were anxious to stand well with the
Roman government, and not to compromise themselves or the privileges
of their city by a wrong decision in this dispute between the Christians
and the Jews.7 The course they adopted was to " take security " from
Jason and his companions. By this expression8 it is most probably
meant that a sum of money was deposited with the magistrates, and that
the Christian community of the place made themselves responsible
that no attempt should be made against the supremacy of Rome, and
that peace should be maintained in Thessalonica itself. By these means
the disturbance was allayed.
But though the magistrates had secured quiet in the city for the
present, the position of Paul and Silas was very precarious. The lower
classes were still excited. The Jews were in a state of fanatical dis
pleasure. It is evident that the Apostles could not appear in public as
before, without endangering their own safety, and compromising their
fellow-Christians who were security for their good behavior. The alter
natives before them were, either silence in Thessalonica, or departure to
some other place. The first was impossible to those who bore the divine
commission to preach the Gospel everywhere. They could not hesitate
to adopt the second course ; and, under the watchful care of " the
brethren," they departed the same evening from Thessalonica, their steps
being turned in the direction of those mountains which are the western
boundary of Macedonia.9 We observe that nothing is said of the de-

1 Acts xvii. 5. this means, as has been imagined, that Ja-
2 Acts xvi. 21. 8 Acts xvii. 7. son and his friends gave bail for the ap^«ar-
4 Xrparriyoi. Acts xvi. 20, 22, 35, &c. ance of Paul and Silas before the magistrates,
Seep. 253 and p. 261. for they sent them away the Bame night.
6 For a general account of Thessalonica, Some think that Jason pledged himself not to
see the article in Smith's Dictionary of Greek receive them again into his house, or that he
and Roman Geography. A coin of the city is gave a promise of their immediate departure.
given at the end of Chap. XI. Neither of these suppositions is improbable ;
6 The words imply some disturbance of but it is clear that it was impossible for Paul
mind on the part of the magistrates. and Silas to stay, if the other Christians were
7 gee above. security for the maintenance of the peace.
8 Acts xvii. 9. It is very unlikely that 9 Pp. 271, 272, and the notes.

292 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap.ix
parture of Timotheus. If he was at Thessalonica at all, he stays there
now, as Luke had staid at Philippi.1 We can trace in all these
arrangements a deliberate care and policy for the well-being of the new
Churches, even in the midst of the sudden movements caused by the
outbreak of persecution. It is the same prudent and varied forethought
which appears afterwards in the pastoral Epistles, where injunctions are
given, according to circumstances, — to " abide " while the Apostle goes
to some other region,2 " hoping that he may come shortly " again,3 — to
" set in order the things that are wanting, and ordain elders," 4 — or "to
use all diligence " to follow5 and co-operate again in the same work at
some new place.
Passing under the Arch of Augustus and out of the Western Gate, the
Via Egnatia crosses the plain and ascends the mountains which have just
been mentioned, — forming a communication over a very rugged country
between the Hellespont and the Adriatic. Just where the road strikes
the mountains, at the head of a bay of level ground, the city of Edessa
is situated, described as commanding a glorious view of all the country,
that stretches in an almost unbroken surface to Thessalonica and the
sea.6 This, however, was not the point to which St. Paul turned his
steps. He travelled, by a less important road,7 to the town of Beroea,
which was farther to the south. The first part of the journey was
undertaken at night, but day must have dawned on the travellers long
before they reached their place of destination. If the journey was at all
like what it is now,8 it may be simply described as follows. After leaving
the gardens which are in the immediate neighborhood of Thessalonica,
the travellers crossed a wide tract of corn-fields, and came to the shift
ing bed of the " wide-flowing Axius." About this part of the journey,
if not before, the day must have broken upon them. Between the Axius
1 See p. 271. ceivable, but not likely, that St. Paul went by
2 1 Tim. i. 3. water from Thessalonica to the neighborhood
8 1 Tim. iii. 14. of Pydna. Colonel Leake, after visiting this
* Tit. i. 5. city, took a boat from Eleftherokhori, and
6 2 Tim. iv. 9, 21, and especially Tit. iii. sailed across the gulf to Salonica. Tol. iii.
12. The first injunction we read of, after this pp. 436-438. So Dr. Clarke.
point, to Timotheus, in conjunction with 8 The description of the journey is liter-
Silas, is when St. Paul leaves Beroea, and ally taken from Cousinery, ch. iii. He was
they are told " to come to him with all speed." travelling from Salonica with a caravan to a
Acts xvii. 15. place called Perlepe, on the mountains to the
6 See p. 274, n. 6. For a description of north-west. The usual road is up the Axius
Edessa (Vodhena) see Cousine'ry. It seems to Gradisca. But one of the rivers higher up
to be on a plateau at the edge of the moun- was said to be flooded and impassable ; hence
tains, with waterfalls, like Tivoli. he went by Caraveria (Beroea), which is four-
7 The Itineraries give two roads from teen leagues from Salonica. Leake travelled
Thessalonica to Beroea, one passing through from Salonica to Pella crossing the Axius on
Pella, the other more to the south. It is con- his way. Ch. xxvii.

chap. rx. JEWS AT BERCEA. 293
and the Haliacmon ! there intervenes another wide extent of the same
continuous plain. The banks of this second river are confined by artifi
cial dikes to check its destructive inundations. All the country round is
covered with a vast forest, with intervals of cultivated land, and villages
concealed among the trees. The road extends for many miles through
these woods, and at length reaches the base of the Western Mountains,
where a short ascent leads up to the gate of Beroea.
Bercea, like Edessa, is on the eastern slope of the Olympian range, and
commands an extensive view of the plain which is watered by the Haliac
mon and Axius. It has many natural advantages, and is now considered
one of the most agreeable towns in Rumili.2 Plane-trees spread a grate
ful shade over its gardens. Streams of water are in every street. Its
ancient name is said to have been derived from the abundance of its
waters ; and the name still survives in the modern Verria, or Kara-
Verria.3 It is situated on the left of the Haliacmon, about five miles
from the point where that river breaks through an immense rocky ravine
from the mountains to the plain. A few insignificant ruins of the Greek
and Roman periods may yet be noticed. The foundations of an ancient
bridge are passed on the ascent to the city-gate ; and parts of the Greek
fortifications may be seen above the rocky bed of a mountain stream.
The traces of repairs in the walls, of Roman and Byzantine date,4 are
links between the early fortunes of Bercea and its present condition.
It still boasts of eighteen or twenty thousand inhabitants, and is placed
in the second rank of the cities of European Turkey.8
In the apostolic age Bercea was sufficiently populous to contain a colo
ny of Jews.6 When St. Paul arrived, he went, according to his custom,
immediately to the synagogue. The Jews here were of a " nobler " spirit
than those of Thessalonica. Their minds were less narrowed by preju
dice, and they were more willing to receive " the truth in the love of it."
There was a contrast between two neighboring communities apparently
open to the same religious influences, like that between the " village of
the Samaritans," which refused to receive Jesus Christ (Luke ix.), and
that other " city " in the same country where " many believed " because
1 The Haliacmon itself would not be 8 Leake uses the former term: Cousine'ry
crossed before arriving at Beroea (see below). calls the town " Caraveria," or " "Verria the
But there are other large rivers which flow Black." In the eleventh century we find it
into it, and which are often flooded. Some called " Verre."
of the "perils of rivers" (p. 146) may very * It was a fortified city in the eleventh
possibly have been in this district. See the century.
preceding note. Compare Leake's remarks 6 Cousine'ry reckons the inhabitants at
on the changing channels of these rivers, p. 15,000 or 20,000.
437. 6 Acts xvii. 10.
1 See Leake, p. 290, &c.

294 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap. rx.
of the word of one who witnessed of Him, and " many more because of
His own word " (John iv.). In a spirit very different from the ignoble
violence of the Thessalonian Jews, the Berceans not only listened to the
Apostle's arguments, but they examined the Scriptures themselves, to see
if those arguments were justified by prophecy. And, feeling the impor
tance of the subject presented to them, they made this scrutiny of their
holy books their " daily " occupation. This was the surest way to come-
to a strong conviction of the Gospel's divine origin. Truth sought in
this spirit cannot long remain undiscovered. The promise that " they
who seek shall find " was fulfilled at Bercea ; and the Apostle's visit
resulted in the conversion of " many." Nor was the blessing confined to
the Hebrew community. The same Lord who " is rich unto all that call
upon Him," l called many " not of the Jews only, but also of the Gen
tiles."2 Both men and women,3 and those of the highest rank, among
the Greeks,4 were added to the church founded by St. Paul in that pro
vincial city of Macedonia, which was his temporary shelter from the sto^m
of persecution.
The length of St. Paul's stay in the city is quite uncertain. Prom the
fact that the Berceans were occupied " daily " in searching the Scriptures'1
for arguments to establish or confute the Apostle's doctrine, we conclude
that he remained there several days at least. From his own assertion in
his first letter to the Thessalonians,6 that, at the time when he had been
recently taken away from them, he was very anxious, and used every
effort to revisit them, we cannot doubt that he lingered as long as possi
ble in the neighborhood of Thessalonica.7 This desire would account for
a residence of some weeks ; and there are other passages8 in the same
Epistle which might induce us to suppose the time extended even to
months. But when we find, on the other hand, that the cause which led
him to leave Bercea was the hostility of the Jews of Thessalonica, and
when we remember that the two cities were separated only by a distance
of sixty miles,9 — that the events which happened in the Synagogue of
1 Rom. x. 12. rumor of the introduction of Christianity
2 Acts ix. 24. into Thessalonica. See below, on 1 Thess.
8 Acts xvii. 12. The stay at Athens was short, and the Epistle
4 The word " Greek " (v. 22) must be con- was written soon after St. Paul's arrival at
sidered as belonging to " men " as well as Corinth ; and, if a sufficient time had elapsed
" women." for a general knowledge to be spread abroad
6 Acts xvii. 11. of what had happened at Thessalonica, we
6 1 Thess. ii. 17. should be inclined to believe that the delay at
7 He says that he made more than one Bercea was considerable.
attempt to return ; and in this expression he 9 Wieseler gives a different turn to this con-
may be referring to what took place at Bercea, sideration, and argues that, because the dis-
as probably as at Athens. tance between Beroea and Thessalonica was so
8 Those which relate to the widely-extended great, therefore a long time must have elapsed

chap. rx. DIRECTION OF ST. PAUL'S FLIGHT. 295
one city would soon be made known in the Synagogue of the other, —
and that Jewish bigotry was never long in taking active measures to
crush its opponents, — we are led to the conclusion that the Apostle was
forced to retreat from Bercea after no long interval of time. The Jews
came like hunters upon their prey, as they had done before from Iconium
to Lystra.1 They could not arrest the progress of the Gospel ; but they
" stirred up the people " there, as at Thessalonica before.2 They made
his friends feel that his continuance in the city was no longer safe. He
was withdrawn from Beroea and sent to Athens, as in the beginning of his
ministry (Acts ix. 30) he had been withdrawn from Jerusalem and sent
to Tarsus. And on this occasion, as on that,3 the dearest wishes of his
heart were thwarted. The providence of God permitted " Satan " to
hinder him from seeing his dear Thessalonian converts, whom " once and
again " he had desired to revisit.4 The divine counsels were accomplished
by means of the antagonism of wicked men ; and the path of the Apostle
was urged on, in the midst of trial and sorrow, in the direction pointed
out in the vision at Jerusalem,5 "far hence unto the Gentiles."
An immediate departure was urged upon the Apostle ; and the
Church of Bercea suddenly 6 lost its teacher. But Silas and Timotheus
remained behind,7 to build it up in its holy faith, to be a comfort and
support in its trials and persecutions, and to give it such organization
as might be necessary. Meanwhile some of the new converts ac
companied St. Paul on his flight ; 8 thus adding a new instance to
those we have already seen of the love which grows up between
those who have taught and those who have learnt the way of the soul's
salvation.9 Without attempting to divine all the circumstances which may have
concurred in determining the direction of this flight, we can mention
some obvious reasons why it was the most natural course. To have
returned in the direction of Thessalonica was manifestly impossible. To
before the news from the latter place could 7 Acts xvii. 14. The last mention of Tim-
have summoned the Jews from the former. othy was at Philippi, but it is highly probable
But we must take into account, not merely the that he joined St. Paul at Thessalonica. See
distance between the two cities, but the pecu- above, p. 292. Possibly he brought some of
liarly close communication which subsisted the contributions from Philippi, p. 284. We
among the Jewish synagogues. See, for in- shall consider hereafter the movements of
stance, Acts xxvi. 11. Silas and Timothy at this point of St. Paul's
l See pp. 172, 173. journey. See note, p. 338. Meantime, we
2 " There also," Acts xvii. 13. Compare may observe that Timotheus was very proba
v 5 bly sent to Thessalonica (1 Thess iii.) from
8 See the remarks, on the vision at Jerusa- Bercea, and not from Athens.
lem, p. 97. s Acts xvii- 14> 15'
* See the preceding page. 9 See above, on the jailer's conversion, pp.
* Acts xvii. 17-21. » See v. 14. 266, 267. Also p. 117.

296 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap. ix.
have pushed over the mountains, by the Via Egnatia, towards Illyricum
and the western parts of Macedonia, would have taken the Apostle
from those shores of the Archipelago to which his energies were pri
marily to be devoted. Mere concealment and inactivity were not to be
thought of. Thus the Christian fugitives turned their steps towards the
sea,1 and from some point on the coast where a vessel was found, they
embarked for Athens. In the ancient tables two roads2 are marked
which cross the Haliacmon and intersect the plain from Bercea, one pass
ing by Pydna,3 and the other leaving it to the left, and both coming to
the coast at Dium near the base of Mount Olympus. The Pierian
level (as this portion of the plain was called) extends about ten miles in
breadth from the woody falls of the mountain to the seashore, forming a
narrow passage from Macedonia into Greece.4 Thus Dium was " the
great bulwark of Macedonia on the south ; " and it was a Roman colony,
like that other city which we have described on the eastern frontier.5
No city is more likely than Dium to have been the last, as Philippi was
" the first," through which St. Paul passed in his journey through the
province. Here then, — where Olympus, dark with woods, rises from the plain
by the shore, to the broad summit, glittering with snow, which was the
throne of the Homeric gods,6 — at the natural termination of Macedo
nia, — and where the first scene of classical and poetic Greece opens on
our view, — we take our leave, for the present, of the Apostle of the Gen
tiles. The shepherds from the heights7 above the vale of Tempe
may have watched the sails of his ship that day, as it moved like a

1 The words (Acts xvii. 14) translated for other reasons, Dium was more convenient-
" as it were to the sea " in the Authorized ly situated for the purpose.
Version do not imply that there was any strat- * Leake describes the ruins of Dium,
agem, but simply denote the intention or the among whieh are probably some remains of
direction. It seems very likely that in the first the temple of Jupiter Olympius, who was
instance they had no fixed plan of going to honored here in periodical games. Mount
Athens, but merely to the sea. Their further Olympus he describes as a conspicuous object
course was determined by providential circum- for all the country round, as far as Saloniki,
stances ; and, when St. Paul was once arrived and as deriving from its steepness an increase
at Athens, he could send a message to Tim- of grandeur and apparent height.
othy and Silas to follow him (v. 15). Those 6 See above, on Philippi.
are surely mistaken who suppose that St. 8 The epithets given by Homer to this
Paul travelled from Macedonia to Attica by poetic mountain are as fully justified by the
land. accounts of modern travellers, as the descrip-
2 The distance in the Antonine Itinerary tions of the scenery alluded to at the close of
is seventeen miles. A Byzantine writer says the preceding chapter, p. 243, n. 3.
that Bercea is 1 60 stadia from the sea. T See Dr. Wordsworth's Greece, p. 197.
8 Mr. Tate (Continuous History, #-c.) sug- and Mr. Urquhart's Spirit of the East, vol. i
gests that St. Paul may have sailed from p. 426
Pydna. But Pydna was not a seaport, and,

VOYAGE TO ATHENS.

297

white speck over the outer waters of the Thermaic Gulf. The sailors,
looking back from the deck, saw the great Olympus rising close above
them in snowy majesty.1 The more distant mountains beyond Thessa
lonica are already growing faint and indistinct. As the vessel approaches
the Thessalian archipelago,2 Mount Athos begins to detach itself from
the isthmus that binds it to the main, and, with a few other heights
of Northern Macedonia, appears like an island floating in the hori
zon.3

The Tullianum at Home.4

1 Compare p. 272, n. 1, and p. 272, n. 5.
See also Purdy's Sailing Directory, p. 148 :
" To the N W. of the Thessalian Isles the
extensive Gulf of Salonica extends thirty
leagues to the north-westward, before it
changes its direction to the north-eastward
and forms the port. The country on the west,
part of the ancient Thessaly, and now the
province of Tricala, exhibits a magnificent
range of mountains, which include Pelion,
now Patras, Ossa, now Kissova, and Olym
pus, now Elymbo. The summit of the latter
is six thousand feet above the level of the
sea."

2 The group of islands off the north end
of Eubcea, consisting of Sciathos, Scopelos,
Peparethos, &c. For an account of them, see
Purdy, pp. 145-148.
8 Cousine'ry somewhere gives this descrip
tion of the appearance of heights near Sa-
loniki, as seen from the Thessalian islands.
For an instance of a very unfavorable voyage
in these seas, in the month of December,
thirteen days being spent at sea between Sa
lonica and Zeitun, the reader may consult
Holland's Travels, ch. xvi.
4 From Rich's Dictionary of Greek and Ro
man Antiquities.

CHAPTER X.

Arrival on the Coast of Attica. — Scenery round Athens. — The Piraeus and the " Long
Walls." — The Agora. — The Acropolis. — The "Painted Porch" and the "Garden." —
The Apostle alone in Athens. — Greek Religion. — The Unknown God. — Greek Philoso
phy. — The Stoics and Epicureans. — Later Period of the Schools. — St. Paul in the Agora.
— The Areopagus. — Speech of St. Paul. — Departure from Athens.
IN the life of Apollonius of Tyana,1 there occurs a passage to the
following effect : — " Having come to anchor in the Pirasus, he went
up from the Harbor to the City. Advancing onward, he met several of
the Philosophers. In his first conversation, finding the Athenians much
devoted to Religion, he discoursed on sacred subjects. This was at
Athens, where also altars of Unknown Divinities are set up." To draw
a parallel between a holy Apostle and an itinerant Magician would be
unmeaning and profane : but this extract from the biography of Apollo
nius would be a suitable and comprehensive motto to that passage in St.
Paul's biography on which we are now entering. The sailing into the
Piraeus, — the entrance into the city of Athens, — the interviews with
philosophers, — the devotion of the Athenians to religious ceremonies
— the discourse concerning the worship of the Deity, — the ignorance
1 He has been alluded to before, p. 112, trates that peculiar state of philosophy and
n. 3. " His life by Philostratus is a mass of superstition which the Gospel preached by
incongruities and fables ; " but it is an impor- St. Paul had to encounter. Apollonius was
tant book as reflecting the opinions of the age partly educated at Tarsus ; he travelled from
in which it was written. Apollonius himself city to city in Asia Minor ; from Greece he
produced a great excitement in the Apostolic went to Rome, in the reign of Nero, about the
age. See Neander's General Church History time when the magicians had lately been ex-
(Eng. Trans.), pp. 40-43, and pp. 236-238. pelled; he visited Athens and Alexandria,
It was the fashion among the anti-Christian where he had a singular meeting with Vespa-
writers of the third century to adduce him as sian : on a second visit to Italy he vanished
a rival of our Blessed Lord ; and the same miraculously from Puteoli : the last scene of
profane comparison has been renewed by his life was Ephesus, or, possibly, Crete or
some of our English freethinkers. Without Rhodes. See the Life in Smith's Dictionary
alluding to this any further, we may safely of Biography. It is thought by many that St.
find some interest in putting his life by the Paul and Apollouius actually met in Ephesus
side of that of St. Paul. They lived at the and Rome. Burton's Lectures on Ecclesiastical
same time, and travelled through the same History, pp. 157, 240.
countries ; and the life of the magician illus-
298

obap. a. ARRIVAL ON THE COAST OF ATTICA 299
implied by the altars to unknown Q-ods,1 — these are exactly the subjects
which are now before us. If a summary of the contents of the seven
teenth chapter of the Acts had been required, it could not have been
more conveniently expressed. The city visited by Apollonius was the
Athens which was visited by St. Paul : the topics of discussion — the
character of the people addressed — the aspect of every thing around —
were identically the same. The difference was this, that the Apostle
could give to his hearers what the philosopher could not give. The God
whom Paul " declared" was worshipped by Apollonius himself as " igno
rantly " as by the Athenians.
We left St. Paul on that voyage which his friends induced him to
undertake on the flight from Beroea. The vessel was last seen among
the Thessalian islands.2 About that point the highest land in Northern
Macedonia began to be lost to view. Gradually the nearer heights of the
snowy Olympus 3 itself receded into the distance as the vessel on her prog
ress approached more and more near to the centre of all the interest of
classical Greece. All the land and water in sight becomes more eloquent
as we advance ; the lights and shadows, both of poetry and history, are on
every side ; every rock is a monument ; every current is animated with
some memory of the past. For a distance of ninety miles, from the con
fines of Thessaly to the middle part of the coast of Attica, the shore is
protected, as it were, by the long island of Eubcea. Deep in the inner
most gulf, where the waters of the .<Egean retreat far within the land,
over against the northern parts of this island, is the pass of Thermopylae,
where a handful of Greek warriors had defied all the hosts of Asia.
In the crescent- like bay on the shore of Attica, near the southern extremi- '
ty of the same island, is the maritime sanctuary of Marathon, where
the battle was fought which decided that Greece was never to be a Per
sian Satrapy.4 When the island of Eubcea is left behind, we soon reach
the southern extremity of Attica, — Cape Colonna, — Sunium's high
promontory, still crowned with the white columns of that temple of
Minerva, which was the landmark to Greek sailors, and which asserted
the presence of Athens at the very vestibule of her country.5
After passing this headland, our course turns to the westward across
the waters of the Saronic Gulf, with the mountains of the Morea on our
left, and the islands of ^Egina and Salamis in front. To one who travels
1 This subject is fully entered into below. 5 See Wordsworth's Athens and Attica, ch.
2 Above p. 297. xxvii. A description of the promontory and
8 See the preceding chapter, p. 296, also ruins will be found in Mure's Journal cf a
272, Tour in Greece. See Falconer's Shipwreck,
4 See Quarterly Review for September, 1846, iii. 526.
and the first number of the Classical Museum.

300 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap. *,
in classical lands no moment is more full of interest and excitement than
when he has left the Cape of Sunium behind, and eagerly looks for the
first glimpse of that city " built nobly on the ^gean shore," which was
" the eye of Greece, mother of arts and eloquence." l To the traveller
in classical times its position was often revealed by the flashing of the
light on the armor of Minerva's colossal statue, which stood with shield
and spear on the summit of the citadel.2 At the very first sight of Athens,
and even from the deck of the vessel, we obtain a vivid notion of the
characteristics of its position. And the place where it stands is so re
markable — its ancient inhabitants were so proud of its climate and its
scenery — that we may pause on our approach to say a few words on
Attica and Athens, and their relation to the rest of Greece.
Attica is a triangular tract of country, the southern and eastern sides
of which meet in the point of Sunium ; its third side is defined by the
high mountain ranges of Cithaeron and Parnes, which separate it by a
strong barrier from Bceotia and Northern Greece. Hills of inferior ele
vation connect these ranges with the mountainous surface of the south
east, which begins from Sunium itself, and rises on the south coast to the
round summits of Hymettus, and the higher peak of Pentelicus near
Marathon on the east. The rest of Attica is a plain, one reach of which
comes down to the sea on the south, at the very base of Hymettus. Here,
about five miles from the shore, an abrupt rock rises from the level, like
the rock of Stirling Castle, bordered on the south by some lower eminences,
and commanded by a high craggy peak on the north. This rock is
the Acropolis of Athens. These lower eminences are the Areopagus, the
Pnyx, and the Museum, which determined the rising aud falling of
the ground in the ancient city. That craggy peak is the hill of Lycabet-
tus,3 from the summit of which the spectator sees all Athens at his feet,
and looks freely over the intermediate plain to the Piraeus and the
sea. Athens and the Piraeus must never be considered separately. One
was the city, the other was its harbor. Once they were connected
together by a continuous fortification. Those who looked down from
Lycabettus in the time of Pericles could follow with the eye all the long
line of wall from the temples on the Acropolis to the shipping in the port.
Thus we are brought back to the point from which we digressed. We
were approaching the Piraeus ; and, since we must land in maritime
1 Paradise Regained, iv. 240. burgh and its neighborhood, and there is so
2 This is stated by Pausanias. much resemblance between Edinburgh Castle
8 The relation of Lycabettus to the crowded and the Acropolis, that a comparison between
buildings below, and to the surrounding land- the city of the Saronic gulf and the city of the
scape, is so like that of Arthur's Seat to Edin- Forth has become justly proverbial.

ohap.x. SCENERY ROUND ATHENS. 301
Athens before we can enter Athens itself, let us return once more co the
vessel's deck, and look round on the land and the water. The island on our
left, with steep cliffs at the water's edge, is iEgina. The distant heights
beyond it are the mountains of the Morea. Before us is another island,
the illustrious Salamis ; though in the view it is hardly disentangled from
the coast of Attica, for the strait where the battle was fought is narrow
and winding. The high ranges behind stretch beyond Eleusis and
Megara, to the left towards Corinth, and to the right along the frontier of
Boeotia. This last ridge is the mountain-line of Parnes, of which we have
spoken above. Clouds l are often seen to rest on it at all seasons of the
year, and in winter it is usually white with snow. The dark heavy moun
tain rising close to us on the right immediately from the sea is Hymettus.
Between Parnes and Hymettus is the plain ; and rising from the plain is
the Acropolis, distinctly visible, with Lycabettus behind, and seeming in
the clear atmosphere to be nearer than it is.
The outward aspect of this scene is now what it ever was. The lights
and shadows on the rocks of ^Egina and Salamis, the gleams on the dis
tant mountains, the clouds or the snow on Parnes, the gloom in the deep
dells of Hymettus, the temple-crowned rock and the plain beneath it, —
are natural features, which only vary with the alternations of morning and
evening, and summer and winter.2 Some changes indeed have taken
place : but they are connected with the history of man. The vegetation
is less abundant,3 the population is more scanty. In Greek and Roman
times, bright villages enlivened the promontories of Sunium and iEgina,
and all the inner reaches of the bay. Some readers will indeed remem
ber a dreary picture which Sulpicius gave his friend Atticus of the deso
lation of these coasts when Greece had ceased to be free ; 4 but we must
make some allowances for the exaggerations of a poetical regret, and
must recollect that the writer had been accustomed to the gay and busy
life of the Campanian shore. After the renovation of Corinth,5 and in
the reign of Claudius, there is no doubt that all the signs of a far more
nunierous population than at present were evident around the Saronic
Gulf, and that more white sails were to be seen in fine weather plying
across its waters to the harbors of Cenchrea 6 or Piraeus.
Now there is indeed a certain desolation over this beautiful bay :
1 See the passage from the Clouds of now. Plato complains that in his day the
Aristophanes quoted by Dr. Wordsworth. wood was diminishing.
Athens and Attica, p. 58. * Cic. Ep. Fam. iv. 5.
2 This is written under the recollection of 6 Corinth was in ruins in Cicero's time.
the aspect of the coast on a cloudy morning in For the results of its restoration, see tho next
winter. It is perhaps more usually seen under chapter.
She glare of a hot sky. 6 See Acts xviii. 18. Rom. xvi. 1.
8 Athens was not always as bare as it is

802 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap. x.
Corintli is fallen, and Cenchrea is an insignificant village. The Piraeus
is probably more like what it was, than any other spot upon the coast.
It remains what by nature it has ever been, — a safe basin oi deep water,
concealed by the surrounding rock ; and now, as in St. Paul's time, the
proximity of Athens causes it to be the resort of various shipping. W e
know that we are approaching it at the present day, if we see, rising
above the rocks, the tall masts of an English line-of-battle ship, side by
side with the light spars of a Russian corvette ! or the black funnel of a
French steamer. The details were different when the Mediterranean was
a Roman lake. The heavy top-gear 2 of corn-ships from Alexandria or
the Euxine might then be a conspicuous mark among the small coasting-
vessels and fishing-boats ; and one bright spectacle was then pre-eminent,
which the lapse of centuries has made cold and dim, the perfect buildings
on the summit of the Acropolis, with the shield and spear of Minerva
Promachus glittering in the sun.3 But those who have coasted along be
neath Hymettus, — and past the indentations in the shore,4 which were
sufficient harbors for Athens in the days of her early navigation, — and
round by the ancient tomb, which tradition has assigned to Themistocles,5
into the better and safer harbor of the Piraeus, — require no great effort
of the imagination to picture the Apostle's arrival. For a moment, as
we near the entrance, the land rises and conceals all the plain. Idlers
come down upon the rocks to watch the coming vessel. The sailors are
all on the alert. Suddenly an opening is revealed ; and a sharp turn of
the helm brings the ship in between two moles,6 on which towers are
erected. We are in smooth water ; and anchor is cast in seven fathoms
in the basin of the Piraeus.7
The Piraeus, with its suburbs (for so, though it is not strictly accurate,
we may designate the maritime city), was given to Athens as a natural

1 This was written in 1850. The entrance lies E. by S. and W. by N., and
2 See Smith's Shipwreck, fyc. has in it nine and ten fathoms. There are
8 See above, p. 300. three moleheads, two of which you have on the
4 The harbors of Phalerum and Munychia. starboard hand, and one on the larboard.
fi For the sepulchre by the edge of the When past these moleheads, shorten all sail,
water, popularly called the " tomb of Themis- luff up, and anchor in seven fathoms. The
tocles," see Leake's Athens, pp. 379, 380, and ground is clear and good. There is room
the notes. enough for three frigates. As the place is very
6 Some parts of the ancient moles are re- narrow, great care is required. . . . During
maining. Leake, p. 272. See what is said of the summer months the sea-breezes blow, nearly
the colossal lions (now removed to Venice) all day, directly into the harbor. . . . The
which gave the harbor its modern name, p. 254. middle channel of the harbor, with a depth
7 "The entrance of the Pirseus (Port Leoni) of 9 or 10 fathoms, is 110 feet in breadth;
is known by a small obelisk, built on a low the starboard channel, with 6 fathoms, 40 feet ;
point by the company of H. M. ship Cambria, the larboard, with 2 fathoms, only 28 feet." —
tn 1820, on the starboard hand going in. . . . Purdv's Sailing Directions, p. 83.

ohap.x. THE "LONG WALLS." 303
advantage, to which much of her greatness must be traced. It consists
of a projecting portion of rocky ground, which is elevated above the
neighboring shore, and probably was originally entirely insulated in the
sea. The two rivers of Athens — the Cephisus and Uissus — seem to
have formed, in the course of ages, the low marshy ground which now
connects Athens with its port. The port itself possesses all the advan
tages of shelter and good anchorage, deep water, and sufficient space.1
Themistocles, seeing that the pre-eminence of his country could only be
maintained by her maritime power, fortified the Piraeus as the outpost of
Athens, and enclosed the basin of the harbor as a dock within the walls.
In the long period through which Athens had been losing its political
power, these defences had been neglected and suffered to fall into decay,
or had been used as materials for other buildings : but there was still a
fortress on the highest point ; 2 the harbor was still a place of some re
sort ; 3 and a considerable number of seafaring people dwelt in the streets
about the seashore. When the republic of Athens was flourishing, the
sailors were a turbulent and worthless part of its population. And the
Piraeus under the Romans was not without some remains of the same
disorderly class, as it doubtless retained many of the outward features of
its earlier appearance : — the landing-places and covered porticoes ; 4 the
warehouses where the corn from the Black Sea used to be laid up ; the
stores of fish brought in daily from the Saronic Gulf and the iEgean ;
the gardens in the watery ground at the edge of the plain ; the theatres 5
into which the sailors used to flock to hear the comedies of Menander ;
and the temples 6 where they were spectators of a worship which had no
beneficial effect on their characters.
Had St. Paul come to this spot four hundred years before, he would
have been in Athens from the moment of his landing at the Piraeus. At
that time the two cities were united together by the double line of fortifi
cation, which is famous under the name of the " Long Walls." The
space included between these two arms 7 of stone might be considered
(as, indeed, it was sometimes called) a third city ; for the street of five
miles in length thus formed across the plain was crowded with people,
1 See the preceding note. 6 In one of the theatres near the harbor we
2 The height of Munychia. have the mention of a great meeting during
8 Strabo speaks of the population living in the Peloponnesian war. Leake, p. 394.
" villages about the port." One of them was 6 See Pausanias. It is here that Pausanias
probably near the theatre of Munychia, on the mentions the altars to the unknown gods.
low ground on the east of the main harbor. 7 " Theseae brachia longa vise," as they are
Leake, p. 396. Even in the time of Alexander called by Propertius (iii. 20, 24). But the
the Piraeus had so much declined that a comic name by which they were usually known at
writer compared it to a great empty walnut. Athens was " the Long legs."
Leake, p. 402.
4 We read especially of the " long portico,"
which was also used as a market.

304 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap.x.
whose habitations were shut out from all view of the country by the vast
wall on either side. Some of the most pathetic passages of Athenian
history are associated with this "longomural" enclosure: as when, in
the beginning ©f the Peloponnesian war, the plague broke out in the
autumn weather among the miserable inhabitants, who were crowded
here to suffocation ; l or, at the end of the same war, when the news
came of the defeat on the Asiatic shore, and one long wail went up from
the Piraeus, " and no one slept in Athens that night."2 The result of
that victory was, that these long walls were rendered useless by being
partially destroyed ; and though another Athenian admiral and states
man 3 restored what Pericles had first completed, this intermediate fortifi
cation remained effective only for a time. In the incessant changes
which fell on Athens in the Macedonian period, they were injured and
became unimportant.4 In the Roman siege under Sulla, the stones were
used as materials for other military works. So that when Augustus was
on the throne, and Athens had reached its ultimate position as a. free city
of the province of Achaia, Strabo, in his description of the place, speaks
of the Long Walls as matters of past history ; and Pausanias, a century
later, says simply that " you see the ruins of the walls as you go up from
the Piraeus." Thus we can easily imagine the aspect of these defences
in the time of St. Paul, which is intermediate to these two writers. On
each side of the road were the broken fragments of the rectangular
masonry put together in the proudest days of Athens ; more conspicuous
than they are at present (for now 5 only the foundations can be traced
here and there acro.s the plain), but still very different from what they
were when two walls of sixty feet high, with a long succession of towers,6
stood to bid defiance to every invader of Attica.
The consideration of the Long Walls leads us to that of the city walls
themselves. Here many questions might be raised concerning the ex
tent of the enclosure,7 and the positions of the gates,8 when Athens was
1 Thucyd. ii. 17. relating to the Long Walls leaves no question
2 Xen. Hell. ii. 2, 3. 8 Conon. as to their having existed." — Leake.
1 Livy speaks of their ruins being objects 7 Our plan of Athens is taken from that of
of admiration in the time of JEm. Paulus. Kiepert, which is based on Forchammer's argu-
0 See Leake, Wordsworth, and other mod- ments. It differs materially from that of
ern travellers. It seems from what Spon and Leake, especially in giving a larger area to the
Wheler say, that, in 1676, the remains were city on the east and south, and thus bringing
larger and more continuous than at present. the Acropolis into the centre. Forchammer
0 " There is no direct evidence of the height thinks that the traces of ancient walls which
of the Long Walls ; but, as Appian informs us are found on the Pnyx, &c, do not belong to
that the walls of the Pciraic city were forty the fortification of Themistoclcs, but to some
cubits high, we may presume those of the Long later defences erected by Valerian.
Walls were not less. Towers were absolutely 8 For various discussions on the gates, see
necessary to such a work ; and the inscription Leake, Wordsworth, and Forchammer.

chap.x. OBJECTS SEEN BY ST. PAUL 305
under the Roman dominion. But all such inquiries must be entirely
dismissed. We will assume that St. Paul entered the city by the gate
which led from the Piraeus, that this gate was identical with that by
which Pausanias entered, and that its position was in the hollow between
the outer slopes of the Pnyx and Museum.1 It is no ordinary advantage
that we possess a description of Athens under the Romans, by the trav
eller and antiquarian whose name has just been mentioned. The work
of Pausanias2 will be our best guide to the discovery of what St. Paul
saw. By following his route through the city, we shall be treading in
the steps of the Apostle himself, and shall behold those very objects which
excited his indignation and compassion.
Taking, then, the position of the Peiraic gate as determined, or at least
resigning the task of topographical inquiries, we enter the city, and, with
Pausanias as our guide, look round on the objects which were seen by the
Apostle. At the very gateway we are met with proofs of the peculiar
tendency of the Athenians to multiply their objects both of art and de
votion.3 Close by the building where the vestments were laid up which
were used in the annual procession of their tutelary divinity Minerva, is
an image of her rival Neptune, seated on horseback, and hurling his tri
dent.4 We pass by a temple of Ceres, on the walls of which an archaic
inscription informs us that the statues it contains were the work of
Praxiteles. We go through the gate : and immediately the eye is at
tracted by the sculptured forms of Minerva, Jupiter, and Apollo, of Mer
cury and the Muses, standing near a sanctuary of Bacchus. We are
already in the midst of an animated scene, where temples, statues, and
altars are on every side, and where the Athenians, fond of publicity and
the open air, fond of hearing and telling what is curious and strange,5
are enjoying their climate and inquiring for news. A long street is
before us, with a colonnade or cloister on either hand, like the covered
arcades of Bologna or Turin.6 At the end of the street, by turning to
1 Pausanias does not mention the Peiraic exception of the new buildings erected by
gate by that name. See Leake, Wordsworth, Hadrian.
and Forchammer. The first of these authori- 8 Acts xvii. 23.
ties places it where the modern road from the * We have used the terms " Minerva, Nep-
Piraeus enters Athens, beyond all the high tune," &c, instead of the more accurate terms
ground to the north of the Pnyx ; the second " Athene, Poseidon," &c, in accommodation to
places it in the hollow between the Pnyx and the popular language. So before (Ch. VI.), in
Museum ; the third in the same direction, but the case of Jupiter and Mercury. See note p.
more remote from the Acropolis, in conformity 168, n. 3.
with his view concerning the larger circum- 6 Acts xvii. 21.
ference of the walls. 6 Forchammer makes this comparison. It
2 Pausanias visited Athens about fifty years is probable, however, that these coveied walks
after St. Paul. It is probable that very few were not formed with arches, but wich pillars
changes had taken place in the city, with the bearing horizontal entablatures. The posi-
20

306 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap.*.
the left, we might go through the whole Ceramicus,1 which leads by the
tombs of eminent Athenians to the open inland country and the groves
of the Academy. But we turn to the right into the Agora, which was the
centre of a glorious public life, when the orators and statesmen, the poets
and the artists of Greece, found there all the incentives of their noblest
enthusiasm ; and still continued to be the meeting-place of philosophy,
of idleness, of conversation, and of business, when Athens could only be
proud of her recollections of the past. On the south side is the Pnyx,2
a sloping hill partially levelled into an open area for political assemblies ;
on the north side is the more craggy eminence of the Areopagus ; 3 before
us, towards the east, is the Acropolis,4 towering high above the scene of
which it is the glory and the crown. In the valley enclosed by these
heights is the Agora,5 which must not be conceived of as a great " market "
(Acts xvii. 17), like the bare spaces in many modern towns, where little
attention has been paid to artistic decoration, — but is rather to be com
pared to the beautiful squares of such Italian cities as Verona and Flor
ence, where historical buildings have closed in the space within narrow
limits, and sculpture has peopled it with impressive figures. Among the
buildings of greatest interest are the porticoes or cloisters, which were dec
orated with paintings and statuary, like the Campo Santo at Pisa. We
think we may be excused for multiplying these comparisons : for though
they are avowedly imperfect, they are really more useful than any at
tempt at description could be, in enabling us to realize the aspect of
ancient Athens. Two of the most important of these were the Portico
of the King, and the Portico of the Jupiter of Freedom.6 On the
roof of the former were statues of Theseus and the Day : in front of
the latter was the divinity to whom it was dedicated, and within were
allegorical paintings illustrating the rise of the Athenian democracy.
One characteristic of the Agora was, that it was full of memorials of
actual history. Among the plane-trees planted by the hand of Cimon
tion we na.i issiened to this street is in because it was simply a level space, without
accordance with the plan of Forchammer, who any work of art to attract the notice of an
places the wall and gate more remotely from antiquarian.
the Agora than our English topographers. 8 See this more fully described below.
1 This term, in its full extent, included not * See above, p. 300.
only the road between the city wall and the R We adopt the view of Forchammer,
Academy, but the Agora itself. See plan of which is now generally received, that the posi-
Athens. tion of the Agora was always the same. The
2 It is remarkable that the Pnyx, the hypothesis of a new Agora to the north of the
famous meeting-place of the political assem- Areopagus was first advanced by Meursius, and
blies of Athens, is not mentioned by Pausanias. has been adopted by Leake.
This may be because there were no longer any 6 In the plan, these two porticoes are placed
such assemblies, and therefore his attention side by side, after Kiepert.
was not called to it ; or, perhaps, it is omitted

chap.x. THE AGORA. 307
were the statues of the great men of Athens — such as Solon the law
giver, Conon the Admiral, Demosthenes the orator. But among her his
torical men were her deified heroes, the representatives of her mythology
— Hercules and Theseus — and all the series of the Eponymi on their
elevated platform, from whom the tribes were named, and whom an
ancient custom connected with the passing of every successive law. And
(among the deified heroes were memorials of the older divinities, — Mer
curies, which gave their name to the street in which they were placed, —
statues dedicated to Apollo, as patron of the city,1 and her deliverer from
plague,2 — and, in the centre of all, the Altar of the Twelve Gods, which
was to Athens what the Golden Milestone was to Rome. If we look up
to the Areopagus, we see the temple 3 of that deity from whom the
eminence had received the name of " Mars' Hill" (Acts xvii. 22) ; and
we are aware that the sanctuary of the Furies * is only hidden by the
projecting ridge beyond the stone steps and the seats of the judges. If
we look forward to the Acropolis, we behold there, closing the long per
spective, a series of little sanctuaries on the very ledges of the rock, —
shrines of Bacchus and iEsculapius, Venus, Earth, and Ceres, ending
with the lovely form of that Temple of Un winged Victory 5 which glittered
by the entrance of the Propylaea above the statues of Harmodius and
Aristogeiton.6 Thus, every god in Olympus found a place in the Agora.
But the religiousness of the Athenians (Acts xvii. 22) went even further.
For every public place and building was likewise a sanctuary. The
Record-House was a temple of the Mother of the Gods. The Council-
House held statues of Apollo and Jupiter, with an altar of Vesta.7 The
Theatre at the base of the Acropolis, into which the Athenians crowded to
hear the words of their great tragedians, was consecrated to Bacchus.8
The Pnyx, near which we entered, on whose elevated platform they
1 Apollo Patrous. His temple was called Wheler. Subsequent travellers found that it
Pythium. In this building the naval car, used had disappeared. In 1835 the various portions
in the Panathenaic procession, was laid up were discovered in an excavation, with the
after its festal voyages, to be exhibited to exception of two, which are in the British
travellers ; " as the Ducal barge of Venice, the Museum. It is now entirely restored. The
Bucentoro, in which the Doge solemnized the original structure belongs to the period of the
annual marriage with the sea, is now preserved close of the Persian wars.
for the same purpose in the Venetian arsenal." 6 For their position, see Pausanias. These
Wordsworth, p. 189. statues were removed by Xerxes ; and Alexan-
2 Apollo Alexicacus, who was believed to der, when at Babylon, gave an order for their
have made the plague to cease in the Pelopon- restoration. Images of Brutus and Cassius
nesian war. 8 See the plan. were at one time erected near them, but proba-
* The sanctuary was in a deep cleft in the bly they were removed by Augustus.
front of the Areopagus, facing the Acropolis. 7 For these two buildings, the Metroum and
See below. Bouleuterium, see the plan.
6 The history of this temple is very curious. 8 Its position may be seen on the plan, on
In 1676 it was found entire by Spon and the south side of the Acropolis.

308 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap. a,
listened in breathless attention to their orators, was dedicated to Jupiter
on High,1 with whose name those of the Nymphs of the Demus were grace
fully associated. And, as if the imagination of the Attic mind knew no
bounds in this direction, abstractions were deified and publicly honored.
Altars were erected to Fame, to Modesty, to Energy, to Persuasion, and
to Pity.2 This last altar is mentioned by Pausanias among " those objects
in the Agora which are not understood by all men : for," he adds, " the
Athenians alone of all the Greeks give divine honor to Pity." 3 It is
needless to show how the enumeration which we have made (and which is
no more than a selection from what is described by Pausanias) throws
light on the words of St. Luke and St. Paul ; and especially how the
groping after the abstract and invisible, implied in the altars alluded to
last, illustrates the inscription " To the Unknown Grod," which was used
by Apostolic wisdom (Acts xvii. 23) to point the way to the highest truth.
What is true of the Agora is still more emphatically true of tho
Acropolis, for the spirit which rested over Athens was concentrated here.
The feeling of the Athenians with regard to the Acropolis was well,
though fancifully, expressed by the rhetorician who said that it was the
middle space of five concentric circles of a shield, whereof the outer
four were Athens, Attica, Greece, and the world. The platform of the
Acropolis was a museum of art, of history, and of religion. The whole
was " one vast composition of architecture and sculpture, dedicated to
the national glory and to the worship of the gods." By one approach
only — through the Propylasa built by Pericles — could this sanctuary
be entered. If St. Paul went up that steep ascent on the western front
of the rock, past the Temple of Victory, and through that magnificent
portal, we know nearly all the features of the idolatrous spectacle he saw
before him. At the entrance, in conformity with his attributes, was the
statue of Mercurius Propylaeus. Farther on, within the vestibule of the
beautiful enclosure, were statues of Venus and the Graces. The re
covery of one of those who had labored among the edifices of the
Acropolis was commemorated by a dedication to Minerva as the goddess
of Health. There was a shrine of Diana, whose image had been wrought
by Praxiteles. Intermixed with what had reference to divinities were the
1 This is attributed to the elevated position Cicero speaks of a temple or altar to Contu-
of the Pnyx as seen from the Agora. Words- mely. In the temple of Minerva Polias, in
worth's Athens and Attica, p. 72. the Acropolis, Plutarch mentions an altar of
2 It is doubtful in what part of Athens Oblivion.
the altars of Fame, Modesty, and Energy were 3 He adds, that this altar was not so much
placed. iEsehines alludes to the altar of due to their human sympathy as to their peculiar
.tame. The altar of Persuasion was on the piety towards the gods; and he confirms this
ascent of the Acropolis. There were many opinion by proceeding to mention the altan
other memorials of the same kind in Athens. of Fame, Modesty, and Energy.

I .i-°S

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SUPPOSED TEMPLE OP MINERVA AT CORINTH ; ASCRIBED TO THE SEVENTH CENTURY B. C.

CHAP-X- THE PARTHENON. 309
memorials of eminent men and of great victories. The statue of Peri
cles, to whom the glory of the Acropolis was due, remained there for
centuries. Among the sculptures on the south wall was one which
recorded a victory we have alluded to, — that of Attalus over the Gala
tians.1 Nor was the Roman power without its representatives on this
proud pedestal of Athenian glory. Before the entrance were statues of
Agrippa and Augustus ; 2 and at the eastern extremity of the esplanade
a temple was erected in honor of Rome and the Emperor.3 But the
main characteristics of the place were mythological and religious, and
truly Athenian. On the wide levelled area were such groups as the fol
lowing : — Theseus contending with the Minotaur ; Hercules strangling
the serpents ; the Earth imploring showers from Jupiter ; Minerva
causing the olive to sprout while Neptune raises the waves. The
mention of this last group raises our thoughts to the Parthenon, —
the Virgin's House, — the glorious temple which rose in the proudest
period of Athenian history to the honor of Minerva, and which ages of
war and decay have only partially defaced. The sculptures on one of its
pediments represented the birth of the goddess: those on the other
depicted her contest with Neptune.4 Under the outer cornice were
groups exhibiting the victories achieved by her champions. Round the
inner frieze was the long series of the Panathenaic procession.5 Within
was the colossal statue of ivory and gold, the work of Phidias, unrivalled
in the world, save only by the Jupiter Olympius of the same famous
artist. This was not the only statue of the Virgin Goddess within the
sacred precincts ; the Acropolis boasted of three Minervas.6 The oldest
and most venerated was in the small irregular temple called the Erec-
theium, which contained the mystic olive-tree of Minerva and the mark
of Neptune's trident. This statue, like that of Diana at Ephesus (Acts
xix. 35), was believed to have fallen from heaven.7 The third, though
1 See p. 206. Several of the statues seen icate any temple to him except in conjunction
by Pausanias in Athens were those of the with Rome. There was a temple of this kind
Greek kings who reigned over the fragments at Caesaraea. See p. 107.
of Alexander's empire. * For descriptive papers on these pediments,
2 One pedestal is still standing in this posi- see the Classical Museum, Nos. VI., XVIII.,
tion, with the name of Agrippa inscribed on and XXII. With the remains themselves, in
it. There is some reason to believe that some the Elgin Room at the British Museum, the
earlier Greek statues had been converted in restoration of Mr. Lucas should be studied.
this instance, as in so many others, into mon- 6 For these sculptures, it is only necessary
uments of Augustus and Agrippa. Cicero, in to refer to the Elgin Room in the British
one of his letters from Athens, speaks indig- Museum.
nantly of this custom. 6 See here, especially, Dr Wordsworth's
8 Some fragments remain, and among them chapter on the three Minervas.
the inscription which records the dedication. 7 Its material was not marble nor metal,
Augustus did not allow the provinces to ded- but olive-wood.

310 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap. x.
less sacred than the Minerva Polias, was the most conspicuous of all.1
Formed from the brazen spoils of the battle of Marathon, it rose in
gigantic proportions above all the buildings of the Acropolis, and stood
with spear and shield as the tutelary divinity of Athens and Attica. It
was the statue which may have caught the eye of St. Paul himself, from
the deck of the vessel in which he sailed round Sunium to the Piraeus.2
Now he had landed in Attica, and beheld all the wonders of that city
which divides with one other city all the glory of Heathen antiquity.
Here, by the statue of Minerva Promachus, he could reflect on the
meaning of the objects he had seen in his progress. His path had been
among the forms of great men and deified heroes, among the temples,
the statues, the altars of the gods of Greece. He had seen the creations
of mythology represented to the eye, in every form of beauty and
grandeur, by the sculptor and the architect. And the one overpowering
result was this : — " His spirit was stirred within him, when he saw the
city crowded with idols."
But we must associate St. Paul, not merely with the Religion, but with
the Philosophy, of Greece. And this, perhaps, is our best opportunity
for doing so, if we wish to connect together, in this respect also, the ap
pearance and the spirit of Athens. If the Apostle looked out from the
pedestal of the Acropolis over the city and the open country, he would
see the places which are inseparably connected with the names of those
who have always been recognized as the great teachers of the pagan
world. In opposite directions he would see the two memorable suburbs
where Aristotle and Plato, the two pupils of Socrates, held their illustri
ous schools. Their positions are defined by the courses of the two rivers
to which we have already alluded.3 The streamless bed of the Uissus
passes between the Acropolis and Hymettus in a south-westerly direction,
till it vanishes in the low ground which separates the city from the
Piraeus. Looking towards the upper part of this channel, we see (or
we should have seen in the first century) gardens with plane-trees and
thickets of agnus-castus, with " others of the torrent-loving shrubs of
Greece." 4 At one spot, near the base of Lycabettus, was a sacred en
closure. Here was a statue of Apollo Lycius, represented in an attitude
of repose, leaning against a column, with a bow in the left hand and the
1 For the position of this statue, see coin 4 Leake, p. 275. See Plato's Fhozdrus.
at end of the chapter. The pedestal appears The Lyceum was remarkable for its plane-
to have been twenty feet, and the statue fifty- trees. Socrates used to discourse under them,
five feet, in height. Leake, p. 351. The "and Aristotle and Theophrastus afterwards
lower part of the pedestal has lately been dis- enjoyed their shade. We cannot tell how fat
covered. these groves were restored since the time if
2 See above, pp. 300, 302. Sulla, who cut them down.
8 Above, p. 303.

chap. x. , THE "PAINTED CLOISTER. 311
right hand resting on his head. The god gave the name to the Lyceum.
Here among the groves, the philosopher of Stagirus,1 the instructor of
Alexander, used to walk. Here he founded the school of the Peripatetics.
To this point an ancient dialogue represents Socrates as coming, outside
the northern city-wall, from the grove of the Academy. Following,
therefore, this line in an opposite direction, we come to the scene of
Plato's school. Those dark olive-groves have revived after all the disas
ters which have swept across the plain. The Cephisus has been more
highly favored than the Uissus. Its waters still irrigate the suburban
gardens of the Athenians.2 Its nightingales are still vocal among the
twinkling olive-branches.3 The gnarled trunks of the ancient trees of
our own day could not be distinguished from those which were familiar
with the presence of Plato, and are more venerable than those which
had grown up after Sulla's destruction of the woods, before Cicero4
visited the Academy in the spirit of a pilgrim. But the Academicians and
Peripatetics are not the schools to which our attention is called in consid
ering the biography of St. Paul. We must turn our eye from the open coun
try to the city itself, if we wish to see the places which witnessed the rise
of the Stoics and Epicureans. Lucian, in a playful passage, speaks of Phi
losophy as coming up from the Academy, by the Ceramicus, to the Agora :
" and there," he says, " we shall meet her by the Stoa Pcecile." Let us
follow this line in imagination, and, having followed it, let us look down
from the Acropolis into the Agora. There we distinguish a cloister or
colonnade, which was not mentioned before, because it is more justly
described in connection with the Stoics. The Stoa Pcecile,5 or the
" Painted Cloister," gave its name to one of those sects who encountered
the Apostle in the Agora. It was decorated with pictures of the legen
dary wars of the Athenians, of their victories over their fellow-Greeks,
and of the more glorious struggle at Marathon. Originally the meeting-
place of the poets, it became the .school where Zeno met his pupils, and
founded the system of stern philosophy which found adherents both
among Greeks and Romans for many generations. The system ol Epicurus
was matured nearly at the same time and in the same neighborhood.
The site of the philosopher's Garden 6 is now unknown, but it was well
known in the time of Cicero ; 7 and in the time of St. Paul it could not
1 See an allusion to his birthplace above, 4 Cicero, at one time, contemplated the
_ 277, erection of a monument to show his attach-
2 The stream is now divided and distrib- ment to the Academy. Aft. vi. 1.
uted, in order to water the gardens and olive- 6 Zroa iromiXv, — hence " Stoic."
trees. Plutarch calls the Academy the best 6 This garden was proverbially known
wooded of the suburbs of Athens. among the ancients. See Juvenal, xiii. 172,
8 See the well-known chorus in Sophocles. xiv. 319.
(Ed Col 668 ' <-,n his fir3t vlsit t0 A'*16118, at tlie aSe

312 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. cnAP. t.
have been forgotten, for a peculiarly affectionate feeling subsisted among
the Epicureans towards their founder. He left this garden as a legacy
to the school, on condition that philosophy should always be taught there,
and that he himself should be annually commemorated. The sect had
dwindled into smaller numbers than tlieir rivals, in the middle of the first
century. But it is highly probable that, even then, those who looked
down from the Acropolis over the roofs of the city could distinguish the
quiet garden where Epicurus lived a life of philosophic contentment, and
taught his disciples that the enjoyment of tranquil pleasure was the
highest end of human existence.
The spirit in which Pausanias traversed these memorable places and
scrutinized every thing he saw, was that of a curious and rather supersti
tious antiquarian. The expressions used by Cicero, when describing the
same objects, show that his taste was gratified, and that he looked with
satisfaction on the haunts of those whom he regarded as his teachers.
The thoughts and feelings in the mind of the Christian Apostle, who
came to Athens about the middle of that interval of time which separates
the visit of Pausanias from that of Cicero, were very different from those
of criticism or admiration. He burned with zeal for that God whom,
" as he went through the city," he saw dishonored on every side. He
was melted with pity for those who, notwithstanding their intellectual
greatness, were " wholly given to idolatry." His eye was not blinded to
the reality of things, by the appearances either of art or philosophy.
Forms of earthly beauty and words of human wisdom were valueless in
his judgment, and far worse than valueless, if they deified vice and made
falsehood attractive. He saw and heard with an earnestness of convic
tion which no Epicurean could have understood, as his tenderness of
affection was morally far above the highest point of the Stoic's impassive
dignity. It is this tenderness of affection which first strikes us, when we turn
of twenty-eight, Cicero lodged with an Epi- master in danger of being destroyed. They
curean. On the occasion of his second visit, had written to Cicero at Rome, to beg him to
the attachment of the Epicureans to the gar- intercede with Memmius to consent to a resto-
den of their founder was brought before him ration of it ; and now at Athens they renewed
in a singular manner. " There lived at this their instances, and prevailed on him to write
time in exile at Athens C. Memmius. . . . about it. . . . Cicero's letter is drawn with
The figure which he had borne in Rome gave much art and accuracy ; he laughs at the tri-
him great authority in Athens ; and the coun- fling zeal of these philosophers for the old rub-
cil of Areopagus had granted him n piece of bish and paltry ruins of their founder, yet
ground to build upon, where Epicurus for- earnestly presses Memmius to indulge them in
merly lived, and where there still remained a prejudice contracted through weakness, not
the old ruins of his walls. But this grant wickedness.'' — Middleton's Life of Cicero.
had given great offence to the whole body of Sect. vii.
the Epicureans, to see the remains of their

chap.x. ST. PAUL ALONE IN ATHENS. 313
from the manifold wonders of Athens to look upon the Apostle himself.
The existence of this feeling is revealed to us in a few words in the
Epistle to the Thessalonians.1 He was filled with anxious thoughts con
cerning those whom he had left in Macedonia, and the sense of solitude
weighed upon his spirit. Silas and Timotheus were not arrived, and it
was a burden and a grief to him to be " left in Athens alone." Modern
travellers have often felt, when wandering alone through the streets of a
foreign city, what it is to be out of sympathy with the place and the peo
ple. The heart is with friends who are far off; and nothing that is
merely beautiful or curious can effectually disperse the cloud of sadness.
If, in addition to this instinctive melancholy, the thought of an irreligious
world, of evil abounding in all parts of society, and of misery following
everywhere in its train, — if this thought also presses heavily on the
spirit, — a state of mind is realized which may be some feeble approxi
mation to what was experienced by the Apostle Paul in his hour of
dejection. But with us such feelings are often morbid and nearly allied
to discontent. We travel for pleasure, for curiosity, for excitement. It
is well if we can take such depressions thankfully, as the discipline of a
worldly spirit. Paul travelled that he might give to others the knowledge
of salvation. His sorrow was only the cloud that kindled up into the
bright pillar of the divine presence. He ever forgot himself in his Mas
ter's cause. He gloried that God's strength was made perfect in his
weakness. It is useful, however, to us, to be aware of the human weak
ness of that heart which God made strong. Paul was indeed one of us.
He loved his friends, and knew the trials both of anxiety and loneliness.
As we advance with the subject, this and similar traits of the man ad
vance more into view, — and with them, and personified as it were in
him, touching traits of the religion which he preached, come before us, —
and we see, as we contemplate the Apostle, that the Gospel has not only
deliverance from the coarseness of vice, and comfort for ruder sorrows,
but sympathy and strength for the most sensitive and delicate minds.
No mere pensive melancholy, no vain regrets and desires, held sway
over St. Paul, so as to hinder him in proceeding with the work appointed
to him. He was " in Athens alone," but he was there as the Apostle of
God. No time was lost ; and, according to his custom, he sought out his
brethren of the scattered race of Israel. Though moved with grief and
indignation when he saw khe idolatry all around him, he deemed that his
1 1 Thess. iii. 1. It may be thought that chapter), and the depression and sense of
too much is built here on this one expression. isolation evidently experienced by St. Paul
But we think the remarks in the text will be when he was without companions. See, es-
justified by those who consider the tone of pecially, Acts xxviii. 15; and 2 Coi. ii. 13,
the Epistles to the Thessalonians (see next vii. 6. Compare the Introduction.

314 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap. x.
first thought should be given to his own people. They had a synagogue
at Athens, as at Thessalonica ; and in this synagogue he first proclaimed
his Master. Jewish topics, however, are not brought before us promi
nently here. They are casually alluded to ; and we are not informed
whether the Apostle was welcomed or repulsed in the Athenian syna
gogue. The silence of Scripture is expressive : and we are taught that
the subjects to which our attention is to be turned are connected, not
with Judaism, but with Paganism. Before we can be prepared to con
sider the great speech, which was the crisis and consummation of this
meeting of Christianity and Paganism, our thoughts must be given for a
few moments to the characteristics of Athenian Religion and Athenian
Philosophy. The mere enumeration of the visible objects with which the city of the
Athenians was crowded, bears witness (to use St. Paul's own words) to
their " carefulness in Religion." 1 The judgment of the Christian Apostle
agreed with that of his Jewish contemporary Josephus, — with the proud
boast of the Athenians themselves, exemplified in Isocrates and Plato, —
and with the verdict of a multitude of foreigners, from Livy to Julian, —
all of whom unite in declaring that Athens was peculiarly devoted to
religion. Replete as the whole of Greece was with objects of devotion,
the antiquarian traveller informs us that there were more gods in Athens*
than in all the rest of the country ; and the Roman satirist hardly exag
gerates, when he says that it was easier to find a god there than a man.
But the same enumeration which proves the existence of the religious
sentiment in this people, shows also the valueless character of the religion
which they cherished. It was a religion which ministered to art and
amusement, and was entirely destitute of moral power. Taste waf
gratified by the bright spectacle to which the Athenian awoke everj
morning of his life. Excitement was agreeably kept up by festal sea
sons, gay processions, and varied ceremonies. But all this religious
dissipation had no tendency to make him holy. It gave him no victory
over himself : it brought him no nearer to God. A religion which ad
dresses itself only to the taste is as weak as one that appeals only to the
intellect. The Greek religion was a mere deification of human attributes
and the powers of nature. It was doubtless better than other forms of
idolatry which have deified the brutes ; but it had no real power to raise
him to a higher position than that which he occupied by nature. It could
not even keep him from falling continually to a lower degradation. To
the Greek this world was every thing : he hardly even sought to rise
above it. And thus all his life long, in the midst of every thing to gratify
his taste and exercise his intellect, he remained in ignorance of God
1 See below, on the Speech, p. 327.

coat. a. GREEK RELIGION. 315
This fact was tacitly recognized by the monuments in his own religious
city. The want of something deeper and truer was expressed on the
very stones. As we are told by a Latin writer that the ancient Romans,
when alarmed by an earthquake, were accustomed to pray, not to any
specified divinity, but to a god expressed in vague language, as avowedly
Unknown; so the Athenians acknowledged their ignorance of the True
Deity by the altars " with this inscription, TO the unknown god," which
are mentioned by Heathen writers,1 as well as by the inspired historian.
Whatever the origin of these altars may have been,2 the true significance
of the inscription is that which is pointed out by the Apostle himself.3
The Athenians were ignorant of the right object of worship. But if we
arc to give a true account of Athenian religion, we must go beyond the
darkness of mere ignorance into the deeper darkness of corruption and
6in. The most shameless profligacy was encouraged by the public works
of art, by the popular belief concerning the character of the gods, and
by the ceremonies of the established worship. Authorities might be
crowded in proof of this statement, both from Heathen and Christian
writings.4 It is enough to say with Seneca, that " no other effect could pos
sibly be produced, but that all shame on account of sin must be taken
away from men, if they believe in such gods ; " and with Augustine, that
" Plato himself, who saw well the depravity of the Grecian gods, and has
seriously censured them, better deserves to be called a god, than those
ministers of sin." It would be the worst delusion to infer any good of
the Grecian religion from the virtue and wisdom of a few great Athe
nians whose memory we revere. The true type of the character formed
by the influences which surrounded the Athenian, was such a man as
Alcibiades, — with a beauty of bodily form equal to that of one of the
consecrated statues, — with an intelligence quick as that of Apollo or
Mercury, — enthusiastic and fickle, — versatile and profligate, — able to
admire the good, but hopelessly following the bad. And if we turn to the
one great exception in Athenian history, — if we turn from Alcibiades to
1 The two Heathen writers who mention scription was not as St. Paul quoted it, but in
these altars are Pausanias and Philostratus. the form of a general dedication to a!k un-
See above, pp. 298 and 308. known gods. But unless St. Ps.ul quoted the
2 It is very probable that they originated actual words, his application of the inscrip-
from a desire to dedicate the altar to the god tion would lose nearly all its point. Some
under whose censure the dedicator had fallen, have fancifully found in the inscription an al-
whom he had unwittingly offended, or whom, lusion to the God of the Jews. For some of
in the particular case, he ought to propitiate. the notions of the older antiquarians concern-
Eichhorn thinks that these altars belonged to a ing the " temple " of the Unknown God, see
Leake. 8 Acts xvii. 23.

period when writing was unknown, and that
the inscription was added afterwards by those
who were ignorant of the deity to which they
were consecrated. Jerome says that the in- Nature and Moral Influence of Heathenism

the inscription was added afterwards by those * A great number of passages are collected
who were io-norant of the deity to which they together by Tholuck, in his Essay on the

316 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap.,
the friend who nobly and affectionately warned him, — who, consciout
of his own ignorance, was yet aware that God was best known by listen
ing to the voice within, — yet even of Socrates we cannot say more than
has been said in the following words : " His soul was certainly in some
alliance with the Holy God ; he certainly felt, in his demon or guardian
spirit, the inexplicable nearness of his Father in heaven ; but he was des
titute of a view of the divine nature in the humble form of a servant,
the Redeemer with the crown of thorns ; he had no ideal conception of
that true holiness, which manifests itself in the most humble love and
the most affectionate humility. Hence, also, he was unable to become
fully acquainted with his own heart, though he so greatly desired it.
Hence, too, he was destitute of any deep humiliation and grief on ac
count of his sinful wretchedness, of that true humility which no longer
allows itself a biting, sarcastic tone of instruction ; and destitute, like
wise, of any filial, devoted love. These perfections can be shared only
by the Christian, who beholds the Redeemer as a wanderer upon earth in
the form of a servant ; and who receives in his own soul the sanctifying
power of that Redeemer by intercourse with Him." l
When we turn from the Religion of Athens to take a view of its
Philosophy, the first name on which our eye rests is again that of Socra
tes.2 This is necessarily the case, not only because of his own singular
and unapproached greatness ; but because he was, as it were, the point
to which all the earlier schools converged, and from which the later
rays of Greek philosophy diverged again. The earlier philosophical
systems, such as that of Thales in Asia Minor, and Pythagoras in Italy,
were limited to physical inquiries : Socrates was the first to call man to
the contemplation of himself, and became the founder of ethical science.'
A new direction was thus given to all the philosophical schools which
succeeded ; and Socrates may be said to have prepared the way for the
gospel, by leading the Greek mind to the investigation of moral truth.
He gave the impulse to the two schools, which were founded in the
Lyceum and by the banks of the Cephisus,4 and which have produced
such, vast results on human thought in every generation. We are not
called here to discuss the doctrines of the Peripatetics and Academicians.
Not that they are unconnected with the history of Christianity : Plato
and Aristotle have had a great work appointed to them, not only as the
1 Tholuck's Essay on Heathenism, as above, maturite-, elle change de caractere et de diree-
p. 163. tion, et elle devient une philosophic morale,
2 For Socrates, see especially the eighth sociale, humaine. C'est Socrate qui ouvre
volume of Grote's History, and the Quarterly cette nouvelle ere, et qui en represente le ca-
Review for December, 1850. ractere en sa personne." — Victor Cousin.
8 " La philosophie greeque avait e'te' d'abord 4 See above, pp. 310, 311.
une philosophie de la nature ; arrivee a sa

CHAPX- GREEK PHILOSOPHY. 317
Heathen pioneers of the Truth before it was revealed, but as the educa
tors of Christian minds in every age : the former enriched human
thought with appropriate ideas for the reception of the highest truth in
the highest form ; the latter mapped out all the provinces of human
knowledge, that Christianity might visit them and bless them : and the
historian of the Church would have to speak of direct influence exerted
on the Gospel by the Platonic and Aristotelian systems, in recounting
the conflicts of the parties of Alexandria, and tracing the formation of
the theology of the Schoolmen. But the biographer of St. Paul has
only to speak of the Stoics and Epicureans. They only, among the
various philosophers of the day, are mentioned as having argued with
the Apostle ; and their systems had really more influence in the period
in which the Gospel was established, though, in the Patristic and Mediae
val periods, the older systems, in modified forms, regained their sway.
The Stoic and Epicurean, moreover, were more exclusively limited than
other philosophers to moral investigations,1 — a fact which is tacitly im
plied by the proverbial application of the two words to moral principles
and tendencies which we recognize as hostile to true Christianity.
Zeno, the founder of the Stoic school, was a native of the same part
of the Levant with St. Paul himself.2 He came from Cyprus to Athens
at a time when patriotism was decayed and political liberty lost, and
when a system, which promised the power of brave and self-sustaining
endurance amid the general degradation, found a willing acceptance
among the nobler minds. Thus in the Painted Porch, which, as we have
said, had once been the meeting-place of the poets, those who, instead of
yielding to the prevailing evil of the times, thought they were able to
resist it, formed themselves into a school of philosophers. In the high
tone of this school, and in some part of its ethical language, Stoicism
was an apparent approximation to Christianity ; but on the whole, it was
a hostile system, in its physics, its morals, and its theology. The Stoics
condemned the worship of images and the use of temples, regarding
them as nothing better than the ornaments of art. But they justified
the popular polytheism, and, in fact, considered the gods of mythology as
minor developments of the Great World-God, which summed up their
1 " Le caractere commun du Stoicisme et shipwrecked near the Piraeus, and settled in
de l'Epicurelsme est de reduire presque en- Athens. The exact dates of his birth and
tierement la philosophie a la morale." — V. death are not known, but he lived through the
Cousin. greater part of the century between B.C. 350
2 He was born at Citium in Cyprus. See and b.c. 250. A portrait-bust at Naples is as-
p. 139. His attention was turned to philoso- signed to him, but there is some doubt whether
phy by the books brought from Athens by it is to be referred to him or to Zeno the
his father, who was a merchant. Somewhere Eleatic.
between the ages of twenty and thirty he was

818 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap. x.
belief concerning the origin and existence of the world. The Stoics
were Pantheists ; and much of their language is a curious anticipation
of the phraseology of modern Pantheism. In their view, God was merely
the Spirit or Reason of the Universe. The world was itself a rational
soul, producing all things out of itself, and resuming them all to itself
again. Matter was inseparable from the Deity. He did not create: He
only organized.1 He merely impressed law and order on the substance,
which was, in fact, himself. The manifestation of the Universe was only
a period in the development of God. In conformity with these notions
of the world, which substitute a sublime destiny for the belief in a per
sonal Creator and Preserver, were the notions which were held concern
ing the soul and its relations to the body. The soul was, in fact, cor
poreal. The Stoics said that at death it would be burnt, or return to be
absorbed in God. Thus, a resurrection from the dead, in the sense in
which the Gospel has revealed it, must have appeared to the Stoics
irrational. Nor was their moral system less hostile to " the truth as it
is in Jesus." The proud ideal which was set before the disciple of
Zeno was, a magnanimous self-denial, an austere apathy, untouched
by human passion, unmoved by change of circumstance. To the Wise
man all outward things were alike. Pleasure was no good. Pain was
no evil. All actions conformable to Reason were equally good ; all
actions contrary to Reason were equally evil. The Wise man lives
according to Reason ; and living thus, he is perfect and self-sufficing.
He reigns supreme as a king : 2 he is justified in boasting as a god
Nothing can well be imagined more contrary to the spirit of Christianity.
Nothing could be more repugnant to the Stoic than the news of a
" Saviour," who has atoned for our sin, and is ready to aid our weakness.
Christianity is the School of Humility : Stoicism was the Education of
Pride. Christianity is a discipline of life : Stoicism was„notJbjuj^J)etter
than an apprenticeship for death.3 And fearfully were the fruits of its
principle illustrated both in its earlier and later disciples. Its first two
leaders 4 died by their own hands ; like the two Romans 5 whose names
1 " Le Dieu des Sto'iciens n'a pas cre'd la philosophie n'est plus qu'wn apprentissage de la
nature, il l'a formee et organisee." — V. mart et non de la vie ; elle tend a, la mort par son
Cousin : who, however, will not allow the image, l'apathie et l'ataraxie, et se resout defini-
Stoical system to be Pantheistic. tivement en un e~goisme sublime." — V. Cousin.
2 Hor. Sat. i. iii., Ep. i. i. 4 Zeno and Cleanthes. And yet Cleanthes
8 " Le Sto'icisme est essentiellement soli- was the author of that hymn which is, per-
taire ; c'est le soin exclusif de son §,me, sans haps, the noblest approximation to a Christian
regard a celle des autres ; et, comme la senle hymn that heathenism has produced. In the
chose importante est la purete" de l'ame, quand speech below (Acts xvii. 28) there is some doubt
cette purete est trop en pe"ril, quand on d&es- whether the Apostle quotes from Cleanthes or
pere d'etre victorieux dans la lutte, on peut la Aratus. See the note there.
terminer comme l'a terminee Caton. Ainsi la 6 Cato and Seneca.

chap*- STOICS AND EPICUREANS. 319
first rise to the memory when the school of the Stoics is mentioned.
But Christianity turns the desperate resolution, that seeks to escape
disgrace by death, into the anxious question, " What must I do to be
saved ? " 1 It softens the pride of stern indifference into the consolation
of mutual sympathy. How great is the contrast between the Stoic ideal
aud the character of Jesus Christ ! How different is the acquiescence
in an iron destiny from the trust in a merc.ful and watchful Providence !
How infinitely inferior is that sublime egotism, which looks down with
contempt on human weakness, to the religion which tells us that " they
who mourn are blessed," and which commands us to " rejoice with them
that rejoice, and to weep with them that weep " !
If Stoicism, in its full development, was utterly opposed to Christianity,
the same may be said of the very primary principle of the Epicurean2
school. If the Stoics were Pantheists, the Epicureans were virtually
Atheists. Tlieir philosophy was a system of materialism, in the strictest
sense of the word. In their view, the world was formed by an accidental
concourse of atoms, and was not in any sense created, or even modified,
by the Divinity. They did indeed profess a certain belief in what were
called gods ; but these equivocal divinities were merely phantoms, — im
pressions on the popular mind, — dreams, which had no objective reality,
or at least exercised no active influence on the physical world or tho
business of life. The Epicurean deity, if self-existent at all, dwelt apart,
in serene indifference to all the affairs of the universe. The universe was
a great accident, and sufficiently explained itself without any reference to
a higher power. The popular mythology was derided, but the Epicureans
had no positive faith in any thing better. As there was no creator, so
i there was no moral governor. All notions of retribution and of judg
ment to come were of course forbidden by such a creed. The principles
of the atomic theory, when applied to the constitution of man, must have
caused the resurrection to appear an absurdity. The soul was nothing
without the body ; or rather, the soul was itself a body, composed of finer
atoms, or at best an unmeaning compromise between the material and
immaterial. Both body and soul were dissolved together and dissipated
into the elements ; and when this occurred, all the life of man was ended.
The moral result of such a creed was necessarily that which the Apostle
Paul described:3 — "If the dead rise not, let us eat and drink: for to
morrow we die." The essential principle of the Epicurean philosopher
1 See p. 266. He died B.C. 270. An authentic bust has
2 Epicurus, who founded, and indeed ma- been preserved of him, which is engraved ia
tured, this school (for its doctrines were never Milman's Horace, p. 391.
further developed), was born in Samos, b.c. 8 1 Cor. xv. 32
342, though his parents were natives of Attica.

320 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OP ST. PAUL. chap. x.
was that there was nothing to alarm him, nothing to disturb him. Hia
furthest reach was to do deliberately what the animals do instijaativelyj
His highest aim was to gratify himself. With the coarser and more
energetic minds, this principle inevitably led to the grossest sensuality
and crime ; in the case of others, whose temperament was more common
place, or whose taste was more pure, the system took the form of a
selfishness more refined. As the Stoic sought to resist the evil which
surrounded him, the Epicurean endeavored to console himself by a tran
quil and indifferent life. He avoided the more violent excitements of
political and social engagements, to enjoy the seclusion of a calm con
tentment. But pleasure was still the end at which he aimed ; and if we
remove this end to its remotest distance, and understand it to mean an
enjoyment which involves the most manifold self-denial, — - if we give Epi
curus credit for taking the largest view of consequences, — and if we be
lieve that the life of his first disciples was purer than there is reason to
suppose,1 — the end remains the same. Pleasure, not duty, is the motive
of moral exertion ; expediency is the test to which actions are referred ;
and the self-denial itself, which an enlarged view of expediency requires,
will probably be found impracticable without the grace of God. Thus,
the Gospel met in the Garden an opposition not less determined, and
more insidious, than the antagonism of the Porch. The two enemies it
has ever had to contend with are the two ruling principles of the Epicu
reans and Stoics, — Pleasure and Pride.
Such, in their original and essential character, were the two schools of
philosophy with which St. Paul was brought directly into contact. We
ought, however, to consider how far these schools had been modified by
the lapse of time, by the changes which succeeded Alexander and accom
panied the formation of the Roman Empire, and by the natural tenden
cies of the Roman character. When Stoicism and Epicureanism were
brought to Rome, they were such as we have described them. In as far as
they were speculative systems, they found little favor : Greek philosophy
was always regarded with some degree of distrust among the Romans.
Their mind was alien from science and pure speculation. Philosophy,
like art and literature, was of foreign introduction. The cultivation of
such pursuits was followed by private persons of wealth and taste, but
was little extended among the community at large. There were no pub
lic schools of philosophy at Rome. Where it was studied at all, it was
studied, not for its own sake, but for the service of the state.2 Thus, the
peculiarly practical character of the Stoic and Epicurean systems recom-
1 Ritter speaks strongly of scenes of sen- 2 Tennemann.
nudity witnessed in the Garden of Epicurus.

«>**¦*• GREEK PHILOSOPHY. 321
mended them to the notice of many. What was wanted in the prevail
ing misery of the Roman world was a philosophy of life. There were
some who weakly yielded, and some who offered a courageous resistance,
to the evil of the times. The former, under the name of Epicureans,
either spent their time in a serene tranquillity, away from the distractions
and disorders of political life, or indulged in the grossest sensualism, and
justified it on principle. The Roman adherents of the school of Epicurus
were never numerous, and few great names can be mentioned among
them ; though one monument remains, and will ever remain, of this phase
of philosophy, in the poem of Lucretius. The Stoical school was more
congenial to the endurance of the Roman character ; and it educated the
minds of some of the noblest men of the time, who scorned to be carried
away by the stream of vice. Three great names can be mentioned, which
divided the period between the preaching of St. Paul and the final estab
lishment of Christianity, — Seneca, Epictetus, and Marcus Aurelius.1
But such men were few in a time of general depravity and unbelief. And
this was really the character of the time. It was a period in the history
of the world, when conquest and discovery, facilities of travelling, and
the mixture of races, had produced a general fusion of opinions, result
ing in au indifference to moral distinctions, and at the same time encour
aging the most abject credulity. The Romans had been carrying on the
work which Alexander and his successors begun. A certain degree of
culture was very generally diffused. The opening of new countries ex
cited curiosity. New religions were eagerly welcomed. Immoral rites
found willing votaries. Vice and superstition went hand in hand through
all parts of society, and, as the natural consequence, a scornful scepti
cism held possession of all the higher intellects.
But though the period of which we are speaking was one of general
scepticism, for the space of three centuries the old dogmatic schools still
lingered on, more especially in Greece.2 Athens was indeed no longer what
she had once been, the centre from which scientific and poetic light radiated
to the neighboring shores of Asia and Europe. Philosophy had found new
homes in other cities, more especially in Tarsus and Alexandria.3 But
Alexandria, though she was commercially great and possessed the trade
of three continents, had not yet seen the rise of her greatest schools ; and
Tarsus could never be what Athens was, even in her decay, to those who
travelled with cultivated tastes and for the purposes of education. Thus
Philosophy still maintained her seat in the city of Socrates. The four
1 The approximation of the latter Stoics, virtue." — See Paradise Regained, book iv. line
especially Epictetus, to Christianity, is remark- 300.
able. Hence the emphasis laid by Milton on 2 Tennemann.
the Stoic's "philosophic pride, by him called 8 For the schools of Tarsus, see pp. 21, 9S
21

322 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap. x.
great schools, the Lyceum and the Academy, the Garden and the Porch,
were never destitute of exponents of their doctrines. When Cicero came,
not long after Sulla's siege, he found the philosophers in residence.1 As
the Empire grew, Athens assumed more and more the character of a
university town. After Christianity was first preached there, this char
acter was confirmed to the place by the embellishments and the benefac
tions of Hadrian.2 And before the schools were closed by the orders of
Justinian,3 the city which had received Cicero and Atticus 4 as students
together became the scene of the college-friendship of St. Basil and St.
Gregory,5 one of the most beautiful episodes of primitive Christianity.
Thus, St. Paul found philosophers at Athens, among those whom he
addressed in the Agora. This, as we have seen, was the common meet
ing-place of a population always eager for fresh subjects of intellectual
curiosity. Demosthenes had rebuked the Athenians for this idle tendency
four centuries before, telling them that they were always craving after news
and excitement, at the very moment when destruction was impending
over their liberties. And they are described in the same manner, on the
occasion of St. Paul's visit, as giving their whole leisure to telling and
hearing something newer than the latest news (Acts xvii. 21). Among
those who sauntered among the plane-trees6 of the Agora, and gathered in
knots under the porticoes, eagerly discussing the questions of the day,
were philosophers, in the garb of their several sects, ready for any new
question, on which they might exercise their subtlety or display their rheto
ric. Among the other philosophers, the Stoics and Epicureans would more
especially be encountered ; for the " Painted Porch " 7 of Zeno was in the
Agora itself, and the " Garden " 8 of the rival sect was not far distant. To
both these classes of hearers and talkers — both the mere idlers and the
professors of philosophy — any question connected with a new religion was
peculiarly welcome ; for Athens gave a ready acceptance to all supersti
tions and ceremonies, and was glad to find food for credulity or scepticism,
ridicule or debate. To this motley group of the Agora, St. Paul made
known the two great subjects he had proclaimed from city to city. He
spoke aloud of " Jesus and the Resurrection," 9 — of that Name which is
1 See above, p. 311, and the note. 6 See above, p. 306. It is, of course, im-
2 Between the visits of St. Paul and Pan- nossible to prove that Cimon's plane-trees were
sanias, Hadrian made vast additions to the succeeded by others ; but a boulevard is com-
buildings of Athens, and gave large endow- monly renewed, when a city recovers from its
ments for the purposes of education. disasters.
3 See Gibbon, xl. 7 For the " Stoa Pcecile," see above, p. 811.
4 See Middleton's Life of Cicero. 8 See again above, p. 311.
5 Basil and Gregory Nazianzene were stu- 9 Acts xvii. 18,
dents together at Athens from 351 to 355.
Julian was there at the same time.'

«hap.x. ST. PAUL IN THE AGORA 323
above every name, — that consummation which awaits all ihe generations
of men who have successively passed into the sleep of death. He was in
the habit of conversing " daily " on these subjects with those whom he met.
His varied experience of men, and his familiarity with many modes of
thought, enabled him to present these subjects in such a way as to arrest
attention. As regards the philosophers, he was providentially prepared
for his collision with them. It was not the first time he had encountered
them.1 His own native city was a city of philosophers, and was especially
famous (as we have remarked before) for a long line of eminent Stoics,
and he was doubtless familiar with their language and opinions.
Two different impressions were produced by St. Paul's words according
to the disposition of those who heard him. Some said that ho was a
mere " babbler," 2 and received him with contemptuous derision. Others
took a more serious view, and, supposing that he was endeavoring to
introduce new objects of worship,3 had their curiosity excited, and were
desirous to hear more. If we suppose a distinct allusion, in these two
classes, to the two philosophical sects which have just been mentioned,
we have no difficulty in seeing that the Epicureans were those who,
according to their habit, received the new doctrine with ridicule, —
while the Stoics, ever tolerant of the popular mythology, were naturally
willing to hear of the new " demons " which this foreign teacher was
proposing to introduce among the multitude of Athenian gods and heroes.
Or we may imagine that the two classes denote the philosophers on the
one hand, who heard with scorn the teaching of a Jewish stranger
untrained in the language of the schools, — and the vulgar crowd on the
other, who would easily entertain suspicion (as in the case of Socrates)
against any one seeking to cast dishonor on the national divinities, or
would at least be curious to hear more of this foreign and new religion.
It is not, however, necessary to make any such definite distinction
between those who derided and those who listened. Two such classes
are usually found among those to whom truth is presented. When Paul
came among the Athenians, he came " not with enticing words of man's
wisdom," and to some of the " Greeks " who heard him the Gospel was
1 See Ch. HI. p. 98. Two of the most temptible and worthless person." Or, from
influential of the second generation of Stoics the perpetual chattering or chirping of such
were Antipater of Tarsus and Zeno of Tar- birds, the word may denote an idle " babbler."
sus. Chrysippus also is said by Strabo to 3 Acts xvii. 18. These are the very words
have been a native of the same place. used in the accusation against Socrates. The
2 The Greek word here means properly a term " demon " is probably here used quite
bird that picks up seeds from the ground, and generally. This is the only place where it
it is so used in the Birds of Aristophanes. occurs in the Acts of the Apostles. See the
Hence, secondarily, it may mean a pauper remarks which have been made before on this
who prowls about the market-place, or a para- subject, pp. 257-260.
sire who lives by his wits, and hence "a con-

824 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap. a.
" foolishness ; " J while in others there was at least that curiosity which is
sometimes made the path wliereby the highest truth enters the mind ; and
they sought to have a fuller and more deliberate exposition of the myste
rious subjects, which now for the first time had been brought before their
attention. The place to which they took him was the summit of tho hill of
Areopagus, where the most awful court of judicature had sat from time
immemorial, to pass sentence on the greatest criminals, and to decide the
most solemn questions connected with religion. The judges sat in the
open air, upon seats hewn out in the rock, on a platform which was
ascended by a flight of stone steps immediately from the Agora.2 On
this spot a long series of awful causes, connected with crime and religion,
had been determined, beginning with the legendary trial of Mars, which
gave to the place its name of " Mars' Hill." A temple of the god,3 as we
have seen, was on the brow of the eminence ; and an additional solemnity
was given to the place by the sanctuary of the Furies,4 in a broken cleft
of the rock, immediately below the judges' seats. Even in the political
decay of Athens, this spot and this court were regarded by the people
with superstitious reverence.5 It was a scene with which the dread recol
lections of centuries were associated. It was a place of silent awe in the
midst of the gay and frivolous city. Those who withdrew to the Areopa
gus from the Agora, came, as it were, into the presence of a higher power.
No place in Athens was so suitable for a discourse upon the mysteries of
religion. We are not, however, to regard St. Paul's discourse on the
Areopagus as a formal defence, in a trial before the court.6 The whole
1 See 1 Cor. i. IS— ii. 5. and the Sanctuary of the Eumenides men-
2 The number of steps is sixteen. See tioned below.
Wordsworth's Athens and Attica, p. 73. " Six- 3 This temple was on the southern slope
teen stone steps cut in the rock, at its south- of the Areopagus, immediately above the*
east angle, lead up to the hill of the Areopa- Agora, near the Eponymi aud the statue of
gus from the valley of the Agora, which lies Demosthenes.
between it and the Pnyx. This angle seems * In harmony with the euphemistic titles
to be the point of the hill on which the coun- given by the Athenians to these dread god-
cil of the Areopagus sat. Immediately above desses, Pausanias says that their statues in
the steps, on the level of the hill, is a bench this place had nothing ferocious in their as-
of stone excavated in the limestone rock, pect. The proximity of this sanctuary to the
forming three sides of a quadrangle, like a Areopagite court must have tended to give
triclinium : it faces the south : on its east and additional solemnity to the place.
west side is a raised block : the former may, 6 In some respects it seems that the influ-
perhaps, have been the tribunal, the two lat- ence of the court was increased under the
ter the rude stones which Pausanias saw Romans.
here, and which are described by Euripides as 6 Some are of opinion that he was
assigned, the one to the accuser, the other to forcibly apprehended and put on a formal
the criminal, in the causes which were tried in trial. It may be argued that, if a public ad-
this court." The stone seats are intermediate dress was all that was required, the Pnyx
in position to the sites of the Temple of Mars would have been more suitable than the Areop

chap.x. ST. PAUL'S DISCOURSE ON THE AREOPAGUS. 325
aspect of the narrative in the Acts, and the whole tenor of the discourse
itself, militate against this supposition. The words, half derisive, half
courteous, addressed to the Apostle before he spoke to his audience,
" May we know what this new doctrine is ? " are not like the words which
would have been addressed to a prisoner at the bar ; and still more unlike
a judge's sentence are the words with which he was dismissed at the
conclusion, " We will hear thee again of this matter." ' Nor is there
any thing in the speech itself of a really apologetic character, as any one
may perceive, on comparing it with the defence of Socrates. Moreover,
the verse 2 which speaks so strongly of the Athenian love of novelty and ex
citement is so introduced, as to imply that curiosity was the motive of the
whole proceeding. We may, indeed, admit that there was something of a
mock solemnity in this adjournment from the Agora to the Areopagus.
The Athenians took the Apostle from the tumult of public discussion, to
the place which was at once most convenient and most appropriate.
There was every thing in the place to incline the auditors, so far as they
were seriously disposed at all, to a reverent and thoughtful attention. It
is probable that Dionysius,3 with other Areopagites, were on the judicial
seats. And a vague recollection oi the dread thoughts associated by
poetry and tradition with the Hill oi Mars may have solemnized the
minds of some of those who crowded up the stone steps with the Apostle,
and clustered round the summit of the hill, to hear his announcement of
the new divinities.
There is no point in the annals of the first planting of Christianity
which seizes so powerfully on the imagination of those who are familiar
with the history of the ancient world. Whether we contrast the intense
earnestness of the man who spoke, with the frivolous character of those
who surrounded him, — or compare the certain truth and awful meaning
. of the Gospel he revealed, with the worthless polytheism which had
made Athens a proverb in the earth, — or even think of the mere words
uttered that day in the clear atmosphere, on the summit of Mars' Hill,
in connection with the objects of art, temples, statues, and altars, which
agus. But we need not suppose the crowd 1 There is indeed an apparent resemblance
about St. Paul to have been very great ; and between Acts xvii. 32 and Acts xxiv. 25, but
though the Pnyx might be equally accessible even in the latter passage Felix is rather set
from the Agora, and more convenient for a ting aside an irksome subject than giving a
general address, the Areopagus was more ap- judicial decision.
propriate for a discourse upon religion. We 2 Acts xvii. 21.
are disposed, too, to lay great stress on the 8 Tradition says that he was the first bishop
verse (21) which speaks of the curiosity of the of Athens. The writings attributed to him,
Athenians. Unless it were meant to be em- which were once so famous, are now acknowl-
phatic, it would almost have the appearance edged to be spurious.
of an interpolation. The phrase in v. 19 is a
word of general import. See Acts ix. 27.

326 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap.x
stood round on every side, — we feel that the moment was, and was
intended to be, full of the most impressive teaching for every age of the
world. Close to the spot where he stood was the Temple of Mars. The
sanctuary " of the Eumenides was immediately below him ; the Parthenon
of Minerva facing him above. Their presence seemed to challenge the
assertion in which he declared here, that in temples made with hands the
Deity does not dwell. In front of him, towering from its pedestal on the
rock of the Acropolis, — as the Borromean Colossus, which at this day,
with outstretched hand, gives its benediction to the low village of Arona;
or as the brazen statue of the armed angel, which from the summit of
the Castle S. Angelo spreads its wings over the city of Rome, — was the
bronze Colossus of Minerva, armed with spear, shield, and helmet, as the
champion of Athens. Standing almost beneath its shade, he pronounced
that the Deity was not to be likened either to that, the work of Phidias, or
to other forms in gold, silver, or stone, graven by art, and man's device,
which peopled the scene before him." 1 Wherever his eye was turned, it
saw a succession of such statues and buildings in every variety of form
and situation. On the rocky ledges on the south side of the Acropolis,
and in the midst of the hum of the Agora, were the " objects of devo
tion " already described. And in the northern parts of the city, which
are equally visible from the Areopagus, on the level spaces, and on every
eminence, were similar objects, to which we have made no allusion, —
and especially that Temple of Theseus, the national hero, which remains
in unimpaired beauty, to enable us to imagine what Athens was when
this temple was only one among the many ornaments of that city, which
was " crowded with idols."
In this scene St. Paul spoke, probably in his wonted attitude,2 " stretch
ing out his hand ; " his bodily aspect still showing what he had suffered
from weakness, toil, and pain ; 3 and che traces of sadness and anxiety
mingled on his countenance with the expression of unshaken faith.
Whatever his personal appearance may have been, we know the words
which he spoke. And we are struck with the more admiration, the more
narrowly we scrutinize the characteristics of his address. To defer for
the present all consideration of its manifold adaptations to the various
characters of his auditors, we may notice how truly it was the outpour
ing of the emotions which, at the time, had possession of his soul. The
mouth spoke out of the fulness of the heart. With an ardent and
enthusiastic eloquence he gave vent to the feelings which had been
1 Wordsworth's Athens and Attica, p. 77. 2 See p. 155 and the note.
The word "graven" (Acts xvii. 29) should be 8 See the account of what took place at
noticed. The Apostle was surrounded by Philippi, and compare p. 281
sculpture as well as by temples.

™AP- x- SPEECH OF ST. PAUL. 327
excited by all that he had seen around him in Athens. We observe,
also, how the whole course of the oration was regulated by his own
peculiar prudence. He was placed in a position, when he might easily
have been insnared into the use of words which would have brought
down upon him the indignation of all the city. Had he begun by
attacking the national gods in the midst of their sanctuaries and with
the Areopagites on the seats near him, he would have been in almost as
great danger as Socrates before him. Yet he not only avoids the
snare, but uses the very difficulty of his position to make a road to
the convictions of those who heard him. He becomes a Heathen to the
Heathen. He does not say that he is introducing new divinities. He
rather implies the contrary, and gently draws his hearers away from
polytheism by telling them that he was making known the God whom
they themselves were ignorantly endeavoring to worship. And if the
speech is characterized by St. Paul's prudence, it is marked by that
wisdom of his Divine Master, which is the pattern of all Christian teach
ing. As our Blessed Lord used the tribute-money for the instruction
of His disciples, and drew living lessons from the water in the well of
Samaria, so the Apostle of the Gentiles employed the familiar objects of
Athenian life to tell them of what was close to them, and yet they knew
not. He had carefully observed the outward appearance of the city.
Ee had seen an altar with an expressive, though humiliating, inscrip
tion. And, using this inscription as a text,1 he spoke to them, as follows,
the Words of Eternal Wisdom.

Their altars to Ye men of Athens, all things which I behold bear wit- acts
gods prove ness to your carefulness in religion.2 For as I passed 99
bothtbeirdesire r "
Ke7r°fen1o?a'nc'e tnrough y°ur city? and beheld the objects of your wor- 23
<wb mping. g^p^ j found amongst them an altar with this inscription,
TO THE 3 UNKNOWN GOD. Whom, therefore, ye worship, though ye
know Him not, Him declare I unto you.
1 The altar erected to Pity, above alluded 8 Although there is no article before the
to, was once used in a similar manner. The adjective, yet we need not scruple to retain
Athenians were about to introduce gladiatorial the definite article of the Authorized Version ;
shows, and Demonax the Cynic said : " Do for although, if we take the expression by it-
not do this till you have firft thrown down self, " AN Unknown God " would be a more
the altar of Pity." correct translation, yet if we consider the
2 The mistranslation of this verse in the probable origin (see above) of these altars
Authorized Version is much to be regretted, erected to unknown gods it will be evident
because it entirely destroys the graceful cour- that " To THE Unknown God " would be
tesy of St. Paul's opening address, and repre- quite as near the sense of the inscription upon
sents him as beginning his speech by offending any particular one of such altars. Each par
tus audience. ticnlar altar was devoted to the unknown god

328 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap, x,
24 God, who made the world and all things therein, seeing Go.i dwells not
' ° ' ° in the temples
that He is Lord of heaven and earth, dwelleth not in tern- Ss, nor need?0
25 pies made with hands.1 Neither is He served by the hands His creatures.
of men, as though He needed any thing; for it is He that giveth unto
26 all life, and breath, and all things. And He made of one blood 2 all the
nations of mankind, to dwell upon the face of the whole earth ; and
ordained to each the appointed seasons of their existence, and the
27 bounds of tlieir habitation. That they should seek God,3 Ma^wa^creM.
if haply they might feel after Him and find Him, £S^i?£«£
_.. to (lave fallen
though He be not far from every one ol us, lor in Him into the fouies
& J ' of idolatry,
28 we live and move and have our being ; as certain also of ^aTadornld"
, . , . , by the art of
your own poets4 have said, Phidias.
" For we are also His offspring."
29 Forasmuch, then, as we are the offspring of God, we ought not to
think that the Godhead is like unto gold, or silver, or stone, graven by
the art and device of man.
30 Howbeit, those past times of ignorance God hath over- footed'tie^st.
. .. .. , but now calls
looked ; 5 but now He commandeth all men everywhere to the world to
prepare for
31 repent, because He hath appointed a day wherein He will J-*££t'8indg'
judge the world in righteousness, by that Man whom He hath ordained ;
to whom it properly belonged, though which 4 The quotation is from Aratus, a Greek
of the gods it might be the dedicator knew poet, who was a native of Cilicia ; a circum-
not. stance which would, perhaps, account for St.
1 Here again (as at Antioch in Pisidia) Paul's familiarity with his writings. His
we find St. Paul employing the very words of astronomical poems were so celebrated, that
St. Stephen. Acts vii. 48. Ovid declares his fame will live as long as the
2 " Of one blood ; '' excluding the boastful sun and moon endure. How little did the
assumption of a different origin claimed by the Athenian audience imagine that the poet's im-
Greeks for themselves over the barbarians. It mortality would really be owing to the quota-
is not necessary to take the words together so tion made by the despised provincial who ad-
as to mean " He caused to dwell," as some in- dressed them ! Nearly the same words occur
terpreters maintain. also in the hymn of Cleanthes. [See p. 5, n.
8 The reading of MSS. A. B. G. H. &c. 2, and p. 318, n. 4. The opening lines of
(" God," not " Lord ") is the best. this hymn have -been thus translated : —
" Thou, who amid the Immortals art throned the highest in glory,
Giver and Lord of life, who by law disposest of all tilings,
Known by many a name, yet One Almighty forever,
Hail, O Zeus I for to Thee should each mortal voice be uplifted :
Offspring are we too of thine, we and all that in mortal around us." H.]
6 See notes upon St. Paul's speech at Lys- phor as " winked at" is to be found in the
tra. It should be observed that no such meta- original.

eHAP.x. DEPAETUEE FROM ATHENS. 329
Christ's mission whereof He hath given assurance unto all,1 in that He hath
resurrection, raised Him from the dead.
St. Paul was here suddenly interrupted, as was no doubt frequently
the case with his speeches both to Jews and Gentiles. Some of those
who listened broke out into laughter and derision. The doctrine of the
" resurrection " was to them ridiculous, as the notion of equal religious
rights with the " Gentiles " was offensive and intolerable to the Hebrew
audience at Jerusalem.2 Others of those who were present on the Are
opagus said, with courteous indifference, that they would " hear him again
on the subject." The words were spoken in the spirit of Felix, who had
no due sense of the importance of the matter, and who waited for " a
convenient season." Thus, amidst the derision of some, and the
indifference of others,3 St. Paul was dismissed, and the assembly dis
persed. But though the Apostle " departed " thus " from among them," and
though most of his hearers appeared to be unimpressed, yet many of
them may have carried away in their hearts the seeds of truth, destined
to grow up into the maturity of Christian faith and practice. We can
not fail to notice how the sentences of this interrupted speech are con
structed to meet the cases in succession of every class of which the
audience was composed. Each word in the address is adapted at once to
win and to rebuke. The Athenians were proud of every thing that
related to the origin of their race and the home where they dwelt. St.
Paul tells them that he was struck by the aspect of their city ; but he
shows them that the place and the time appointed for each nation's
existence are parts of one great scheme of Providence, and that one
God is the common Father of all nations of the earth. For the general
and more ignorant population, some of whom were doubtless listening, a
word of approbation is bestowed on the care they gave to the highest of
all concerns ; but they are admonished that idolatry degrades all wor
ship, and leads men away from true notions of the Deity. That more
educated and more imaginative class of hearers, who delighted in the
diversified mythology which personified the operations of nature and
localized the divine presence4 in sanctuaries adorned by poetry and art,
are led from the thought of their favorite shrines and customary sacri-

1 Observe the coincidence between this * The sacred grottoes in the rocks withm
«entimcnt and that in Bom. 1. 4. view from the Areopagus should be remem-
2 Auts xxii. 22. bered, as well as the temples, &c. See Words-
8 Some commentators And again in these worth.
two classes the Stoics and Epicureans. It is
¦ot necessary to make so precise a division.

330 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL, cbap. x.
fices, to views of that awful Being who is the Lord of heaven and earth,
and the one Author of universal life. " Up to a certain point in this.
high view of the Supreme Being, the philosopher of the Garden, as well
as of the Porch, might listen with wonder and admiration. It soared.
indeed, high above the vulgar religion ; but in the lofty and serene Deity,
who disdained to dwell in the earthly temple, and needed nothing from
the hand of man, the Epicurean might almost suppose that he heard the
language of his own teacher. But the next sentence, which asserted the
providence of God as the active, creative energy, — as the conservative,
the ruling, the ordaining principle, — annihilated at once the atomic
theory, and the government of blind chance, to which Epicurus ascribed
the origin and preservation of the universe." l And when the Stoic
heard the Apostle say that we ought to rise to the contemplation of the
Deity without the intervention of earthly objects, and that we live and
move and have our being in Him — it might have seemed like an echo
of his own thought 2 — until the proud philosopher learnt that it was
no pantheistic diffusion of power and order of which the Apostle spoke,
but a living centre of government and love — that the world was ruled,
not by the iron necessity of Fate, but by the providence of a personal
God — and that from the proudest philosopher repentance and meek
submission were sternly exacted. Above all, we are called upon to
notice how the attention of the whole audience is concentred at the
last upon Jesus Christ, though His name is not mentioned in the whole
speech. Before St. Paul was taken to the Areopagus, he had been
preaching " Jesus and the resurrection ; " 3 and though his discourse was
interrupted, this was the last impression he left on the minds of those
who heard him. And the impression was such as not merely to excite
or gratify an intellectual curiosity, but to startle and search the con
science. Not only had a revival from the dead been granted to that man
whom God had ordained — but a day had been appointed on which by
Him the world must be judged in righteousness.
Of the immediate results of this speech we have no further knowledge,
than that Dionysius,4 a member of the Court of Areopagus, and a woman
whose name was Damaris,5 with some others, were induced to join
themselves to the Apostle, and became converts to Christianity. How
1 Milman's History of Christianity, vol. ii. 8 Acts xvii. 18.
p. 18. See his observations on the whole * See above, p. 325, n. 3.
speech. He remarks, in a note, the coinci- 5 Nothing is known of Damaris. But,
dence of St. Paul's " needing nothing " with considering the seclusion of the Greek women,
the " nihil indiga nostri " of the Epicurean the mention of her name, and apparently in
Lucretius. connection with the crowd on the Areopagus,
2 This strikes us the more forcibly if the quo- is remarkable.
tation is from the Stoic Cleanthes. See above

ciiap.x. FRUITS OF PAUL'S SOJOURN AT ATHENS. 331
long St. Paul staid in Athens, and with what success, cannot possibly
be determined. He does not appear to have been driven away by any
tumult or persecution. We are distinctly told that he waited for some
time at Athens, till Silas and Timotheus should join him ; and there is
some reason for believing that the latter of these companions did rejoin
him in Athens, and was despatched again forthwith to Macedonia.1 The
Apostle himself remained in the province of Achaia, and took up his
abode at its capital on the Isthmus. He inferred, or it was revealed to
him, that the Gospel would meet with a more cordial reception there
than at Athens. And it is a serious and instructive fact that the mer
cantile populations of Thessalonica and Corinth received the message of
God with greater readiness than the highly educated and polished Athe
nians. Two letters to the Thessalonians, and two to the Corinthians,
remain to attest the flourishing state of those Churches. But we possess
no letter written by St. Paul to the Athenians ; and we do not read that
he was ever in Athens again.2
Whatever may have been the immediate results of St. Paul's sojourn
at Athens, its real fruits are those which remain to us still. That speech
on the Areopagus is an imperishable monument of the first victory of
Christianity over Paganism. To make a sacred application of the words
used by the Athenian historian,3 it was " no mere effort for the moment,"
but it is a " perpetual possession," wherein the Church finds ever-fresh
supplies of wisdom and guidance. It is in Athens we learn what is the
highest point to which unassisted human nature can attain ; and here we
learn also the language which the Gospel addresses to a man on his
proudest eminence of unaided strength. God, in His providence, has
preserved to us, in fullest profusion, the literature which unfolds to us all
the life of the Athenian people, in its glory and its shame ; and He has
ordained that one conspicuous passage in the Holy Volume should be the
speech, in which His servant addressed that people as ignorant idolaters,
called them to repentance, and warned them of judgment. And it can
hardly be deemed profane, if we trace to the same Divine Providence the
preservation of the very imagery which surrounded the speaker — not
only the sea, and the mountains, and the sky, which change not with the
decay of nations — but even the very temples, which remain, after wars
and revolutions, on their ancient pedestals in astonishing perfection. We
1 See 1 Thess. iii. 1. For the movements nourishing there as ever. The Christian com-
of Silas and Timotheus about this time, see munity seems at one time to have been entirely
the note at p. 338. dispersed, and to have been collected again
2 The church of Athens appears to have about a.d. 165. See Leake, p. 60.
been long in a very weak state. In the time 8 Thuc. i. 22.
of the Antonines, Paganism was almost as

332

THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL.

are thus provided with a poetic and yet a truthful commentary on the
words that were spoken once for all at Athens ; and Art and Nature have
been commissioned from above to enframe the portrait of that Apostle,
who stands forever on the Areopagus as the teacher of the Gentiles.

Coin of Athens. i

1 From the British Museum. This coin shows the position of the colossal statue of
Minerva Promachus, facing the west.

CHAPTER XI.
Letters to Thessalonica written from Corinth. — Expulsion of the Jews from Borne. — Aquila
and Priscilla. — St. Paul's Labors. — Arrival of Timothy and Silas. — First Epistle to the
Thessalonians. — St. Paul is opposed by the Jews, and turns to the Gentiles. — His Vision. —
Second Epistle to the Thessalonians. — Continued residence in Corinth.
WHEN St. Paul went from Athens to Corinth, he entered on a scene
very different from that which he had left. It is not merely that
his residence was transferred from a free Greek city to a Roman colony ;
as would have been the case had he been moving from Thessalonica to
Philippi.1 His present journey took him from a quiet provincial town
to the busy metropolis of a province, and from the seclusion of an ancient
university to the seat of government and trade.2 Once there had been a
time, in the flourishing age of the Greek republics, when Athens had
been politically greater than Corinth : but now that the little territories
of the Levantine cities were fused into the larger political divisions of
the empire, Athens had only the memory of its pre-eminence, while
Corinth held the keys of commerce and swarmed with a crowded popu
lation. Both cities had recently experienced severe vicissitudes, but a
spell was on the fortunes of the former, and its character remained more
entirely Greek than that of any other place : 3 while the latter rose from
its ruins, a new and splendid city, on the Isthmus between its two seas,
where a multitude of Greeks and Jews gradually united themselves with
the military colonists sent by Julius Caesar from Italy,4 and were kept in
order by the presence of a Roman proconsul.5
The connection of Corinth with the life of St. Paul and the early prog
ress of Christianity is so close and eventful, that no student of Holy
1 See above, p. 288. Julius Csesar established the city on the Isth-
2 A journey in the first century from Ath- mus, in the form of a colony ; and the mer-
ens to Corinth might almost be compared to a cantile population flocked back to their old
journey, in the eighteenth, from Oxford to place ; so that Corinth rose with great rapidity
London. For the probabilities of St. Paul's till it was a city of the second rank in tm.
actual route, see notes on p. 356. Empire. The historical details will be given
3 See the preceding chapter on Athens. in the next chapter.
4 At the close of the Republic, Corinth was 6 Acts xviii. 12 shows that the province of
entirely destroyed. Thus we find Cicero trav- Achaia was proconsular. See, under Cyprus,
elling, not by Corinth, but by Athens. But pp. 129-131.

334 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap. xi.
Writ ought to be satisfied without obtaining as correct and clear an idea
as possible of its social condition, and its relation to other parts of the
Empire. This subject will be considered in the succeeding chapter. At
present another topic demands our chief attention. We are now arrived
at that point in the life of St. Paul when his first Epistles were written.
This fact is ascertained, not by any direct statements either in the Acts
or the Epistles themselves, but by circumstantial evidence derived from a
comparison of these documents with one another.1 Such a comparison
enables us to perceive that the Apostle's mind, on his arrival at Corinth,
was still turning with affection and anxiety towards his converts at Thes
salonica. In the midst of all his labors at the Isthmus, his thoughts
were continually with those whom he had left in Macedonia ; and though
the narrative2 tells us only of his tent-making and preaching in the
metropolis of Achaia, we discover, on a closer inquiry, that the Letters to
the Thessalonians were written at this particular crisis. It would be
interesting, in the case of any man whose biography has been thought
worth preserving, to find that letters full of love and wisdom had been
written at a time when no traces would have been discoverable, except
in the letters themselves, of the thoughts which had been occupying the
writer's mind. Such unexpected association of the actions done in one
place with affection retained towards another, always seems to add to
our personal knowledge of the man whose history we may be studying,
and to our interest in the pursuits which were the occupation of his life.
This is peculiarly true in the case of the first Christian correspondence,
which has been preserved to the Church. Such has ever been the influ
ence of letter-writing, — its power in bringing those who are distant
near to one another, and reconciling those who are in danger of being
estranged ; — such especially has been the influence of Christian letters
in developing the growth of faith and love, and binding together the dis
located members of the body of our Lord, and in making each generation
in succession the teacher of the next, — that we have good reason to take
these Epistles to the Thessalonians as the one chief subject of the present
chapter. The earliest occurrences which took place at Corinth must
first be mentioned : but for this a few pages will suffice.
The reasons which determined St. Paul to come to Corinth (over and
above the discouragement he seems to have met with in Athens) were,
probably, twofold. In the first place, it was a large mercantile city, in
immediate connection with Rome and the West of the Mediterranean,
with Thessalonica and Ephesus in the Mg&zn., and with Antioch and
Alexandria in the East.3 The Gospel once established in Corinth, would
1 See the arguments below, p. 340, n. 6. 2 For full details, see the next chapter
3 Acts x'dii. 1-4.

chap. xi. EXPULSION OF THE JEWS FROM ROME. 335
rapidly spread everywhere. And, again, from the very nature of the
city, the Jews established there were numerous. Communities of scat
tered Israelites were found in various parts of the province of Achaia, —
in Athens, as we have recently seen,1 — in Argos, as we learn from Philo,
— in Bceotia and Eubcea. But their chief settlement must necessarily
have been in that city, which not only gave opportunities of trade by
land along the Isthmus between the Morea and the Continent, but reeeived
in its two harbors the ships of the Eastern and Western Seas. A religion
which was first to be planted in the Synagogue, and was thence intended
to scatter its seeds over all parts of the earth, could nowhere find a more
favorable soil than among the Hebrew families at Corinth.2
At this particular time there was a greater number of Jews in the city
than usual ; for they had lately been banished from Rome by command
of the Emperor Claudius.3 The history of this edict is involved in some
obscurity. But there are abundant passages in the contemporary Hea
then writers which show the suspicion and dislike with which the Jews
were regarded.4 Notwithstanding the general toleration, they were
violently persecuted by three successive Emperors ; 5 and there is good
reason for identifying the edict mentioned by St. Luke with that alluded
to by Suetonius, who says that Claudius drove the Jews from Rome be
cause they were incessantly raising tumults at the instigation of a certain
Chrestus? Much has been written concerning this sentence of the
biographer of the Caesars. Some have held that there was really a Jew
called Chrestus, who had excited political disturbances, others that the
name is used by mistake for Christus, and that the disturbances had
arisen from the Jewish expectations concerning the Messiah, or Christ.
It seems to us that the last opinion is partially true ; but that we must
trace this movement not merely to the vague Messianic idea entertained
by the Jews, but to the events which followed the actual appearance of
the Christ. We have seen how the first progress of Christianity had been
the occasion of tumult among the Jewish communities in the provinces ; '
and there is no reason why the same might not have happened in the
capital itself.8 Nor need we be surprised at the inaccurate form in
which the name occurs, when we remember how loosely more careful
1 See the preceding chapter, p. 313. secntion of Caligula has been mentioned previ-
2 See what has been said above on Thessa- ously, Ch. IV. pp. 102, 103.
lonica. 6 The words are quoted p. 262, n. 2. Com-
8 Acts xviii. 2. pare p. 287.
4 Tacitus, for instance, and Juvenal. See 7 In Asia Minor (Ch. VI.), and more espe-
the quotation from Cicero, p. 262, n. 1. cially in Thessalonica and Bercea (Ch. IX.).
6 Four thousand Jews or Jewish proselytes 8 Christianity must have been more or less
were sent as convicts by Tiberius to the island known in Borne since the return of the Italian
of Sardinia. The more directly religious per- Jews from Pentecost (Acts ii.).

336 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap.ii.
writers than Suetonius express themselves concerning the affairs of the
Jews.1 Chrestus was a common name;2 Christus was not: and we have
a distinct statement by Tertulhan and Lactantius 3 that in their day the
former was often used for the latter.4
Among the Jews who had been banished from Rome by Claudius, and
had settled for a time at Corinth, were two natives of Pontus, whose
names were Aquila and Priscilla.5 We have seen before (Ch. VIII.)
that Pontus denoted a province of Asia Minor on the shores of the
Euxine, .and we have noticed some political facts which tended to bring
this province into relations with Judaea.6 Though, indeed, it is hardly
necessary to allude to this : for there were Jewish colonies over every
part of Asia Minor, and we are expressly told that Jews from Pontus
heard St. Peter's first sermon7 and read his first Epistle.8 Aquila and
Priscilla were, perhaps, of that number. Their names have a Roman
form ; 9 and we may conjecture that they were brought into some con
nection with a Roman family, similar to that which we have supposed
to have existed in the case of St. Paul himself.10 We find they were on
the present occasion forced to leave Rome ; and we notice that they are
afterwards addressed " as residing there again ; so that it is reasonable
to suppose that the metropolis was their stated residence. Yet we
observe that they frequently travelled ; and we trace them on the Asiatic
coast on two distinct occasions, separated by a wide interval of time.
First, before their return to Italy (Acts xviii. 18, 26 ; 1 Cor. xvi. 19),
and again, shortly before the martyrdom of St. Paul (2 Tim. iv. 19), we
find them at Ephesus. From the manner in which they are referred to
as having Christian meetings in their houses, both at Ephesus and Rome,12

1 Even Tacitus. of good education. Her name appears in
2 Moreover, Christus and Chrestus are pro- 2 Tim. iv. 19 (also, according io the best
nounced alike in Romaic. MSS., in Rom. xvi. 3), under the form
8 See the passages quoted by Dean Milman " Prisca." So, in Latin authors, ' Livia " and
(Hist, of Christianity, I. p. 430), who remarks " Livilla," " Drusa " and " Drusilla," are used
that these tumults at Rome, excited by the of the same person. Prisca is well known as
mutual hostility of Jews and Christians, imply a Roman name.
that Christianity must already have made con- It is well, worthy of notice that in both
siderable progress there. cases St. Paul mentions the name of t'riscilla
4 See pp. Ill, 112, and Tac. Ann. xv. 44. before that of Aquila. This conveys the
5 Acts xviii. 2. impression that she was the more energetic
6 Especially the mai i iage of Polemo with character of the two. See the notice of these
Berenice, p. 23 and p. 213. two Christians by the Archdeacon Evans
7 Acts ii. 9. (Script. Biog.), and his remarks on the proba-
8 1 Pet. i. 1. ble usefulness of Priscilla with reference to
6 See p. 136, also p. 44. From the men- female converts, the training of Deaconesses,
tion of Priscilla as St. Paul's "fellow-labor- &c. Compare the note on Rom. xvi. 3.
er," and as one of the instructors of Apollos, 10 P. 43. u Rom. xvi. 3.
we might naturally infer that she was a woman 12 Rom. xvi. 3 : 1 Cor. xvi. 19.

chap. d. AQUILA AND PRISCILLA. 337
we should be inclined to conclude that they were possessed of some
considerable wealth. The trade at which they labored, or which at least
they superintended, was the manufacture of tents,1 the demand for
which must have been continual in that age of travelling, — while the
cilieium2 or hair-cloth, of which they were made, could easily be pro
cured at every large town in the Levant.
A question has been raised as to whether Aquila and Priscilla were
already Christians when they met with St. Paul.3 Though it is cer
tainly possible that they may have been converted at Rome, we think, on
the whole, that this was probably not the case. They are simply classed
with the other Jews who were expelled by Claudius ; and we are told
that the reason why St. Paul " came and attached himself to them " 4
was not because they had a common religion, but because they had a
common trade. There is no doubt, however, that the connection soon
resulted in their conversion to Christianity.5 The trade which St. Paul's
father had taught him in his youth 6 was thus made the means of procur
ing him invaluable associates in the noblest work in which man was ever
engaged. No higher example can be found of the possibility of combin
ing diligent labor in the common things of life with the utmost spiritual
ity of mind. Those who might have visited Aquila at Corinth in the
working-hours would have found St. Paul quietly occupied with the
same task as his fellow-laborers. Though he knew the Gospel to be a
matter of life and death to the soul, he gave himself to an ordinary
trade with as much zeal as though he had no other occupation. It is the
duty of every man to maintain an honorable independence ; and this, he
felt, was peculiarly incumbent on him, for the sake of the Gospel he
came to proclaim.1 He knew the obloquy to which he was likely to be
exposed, and he prudently prepared for it. The highest motives instigat
ed his diligence in the commonest manual toil. And this toil was no
hinderance to that communion with God, which was his greatest joy, and
the source of all his peace. While he " labored, working with his own
hands," among the Corinthians, as he afterwards reminded them,8 — in

1 Many meanings have been given by the * Acts xviii. 2.
commentators to the word, — weavers of tap- 6 They were Christians, ana able to instruct
estry, saddlers, mathematical instrument- others, when St. Paul left them at Ephesus,
makers, ropemakers. But nothing is so prob- on his voyage from Corinth to Syria. See
able as that they were simply makers of those Acts xviii. 18, 26.
hair-cloth tents, which are still in constant use B See p. 44.
in the Levant. That they were manufacturers 7 See what is said above in reference to his
of the cloth itself is less likely. labors at Thessalonica, pp. 284, 285. We
2 An account of this cloth is given in Ch. shall meet with the same subject again in the
II. p. 44. See p. 150 and p. 284. Epistles to the Corinthians.
8 See the various commentators. 8 1 Cor. iv. 12.
22

338

THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL.

his heart he was praying continually, with thanksgiving, on behalf of the
Thessalonians, as he says to them himself1 in the letters which he dictat
ed in the intervals of his labor.
This was the first scene of St. Paul's life at Corinth. For the second
scene we must turn to the synagogue. The Sabbath 2 was a day of rest.
On that day the Jews laid aside their tent-making and their other trades,
and, amid the derision of their Gentile neighbors, assembled in the house
of prayer to worship the God of their ancestors. There St. Paul spoke
to them of the " mercy promised to their forefathers," and of the " oath
sworn to Abraham," being " performed." There his countrymen listened
with incredulity or eonviction ; and the tent-maker of Tarsus " reasoned "
with them, and " endeavored to persuade " 3 both the Jews and the Gen
tiles who were present to believe in Jesus Christ as the promised Messiah
and the Saviour of the World.
While these two employments were proceeding, — the daily labor in
the workshop, and the weekly discussions in the synagogue, — Timotheus
and Silas returned from Macedonia.4 The effect produced by their
arrival 5 seems to have been an instantaneous increase of the zeal and

1 1 Thess. i. 2, ii. 13 ; 2 Thess. i. 11.
2 See Acts xviii. 4.
8 This is the sense of the imperfect.
4 Acts xviii. 5. We may remark here that
Silas and Timotheus were probably the
" brethren " who brought the collection men
tioned 2 Cor. xi. 9. Compare Phil. iv. 15.
5 There are some difficulties and differences
of opinion, with regard to the movements of
Silas and Timotheus, between the time when
St. Paul left them in Macedonia and their
rejoining him in Achaia.
The facts which are distinctly stated are as
follows. (1.) Silas and Timotheus were left
at Beroea (Acts xvii. 14) when St. Paul went
to Athens. We are not told why they were
left there, or what commissions they received ;
but the Apostle sent a message from Athens
(Acts xvii. 15) that they should follow him
with all speed, and (Acts xvii. 16) he waited
for them there. (2.) The Apostle was rejoined
by them when at Corinth (Acts xviii. 5).
We are not informed how they had been em
ployed in the interval, but they came " from
Macedonia." It is not distinctly said that they
came together, but the impression at first sight is
thatthcydid. (3.) St. Paul informs us (1 Thess.
iii. 1 ) that he was " left in Athens alone," and
that this solitude was in consequence of Timothy
having been sent to Thessalonica (1 Thess. iii.

2). Though it is not expressly stated that
Timothy was sent from Athens, the first
impression is that he was.
Thus there is a seeming discrepancy be
tween the Acts and Epistles; a journey of
Timotheus to Athens, previous to his arrival
with Silas at Corinth, appearing to be men
tioned by St. Paul, and to be quite unnoticed
by St. Luke.
Paley, in the Harm Paulines, says that the
Epistle " virtually asserts that Timothy came
to the Apostle at Athens," and assumes that
it is " necessary " to suppose this, in order to
reconcile the history with the Epistle. And
he points out three intimations in the history,
which make the arrival, though not expressly
mentioned, extremely probable : — first, the
message that they should come with all speed ;
secondly, the fact of his waiting for them ;
thirdly, the absence of any appearance of
haste in his departure from Athens to Corinth.
" Paul had ordered Timothy to follow him with
out delay : he waited at Athens on purpose
that Timothy might come up with him, and
he staid there as long as his own choice led
him to continue."
This explanation is satisfactory. But two
others might be suggested, which would
equally remove the difficulty.
It is not expressly said that Timotheus was

ARRIVAL OF SILAS AND TIMOTHEUS.

339

energy with which St. Paul resisted the opposition, which was even now
beginning to hem in the progress of the truth. The remarkable word1
which is used to describe the "pressure" which he experienced at this
moment in the course of his teaching at Corinth, is the same which is
employed of our Lord Himself in a solemn passage of the Gospels,2 when
He says, " I have a baptism to be baptized with ; and how am I straitened
till it be accomplished ! " He who felt our human difficulties has given
us human help to aid us in what He requires us to do. When St. Paul's
companions rejoined him, he was re-enforced with new earnestness and

sent from Athens to Thessalonica. St. Paul
was anxious, as we have seen, to revisit the
Thessalonians; but since he was hindered
from doing so, it is highly probable (as Hem-
sen and Wieseler suppose) that he may have
sent Timotheus to them from Bercea. Silas
might be sent on some similar commission, and
this would explain why the two companions
were left behind in Macedonia. This would
necessarily cause St. Paul to be " left alone in
Athens." Such solitude was doubtless pain
ful to him ; but the spiritual good of the new
converts was at stake. The two companions,
after finishing the work intrusted to them,
finally rejoined the Apostle at Corinth. [We
should observe that the phrase is " from
Macedonia," not "from Beroea."] That he
" waited for them " at Athens need cause us
no difficulty : for in those days the arrival of
travellers could not confidently be known be
forehand. When he left Athens and pro
ceeded to Corinth, he knew that Silas and
Timotheus could easily ascertain his move
ments, and follow his steps, by help of infor
mation obtained at the synagogue.
But, again, we may reasonably suppose,
that, in the course of St. Paul's stay at
Corinth, he may have paid a second visit to
Athens, after the first arrival of Timotheus
and Silas from Macedonia; and that during
some such visit he may have sent Timotheus
to Thessalonica. This view may be taken
without our supposing, with Bottger, that the
First Epistle to the Thessalonians was written
at Athens. Schrader and others imagine a
visit to that city at a later period of his life ;
but this view cannot be admitted without de
ranging the arguments for the date of 1 Thess.,
which was evidently written soon after leav
ing Macedonia.
Two further remarks maybe added. (1.)
If Timothy did rejoin St. Paul at Athens, we

need not infer that Silas was not with him,
from the fact that the name of Silas is not
mentioned. It is usually taken for granted
that the second arrival of Timothy (1 Thess.
iii. 6) is identical with the coming of Silas
and Timotheus to Corinth (Acts xviii. 5) ;
but here we see that only Timothy is men
tioned, doubtless because he was most recently
and familiarly known at Thessalonica, and per
haps, also, because the mission of Silas was to
some other place. (2.) On the other hand, it
is not neccessary to assume, because Silas and
Timotheus are mentioned together (Acts
xviii. 5), that they came together. All condi
tions are satisfied if they came about the same
time. If they were sent on missions to two
different places, the times of their return
would not necessarily coincide. [Something
may be implied in the form of the Greek
phrase, " Silas as well as Timotheus."] In
considering all these journeys, it is very need
ful to take into account that they would be
modified by the settled or unsettled state of
the country with regard to banditti, and by
the various opportunities of travelling, which
depend on the season and the weather, and the
sailing of vessels. Hinderances connected
with some such considerations may be referred
to in Phil. iv. 10.
1 The state of mind, whatever it was, is
clearly connected with the coming of Timo
thy and Silas, and seems to imply increasing
zeal with increasing opposition. "Instabat
verbo." Compare avdynn, 1 Thess. iii. 7.
The A. V. rests on an incorrect reading,
though the general result is the same. Hack-
ett's note is very much to the purpose. " He
was engrossed with the word. The arrival of
his associates relieved him from anxiety which
had pressed heavily upon him ; and he could
now devote himself with unabated energy to
his work." 2 Luke xii. 50.

340 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap. xi.
vigor in combating the difficulties which met him. He acknowledges
himself that he was at Corinth " in weakness, and in fear and much
trembling ; " l but " God, who comforteth those that are cast down, com
forted him by the arrival " 2 of his friends. It was only one among many
instances we shall be called to notice, in which, at a time of weakness,
" he saw the brethren and took courage." 3
But this was not the only result of the arrival of St. Paul's com
panions. Timotheus 4 had been sent, while St. Paul was still at Athens,
to revisit and establish the Church of Thessalonica. The news he
brought on his return to St. Paul caused the latter to write to these be
loved converts ; and, as we have already observed, the letter which he
sent them is the first of his Epistles which has been preserved to us. It
seems to have been occasioned partly by his wish to express his earnest
affection for the Thessalonian Christians, and to encourage them under
their persecutions ; but it was also called for by some errors into which
they had fallen. Many of the new converts were uneasy about the state
of their relatives or friends, who had died since their conyersion. They
feared that these departed Christians would lose the happiness of witness
ing their Lord's second coming, which they expected soon to behold. In
this expectation others had given themselves up to a religious excitement,
under the influence of which they persuaded themselves that they need
not continue to work at the business of their callings, but might claim
support from the richer members of the Church. Others, again, had
yielded to the same temptations which afterwards influenced the Corin
thian Church, and despised the gift of prophesying 5 in comparison with
those other gifts which afforded more opportunity for display. These
reasons, and others which will appear in the letter itself, led St. Paul to
write to the Thessalonians as follows : —
FIRST EPISTLE TO THE THESSALONIANS.6
6.1 PAUL, and Silvanus, and Timotheus, TO THE CHURCH salutation.
OF THE THESSALONIANS, in God our Father, and our Lord Jesus
Christ. 1 1 Cor. ii. 3. sion of the Thessalonians (1 Thess. i. 8, 9),
2 2 Cor. vii. 6. while the tidings of it were still spreading (the
8 Acts xxviii. 15. See above on his soli- verb is in the present tense) through Macedc-
tude in Athens, p. 313. nia and Achaia, and while St. Paul could
4 See above, p. 331. speak of himself as only taken from them, for
6 1 Thess. v. 20. a short season (1 Thess. ii. 17). (2.) St.
6 The correctness of the date here assigned Paul had been recently at Athens (iii. 1), and
to this Epistle may be proved as follows : — had already preached in Achaia (i. 7, 8). (3.)
(1.) It was written not long after the conver- Timotheus and Silas were just returned (iii.

"HAP. XI.

FIRST EPISTLE TO THE THESSALONIANS.

341

Grace1 be to you and peace.

Thanksgiving
for their cor •
version.

I give 3 continual thanks to God for you all, and make i. 2

mention of you in my prayers without ceasing ; remembering,
in the presence of our God and Father, the working of your faith, and
the labors of your love, and the steadfastness of your hope of our Lord
Jesus Christ.4 Brethren, beloved by God, I know how God has chosen
you ; for my Glad-tidings came to you, not only in word, but also in
power ; with the might of the Holy Spirit, and with the full assurance
of belief.5 As you, likewise, know the manner in which I behaved my
self among you, for your sakes. Moreover, you followed in my steps, and

6) from Macedonia, which happened (Acts
xviii. 5) soon after St. Paul's first arrival at
Corinth. We have already observed (Ch. IX. p.
285), that the character of these Epistles to
the Thessalonians proves how predominant
was the Gentile element in that church, and
that they are among the very few letters of
St. Paul in which not a single quotation from
the Old Testament is to be found. The use,
however, of the word " Satan " ( 1 Thess. ii.
18, and 2 Thess. ii. 9) might be adduced as
implying some previous knowledge of Juda
ism in those to whom the letter was addressed.
See also the note on 2 Thess. ii. 8.
1 This salutation occurs in all St. Paul's
Epistles, except the three Pastoral Epistles,
where it is changed into " Grace, mercy, and
peace." 2 The remainder of this verse has been
introduced into the Textus Receptus by mis
take in this place, where it is not found in the
best MSS. It properly belongs to 2 Thess.
i. 2. 8 It is important to observe in this place,
once for all, that St. Paul uses " we," accord
ing to the idiom of many ancient writers,
where a modern writer would use "I." Great
confusion is caused in many passages by not
translating, according to his true meaning, in
the first person singular; for thus it often hap
pens, that what he spoke of himself individ
ually appears to us as if it were meant for a
general truth : instances will occur repeatedly
of this in the Epistles to the Corinthians,
especially the Second. It might have been
supposed, that when St. Paul associated

others with himself in the salutation at the
beginning of an epistle, he meant to indicate
that the epistle proceeded from them as well as
from himself; but an examination of the body
of the Epistle will always convince us that
such was not the case, but that he was the sole
author. For example, in the present Epistle,
Silvanus and Timotheus are joined with him
in the salutation; but yet we find (ch. iii.
1, 2) — " we thought it good to be left in
Athens alone, and sent Timothy our brother."
Now, who was it who thought fit to be left
at Athens alone? Plainly St. Paul himself,
and he only ; neither Timotheus (who is hire
expressly excluded) nor Silvanus (who proba
bly did not rejoin St. Paul till afterwards
at Corinth, Acts xviii. 5, and see the note,
p. 338) being included. Ch. iii. 6 is not less
decisive — " but now that Timotheus is just
come to ms from you " — when we remember
that Silvanus came with Timotheus. Several
other passages in the Epistle prove the same
thing, but these may suffice.
It is true, that sometimes the ancient idiom
in which a writer spoke of himself in the plu
ral is more graceful, and seems less egotistical,
than the modern usage ; but yet (the modern
usage being what it is) a literal translation of
the T/ueis very often conveys a confused idea of
the meaning ; and it appears better, therefore,
to translate according to the modern idiom.
4 St. Paul is here referring to the time when
he first visited and converted the Thessalo
nians ; the " hope " spoken of was the hope of
our Lord's coming.
R In illustration of the word here we may
refer to Rom. xiv. 5, and Heb. x. 22.

342 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap. m.
in the steps of the Lord ; and you received the word in great tribula-
i- 7 tion,1 with joy which came from the Holy Spirit. And thus you have
8 become patterns to all the believers in Macedonia and in Achaia. For
from you the word of the Lord has been sounded forth,2 and not only
has its sound been heard in Macedonia and Achaia, but also in every
place the tidings of your faith towards God have been spread abroad, so
9 that I have no need to speak of it at all. For others are telling of their
own accord,3 concerning me, what welcome you gave me, and how you
forsook your idols, and turned to serve God, the living and the true :
10 and to wait for His Son from the heavens, whom He raised from the
dead, even Jesus our deliverer from the coming wrath.
ii. 1 For, you know yourselves, brethren, that my coming He reminds
2 amongst you was not fruitless ; but after I had borne suffer- own sample.
ing and outrage (as you know) at Philippi, I trusted in my God, and
boldly declared to you God's Glad-tidings, in the midst of great conten-
3 tion. For my exhortations are not prompted by imposture, nor by
4 lasciviousness, nor do I speak in guile.4 But as God has proved my
fitness for the charge of the Glad-tidings, so I speak, not seeking to
5 please men, but God, who proves our hearts. For never did I use flatter
ing words, as you know ; nor hide covetousness under fair pretences,
6 (God is witness) ; nor did I seek honor from men, either from you or
others ; although I might have been burdensome, as Christ's apostle.5
7 But I behaved myself among you with gentleness ; and as a nurse
8 cherishes her own children,6 so in my fond affection it was my joy to give
you not only the Glad-tidings of God, but my own life also, because you
9 were dear to me. For you remember, brethren, my toilsome labors ;
1 This tribulation they brought on them- Judaizing opponents denied his apostolic au-
selves by receiving the Gospel. thority was the fact that he (in general) refused
2 See p. 279, n. 8. to be maintained by his converts, whereas our
8 " Themselves," emphatic. Lord had given to His apostles the right of
4 In this and the following verses, we have being so maintained. St. Paul fully explains
allusions to the accusations brought against his reasons for not availing himself of that
St. Paul by his Jewish opponents. He would right in several passages, especially 1 Cor. ix. :
of course have been accused of imposture, as and he here takes care to allude to his posses-
the preacher of a miraculous revelation ; the sion of the right, while mentioning his renun-
charge of impurity might also have been sug- ciation of it. Cf. 2 Thess. iii. 9.
gestcd to impure minds, as connected with the 6 " Her own children." See p. 284, n. 4.
conversion of female proselytes ; the charge of It will be observed, also, that we adopt a
seeking to please men was repeated by the Juda- different punctuation from that which has lid
izers in Galatia. See Gal. i. 10. to the received version.
6 One of the grounds upon which St. Paul's

chap. xi. FIRST EPISTLE TO THE THESSALONIANS. 343
how I worked both night and day, that I might not be burdensome to
any of you, while I proclaimed to you the message x which I bore, the
Glad-tidings of God. Ye are yourselves witnesses, and God also is ii. Id
witness, how holy, and just, and unblamable were my dealings towards
you that believe. You know how earnestly, as a father his own children, 11
I exhorted, and entreated, and adjured each one among you to walk 12
worthy of God, by whom you are called into His own kingdom and glory.
Wherefore I also give continual thanks to God, because, when you 13
heard from me the spoken word 2 of God, you received it not as the word
of man, but, as it is in truth, the word of God ; who Himself works
effectually in you that believe. For you, brethren, followed in the steps 14
of the churches of God in Judaea, which are in Christ Jesus, inasmuch
as you suffered the like persecution from your own countrymen, which
they endured from the Jews ; who killed both the Lord Jesus, and the 15
prophets, and who have driven me forth [from city to city 3 ] ; a people
displeasing to God, and enemies to all mankind, who would hinder me 16
from speaking to the Gentiles for their salvation ; continuing always to
fill up the measure of their sins ; but the wrath [of God] has overtaken
them to destroy them.4
Expresses Ms But I, brethren, having been torn from you for a short 17
desire to see
them. season (in presence, not in heart), sought very earnestly to
behold you [again] face to face.5 Wherefore I, Paul (for my own part), 18
desired to visit you once and again ; but Satan hindered me. For what 19
is my hope or joy ? what is the crown wherein I glory ? what but your
own selves, in the presence of our Lord Jesus Christ at His appearing ? 6
Yea, you are my glory and my joy. 20
And ws joy Therefore, when I was no longer able to forbear, I deter- iii. 1
in hearing of . - M1. 1 . 1 T rn.
their well- mined willingly to be left at Athens alone ; and 1 sent Timo- 2
doing from ° J '
TimotheuB. theus, my brother, and God's fellow-worker 7 in the Glad-tidings
of Christ, that he might strengthen your constancy, and exhort you con-
1 The original word involves the idea of a 6 The anticipative blending of the future
herald proclaiming a message. with the present here is parallel with and
2 Literally word received by hearing, i. e. explains Rom. ii. 15, 16.
spoken word. Cf. Rom. x. 16. 7 There is some doubt about the reading
3 Referring to his recent expulsion from here. That which we adopt is analogous to
Thessalonica and Beroea. 1 Cor. iii. 9. The boldness of the expression
* 4 More literally, " to make an end of them." probably led to the variation in the MSS. On
5 See what is said in the preceding chapter the fact mentioned in these two verses, see the
in connection with Beroea. note at p. 338 above.

844 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap. xi.
Hi. 3 cerning your faith, that none of you should waver in these afflictions ; since
4 you know yourselves that such is our appointed lot, for when I was with
you, I forewarned you that affliction awaited us, as you know that it befell.
5 For this cause, I also, when I could no longer forbear, sent to learn
tidings of your faith ; fearing lest perchance the tempter had tempted yo a,
6 and lest my labor should be in vain. But now that Timotheus ha?
returned from you to me, and has brought me the glad tidings of your
faith and love, and that you still keep an affectionate remembrance of me,
7 longing to see me, as I to see you — I have been comforted, brethren, on
your behalf, and all my own tribulation and distress : has been lightened
8 by your faith. For now I live,2 if you be steadfast in the Lord. What
9 thanksgiving can I render to God for you, for all the joy which you
10 cause me in the presence of my God ? Night and day, I pray exceeding
earnestly to see you face to face, and to complete what is yet wanting in
11 your faith. Now, may our God and Father Himself, and our Lord Jesus,'
12 direct my path towards you. Meantime, may the Lord cause you to
increase and abound in love to one another and to all men ; even as I
13 to you. And so may He keep your hearts steadfast and unblamable in
holiness, in the presence of our God and Father, at the appearing of oui
Lord Jesus, with all his saints.
iy l Furthermore, brethren, I beseech and exhort you in the
» Against sen-
name of the Lord Jesus, that, as I taught you how to walk that BuaUty-
2 you might please God, you would do so more and more. For you know
what commands I delivered to you by the authority of the Lord Jesus.
3 This, then, is the will of God, even your sanctification ; that you should
4 keep yourselves from fornication, that each of you should learn to master
5 his body,4 in sanctification and honor ; not in lustful passions, like the
6 Heathen who know not God ; that no man wrong his brother in this
matter by transgression.8 All such the Lord will punish, as I forewarned
7 you by my testimony. For God called us not to uncleanness, but His
1 See p. 339, and note. may be said to gain possession of his own body
2 Compare Rom. vii. 9. when he subdues those lusts which tend to
8 The word for " Christ " is omitted by the destroy his mastery over it. Hence the inter-
best MSS: both here and in verse 13. pretation which we have adopted.
4 The original cannot mean to possess; it 6 The reading adopted in the Received
means, to gain possession of, to acquire for one's Text is allowed by all modern critics to be
own use. The use of " vessel " for body is wrong. The obvious translation is, " in the
common, and found 2 Cor. iv. 7. Now a man matter in question."

•jhap.xi. FIRST EPISTLE TO THE THESSALONIANS. 345
calling is a holy calling.1 Wherefore, he that despises these my words iv. 8
despises not man, but God, who also has given unto me 2 His Holy Spirit.
toiOTe^eace Concerning brotherly love it is needless that I should write 9
Srder!°od to you ; for ye yourselves are taught by God to love one another ;
as you show by deeds towards all the brethren through the whole of 10
Macedonia. But I exhort you, brethren, to abound still more ; and be it 11
your ambition to live quietly, and to mind your own concerns ; 3 and to
work with your own hands (as I commanded you) ; that the seemly 12
order of your lives may be manifest to those without, and that you may
need help from no man.4
Happiness of But I would not have you ignorant, brethren, concerning 13
dead. r"" those who are asleep, that you sorrow not like other men, who
have no hope.5 For if we believe that Jesus died and rose again, so 14
also will God, through Jesus,6 bring back those who sleep, together with
Him. This I declare to you, in the word of the Lord, that we who are 15
living, who survive to the appearing of the Lord, shall not come before
those who sleep. For the Lord himself shall descend from heaven with 16
the shout of war,' the Archangel's voice, and the trumpet of God ; and
first the dead in Christ8 shall rise ; then we the living, who remain, shall 17
be caught up with them among the clouds 9 to meet the Lord in the air ;
and so we shall be forever with the Lord. Wherefore comfort10 one 18
another with these words.
The sudden- But of the times and seasons, brethren, you need not that I v. 1
coming a 'mo- should write to you. For yourselves know perfectly that the 2
tive to watoh-
ruiness. day 0f the Lord will come as a robber in the night ; and while 3

1 Literally " in holiness," not " unto holi- 6 This connection is more natural than that
ness," as in A. V. of the Authorized Version.
2 We have retained " us " with the Re- 7 The word denotes the shout used in battle.
ceived Text, on the ground of context ; al- 8 Equivalent to " they that sleep in Christ "
though the weight of MS. authority is in (1 Cor. xv. 18).
favor of "you." 9 " [Borne aloft from earth by upbeanng
8 The original expression is almost equiva- clouds," as it is rendered by Professor Ellicott
lent to " oe ambitions to be unambitious." in his Historical Lectures on the Life of our
4 It seems better to take this as masculine Lord, p. 234. See his note there, and in his
than as neuter. We may compare with these Comm. on 1 Thess. ii. — H.]
verses the similar directions in the speech at 10 This verb, originally to call to one's side,
Miletus, Acts xx. thence sometimes to comfort, more usually to
6 This hopelessness in death is illustrated exhort, must be translated according to the
by the funeral-inscriptions found at Thessa- context. (See on Barnabas, pp. 109, 155, and
lonica, referred to p. 286. notes. — H.)

346 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap. xi.
men say Peace and Safety, destruction shall come upon them in a
v. 4 moment, as the pangs of travail upon a woman with child ; and they shall
find no escape. But you, brethren, are not in darkness, that The Day
5 should come upon you as the robber on sleeping men ; l for you are all
the children of the light and of the day. We are not of the night, nor
6 of darkness ; therefore let us not sleep as do others, but let us watch and
7 be sober ; for they who slumber, slumber in the night ; and they who are
8 drunken, are drunken in the night ; but let us, who are of the day, be
sober ; putting on faith and love for a breastplate ; and for a helmet, th*
9 hope of salvation. For not to abide His wrath, but to obtain salvation,
hath God ordained us, through our Lord Jesus Christ, who died for us,
10 that whether we wake or sleep we should live together with Him.
11 Wherefore exhort one another, and build one another up,2 even as you
already do.
12 I beseech you, brethren, to acknowledge those who are labor- The Presbyter
to be duly re-
ing among you ; who preside over you in the Lord's name, garded.
13 and give you admonition. I beseech you to esteem them very highly in
love, for their work's sake. And maintain peace among yourselves.
Postscript [addressed to the Presbyters (?) ].8
14 But you, brethren, I exhort ; admonish the disorderly, en-
15 courage the timid, support the weak, be patient with all. Take Presbyter8-
heed that none of you return evil for evil, but strive to do good always,
16 both to one another and to all men. Rejoice evermore; pray without
1 There is some authority for the accusative plained 1 Cor. iii. 10-17. It is very difficult
plural, — " as the daylight surprises robbers ; " to express the meaning by any single word in
and this sort of transition, where a word sug- English, and yet it would weaken the expres-
gests a rapid change from one metaphor to sion too much if it were diluted into a pe-
another, is not unlike the style of St. Paul. riphrasis fully expressing its meaning.
We may add that the A. V. in translating the 3 It appears probable, as Chrysostom
word " thief" both here and elsewhere, gives thought, that those who are here directed " to
an inadequate conception of the word. It is admonish " are the same who are describea
in fact the modern Greek "klepht," and de- immediately before (v. 12) as "giving admo-
notes a bandit, who comes to murder as well nition." Also they are very solemnly directed
as to steal. For the meaning of " the Day " (v. 27) to see that the letter be read to all the
[the great day, the day of Judgment), compare Christians in Thessalonica ; which seems to
1 Cor. iii. 13. imply that they presided over the Christian
2 The full meaning is, " build one another assemblies. At the same time it must be ad-
up, that you may all together grow into a mitted that many of the duties here enjoined
temple of God." The word is frequently used are duties of all Christians.
by St. Paul in this sense, which is fully ex-

THE MALEVOLENCE OF THE JEWS.

347

ceasing; continue to give thanks, whatever be your lot; for this is the v. n
will of God in Christ Jesus concerning you. Quench not [the manifes- 18, is
tation of] the Spirit ; think not meanly of1 prophesyings ; try all [which 20
the prophets utter] ; reject2 the false, but keep the good; hold your- 21
selves aloof from every form of evil.8 22
Concluding Now may the God of peace Himself sanctify you wholly ; 23
prayers aiid
salutations, and may your spirit and soul and body all together be preserved
blameless at the appearing of our Lord Jesus Christ. Faithful is He who 24
calls you ; He will fulfil my prayer.
Brethren, pray for me. Greet all the brethren with the kiss of holi- 25
ness.4 I adjure you,5 in the name of the Lord, to see that this letter be 26
read to all the6 brethren. 27
ben^ouon. 7 ^ne grace °f our Lord Jesus Christ be with you.8 28
The strong expressions used in this letter concerning the malevolence
of the Jews, lead us to suppose that the Apostle was thinking not only
of their past opposition at Thessalonica,9 but of the difficulties with which
they were beginning to surround him at Corinth. At the very time of
his writing, that same people who had " killed the Lord Jesus and their

1 We know, from the First Epistle to
Corinth, that this warning was not unneeded
in the early church. (See 1 Cor. xiv.) The
gift of prophesying (i. e. inspired preaching)
Ind less the appearance of a supernatural gift
th»n several of the other Charisms; and
he-ice it was thought little of by those who
sought more for display than edification.
2 This word includes the notion of reject
ing that which does not abide the test.
8 Not "appearance" (A. V.), but species
under a genus.
4 This alludes to the same custom which is
referred to in Rom. xvi. 16; 1 Cor. xvi. 20;
2 Cor. xiii. 12. We find a full account of it,
as it was practised in the early church, in the
Apostolic Constitutions (book ii. ch. 57). The
men and women were placed in separate parts
of the building where they met for worship ;
and then, before receiving the Holy Com
munion, the men kissed the men, and the
women the women : before the ceremony,
a proclamation was made by th? principal
deacon : — " Let none bear malice against any ;
let none do it in hypocrisy." " Then," it is

added, " let the men salute one another, and
the women one another, with the kiss of the
Lord." It should be remembered by English
readers, that a kiss was in ancient times (as,
indeed, it is now in many foreign countries)
the ordinary mode of salutation between
friends when they met.
6 Whom does he adjure here? Plainly
those to whom, in the first instance, the letter
was addressed, or rather delivered. Now these
must probably have been the Presbyters.
0 The word for "holy" is omitted in the
best MSS.
7 It should be remarked, that this conclud
ing benediction is used by St. Paul at the end
of the Epistles to the Romans, Corinthians
(under a longer form in 2 Cor.), Galatians,
Ephesians, Philippians, and Thessalonians.
And, in a shorter form, it is used also at the
end of all his other Epistles. It seems (from
what he says in 2 Thess. iii. 17, 18) to have
been always written with his own hand.
8 The " Amen " of the Received Text is a
later addition, not found in the best MSS.
9 See above, Chap. IX.

348 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap. xi.
own prophets," and had already driven Paul " from city to city," were
showing themselves " a people displeasing to God, and enemies to all
mankind," by endeavoring to hinder him from speaking to the Gentiles
for their salvation (1 Thess. ii. 15, 16). Such expressions would natu
rally be used in a letter written under the circumstances described in the
Acts (xviii. 6), when the Jews were assuming the attitude of an organ
ized and systematic resistance,1 and assailing the Apostle in the language
of blasphemy,2 like those who had accused our Saviour of casting out
devils by Beelzebub.
Now, therefore, the Apostle left the Jews, and turned to the Gentiles.
He withdrew from his own people with one of those symbolical actions,
which, in the East, have all the expressiveness of language,3 and which,
having received the sanction of our Lord Himself,4 are equivalent to the
denunciation of woe. He shook the dust off his garments,5 and pro
claimed himself innocent of the blood 6 of those who refused to listen to
the voice which offered them salvation. A proselyte, whose name was
Justus,1 opened his door to the rejected Apostle ; and that house became
thenceforward the place of public teaching. While he continued doubt
less to lodge with Aquila and Priscilla (for the Lord had said 8 that His
Apostle should abide in the house where the " Son of peace " was), he
met his flock in the house of Justus. Some place convenient for general
meeting was evidently necessary for the continuance of St. Paul's work
in the cities where he resided. So long as possible, it was the Synagogue.
When he was exiled from the Jewish place of worship, or unable from
other causes to attend it, it was such a place as providential circumstances
might suggest. At Rome it was his own hired lodging (Acts xxviii. 30) :
at Ephesus it was the School, of Tyrannus (Acts xix. 9). Here at
Corinth it was a house " contiguous to the Synagogue," offered on the
emergency for the Apostle's use by one who had listened and believed. It
may readily be supposed that no convenient place could be found in the
manufactory of Aquila and Priscilla. There, too, in the society of Jews
lately exiled from Rome, he could hardly have looked for a congregation
of Gentiles ; whereas Justus, being a proselyte, was exactly in a position
to receive under his roof, indiscriminately, both Hebrews and Greeks.
Special mention is made of the fact, that the house of Justus was
" contiguous to the Synagogue." We are not necessarily to infer from
1 St. Luke here uses a military term. ' Nothing more is known of him. The
2 Compare Matt. xii. 24-31. name is Latin.
8 See Acts xiii. 51 [p. 162]. 8 Luke x. 6, 7. St. Paul " abode " (imp.)
4 Mark vi. 11. 6 Acts xviii. 6. in the house of Aquila and Priscilla (v. 3),
6 See Acts v. 28, xx. 26. Also Ezek. xxxiii. while it is merely said that he " went t»"
8, 9 ; and Matt, xxvii. 24. (aor.) that of Justus (v. 7).

chap. xi. CORINTHIANS REFERRED TO BY ST. PAUL. 349
this that St. Paul had any deliberate motive for choosing that locality.
Though it might be that he would show the Jews, as in a visible symbol,
that " by their sin salvation had come to the Gentiles, to provoke them to
jealousy," ! — while at the same time he remained as near to them as
possible, to assure them of his readiness to return at the moment of their
repentance. Whatever we may surmise concerning the motive of this
choice, certain consequences must have followed from the contiguity of
the house and the Synagogue, and some incident resulting from it may
have suggested the mention of the fact. The Jewish and Christian con
gregations would often meet face to face in the street ; and all the success
of the Gospel would become more palpable and conspicuous. And even
if we leave out of view such considerations as these, there is a certain
interest attaching to any phrase which tends to localize the scene of Apos
tolical labors. When we think of events that we have witnessed, we always
reproduce in the mind, however dimly, some image of the place where the
events have occurred. This condition of human thought is common to
us and to the Apostles. The house of John's mother at Jerusalem (Acts
xii.), the proseucha by the water-side at Philippi (Acts xvi.), were asso
ciated with many recollections in the minds of the earliest Christians.
And when St. Paul thought, even many years afterwards, of what
occurred on his first visit to Corinth, the images before the "inward eye"
would be not merely the general aspect of the houses and temples of
Corinth, with the great citadel overtowering them, but the Synagogue
and the house of Justus, the incidents which happened in their neighbor
hood, and the gestures and faces of those who encountered each other in
the street.
If an interest is attached to the places, a still deeper interest is attached
to the persons, referred to in the history of the planting of the Church.
In the case of Corinth, the names both of individuals and families arc
mentioned in abundance. The family of Stephanas is the first that
occurs to us ; for they seem to have been the earliest Corinthian converts.
St. Paul himself speaks of that household, in the first Epistle to the
Corinthians (xvi. 15), as " the first-fruits of Achaia."2 Another Chris
tian of Corinth, well worthy of the recollection of the church of after-
ages, was Caius (1 Cor. i. 14), with whom St. Paul found a home on his
next visit (Rom. xvi. 23), as he found one now with Aquila and Priscilla.
We may conjecture, with reason, that his present host and hostess had
now given their formal adherence to St. Paul, and that they left the
1 Rom. xi. 11. ia" were retained, we should be at liberty to
2 In Rom. xvi. b we hold " Asia " to be suppose that Epsenetus was a member of the
undoubtedly the right reading. See note on household of Stephanas, and thus we might
the passage. If, however, the reading " Acha- reconcile 1 Cor. xvi. 15 with Rom. xvi. 5.

350 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap. xi.
Synagogue with him. After the open schism had taken place, we find
the Church rapidly increasing. " Many of the Corinthians began to be
lieve when they heard, and came to receive baptism." (Acts xviii. 8.)
We derive some information from St. Paul's own writings concerning the
character of those who became believers. Not many of the philosophers,
— not many of the noble and powerful (1 Cor. i. 26), — but many of
those who had been profligate and degraded (1 Cor. vi. 11), were called.
The ignorant of this world were chosen to confound the wise, and the
weak to confound the strong. From St. Paul's language we infer that
the Gentile converts were more numerous than the Jewish. Yet one
signal victory of the Gospel over Judaism must be mentioned here, —
the conversion of Crispus (Acts xviii. 8), — who, from his position as
" ruler of the Synagogue," may be presumed to have been a man of
learning and high character, and who now, with all his family, joined
himself to the new community. His conversion was felt to be so impor
tant, that the Apostle deviated from his usual practice (1 Cor. i. 14—16),
and baptized him, as well as Caius and the household of Stephanas, with
his own hand.
Such an event as the baptism of Crispus must have had a great effect
in exasperating the Jews against St. Paul. Their opposition grew with
his success. As we approach the time when the second letter to tho
Thessalonians was written, we find the difficulties of his position increas
ing. In the first Epistle the writer's mind is almost entirely occupied
with the thought of what might be happening at Thessalonica : in the
second, the remembrance of his own pressing trial seems to mingle
more conspicuously with the exhortations and warnings addressed to
those who are absent. He particularly asks for the prayers of the
Thessalonians, that he may be delivered from the perverse and wicked
men around him, who were destitute of faith.1 It is evident that he
was in a condition of fear and anxiety. This is further manifest from
the words which were heard by him in a vision vouchsafed at this criti
cal period.2 We have already had occasion to observe, that such timely
visitations were granted to the Apostle, when he was most in need of
supernatural aid.3 In the present instance, the Lord, who spoke to him
in the night, gave him an assurance of His presence,4 and a promise of
safety, along with a prophecy of good success at Corinth, and a command
to speak boldly without fear, and not to keep silence. From this we may
infer that his faith in Christ's presence was failing, — that fear was
beginning to produce hesitation, — and that the work of extending th*

1 See below, 2 Thess. iii. 2. 8 See p. 243.
1 Acts xviii. 9, 10 * Compare Matt, xxviii. 20.

chap. xi. THE SECOND ADVENT OF THE LORD. 351
Gospel was in danger of being arrested.1 The servant of God received
conscious strength in the moment of trial and conflict ; and the divine
words were fulfilled in the formation of a large and flourishing church at
Corinth, and in a safe and continued residence in that city, through the
space of a year and six months.
Not many months of this period had elapsed when St. Paul found it
necessary to write again to the Thessalonians. The excitement which
he had endeavored to allay by his first Epistle was not arrested, and the
fanatical portion of the church had availed themselves of the impres
sion produced by St. Paul's personal teaching to increase it. It will be
remembered that a subject on which he had especially dwelt while he was
at Thessalonica,2 and to which he had also alluded in his first Epistle,3
was the second advent of our Lord. We know that our Saviour Him
self had warned His disciples that " of that day and that hour knoweth
no man, no, not the angels of heaven, but the Father only ; " and we
find these words remarkably fulfilled by the fact that the early Church,
and even the Apostles themselves, expected4 their Lord to come
again in that very generation. St. Paul himself shared in that expecta
tion, but, being under the guidance of the Spirit of Truth, he did not
deduce therefrom any erroneous practical conclusions. Some of his
disciples, on the other hand, inferred that if indeed the present world
were so soon to come to an end, it was useless to pursue their common
earthly employments any longer. They forsook their work, and gave
themselves up to dreamy expectations of the future ; so that the whole
framework of society in the Thessalonian Church was in danger of dis
solution. Those who encouraged this delusion, supported it by imagina
ry revelations of the Spirit : 5 and they even had recourse to forgery, and
circulated a letter purporting to be written by St. Paul,6 in confirmation
of their views. To check this evil, St. Paul wrote his second Epistle.
In this he endeavors to remove their present erroneous expectations of
Christ's immediate coming, by reminding them of certain signs which
must precede the second advent. He had already told them of these
signs when he was with them ; and this explains the extreme obscurity
of his description of them in the present Epistle ; for he was not giving
new information, but alluding to facts which he had already explained to
1 Observe the strong expressions which St. iv. 15, deprecates the inference that the Apos-
Paul himself uses (1 Cor. ii. 3) of his own tie definitely expected the second Advent to
state of mind during this stay at Corinth. occur in his own lifetime. — h.]
2 As he himself reminds his readers (2 5 2 Thess. ii. 2.
Thess. ii. 5), and as we find in the Acts (xvii. 8 2 Thess. ii. 2. Compare iii. 17. Per-
7). See p. 282. haps, however, these expressions may admit
8 1 Thess. v. 1-11. of being explained as referring to the rumor
4 [Professor Ellicott, in his note on 1 Thess. of a letter.

352 THE LIPE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap.xi.
them at an earlier period. It would have been well if this had been
remembered by all those who have extracted such numerous and dis
cordant prophecies and anathemas from certain passages in the following
Epistle. SECOND EPISTLE TO THE THESSALONIANS.1
1 PAUL, and Silvanus, and Timotheus, TO THE CHURCH salutation
OF THE THESSALONIANS, in God our Father, and our Lord Jesus
Christ.
2 Grace be to you, aud peace, from God our Father and our Lord Jesus
Christ.
3 1 2 am bound to give thanks to God continually on your be- Encouragementunder their per-
half, brethren, as is fitting, because of the abundant increase ?heUhop°8of°m
of your faith, and the overflowing love wherewith you are mstscomne-
4 filled, every one of you, towards each other. So that I myself boast of
you among the churches of God, for your steadfastness and faith, in all
5 the persecutions and afflictions which you are bearing. And these
things are a token that the righteous judgment of God will count you
6 worthy of His kingdom, for which you are even now suffering. For
doubtless God's righteousness cannot but render back trouble to those
7 who trouble you, and give to you, who now are troubled, rest with
me,3 when the Lord Jesus shall be revealed from heaven with the
8 angels of His might, in flames of fire, taking vengeance on those who
know not God, and will not hearken to the Glad-tidings of our Lord
9 Jesus Christ. And from 4 the presence of the Lord, and from the
brightness of His glorious majesty, they shall receive their righteous
10 doom, even an everlasting destruction, in that day when He shall come
1 It is evident that this Epistle was written (2) Silas and Timotheus were still with St.
at the time here assigned to it, soon after the Paul. 2 Thess. i. 1. It should be observed
first, from the following considerations : — that Timotheus was next with St. Paul at
( 1 ) The state of the Thessalonian Church Ephesus ; and that, before then, Silas disap-
described in both Epistles is almost exactly pears from the history.
the same. (A.) The same excitement pre- 2 See note on 1 Thess. i. 3.
vails concerning the expected advent of our 8 On the use of the plural pronoun, set
Lord, only in a greater degree. (B.) The note on 1 Thess. i. 3.
same party continued fanatically to neglect 4 The preposition here has the sense of
their ordinary employments. Compare 2 '• proceeding from.'
Thess. iii. 6-14 with 1 Thess. iv. 10-12, and
1 Thess. ii. 9.

chap. xi. SECOND EPISTLE TO THE THESSALONIANS. 353
to be glorified in His saints, and to be admired in all believers ; [and you
are of that number], for you believed my testimony. To this end I prayi. 11
continually on your behalf, that our God may count you worthy of the
calling wherewith He has called you, and mightily perfect within you all
the content of goodness l and the work of faith. That the name of our 12
Lord Jesus may be glorified in you, and that you may be glorified 2 in
Him, according to the grace of our God, and of our Lord Jesus Christ.
warning But concerning3 the appearing of our Lord Jesus Christ, ii 1
against an im- oi.ro t ". •¦
jactation of and our gathering together to meet Him, I beseech you, 2
ingr. brethren, not rashly to be shaken from your soberness of mind,
nor to be agitated either by spirit,4 or by rumor, or by letter 6 attributed to
me,8 saying that the day of the Lord is come.' Let no one deceive you by 3
any means ; for before that day, the falling-away must first have come, and
the man of sin be revealed, the son of perdition ; who opposes himself 4
and exalts himself against all that is called God, and against all worship ;
even to seat himself8 in the temple of God, and openly declare himself a
God. Do you not remember that when I was still with you, I often 9 told 5
you this ? And now you know the hinderance why he is not yet revealed, 6
in his own season. For the mystery of lawlessness 10 is already working, 7
only he, who now hinders, will hinder till he be taken out of the way ;
and then the lawless one will be revealed, whom the Lord shall consume $
with the breath of His mouth,11 and shall destroy with the brightness of
1 The same word is nsed in the sense of 6 Literally " as though originated by me : "
good will, good pleasure, satisfaction, in Luke ii. the words may include both " spirit," " ru-
14 and Rom. x. i. The A. V. here would mor," and " letter."
require a word to be supplied. 7 Literally " is present." So the verb is
2 The glory of our Lord at His coming always nsed in the New Testament. See
will be manifested in His people (see v. 10) ; Rom. viii. 38; 1 Cor. iii. 22; Gal. i. 4; 2
that is, they, by virtue of their union with Tim. iii. 1 ; Heb. ix. 9.
Him, will partake of His glorious likeness. 8 The received text interpolates here " as
Cf. Rom. viii. 17, 18, 19. And, even in this God," but the MSS. do not confirm this read-
world, this glorification takes place partially, ing.
by their moral conformity to His image. See 9 The verb is in the imperfect.
Rom. viii. 30, and 2 Cor. iii. 18. 10 The proper meaning of avouoc is one un-
3 In respect of, or perhaps (as Prof. Jowett restrained by law : hence it is often used as u
takes it) on behalf of, as though St. Paul were transgressor, or, generally, a wicked man, as
pleading in honor of that day ; it is wrongly avouia is used often simply for iniquity ; but in
translated in A. V. as an adjuration. this passage it seems best to keep to the origi-
4 i. c. any pretended revelation of those nal meaning of the word.
who claimed inspiration. u This appears to be an allusion to (al-
6 See the preceding remarks upon the though not an exact quotation of ) Isaiah xi.
occasion of this Epistle. 4 ; — " With the breath of His lips He shall
23

354 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap. n.
ii. 9 His appearing. But the appearing of that lawless one shall be in the
strength of Satan's working, with all the might and signs and wonders of
10 falsehood, aud all the delusions of unrighteousness, for those who are in
the way of perdition ; because they received not the love of the truth,
11 whereby they might be saved. For this cause, God will send upon them
12 an inward working of delusion, making them believe in lies, that all
should be condemned who have not believed the truth, but have taken
pleasure in unrighteousness.
13 But for you, brethren beloved of the Lord, I am bound to Exhortation
thank God continually, because He chose you from the first n°s/andifa8t'
unto salvation, in sanctification of the Spirit, and belief of the ° e enoe'
14 truth. And to this He called you through my Glad-tidings, that you
15 might obtain the glory of our Lord Jesus Christ. Therefore, brethren, be
steadfast, and hold fast the teaching which has been delivered to you,
16 whether by my words or by my letters. And may our Lord Jesus Christ
Himself, and our God and Father, who has loved us, and has given us in
His grace a consolation that is eternal, and a hope that cannot fail,
17 comfort your hearts, and establish you in all goodness both of word and
deed.
Si. l Finally, brethren, pray for me, that the word of the Lord He asks their
Jesus may hold its onward course, and that its glory may be Prayers-
2 shown forth towards others as towards you ; and that I may be delivered
3 from the perverse and wicked ; for not all men have faith. But the Lord
4 is faithful, and He will keep you steadfast, and guard you from evil. And
I rely upon you in the Lord, that you are following and will follow my
5 precepts. And may the Lord guide your hearts to the love of God, and
to the steadfastness of Christ.
6 I charge you, brethren, in the name of the Lord Jesus Exhorts to an
orderly and
Christ, to withdraw yourselves from every brother who walks apPlaiingfS
disorderly, and not according to the rules which I delivered, ampler"
7 For you know yourselves the way to follow my example ; you know that
my life among you was not disorderly, nor was I fed by any man's
8 bounty, but earned my bread by my own labor, toiling night and day,
destroy the impious man." (LXX. version.) Paul's thoughts) to the Messiah's coming, and
Some of the Rabbinical commentators applied interpreted " the impious " to mean an individ-
this prophecy (which was probably in St. ual opponent of the Messiah.

chap. xi. CHRISTIAN CORRESPONDENCE. 355
that I might not be burdensome to any of you.1 And this I did, not iii. 9
because I am without the right 2 [of being maintained by those to whom
I minister], but that I might make myself a pattern for you to imitate.
For when I was with you I often 3 gave you this rule : " If any man will 10
not work, neither let him eat." Whereas I hear that some among you n
are walking disorderly, neglecting their own work, and meddling 4 with
that of others. Such, therefore, I charge and exhort, by the authority of 12
our Lord Jesus Christ, to work in quietness, and eat their own bread.
Mode of deal- But you, brethren, notwithstanding,5 be not weary of doing 13
obedience* good. If any man be disobedient to my written word,6 mark 14
that man, and cease from intercourse with him, that be may be brought
to shame. Yet count him not as an enemy, but admonish him as a 15
brother. And may the Lord of peace Himself give you peace in all ways 16
and at all seasons. The Lord be with you all.
An autograph The salutation of me Paul with my own hand, which is my n
postscript the
sign of genu- token in every letter. Thus I write.7
lneness. J
ol°ndiction? The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you all.8 18
Such was the second of the two letters which St. Paul wrote to Thes
salonica during his residence at Corinth. Such was the Christian cor
respondence now established, in addition to the political and commercial
correspondence existing before, between the two capitals of Achaia and
Macedonia. Along with the official documents which passed between the
governors of the contiguous provinces,9 and the communications between
the merchants of the Northern and Western ^Egean, letters were now
sent, which related to the establishment of a "kingdom not of this'
world," 10 and to " riches " beyond the discovery of human enterprise.11
1 Compare the speech at Miletus, Acts xx. 7 " Thus." With this we may compare
2 See note on 1 Thess. ii. 6. Gal. vi. 11. We have before remarked that
8 Imperfect. St. Paul's letters were written by an amanuen-
4 The characteristic paronomasia here is not sis, with the exception of an autograph post-
exactly translatable into English. " Busy-bodies script. Compare Rom. xvi. 22.
who do no business " would be an imitation. 8 "Amen " here (as in the end of 1 Thess.)
6 i. e. although your kindness may have is a subsequent addition.
been abused by such idle trespassers on your 9 Cicero's Cilician Correspondence fur-
bounty, nishes many specimens of the letters which
6 Literally, my word [sent] by the letter, passed between the governors of neighboring
which probably refers to the directions sent in provinces.
the former letter, 1 Thess. iv. 11, 12. So a 10 John xviii. 36.
previous letter is referred to, 1 Cor. v. 9, and u Eph. iii. 8.
2 Cor. vii. 8.

356

THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL.

The influence of great cities has always been important on the wider
movements of human life. We see St. Paul diligently using this in
fluence, during a protracted residence at Corinth, for the spreading and
strengthening of the Gospel in Achaia and beyond. As regards the
province of Achaia, we have no reason to suppose that he confined his
activity to its metropolis. The expression used by St. Luke 1 need only
denote that it was his headquarters, or general place of residence. Com
munication was easy and frequent, by land or by water,2 with other parts
of the province. Two short days' journey to the south were the Jews of
Argos,3 who might be to those of Corinth what the Jews of Bercea had
been to those of Thessalonica.4 About the same distance to the east was
the city of Athens,5 which had been imperfectly evangelized, and could be
visited without danger. Within a walk of a few hours, along a road
busy with traffic, was the seaport of Cenchrea, known to us as the resi
dence of a Christian community.6 These were the " Churches of God "
(2 Thess. i. 4), among whom the Apostle boasted of the patience and the
faith of the Thessalonians,7 — the homes of " the saints in all Achaia"
(2 Cor. i. 1), saluted at a later period, with the Church of Corinth,8 in a
letter written from Macedonia. These Churches had alternately the
blessings of the presence and the letters — the oral and the written teach
ing — of St. Paul. The former of these blessings is now no longer
granted to us ; but those long and wearisome journeys, which withdrew
the teacher so often from his anxious converts, have resulted in our pos
session of inspired Epistles, in all their freshness and integrity, and with
all their lessons of wisdom and love.

Coin of Thessalonica.*

1 Acts xviii. 11.
4 Much of the intercourse in Greece has
always gone on by small coasters. Pouque-
ville mentions traces of a paved road between
Corinth and Argos.
8 See pp. 17 and 335.
4 See above, p. 293.
6 We have not entered into the question of
St. Paul's journey from Athens to Corinth.
He may have travelled by the coast road

through Eleusis and Megara ; or a sail of a
few hours, with a fair wind, would take him
from the Piraeus to Cenchrea.
6 Rom. xvi. 1.
' Compare 1 Thess. i. 7, 8.
8 It is possible that the phrase " in every
place " ( 1 Cor i. 2 ) may have the same meaning.
9 From the British Museum. For a long
series of coins of this character, see Mionnet
and the Supplement.

CHAPTER XH.
The Isthmus and Acrocorinthus. — Early History ot Corinth. — Its Trade and Wealth.—
Corinth nnder the Romans. — Province of Achaia. — Gallio the Governor. — Tumult at
Corinth. — Cenchrea. — Voyage by Ephesus to Caesarea. — Visit to Jerusalem. — Antioch.
NOW that we have entered upon the first part of the long series of St.
Paul's letters, we seem to be arrived at a new stage of the Apostle's
biography. The materials for a more intimate knowledge are before us.
More life is given to the picture. We have advanced from the field of
geographical description and general history to the higher interest of per
sonal detail. Even such details as relate to the writing materials employed
in the Epistles, and the mode in which these epistles were transmitted
from city to city, — all stages in the history of an Apostolic letter, from
the hand of the amanuensis who wrote from the author's inspired dicta
tion, to the opening and reading of the document in the public assembly
of the Church to which it was addressed, — have a sacred claim on the
Christian's attention. For the present we must defer the examination of
such particulars.1 We remain with the Apostle himself, instead of follow
ing the journeys of his letters to Thessalonica, and tracing the effects
which the last of them produced. We have before us a protracted resi
dence in Corinth,2 a voyage by sea to Syria,3 and a journey by land from
Antioch to Ephesus,4 before we come to the next group of St. Paul's
Epistles. We must linger first for a time in Corinth, the great city where he
staid a longer time than at any point on his previous journeys, and
from which, or to which, the most important of his letters were written.5
And, according to the plan we have hitherto observed, we proceed to
elucidate its geographical position, and the principal stages of its history.
The Isthmus 6 is the most remarkable feature in the Geography of
Greece ; and the peculiar relation which it established between the land
and the water — and between the Morea and the Continent — had the

1 See a note on this subject in Ch. XXVI. 8 It is from this Greek " bridge of the
2 Acts xviii. 11-18. 8 Acts xviii. 18-22. sea" that the name isthmus has been given to
• Acts xviii. 23. See xix. 1. every similar neck of land in the world.
5 The Epistles to the Thessalonians, Corin
thians, and Romans. 387

358 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL chap, xn
utmost effect on the whole course of the History of Greece. When we
were considering the topography and aspect of Athens, all the associa
tions which surrounded us were Athenian. Here at the Isthmus, we
are, as it were, at the centre of the activity of the Greek race in general.
It has the closest connection with all their most important movements,
both military and commercial.
In all the periods of Greek history, from the earliest to the latest, we
see the military importance of the Isthmus. The phrase of Pindar is,
that it was " the bridge of the sea : " it formed the only line of march
for an invading or retreating army. Xenophon speaks of it as " the gate
of the Peloponnesus," the closing of which would make all ingress and
egress impossible. And we find that it was closed at various times, by
being fortified and re-fortified by a wall, some traces of which remain to the
present day. In the Persian war, when consternation was spread amongst
the Greeks by the death of Leonidas, the wall was first built. In the
Peloponnesian war, when the Greeks turned fratricidal arms against each
other, the Isthmus was often the point of the conflict between the Athe
nians and their enemies. In the time of the Theban supremacy, the wall
again appears as a fortified line from sea to sea. When Greece became
Roman, the provincial arrangements neutralized, for a time, the military
importance of the Isthmus. But when the barbarians poured in from
the North, like the Persians of old, its wall was repaired by Valerian.
Again it was rebuilt by Justinian, who fortified it with a hundred and
fifty towers. And we trace its history through the later period of the
Venetian power in the Levant, from the vast works of 1463, to the peace
of 1699, when it was made the boundary of the territories of the Re
public.1 Conspicuous, both in connection with the military defences of the
Isthmus, and in the prominent features of its scenery, is the Acrocorinthus
or citadel of Corinth, which rises in form and abruptness like the rock of
Dumbarton. But this comparison is quite inadequate to express the
magnitude of the Corinthian citadel. It is elevated two thousand feet 3
above the level of the sea ; it throws a vast shadow across the plain at its
base ; the ascent is a journey involving some fatigue ; and the space of
ground on the summit is so extensive, that it contained a whole town,3
1 The wall was not built in a straight line, the shadow of the Acrocorinthus, of a conical
but followed the sinuosities of the ground. shape, extended exactly half across its length,
The remains of square towers are visible in the point of the cone being central between
some places. The eastern portion abutted the two seas." — Dr. Clarke.
on the Sanctuary of Neptune, where the Isth- ' Dodwell and Clarke. The city, accord-
mian games are held. ing to Xenophon, was forty stadia in circum-
2 Dodwell. The ascent is by a zigzag ference without the Acropolis, and eighty- five
road, which Strabo says was thirty stadia in with it.
length. " Looking down upon the isthmus.

CHAP. in. THE ACROCORINTHUS. 359
which, under the Turkish dominion, had several mosques. Yet notwith
standing its colossal dimensions, its sides are so precipitous, that a few
soldiers are enough to guard it.1 The possession of this fortress has been
the object of repeated struggles in the latest wars between the Turks and
the Greeks, and again between the Turks and the Venetians. It was said to
Philip, when he wished to acquire possession of the Morea, that the Acro
corinthus was one of the horns he must seize, in order to secure the heifer.
Thus Corinth might well be called " the eye of Greece " in a military
sense, as Athens has often been so called in another sense. If the rock
of Minerva was the Acropolis of the Athenian people, the mountain of
the Isthmus was truly named " the Acropolis of the Greeks."
It will readily be imagined that the view from the summit is magnifi
cent and extensive.2 A sea is on either hand. Across that which lies on
the east, a clear sight is obtained of the Acropolis of Athens, at a dis
tance of forty-five miles.3 The mountains of Attica and Boeotia, and the
islands of the Archipelago, close the prospect in this direction. Beyond
the western sea, which flows in from the Adriatic, are the large masses
of the mountains of north-eastern Greece, with Parnassus towering
above Delphi. Immediately beneath us is the narrow plain which
separates the seas. The city itself is on a small table-land 4 of no great
elevation, connected with the northern base of the Acrocorinthus. At
the edge of the lower level are the harbors which made Corinth the em
porium of the richest trade of the East and the West.
We are thus brought to that which is really the characteristic both of
Corinthian geography and Corinthian history, its close relation to the
commerce of the Mediterranean. Plutarch says, that there was a want
1 Plutarch says that it was guarded by 400 tered up and down it, is none of the least of
soldiers, 50 dogs, and as many keepers. the ornaments of this prospect. The town
2 Wheler's description is as follows : — also that lieth north of the castle, in little
" We mounted to the top of the highest point, knots of houses, surrounded with orchards
and had one of the most agreeable prospects and gardens of oranges, lemons, citrons, and
in the world. On the right hand of us the cypress-trees, and mixed with cornfields between,
Saronic Gulf, with all its little islands strewed is a sight not less delightful. So that it is hard
up and down it, to Cape Colonne on the to judge whether this plain is more beautiful to
Promontory Sunium. Beyond that the is- the beholders or profitable to the inhabitants."
lands of the Archipelago seemed to close up This was in 1675, before the last conflicts of
the mouth of the Gulf. On the left hand of us the Turks and Venetians.
we had the Gulf of Lepanto or Corinth, a3 8 " As from the Parthenon at Athens we
far as beyond Sicyon, bounded northward with had seen the citadel of Corinth, so now we '
all these famous mountains of old times, with had a commanding view, across the Saronic
the Isthmus, even to Athens, lying in a row, Gulf, of Salamis and the Athenian Acrop-
and presenting themselves orderly to our view. olis." — Dr. Clarke. See above, under
The plain of Corinth towards Sicyon or Athens.
Basilico is well watered by two rivulets, well 4 Leake's description entirely corresponds
tilled, well plaDted with olive-yards and vine- with Strabo's.
yards, and, having many little villages scat-

360 THE LIPE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap, xn,
of good harbors in Achaia ; and Strabo speaks of the circumnavigation
of the Morea as dangerous.1 Cape Malea was proverbially formidable,
and held the same relation to the voyages of ancient days which the
Cape of Good Hope does to our own.2 Thus, a narrow and level isth
mus,3 across which smaller vessels could be dragged from gulf to gulf,4
was of inestimable value to the early traders of the Levant. And the
two harbors, which received the ships of a more maturely developed
trade, — Cenchrea5 on the Eastern Sea, and Lechaeum6 on the Western,
with a third and smaller port, called Schcenus,7 where the isthmus was
narrowest, — form an essential part of our idea of Corinth. Its common
title in the poets is " the city of the two seas." 8 It is allegorically
represented in art as a female figure on a rock, between two other
figures, each of whom bears a rudder, the symbol of navigation and
trade.9 It is the same image which appears under another form in the
words of the rhetorician, who said that it was " the prow and the stern
of Greece." 10
As we noticed above a continuous fortress which was carried across
the Isthmus, in connection with its military history, so here we have to
mention another continuous work which was attempted, in connection
with its mercantile history. This was the ship canal ; — which, after
being often projected, was about to be begun again near the very time
of St. Paul's visit.11 Parallels often suggest themselves between the
relation of the parts of the Mediterranean to each other, and those of
the Atlantic and Pacific : for the basins of the " Midland Sea " were to
the Greek and Roman trade what the Oceanic spaces are to ours. And

1 He adds that the Sicilian sea was avoided of Neptune and the eastern portion of the
by mariners as much as possible. Isthmian wall. The ship is described as sail-
2 A proverb said of this south-eastern point ing to this port in the early times when Athens
of the Morea : " When you are round Cape had the presidency of the games.
Malea, forget all you have at home.'' 8 One phrase which was used of it is that
8 See above, note on the word " Isthmus." which we find in Acts xxvii. 41.
4 Hence the narrowest part of the Isthmus 9 See this on the coin at the end of Chap.
was called by a word which in meaning and in XIII.
piratic associations corresponds with the Tar- 10 The phrase seems to have been pro-
bert of Scotch geography. The distance verbial.
across is about three miles ; nearer Corinth it u Demetrius Poliorcetes, Julius Csesar, and
is six miles, whence the name of the modern Caligula had all entertained the notion of cut-
• village of Hexamili. ting through the Isthmus. Nero really began
s For Cenchrea, see below, pp. 366, 367. the undertaking in the year 52, but soon de-
It was seventy stadia distant from the city. sisted. See Leake (pp. 297-302), who quotes
6 Lechseum was united to Corinth by long all the authorities. The portion of the trench
walls. It was about twelve stadia distant from which remains is at the narrowest part, near
the city. the shore of the Corinthian Gulf. Dodwell
7 Schcenus was at the point where the came upon it, after crossing Mount Geraneia
Isthmus was narrowest, close to the Sanctuary from Attica.

chap. xn. COMMERCE AND WEALTH OF CORINTH. 361
it is difficult, in speaking of a visit to the Isthmus of Corinth in the year
52,1 — which only preceded by a short interval the work of Nero's engi
neers, — not to be reminded of the Isthmus of Panama in the year 1852,
during which active progress was made in an undertaking often project
ed, but never yet carried into effect.2
There is this difference, however, between the Oceanic and the Medi
terranean Isthmus, that one of the great cities of the ancient world always
existed at the latter. What some future Darien may be destined to be
come, we cannot prophesy : but, at a very early date, we find Corinth
celebrated by the poets for its wealth. This wealth must inevitably have
grown up, from its mercantile relations, even without reference to its two
seas, — if we attend to the fact on which Thucydides laid stress, that it
was the place through which all ingress and egress took place between
Northern and Southern Greece, before the development of commerce
by water But it was its conspicuous position on the narrow neck of land
between the ^Egean and Ionian Seas, which was the main cause of its
commercial greatness. The construction of the ship Argo is assigned by
mythology to Corinth. Tlie £>amians obtained their shipbuilders from
her. The first Greek triremes, — the first Greek sea-fights, — are con
nected with her history. Neptune was her god. Her colonies were
spread over distant coasts in the East and West; and ships came from
every sea to her harbors. Thus she became the common resort and the
universal market of the Greeks.3 Her population and wealth were fur
ther augmented by the manufactures in metallurgy, dyeing, and porce
lain, which grew up in connection with the import and export of goods.
And at periodical intervals the crowding of her streets and the activity
of her trade received a new impulse from the strangers who flocked to
the Isthmian games ; — a subject to which our attention will often be called
hereafter, but which must be passed over here with a simple allusion.4
If we add all these particulars together, we see ample reason why the
wealth, luxury, and profligacy of Corinth were proverbial 5 in the ancient
world. In passing from the fortunes of the earlier, or Greek Corinth, to its his
tory under the Romans, the first scene that meets us is one of disaster
1 The arguments for this date may be seen Corinth to a ship loaded with merchandise.
in Wieseler. We shall return to the subject and says that a perpetual fair was held yearly
again. and daily at the Isthmus.
2 Our first edition was published in 1832. 4 See the beginning of Chap. XX., and the
At that time the various plans for an inter- plan of the Posidonium there given.
oceanic canal were very much before the pub- 6 " Non cuivis homini contingit adire Co
lic. Now at least the railway is open for rinthum." — Hor. Ep. i. 17, 36. The word
traffic from ocean to ocean. " Corinthianize " was used proverbially foi an
3 One writer in another place compares immoral life.

362 THE LIFE AND- EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap. hi.
and ruin. The destruction of this city by Mummius, about the same
time that Carthage ] was destroyed by Scipio, was so complete, that, like
its previous wealth, it passed into a proverb. Its works of skill and lux
ury were destroyed or carried away. Polybius, the historian, saw Roman
soldiers playing at draughts on the pictures of famous artists ; and the
exhibition of vases and statues that decorated the triumph of the Capitol
introduced a new era in the habits of the Romans. Meanwhile, the very
place of the city from which these works were, taken remained desolate
for many years.2 The honor of presiding over the Isthmian games was
given to Sicyon ; and Corinth ceased even to be a resting-place of travel
lers between the East and the West.3 But a new Corinth rose from the
ashes of the old. Julius Caesar, recognizing the importance of the Isth
mus as a military and mercantile position, sent thither a colony of Italians,
who were chiefly freedmen.4 This new establishment rapidly increased
by the mere force of its position. Within a few years it grew, as Sinca-
pore5 has grown in our days, from nothing to an enormous city. The
Greek merchants, who had fled on the Roman conquest to Delos and the
neighboring coasts, returned to their former home. The Jews settled
themselves in a place most convenient both for the business of commerce
and for communication with Jerusalem.6 Thus, when St. Paul arrived at
Corinth after his sojourn at Athens, he found himself in the midst of a
numerous population of Greeks and Jews. They were probably far more
numerous than the Romans, though the city had the constitution of a
colony? and was the metropolis of a province.
It is commonly assumed that Greece was constituted as a province un
der the name of Achaia, when Corinth was destroyed by Mummius. But
this appears to be a mistake. There seems to have been an intermediate
period, during which the country had a nominal independence, as was
the case with the contiguous province of Macedonia. The description
1 See Chap. I. p. 13. 4 Professor Stanley notices the great num-
2 "Nevertheless," says Colonel Leake, ber of names of Corinthian Christians (Caius,
" the site, I conceive, cannot have been quite Quartus, Fortunatus, Achaicus, Crispus, Jus-
uninhabited, as the Romans neither destroyed tus), which indicate "either a Roman or a
the public buildings nor persecuted the religion servile origin." Pref to Corinthians.
of the Corinthians. And as many of those 5 gee tne Life 0f Sir Stamford Raffles and
buildings were still perfect in the time of later notices of the place in Rajah Brooke's
Pausanias, there must have been some persons journals, &c.
who had the care of them during the century 8 See the preceding chapter for the estab-
of desolation." lishment of the Jews at Corinth.
8 We have noticed above (p. 333, n. 4) that i See the Latin letters on its coins. It»
on Cicero's journey between the East and full name was " Colonia Laus Julia Corin-
West, we find him resting, not at Corinth, thus." See coin at the end of this chapter.
but at Athens. In the time of Ovid, the city
was rising again.

chap. xn. ROMAN PROVINCE OF ACHAIA. 363
which has been given of the political limits of Macedonia (Ch. IX.) de
fines equally the extent of Achaia. It was bounded on all other sides by
the sea, and was nearly co-extensive with the kingdom of Modern Greece.
The name of Achaia was given to it, in consequence of the part played
by the Achaean league in the last independent struggles of ancient
Greece ; and Corinth, the head of that league, became the metropolis.1
The province experienced changes of government, such as those which
have been alluded to in the case of Cyprus.2 At first it was proconsular.
Afterwards it was placed by Tiberius under a procurator of his own.
But in the reign of Claudius it was again reckoned among the " unarmed
provinces," 3 and governed by a proconsul.
One of the proconsuls who were sent out to govern the province of
Achaia in the course of St. Paul's second missionary journey was Gallio.4
His original name was Annaeus Novatus, and he was the brother of
Annaeus Seneca the philospher. The name under which he was known
to us in sacred and secular history was due to his adoption into the family
of Junius Gallio the rhetorician. The ' time of his government at
Corinth, as indicated by the sacred historian, must be placed between the
years 52 and 54, if the dates we have assigned to St. Paul's movements
be correct. We have no exact information on this subject from any
secular source, nor is he mentioned by any Heathen writer as having
been proconsul of Achaia. But there are some incidental notices of his
life, which give rather a curious confirmation of what is advanced above.
We are informed by Tacitus and Dio that he died in the year 65. Pliny
says that after his consulship he had a serious illness, for the removal of
which he tried a sea-voyage : and from his brother Seneca we learn that
it was in Achaia that he went on shipboard for the benefit of his health.
If we knew the year of Gallio's consulship, our chronological result
would be brought within narrow limits. We do not possess this informa
tion ; but it has been reasonably conjectured that his promotion, if due
to his brother's influence, would be subsequent to the year 49, in which
the philospher returned from his exile in Corsica, and had the youthful
Nero placed under his tuition. The interval of time thus marked out
between the restoration of Seneca and the death of Gallio, includes the
narrower period assigned by St. Luke to the proconsulate in Achaia.
The coming of a new governor to a province was an event of great im
portance. The whole system of administration, the general prosperity,
the state of political parties, the relative position of different sections of
1 Ritter says that this is the meaning of which were proconsular and required the
" Corinthus Achaia? urbs," in Tac. Hist. ii. 1. presence of no army. See p. 214, n. 11.
3 See Ch. V. 4 Acts xviii. 12.
' A phrase applied to those provinces

364 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL chap.xu
the population, were necessarily affected by his personal character. The
provincials were miserable or happy, according as a Verres or a Cicero
was sent from Rome. As regards the personal character of Gallio, the
inference we should naturally draw from the words of St. Luke closely
corresponds with what we are told by Seneca. His brother speaks of him
with singular affection, not only as a man of integrity and honesty, but
as one who won universal regard by his amiable temper and popular
manners.1 His conduct on the occasion of the tumult at Corinth is quite
in harmony with a character so described. He did not allow himself, like
Pilate, to be led into injustice by the clamor of the Jews ; 2 and yet he
overlooked, with easy indifference, an outbreak of violence which a
sterner and more imperious governor would at once have arrested.3
The details of this transaction were as follows : — The Jews, anxious to
profit by a change of administration, and perhaps encouraged by the well-
known compliance of Gallio's character, took an early opportunity of
accusing St. Paul before him. They had already set themselves in battle
array 4 against him, and the coming of the new governor was the signal
for a general attack.5 It is quite evident that the act was preconcerted
and the occasion chosen. Making use of the privileges they enjoyed as a
separate community, and well aware that the exercise of their worship
was protected by the Roman State,6 they accused St. Paul of violating
their own religious Law. They seem to have thought, if this violation of
Jewish law could be proved, that St. Paul would become amenable to the
criminal law of the Empire ; or, perhaps, they hoped, as afterwards at
Jerusalem, that he would be given up into their hands for punishment.
Had Gallio been like Festus or Felix, this might easily have happened ;
and then St. Paul's natural resource would have been to appeal to the
Emperor, on the ground of his citizenship. But the appointed time of
his visit to Rome was not yet come, and the continuance of his missionary
labors was secured by the character of the governor, who was providen
tially sent at this time to manage the affairs of Achaia.
The scene is set before us by St. Luke with some details which give us
a vivid notion of what took place. Gallio is seated on that proconsular
chair 7 from which judicial sentences were pronounced by the Roman
1 The same character is given of him by Jews were citizens under their Ethnarch, like
the poet Statius. the Romans under their Juridicus. We need
2 Acts xviii. 14. not discuss here the later position of the Jews,
8 Acts xviii. 17. after Caracalla had made all freemen citizens.
4 See p. 348, n. 1 . i This chair, or tribunal, " the indispensa-
6 Acts xviii. 12. ble symbol of the Roman judgment-seat," as
6 Compare Joseph. War, ii. 14, 4, on it has been called, is mentioned three times in
Ctesarea. In Alexandria, there were four dis- the course of this narrative. It was of two
linct classes of population, among which the kinds: (1) fixed in some open and pttblfc

chap. xn. 8T. PAUL ACCUSED BEFORE GALLIO. 365
magistrates. To this we must doubtless add the other insignia of Roman
power, which were suitable to a colony and the metropolis of a province.
Before this Heathen authority the Jews are preferring their accusation
with eager clamor. Their chief speaker is Sosthenes, the successor of
Crispus, or (it may be) the ruler of another synagogue.1 The Greeks 2
are standing round, eager to hear the result, and to learn something
of the new governor's character; and, at the same time, hating the
Jews, and ready to be the partisans of St. Paul. At the moment when
the Apostle is " about to open his mouth," 3 Gallio will not even hear his
defence, but pronounces a decided and peremptory judgment.
His answer was that of a man who knew the limits of his office, and
felt that he had no time to waste on the religious technicalities of the
Jews. Had it been a case in which the Roman law had been violated by
any breach of the peace or any act of dishonesty, then it would have
been reasonable and right that the matter should have been fully investi
gated ; but since it was only a question of the Jewish law, relating to
the disputes of Hebrew superstition,4 and to names of no public interest,
he utterly refused to attend to it. They might excommunicate the offend
er, or inflict on him any of their ecclesiastical punishments ; but he
would not meddle with trifling quarrels, which were beyond his juris
diction. And without further delay he drove the Jews away from before
his judicial chair.5
The effect of this proceeding must have been to produce the utmost
rage and disappointment among the Jews. With the Greeks and other
bystanders6 the result was very different. Their dislike of a supersti
tious and misanthropic nation was gratified. They held the forbearance
of Gallio as a proof that their own religious liberties would be respected
under the new administration ; and, with the disorderly impulse of a mob
which has been kept for some time in suspense, they rushed upon the
ruler of the synagogue, and beat him in the very presence of the procon
sular tribunal. Meanwhile, Gallio took no notice 7 of the injurious pun-
place; (2) movable, and taken by the Roman 2 See note 6, below.
magistrates to be placed wherever they might 8 Acts xviii. 14.
sit in a judicial character. Probably here i Acts xviii. 15. We recognize here that
and in the case of Pilate (John xix. 13) the much had been made by the Jews of the name
former kind of seat is intended. See Smith's of " Christ " being given to Jesus.
Dictionary of Antiquities, under " Sella." 6 Acts xviii. 16.
1 Whether Sosthenes had really been b The true reading here does not specify
elected to fill the place of Crispus, or was only wno the persons were who beat Sosthenes. It
a co-ordinate officer in the same or some other cannot, however, be well doubted that they
synagogue, must be left undetermined. On were Greeks. The reading " Jews," found in
the organization of the synagogues, see Ch. some MSS., is evidently wrong.
VI. p. 154. It should be added, that we can- 7 Acts xviii. 17. See above on Gallio's
not confidently identify this Sosthenes with character.
the " brother" whose name occurs 1 Cor. i. 1.

366 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap.xu.
ishment thus inflicted on the Jews, and with characteristic indifference
left Sosthenes to his fate.
Thus the accusers were themselves involved in disgrace ; Gallio
obtained a high popularity among the Greeks, and St. Paul was enabled
to pursue his labors in safety. Had he been driven away from Corinth,
the whole Christian community of the place might have been put in
jeopardy. But the result of the storm was to give shelter to the infant
Church, with opportunity of safe and continued growth. As regards the
Apostle himself, his credit rose with the disgrace of his opponents. So
far as he might afterwards be noticed by the Roman governor or the
Greek inhabitants of the city, he would be regarded as an injured man.
As his own discretion had given advantage to the holy cause at Philippi,
by involving his opponents in blame,1 so here the most imminent peril
was providentially turned into safety and honor.
Thus the assurance communicated in the vision was abundantly
fulfilled. Though bitter enemies had " set on " Paul (Acts xviii. 10), no
one had " hurt " him. The Lord had been " with him," and " much
people" had been gathered into His Church. At length the time came
when the Apostle deemed it right to leave Achaia and revisit Judaea,
induced (as it would appear) by a motive which often guided his
journeys, the desire to be present at the great gathering of the Jews at
one of their festivals,2 and possibly also influenced by the movements of
Aquila and Priscilla, who were about to proceed from Corinth to
Ephesus. Before his departure, he took a solemn farewell of the assem
bled Church.3 How touching St. Paul's farewells must have been, espe
cially after a protracted residence among his brethren and disciples, we
may infer from the affectionate language of his letters ; and one specimen
is given to us of these parting addresses, in the Acts of the Apostles.
From the words spoken at Miletus (Acts xx.), we may learn what was
said and felt at Corinth. He could tell his disciples here, as he told
them there, that he had taught them " publicly and from house to
house ; " 4 that he was " pure from the blood of all men ; " 5 that by the
space of a year and a half he had " not ceased to warn every one night
and day with tears." 6 And doubtless he forewarned them of " grievous
wolves entering in among them, of men speaking perverse things arising7
of themselves, to draw away disciples after them." And he could appeal
1 See p. 269. 8 Acts xviii. 18.
2 See Acts xviii. 21. There is little doubt * Acts xx. 20.
that the festival was Pentecost. We should 6 v. 26. Compare xviii. 6, and see p. 348.
not, however, leave unnoticed that it is doubt- 6 v. 31. Couroare wbat is said of his tears
ful whether this allusion to the festival ought at Philippi. Philip, m. io.
to be in the text. 7 vv. 29. 30.

chap. in. CENCHREA. 367
to them, with the emphatic gesture of " those hands " which had labored
at Corinth, in proof that he had " coveted no man's gold or silver," and in
confirmation of the Lord's words, that " it is more blessed to give than to
receive." 1 Thus he departed, with prayers and tears, from those who
" accompanied him to the ship " with many misgivings that they might
" see his face no more." 2
The three points on the coast to which our attention is called in
the brief notice of this voyage contained in the Acts,3 are Cenchrea,
the harbor of Corinth ; Ephesus, on the western shore of Asia
Minor; and Caesarea Stratonis, in Palestine. More suitable occasions
will be found hereafter for descriptions of Caesarea and Ephesus.
The present seems to require a few words to be said concerning
Cenchrea. After descending from the low table-land on which Corinth was situ
ated, the road which connected the city with its eastern harbor extended
a distance of eight or nine miles across the Isthmian plain. Cenchrea
has fallen with Corinth ; but the name 4 still remains to mark the place
of the port, which once commanded a large trade with Alexandria and
Antioch, with Ephesus and Thessalonica, and the other cities of the
^Egean. That it was a town of some magnitude may be inferred from
the attention which Pausanias devotes to it in the description of the en
virons of Corinth ; and both its mercantile character, and the pains
which had been taken in its embellishment, are well symbolized in the
coin 5 which represents the port with a temple on each enclosing promon
tory, and a statue of Neptune on a rock between them.
From this port St. Paul began his voyage to Syria. But before the
vessel sailed, one of his companions performed a religious ceremony
which must not be unnoticed, since it is mentioned in Scripture. Aquila 6
had bound himself by one of those vows, which the Jews often volunta
rily took, even when in foreign countries, in consequence of some mercy
received, or some deliverance from danger, or other occurrence which
had produced a deep religious impression on the mind. The obligations
of these vows were similar to those in the case of Nazarites, — as regards
abstinence from strong drinks and legal pollutions, and the wearing of
1 Compare w. 33-35 with xviii. 3, and ments from the structure of the original are
with 1 Cor. iv. 12. rather in favor of referring the vow, not to
2 w. 36-38. Aquila, but to St. Paul. The difficulty lies
8 Acts xviii. 18-22. not so much in supposing that Paul took a
4 The modern name is Kichries. Jewish vow (see Acts xxi. 26), as in suppos-
6 An engraving of this coin will be given ing that he made himself conspicuous for Jew-
at the end of Ch. XIX. ish peculiarities while he was forming a mixed
6 This is left as it stood in the earlier edi- church at Corinth. But we are ignorant of
tions. It must be admitted that the argn- the circumstances of the case.

368 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap. xn.
the hair uncut till the close of a definite length of time. Aquila could
not be literally a Nazarite ; for, in the case of that greater vow, the cut
ting of the hair, which denoted that the legal time was expired, could
only take place at the Temple in Jerusalem, or at least in Judaea. In
this case the ceremony was performed at Cenchrea. Here Aquila —
who had been for some time conspicuous, even among the Jews
and Christians at Corinth, for the long hair which denoted that he
was under a peculiar religious restriction — came to the close of the
period of obligation ; and, before accompanying the Apostle to Ephesus,
laid aside the tokens of his vow.
From Corinth to Ephesus, the voyage was among the islands of the
Greek Archipelago. The Isles of Greece, and the waters which break on
their shores, or rest among them in spaces of calm repose, always present
themselves to the mind as the scenes of interesting voyages, — ¦ whether
we think of the stories of early legend, or the stirring life of classical
times, of the Crusades in the middle ages, or of the movements of modern
travellers, some of whom seldom reflect that the land and water round
them were hallowed by the presence and labors of St. Paul. One great
purpose of this book will be gained, if it tends to associate the Apostle of
the Gentiles with the coasts, which are already touched by so many other
historical recollections.
No voyage across the iEgean was more frequently made than that
between Corinth and Ephesus. They were the capitals of the two
flourishing and peaceful provinces of Achaia and Asia,1 and the two great
mercantile towns on opposite sides of the sea. If resemblances may again
be suggested between the ocean and the Mediterranean, and between an
cient and modern times, we may say that the relation of these cities of the
Eastern and Western Greeks to each other was like that between New
York and Liverpool. Even the time taken up by the voyages constitutes a
point of resemblance. Cicero says that, on his eastward passage, which
was considered a long one, he spent fifteen days, and that his return was
accomplished in thirteen.2
A fair wind, in much shorter time than either thirteen or fifteen days,
would take the Apostle across, from Corinth, to the city on the other
side of the sea. It seems that the vessel was bound for Syria, and staid
only a short time in harbor at Ephesus. Aquila and Priscilla remained
there while he proceeded.3 But even during the short interval of his
stay, Paul made a visit to his Jewish fellow-countrymen, and (the Sab
bath being probably one of the days during which he remained) he held
1 See how Achaia and Asia are mentioned 2 The voyage was often accomplished to
by Tacitus, Hist. ii. 8. three or four days. See Thuc. iii. 3.
3 Acts xviii. 19.

chap. in. VOYAGE TO SYRIA. 369
a discussion with them in the synagogue concerning Christianity.1 Their
curiosity was excited by what they heard, as it had been at Antioch in
Pisidia ; and perhaps their curiosity would speedily have been succeeded
by opposition, if their visitor had staid longer among them. But he
was not able to grant the request which they urgently made. He
was anxious to attend the approaching festival at Jerusalem;2 and,
had he not proceeded with the ship, this might have been impossible.
He was so far, however, encouraged by the opening which he saw,
that he left the Ephesian Jews with a promise of his return. This
promise was limited by an expression of that dependence on the divine
will which is characteristic of a Christian's life,3 whether his vocation be
to the labors of an Apostle, or to the routine of ordinary toil. We shall
see that St. Paul's promise was literally fulfilled, when we come to pur
sue his progress on his third missionary circuit.
The voyage to Syria lay first by the coasts and islands of the ./Egean
to Cos and Cnidus, which are mentioned on subsequent voyages,4 and
then across the open sea by Rhodes and Cyprus to Caesarea.5 This city
has the closest connection with some of the most memorable events of
early Christianity. We have already had occasion to mention it, in
alluding to St. Peter and the baptism of the first Gentile convert.6 We
shall afterwards be required to make it the subject of a more elaborate
notice, when we arrive at the imprisonment which was suffered by St.
Paul under two successive Roman governors.7 The country was now no
longer under native kings. Ten years had elapsed since the death of
Herod Agrippa, the last event alluded to (Ch. IV.) in connection with
Caesarea. Felix had been for some years already procurator of Judaea.8
If the aspect of the country had become in any degree more national
under the reign of the Herods, it had now resumed all the appearance of
a Roman province.9 Caesarea was its military capital, as well as the
harbor by which it was approached by all travellers from the West.
From this city, roads 10 had been made to the Egyptian frontier on the
south, and northwards along the coast by Ptolemais, Tyre, and Sidon, to
Antioch, as well as across the interior by Neapolis or Antipatris to Jeru
salem and the Jordan.
The journey from Caesarea to Jerusalem is related by St. Luke in a
single word."'1 No information is given concerning the incidents which
1 The aorist (v. 19) should be contrasted 6 See Acts xxi. 1-3.
with the imperfect used (v. 4) of the continued 6 See p. 113. Compare p. 49.
discussions at Corinth. 7 Acts xxi. &c.
2 Acts xviii. 21. See above. 8 Tac. Ann. xiv. 54, and Josephus.
8 " If God will." See James iv. 15. " If • See pp. 26 and 51.
the Lord will, we shall live," &c. 10 See the remarks, pp. 78, 79.
* Acts xxi. 1, xxvii. 7. u " When he had gone up," Acts rviii
24

370 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap. xn.
occurred there : — no meetings with other Apostles, — no controversies
on disputed points of doctrine, — are recorded or inferred. We are not
even sure that St. Paul arrived in time for the festival at which he de
sired to be present.1 The contrary seems rather to be implied ; for he is
said simply to have " saluted the Church," and then to have proceeded
to Antioch. It is useless to attempt to draw aside the veil which con
ceals the particulars of this visit of Paul of Tarsus to the city of his
forefathers. As if it were no longer intended that we should view the
Church in connection with the centre of Judaism, our thoughts are
turned immediately to that other city,2 where the name " Christian " was
first conferred on it.
From Jerusalem to Antioch it is likely that the journey was accom
plished by land. It is the last time we shall have occasion to mention a
road which was often traversed, at different seasons of the year, by St.
Paul and his companions. Two of the journeys along this Phoenician
coast have been long ago mentioned. Many years had intervened since
the charitable mission which brought relief from Syria to the poor in •
Judaaa (Ch. IV.), and since the meeting of the council at Jerusalem,
and the joyful return at a time of anxious controversy (Ch. VII.).
When we allude to these previous visits to the Holy City, we feel how
widely the Church of Christ had been extended in the space of very few
years. The course of our narrative is rapidly carrying us from the East
towards the West. We are now for the last time on this part of the
Asiatic shore. For a moment the associations which surround us are all
of the primeval past. The monuments which still remain along this
coast remind us of the ancient Phoenician power, and of Baal and
Ashtaroth,3 — or of the Assyrian conquerors, who came from the Eu
phrates to the West, and have left forms like those in the palaces of
Nineveh sculptured on the rocks of the Mediterranean,4 — rather than of
any thing connected with the history of Greece and Rome. The moun
tains which rise above our heads belong to the characteristic imagery of
the Old Testament ; the cedars are those of the forests which were hewn
by the workmen of Hiram and Solomon ; the torrents which cross the
roads are the waters from " the sides of Lebanon." 5 But we are taking
22. Some commentators think that St. Paul voyage (Acts xx., xxi.), that he could not
did not go to Jerusalem at all, but that this have arrived in time for the festival, had not
participle merely denotes his going up from the weather been peculiarly favorable.
the ship into the town of Ca?sarea : but, inde- 2 Acts xviii. 22.
pendently of his intention to visit Jerusalem, 8 The ruins of Tortosa and Aradus.
it is hardly likuly that such a circumstance 4 The sculptures of Assyrian figures on
would have been specified in a narrative so the coast road near Beyrout are noticed in the
briefly given. works of many travellers.
1 We shall see, in the case of the later 6 These torrents are often flooded, so as to

THE CENTRE OF THE CHURCH.

371

our last view of this scenery ; and, as we leave it, we feel that we are
passing from the Jewish infancy of the Christian Church to its wider
expansion among the Heathen.
Once before we had occasion to remark that the Church had no longer
now its central point in Jerusalem, but in Antioch, a city of the Gen
tiles.1 The progress of events now carries us still more remotely from
the land which was first visited by the tidings of salvation. The world
through which our narrative takes us begins to be European rather than
Asiatic. So far as we know, the present visit which St. Paul paid to
Antioch was his last.2 We have already seen how new centres of Chris
tian life had been established by him in the Greek cities of the ^Egean.
The course of the Gospel is farther and farther towards the West ; and
the inspired part of the Apostle's biography, after a short period of deep
interest in Judaea, finally centres in Rome.

Coin of Corinth.'

be extremely dangerous ; so that St. Paul may
have encountered "perils of rivers" in this
district. Maundrell says that the traveller
Spor lost his life in one of these torrents.
1 Pp. 101, 102.

2 Antioch is not mentioned in the Acts
after xviii. 22.
8 From the British Museum. The head is
that of Julius Caesar himself.

CHAPTER XIII.
The Spiritual Gifts, Constitution, Ordinances, Divisions, and Here-ies of the Primitive Church in
the Lifetime of St. Paul.
WE are now arrived at a point in St. Paul's history when it seems
needful for the full understanding of the remainder of his career,
and especially of his Epistles, to give some description of the internal
condition of those churches which looked to him as their father in the
faith. Nearly all of these had now been founded, and, regarding the
early development .of several of them, we have considerable information
from his letters and from other sources. This information we shall now
endeavor to bring into one general view ; and in so doing (since the
Pauline Churches were only particular portions of the universal Church),
we shall necessarily have to consider the distinctive peculiarities and
internal condition of the primitive Church generally, as it existed in the
time of the Apostles.
The feature which most immediately forces itself upon our notice, as
distinctive of the Church in the Apostolic age, is its possession of super
natural gifts. Concerning these, our whole information must be derived
from Scripture, because they appear to have vanished with the disap
pearance of the Apostles themselves, and there is no authentic account of
their existence in the Church in any writings of a later date than the
books of the New Testament. This fact gives a more remarkable and
impressive character to the frequent mention of them in the writings of
the Apostles, where the exercise of such gifts is spoken of as a matter of
ordinary occurrence. Indeed, this is so much the case, that these miracu
lous powers are not even mentioned by the Apostolic writers as a class
apart (as we should now consider them), but are joined in the same
classification with other gifts, which we are wont to term natural endow
ments or " talents." x Thus St. Paul tells us (1 Cor. xii. 11) that all
1 The two great classifications of them in Class 3. I (yl ) kinds of tongues.
St. Paul's writings are as follows:— toanother.\ (y3) interpretation of tongues.
.. , H. (1 Cor. xii. 28.)
I. (1 Cor. m 8.) 1. apostles.
Classi. ( (ox) the word of wisdom. 2. prophets. See (/34).
to one. \ (a2) tlie word of knowledge. 3. teachers ; including (aj) and (aa) perhaps.

Class 2.
to another.

(p^ faith. 4. miracles. See (/32).
(,S2i gifts of healing. f (1) gifts of healing. See (/38).
(j3 g) working of miracles. J (2) helps.
(fii) prophecy. 6. | (3) governments.
(/? 6) discerning of spirits. [ (4) diversities cf tongues. See (v.).
372

CHAP.xm. SPIRITUAL GIFTS. 373
these charisms, or spiritual gifts, were wrought by one and the same
Spirit, who distributed them to each severally according to His own will ;
and among these he classes the gift of Healing, and the gift of Tongues,
as falling under the same category with the talent for administrative use
fulness, and the faculty of Government. But though we learn from this
to refer the ordinary natural endowments of men, not less than the super
natural powers bestowed in the Apostolic age, to a divine source, yet,
since we are treating of that which gave a distinctive character to the
Apostolic Church, it is. desirable that we should make a division between
the two classes of gifts, the extraordinary and the ordinary ; although
this division was not made by the Apostles at the time when both kinds
of gifts were in ordinary exercise.
The most striking manifestation of divine interposition was the power
of working what are commonly called Miracles, that is, changes in the
usual operation of the laws of nature. This power was exercised by St.
Paul himself very frequently (as we know from the narrative in the
Acts), as well as by the other Apostles; and in the Epistles we find
repeated allusions to its exercise by ordinary Christians.1 As examples
of the operation of this power, we need only refer to St. Paul's raising
Eutychus from the dead, his striking Elymas with blindness, his healing
the sick at Ephesus,2 and his curing the father of Publius at Melita.3
The last-mentioned examples are instances of the exercise of the gift
of healing, which was a peculiar branch of the gift of miracles, and
sometimes apparently possessed by those who had not the higher gift.
The source of all these miraculous powers was the charism of faith ;
namely, that peculiar kind of wonder-working faith spoken of in Matt.
xvii. 20, 1 Cor. xii. 9, and xiii. 2, which consisted in an intense belief
that all obstacles would vanish before the power given. This must of
course be distinguished from that disposition of faith which is essential to
the Christian life.
It may be remarked, that the following divis- charisms themselves : they are alluded tu only
ions are in I., and not in II. ; viz. /Sj, /36, and as things well known to the Corinthians, and
/> : <ii and aa, though not explicitly in H., of course without any precise description of
yet are probably included in it as necessary their nature.
gifts for " apostles," and perhaps also for In Rom. xii. 6-8, another unsystematic
" teachers," as Neander supposes. enumeration of four charisms is given ; viz.
It is difficult to observe any principle which (1) prophecy, (2) ministry, (3) teaching, (4) ex-
runs through these classifications ; probably I. hortation.
was not meant as a systematic classification at 1 Gal. iii. 5 (where observe the present
all ; H., however, certainly was in some raeas- tense ) is one of many examples.
ure, because St. Paul uses the words "first, 2 Acts xix. 11, 12.
second, third," frc. 8 On this latter miracle see the excellent
It is very difficult to arrive at any certain remarks in Smith's Voyaye and Shipwreck of
conclusion on the subject, because of our im- St. Paul, p. 115.
perfect understanding of the nature of the

374 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap.xhi.
We have remarked that the exercise of these miraculous powers is
spoken of both in the Acts and Epistles as a matter of ordinary occur
rence, and in that tone of quiet (and often incidental) allusion in which
we mention the facts of our daily life. And this is the case, not in a
narrative of events long past (where unintentional exaggeration might
be supposed to have crept in), but in the narrative of a contemporary,
writing immediately after the occurrence of the events which he records.
and of which he was an eye-witness ; and yet farther, this phenomenon
occurs in letters which speak of those miracles as wrought in the daily
sight of the readers addressed. Now the question forced upon every
intelligent mind is, whether such a phenomenon can be explained except
by the assumption that the miracles did really happen. Is this assump
tion more difficult than that of Hume (which has been revived with an
air of novelty by modern infidels) , who cuts the knot by assuming that
whenever we meet with an account of a miracle, it is ipso facto to be
rejected as incredible, no matter by what weight of evidence it may be
supported ?
Besides the power of working miracles, other supernatural gifts of a
less extraordinary character were bestowed upon the early Church. The
most important were the gift of tongues, and the gift of prophecy. With
regard to the former there is much difficulty, from the notices of it in
Scripture, in fully comprehending its nature. But from the passages
where it is mentioned x we may gather thus much concerning it : first,
that it was not a knowledge of foreign languages, as is often supposed ; we
never read of its being exercised for the conversion of foreign nations,
nor (except on the day of Pentecost alone) for that of individual foreign
ers ; and even on that occasion the foreigners present were all Jewish
proselytes, and most of them understood the Hellenistic 2 dialect. Sec
ondly, we learn that this gift was the result of a sudden influx of super
natural inspiration, which came upon the new believer immediately after
his baptism, and recurred afterwards at uncertain intervals. Thirdly, we
find that while under its influence the exercise of the understanding was
suspended, while the spirit was rapt into a state of ecstasy by the imme
diate communication of the Spirit of God. In this ecstatic trance the
believer was constrained by an irresistible 8 power to pour forth his feel-
1 Viz. Mark xvi. 17 ; Acts ii. 4, &c., Acts and the Jews from these latter countries woald
x. 46, Acts xi. 15-17, Acts xix. 6; 1 Cor. probably understand the Aramaic of Palestine.
xii., and I Cor. xiv. We must refer to the [For a different view of the gift of tongues we
notes on these two last-named chapters for may refer to Dr. Wordsworth's note on Acts
some further discussion of the difficulties con- ii. 4. — h.]
nected with this gift. 8 His spirit was not subject to his will.
2 This must probably have been the case See 1 Cor. xiv. 32. [Some power of self-con-
with all the foreigners mentioned, except the trol does appear distinctly implied in this pas-
Parthians, Medes, Elamites, and Arabians, sage and v. 28.  h.]

eHAP.xrfi. THE GD7T OF PROPHECY. 376
ings of thanksgiving and rapture in words ; yet the words which issued
from his mouth were not his own ; he was even (usually) ignorant of
their meaning. St. Paul desired that those who possessed this gift should
not be suffered to exercise it in the congregation, unless some one present
possessed another gift (subsidiary to this), called the interpretation of
tongues, by which the ecstatic utterance of the former might be ren
dered available for general edification. Another gift, also, was needful
for the checking of false pretensions to this and some other charisms, viz.
the gift of discerning of spirits, the recipients of which could distinguish
between the real and the imaginary possessors of spiritual gifts.1
From the gift of tongues we pass, by a natural transition, to the gift
of prophecy.2 It is needless to remark that, in the Scriptural sense of the
term, a. prophet does not mean & foreteller of future events, but a. revealer
of God' 8 will to man ; though the latter sense may (and sometimes does)
include the former. So the gift of prophecy was that charism which
enabled its possessors to utter, with the authority of inspiration, divine
strains of warning, exhortation, encouragement, or rebuke ; and to teach
and enforce the truths of Christianity with supernatural energy and
effect. The wide diffusion among the members of the Church of this
prophetical inspiration was a circumstance which is mentioned by St.
Peter as distinctive of the Gospel dispensation ; 3 in fact, we find that in
the family of Philip the Evangelist alone,4 there were four daughters who
exercised this gift ; and the general possession of it is in like manner
implied by the directions of St. Paul to the Corinthians.5 The latter
Apostle describes the marvellous effect of the inspired addresses thus
spoken.6 He looks upon the gift of prophecy as one of the great instru
ments for the conversion of unbelievers, and far more serviceable in this
respect than the gift of tongues, although by some of the new converts
it was not so highly esteemed, because it seemed less strange and won
derful. Thus far we have mentioned the extraordinary gifts of the Spirit which
were vouchsafed to the Church of that age alone ; yet (as we have before
said) there was no strong line of division, no " great gulf fixed " between
these, and what we now should call the ordinary gifts, or natural endow
ments of the Christian converts. Thus the gift of prophecy cannot easily
be separated by any accurate demarcation from another charism often
mentioned in Scripture, which we should now consider an ordinary talent,
1 This latter charism seems to have oeen sufficient to refer to such passages as Acts xi.
requisite for the presbyters. See 1 Thess. v. 27,28. 8 Acts ii. 17, 18.
21. 4 Acts xxi. 9.
2 If it be asked why we class this as among 6 1 Cor. xi. 4, and 1 Cor. xiv. 24, 31, 34.
the supernatural or extraordinary gifts, it will be 6 1 Cor. xiv. 25.

876 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap. xm.
namely, the gift of teaching. The distinction between them appears to
have been that the latter was more habitually and constantly exercised
by its possessors than the former : we are not to suppose, however, that
it was necessarily given to different persons ; on the contrary, an excess
of divine inspiration might at any moment cause the teacher to speak as a
prophet; and this was constantly exemplified in the case of the Apostles,
who exercised the gift of prophecy for the conversion of their unbeliev
ing hearers, and the gift of teaching for the building-up of their converts
in the faith.
Other gifts specially mentioned as charisms are the gift of government
and the gift of ministration.1 By the former, certain persons were spe
cially fitted to preside over the Church and regulate its internal order ; by
the latter its possessors were enabled to minister to the wants of their
brethren to manage the distribution of relief among the poorer members of
the Church, to tend the sick, and carry out other practical works of piety.
The mention of these latter charisms leads us naturally to consider the
offices which at that time existed in the Church, to which the possessors
of these gifts were severally called, according as the endowment which
they had received fitted them to discharge the duties of the respective
functions. We will endeavor, therefore, to give an outline of the con
stitution and government of the primitive Christian churches, as it existed
in the time of the Apostles, so far as we can ascertain it from the informa
tion supplied to us in the New Testament.
Amongst the several classifications which are there given of church
officers, the most important (from its relation to subsequent ecclesiastical
history) is that by which they are divided into Apostles,2 Presbyters, and
1 The " charism " of " ministry " or of 16 times in Corinthians ; — 14 times of St.
" help." Paul or the Twelve, twice in etymological
2 "Apostles and Presbyters" are men- sense, viz. 2 Cor. viii. 23, and xi. 13.
tioned Acts xv. 2, and elsewhere ; and the 3 times in Gal. ; — of St. Paul and the
two classes of " Presbyters and Deacons " Twelve.
are mentioned Phil. i. 1. See p. 378, n. 2. 4 times in Ephes. ; — of St. Paul and the
The following are the facts concerning the use Twelve.
of the word roroffToAoc in the New Testament. once in Philip. ; — etymological sense.
It occurs — once in Thess. ; — of St. Paul.
once in St. Matthew ; — of the Twelve. 4 times in Timothy ; — of St. Paul.
once in St. Mark ; — of the Twelve. once in Titus ; — of St. Paul.
6 times in St. Luke ; — 5 times of the Twelve, once in Hebrews (iii. 1 ) ; — of Christ Himself.
once in its general etymological sense. 3 times in Peter ; — of the Twelve.
once in St. John ; — in its general etymologi- once in Jude ; — of the Twelve.
cal sense. 3 times in Apocalypse; — either of "false
30 times in Acts ; — (always in plural) 28 apostles " or of the Twelve.
times of the Twelve, and twice of Paul Besides this, the word anooroXv is used to
and Barnabas. signify the Apostolic office, once in Acts and
3 times in Romans ; — twice of St. Paul, three times by St. Paul (who attributes it to
once of Andronicus. himself).

chap. xra. CONSTITUTION OF THE PRIMITIVE CHURCH. 377
Deacons. The monarchical, or (as it would be now called) the episcopal
element of church government was, in this first period, supplied by the
authority of the Apostles. This title was probably at first confined to " the
Twelve," who were immediately nominated to their ofiice (with the excep
tion of Matthias) by our Lord himself. To this body the title was limited
by the Judaizing section of the Church ; but St. Paul vindicated his own
claim to the Apostolic name and authority as resting upon the same com
mission given him by the same Lord ; and his companion, St. Luke, applies
the name to Barnabas also. In a lower sense, the term was applied to all
the more eminent Christian teachers ; as, for example, to Andronicus
and Juuias.1 And it was also sometimes used in its simple etymological
sense of emissary, which had not yet been lost in its other and more
technical meaning. Still those only were called emphatically the Apostles
who had received their commission from Christ himself, including the
eleven who had been chosen by Him while on earth, with St. Matthias
and St. Paul, who had been selected for the office by their Lord (though
in different ways) after His ascension.
In saying that the Apostles embodied that element in church govern
ment, which has since been represented by episcopacy, we must not,
however, be understood to mean that the power of the Apostles was sub
ject to those limitations to which the authority of bishops has always
been subjected. The primitive bishop was surrounded by his council of
presbyters, and took no important step without their sanction ; but this
was far from being the case with the Apostles. They were appointed by
Christ himself, with absolute power to govern His Church ; to them He
had given the keys of the kingdom of Heaven, with authority to admit or
to exclude ; they were also guided by His perpetual inspiration, so that
all their moral and religious teaching was absolutely and infallibly true ;
they were empowered by their solemn denunciations of evil, and their in
spired judgments on all moral questions, to bind and to loose, to remit
and to retain the sins of men.2 This was the essential peculiarity of their
office, which can find no parallel in the after-history of the Church. But,
so far as their function was to govern, they represented the monarchical ele
ment in the constitution of the early Church, and their power was a full
counterpoise to that democratic tendency which has sometimes been
attributed to the ecclesiastical arrangements of the Apostolic period.
Another peculiarity which distinguishes them from all subsequent rulers
of the Church is, that they were not limited to a sphere of action defined
1 Rom. xvi. 7. now, but it is in quite a secondary sense ; viz.
2 No doubt, in a certain sense, this power is only so far as it is exercised in exact accord-
shared (according to the teaching of our ance with the inspired teaching of the
Ordination Service) by Christian ministers Apostles.

378 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAOL. chap. xm.
by geographical boundaries : the whole world was their diocese, and they
bore the Glad-tidings, east or west, north or south, as the Holy Spirit
might direct their course at the time, and governed the churches which
they founded wherever they might be placed. Moreover, those charisms
which were possessed by other Chrstians singly and severally, were collec
tively given to the Apostles, because all were needed for their work. The
gift of miracles was bestowed upon them in abundant measure, that thej
might strike terror into the adversaries of the truth, and win, by outward
wonders, the attention of thousands, whose minds were closed by igno
rance against the inward and the spiritual. They had the gift of prophecy
as the very characteristic of their office, for it was their especial commis
sion to reveal the truth of God to man ; they were consoled in the midst
of their labors by heavenly visions, and rapt in supernatural ecstasies, in
which they " spake in tongues " " to God, and not to man." l They had
the "gift of government," for that which came upon them daily was " the
care of all the Churches ; " the "gift of teaching," for they must build up
their converts in the faith; even the "gift of ministration" was not
unneeded by them, nor did they think it beneath them to undertake the
humblest offices of a deacon for the good of the Church. When need
ful, they could " serve tables," and collect arms, and work with their
own hands at mechanical trades, " that so laboring they might support
the weak ; " inasmuch as they were the servants of Him who came not
to be ministered unto, but to minister.
Of the offices concerned with Church government, the next in rank to
that of the Apostles was the office of Overseers or Elders, more usually
known (by their Greek designations) as Bishops or Presbyters. These
terms are used in the New Testament as equivalent,2 the former (Inlaxonog)
denoting (as its meaning of overseer implies) the duties, the latter
(Ttgsa^vrsQog') the rank, of the office. The history of the Church leaves
us no room for doubt that on the death of the Apostles, or perhaps at au
earlier period (and, in either case, by their directions), one amongst the
Presbyters of each Church was selected to preside over the rest, and to
him was applied emphatically the title of the bishop or overseer, which
had previously belonged equally to all ; thus he became in reality (what he
was sometimes called) the successor of the Apostles, as exercising (though
in a lower degree) that function of government which had formerly
belonged to them.3 But in speaking of this change we are anticipating ;
1 See note on 1 Cor. xiv. 18. Also see (Acts xx. 17). See also the Pastoral Epistles,
2 Cor. xii. 12. passim.
2 Thus, in the address at Miletus, the same 8 Baron Bunsen (whom no one can suspect
persons are called kmoKonovq (Acts xx. 28) of hierarchal tendencies) expressed his con-
who had just before been named Kpeofivrspovc currence in this view. He says: " St. John

chap.xih. CONSTITUTION OF THE PRIMITIVE CHURCH. 379
for at the time of which we are now writing, at the foundation of the
Gentile Churches, the Apostles themselves were the chief governors of
the Church, and the presbyters of each particular society were co-ordi
nate with one another. We find that they existed at an early period in
Jerusalem, and likewise that they were appointed by the Apostles upon
the first formation of a church in every city. The same name, " Elder,"
was attached to an office of a corresponding nature in the Jewish syna
gogues, whence both title and office were probably derived. The name
of Bishop was afterwards given to this office in the Gentile churches at
a somewhat later period, as expressive of its duties, and as more familiar
than the other title to Greek ears.1
The office of the Presbyters was to watch over the particular church
in which they ministered, in all that regarded its external order and
internal purity ; they were to instruct the ignorant,2 to exhort the faith
ful, to confute the gainsayers,8 to " warn the unruly, to comfort the
feeble-minded, to support the weak, to be patient towards all." 4 They
were " to take heed to the flock over which the Holy Ghost had made
them overseers, to feed the Church of God which He had purchased with
His own blood." 5 In one word, it was their duty (as it has been the
duty of all who have been called to the same office during the nineteen
centuries which have succeeded) to promote to the utmost of their ability,
and by every means within their reach, the spiritual good of all those
committed to their care.6
The last of the three orders, that of Deacons, did not take its place in
the ecclesiastical organization till towards the close of St. Paul's life ; or,
at least, this name was not assigned to those who discharged the func
tions of the Diaconate till a late period ; the Epistle to the Philippians
being the earliest in which the term occurs7 in its technical sense. In
established or sanctioned the institution of " teachers " may at first have been sometimes
single Rectors, called Overseers (kmanonoi), as different from the "presbyters," as the
presidents of the Presbytery. This form of " charism of teaching " was distinct from the
government, as being the more perfect and " charism of governing ; " but those who
practical, particularly in such difficult times, possessed both gifts would surely have been
soon spread over the Christian world." — Bun- chosen presbyters from the first, if they were
sen's Hippolytus, 2d ed. ii. 360. to be found ; and, at all events, in the time of
i 'Emo/cono; was the title of the Athenian the Pastoral Epistles we find the offices united.
commissioners to their subject allies. (1 Tim. iii. 2.) See, however, the note on
2 1 Tim. iii. 2. 1 Tim. v. 17.
8 Tit. i. 9. 7 In Romans xvi. 1, it is applied to a wo-
* 1 Thess. v. 14. 6 Acts xx. 28. man ; and we cannot confidently assert that it
6 Other t'tles, denoting their office, are ap- is there used technically to denote an office,
plied to tl» presbyters in some passages ; e. g. especially as the word dtd/covoc is so constantly
Rom. xii * ; and 1 Thessi v. 12 ; Heb. xiii. used in its non-technical sense of one who
7; Eph. » 11; 1 Cor. xii. 28. It is, indeed, ministers in any way to others. [See next
possible 'as Neander thinks ) that the note but one. — h.]

380 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap, xm
fact the word (dtdxovog^) occurs thirty times in the New Testament, and
only three times (or at most four) is it used as an official designation ; in
all the other passages it is used in its simple etymological sense of a
ministering servant. It is a remarkable fact, too, that it never once occurs
in the Acts as the title of those seven Hellenistic Christians who are gen
erally (though improperly) called the seven deacons, and who were only
elected to supply a temporary emergency.1 But although the title of
the Diaconate does not occur till afterwards, the office seems to have
existed from the first in the Church of Jerusalem (see Acts v. 6, 10) ;
those who discharged its duties were then called the young men, in con
tradistinction to the presbyters or elders / and it was their duty to assist
the latter by discharging the mechanical services requisite for the well-
being of the Christian community. Gradually, however, as the Church
increased, the natural division of labor would suggest a subdivision of
the ministrations performed by them ; those which only required bodily
labor would be intrusted to a less educated class of servants, and those
which required the work of the head as well as the hands (such, for
example, as the distribution of alms) would form the duties of the dea
cons ; for we may now speak of them by that name, which became appro
priated to them before the close of the Apostolic epoch.
There is not much information given us, with regard to their functions,
in the New Testament : but, from St. Paul's directions to Timothy con
cerning their qualifications, it is evident that their office was one of con
siderable importance. He requires that they should be men of grave
character, and "not greedy of filthy lucre;" the latter qualification
relating to tlieir duty in administering the charitable fund of the Church.
He desires that they should not exercise the office till after their character
had been first subjected to an examination, and had been found free from
all imputation against it. If (as is reasonable) we explain these intima
tions by what we know of the Diaconate in the succeeding century, we
may assume that its duties in the Apostolic Churches (when their organi
zation was complete) were to assist the presbyters in all that concerned
the outward service of the Church, and in executing the details of those
measures, the general plan of which was organized by the presbyters.
And, doubtless, those only were selected for this office who had received
the gift of ministration previously mentioned.
It is a disputed point whether there was an order of Deaconesses to
minister among the women in the Apostolic Church ; the only proof of
1 See Chap. II. p. 61. We observe; also, much higher importance than that held oy the
that when any of the seven are referred to, it subsequent deacons. [Still it can haidl r be
is never by the title of deacon ; thus Philip is doubted that we have here the beginmn,, of
called "the evangelist" (Acts xxi. 8). In the official diaconate in the Church.— h.,
fact, the office of " the seven " was one of

chap. xm. CONSTITUTION OP THE PRIMITIVE CHURCH. 381
their existence is the epithet attached to the name of Phoebe,1 which may
be otherwise understood. At the same time, it must be acknowledged
that the almost Oriental seclusion in which the Greek women were kept
would render the institution of such an office not unnatural in the
churches of Greece, as well as in those of the East.
Besides the three orders of Apostles, Presbyters, and Deacons, we find
another classification of the ministry of the Church in the Epistle to the
Ephesians,2 where they are divided under four heads, viz.,3 1st, Apostles ;
2dly, Prophets ; 3dly, Evangelists ; 4thly, Pastors and Teachers. By
the fourth class we must understand * the Presbyters to be denoted, and
we then have two other names interpolated between these and the
Apostles ; viz. Prophets and Evangelists. By the former we must under
stand those on whom the gift of prophecy was bestowed in such abundant
measure as to constitute their peculiar characteristic, and whose work
it was to impart constantly to their brethren the revelations which they
received from the Holy Spirit. The term Evangelist is applied to those
missionaries, who, like Philip,5 and Timothy,6 travelled from place to
place, to bear the Glad-tidings of Christ to unbelieving nations or individ
uals. Hence it follows that the Apostles were all Evangelists, although
there were also Evangelists who were not Apostles. It is needless to
add that our modern use of the word Evangelist (as meaning writer of a
Gospel) is of later date, and has no place here.
All these classes of Church-officers were maintained (so far as they re
quired it) by the contributions of those in whose service they labored.
St. Paul lays down, in the strongest manner, their right to such main
tenance ; T yet, at the same time, we find that he very rarely accepted the
offerings, which, in the exercise of this right, he might himself have
claimed. He preferred to labor with his own hands for his own support,
that he might put his disinterested motives beyond the possibility of
suspicion ; and he advises the presbyters of the Ephesian Church to follow
his example in this respect, that so they might be able to contribute, by
their own exertions, to the support of the helpless.
The mode of appointment to these different offices varied with the
nature of the office. The Apostles, as we have seen, received their com
mission directly from Christ himself; the Prophets were appointed by
1 Rom. xvi. 1. See p. 379, u. 7. It a different view is held of the Scriptural
should be observed, however, that the "wid- authority for a female diaconate. — H.j
ows" mentioned 1 Tim. v. 9 were practically 2 Eph. iv. 11.
Deaconesses, although they do not seem, at 8 A similar classification occurs 1 Cor. xii.
the time of the Pastoral Epistles, to lyive been 28 ; viz., 1st, Apostles ; 2dly, Prophets ; 3dly,
called by that name. [For a general discus- Teachers. 4 See above, p. 379, u. 6.
sion of this subject, see the Quarterly Review 5 Acts xxi. 8. • 2 Tim. iv. 5.
for October, 1860, especially pp. 357, 358, where 7 1 Cor. ix. 7-14.

382 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap. xm.
that inspiration which they received from the Holy Spirit, yet their claims
would be subjected to the judgment of those who had received the gift of
discernment of spirits. The Evangelists were sent on particular missions
from time to time, by the Christians with whom they lived (but not with
out a special revelation of the Holy Spirit's will to that effect), as the
Church of Antioch sent away Paul and Barnabas to evangelize Cyprus.
The Presbyters and Deacons we're appointed by the Apostles themselves
(as at Lystra, Iconium, and Antioch in Pisidia),1 or by their deputies, as
in the case of Timothy and Titus ; yet, in all such instances, it is not
improbable that the concurrence of the whole body of the Church was
obtained ; and it is possible that in other cases, as well as in the appoint
ment of the seven Hellenists, the officers of the Church may have been
elected by the Church which they were to serve.
In all cases, so far as we may infer from the recorded instances in the
Acts, those who were selected for the performance of Church offices were
solemnly set apart for the duties to which they devoted themselves. This
ordination they received, whether the office to which they were called was
permanent or temporary. The Church, of which they were members, de
voted a preparatory season to " fasting and prayer ; " and then those who
were to be set apart were consecrated to their work by that solemn and
touching symbolical act, the laying-on of hands, which has been ever
since appropriated to the same purpose and meaning. And thus, in
answer to the faith and prayers of the Church, the spiritual gifts neces
sary for the performance of the office were bestowed 2 by Him who is " the
Lord and Giver of Life."
Having thus briefly attempted to describe the Offices of the Apostolic
Church, we pass to the consideration of its Ordinances. Of these, the
chief were, of course, those two sacraments ordained by Christ Himself,
which have been the heritage of the Universal Church throughout all
succeeding ages. The sacrament of Baptism was regarded as the door
of entrance into the Christian Church, and was held to be so indispen
sable that it could not be omitted even in the case of St. Paul. We
have seen that although he had been called to the apostleship by the
direct intervention of Christ Himself, yet he was commanded to receive
baptism at the hands of a simple disciple. In ordinary cases, the sole
condition required for baptism was, that the persgns to be baptized
should acknowledge Jesus as the Messiah,3 " declared to be the Son of
1 Acts xiv. 21-23. pear as if only applicable to Jews or Jewish
2 Compare 2 Tim. i. 6. " The gift of God proselytes, who already were looking for a
which is in thee by the pntting-on of my Messiah ; yet, since the acknowledgment of
hands." Jesus as the Messiah involves in itself, when
8 This condition would (at first sight) ap- rightly understood, the whole of Christianity,

chap. xm. ORDINANCES OF THE PRIMITIVE CHURCH. 383
God with power, by His resurrection from the dead." In this acknowl
edgment was virtually involved the readiness of the new converts to
submit to the guidance of those whom Christ had appointed as the
Apostles and teachers of His Church; and we find1 that they were
subsequently instructed in the truths of Christianity, and were taught the
true spiritual meaning of those ancient prophecies, which (if Jews} they
had hitherto' interpreted of a human conqueror and an earthly kingdom.
This instruction, however, took place after baptism, not before it ; and
herein we remark a great and striking difference from the subsequent
usage of the Church. For, not long after the time of the Apostles, the
primitive practice in this respect was completely reversed ; in all cases
the convert was subjected to a long course of preliminary instruction
before he was admitted to baptism, and in some instances the catechumen
remained unbaptized till the hour of death ; for thus he thought to
escape the strictness of a Christian life, and fancied that a death-bed
baptism would operate magically upon his spiritual condition, and
insure his salvation. The Apostolic practice of immediate baptism
would, had it been retained, have guarded the Church from so baneful a
superstition. It has been questioned whether the Apostles baptized adults only, or
whether they admitted infants also into the Church ; yet we cannot but
think it probable that infant baptism2 was their practice. This appears,
not merely because (had it been otherwise) we must have found some
traces of the first introduction of infant baptism afterwards, but also
it was a sufficient foundation for the faith of opposite view. Yet the arguments on which
Gentiles also. In the case both of Jews and he grounds his opinion, both in the Planting
Gentiles, the thing required, in the first in- and Leading and in the Church History, seem
stance, waj a belief in the testimony of the plainly inconclusive. He himself acknowl-
Apostles, that " this Jesus had God raised up," edges that the principles laid down by St.
and thus had " made that same Jesus, whom Paul (1 Cor. vii. 14) contain a justification of
they had crucified, both Lord and Christ." infant baptism, and he admits that it was
The most important passages, as bearing on practised in the time of Irenseus. His thief
this subject, are the baptism and confirmation reason against thinking it an Apostolical
of the Samaritan converts (Acts viii.), the practice (Church History, sect. 3) is, that
account of the baptism of the Ethiopian Tertullian opposed it ; but Tertullian does not
eunuch (Acts Viii.), of Cornelius (Acts x.), of pretend to call it an innovation. It is necd-
the Philippian jailer (Acts xvi.) (the only less here to do more than refer to the well-
case where the baptism of » non-proselyted kiiown passages of Origen which prove that
Heathen is recorded), of John's disciples at infant baptism prevailed in the church of
Ephesus (Acts xix.), and the statement in Alexandria as early as the close of the second
Rom. x. 9, 10. century. Surely if infant baptism had not
1 This appears from such passages as Gal. been sanctioned by the Apostles, we should
vi 6 ; 1 Thess. v. 12 ; Acts xx. 20, 28, and have found some one at least among the many
many others. churches of primitive Christendom resisting
2 It is at first startling to find Neander, its introduction.
with his great learning and candor, taking an

384 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap. xm.
because the very idea of the Apostolic baptism, as the entrance into
Christ's kingdom, implies that it could not have been refused to infants
without violating the command of Christ : " Suffer little children to come
unto me, and forbid them not, for of such is the kingdom of heaven."
Again, St. Paul expressly says that the children of a Christian parent
were to be looked upon as consecrated to God (ajtoi) by virtue of their
very birth ; l and it would have been most inconsistent with this view, as
well as with tlie practice in the case of adults, to delay the reception of
infants into the Church till they had been fully instructed in Christian
doctrine. We know from the Gospels 2 that the new converts were baptized " in
the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost." And
after the performance 3 of the sacrament, an outward sign was given that
God was indeed present with His Church, through the mediation of The
Son, in the person of The Spirit ; for the baptized converts, when the
Apostles had laid their hands on them, received some spiritual gift,
either the power of working miracles, or of speaking in tongues, be
stowed upon each of them by Him who " divideth to every man
severally as He will." It is needless to add that baptism was (unless
in exceptional cases) administered by immersion, the convert being
plunged beneath the surface of the water to represent his death to
the life of sin, and then raised from this momentary burial to repre
sent his resurrection to the life of righteousness. It must be a subject
of regret that the general discontinuance of this original form of
baptism (though perhaps necessary in our northern climates) has
rendered obscure to popular apprehension some very important passages
of Scripture.
With regard to the other sacrament, we know both from the Acts and
the Epistles how constantly the Apostolic Church obeyed their Lord's
command : " Do this in remembrance of me." Indeed it would seem
that originally their common meals were ended, as that memorable feast
at Emmaus had been, by its celebration ; so that, as at the first to those
two disciples, their Lord's presence was daily " made known unto them
in the breaking of bread." 4 Subsequently the Communion was admin-
1 1 Cor. vii. 14. baptism. Tho answer of St. Paul to the dis-
2 Matt, xxviii. 19. We cannot agree with ciples of John the Baptist at Ephesus (Acts
Neander (Planting and Leading, I. 25, and xix. 3), is a strong argument that the name of
188) that the evidence of this positive com- the Holy Ghost occurred in the baptismal for-
mand is at all impaired by our finding baptism mula then employed.
described in the Acts and Epistles as baptism 8 The case of Cornelius, in which the gifts
into the name of Jesus ; tlie latter seems a con- of the Holy Spirit were bestowed before bap-
denscd expression which would naturally be tism, was an exception to the ordinary rulo.
employed, just as we now speak of Christian * Luke xxiv. 35.

«HAP.xm. ORDINANCES OF THE PRIMITIVE CHURCH. 385
istered at the close of the public feasts of love (Agapce L) at which the
Christians met to realize their fellowship one with another, and to par
take together, rich and poor, masters and slaves, on equal terms, of the
common meal. But this practice led to abuses, as we see in the case of
the Corinthian Church, where the very idea of the ordinance was vio
lated by the providing of different food for the rich and poor, and where
some of the former were even guilty of intemperance. Consequently a
change was made, and the communion administered before instead of
after the meal, and finally separated from it altogether.
The festivals observed by the Apostolic Church were at first the same
with those of the Jews ; and the observance of these was continued,
especially by the Christians of Jewish birth, for a considerable time. A
higher and more spiritual meaning, however, was attached to their cele
bration ; and particularly the Paschal feast was kept, no longer as a
shadow of good things to come, but as the commemoration of blessings
actually bestowed in the death and resurrection of Christ. Thus we
already see the germ of our Easter festival in the exhortation which St.
Paul gives to the Corinthians concerning the manner in which they
should celebrate the Paschal feast. Nor was it only at this annual feast
that they kept in memory the resurrection of their Lord ; every Sunday
likewise was a festival in memory of the same event ; the Church never
failed to meet for common prayer and praise on that day of the week ;
and it very soon acquired the name of the " Lord's Day," which it has
since retained.
But the meetings of the first converts for public worship were not con
fined to a single day of the week ; they were always frequent, often daily.
The Jewish Christians met at first in Jerusalem in some of the courts of
the temple, there to join in the prayers and hear the teaching of Peter
and John. Afterwards the private houses2 of the more opulent
Christians were thrown open to furnish their brethren with a place of
assembly ; and they met for prayer and praise in some " upper chamber," 5
with the " door shut for fear of the Jews." The outward form and order
of their worship differed very materially from our own, as indeed was
necessarily the case where so many of the worshippers were under the
miraculous influence of the Holy Spirit. Some were filled with prophetic
inspiration ; some constrained to pour forth their ecstatic feelings in the
exercise of the gift of tongues, " as the Spirit gave them utterance."
We see, from St. Paul's directions to the Corinthians, that there was
1 Jude 12. This is the custom to which 2 See Rom. xvi. 5, and 1 Cor. xvi. 19, and
Pliny alludes, when he describes the Chris- Acts xviii. 7.
tians meeting to partake of cibus promiscuus et 3 " The upper chamber where they were
mnoxius. gathered togeti-*." — Acts xx. 8.
26

386 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. OHAp.xm.
danger even then lest their worship should degenerate into a scene of
confusion, from the number who wished to take part in the public minis
trations ; and he lays down rules which show that even the exercise of
supernatural gifts was to be restrained, if it tended to violate the orderly
celebration of public worship. He directs that not more than two or
three should prophesy in the same assembly ; and that those who had the
gift of tongues should not exercise it, unless some one present had the
gift of interpretation, and could explain their utterances to the congrega
tion. He also forbids women (even though some of them might be
prophetesses) l to speak in the public assembly ; and desires that they
should appear veiled, as became the modesty of their sex.
In the midst of so much diversity, however, the essential parts of
public worship were the same then as now, for we find that prayer was
made, and thanksgiving offered up, by those who officiated, and that the
congregation signified their assent by a unanimous Amen.2 Psalms also
were chanted, doubtless to some of those ancient Hebrew melodies which
have been handed down, not improbably, to our own times in the sim
plest form of ecclesiastical music ; and addresses of exhortation or
instruction were given by those whom the gift of prophecy, or the gift of
teaching, had fitted for the task.
But whatever were the other acts of devotion in which these assem
blies were employed, it seems probable that the daily worship always con
cluded with the celebration of the Holy Communion.3 And as in this
the members of the Church expressed and realized the closest fellowship,
not only with their risen Lord, but also with each other, so it was cus-
omary to symbolize this latter union by the interchange of the kiss of
peace before the sacrament, a practice to which St. Paul frequently
alludes.4 It would have been well if the inward love and harmony of the
Church had really corresponded with the outward manifestation of it in
this touching ceremony. But this was not the case, even while the
Apostles themselves poured out the wine and broke the bread which
symbolized the perfect union of the members of Christ's body. The
1 Acts xxi. 9. of the Church. This was certainly the case
2 1 Cor. xiv. 16. in Acts xx. 8 ; a passage which Neander must
8 This seems proved by 1 Cor. xi. 20, have overlooked when he says ( Church History,
where St. Paul appears to assume that the sect. 3) that the church service in the time of
very object of " coming together in Church " the Apostles was held early in the morning.
was " to eat the Lord's Supper." As the There are obvious reasons why the evening
Lord's Supper was originally the conclusion would have been the most proper time for a
of the Agape, it was celebrated in the even- service which was to be attended by those
ing ; and probably, therefore, evening was the whose day was spent in working with their
time, on ordinary occasions, for the meeting hands. * See note on 1 Thess. v. 26.

CHAP.xm. DIVISIONS IN THE PRIMITIVE CHURCH. 387
kiss of peace sometimes only veiled the hatred of warring factions. So
St. Paul expresses to the Corinthians his grief at hearing that there were
" divisions among them," which showed themselves when they met
together for public worship. The earliest division of the Christian
Church into opposing parties was caused by the Judaizing teachers, of
whose factious efforts in Jerusalem and elsewhere we have already
spoken. Their great object was to turn the newly-converted Christians
into Jewish proselytes, who should differ from other Jews only in the
recognition of Jesus as the Messiah. In their view the natural posterity
of Abraham were still as much as ever the theocratic nation, entitled to
God's exclusive favor, to which the rest of mankind could only be admit
ted by becoming Jews. Those members of this party who were really sin
cere believers in Christianity, probably expected that the majority of theii
countrymen, finding their own national privileges thus acknowledged and
maintained by the Christians, would on their part more willingly
acknowledge Jesus as their Messiah ; and thus they fancied that the
Christian Church would gain a larger accession of members than could
ever accrue to it from isolated Gentile converts : so that they probably
justified their opposition to St. Paul on grounds not only of Jewish but
of Christian policy ; for they imagined that by his admission of uncir
cumcised Gentiles into the full membership of the Church he was repel
ling far more numerous converts of Israelitish birth, who would otherwise
have accepted the doctrine of Jesus. This belief (which in itself, and
seen from their point of view, in that age, was not unreasonable) might
have enabled them to excuse to their consciences, as Christians, the bit
terness of their opposition to the great Christian Apostle. But in consid
ering them as a party, we must bear in mind that they felt themselves
more Jews than Christians. They acknowledged Jesus of Nazareth as
the promised Messiah, and so far they were distinguished from the rest
of their countrymen ; but the Messiah himself, they thought, was only a
" Saviour of His people Israel ; " and they ignored that true meaning of
the ancient prophecies, which St. Paul was inspired to reveal to the
Universal Church, teaching us that the " excellent things " which are
spoken of the people of God, and the city of God, in the Old Testa
ment, are to be by us interpreted of the " household of faith," and " the
heavenly Jerusalem."
We have seen that the Judaizers at first insisted upon the observance of
the law of Moses, and especially of circumcision, as an absolute requisite
for admission into the Church, " saying, Except ye be circumcised after
the manner of Moses, ye cannot be saved." But after the decision of the
" Council of Jerusalem " it was impossible for them to require this con
dition ; they therefore altered their tactics, and as the decrees of the

388 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap.xiu
Council seemed to assume that the Jewish Christians would continue to
observe the Mosiac Law, the Judaizers took advantage of this to insist
on the necessity of a separation between those who kept the whole Law
and all others ; they taught that the uncircumcised were in a lower con
dition as to spiritual privileges, and at a greater distance from God ; and
that only the circumcised converts were in a state of full acceptance with
Him : in short, they kept the Gentile converts who would not submit to
circumcision on the same footing as the proselytes of the gate, and treated
the circumcised alone as proselytes of righteousness. When we compre
hend all that was involved in this, we can easily understand the energetic
opposition with which their teaching was met by St. Paul. It was no
mere question of outward observance, no matter of indifference (as it
might at first sight appear) , whether the Gentile converts were circum
cised or not ; on the contrary, the question at stake was nothing less than
this, whether Christians should be merely a Jewish sect under the bondage
of a ceremonial law, and only distinguished from other Jews by believing
that Jesus was the Messiah, or whether they should be the Catholic
Church of Christ, owing no other allegiance but to him, freed from the
bondage of the letter, and bearing the seal of their inheritance no longer
in their bodies, but in their hearts. We can understand now the full
truth of his indignant remonstrance, " If ye be circumcised, Christ shall
profit you nothing." And we can understand also the exasperation which
his teaching must have produced in those who held the very antithesis
of this, namely, that Christianity without circumcision was utterly worth
less. Hence their long and desperate struggle to destroy the influence
of St. Paul in every Church which he founded or visited, in Antioch, in
Galatia, in Corinth, in Jerusalem, and in Rome. For as he was in truth
the great prophet divinely commissioned to reveal the catholicity of the
Christian Church, so he appeared to them the great apostate, urged by
the worst motives l to break down the fence and root up the hedge, which
separated the heritage of the Lord from a godless world.
We shall not be_ surprised at their success in creating divisions in the
Churches to which they came, when we remember that the nucleus of all
those Churches was a body of converted Jews and proselytes. The Ju
daizing emissaries were ready to flatter the prejudices of this influential
body ; nor did they abstain (as we know both from tradition and from his
own letters) from insinuating the most scandalous charges against their
1 That curious apocryphal book, the Clem- Peter to James. The English reader should
entine Recognitions, contains, in a modified consult the interesting remarks of Prof. Stan-
form, a record of the view taken by the Juda- ley on the Clementines (Stanley's Sermons,
izers of St. Paul, from the pen of the Judaiz- p. 374, &c), and also Neander's Church History
ing party itself, in the pretended epistle of ( American translation, vol. ii. p. 35, &c).

HHAp.xm. DIVISIONS IN THE PRIMITIVE CHURCH 389
great opponent.1 And thus, in every Christian church established by St.
Paul, there sprang up, as we shall see, a schismatic party, opposed to his
teaching and hostile to his person.
This great Judaizing party was of course subdivided into various sec
tions, united in their main object, but distinguished by minor shades of
difference. Thus, we find at Corinth that it comprehended two factions,
the one apparently distinguished from the other by a greater degree of
violence. The more moderate called themselves the followers of Peter,
or rather of Cephas, for they preferred to use his Hebrew name.2 These
dwelt much upon our Lord's special promises to Peter, and the necessary
inferiority of St. Paul to him who was divinely ordained to be the rock
whereon the Church should be built. They insinuated that St. Paul felt
doubts about his own Apostolic authority, and did not dare to claim the
right of maintenance,3 which Christ had expressly given to His true
Apostles. They also depreciated him as a maintainer of celibacy, and
contrasted him in this respect with the great Pillars of the Church, " the
brethren of the Lord and Cephas," who were married.4 And no doubt
they declaimed against the audacity of a converted persecutor, " born
into the Church out of due time," in "withstanding to the face" the
chief of the Apostles. A still more violent section called themselves, by
a strange misnomer, the party of Christ.5 These appear to have laid
great stress upon the fact, that Paul had never seen or known our Lord
while on earth ; and they claimed for themselves a peculiar connection
with Christ, as having either been among the number of His disciples, or
at least as being in close connection with the " brethren of the Lord," and
especially with James, the head of the Church at Jerusalem. To this
subdivision probably belonged the emissaries who professed to come " from
James," 6 and who created a schism in the Church of Antioch.
Connected to a certain extent with the Judaizing party, but yet to be
carefully distinguished from it, were those Christians who are known in
the New Testament as the " weak brethren." 7 These were not a factious
or schismatic party ; nay, they were not, properly speaking, a party at all.

1 We learn from Epiphanius that the Ebi- tion of the "Christ" party (1 Cor. i. 12).
onites accused St. Paul of renouncing Juda- As to the views held by some eminent com-
ism because he was a rejected candidate for mentators on the passage, it is a question
the hand of the High Priest's daughter. See whether they are consistent with 2 Cor. x. 7.
p. 91. Surely St. Paul would never have said, "As
2 The MS. reading is Cephas, not Peter, in those who claim some imaginary communion
those passages where the language of the with Christ belong to Christ, so also do 1
Jndaizers is referred to. See note on Gal. i. 18. belong to Christ."
8 1 Cor. ix. 4, 6 ; 2 Cor. xi. 9, 10. 6 Gal. ii. 12.
4 1 Cor. ix. 5. 7 Rom. xiv. 1,2; Rom. xv. 1 ; 1 Cor. vni
6 Such appears the most natural explana- 7, ix. 22.

390 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap, xm
They were individual converts of Jewish extraction, whose minds were
not as yet sufficiently enlightened to comprehend the fulness of " the
liberty with which Christ had made them free." Their conscience was
sensitive, and filled with scruples, resulting from early habit and old
prejudices ; but they did not join in the violence of the Judaizing bigots,
and there was even a danger lest they should be led, by the example, of
their more enlightened brethren, to wound their own conscience, by join
ing in acts which they, in their secret hearts, thought wrong. Nothing is
more beautiful than the tenderness and sympathy which St. Paul shows
towards these weak Christians. While he plainly sets before them their
mistake, and shows that their prejudices result from ignorance, yet he has
no sterner rebuke for them than to express his confidence in their further
enlightenment : " If in any thing ye be otherwise minded, God shall reveal
this also unto you." l So great is his anxiety lest the liberty which they
witnessed in others should tempt them to blunt the delicacy of their
moral feeling, that he warns his more enlightened converts to abstain
from lawful indulgences, lest they cause the weak to stumble. " If meat
make my brother to offend, I will eat no meat while the world standeth,
lest I make my brother to offend."2 "Brethren, ye have been called
unto liberty, only use not liberty for an occasion to the flesh, but by love
serve one another." 3 " Destroy not him with thy meat for whom Christ
died." 4
These latter warnings were addressed by St. Paul to a party very differ
ent from those of whom we have previously spoken ; a party who called
themselves (as we see from his epistle to Corinth) by his own name, and
professed to follow his teaching, yet were not always animated by hie
spirit. There was an obvious danger lest the opponents of the Judaizing
section of the Church should themselves imitate one of the errors of
their antagonists, by combining as partisans rather than as Christians.
St. Paul feels himself necessitated to remind them that the very idea of
the Catholic Church excludes all party combinations from its pale, and
that adverse factions, ranging themselves under human leaders, involve a
contradiction to the Christian name. " Is Christ divided ? was Paul
crucified for you ? or were you baptized into the name of Paul ? " " Who,
then, is Paul, and who is Apollos, but ministers by whom ye believed ? " 5
The Pauline party (as they called themselves) appear to have ridiculed
the scrupulosity of their less enlightened brethren, and to have felt for
them a contempt inconsistent with the spirit of Christian love.6 And in
i Phil. iii. 15. 6 i fjor. i. 13, and 1 Cor. iii. 5.
2 1 Cor. viii. 13. 6 Rom. xiv. 10. " Why dost thou despise
8 Gal. v. 13. thy brother'! " is a question addressed to thi»
* Rom. xiv. 15. party.

CHAP.xm. DIVISIONS IN THE PRIMITIVE CHURCH. 391
their opposition to the Judaizers, they showed a bitterness of feeling and
violence of action,1 too like that of their opponents. Some of them, also,
were inclined to exult over the fall of God's ancient people, and to glory
in their own position, as though it had been won by superior merit.
These are rebuked by St. Paul for their " boasting," and warned against
its consequences. " Be not high-minded, but fear ; for if God spared not
the natural branches, take heed lest He also spare not thee." 2 One sec
tion of this party seems to have united these errors with one still more
dangerous to the simplicity of the Christian faith ; they received Chris
tianity more in an intellectual than a moral aspect ; not as a spiritual
religion, so much as a new system of philosophy. This was a phase of
error most likely to occur among the disputatious 3 reasoners who
abounded in the great Greek cities ; and, accordingly, we find the first
trace of its existence at Corinth. There it took a peculiar form, in con
sequence of the arrival of Apollos as a Christian teacher, soon after the
departure of St. Paul. He was a Jew of Alexandria, and as such had
received that Grecian cultivation, and acquired that familiarity with
Greek philosophy, which distinguished the more learned Alexandrian
Jews. Thus he was able to adapt his teaching to the taste of his philos
ophizing hearers at Corinth far more than St. Paul could do ; and,
indeed, the latter had purposely abstained from even attempting this at
Corinth.4 Accordingly, the School which we have mentioned called
themselves the followers of Apollos, and extolled his philosophic views, in
opposition to the simple and unlearned simplicity which they ascribed to
the style of St. Paul. It is easy to perceive in the temper of this portion
of the Church the germ of that rationalizing tendency which afterwards
developed itself into the Greek element of Gnosticism. Already, indeed,
although that heresy was not yet invented, some of the worst opinions of
the worst Gnostics found advocates among those who called themselves
Christians ; there was, even now, a party in the Church which defended
fornication 5 on theory, and which denied the resurrection of the dead.6
These heresies probably originated with those who (as we have observed)
embraced Christianity as a new philosophy ; some of whom attempted,
with a perverted ingenuity, to extract from its doctrines a justification of
the immoral life to which they were addicted. Thus, St. Paul had taught
that the law was dead to true Christians ; meaning thereby, that those
who were penetrated by the Holy Spirit, and made one with Christ,
worked righteousness, not in consequence of a law of precepts and penal-
1 See the admonitions addressed to the 8 The " disputers of this world," 1 Cor. i,
" spiritual" in Gal. v. 13, 14, 26, and Gal. vi. 20. 4 1 Cor. ii. 1.
1_5_ 6 See 1 Cor. vi. 9-20. '
2 Rom. xi. 17-22 6 See 1 Cor. xv. 12.

392 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. CHAi-.xm.
ties, but through the necessary operation of the spiritual principle within
them. For, as the law against theft might be said to be dead to a rich
man (because he would feel no temptation to break it), so the whole
moral law would be dead to a perfect Christian ; 1 hence, to a real Chris
tian, it might in one sense be truly said that prohibitions were abolished?
But the heretics of whom we are speaking took this proposition in a sense
the very opposite to that which it really conveyed ; and whereas St. Paul
taught that prohibitions were abolished for the righteous, they maintained
that all things were lawful to the wicked. " The law is dead " 3 was their
motto, and their practice was what the practice of Antinomians in all
ages has been. " Let us continue in sin, that grace may abound," was
their horrible perversion of the Evangelical revelation that God is love.
" In Christ Jesus, neither circumcision availeth any thing, nor uncircum
cision." 4 " The letter killeth, but the Spirit giveth life." 5 " Meat com-
mendeth us not to God ; for neither if we eat are we the better, nor if we
eat not are we the worse ; " 6 " the kingdom of God is not meat and
drink."7 Such were the words in which St. Paul expressed the great
truth, that religion is not a matter of outward ceremonies, but of inward
life. But these heretics caught up the words, and inferred that all out
ward acts were indifferent, and none could be criminal. They advocated
the most unrestrained indulgence of the passions, and took for their
maxim the worst precept of Epicurean atheism, " Let us eat and drink,
for to-morrow we die." It is in the wealthy and vicious cities of Rome
and Corinth that we find these errors first manifesting themselves ; and
in the voluptuous atmosphere of the latter it was not unnatural that there
should be some who would seek in a new religion an excuse for their old
vices, and others who would easily be led astray by those " evil communi
cations " whose corrupting influence the Apostle himself mentions as the
chief source of this mischief.
The Resurrection of the Dead was denied in the same city and by the
same 8 party ; nor is it strange that as the sensual Felix trembled when
Paul preached to him of the judgment to come, so these profligate cavil
lers shrank from the thought of that tribunal before which account must
be given of the things done in the body. Perhaps, also (as some have
inferred from St. Paul's refutation of these heretics), they had misunder

1 This state would be perfectly realized if 2 Compare 1 Tim. i. 9, — " the Law is not
the renovation of heart were complete ; and it made for a righteous man."
is practically realized in proportion as the 8 " All things are lawful unto me," 1 Cor
Christian's spiritual union with Christ ap- vi. 12. 4 Gal. <r. 6.
proaches its theoretic standard. Perhaps it 6 2 Cor. iii. 6. 6 1 Cor. viii. 8.
was perfectly realized by St. Paul when ho 7 Rom. xiv. 17.
wrote Gal. ii. 20. 8 This i3 proved by 1 Cor. xv 35.

chap. xm. HERESIES IN THE PRIMITIVE CHURCH. 393
stood the Christian doctrine, which teaches us to believe in the resurrec
tion of a spiritual body, as though it had asserted the re-animatiou of
" this vile body " of " flesh and blood," which " cannot inherit the king
dom of God ; " or it is possible that a materialistic philosophy1 led them
to maintain that when the body had crumbled away in the grave, or been
consumed on the funeral pyre, nothing of the man remained in being.
In either case, they probably explained away the doctrine of the Res
urrection as a metaphor, similar to that employed by St. Paul when he
6ays that baptism is the resurrection of the new convert ; 2 thus they
would agree with those later heretics (of whom were Hymenasus and
Philetus) who taught " that the Resurrection was past already."
Hitherto we have spoken of those divisions and heresies which appear
to have sprung up in the several Churches founded by St. Paul at the
earliest period of their history, almost immediately after their conversion.
Beyond this period we are not yet arrived in St. Paul's life ; and from
his conversion even to the time of his imprisonment, his conflict was
mainly with Jews or Judaizers. But there were other forms of error
which harassed his declining years ; and these we will now endeavor
(although anticipating the course of our biography) shortly to describe,
so that it may not be necessary, afterwards to revert to the subject, and
at the same time that particular cases, which will meet us in the Epistles,
may be understood in their relation to the general religious aspect of
the time.
We have seen that, in the earliest epoch of ^the Church, there were
two elements of error which had already shown themselves ; namely,
the bigoted, exclusive, and superstitious tendency, which was of Jewish
origin ; and the pseudo-philosophic, or rationalizing tendency, which was
of Grecian birth. In the early period of which we have hitherto spoken,
and onwards till the time of St. Paul's imprisonment at Rome, the first
of these tendencies was the principal source of danger ; but after this, as
the Church enlarged itself, and the number of Gentile converts more and
more exceeded that of Jewish Christians, the case was altered. The
catholicity of the Church became an established fact, and the Judaizers,
properly so called, ceased to exist as an influential party anywhere except
in Palestine. Yet still, though the Jews were forced to give up their
exclusiveness, and to acknowledge the uncircumcised as " fellow-heirs
and of the same body," their superstition remained, and became a
fruitful source of mischief. On the other hand, those who sought for
nothing more in Christianity than a new philosophy, were naturally
1 If this were the case, we must suppose Gnostics, who denied the Resurrection.
them to have been of Epicurean tendencies, 2 Col. ii. 12. Compare Rom. vi. 4
anil, so far, different from the later Platonizing

394 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap. rin.
increased in number, in proportion as the Church gained converts from
the educated classes ; the lecturers in the schools of Athens, the " wis
dom-seekers " of Corinth, the Antinomian perverters of St. Paul's
teaching, and the Platonizing rabbis of Alexandria, all would share in
this tendency. The latter, indeed, as represented by the learned Philo,
had already attempted to construct a system of Judaic Platonism, which
explained away almost all the peculiarities of the Mosaic theology into
accordance with the doctrines of the Academy. And thus the way was
already paved for the introduction of that most curious amalgam of
Hellenic and Oriental speculation with Jewish superstition, which was
afterwards called the Gnostic heresy. It is a disputed point at what time
this heresy made its first appearance in the Church : some ! think that it
had already commenced in the Church of Corinth when St. Paul warned
them to beware of the knowledge ( Gnosis') which puffeth up ; others
maintain that it did not originate till the time of Basilides, long after
the last Apostle had fallen asleep in Jesus. Perhaps, however, we may
consider this as a difference rather about the definition of a term than
the history of a sect. If we define Gnosticism to be that combination of
Orientalism and Platonism held by the followers of Basilides or Valen-
tinus, and refuse the title of Gnostic to any but those who adopted their
systems, no doubt we must not place the Gnostics among the heretics of
the Apostolic age. But if, on the other hand (as seems most natural),
we define a Gnostic to be one who claims the possession of a peculiar
" Gnosis " (i. e. a deep and philosophic insight into the mysteries of
theology, unattainable by the vulgar), then it is indisputable that Gnos
ticism had begun when St. Paul warned Timothy against those who laid
claim to a " knowledge (Gnosis)2 falsely so called. And, moreover, we
find that, even in the Apostolic age, these arrogant speculators had begun
to blend with their Hellenic philosophy certain fragments of Jewish
superstition, which afterwards were incorporated into the Cabala.3 In
1 This is the opinion of Dr. Burton, the ing the Christian principle which recognizes
great English authority on the Gnostic heresy. no religious distinctions between rich and poor,
(Lectures, pp. 84, 85.) We cannot refer to learned and ignorant. (Church History, sect
this eminent theologian without expressing 4.) So in Hippolytus's recently-discovered
our obligation to his writings, and our admi- " Refutation of Heresies," we find that some
ration for that union of profound learning of the earlier Gnostics are represented as in-
with clear good sense and candor which dis- terpreting the " good ground " in the parable
tinguisb.es him. His premature death robbed of the Sower to mean the higher order of
the Church of England of a writer, who, had intellects.
his life been spared, would have been inferior 8 Thus the " genealogies " mentioned in
to none of its brightest ornaments. the Pastoral Epistles were probably those
2 Neander well observes, that the essential speculations about the emanations of spiritual
feature in Gnosticism is its re-establishing an beings found in the Cabala ; at least, such is
aristocracy of knowledge in religion, and reject- Burton's opinion. (Pp. 114 and 413.) And

chap. xm. HERESIES IN THE PRIMITIVE CHURCH. 395
spite, however, of the occurrence of such Jewish elements, those heresies
which troubled the later years of St. Paul, and afterwards of St. John,
were essentially rather of Gentile1 than of Jewish origin. So far as
they agreed with the later Gnosticism, this must certainly have been the
case, for we know that it was a characteristic of all the Gnostic sects to
despise the Jewish Scriptures.2 Moreover, those who laid claims to
" Gnosis" at Corinth (as we have seen) were a Gentile party, who pro
fessed to adopt St. Paul's doctrine of the abolition of the law, and per
verted it into Antinomianism : in short, they were the opposite extreme
to the Judaizing party. Nor need we be surprised to find that some
of these philosophizing heretics adopted some of the wildest super
stitions of the Jews ; for these very superstitions were not so much the
natural growth of Judaism as ingrafted upon it by its Rabbinical
corrupters and derived from Oriental sources. And there was a strong
affinity between the neo-Platonic philosophy of Alexandria and the
Oriental theosophy which sprang from Buddhism and other kindred
systems, and which degenerated into the practice of magic and incanta
tions. It is not necessary, however, that we should enter into any discussion
of the subsequent development of these errors ; our subject only re
quires that we give an outline of the forms which they assumed during
the lifetime of St. Paul ; and this we can only do very imperfectly,
because the allusions in St. Paul's writings are so few and so brief, that
they give us but little information. Still, they suffice to show the main
features of the heresies which he condemns, especially when we compare
them with notices in other parts of the New Testament, and with the
history of the Church in the succeeding century.
We may consider these heresies, first, in their doctrinal, and, secondly,
in their practical aspect. With regard to the former, we find that their
general characteristic was the claim to a deep philosophical insight into
the mysteries of religion. Thus the Colossians are warned against the
false teachers who would deceive them by a vain affectation of " Philoso
phy," and who were " puffed up by a fleshly mind." (Col. ii. 8, 18.) s
So, in the Epistle to Timothy, St. Paul speaks of these heretics as falsely
claiming " knowledge " (Gnosis). And in the Epistle to the Ephesians
the Angel worship at Colossse belonged to the J In the larger editions is an Appendix on
same class of superstitions. It has been shown the " Heretics of the later Apostolic Age."
by Dr. Burton (pp. 304-306), as well as by 2 Dr. Burton says: — "We find all the
Ncander and other writers, that the later Gnostics agreed in rejecting the Jewish Scrip-
Gnostic theories of seons and emanations were tures, or at least in treating them with con-
derived, in some measure, from Jewish sources, tempt." — P. 39.
although the essential character of Gnosticism 8 Compare 1 Cor. viii. I : " Knowledge
is entirely Anti-Judaical. (gnosis) puffeth up."

396 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap. xm.
(so called) he seems to allude to the same boastful assumption, when he
speaks of the love of Christ as surpassing " knowledge," in a passage
which contains other apparent allusions l to Gnostic doctrine. Connect
ed with this claim to a deeper insight into truth than that possessed by
the uninitiated, was the manner in which some of these heretics explained
away the facts of revelation by an allegorical interpretation. Thus we
find that Hymenaeus and Philetus maintained that " the Resurrection
was past already." We have seen that a heresy apparently identical with
this existed at a very early period in the Church of Corinth, among the
free-thinking, or pseudo-philosophical, party there ; and all the Gnostic
sects of the second century were united in denying the resurrection of
the dead.2 Again, we find the Colossian heretics introducing a worship
of angels, " intruding into those things which they have not seen : " and
so, in the Pastoral Epistles, the " self-styled Gnostics " (1 Tim. vi. 20)
are occupied with " endless genealogies," which were probably fanciful
myths, concerning the origin and emanation of spiritual beings.3 This
latter is one of the points in which Jewish superstition was blended with
Gentile speculation ; for we find in the Cabala,4 or collection of Jewish
traditional theology, many fabulous statements concerning such emana
tions. It seems to be a similar superstition which is stigmatized in the
Pastoral Epistles as consisting of " profane and old wives' fables ; " 5 and,
again, of " Jewish fables and commandments of men." 6 The Gnostics of
the second century adopted and systematized this theory of emanations,
and it became one of the most peculiar and distinctive features of their
heresy. But this was not the only Jewish element in the teaching of
these Colossian heretics ; we find also that they made a point of conscience
of observing the Jewish Sabbaths 7 and festivals, and they are charged
with clinging to outward rites (Col. ii. 8, 20), and making distinctions
between the lawfulness of different kinds of food.
1 Eph. iii. 19. See Dr. Burton's remarks, evidence that it had been cultivated by the
Lectures, pp. 83 and 125. Jewish doctors long before." — P. 298. [See
2 Burton, p. 131. above, Ch. II. p. 55. — h.]
3 See p. 394, a. 3. According to the 6 1 Tim. iv. 7.
Cabala, there were ten Sephiroth, or emana- 6 Tit. i. 14.
tions proceeding from God, which appear to t This does not prove them, however, to
have suggested the Gnostic sons. Upon this have been Jews, for the superstitious Heathen
theory was grafted a system of magic, con- were also in the habit of adopting some of
sisting mainly of the use of Scriptural words the rites of Judaism, under the idea of their
to produce supernatural effects. producing some magical effect upon them ; as
* St. Paul denounces " the tradition of we find from the Roman satirists. Compare
men" (Col. ii. 8) as the source of these Horace, Sat. i. 9, 71 ("Hodie tricesima sab-
errors; and the word Cabala means tradition. bata," &c), and Juv. vi. 542-547. See also
Dr. Burton says, " The Cabala had certainly some remarks on the Colossian heretics in
grown into a, system at the time of the de- our introductory remarks on the Epistle to the
struction of Jerusalem; and there is also Colossians.

cHAP.xm. HERESIES IN THE PRIMITIVE CHURCH. 397
In their practical results, these heresies which we are considering had
a twofold direction. On one side was an ascetic tendency, such as we
find at Colossae, showing itself by an arbitrarily invented worship of God,1
an affectation of self-humiliation and mortification of the flesh. So, in
the Pastoral Epistles, we find the prohibition of marriage,2 the enforced
abstinence from food, and other bodily mortifications, mentioned as
characteristics of heresy.3 If this asceticism originated from the Jewish
element which has been mentioned above, it may be compared with the
practice of the Essenes,4 whose existence shows that such asceticism was
not inconsistent with Judaism, although it was contrary to the views of
the Judaizing party properly so called. On the other hand, it may have
arisen from that abhorrence of matter, and anxiety to free the soul from
the dominion of the body, which distinguished the Alexandrian Plato
nists, and which (derived from them) became a characteristic of some of
the Gnostic sects.
But this asceticism was a weak and comparatively innocent form, in
which the practical results of this incipient Gnosticism exhibited them
selves. Its really dangerous manifestation was derived, not from its
Jewish, but from its Heathen element. We have seen how this showed
itself from the first at Corinth ; how men sheltered their immoralities
under the name of Christianity, and even justified them by a perversion
of its doctrines. Such teaching could not fail to find a ready audience
wherever there were found vicious lives and hardened consciences. Ac
cordingly, it was in the luxurious and corrupt population of Asia Minor,5
that this early Gnosticism assumed its worst form of immoral practice
defended by Antinomian doctrine. Thus, in the Epistle to the Ephesians,
St. Paul warns his readers against the sophistical arguments by which
certain false teachers strove to justify the sins of impurity, and to per
suade them that the acts of the body could not contaminate the soul, —
" Let no man deceive you with vain words ; for because of these things
i " Will-worship." — Col. ii. 23. 4 [See above, Ch. II. p. 32. — h.]
2 Which certainly was the reverse of the 6 Both at Colossae and in Crete it seems
Judaizing exaltation of marriage. to have been the Jewish form of these heresies
8 St. Paul declares that these errors shall which predominated : at Colossse they took
come "in the last days" (2 Tim. iii. 1); but an ascetic direction; in Crete, among a sim-
St. John says " the last days " were come in pier and more provincial population, the false
his time (1 John ii. 18) ; and it is implied by teachers seem to have been hypocrites, who
St. Paul's words that the evils he denounces encouraged the vices to which their followers
were already in action ; just as he had said were addicted, and inoculated them with
before to the Thessalonians, "the mystery of foolish superstitions (Tit. i. 14, iii. 9) ; but
lawlessness is already working" (2 Thess. we do not find in these Epistles any mention
ii. 7), where the peculiar expressions " lawless- of the theoretic Antinomianism which existed
ness " and " the lawless one " seem to point to in some of the great cities.
the Antinomian character of these heresies.

398 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap. xm.
cometh the wrath of God upon the children of disobedience." l Hy
menaeus and Philetus are the first leaders of this party mentioned by
name : we have seen that they agreed with the Corinthian Antinomians
in denying the Resurrection, and they agreed with them no less in prac
tice than in theory. Of the first of them it is expressly said that he2 had
" cast away a good conscience," and of both we are told that they showed
themselves not to belong to Christ, because they had not His seal ; this
seal being described as twofold, — " The Lord knoweth them that are
His," and " Let every one that nameth the name of Christ depart from
iniquity." 3 St. Paul appears to imply that though they boasted their
" knowledge of God," yet the Lord had no knowledge of them ; as our
Saviour had himself declared that to the claims of such false disciples He
would reply," I never knew you ; depart from me, ye workers of iniquity."
But in the same Epistle where these heresiarchs are condemned, St. Paul
intimates that their principles were not yet fully developed ; he warns
Timothy 4 that an outburst of immorality and lawlessness must be shortly
expected within the Church beyond any thing which had yet been ex
perienced. The same anticipation appears in his farewell address to the
Ephesian presbyters, and even at the early period of his Epistles to the
Thessalonians ; and we see from the Epistles of St. Peter and St. Jude,
and from the Apocalypse of St. John, all addressed (it should be remem
bered) to the Churches of Asia Minor, that this prophetic warning was
soon fulfilled. We find that many Christians used their liberty as a cloak
of maliciousness ; 5 " promising their hearers liberty, yet themselves the
slaves of corruption ; " 6 " turning the grace of God into lasciviousness ; " '
that they were justly condemned by the surrounding Heathen for their
crimes, and even suffered punishment as robbers and murderers.8 They
were also infamous for the practice of the pretended arts of magic and
witchcraft,9 which they may have borrowed either from the Jewish sooth
sayers 10 and exorcisers,11 or from the Heathen professors of magical arts
who so much abounded at the same epoch. Some of them, who are called
the followers of Balaam in the Epistles of Peter and Jude, and the
Nicolaitans (an equivalent name) in the Apocalypse, taught their follow
ers to indulge in the sensual impurities, and even in the idol-feasts, of tho
1 Eph. v. 6. See also the whole of the ° 2 Pet. ii. 19.
warnings in Eph. v. The Epistle, though not 7 Jude 4.
addressed (at any rate not exclusively) to the 8 1 Pet. iv. 15.
Ephesians, was probably sent to several other 9 Rev. ii. 20. Compare Rev. ix. 21, Rev.
cities in Asia Minor. xxi. 8, and Rev. xxii. 15.
2 1 Tim. i. 19, 20. 10 Compare Juv. vi. 546 : " Qualiacunque
2 Tim. ii. 19. voles Juclosi somnia vendnnt." [See above
4 2 Tim. iii. Ch. V. pp. 132, 133. — H.]
4 1 Pet. ii. 16. n See Acts xix. 13.

chap. xra. HERESIES IN THE PRIMITIVE CHURCH. 899
Heathen.1 We find, moreover, that these false disciples, with their
licentiousness in morals, united anarchy in politics, and resistance to law
and government. They " walked after the flesh in the lust of unclean
ness, and despised governments." And thus they gave rise to those
charges against Christianity itself, which were made by the Heathen
writers of the time, whose knowledge of the new religion was naturally
taken from those amongst its professors who rendered themselves notori
ous by falling under the judgment of the Law.
When thus we contemplate the true character of these divisions and
heresies which beset the Apostolic Church, we cannot but acknowledge
that it needed all those miraculous gifts with which it was endowed, and
all that inspired wisdom which presided over its organization, to ward off
dangers which threatened to blight its growth and destroy its very exist
ence. In its earliest infancy, two powerful and venomous foes twined
themselves round its very cradle ; but its strength was according to its
day ; with a supernatural vigor it rent off the coils of Jewish bigotry and
stifled the poisonous breath of Heathen licentiousness ; but the peril was
mortal, and the struggle was for life or death. Had the Church's fate
been subjected to the ordinary laws which regulate the history of earthly
commonwealths, it could scarcely have escaped one of two opposite desti
nies, either of which must have equally defeated (if we may so speak)
the world's salvation. Either it must have been cramped into a Jewish
sect, according to the wish of the majority of its earliest members, or
(having escaped this immediate extinction) it must have added one more
to the innumerable schools of Heathen philosophy, subdividing into a
hundred branches, whose votaries would some of them have sunk into
1 Such, at least, seems the natural explana- not impute to them sin." And Epiphanius
tion of the words in Rev. i\. 20 ; for we can gives the most horrible details of the enor-
scarcely suppose so strong a condemnation if mities which they practised. Again, their
the offence had been only eating meat which addiction to magical arts was notorious. And
had once formed part of a sacrifice. It is re- their leaders, Basilides and Valentinus, are
markable how completely the Gnostics of the accused of acting like the Nicolaitans of the
second century resembled these earlier heretics Apocalypse, to avoid persecution. Such ac-
in all the points here mentioned. Their im- cusations may, no doubt, be slanders, as far as
morality is the subject of constant animadver- those leaders were individually concerned.
sion in the writings of the Fathers, who tell The increased knowledge of them which we
us that the calumnies which were cast upon have lately derived from the publication of
the Christians by the Heathen were caused by Hippolytus's " Refutation of Heresies " leads
the vices of the Gnostics. Irenaeus asserts us to think of them as bold speculators, but
that they said, " as gold deposited in mud does not as bad men. Yet we cannot doubt that
not lose its beauty, so they themselves, what- their philosophical speculations degenerated
ever may be their outward immorality, can- into the most superstitious theosophy in the
not be injured by it, nor lose their spiritual hands of their followers. And the details
substance." And so Justin Martyr speaks of furnished by Hippolytus prove that many of
heretics, who said " that though they live sin- the Gnostics fully deserved the charges of
ful lives, yet, if they know God, the Lord will immorality commonly brought against them.

400 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap.xm.
Oriental superstitions, others into Pagan voluptuousness. If we need
any proof how narrowly the Church escaped this latter peril, we have
only to look at the fearful power of Gnosticism in the succeeding century.
And, indeed, the more we consider the elements of which every Christian
community was originally composed, the more must we wonder how
the little flock of the wise and good 1 could have successfully resisted the
overwhelming contagion of folly and wickedness. In every city the
nucleus of the Church consisted of Jews and Jewish proselytes ; on this
foundation was superadded a miscellaneous mass of Heathen converts,
almost exclusively from the lowest classes, baptized, indeed, into the name
of Jesus, but still with all the habits of a life of idolatry and vice cling
ing to them. How was it, then, that such a society could escape the two
temptations which assailed it just at the time when they were most likely
to be fatal ? While as yet the Jewish element preponderated, a fanatical
party, commanding almost necessarily the sympathies of the Jewish por
tion of the society, made a zealous and combined effort to reduce
Christianity to Judaism, and subordinate the Church to the Synagogue.
Over their great opponent, the one Apostle of the Gentiles, they won a
temporary triumph, and saw him consigned to prison and to death. How
was it that the very hour of their victory was the epocb from which we
date their failure? Again, — this stage is passed, — the Church is
thrown open to the Gentiles, and crowds flock in, some attracted by
wonder at the miracles they see, some by hatred of the government under
which they live, and by hopes that they may turn the Church into an
organized conspiracy against law and order ; and even the best, as yet
unsettled in their faith, and ready to exchange their new belief for a
newer, " carried about with every wind of doctrine." At such an epoch,
a systematic theory is devised, reconciling the profession of Christianity
with the practice of immorality ; its teachers proclaim that Christ has
freed them from the law, and that the man who has attained true spiritual
enlightenment is above the obligations of outward morality ; and with
this seducing philosophy for the Gentile they readily combine the Caba
listic superstitions of Rabbinical tradition to captivate the Jew. Who
could wonder if, when such incendiaries applied their torch to such mate
rials, a flame burst forth which well-nigh consumed the fabric ? Surely
that day of trial was " revealed in fire," and the building which was able
to abide the flame was nothing less than the temple of God.
It is painful to be compelled to acknowledge among the Christians
of the Apostolic Age the existence of so many forms of error and sin.
It was a pleasing dream which represented the primitive church as a
1 Whom St. Paul calls "perfect" (Phil. iii. 15), t. e. mature in the knowledge of Christian
truth.

OBAP.xm. HERESIES IN THE PRIMITIVE CHURCH. 401
society of angels ; and it is not without a struggle that we bring our
selves to open our eyes and behold the reality. But yet it is a higher
feeling which bids us thankfully recognize the truth that " there is no
partiality with God ; " J that He has never supernaturally coerced any
generation of mankind into virtue, nor rendered schism and heresy
impossible in any age of the Church. So St. Paul tells his converts2
that there must needs be heresies among them, that the good may be
tried and distinguished from the bad ; implying that, without the possi
bility of a choice, there would be no test of faith or holiness. And so
our Lord Himself compared His Church to a net cast into the sea,
which gathered fish of all kinds, both good and bad ; nor was its purity
to be attained by the exclusion of evil, till the end should come. There
fore, if we sigh, as well we may, for the realization of an ideal which
Scripture paints to us and imagination embodies, but which our eyes
seek for and cannot find ; if we look vainly and with earnest longings
for the appearance of that glorious Church, " without spot or wrinkle
or any such thing," the fitting bride of a heavenly spouse; — it may
calm our impatience to recollect that no such Church has ever existed
upon earth, while yet we do not forget that it has existed and does
exist in heaven. In the very lifetime of the Apostles, no less than
now, " the earnest expectation of the creature waited for the mani
festation of the sons of God ; " miracles did not convert ; inspira
tion did not sanctify ; then, as now, imperfection and evil clung to the
members, and clogged the energies of the kingdom of God ; now, as
then, Christians are fellow-heirs, and of the same body with the spirits
of just men made perfect ; now, as then, the communion of saints unites
into one family the Church militant with the Church triumphant.

Coin of Corinth.'

i Acts x 34. the eastern and western harbors of Corinth,
a 1 Cor. xi. 19. which is symbolized by the female figure on a
• The figures on the right and left represent rock in the centre. See p. 360.

26

CHAPTEE XIV.
Departure from Antioch. — St. Paul's Companions. — Journey through Phrygia and Galatia.—
Apollos at Ephesus and Corinth. — Arrival of St. Paul at Ephesus. — Disciples of John the
Baptist. — The Synagogue. — The School of Tyrannus. — Ephesian Magic. — Miracles. -
The Exorcists. — Burning of the Books.
THE next period of St. Paul's life opens with a third journey through
the interior of Asia Minor.1 In the short stay which he had made
at Ephesus on his return from his second journey, he had promised to
come again to that city, if the providence of God should allow it. This
promise he was enabled to fulfil, after a hasty visit to the metropolis of
the Jewish nation, and a longer sojourn in the first metropolis of the
Gentile Church.8
It would lead us into long and useless discussions, if we were to
speculate on the time spent at Antioch, and the details of the Apostle's
occupation in the scene of his early labors. We have already stated our
reasons for believing that the discussions which led to the Council at
Jerusalem, took place at an earlier period,4 as well as the quarrel between
St. Peter and St. Paul concerning the propriety of concession to the
Judaizers.5 But without knowing the particular form of the controver
sies brought before him, or the names of those Christian teachers with
whom he conferred, we have seen enough to make us aware that immi
nent dangers from the Judaizing party surrounded the Church, and that
Antioch was a favorable place for meeting the machinations of this party,
as well as a convenient starting-point for a journey undertaken to
strengthen those communities that were likely to be invaded by false
teachers from Judaea.
It is evident that it was not St. Paul's only object to proceed with all
haste to Ephesus : nor indeed is it credible that he could pass through
the regions of Cilicia and Lycaonia, Phrygia and Galatia, without
remaining to confirm those Churches which he had founded himself, and
1 Acts xviii. 23. 6 Neander is inclined to assign the misun-
2 Ib. 21. See pp. 368, 369. demanding of the two Apostles to this time.
8 See the end of Ch. XII. So Olshausen. See p. 198.
4 See Appendix I. for the answers to Wie-
seler's arguments on this subject.
402

chap.xiv. ST. PAUL'S THIRD JOURNEY IN ASIA MINOR. 403
some of which he had visited twice. We are plainly told that his journey
was occupied in this work, and the few words which refer to this subject
imply a systematic visitation.1 He would be the more anxious to estab
lish them in the true principles of the Gospel, in proportion as he was
aware of the widely-spreading influence of the Judaizers. Another
specific object, not unconnected with the healing of divisions, was before
him during the whole of this missionary journey, — a collection for the
relief of the poor Christians in Judaea.2 It had been agreed, at the meet
ing of the Apostolic Council (Gal. ii. 9, 10), that while some should go
to the Heathen, and others to the Circumcision, the former should care
fully " remember the poor;" and this we see St. Paul, on the present
journey among the Gentile Churches, " forward to do." We even know
the "order which he gave to the Churches of Galatia" (1 Cor. xvi. 1,
2). He directed that each person should lay by in store, on the first day
of the week, according as God had prospered him, that the collection
should be deliberately made, and prepared for an opportunity of being
taken to Jerusalem.
We are not able to state either the exact route which St. Paul followed,
or the names of the companions by whom he was attended. As regards
the latter subject, however, two points may be taken for granted, that
Silas ceased to be, and that Timotheus continued to be, an associate of
the Apostle. It is most probable that Silas remained behind in Jerusa
lem, whence he had first accompanied Barnabas with the Apostolic letter,3
and where, on the first mention of his name, he is stated to have held a
leading position in the Church.4 He is not again mentioned in connec
tion with the Apostle of the Gentiles.5 The next place in Scripture
where his name occurs is in the letter of the Apostle of the Circumcision
(1 Pet. v. 12), which is addressed to the strangers scattered throughout
Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia, and Bithynia. There, " Silvanus " is
spoken of as one not unknown to the persons addressed, but as " a faith
ful brother unto them ; " — by him the letter was sent which " exhorted "
the Christians in the north and west of Asia Minor, and " testified that
that was the true grace of God wherein they stood ; " — and the same
disciple is seen, on the last mention of his name, as on the first, to be
co-operating for the welfare of the Church, both with St. Peter and St.
Paul.6 1 Acts xviii. 23. Notice the phrase "in 8 Seep. 198. 4 Acts xv. 22.
order." 5 His name is in the salutation in the
2 The steady pursuance of this object in Epistles to the Thessalonians, but not in any
the whole course of this journey may be subsequent letters. Compare 2 Cor. i. 19.
traced through the following passages : 1 Cor. 6 Compare again the account of the Coun-
xvi. 1-4-2 Cor. viii., ix. ; Rom. xv. 25, 26 ; cil of Jerusalem and the mission of Silas and
Acts xxiv. 17 Barnabas.

404 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap. xrv.
It may be considered, on the other hand, probable, if not certain, that
Timotheus was with the Apostle through the whole of this journey.
Abundant mention of him is made, both in the Acts and the Epistles, in
connection with St. Paul's stay at Ephesus, and his subsequent move
ments.1 Of the other companions who were undoubtedly with him at
Ephesus, we cannot say with confidence whether they attended him from
Antioch, or joined him afterwards at some other point. But Erastus
(Acts xix. 22) may have remained with him since the time of his first
visit to Corinth, and Caius and Aristarchus (Acts xix. 29) since the
still earlier period of his journey through Macedonia.2 Perhaps we have
stronger reasons for concluding that Titus, who, though not mentioned
in the Acts,3 was certainly of great service in the second missionary
journey, travelled with Paul and Timotheus through the earlier part of
it. In the frequent mention which is made of him in the Second Epistle
to the Corinthians, he appears as the Apostle's laborious minister, and as
a source of his consolation and support, hardly less strikingly than the
disciple whom he had taken on the previous journey from Lystra and
Iconium.4 Whatever might be the exact route which the Apostle followed from
Antioch to Ephesus, he would certainly, as we have said, revisit those
Churches which twice 5 before had known him as their teacher. He
would pass over the Cilician plain on the warm southern shore,6 and the
high table-land of Lycaonia on the other side of the Pass of Taurus.7 He
would see once more his own early home on the banks of the Cydnus ; 8
and Timothy would be once more in the scenes of his childhood at the
base of the Kara-Dagh.9 After leaving Tarsus, the cities of Derbe,
Lystra, and Iconium, possibly also Antioch in Pisidia,10 would be the
primary objects in the Apostle's progress. Then we come to Phrygia

1 See Acts xix. 22; 1 Cor. iv. 17, xvi. 10; mentary; but it has been put forth indepen
2 Cor. i. 1 ; Rom. xvi. 21 ; Acts xx. 4. dently, and more fully elaborated by Mr.
2 See Tate, pp. 52, 53. Lightfoot in the Cambridge Journal of Classical
8 Wieseler, indeed, identifies him with Jus- and Sacred Philology (June, 1855).
tus, who is mentioned xviii. 7. See Appen- 6 He had been in Lycaonia on the first and
dix I. second missionary journeys, in Cilicia on the
4 If we compare 2 Cor. xii. 18 with 1 Cor. second; but he had previously been there at
xvi. 11, 12, it is natural to infer that the least once since his conversion.
bearers of the First Epistle (from Ephesus to 6 See p. 20, and the allusions to the climate
Corinth) were Titus, and some brother, who is in Ch. VI. and Ch. VIII.
unnamed, but probably identical with one of 7 See again Ch. VI. and Ch. VH1. for Ly-
the two brethren sent on the subsequent mission caonia and Mount Taurus.
(2 Cor. viii. 16-24), and with the Second 8 See pp. 21 and 46.
Epistle (from Macedonia to Corinth). See 9 See Ch. VI. and VIII., with the map on
also 2 Cor. viii. 6. This view is advocated by p. 167, and the engraving on p, 226.
Prof. Stanley in his recently published Com- w See p. 232

HAPXIV- APOLLOS AT EPHESUS.. 405
and Galatia, both vague and indeterminate districts, which he had visited
once, and through which, as before, we cannot venture to lay down a
route.' Though the visitation of the Churches was systematic, we need
not conclude that the same exact course was followed. Since the order
in which the two districts are mentioned is different from that in the
former instance,3 we are at liberty to suppose that he travelled first from
Lycaonia through Cappadocia4 into Galatia, and then by Western
Phrygia to the coast of the ^Igean. In this last part of his progress we
are in still greater doubt as to the route, and one question of interest is
involved in our opinion concerning it. The great road from Ephesus by
Iconium to the Euphrates passed along the valley of the Maeander, and
near the cities of Laodicea, Colossae and Hierapolis ; and we should
naturally suppose that the Apostle would approach the capital of Asia
along this well-travelled line.5 But the arguments are so strong for
believing that St. Paul was never personally at Colossae,6 that it is safer
to imagine him following some road farther to the north, such as that,
for instance, which, after passing near Thyatira, entered the valley of the
Hermus at Sardis.7
Thus, then, we may conceive the Apostle arrived at that region, where
he was formerly in hesitation concerning his future progress,8 — the
frontier district of Asia and Phrygia,9 the mountains which contain the
upper waters 10 of the Hermus and Maeander. And now our attention is
suddenly called away to another preacher of the Gospel, whose name,
next to that of the Apostles, is perhaps the most important in the early
history of the Church. There came at this time to Ephesus, either
directly from Egypt by sea, as Aquila or Priscilla from Corinth, or by
1 Acts xvi. 6. 2 See Ch. VHI. of Hamilton's travels. See especially ch. viii.
* Compare Acts xvi. 6 with xviii. 23. In -x., xxviii.-xl. ; also li., Hi., and especially
both oases we should observe that the phrase vol. i. pp. 135, 149. We may observe that, on
" region (or country) of Galatia " is nsed. one of his journeys, nearly in the direction in
The Greek in each passage is the same. See which St. Paul was moving, he crossed the
what is said on the expression " Churches of mountains from near Afium Kara Hissar
Galatia," p. 234. (Synnada) to visit Yalobatch (Antioch in Pisi-
4 This is Wieseler's view. For the prov- dia). The Apostle might easily do the same.
ince of Cappadocia, see p. 214. The district 8 Acts xvi. 6-8.
is mentioned Acts ii. 9, and 1 Pet. i. 1. 9 See description of this district on p. 239.
6 See pp. 232-234. 10 This part of the table-land of the interior
6 From Col. ii. 1 we should naturally infer . is what is meant by " the higher districts,"
that St. Paul had never been personally among Acts xix. 1 . It is needless to say that the word
the Colossians. Compare Col. i. 4, 7, 8, and " coasts " in the Authorized Version has no
our note below on Col. ii. 1. A full discus- reference to the sea. Herodotus uses a similar
sion of the subject will be found in Dr. David- expression of this region, i. 177. Even Paley
son's Introduction. makes a curious mistake here, 1 y taking
' The characteristic scenery of the Maean- "upper" in the sense of "northern." Hor.
der and Hermus is described in several parts Paul. 1 Cor. No. 5.

406 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap. xiv.
some route through the intermediate countries, like that of St. Paul him
self, a " disciple " named Apollos, a native of Alexandria. This visit
occurred at a critical time, and led to grave consequences in reference to
the establishment of Christian truth, and the growth of parties in the
Church ; while the religious community (if so it may be called) to which
he belonged at the time of his arrival, furnishes us with one of the most
interesting links between the Gospels and the Acts.1
Apollos,2 along with twelve others,3 who are soon afterwards mentioned
at Ephesus, was acquainted with Christianity only so far as it had been
made known by John the Baptist. They " knew only the baptism of
John." 4 Prom the great part which was acted by the forerunner of
Christ in the first announcement of the Gospel, and from the effect pro
duced on the Jewish nation by his appearance, and the number of dis
ciples who came to receive at his hands the baptism of repentance, we
should expect some traces of his influence to appear in the subsequent
period, during which the Gospel was spreading beyond Judaea. Many
Jews from other countries received from the Baptist their knowledge of
the Messiah, and carried with them this knowledge on their return from
Palestine. We read of an heretical sect, at a much later period, who held
John the Baptist to have been himself the Messiah.5 But in a position
intermediate between this deluded party, and those who were travelling
as teachers of the full and perfect Gospel, there were doubtless many,
among the floating Jewish population of the Empire, whose knowledge
of Christ extended only to that which had been preached on the banks of
the Jordan. That such persons should be found at Ephesus, the natural
meeting-place of all religious sects and opinions, is what we might have
supposed d priori. Their own connection with Judasa, or the connection
of their teachers with Judaea, had been broken before the day of Pente
cost. Thus their Christianity was at the same point at which it had stood
at the commencement of our Lord's ministry. They were ignorant of
the full meaning of the death of Christ ; possibly they did not even know
the fact of His resurrection ; and they were certainly ignorant of the
mission of the Comforter.6 But they knew that the times of the Messiah
were come, and that one had appeared 7 in whom the prophecies were
1 See the excellent remarks of Olshausen 8 See Acts xix. 1-7.
on the whole narrative concerning Apollos 4 Acts xviii. 25. Compare xix. 3.
and the other disciples of John the Baptist. 6 The Zabeans. So in the Clementine
2 Winer remarks that this abbreviated Recognitions are mentioned some " ot John's
form of the name Apollonius is found in Sozo- disciples, who preached their master as though
men. It is, however, very rare ; and it is he were Christ."
worth observing that among the terra-cottas 6 Acts xix. 2.
discovered at Tarsus (described p. 221, u. 4) is ' Kuinoel thinks they were not even aware
a circular disk which has the name AIIOAAS2C of Christ's appearance.
inscribed on it in cursive Greek.

ca.ip.xrv. APOLLOS AT EPHESUS. 407
fulfilled. That voice had reached them, which cried, " Prepare ye the
way of the Lord " (Is. xl. 3). They felt that the axe was laid to the root
of the tree, that " the kingdom of Heaven was at hand," that " the
knowledge of salvation was come to those that sit in darkness " (Luke i.
77), and that the children of Israel were everywhere called to " repent."
Such as were in this religious condition were evidently prepared for the
full reception of Christianity, so soon as it was presented to them ; and
we see that they were welcomed by St. Paul and the Christians at
Ephesus as fellow-disciples * of the same Lord and Master.
In some respects Apollos was distinguished from the other disciples of
John the Baptist, who are alluded to at -the same place, and nearly at the
same time. There is much significance in the first fact that is stated, that
he was " born at Alexandria." Something has been said by, us already
concerning the Jews of Alexandria, and their theological influence in the
age of the Apostles.2 In the establishment of a religion which was in
tended to be the complete fulfilment of Judaism, and to be universally
supreme in the Gentile world, we should expect Alexandria to bear her
part, as well as Jerusalem. The Hellenistic learning fostered by the
foundations of the Ptolemies might be made the handmaid of the truth,
no less than the older learning of Judaea and the schools of the Hebrews.
As regards Apollos, he was not only an Alexandrian Jew by birth, but he
had a high reputation for an eloquent and forcible power of speaking, and
had probably been well trained in the rhetorical schools on the banks of
the Nile.3 But though he was endued with the eloquence of a Greek
orator, the subject of his study and teaching was the Scriptures of his
forefathers. The character which he bore in the Synagogues was that of
a man " mighty in the Scriptures." In addition to these advantages of
birth and education, he seems to have had the most complete and
systematic instruction in the Gospel which a discipie of John could
possibly receive.4 Whether from the Baptist himself, or from some of
those who travelled into other lands with his teaching as their possession,
Apollos had received full and accurate instruction in the " way of the
Lord." We are further told that his character was marked by a fervent
zeal 5 for spreading the truth. Thus we may conceive of him as travel
ling, like a second Baptist, beyond the frontiers of Judaea, — expounding
the prophecies of the Old Testament, announcing that the times of the
Messiah were come, and calling the Jews to repentance in the spirit of
i Note the word " disciples," xix. 1. "learned," inasmuch as in the same verse he
2 See pp. 33-36. Also pp. 9, 15-17, and is called "mighty in the Scriptures."
103 4 Literally, "he was catechetically in-
0 The A. V. is probably correct in ren- structed in the way of the Lord "
dering the word " eloquent " rather than b Acts xviii. 25.

408 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap.xtv.
Elias.1 Hence he was, like his great teacher, diligently " preparing the
way of the Lord." 2 Though ignorant of the momentous facts which had
succeeded the Resurrection and Ascension, he was turning the hearts of
the " disobedient to the wisdom of the just," and " making ready a peo
ple for the Lord," 3 whom he was soon to know " more perfectly."
Himself " a burning and a shining light," he bore witness to " that Light
which lighteth every man that cometh into the world," 4 — as, on the
other hand, he was a " swift witness " against those Israelites whose lives
were unholy, and came among them " to purify the sons of Levi, that
they might offer unto the Lord an offering in righteousness," 5 and to
proclaim that, if they were unfaithful, God was still able " to raise up
children unto Abraham." 6
Thus burning with zeal, and confident of the truth of what he had
learnt, he spoke out boldly in the Synagogue.7 An intense interest must
have been excited about this time concerning the Messiah in the syna
gogue at Ephesus. Paul had recently been there, and departed with the
promise of return.8 Aquila and Priscilla, though taking no forward
part as public teachers, would diligently keep the subject of the Apostle's
instruction before the mind of the Israelites. And now an Alexandrian
Jew presented himself among them, bearing testimony to the same Mes
siah with singular eloquence, and with great power in the interpretation
of Scripture. Thus an unconscious preparation was made for the arrival
of the Apostle, who was even now travelling towards Ephesus through
the uplands of Asia Minor.
The teaching of Apollos, though eloquent, learned, and zealous, was
seriously defective. But God had provided among his listeners those who
could instruct him more perfectly. Aquila and Priscilla felt that he was
proclaiming the same truth in which they had been instructed at Corinth.
They could inform him that they had met with one who had taught with
authority far more concerning Christ than had been known even to John
the Baptist ; and they could recount to him the miraculous gifts, which
attested the outpouring of the Holy Ghost. Thus they attached them
selves closely to Apollos ; 9 and gave him complete instruction in that
" way of the Lord," which he had already taught accurately,10 though
1 He was probably able to go further in erence to John the Baptist. Matt. iii. 3;
Christian teaching than John the Baptist Mark i. 3 ; Luke iii. 4 ; John i. 23 ; Isa. xl
could do, by giving an account of the life of 3 (LXX.). Compare Mai. iii. 1 (LXX.).
Jesus Christ. So far his knowledge was 3 Luke i. 16, 17.
accurate. Further instruction from Aquila 4 John v. 35, i. 9.
and Priscilla made it more accurate. 6 Mai. iii. 3-5. 6 Matt. iii. 9.
2 The phrase " way of the Lord " should 7 Acts xviii. 26. 8 See p. 369
be carefully compared with the passages in the ' " They took him to themselves," v. 26.
Gospels and Prophets, where it occurs in ref- 10 Compare v. 25 and v. 26.

chap. xiv. APOLLOS AT CORINTH. 409
imperfectly ; and the learned Alexandrian obtained from the tent- makers
a knowledge of that " mystery " which the ancient Scriptures had only
partially revealed.
This providential meeting with Aquila and Priscilla in Asia became the
means of promoting the spread of the Gospel in Achaia. Now that
Apollos was made fully acquainted with the Christian doctrine, his zeal
urged him to go where it had been firmly established by an Apostle.1 It
is possible, too, that some news received from Corinth might lead him to
suppose that he could be of active service there in the cause of truth.
The Christians of Ephesus encouraged2 him in this intention, and gave
him " letters of commendation " 3 to their brethren across the iEgean.
On his arrival at Corinth, he threw himself at once among those Jews
who had rejected St. Paul, and argued with them publicly and zealously
on the ground of their Scriptures,4 and thus5 became " a valuable support
to those who had already believed through the grace of God ; " for he
proved with power that that Jesus who had been crucified at Jerusalem,
and whom Paul was proclaiming throughout the world, was indeed the
Christ.6 Thus he watered where Paul had planted, and God gave an
abundant increase. (1 Cor. iii. 6.) And yet evil grew up side by side
with the good. For while he was a valuable aid to the Christians, and
a formidable antagonist to the Jews, and while he was honestly co-ope
rating in Paul's great work of evangelizing the world, he became the
occasion of fostering party-spirit among the Corinthians, and was un
willingly held up as a rival of the Apostle himself. In this city of rheto
ricians and sophists, the erudition and eloquent speaking of Apollos were
contrasted with the unlearned simplicity with which St. Paul had studi
ously presented the Gospel to his Corinthian hearers.7 Thus many
attached themselves to the new teacher, and called themselves by the
name of Apollos, while others ranged themselves as the party of Paul
(1 Cor. i. 12), forgetting that Christ could not be "divided," and that
Paul and Apollos were merely " ministers by whom they had believed."
(1 Cor. iii. 5.) We have no reason to imagine that Apollos himself
1 Acts xviii. 27. Christians against the Jews, in the contro-
2 The exhortation (v. 27) may refer to versies which had doubtless been going on
him. At all events, he was encouraged in his since St. Paul's departure.
plan. 6 " Showing by the Scriptures that Jesus
5 Compare what is said here in v. 27 with was Christ," v. 28. The phrase is much more
2 Cor. iii. 1 , where the reference is to com- definite than those which are used above
mendatory letters addressed to or from the (" the way of the Lord," and "the things of
very same Church of Corinth. the Lord," v. 25) of the time when he was
4 Compare in detail the expressions in v. not fully instructed.
28 with those in w. 24-26. 7 See the remarks on the Corinthian parries
6 The word " for " should be noticed. His in p. 391.
coming was a valuable assistance to the

410 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL chap.xi,
encouraged or tolerated such unchristian divisions. A proof of his
strong feeling to the contrary, and of his close attachment to St. Paul,
is furnished by that letter to the Corinthians, which will soon be brought
under our notice,1 where, after vehement rebukes of the schismatic spirit
prevailing among the Corinthians, it is said, " touching our brother Apol
los," that he was unwilling to return to them at that particular time,
though St. Paul himself had "greatly desired it."
But now the Apostle himself is about to arrive in Ephesus. His resi
dence in this place, like his residence in Antioch and Corinth, is a subject
to which our attention is particularly called. Therefore, all the features
of the city — its appearance, its history, the character of its population,
its political and mercantile relations — possess the utmost interest for us.
We shall defer such description to a future chapter, and limit ourselves
here to what may set before the reader the geographical position of
Ephesus, as the point in which St. Paul's journey from Antioch termi
nated for the present.
We imagined him2 about the frontier of Asia and Phrygia, on his
approach from the interior to the sea. Prom this region of volcanic
mountains, a tract of country extends to the iEgean, which is watered
by two of the long western rivers, the Hermus and the Maeander, and
which is celebrated through an extended period of classical history, and
is sacred to us as the scene of the Churches of the Apocalypse.3 Near
the mouth of one of these rivers is Smyrna ; near that of the other is
Miletus. The islands of Chios and Samos are respectively opposite the
projecting portions of coast, where the rivers flow by these cities to the
sea.4 Between the Hermus and the Maeander is a smaller river, named
the Cayster, separated from the latter by the ridge of Messogis, and from
the former by Mount Tmolus.5 Here, in the level valley of the Cayster, is
the early cradle of the Asiatic name, — the district of primeval " Asia,"
— not as understood in its political or ecclesiastical sense, but the Asia of
old poetic legend.6 And here, in a situation pre-eminent among the
excellent positions which the Ionians chose for their cities, Ephesus was
1 1 Cor. xvi. 12. We may just mention and Philadelphia are in that of the Hermus;
that a very different view has been taken of Pergamus is farther to the north, on the
the character of Apollos and his relation to Caicus. For a description of this district, see
St. Paul, — viz. that he was the chief promo- Arundell's Visit to the Seven Churches, and
ter of the troubles at Corinth, and that he Fellows's Asia Minor.
acted rebelliously in refusing to return thither 4 In the account of St. Paul's return we
when the Apostle desired him to do so. We shall have to take particular notice of this
have no doubt, however, that the ordinary coast. He sailed between these islands and
view is correct. the mainland, touching at Miletus. Acts xx.
2 Above, p. 405. 6 gee p. 461 .
8 Rev. i., ii., iii. Laodicea is in the basin 6 For the early history of the word Asia.
of the Maeander ; Smyrna, Thyatira, Sardis, see pp. 205, 206.

«hap.xiv. ST. PAUL'S VISIT TO EPHESUS. 411
built, on some hills near the sea. For some time after its foundation by
Androclus the Athenian, it was inferior to Miletus ; but with the decay
of the latter city, in the Macedonian and Roman periods, it rose to
greater eminence, and in the time of St. Paul it was the greatest city of
Asia Minor, as well as the metropolis of the province of Asia. Though
Greek in its origin, it was half-Oriental in the prevalent worship and in
the character of it's inhabitants ; and being constantly visited by ships
from all parts of the Mediterranean, and united by great roads with the
markets of the interior, it was the common meeting-place of various char
acters and classes of men.
Among those whom St. Paul met on his arrival was the small company
of Jews above alluded to,1 who professed the imperfect Christianity of
John the Baptist. By this time, Apollos had departed to Corinth.
Those " disciples " who were now at Ephesus were in the same religious
condition in which he had been when Aquila arid Priscilla first spoke to
him, though doubtless they were inferior to him both in learning and in
zeal.2 St. Paul found, on inquiry, that they had only received John's
baptism, and that they were ignorant of the great outpouring of the
Holy Ghost, in which the life and energy of the Church consisted.3
They were even perplexed by his question.4 He then pointed out, in
conformity with what had been said by John the Baptist himself, that
that prophet only preached repentance to prepare men's minds for Christ,
who is the true object of faith. On this they received Christian
baptism ; 5 and after they were baptized, the laying-on of the Apostle's
hands resulted, as in all other Churches, in the miraculous gifts of
tongues and of prophecy.6
After this occurrence has been mentioned as an isolated fact, our atten
tion is called to the great teacher's labors in the Synagogue. Doubtless,
Aquila and Priscilla were there. Though they are not mentioned here
in connection with St. Paul, we have seen them so lately instructing
Apollos (Acts xviii.), and we shall find them so soon again sending salu
tations to Corinth in the Apostle's letter from Ephesus (1 Cor. xvi.); that
we cannot but believe he met his old associates, and again experienced
the benefit of their aid. It is even probable that he again worked with
1 Above, p. 406. See Acts xix. 1-7. were baptized, receive the miraculous gifts
2 It is impossible to know whether these of the Holy Ghost?" The aorist is used
men were connected with Apollos. The again in the answer. We should compare
whole narrative seems to imply that they were John vii. 39.
in a lower state of religious knowledge than 5 On the inference derivable from this pas-
he was. 8 See Ch. XIII. sage, that the name of the Holy Ghost was
4 The chief difficulty here is created by the used in the baptismal formula, see p. 384.
inaccurate rendering of the aorists in the A. V. 6 See again Ch. XHI. and the note below
The Apostle's question is, " Did ye, when ye on 1 Cor.

412 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap.xtv.
them at the same trade : for in the address to the Ephesian elders at
Miletus (Acts xx. 34) he stated that " his own hands had ministered to
his necessities, and to those who were with him ; " and in writing to the
Corinthians he says (1 Cor. iv. 11, 12), that such toil had continued
" even to that hour." There is no doubt that he " reasoned " in the
Synagogue at Ephesus with the same zeal and energy with which his
spiritual labors had been begun at Corinth.1 He had been anxiously ex
pected, and at first he was heartily welcomed. A preparation for his
teaching had been made by Apollos and those who instructed him.
" For three months," Paul continued to speak boldly in the Synagogue,
" arguing, and endeavoring to convince his hearers of all that related to
the kingdom of God." 2 The hearts of some were hardened, while others
repented and believed ; and, in the end, the Apostle's doctrine was public
ly calumniated by the Jews before the people.3 On this he openly sepa
rated himself, and withdrew the disciples from the Synagogue ; and the
Christian Church at Ephesus became a distinct body, separated both
from the Jews and the Gentiles.
As the house of Justus at Corinth 4 had afforded St. Paul a refuge from
calumny, and an opportunity of continuing his public instruction, so here
he had recourse to " the school of Tyrannus," who was probably a
teacher of philosophy or rhetoric, converted by the Apostle to Chris
tianity.5 His labors in spreading the gospel were here continued for two
whole years. For the incidents which occurred during this residence, for
the persons with whom the Apostle became acquainted, and for the pre
cise subjects of his teaching, we have no letters to give us information
supplementary to the Acts, as in the case of Thessalonica and Corinth : 6
inasmuch as that which is called the " Epistle to the Ephesians " enters
into no personal or incidental details.7 But we have, in the address to
the Ephesian elders at Miletus, an affecting picture of an Apostle's labors
for the salvation of those whom his Master came to redeem. From that
address we learn that his voice had not been heard within the school of
Tyrannus alone, but that he had gone about among his converts, instruct
ing them "from house to house," and warning "each one" of them
affectionately "with tears."8 The subject of his teaching was ever the
same, both for Jews and Greeks, — " repentance .towards God, and faith
1 Acts xviii. 4. 2 ActB xix. 8. 6 See in the chapter containing the two
8 " Before the multitude," v. 9. Epistles to the Thessalonians, and in those
4 Acts xviii. 7. See p. 348. which contain the two Epistles to the Co-
6 Those who are apt to see a Jewish or rinthians.
Talmudical reference almost everywhere 7 The peculiarities of this Epistle will b»
think that Tyrannus may have been a Jew, considered hereafter.
M)d his " school " a place for theological 8 Acts xx. 20, 31. Compare y. 19
teaching such as those mentioned p. 55.

ohap. xrv. EPHESIAN MAGIC. 413
towards our Lord Jesus Christ." J Labors so incessant, so disinterested,
and continued through so long a time, could not fail to produce a great
pesult at Ephesus. A large Church was formed over which many pres
byters were called to preside.2 Nor were the results confined to the city.
Throughout the province of " Asia " the name of Christ became generally
known, both to the Jews and the Gentiles ; 3 and, doubtless, many
daughter-churches were founded, whether in the course of journeys un
dertaken by the Apostle himself,4 or by means of those with whom he
became acquainted, — as for instance by Epaphras, Archippus, and
Philemon, in connection with Colossae, and its neighbor cities Hierapolis
and Laodicea.5
ft is during this interval, that one of the two characteristics of the
people of Ephesus comes prominently into view. This city was renowned
throughout the world for the worship of Diana, and the practice of magic.
Though it was a Greek city, like Athens or Corinth, the manners of its
inhabitants were half Oriental. The image of the tutelary goddess
resembled an Indian idol6 rather than the beautiful forms which crowded
the Acropolis of Athens : 7 and the enemy which St. Paul had to oppose
was not a vaunting philosophy, as at Corinth,8 but a dark and Asiatic
superstition. The worship of Diana and the practice of magic were
closely connected together. Eustathius says, that the mysterious
symbols called "Ephesian Letters" were engraved on the crown, the
girdle, and the feet of the goddess. These Ephesian letters or monograms
have been compared by a Swedish writer to the Runic characters of the
North. When pronounced, they were regarded as a charm ; and were
directed to be used, especially by those who were in the power of evil
spirits. When written, they were carried about as amulets. Curious
stories are told of their influence. Croesus is related to have repeated
the mystic syllables when on his funeral-pile ; and an Ephesian wrestler
is said to have always struggled successfully against an antagonist from
Miletus until he lost the scroll, which before had been like a talisman.
1 j^cta xx_ 21. Ephesus by Colossse and the valley of the
2 Acts xx. 17, " the elders of the church," Maeander. The same arguments tend to prove
below (v. 28) called " overseers." See what is that he never visited this district from Ephesus.
said on this subject, p. 378. . It is thought by many that Epaphras was con-'
3 " So that all they which dwelt in Asia," verted by St. Paul at Ephesus, and founded
&c, Acts xix. 10. There must have been the church of Colossse. See Col. i. 7, iv
many Jews in various parts of the prov- 12-17 ; Philem. 23.
mce 6 See the coin at the end of this chapter,
4 What is said of his continued residence and the description of Diana's worship in
at Ephesus by no means implies that he did Ch. XVI.
not make journeys in the province. 7 See p. 308, &c.
6 See above (p. 405, n. 6) for the arguments 8 See p. 391.
against supposing that St. Paul travelled to

414 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OP ST. PAUL. chap, xiv
The study of these symbols was an elaborate science : and books, both
numerous and costly, were compiled by its professors.1
This statement throws some light on the peculiar character of the
miracles wrought by St. Paul at Ephesus. We are not to suppose that
the Apostles were always able to work miracles at will. An influx of
supernatural power was given to them, at the time, and according to the
circumstances, that required it. And the character of the miracles was
not always the same. They were accommodated to the peculiar forms
of sin, superstition, and ignorance they were required to oppose.2 Here,
at Ephesus, St. Paul was in the face of magicians, like Moses and Aaron
before Pharaoh ; and it is distinctly said that his miracles were " not
ordinary wonders ; " 3 from which we may infer that they were different
from those which he usually performed. We know, in the case of our
blessed Lord's miracles, that though the change was usually accomplished
on the speaking of a word, intermediate agency was sometimes em
ployed ; as when the blind man was healed at the pool of Siloam.4 A
miracle which has a closer reference to our present subject is that in
which the hem of Christ's garment was made effectual to the healing of a
poor sufferer, and the conviction of the bystanders.5 So on this occasion
garments6 were made the means of communicating a healing power to
those who were at a distance, whether they were possessed with evil
spirits, or afflicted with ordinary diseases.7 Such effects, thus publicly
manifested, were a signal refutation of the charms and amulets and
mystic letters of Ephesus. Yet was this no encouragement to blind
superstition. When the suffering woman was healed by touching the
hem of the garment, the Saviour turned round, and said, " Virtue is gone
out of me." 8 And here at Ephesus we are reminded that it was God
who " wrought miracles by the hands of Paul" (v. 11), and that " the
name," not of Paul, but " of the Lord Jesus, was magnified." (v. 17.)
1 The lives of Alexander of Tralles in Go, wash in the pool of Siloam." John ix.
Smith's Diet, cf Biography and in the Biog- 6, 7.
raphy of the U. K. Society, contain some im- 6 Matt. ix. 20. See Trench on the Miracles,
portant illustrations of Ephesian magic. p. 189, &c.
2 The narrative of what was done by St. 6 Both the words nsed here are Latin.
Paul at Ephesus should be compared with St. The former, sudarium, is that which occurs
Peter's miracles at Jerusalem, when " many Luke xix. 20 ; John xi. 44, xx. 7 ; and is
signs and wonders were wrought among the translated " napkin." The latter, semicinctium,
people . . . insomuch that they brought forth denotes some such article of dress — shawl,
the sick into the streets, and laid them on beds handkerchief, or apron — as is easily laid
and couches, that at the least the shadow of aside. Baumgarten's remarks on the signifi-
Peter passing by might overshadow some of cance of these miracles are well worthy of
them." — Acts v. 12-16. 8 Acts xix. 11. consideration. He connects the sudaria and
4 " He spat on the ground, and made clay semicinctia with St. Paul's daily labor in his
of the spittle, and anointed the eyes of the own support. 7 Acts xix. 12.
blind man with the clay, and said unto him, 8 Luke viii. 46. Compare vi. 19.

chap. xrv. MIRACLES WORKED BY ST. PAUL. 415
These miracles must have produced a great effect upon the minds of
those who practised curious arts in Ephesus. Among the magicians who
were then in this city, in the course of their wanderings through the
East, were several Jewish exorcists.1 This is a circumstance which need
not surprise us. The stern severity with which sorcery was forbidden in
the Old Testament 2 attests the early tendency of the Israelites to such
practices : the Talmud bears witness to -the continuance of these prac
tices at a later period ; 3 and we have already had occasion, in the course
of this history, to notice the spread of Jewish magicians through various
parts of the Roman Empire.4 It was an age of superstition and impos
ture — an age also in which the powers of evil manifested themselves with
peculiar force. Hence we find St. Paul classing " witchcraft " among
the works of the flesh (Gal. v. 20), and solemnly warning the Galatians
both in words5 and by his letters, that they who practise it cannot inherit
the kingdom of God ; and it is of such that he writes to Timothy
(2 Tim. iii. 13) — that " evil men and seducers 6 shall wax worse and
worse, deceiving and being deceived." This passage in St. Paul's latest
letter had probably reference to that very city in which we see him now
brought into opposition with Jewish sorcerers. These men, believing
that the name of Jesus acted as a charm, and recognizing the Apostle as
a Jew like themselves, attempted his method of casting out evil spirits.7
But He to whom the demons were subject, and who had given to His
servant " power and authority " over them (Luke ix. 1), had shame and
terror in store for those who presumed thus to take His Holy Name in
vain. One specific instance is recorded, which produced disastrous conse
quences to those who made the attempt, and led to wide results among
the general population. In the number of those who attempted to cast
out evil spirits by the " name of Jesus," were seven brothers, sons of
Sceva, who is called a high priest,8 either because he had really held this
office at Jerusalem, or because he was chief of one of the twenty-four
courses of priests. But the demons, who were subject to Jesus, and by
i Acts xix. 13 cians which they attributed to King Solo
2 See Exod. xxii. 18 ; *jki . xx. 27 ; Deut. mon. 4 See p. 133, &c.
xviii. 10, 11 ; 1 Sam. xxviii. 3, 9. 6 Observe the phrase in v. 21, "as I told
8 A knowledge of magic was a requisite you in time past," perhaps on the very journey
qualification of a member of the Sanhedrin, through Galatia which we have just had occa-
that he might be able to try those who were sion to mention.
accused of such practices. Josephus (Ant. xx. 8 The word here used is the customary
7 2) speaks of a Cyprian Jew, a sorcerer, who term for these wandering magicians.
was a friend and companion of Felix, and who T See v. 13.
is identified by some with Simon Magus. 8 Olshausen's version, that he was merely
Again (Ant. viii. 2, 5), he mentions certain the chief rabbi of the Ephesian Jews, can
forms of incantation used by Jewish magi- hardly be a correct rendering of the term.

416 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap, xrv
His will subject to those who preached His Gospel, treated with scorn
those who used His Name without being converted to His truth. " Je
sus I recognize, and Paul I know ; ' but who are ye ? " was the answer
of the evil spirit. And straightway the man who was possessed sprang
upon them with frantic violence, so that they were utterly discomfited,
and " fled out of the house naked and wounded." 2
This fearful result of the profane use of that Holy Name which was
proclaimed by the Apostles for the salvation of all men, soon became
notorious, both among the Greeks and the Jews.3 Consternation and
alarm took possession of the minds of many ; and in proportion to this
alarm the name of the Lord Jesus began to be reverenced and honored.4
Even among those who had given their faith to St. Paul's preaching,5
some ippear to have retained their attachment to the practice of magical
arts. Their conscience was moved by what had recently occurred, and
they came and made a full confession to the Apostle, and publicly
acknowledged and forsook their deeds of darkness.6
The fear and conviction seem to have extended beyond those who made
a profession of Christianity. A large number of the sorcerers them
selves 7 openly renounced the practice which had been so signally con
demned by a higher power ; and they brought together the books 8 that
contained the mystic formularies, and burnt them before all the people.
When the volumes were consumed,9 they proceeded to reckon up the
price at which these manuals of enchantment would be valued. Such
books, from their very nature, would be costly ; and all books in that age
bore a value which is far above any standard with which we are familiar.
Hence we need not be surprised that the whole cost thus sacrificed and
surrendered amounted to as much as two thousand pounds of English
money.10 This scene must have been long remembered at Ephesus. It
was a strong proof of honest conviction on the part of the sorcerers, and
a striking attestation of the triumph of Jesus Christ over the powers of
darkness. The workers of evil were put to scorn, like the priests of Baal
1 The two verbs in the original are differ- 8 Literally, " their books."
ent. 9 The imperfect should be noticed, as im-
2 v. 16. parting a graphic character to the whole nar-
8 f- 17. rative. The burning and blazing of the books
4 The verb is in the imperfect. went on for some considerable time. Compare
6 It seems unnatural to take the perfect the instances of the burning of magical books
participle in any other sense than " those who recorded in Liv. xl. 29 ; Suet. Aug. 31 : also
had previously believed." Tac. Ann. xiii. 50 ; Ayr. 2.
8 " Their deeds," which must surely refer w The " piece of silver " mentioned here
to the particular practices in question. The was doubtless the drachma, the current Greek
verb denotes " to make a full confession," as coin of the Levant : the value was about ten-
ni Matt. iii. 6, Jam. v. 16. pence. There can be no reason to suppose
' T- 19- with Grotius that the shekel is meant.

BURNING OF THE BOOKS

417

by Elijah on Mount Carmel ; l and the teaching of the doctrine of Christ
" increased mightily and grew strong." 2
With this narrative of the burning of the books, we have nearly
reached the term of St. Paul's three-years' residence at Ephesus.3
Before his departure, however, two important subjects demand our atten
tion, each of which may be treated in a separate chapter : — the First
Epistle to the Corinthans, with the circumstances in Achaia which led to
the writing of it, — and the uproar in the Ephesian Theatre, which will
be considered in connection with a description of the city, and some notice
of the worship of Diana.

Coin of Ephe«u.4

1 I Kings xviii.
a v. 20.
8 See y. 21, which immediately follows.
87

4 From Akerman's Numismatic Illustrations,
p. 49. For the form under which Diana is
represented, see below, pp. 465, 466.

CHAPTEE XV.

St. Paul pays a Short Visit to Corinth. — Returns to Ephesus. — Writes a Letter to the Corin
thians, which is now lost. — They reply, desiring further Explanations. — State of the
Corinthian Church. — St. Paul writes the First Epistle to the Corinthians.
WE have hitherto derived such information as we possess, concern
ing the proceedings of St. Paul at Ephesus, from the narrative in
the Acts ; but we must now record an occurrence which St. Luke has
passed over in silence, and which we know only from a few incidental
allusions in the letters of the Apostle himself. This occurrence, which
probably took place not later than the beginning of the second year of
St. Paul's residence at Ephesus, was a short visit which he paid to the
Church at Corinth.1

1 The occurrence of this visit is proved by
the following passages : —
(I.) 2 Cor. xii. 14. "Now for the third
time I am prepared to come to you."
(2.) 2 Cor. xiii. 1. "Now for the third
time I am coming to yon."
If the visit after leaving Ephesus was the
third, there must have been a second before it.
(3.) 2 Cor. xii. 21. "Lest again, when I
come, God should humble me, and I should
grieve many of those who sinned before." He
fears lest he should again be humbled on visit
ing them, and again have to mourn their sins.
Hence there must have been a former visit, in
which he was thus humbled and made to
mourn. Paley in the Horae Paulinas, and other com
mentators since, have shown that these pas
sages (though they acknowledge their most
natural meaning to be in favor of an inter
mediate visit) may be explained away ; in the
first two St. Paul might perhaps only have
meant " this is the third time I have intended
to come to you ; " and in the third passage we
may take again with come in the sense of " on
my return." But we think that nothing but
the hypothesis of an intermediate visit can ex
plain the following passages : —
418

(4) 2 Cor. ii. 1. "I decided not to come
again in grief to you " (which is the reading
of every one of the Uncial manuscripts).
Here it would be exceedingly unnatural to
join again with come ; and the feeling of this
probably led to the error of the Textus Recep
tus. (5) 2 Cor. xiii. 2 (according to the reading
of the bestMSS.). i" have warned you formerly,
and I now forewarn you, as when I was present
the second time, so now while I am absent, saying
to those who had sinned before that time, and to all
the rest, " If I come again, I will not spare."
Against these arguments Paley sets (1st)
St. Luke's silence, which, however, is acknowl
edged by all to be inconclusive, considering
that so very many of St. Paul's travels and ad
ventures are left confessedly unrecorded in the
Acts (see note on 2 Cor. xi. 23, &c). (2dly)
The passage, 2 Cor. i. 15, 16, in which St.
Paul tells the Corinthians he did not wish now
to give them a " second benefit ; " whence he
argues that the visit then approaching would
be his second visit. But a more careful exam
ination of the passage shows that St. Paul i»
speaking of his original intention of paying
them a double visit, on his way to Macedonia,
and on his return from Macedonia.

chap.xy.- VISIT TO CORINTH. 419
If we had not possessed any direct information that such a visit had
been made, yet in itself it would have seemed highly probable that St.
Paul would not have remained three years at Ephesus without revisiting
his Corinthian converts We have already remarked 1 on the facility of
communication existing between these two great cities, which were united
by a continual reciprocity ot commerce, and were the capitals of two
peaceful provinces. And examples of the intercourse which actually
took place between the Christians of the two Churches have occurred,
both in the case of Aquila and Priscilla, who had migrated from the one to
the other (Acts xviii. 18, 19), and in that of Apollos, concerning whom,
" when he was disposed to pass into Achaia," " the brethren [at Ephesus]
wrote, exhorting the disciples [at Corinth] to receive him " (Acts xviii.
27). In the last chapter, some of the results of this visit of Apollos to
Corinth have been noticed ; he was now probably returned to Ephesus,
where we know2 that he was remaining (and, it would seem, stationary)
during the third year of St. Paul's residence in that capital. No doubt,
on his return, he had much to tell of the Corinthian converts to their
father in the faith, — much of joy and hope, but also much of pain, to
communicate ; for there can be little doubt that those tares among the
wheat, which we shall presently see in their maturer growth, had already
begun to germinate, although neither Paul had planted, nor Apollos
watered them. One evil at least, we know, prevailed extensively, and
threatened to corrupt the whole Church of Corinth. This was nothing
less than the addiction of many Corinthian Christians to those sins of
impurity which they had practised in the days of their Heathenism, and
which disgraced their native city, even among the Heathen. We have
before mentioned the peculiar licentiousness of manners which prevailed
at Corinth. So notorious was this, that it had actually passed into the
vocabulary of the Greek tongue ; and the very word " to Corinthianize,"
meant " to play the wanton ; " 8 nay, the bad reputation of the city had
become proverbial, even in foreign languages, and is immortalized by the
Latin poets.4 Such being the habits in which many of the Corinthian
converts had been educated, we cannot wonder if it proved most difficult
to root out immorality from the rising Church. The offenders against
Christian chastity were exceedingly numerous 5 at this period ; and it was
especially with the object of attempting to reform them, and to check the
growing mischief, that St. Paul now determined to visit Corinth.
He has himself described this visit as a painful one ; 6 he went in sorrow
1 P. 368. B Only a part of them, who remained nnre-
2 I Cor. xvi. 12. pentant after rebuke and warning, are called
8 It is so used by Aristophanes. " many." 2 Cor. xii. 21.
4 Ho-r. Ep. i. 1 7. See p. 361, n. 5 6 2 Cor. ii. 1.

420 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chAP. x».
at the tidings he had received ; and when he arrived, he found the state
of things even worse than he had expected ; he tells us that it was a time
of personal humiliation ' to himself, occasioned by the flagrant sins of
so many of his own converts ; he reminds the Corinthians, afterwards,
how he had " mourned " over those who had dishonored the name of
Christ by " the uncleanness and fornication and wantonness which they
had committed." 2
But in the midst of his grief he showed the greatest tenderness for the
individual offenders ; he warned them of the heinous guilt which they
were incurring ; he showed them its inconsistency with their Christian
calling ; 3 he reminded them how, at their baptism, they had died to sin,
and risen again unto righteousness ; but he did not at once exclude them
from the Church which they had defiled. Yet he was compelled to
threaten them with this penalty, if they persevered in the sins which had
now called forth his rebuke. He has recorded the very words which he
used. " If I come again," he said, " I will not spare." 4
It appears probable that, on this occasion, St. Paul remained but a very
short time at Corinth. When afterwards, in writing to them, he says
that he does not wish " now to pay them a passing visit," he seems 5 to
imply that his last visit had deserved that epithet. Moreover, had it
occupied a large portion of the " space of three years," which he
describes himself to have spent at Ephesus (Acts xx. 31), he would
probably have expressed himself differently in that part of his. address to
the Ephesian presbyters ; 6 and a long visit could scarcely have failed to
furnish more allusions in the Epistles so soon after written to Corinth.
The silence of St. Luke also, which is easily explained on the supposi
tion of a short visit, would be less natural had St. Paul been long absent
from Ephesus, where he appears, from the narrative in the Acts, to be
stationary during all this period.
On these grounds, we suppose that the Apostle, availing himself of the
constant maritime intercourse between the two cities, had gone by sea to
Corinth ; and that he now returned to Ephesus by the same route (which
was very much shorter than that by land), after spending a few days or
weeks at Corinth.
1 2 Cor. xii. 21. (by the direct route) on my way to Macedonia
2 2 Cor. xii. 21. for a passing visit," &c.
8 There can be no doubt that he urged 6 Wiesler, however, gets over this, by snp-
upon them the same arguments which he was posing that when St. Paul mentions three year*
afterwards obliged to repeat at 1 Cor. vi. 15. spent among his hearers, he means to address
4 2 Cor. xiii. 2. not only the Ephesian presbyters whom he
5 1 Cor. xvi. 7. Yet this admits of another had summoned, but also the companions of
explanation ; for perhaps he only meant to his voyage (Acts xx. 4) who had been with
say, " I will not now (at once) come to you him in Macedonia and Achaia.

<~ap. xv. AN EPISTLE CONCERNING PROFLIGACY. 421
But his censures and warnings had produced too little effect upon his
converts : his mildness had been mistaken for weakness ; his hesitation in
punishing had been ascribed to a fear of the offenders ; and it was not
long before he received new intelligence that the profligacy which had
infected the community was still increasing. Then it was that he felt
himself compelled to resort to harsher measures ; he wrote an Epistle
(which has not been, preserved to us) J in which, as we learn from himself,
he ordered the Christians of Corinth, by virtue of his Apostolic authority,
" to cease from all intercourse with fornicators." By this he meant, as
he subsequently explained his injunctions, to direct the exclusion of all
profligates from the Church. The Corinthians, however, either did not
understand this, or (to excuse themselves) they affected not to do so ; for
they asked, how it was possible for them to abstain from all intercourse
with the profligate, unless they entirely secluded themselves from all the
business of life which they had to transact with their Heathen neighbors.
Whether the lost Epistle contained any other topics, we cannot know with
certainty ; but we may conclude with some probability that it was very
short, and directed to this one subject ; 2 otherwise it is not easy to under
stand why it should not have been preserved together with the two subse
quent Epistles.
Soon after this short letter had been despatched, Timotheus, accom
panied by Erastus,3 left Ephesus for Macedonia. St. Paul desired him,
if possible, to continue his journey to Corinth ; but did not feel certain
that it would be possible for him to do so 4 consistently with the other
objects of his journey, which probably had reference to the great collec
tion now going on for the poor Hebrew Christians at Jerusalem.
Meantime, some members of the household of Chloe, a distinguished
Christian family at Corinth, arrived at Ephesus ; and from them St. Paul
received fuller information than he before possessed of the condition of
the Corinthian Church. The spirit of party had seized upon its mem
bers, and well-nigh destroyed Christian love. We have already seen, in
our general view of the divisions of the Apostolic Church, that the great
parties which then divided the Christian world had ranked themselves
under the names of different Apostles, whom they attempted to set up
1 In proof of this, see the note on 1 Cor. v. * Erastus was probably the " treasurer " of
9-12. This lost Epistle must have been the city of Corinth, mentioned Rom. xvi. 23,
written after his second visit ; otherwise he and 2 Tim. iv. 20 ; and therefore was most
need not have explained it in the passage re- likely proceeding at any rate to Corinth.
ferred to. 4 Timotheus apparently did not reach Cor-
2 Probably it was in this lost letter that he inth on this occasion, or the fact would have
gave them notice of his intention to visit them been mentioned 2 Cor. xii. 18
on his way to Macedonia ; for altering which
he was so much blamed by his opponents.

422 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap.xv,
against each other as rival leaders. At Corinth, as in other j laces, emis
saries had arrived from the Judaizers of Palestine, who boasted of their
" letters of commendation " from the metropolis of the faith ; they did not,
however, attempt, as yet, to insist upon circumcision, as we shall find
them doing successfully among the simpler population of Galatia. This
would have been hopeless in a great and civilized community like that of
Corinth, imbued with Greek feelings of contempt for what they would
have deemed a barbarous superstition. Here, therefore, the Judaizers
confined themselves, in the first instance, to personal attacks against St.
Paul, whose apostleship they denied, whose motives they calumniated, and
whose authority they persuaded the Corinthians to repudiate. Some of
them declared themselves the followers of " Cephas," whom the Lord
himself had selected to be the chief Apostle ; others (probably the more
extreme members of the party) l boasted of their own immediate connec
tion with Christ himself, and their intimacy with " the brethren of the
Lord," and especially with James, the head of the Church at Jerusalem.
The endeavors of 'these agitators to undermine the influence of tlie
Apostle of the Gentiles met with undeserved success ; and they gained
over a strong party to their side. Meanwhile, those who were still stead
fast to the doctrines of St. Paul, yet were not all unshaken in their
attachment to his person : a portion of them preferred the Alexandrian
learning with which Apollos had enforced his preaching, to the simple
style of their first teacher, who had designedly abstained, at Corinth, from
any thing like philosophical argumentation.2 This party, then, who
sought to form for themselves a philosophical Christianity, called them
selves the followers of Apollos ; although the latter, for his part, evidently
disclaimed the rivalry with St. Paul which was thus implied, and even
refused to revisit Corinth,3 lest he should seem to countenance the
factious spirit of his adherents.
It is not impossible that the Antinomian Free-thinkers, whom we have
already seen to form so dangerous a portion of the Primitive Church,
attached themselves to this last-named party ; at any rate, they were, at
this time, one of the worst elements of evil at Corinth : they put forward
a theoretic defence of the practical immorality in which they lived ; and
some of them had so lost the very foundation of Christian faith as to
deny the resurrection of the dead, and thus to adopt the belief as well
as the sensuality of their Epicurean neighbors, whose motto was, " Let us
eat and drink, for to-morrow we die."
A crime, recently committed by one of these pretended Christians, was
now reported to St. Paul, and excited his utmost abhorrence : a member
1 See above, p. 389. 2 I Cor. ii. 1-5. 8 1 Cor. xvi. 12.

chap. xv. CONTROVERSIES IN THE CORINTHIAN CHURCH. 423
of the Corinthian Church was openly living in incestuous intercourse
with his stepmother, and that during his father's life ; yet this audacious
offender was not excluded from the Church.
Nor were these the only evils : some Christians were showing their
total want of brotherly love by bringing vexatious actions against their
brethren in the Heathen courts of law ; others were turning even the
spiritual gifts which they had received from the Holy Ghost into occa
sions of vanity and display, not unaccompanied by fanatical delusion ;
the decent order of Christian worship was disturbed by the tumultuary
claims of rival ministrations ; women had forgotten the modesty of their
sex, and came forward, unveiled (contrary to the habit of their country),
to address the public assembly ; and even the sanctity of the Holy Com-'
munion itself was profaned by scenes of revelling and debauch.
About the same time that all this disastrous intelligence was brought
to St. Paul by the household of Chloe, other messengers arrived from
Corinth, bearing the answer of the Church to his previous letter, of which
(as we have mentioned above) they requested an explanation ; and at
the same time referring to his decision several questions which caused
dispute and difficulty. These questions related — 1st, To the contro
versies respecting meat which had been offered to idols ; 2dly, To the
disputes regarding celibacy and matrimony ; the right of divorce ; and
the perplexities which arose in the case of mixed marriages, where one
of the parties was an unbeliever ; 3dly, To the exercise of spiritual gifts
in the public assemblies of the Church.
St. Paul hastened to reply to these questions, and at the same time to
denounce the sins which had polluted the Corinthian Church, and almost
annulled its right to the name of Christian. The letter which he was
thus led to write is addressed, not only to this metropolitan Church, but
also to the Christian communities established in other places in the same
province,1 which might be regarded as dependencies of that in the capital
city ; hence we must infer that these Churches also had been infected by
some of the errors or vices which had prevailed at Corinth. The letter
is, in its contents, the most; diversified of all St. Paul's Epistles ; and in
proportion to the variety of its topics, is the depth of its interest for our
selves. For by it we are introduced, as it were, behind the scenes of the
Apostolic Church, and its minutest features are revealed to us under the
light of daily life. We see the picture of a Christian congregation as it
met for worship in some upper chamber, such as the house of Aquila, or
of Gaius, could furnish. We see that these seasons of pure devotion
were not unalloyed by human vanity and excitement ; yet, on the other
i See the translation of 1 Cor. ii. 2, and the note. Also p. 356

424 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap. xy.
hand, we behold the Heathen auditor pierced to the heart by the inspired
eloquence of the Christian prophets, the secrets of his conscience laid
bare to him, and himself constrained to fall down on his face and worship
God ; we hear the fervent thanksgiving echoed by the unanimous Amen ;
we see the administration of the Holy Communion terminating the feast
of love. Again we become familiar with the perplexities of domestic
life, the corrupting proximity of Heathen immorality, the lingering
superstition, the rash speculation, the lawless perversion of Christian
liberty ; we witness the strife of theological factions, the party names, the
sectarian animosities. We perceive the difficulty of the task imposed
upon the Apostle, who must guard from so many perils, and guide
through so many difficulties, his children in the faith, whom else he had
begotten in vain ; and we learn to appreciate more fully the magnitude
of that laborious responsibility under which he describes himself as
almost ready to sink, " the care of all the Churches."
But while we rejoice that so many details of the deepest historical in
terest have been preserved to us by this Epistle, let us not forget to thank
God, who so inspired His Apostle, that in his answers to questions of
transitory interest he has laid down principles of eternal obligation.1
Let us trace with gratitude the providence of Him, who " out of dark
ness calls up light ; " by whose mercy it was provided that the unchastity
of the Corinthians should occasion the sacred laws of moral purity to be
established forever through the Christian world ; — that their denial of
the resurrection should cause those words to be recorded whereon
reposes, as upon a rock that cannot be shaken, our sure and certain hope
of immortality.
The following is a translation of the Epistle, which was written at
Easter, in the third year of St. Paul's residence at Ephesus : —
FIRST EPISTLE TO THE CORINTHIANS.2
i, l PAUL, a called Apostle of Jesus Christ by the will of God, salutation.
2 and Sosthenes3 the Brother, TO THE CHURCH OF GOD AT
1 The contrast between the short-lived in- 2 The date of this Epistle can be fixe^
terest of the questions referred to him for with more precision than that of any other.
solution, and the eternal principles by which It gives us the means of ascertaining, not
they roust be solved, was brought prominently merely the year, but even (with great proba-
before the mind of the Apostle himself by bility) the month and week, in which it was
the Holy Spirit, under whose guidance he written.
wrote ; and he has expressed it in those sub- ( 1 ) Apollos had been working at Corinth,
lime words which might serve as a motto for and was now with St. Paul at Ephesus II Cor.
the whole Epistle (i Cor. vii. 29-31). i. 12; iii. 4, 22; iv. 6; xvi. 12). This was
8 Sosthenes is, perhaps, the same mentioned Acts xviii. 17

FIRST EPISTLE TO THE CORINTHIANS.

425

CORINTH, hallowed in Christ Jesus, called Saints;1 together with all2
who call upon the name of Jesus Christ our Lord in every place which is
their home — and our home also.3
Grace be unto you and peace, from God our Father, aud from our i. 3
Lord Jesus Christ.
thanksgiving l 4 thank mJ God continually on your behalf, for the grace of 4
version. * God given unto you in Christ Jesus. Because, in Him, you 5
were s every-wise enriched with all the gifts of speech and knowledge
(for thus my testimony to Christ was confirmed among you), so that you 6

the case during St. Paul's residence at Ephe
sus (Acts xix. 1).
(2) He wrote during the days of unleavened
bread, i. e. at Easter (1 Cor. v. 7 : see the
note on that passage), and intended to remain
at Ephesus till Pentecost (xvi. 8, cf. xv. 32).
After leaving Ephesus, he purposed to come
by Macedonia to Achaia (xvi. 5-7). This
was the route he took (Acts xx. I, 2) on leav
ing Ephesus after the tumult in the theatre.
(3) Aquila and Priscilla were with him at
Ephesus (xvi. 19). They had taken up their
residence at Ephesus before the visit of St.
Paul (Acts xviii. 26).
(4) The Great Collection was going on in
Achaia (xvi. 1-3). When he wrote to the
Romans from Corinth during his three
months' visit there (Acts xx. 3), the collection
was completed in Macedonia and Achaia
(Rom. xv. 26).
(5) He hopes to go by Corinth to Jerusa
lem, and thence to Rome (xvi. 4, and xv.
25-28). Now the time when he entertained
this very purpose was towards the conclusion
of his long Ephesian residence (Acts xix. 21).
(6) He had sent Timothy towards Corinth
(iv. 17), but not direct (xvi. 10). Now it was
at tne close of his Ephesian residence (Acts
xix. -zl) that he sent Timothy with Erastus
(the Corinthian) from Ephesus to Macedonia,
which was one way to Corinth, but not the
shortest. 1 The sense of the word for " Saints " in
the New Testament is nearly equivalent to the
modern " Christians ; " but it would be an
anachronism so to translate it here, since (in
the time of St. Paul) the word " Christian "
was only used as a term of reproach. The
objection to. translating it " saints " is, that the

idea now often conveyed by that term is differ
ent from the meaning of the Greek word as
nsed by St. Paul. Yet as no other English
word represents it better, either the old render
ing must be retained, or an awkward periph
rasis employed. The English reader should,
bear in mind that St. Paul applies the term
to all members of the Church.
2 This is added to comprehend those Chris
tians of the Church of Achaia who were not
resident at Corinth, . but in the neighboring
places" of the same province. Compare 2 Cor.
i. 1. 8 The Authorized Version here appears
scarcely reconcilable with the order of the
Greek, though it is defended by the opinions
of Chrysostom, Billroth, Olshausen, &c. The
translation of Meyer, " in every place under
their and our dominion," seems more like a
Papal than an Apostolic rescript ; and that of
De Wette, " in every place both of their and our
abode," is frigid, and adds nothing to the idea
of " every place." St. Paul means to say
that he feels the home of his converts to be also his
own. Both sentiment and expression are the
same as in Rom. xvi. 13 : " His mother and
mine." 4 Observe how " I thank" and " my " fol
low immediately after " Paul and Sosthenes,"
showing that, though the salutation runs in
the name of both, the author of the Epistle
was St. Paul alone. Compare the remarks on
1 Thess. i. 2.
8 In this passage the aorists are here trans
lated as aorists. But as tbe distinction be
tween the aorist and perfect is by no means
constantly observed in St. Paul's Hellenistic
Greek, it may be doubted whether the aorists
here are not used for perfects.

•±26 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap xv.
i. 7 come behind no other church in any gift ; looking earnestly for the time
when our Lord Jesus Christ shall be revealed to sight.1
8 And He also will confirm 2 you unto the end, that you may be without
9 reproach at the day of our Lord Jesus Christ. For God is faithful, by whom
you were called into fellowship with His Son, Jesus Christ, our Lord.
10 I exhort you, brethren, by the name of our Lord Jesus ^p^.
11 Christ, to shun disputes, and have no divisions among you, IpecmiTen-sure of -the
but to be knit together in the same mind, and the same pseudo-phiio-
o ' sophical par-
judgment.3 For I have been informed concerning you, my ty'
brethren, by the members of Chloe's household, that there are contentions
12 among you. I mean, that one of you says, " I am a follower of Paul ; "
another, " I of Apollos ; " another, " I of Cephas ; " 4 another, " I of
13 Christ." Is Christ divided ? Was Paul crucified for you ? or were
14 you baptized unto the name of Paul ? I thank God that I baptized
15 none of you except Crispus and Gaius 5 (lest any one should say that I
16 baptized unto my own name) ; and I baptized also the household of
17 Stephanas ; besides these I know not that I baptized any other. For
Christ sent me forth as His Apostle,6 not to baptize, but to publish the
Glad-tidings ; and that, not with wisdom of word, lest thereby the cross
18 of Christ should be made void.7 For the word of the cross 8 to those in
the way of perdition is folly ; but to us in the way of salvation 9 it is
19 the power of God. And so it is written, " Jf fajill Ofislrog fjie tolS-
bom of % tam, an-ir faring to noi^mg % atttorstattoma, of %
20 pruirmt." 10 Where is the Philosopher ? Where is the Rabbi ? Where
is the reasoner of this world ? u Has not God turned the world's wis-
1 See note on Rom. ii. 5. 6 Or Caius, if we use the Roman spelling;
2 i. e. He will do His part to confirm you see p. 349.
unto the end. If you fall, it will not be for 6 The verb involves this.
want of His help. 7 Compare the use of the same verb in
8 " Mind " refers to the view taken by the Rom. iv. 14.
understanding ; "judgment," to the practical 8 i. e. the tidings of a crucified Messiah.
decision arrived at. " For the present participle we may refer
4 Ceplias is the name by which St. Peter to Acts ii. 47, and to ii. 6, below. In render-
is called throughout this Epistle. It was the ing the participles here, "already dead," and
actual word used by our Lord himself, and "already saved," Prof. Stanley neglects the
remained the Apostle's usual appellation force of the tense. [This is corrected in the
among the Jewish Christians up to this time. 2d edition. — h.1
It is strange that it should afterwards have been i° Is. xxix. 14 ; not quite literally quoted
so entirely supplanted by its Greek equivalent, from LXX.
" Peter," even among the Jewish Christians. n There are two words in the N. T. trans
See note on Gal. i. 18. For an explanation of lated " world " in the A. V. That which ia
the parties here alluded to, see pp. 387-393. used here involves the notion of transitory

ohap.xv. FIRST EPISTLE TO THE CORINTHIANS. 427
dotn into folly ? for. when the world had failed to gain by its wisdom the i. 21
knowledge of God in the wisdom of God, it pleased God, by the folly of
our preaching,1 to save those who believe.2 For the Jews require a sign 22
[from heaven] , and the Greeks demand philosophy ; but we 3 proclaim 23
a Messiah crucified, to the Jews a stumbling-block, and to the Greeks a
folly ; but to the called 4 themselves, whether they be Jews or Greeks, 24
Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God. For the folly of God 25
is wiser than man's wisdpm, and the weakness of God is stronger than
man's strength. For you see, brethren, how God has called you ; how 26
few of you are wise in earthly wisdom, how few are powerful, how few
are noble. But the world's folly God has chosen, to confound its wis- 27
dom ; and the world's weakness God has chosen, to confound its strength ;
and the world's base things, and things despised, yea things that have no 28
being, God has chosen, to bring to nought the things that be ; that no 29
flesh should glory in His presence. But you are His children 5 in Christ B<j)
Jesus, whom God sent unto us as our wisdom,6 and righteousness, and
sanctification, and redemption ; that it might be according as it is writ
ten, " Jf* iljat froastetjj, tat {jim boast in % |jjrir." 7 31
in his own So, brethren, when I myself came among you, and de- ii 1
teaching he . . „.
had not aimed clared to you the testimony ot God, 1 came not with surpass- '
at establish- J J f
tionrforlta" m§ skill of speech, or wisdom. For no knowledge did I 2
eioqueucef or purpose to display among you, but the knowledge of Jesus
but had relied "-
on the super- Christ alone, and Him 8 — crucified. And in my intercourse 3
natural power ' J
which belongs with you, I was filled with weakness and fear and much trem-
ofGod. bling.9 And when I proclaimed my message, I used not 4

duration. So in English we speak of " the God, which has called them to enter into His
notions (or spirit) of the age." Also in this church.
¦xpression is contained a reference to " the 6 " Of Him."
future age," the period of the final triumph of 6 Literally, who became unsdom to us from
Christ's kingdom. God, the preposition implying "sent from."
1 [Or, more correctly, " that which we 7 Jerem. ix. 23, 24, from the LXX., but
preach," viz. the Gospel, which men deem not literally. Quoted also 2 Cor. x. 17 ; see
f0Uy. — H.] note there.
2 Observe that the participle here is present, 8 i. e. Him, not exalted on the earthly
not past. throne of David, but condemned to the death
8 We, including St. Paul and the other of the vilest malefactor.
preachers of Christianity. 9 St. Paul appears, on his first coming to
* All who make an outward profession of Corinth, to have been suffering under great
Christianity are, in St. Paul's language, " the depression, perhaps caused by the bodily
called." They have received a message from malady to which he was subject (cf. 2 Cor

428 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap, xv
ii. 5 persuasive words of human wisdom, but showed forth the working of
God's Spirit and power, that your faith might have its foundation not
in the wisdom of men, but in the power of God.
6 Nevertheless, among those who are ripe in understanding,1 I speak
wisdom ; albeit not the wisdom of this world, nor of its rulers, who will
7 soon be nought.2 But it is God's wisdom that I speak, whereof the
secret is made known to His people ; 3 even the hidden wisdom which
8 God ordained before the ages, that we might be glorified thereby. But
the rulers of this world knew it not ; for had they known it, they would
9 not have crucified the Lord of Glory. But as it is written, " (Jpjii jjatj}
not mn, nor mt barb, ner%r jjafrj mttrtin into tr]* fruart of man,
% flings fojjiefr <§otr frat|j p«pa«o for %m tfrat Iota Pirn."4
10 Yet to us 5 God has revealed them by His Spirit. For the Spirit fathoms
11 all things, even the depths of God. For who can know what belongs to
man but the spirit of man which is within him ? even so none can know
12 what belongs to God, but the Spirit of God alone. Now we have received,
not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit which is of God ; that we might
understand those things which have been freely given us by God.
13 These are the things whereof we speak, in words not taught by man's
wisdom, but by the Spirit; explaining spiritual things to spiritual6 men.
14 But the natural1 man rejects the teaching of God's Spirit, for to him it is
folly ; and he cannot comprehend it, because it is spiritually discerned.
15 But the spiritual man judges all things truly, yet cannot himself be truly
xii. 8 ; see p. 235), perhaps by the ill success 8 "Wisdom in a mystery" is a wisdom
of his efforts at Athens. See p. 334. revealed to the initiated, i. e. (in this case) to
The expression " fear and trembling " is Christians, but hidden from the rest of the
peculiarly Pauline, being used in four of St. world.
Paul's Epistles, and by no other writer in the 4 Isaiah lxiv. 4 is the nearest passage to
New Testament. It does not mean fear of this in the Old Testament. The quotation is
personal danger, but a trembling anxiety to per- not to be found anywhere exactly.
form a duty. Thus in Eph. vi. 5, slaves are 6 Us, including all the inspired Christian
charged to obey their masters thus, and this teachers, and the rest of the " perfect."
anxious conscientiousness is opposed to " eye- 6 Compare iii. 1 . It should be observed
service." that this verb is often used by LXX. for ex-
1 " The perfect " is St. Paul's expression plain, interpret, as at Gen. xl. 8.
for those who had attained the maturity of ' Properly man considered as endowed
Christian wisdom. Compare 1 Cor. xiv. 20, with the anima (the living principle), as dis-
and Phil. iii. 15. Such men could understand tinguished from the spiritual principle. See
that his teaching was in truth the highest Juv. Sat. xv. 148. Etymologically speaking,
philosophy. the animal man would be the best translation ;
2 Literally, " passing away into nothing- but to English readers this would convey a
ness." harsher meaning than the original.

chap, xv FIRST EPISTLE TO THE CORINTHIANS. 429
judged by others. For " W&fya Ijaf|r hnuimt % mmb of % ^orbii. 16
tjiat fje sjnrulb instruct Pint1?"1 but we have the mind of the Lord2
[within us].
The party And I, brethren, could not speak to you as spiritual men,
which claimed ,./-,,. T
to be "the but as carnal, yea, as babes in Christ. I fed you with milk, iii. 1
spiritual" are ' J ' J
carna? by be an(i not with meat ; for you were not able to bear it ; nay,
eious. you are not yet able, for you are still carnal. For while you 2
are divided amongst yourselves by jealousy, and strife, and factious par- 3
ties, is it not evident that you are carnal, and walking in the ways of
men ? When one says, " I follow Paul," and another, " I follow Apollos,"
can you deny that you are carnal ? 4
Who, then, is Paul, or who is Apollos ? what are they but
It is a contra-
*™snton servants, by whose ministration you believed ? and was it not 5
t?au6teahche"r8 the Lord who gave to each of them the measure of his success ? 6
the leaders of
opposing par- I planted, Apollos watered ; but it was God who made the seed
tics. Nature r ' r
ot their work. t0 grow# g0 that he who plants is nothing, nor he who waters,
but God alone who gives the growth. But the planter and the waterer 7
are one together ; 3 and each will receive his own wages according to his 8
work. For we are God's fellow-laborers,4 and you are God's husbandry.
You are God's building ; God gave me the gift of grace whereby like a 9
skilful architect I laid a foundation ; and on this foundation another 10
builds ; but let each take heed what he builds thereon — [" thereon," I
say,] for other foundation can no man lay than that already laid, which 11
is Jesus Christ.5 But on this foundation one may raise gold, and silver,
and precious stones; another, wood, hay, and stubble.6 But each man's 12
work will be made manifest ; for The Day 7 will make it known ; because 13
1 Isaiah xl. 13 (LXX.), quoted also Rom. 6 [The image becomes much more vivid, if
xi, 34, we remember the contrasted buildings of an
2 The best MSS. are divided between the ancient city, — the sumptuous edifices of
readings of "Christ " and "Lord" here. granite and marble, with ornaments of gold
3 " And therefore cannot be set against and silver, on the one hand, and the hovels of
each other " is implied. the poor on the other, with walls of wood and
4 This remarkable expression is used by roof of thatch, and interstices stuffed with
St. Paul more than once. Compare 2 Cor. vi. straw. See the description of Rome below,
1, and the note on 1 Thess. iii. 2. Ch. XXIII. — H.]
6 The MSS. vary here, but the same sense 7 " The Day of Christ's coming." Com-
is virtually involved in all three readings ; viz. pare 1 Thess. v. 4.
that the Messiahship of Jesus was the founda
tion of the teaching of the Apostles.

430 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap. xv.
that day will be revealed with fire, and the fire will test each builder's
iii. 14 work. He whose building stands unharmed shall receive payment for
15 his labor ; he whose work is burned down shall forfeit his reward : yet
he shall not himself be destroyed, but shall be saved as it were through
the flames.
16 Know l ye not that you are God's temple, and that you form Thechurchia
17 a shrine wherein God's Spirit dwells ? If any man ruin the
temple of God, God shall ruin 2 him ; for the temple of God is holy ; and
holy3 therefore are ye.
18 Let none deceive himself; if any man is held wise among intellectual
pride and
Vou in the wisdom of this world, let him make himself a fool party-spirit
J ' are unchns-
19 [in the world's judgment] , that so he may become wise. For tiaa'
the wisdom of this world is foolishness with God, as it is written,
20 "Jp£ taketjj % ia'mt in tjjwr ohm craftiness."* And again, "&§t
l^orb knobttifj % tjjongjrts of % toise ifraf %g nn train."8
21 Therefore let none of you make his boast in men ; 6 for all things are
22 yours ; both Paul and Apollos, and Cephas, and the whole world itself;
both life and death, things present and things to come — all are yours —
23 but 7 you are Christ's ; and Christ is God's.
Let us be accounted as servants of Christ, and stewards of Christ's
iv 1 the mysteries of God.8 Moreover, it is required in a steward omy stew-
2 to be found faithful.9 Yet to me it matters nothing that I be ataSnister n
3 judged by you or by the doom10 of man ; nay, I judge not even own. ea

1 The connection with what precedes is, vice, even as He Himself came to do the will
" In calling you God's building, I tell you no of His Father.
new thing ; you know already that you are 8 Mysteries are secrets revealed (i. e. the
God's temple." Glad-tidings of Christ) to the initiated, i. e. to
2 The verbal link is lost in the A. V. all Christians. See note on ii. 7. The meta-
" Not " which temple" (A. V.). phor here is, that as a steward dispensed his
4 Job v. 13, from LXX., with an imma- master's bread to his fellow-servants, so Paul,
terial variation. Peter, and Apollos dispensed the knowledge
6 Ps. xciv. 11, from LXX., with a slight of Christ to their brethren.
change. 9 [Or rather, " Inquiry is made into a stew-
6 The meaning is, " Boast not of having ard's conduct, in order that he may be proved
this man or that as your leader ; for all the faithful." — h.]
Apostles, nay, all things in the universe, are 10 This use of " day" is peculiar to St.
ordained by God to co-operate for your good." Paul ; so that Jerome calls it a Cilicism. It is
7 All things work together for the good of connected with that above (iii. 18), and occun
Christians ; all things conspire to do them 1 Thess. v. 4.
service : but their work is to do Christ's ser-

chap. xv. FIRST EPISTLE TO THE CORINTHIANS. 431
myself. For although I know not that I am guilty of unfaithfulness, yetiv. 4
this does not justify me ; but I must be tried by the judgment of the
Lord. Therefore judge nothing hastily, until the coming of the Lord ; 5
for He shall bring to light the secrets of darkness, and make manifest the
counsels of men's hearts ; and then shall each receive his due 1 praise
from God.
contrast be- But these things, brethren, I have represented under the 6
exultation of " persons of myself and Apollos, for your sakes ; that by con-
the pseudo-
Partv80aPndical Bering us vou might learn not to think of yourselves above
ofechr1st™ent that which has been written,2 and that you may cease to puff
Apostles. yourselves up in the cause 3 of one against another. For who 7
makes thee to differ from another ? what hast thou that thou didst not
receive ? and how, then, canst thou boast, as if thou hadst won it for
thyself? But ye, forsooth, have already eaten to the full [of spiritual 8
food], ye are already rich, ye have seated yourselves upon your throne.
and have no need4 of me. Would that you were indeed enthroned, that
I too might reign with you ! For,5 1 think, God has set forth us the 9
Apostles last of all, like criminals condemned to die, to be gazed at in a
theatre6 by the whole world, both men and angels. We for Christ's 10
sake are fools, while you are wise in Christ ; we are weak, while you
are strong ; you are honorable, while we are outcasts ; even to the 11
present hour we bear hunger and thirst, and nakedness and stripes, and
have no certain dwelling-place, and toil with our own hands ; curses we 12
meet with blessings, persecution with patience, railings with good words.
We have been made as it were the refuse of the earth, the offscouring 13
of all things, unto this day. I write not thus to reproach you ; but as a 14
father I chide the children whom I love. For though you may have ten 15
1 " His praise." The error in A. V. was 6 Literally, because we Ixave been made a
caused by not observing the article. theatrical spectacle. Compare Heb. x. 33.
2 This is ambiguous ; the phrase is com- The spectacle to which St. Paul here alludes
monly employed in reference to the Old Testa- was common in those times. Criminals con-
ment ; but here it suits better with the con- demned to death were exhibited for the amuse-
text to take it as referring to the preceding ment of the populace on the arena of the
remarks of St. Paul himself. amphitheatre, and forced to fight with wild
8 St. Paul probably means " in the cause beasts, or to slay one another as gladiators.
of your party-leaders;" but speaks with in- These criminals were exhibited at the end of
tentional indistinctness. the spectacle as an exciting termination to the
4 " Without us." entertainment ("set forth last of all"). So
5 The connection is, " The lot of an Tertullian paraphrases the passage " Nos Deus
Apostle is no kingly lot." Apostolos novissimos elegit velut bestiarios. ''

432 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. . chap.xv.
thousand guardians ! to lead you towards the school of Christ, you can
have but one father ; and it was I who begat you in Christ Jesus, by the
iv 16 Glad-tidings which I brought. I beseech you, therefore, become follow
ers of me.
17 For this cause I have sent to you Timotheus, my beloved Mission of
J ' J Timotheus;
son, a faithful servant of the Lord, who shall put you in ^"SlJg,*"
, „ „, . . T , , dient faction
remembrance ot my ways in Christ, as 1 teach everywhere atcormth.
18 in all the churches. Now some have been failed with arrogance, sup-
19 posing that I am not coming to you. But I shall be with you shortly,
if the Lord will ; and then I shall learn, not the word of these boasters,
20 but their might. For mighty deeds, not empty words, are the tokens of
21 God's kingdom. What is your desire ? Must I come to you with the
rod, or in love and the spirit of meekness ?
t. 1 It is reported that there is fornication generally 2 among judgmenton the inces-
you, and such fornication, as is not known3 even among tuous person.
2 the Heathen, so that one among you has his father's wife. And you,
forsooth, have been puffed up when you should have mourned, that
3 the doer of this deed might be put away from the midst of you. For
me, — being present with you in spirit, although absent in body, — I
have already passed sentence, as though present, on him who has done
4 this thing ; [and I decree] in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that
you convene an assembly, and when you, and my spirit with you, are gath-
6 ered together, with the power of our Lord Jesus Christ, that you deliver
over to Satan 4 the man who has thus sinned, for the destruction of his
fleshly lusts, that his spirit may be saved in the day of the Lord Jesus.
fj Unseemly is your boasting ; know ye not that " a little leaven leaveneth
7 the whole lump ? " 5 Cast out therefore the old leaven, that you may be
an untainted mass, even as now d you are without taint of leaven ; for
1 The guardian slave who led the child to 4 This expression appears used as equiva-
school. The word is the same as in Gal. iii. lent to casting out of the Church : cf. 1 Tim i.
24. See the note there. 20. From the following words there seems
2 The adverb seems most naturally joined also a reference to the doctrine that Satan is
with " among you," but it may be taken with the author of bodily disease. Compare 2 Cor.
" reported " in the sense of " universally ; " so xii. 7.
Prof. Stanley, " There is nothing heard of 6 The same proverb is quoted Gal. v. 9.
except this." 6 In spite of the opinion of some eminent
3 The " is named " of T. R. is omitted by modem commentators, which is countenanced
the best MSS.; "is heard of," or something by Chrysostom, we must adhere to the inter-
equivalent, must be supplied. pretation which considers these words as writ

CHAP. XT.

FIRST EPISTLE TO THE CORINTHIANS.

433

our Paschal Lamb is Christ, who was slain for us ; therefore let us keep v. 8
the feast, not with the old leaven, nor the leaven of vice and wickedness,
but with the unleavened bread of purity and truth.
open. and I enjoined you in my letter1 to keep no company with 9
JKbe'ex- fornicators ; not that you should utterly forego all intercourse 10
the church, with the men of this world who may be fornicators, or lasciv
ious, or extortioners, or idolaters ; for so you would need to go utterly
out of the world. But2 my meaning was, that you should keep no 11
company with any man, who, bearing the name of a Brother, is either

ten at the Paschal season, and suggested by it.
The words leaven, lump, Paschal Lamb, and
feast, all agree most naturally with this view.
It has been objected, that St. Paul would not
address the Corinthians as engaged in a feast
which he, at Ephesus, was celebrating ; be
cause it would be over before his letter could
reach them. Any one who has ever written n
birth-day letter to a friend in India will see
the weakness of this objection. It has also
been urged that he would not address a mixed
church of Jews and Gentiles as engaged in
the celebration of a Jewish feast. Those who
urge this objection must have forgotten that
St. Paul addresses the Galatians (undoubt
edly a mixed church) as if they had all been
formerly idolaters (Gal. iv. 8); and addresses
the Romans, sometimes as if they were
all Jews (Rom. vii. 1), sometimes as if they
were Gentiles (Rom. xi. 18). If we take
" as ye are unleavened " in a metaphorical
sense, it is scarcely consistent with the pre
vious " cast out the old leaven ; " for the pas
sage would then amount to saying, " Be free
from leaven (metaphorically) as you are free
from leaven (metaphorically) ; " whereas, on
the other view, St. Paul says, " Be free from
leaven (metaphorically) as you are free from
leaven (literally) " There seems no difficulty
in supposing that the Gentile Christians joined
with the Jewish Christians in celebrating the
Paschal feast after the Jewish manner, at least
to the extent of abstaining from leaven in the
love-feasts. And we see that St. Paul still
observed the " days of unleavened bread " at
this period of his life, from Acts xx. 6. Also,
from what follows, we perceive how naturally
this greatest of Jewish feasts changed into the
greatest of Christian festivals.
1 Literally, " / wrote to you in the letter,"
28

viz. the letter which I last wrote, or the letter to
which you refer in your questions ; for they had
probably mentioned their perplexity about this
direction in it. So in 2 Cor. vii. 8 the present
letter (1 Cor.) is referred to in the same phrase
(/ grieved you in the letter). There are two
decisive reasons why these words must refer
to ^previous letter, not to the letter St. Paul
is actually writing. (1.) No such direction
as " Keep no company with fornicators " oc
curs in what has gone before. (2.) If St.
Paul had meant to say " I have just written,"
he could not have added the words " in the
letter," which would have been then worse
than superfluous. Prof. Stanley (who has
recently supported the view here opposed)
urges that the aorist might be used of the
present epistle as at 1 Cor. ix. 15; which is
obviously true. He also urges that " the
letter " may sometimes refer to the present
letter; which may also be admitted in cases
where the letter is referred to as a whole in its
postscript ; e. g. " / Tertius, who wrote the letter "
(Rom. xvi. 22). "I charge you that the letter
be read" (1 Thess. v. 27). " When the letter
has been read among you, cause it to be read at
Laodicea" (Col. iv. 16). But none of these
instances gives any support to the view that
a writer could refer to his own words, just
uttered, by such a phrase as " I wrote to you
in the letter." We are forced, therefore, to
conclude that these words refer to a preceding
letter, which has not been preserved. And
this view receives a strong confirmation from
the words of St. Paul's Corinthian opponents
(spoken before 2 Cor. was written) : " His let
ters are weighty, &c." (2 Cor. x. 10.,)
2 The conjunction here seems not to be a
particle of time, but of connection.

434 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap.xv.
a fornicator, or a wanton,1 or an idolater, or a railer, or a drunkard, or
an extortioner ; with such a man, I say, you must not so much as eat.
v.12 For what need have I to judge those also that are without ? Is it
13 not your part to judge those that are within ? But those without are
for God's judgment. " Jfrom amongst gonrsrlhes ne sjrall rast out
% soil om."2
vi. 1 Can there be any of you who dare to bring their private ^fn cms™"
differences into the courts of law, before the wicked, and not bebro'ught110'
into Heathen
2 rather bring them before the saints ? 3 Know ye not that the courts; ana
° J its existence
saints shall judge the world ? and if the world is subjected to ev3.proof °f
3 your judgment, are you unfit to decide the most trifling matters ? Know
ye not that we shall judge angels ? how much more the affairs of this
4 life ? If, therefore, you have disputes to settle which concern the affairs
of this life, give the arbitration of them to the very least esteemed in
5 your Church. I speak to your shame. Can it be that amongst you there
is not so much as one man wise enough to arbitrate between his breth-
6 ren, but must brother go to law with brother, and that in the courts of
7 the unbelievers ? Nay, farther, you are in fault, throughout, in having
such disputes at all. Why do you not rather submit to wrong ? Why
8 not rather suffer yourselves to be defrauded ? Nay, you are yourselves
9 wronging and defrauding, and that your brethren. Know ye No immo.
not that wrong-doers shall not inherit the kingdom of God ? consfst'withtrue Chris-
Be not deceived — neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adul- Canity.
10 terers, nor self-defilers, nor sodomites, nor robbers, nor wantons,4 nor
1 The Greek word has the meaning of a 2 Deut. xxiv. 7 (LXX.).
concupiscent man in some passages of St. Paul's 3 It should be remembered that the Greek
writings. Compare Eph. v. 5 (where it is and Eoman law gave its sanction to the
coupled with unclean). So the corresponding decision pronounced in a litigated case by
substantive, in St. Paul, almost invariably arbitrators privately chosen ; so that the
means lasciviousness. See Eph. iv. 19, v. 3 Christians might obtain a just decision of
(and the note), and Col. iii. 5. The only their mutual differences without resorting to
places where the word is used by St. Paul in the Heathen tribunals. The Jews resident in
the sense covetousness are 2 Cor. ix. 5, and foreign parts were accustomed to refer their
1 Thess. ii. 5, in the latter of which passages disputes to Jewish arbitrators. Josephus
the other meaning would not be inadmissible. (Ant. xiv. 10, 17) gives a decree by which the
How the word contracted its Pauline meaning Jews at Sardis were permitted to establish a
may be inferred from the similar use of con- " private court," for the purpose of deciding
cupiscence in English. [Since the above was " their misunderstandings with one another."
first published, Prof. Stanley and Prof. Jowett 4 Persons fiver '.o concupiscence. See note
have both expressed their concurrence in this out. 11.
rendering of the word ; see note in this vol-
«me on Eph. v. 3.1

FIRST EPISTLE TO THE CORINTHIANS.

435

drunkards, nor railers, nor extortioners, shall inherit the kingdom of
God. And such were some of you ; but you have washed away your vi 11
stains,1 — you have been hallowed, you have been justified, in the name
of the Lord Jesus, and in the Spirit of our God.2
" All things are lawful for me." 3 But not all things are 12
Antinomiau
fmmoraitty Sood for me- Tn<>ugh a11 things are in my power, they shall
not bring me under their power. " Meat is for the belly, and 13
the belly for meat," though God will soon put an end to both ; but the
body is not for fornication, but for the Lord, and the Lord for the body ; 4
and as God raised the Lord from the grave, so He will raise us also by 14
His mighty power.5 Know ye not that your bodies are members of 15
Christ's body ? Shall I then take the members of Christ, and make them
the members of an harlot ? God forbid. Know ye not, that he who 16
joins himself to an harlot becomes one body with her ? For it is said,
"%8 ttoain sjrall bt am fles[l."6 But he who joins himself to the 17
Lord, becomes one spirit with Him. Flee fornication. The root of sin 18
is not in the body,7 [but in the soul ;] yet the fornicator sins against his

1 Observe that the Greek verb is middle,
not passive, as in A. V. : cf. Acts xxii. 16.
If the aorist is here used in its proper sense
(of which we can never be sure in St. Paul),
the reference is to the time of their first con
version, or baptism.
2 The words may be paraphrased thus,
" By your fellowship with the Lord Jesus,
whose name you bear, and by the indwelling
of the Spirit of our God."
3 See the explanation of this in Ch. XIII. ;
and compare (for the true side of the phrase)
Gal. v. 23, " Against such there is no law."
Probably St. Paul had used the very words
" All things are lawful for me " in this true
sense, and the immoral party at Corinth had
¦caught them up, and used them as their watch
word. It is also probable that this fact was
mentioned in the letter which St. Paul had
just received from Corinth (1 Cor. vii. 1).
Also see chap. viii. 1 below. From what
follows it is evident that these Corinthian
freethinkers argued that the existence of bodily
appetites proved the lawfulness of their gratifi
cation. 4 The body is for the Lord Jesus, to be

consecrated by His indwelling to His service ;
and the Lord Jesus is for the body, to conse
crate it by dwelling therein in the person of
His Spirit.
6 St. Paul's argument here is, that sins
of unchastity, though bodily acts, yet injure
a part of our nature (compare the phrase
" spiritual body," 1 Cor. xv. 44) which will
not be destroyed by death, and which is closely
connected with our moral well-being. And it
is a fact no less certain than mysterious, that
moral and spiritual ruin is caused by such
sins ; which human wisdom (when untaught
by Revelation) held to be actions as blameless
as eating and drinking.
b Gen. ii. 24 (LXX.), quoted by our Lord,
Matt. xix. 5.
7 Literally, " every sin which a man commits
is without (external to) the body." The Corin
thian freethinkers probably used this argu
ment also ; and perhaps availed themselves of
our Lord's words, Mark vii. 18: "Do ye not
perceive that whatsoever thing from untlout enter-
eth into the man, it cannot defile him, because it
entereth not into his heart ? " &c. ( See the whole
passage.)

436 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap, xv,
vi.19 own body. Know ye not that your bodies are temples of the Holy Spirit
which dwells within you, which ye have received from God ? And you
20 are not your own, for you were bought with a price.1 Glorify God,
therefore, not in your spirit only, but in your body also, since both are
His.2
vii. 1 As to the questions which you have asked me in your letter, Answers to
, questions
2 this is mv answer. It is good for a man to remain unmarried, concerning
J ° marriage
Nevertheless, to avoid fornication,3 let every man have his own tuh^SaV* r*f-f Vi |-p] i pp f f)
3 wife, and every woman her own husband. Let the husband cases of
J mixed mar-
live in the intercourse of affection with his wife, and likewise riasee-
4 the wife with her husband. The wife has not dominion over her own body,
but the husband ; and so also the husband has not dominion over his own
5 body, but the wife. Do not separate one from the other, unless it be with
mutual consent for a time, that you may give yourselves without disturb
ance 4 to prayer, and then return to one another, lest, through your
Q fleshly passions, Satan should tempt you to sin. Yet this I say by way of
7 permission, not of command. Nevertheless I would that all men were as
I myself am ; but men have different gifts from God, one this, another
8 that. But to the unmarried and to the widows, I say that it would be
good for them if they should remain in the state wherein I myself also
9 am ; yet if they are incontinent, let them marry ; for it is better to marry
10 than to burn. To the married, not I, but the Lord gives commandment,*
11 that the wife part not from her husband ; (but if she be already parted
let her remain single, or else be reconciled with him ;) and also, that the
husband put not away his wife.
12 But to the rest speak I, not the Lord. If any Brother be married to
an unbelieving wife, let him not put her away, if she be content to live
13 with him ; neither let a believing wife put away an unbelieving husband

1 The price is the blood of Christ. Com- every unmarried person would be liable to spe
pare Acts xx. 28, and Col. i. 14. cial temptation.
2 The latter part of this verse, though 4 " Fasting " is an interpolation, not found
not in the best MSS., yet is implied in the in the best MSS.
sense. 6 This commandment is recorded Mark x.
8 The plural in the Greek perhaps means 11, 12: Whosoever shall put away his wife, and
(as Prof. Stanley takes it) "because of the gen- marry another, committeth adultery against her.
eral prevalence of fornication," with special ref- And if a woman shall put away her husband, and
erence to the profligacy of Corinth, where be married to another, she committeth adulter]/.

chap. xt. FIRST EPISTLE TO THE CORINTHIANS. 437
who is willing to live with her ; for the unbelieving husband is hallowed vii.14
by union with his believing wife, and the unbelieving wife by union with
her believing husband ; for otherwise your children would be unclean,1
but now they are holy. But if the unbelieving husband or wife seeks for 15
separation, let them be separated ; for in such cases, the believing
husband or wife is not bound to remain under the yoke. But the call
whereby God has called 2 us is a call of peace.3 For thou who art the 16
wife of an unbeliever, how knowest thou whether thou mayest save thy
husband ? or thou who art the husband, whether thou mayest save thy
wife?
General rule, Only4 let each man walk in the same path which God allotted 17
that the con
verts should to him, wherein the Lord has called him. This rule I give in 18
not quit that ' D
wherein they aU the churches. Thus, if any man, when he was called,5
conversion, bore the mark of circumcision, let him not efface it ; if any
man was uncircumcised at the time of his calling, let him not receive cir
cumcision. Circumcision is nothing, and uncircumcision is nothing ; but lu
obedience to the commands of God. Let each abide in the condition 20
wherein he was called. Wast thou in slavery at the time of thy calling ? 21
Care not for it. Nay, though thou have power to gain thy freedom,6
rather make use of thy condition. For the slave who has been called in 22
the Lord is the Lord's freedman ; and so also the freeman who has been
called is Christ's slave. He has bought you all ; ' beware lest you make 23
yourselves the slaves of man.8 Brethren, in the state wherein he was 24
called, let each abid« with God.
1 The i' . terally, "unclean," 6 The past teDje is mistranslated "u
and is used i_  sense, to denote that called" in A. V. throughout this chapter.
which is beyond the hallowed pale cf God's peo- 6 The Greek here is ambiguous, and might
vfe- ?v~ jitithesis to "holy," which was ap- be so rendered as to give directly opposite pre-
..uu to all within the consecrated limits. On cepts ; but the version given in the text
the inferences from this verse, with respect to (which is that advocated by Chrysostom,
infant baptism, see Ch. XIII. Meyer, and De Wette) agrees best with the
2 This verb, in St. Paul's writings, means order of the Greek words, and also with the
"to call into fellowship with Christ;" "to context. We must remember, with regard to
call from the unbelieving World into the this and other precepts here given, that thej
Church " were given under the immediate anticipation
8 The inference is, " therefore the profes- of our Lord's coming.
sion of Christianity ought not to lead the 7 There is a change here in the Greek from
believer to quarrel with the unbelieving mem- singular to plural. For the " price," see chap.
bers of his family." ?»• 20-
4 Literally, only, as God allotted to each, as 8 Alluding to their servile adherence to
the Lord has called each, so let him walk. party leaders. Compare 2 Cor. xi. 20

438

THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL.

vii.25 Concerning your virgin daughters 1 I have no command from A™8w£rJ0
the Lord, but I give my judgment, as one who has been moved ^Vailf
26 by the Lord's mercy 2 to be faithful. I think, then, that it is marriage.
27 good, by reason of the present3 necessity, for all to be unmarried.4 Art
28 thou bound to a wife ? seek not separation ; art thou free ? seek not
marriage ; yet if thou marry, thou sinnest not.6 And if your virgin daugh
ters marry, they sin not ; but the married will have sorrows in the flesh,,
29 and these I would spare you.6 But this I say, brethren, the time is
short ; 7 that henceforth both they that have wives be as though they had
SO none, and they that weep as though they wept not, and they that rejoice
as though they rejoiced not, and they that buy as though they possessed
31 not, and they that use this world as not abusing 8 it ; for the outward
32 show of this world is passing away.9 But I would have you free from
earthly care. The cares of the unmarried man are fixed upon the Lord,
33 and he strives to please the Lord. But the cares of the husband are
34 fixed upon worldly things, striving to please his wife. The wife also has
this difference 10 from the virgin ; the cares of the virgin are fixed upon

i We cannot help remarking, that the man
ner in which a recent infidel writer has spoken
of this passage is one of the most striking
proofs how far a candid and acute mind may
be warped by a strong bias. In this case the
desire of the writer is to disparage the moral
teaching of Christianity; and he brings for
ward this passage to prove his case, and
blames St. Paul because he assumes these
Corinthian daughters to be disposable in mar
riage at the will of their father; as if any
other assumption had been possible in the
case of Greek or Jewish daughters in that age.
We must suppose that this writer would (on
the same grounds) require a modern mission
ary to Persia to preach the absolute incom
patibility of despotic government with sound
morality. A similar ignoratio elenchi runs
through all his remarks upon this chapter.
2 Compare " I obtained mercy," 1 Tim. i.
13. 3 The participle here can only mean present.
See the note on 2 Thess. ii. 2. The word was
mistranslated in this passage in the first edition.
4 " So," namely " as virgins."
6 Literally, though thou shalt have married,
thou hast not sinned; the aorist used for the
perfect, as constantly by St. Paul.

6 I is emphatic, /, if you followed my ad
vice ; also observe the present, "I am sparing
you [by this advice]," or, in other words, " /
would spare you."
' We adopt Lachmann's reading. " The
object of this contraction of your earthly life
is, that you may henceforth set your affections
on things above."
8 Literally, the verb appears to mean to use
up, as distinguished from to use. Compare ix
18. It thus acquired the sense of to abuse, ra.
which it is sometimes employed by Demos
thenes and by the grammarians.
9 Literally, "passing by," flitting past, like
the shadows in Plato's Cavern (Repub. vii. 1 ),
or the figures in some moving phantasma
goria. 10 The reading of Lachmann makes a con
siderable difference in the translation, whicb
would thus run : "The husband strives to pleast
his wife, and is divided [in mind] . Both the un
married wife [i. e. the widow] and the virgin can
for the things of the Lord," Sfc. This reading
gives a more natural sense to " divided " (cf.
i. 13, so Stanley) ; but on the other hand, tho
use of " unmarried wife " for widow is unprece
dented ; and in this very chapter (verse 8)
the word widows is opposed to unmarried.

otap. xv. FIRST EPISTLE TO THE CORINTHIANS. 439
the Lord, that she may be holy both in body and in spirit ; but the cares
of the wife are fixed upon worldly things, striving to please her husband.
Now this I say for your own profit; not that I may entangle you in avii.35
snare ; but that I may help you to serve the Lord with a seemly and
undivided service. But if any man think that he is treating his virgin 36
daughter in an unseemly manner, by leaving her unmarried beyond the
flower of her age, and if need so require, let him act according to his will ;
he may do so without sin ; let them l marry. But he who is firm in his 37
resolve, and is not constrained to marry his daughter, but has the power
of carrying out his will, and has determined to keep her unmarried, does
well. Thus he who gives his daughter in marriage does well, but he who 38
gives her not in marriage does better.
Marriage of ^he w^e 1S D°und by the law of wedlock so long as her 39
husband lives ; but after his death she is free to marry whom
she will, provided that she choose one of the brethren 2 in the Lord. Yet 46
she is happier if she remain a widow, in my judgment ; and I think that
I, no less 3 than others, have the Spirit of God.
Answer to &-s to *ne meats which have been sacrificed to idols, we viii.l
cCTniDgnniea.ts know — (for " we all have knowledge ; " 4 but knowledge
offered to
idols. puffs up, while love builds. If any man prides himself on his 2
knowledge, he knows nothing yet as he ought to know ; but whosoever 8
loves God, of him God hath knowledge) 5 — as to eating the meats sacri- 4
need to idols, we know (I say) that an idol has no true being, and that
there is no other God but one. For though there be some who are called 5
gods, either celestial or terrestrial, and though men worship many gods
and many lords, yet to us there is but one God, the Father, from whom 6
are all things, and we for Him ; and one Lord, Jesus Christ, by whom
are all things, and we by Him.6 But " aril " have not this " knowledge ; " 7
1 " Them," viz. the daughter and the suitor. 6 That is, God acknowledges him ; compare
2 Literally, provided it be in the Lord. Gal. iv. 9.
8 The " also " in " I also " has this meaning. D That is, by whom the life of all things, and
4 It is necessary, for the understanding of our life also, is originated and sustained. So Col.
this Epistle, that we should remember that it i. 16 : "By Him and for Him were all created,
is an answer to a letter received from the Co- and in Him all things subsist ; " where it
rinthian Church (1 Cor. vii. 1), and therefore should be remarked that the "for Him" is
constantly alludes to topics in that letter. It predicated of the Son, as in the present passage
seems probable, from the way in which they of the Father. Both passages show how fully
are introduced, that these words, " We all have St. Paul taught the doctrine of the A070C.
knowledge," are quoted from that letter.

440 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap.xv.
on the contrary, there are some who still have a conscientious fear of the
idol, and think the meat an idolatrous sacrifice, so that, if they eat it,
viii. 8 their conscience being weak is defiled. Now our food cannot change our
place in God's sight ; with Him we gain nothing by eating, nor lose by
9 not eating. But beware lest, perchance, this exercise of your rights '
10 should become a stumbling-block to the weak. For if one of them see
thee, who boastest of thy knowledge,2 feasting in an idol's temple, will
not he be encouraged to eat the meat offered in sacrifice, notwithstanding
11 the weakness of his conscience ? 3 And thus, through thy knowledge,
12 will thy weak brother perish, for whom Christ died. Nay, when you
sin thus against your brethren, and wound their weak conscience, you
13 sin against Christ. Wherefore, if my food cast a stumbling-block in
my brother's path, I will eat no flesh while the world stands, lest thereby
I cause my brother's fall.4
ix 1 Is it denied that I am an Apostle ? Is it denied that I He vindicates
am free from man's authority ? 5 It is denied that I have J\*8 c]aim *°,.
J the Apostolic
2 seen Jesus6 our Lord ? Is it denied that you are the fruits of Su juXiLtg
my labor in the Lord ? If to others I am no apostle, yet at and explains
r his renuncia-
least I am such to you ; for you are yourselves the seal which oiTheAp'oTtoi
3 stamps the reality of my apostleship, in the Lord ; this is my '° pnv ege8'
4 answer to those who question my authority. Do they deny my right to
5 be maintained ' [by my converts] ? Do they deny my right to carry a
believing wife with me on my journeys, like the rest of the apostles, and
6 the brothers of the Lord,8 and Cephas ? Or do the- think that I and
1 " This liberty of yours." Observe again 8 Literally, will not the conscience of him,
the reference to the language of the self-styled though he is weak, be, frc.
Pauline party at Corinth. Compare " all 4 The whole of this eighth chapter is paral-
things are lawful for me" (vi. 12). The'de- lei to Rom. xiv.
crees of the " Council of Jerusalem " might 6 "Free." Compare verse 19 and Gal i. 1,
seem to have a direct bearing on the question " an Apostle not of men."
discussed by St. Paul in this passage ; but he 6 " Christ " here is omitted by the best
does not refer to them as deciding the points MSS.
in dispute, either here or elsewhere. Probably t This was a point much insisted on by
the reason of this is, that the decrees were the Judaizers (see 2 Cor. xii. 13-16). They
meant only to be of temporary application ; argued that St. Paul, by not availing himself
and in their terms they applied originally only of this undoubted apostolic right, betrayed his
to the churches of Syria and Cilicia (see Acts own consciousness that he was no true
xv. 23 ; also Chap. VH.). Apostle.
2 Literally, the possessor of knowledge; in aim- 8 "The brothers of the Lord." It is a
sion to the orevious " We all have knowl- very doubtful question whether these were the
edge.' sons of our Lord's mother's sister, viz. the

chap. xv. FIRST EPISTLE TO THE CORINTHIANS. 441
Barnabas alone have no right to be maintained, except by the labor of
our own hands ? What soldier ' ever serves at his private cost ? What k. 7
husbandman plants a vineyard without sharing in its fruit? What
shepherd tends a flock without partaking of their milk ? Say I this on 8
Man's judgment only, or says not the Law the same ? Yea, in the Law 9
of Moses it is written, " fofyan sjjttlt not mufti* % 0* fytxt txtlXQtfy
Out t\l tOXVi." 2 Is it for oxen that God is caring, or speaks He alto- 10
gether for our sake ? For our sake, doubtless, it was written ; because
the ploughman ought to plough, and the thresher to thresh, with hope to
share in the produce of his toil. If I have sown for you the seed of 11
spiritual gifts, would it be much if I were to reap some harvest from
your carnal gifts ? If others share this right over you, how much more 12
should I ? Yet I have not used my right, but forego every claim,3 lest I
should by any means hinder the course of Christ's Glad-tidings. Know 13
ye not that they 4 who perform the service of the temple live upon the
revenues of the temple, and they who minister at the altar share with it
in the sacrifices ? So also the Lord commanded 8 those who publish the 14
Glad-tidings, to be maintained thereby. But I have not exercised any of 15
these rights, nor do I write 6 this that it may be practised in my own
case. For I had rather die than suffer any man to make void my
boasting. For, although I proclaim the Glad-tidings, yet this gives me 16
no ground of boasting ; for I am compelled to do so by order of my '
Master. Yea, woe is me if I proclaim it not. For were my service of 17
my own free choice, I might claim wages to reward my labor ; but since
I serve by compulsion, I am a slave intrusted with a stewardship.8 What,
then, is my wage ? It is to make the Glad-tidings free of cost where I 18
Apostles James and Judas, the sons of Al- 6 (Matt. x. 9, 10.) Provide neither gold nor
phseus (Luke vi. 15, 16) (for cousins were silver nor brass in your purses, nor scrip for your
called brothers), or whether they were sons of journey, neither two coats, neither shoes, nor yet
Joseph by a former marriage, or actually sons staves : for the workman is worthy of his meat.
of the mother of our Lord. 6 The aorist is the epistolary tense. There
1 He means to say that, to have this right is considerable difference of reading in this
of maintenance, a man need be no Apostle. verse, but not materially affecting the sense.
2 Deut. xxv. 4 (LXX.), quoted also 1 Tim. 7 "Necessity" here is the compulsion ex-
v. 18. ercised by a master over a slave. In calling
' The proper meaning of the verb used his service compulsory, St. Paul refers to the
here is to hold out against, as a fortress against miraculous character of his conversion.
assault, or ice against superincumbent weight. 8 This " stewardship " consisted in dispens-
Compare xiii. 7, and 1 Thess. iii. 1. ing his Master's goods to liis fellow-slaves.
4 Numbers vii. and Deut. xviii. See iv. 1. 2.

442 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap, xv
ix.19 carry it, that I may forego my right as an Evangelist.1 Therefore,
20 although free from the authority of all men, I made myself the slave of
all, that I might gain 2 the most. To the Jews I became as a Jew, that I
might gain the Jews ; to those under the law, as though I were under the
law (not that I was myself subject to the law) ,3 that I might gain those
21 under the law ; to those without the law,4 as one without the law (not
that I was without law before God, but under the law of Christ), that I
22 might gain those who were without the law. To the weak, I became
weak, that I might gain the weak. I am become all things to all men,
23 that by all means I might save some. And this I do for the sake of the
Glad-tidings, that I myself may share therein with those who hear me.
24 Know ye not that in the races of the stadium, though all run, yet but
25 one can win the price ? — (so run that you may win) — and every man
who strives in the matches trains himself by all manner of self-restraint.4
Yet they do it to win a fading crown,6 — we, a crown that cannot fade.
26 I, therefore, run not like the racer who is uncertain of his goal ; I fight,
27 not as the pugilist who strikes out against the air;7 but I bruise8 my
body and force it into bondage ; lest, perchance, having called others to
the contest,9 1 should myself fail shamefully of the prize.
x.l For10 I would not have you ignorant, brethren, that our He again
J ° warns the Co-
forefathers all were guarded by the cloud, and all passed safely J^n'stimmo.
2 through the sea. And all, in the cloud, and in the sea, were example' of
the punish-
3 baptized unto Moses. And all of them alike ate the same me>?tofGod'»
1 ancient peo-
4 spiritual food ; and all drank of the same spiritual stream ; for ple'
1 Literally, that I may not fully use. See 6 This was the crown made of the leaves
note on vii. 31 . The perplexity which com- of the pine, groves of which surrounded the
mentators have found in this passage is partly Isthmian Stadium : the same tree still grows
due to the construction of the Greek, but prin- plentifully on the Isthmus of Corintli. It was
cipally to the oxymoron ; St. Paul virtually the prize of the great Isthmian games.
says that his wage is the refusal of wages. The Throughout the passage, St. Paul alludes to
passage may be literally rendered, " It is, that these contests, which were so dear to the pride
I should, while Evangelizing, make the Evangel and patriotism of the Corinthians. Compare
free of cost, that I may not fully use my right as an also 2 Tim. ii. 5. And see the beginning of
Evangdist." Ch. XX. on the same subject.
2 " Gain " alludes to " wage." The souls 7 Literally, / run as one not uncertain [of the
whom he gained were his wage. goal] : I fight as one not striking the air.
3 The best MSS. here insert a clause which 8 This is the literal meaning of the pugilis
ts not in the Textus Receptus. tic term which the Apostle here employs.
4 For " without law " in the sense of 9 " As a herald." See the second note on
" heathen," compare Rom. ii. 12. Ch. XX.
6 For a description of the severe training i» The reading of the best MSS. is " for."
required, see notes at the beginning of Ch. XX. The connection with what precedes is the pos-

riiAr.xv. FIRST EPISTLE TO THE CORINTHIANS. 413
they drank from the spiritual rock which followed them ; ' but that rock
was Christ. Yet most of them lost God's favor, yea, they were struck x. 5
down and perished in the wilderness. Now, these things were shadows 6
of our own case, that we might learn not to lust after evil, as they lusted.2
Nor be ye idolaters, as were some of them ; as it is written, — " ^{j£ g£0- 7
pl« sal ootoit to mt mo atink, una xa&t up to plag." 3 Neither let 8
us commit fornication, as some of them committed, and fell in one day
three and twenty thousand.4 Neither let us try the long-suffering of 9
Christ, as did some of them, who were destroyed by the serpents.5 Nor 10
murmur as some of them murmured, and were slain by the destroyer.6
Now all these things befell them as shadows of things to come ; and they 11
were written for our warning, on whom the ends of the ages are come.7
Wherefore, let him who thinks that he stands firm, beware lest he fall. 12
No trial has come upon you beyond man's power to bear ; and God is faith- 13
ful to His promises, and will not suffer you to be tried beyond your
strength, but will with every trial provide the way of escape, that you
may be able to sustain it.
Theymuntre- Wherefore, my beloved, flee from idolatry. I speak as to 14
nonnce all fel- -. ' ^ ' * r
Idolatry. wlth men of understanding ; 8 use your own judgment upon my 15
words. When we drink the cup of blessing, which we bless, are we not 16
all partakers in the blood of Christ ? When we break the bread, are we
not all partakers in the body of Christ? 9 For as the bread is one, so we, 17
the many, are one body ; for of that one bread we all partake. If you 18
sibility of failure even in those who had re- 6 See Numbers xvi. 41. The murmuring
ceived the greatest advantages. of the Corinthians against the Apostle is com-
1 St. Paul's meaning is, that, under the pared to the murmuring of Korah against
allegorical representation of the Manna, the Moses.
Water and the Rock are shadowed forth 7 The coming of Christ was " the end of
spiritual realities : for the Rock is Christ, the the ages," i. e. the commencement of a new
only source of living water (John iv.), and the period of the world's existence. So nearly
Manna also is Christ, the true bread from the same phrase is used Heb. ix. 26. A simi
Heaven (John vi.). For the Rabbinical tradi- lar expression occurs five times in St. Matthew,
tions about the rock, see Schottgen ; and on the signifying the coming of Christ to judgment.
whole verse, see Prof. Stanley's excellent note. 8 " Wise men," the character peculiarly
2 Viz. after the flesh-pots of Egypt. affected by the Corinthians. The word is per-
8 Exod. xxxii. 6 (LXX.). haps used with a mixture of irony, as at 1
* Numbers xxv. 9, where twenty-four thou- Cor. iv. 10, and 2 Cor. xi. 19.
sand is the number given. See the remarks 9 Literally, The cup of blessing which we bless,
on p. 157, n. 2, on the speech at Antioch, and is it not a common participation in the blood of
also the note on Gal. iii. 17. Christ f The bread which we break, is it not a
s Numbers xxi. 6. common participation in the body of Christ?

444 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap.xv
look to the carnal Israel, do you not see that those who eat of the sacri-
x.19 fices are in partnership with the altar ? What would I say then ? that an
idol has any real being ? or that meat offered to an idol is really changed
20 thereby ? Not so ; but I say, that when the heathen offer their sacrifices,
" %g sacrhlcs to itttnons, ma not to (Bob ; 'M and I would not have
21 you become partners 2 with the demons. You cannot drink the cup of
the Lord, and the cup of demons ; you cannot eat at the table of the
22 Lord, and at the table of demons. Would we provoke the Lord to jeal
ousy ? Are we stronger than He ?
23 " All things are lawful," 3 but not all things are expedient ; They must
deny them-
" all things are lawful," but not all things build up the church. felvfeB,fT(fnl
24 Let no man seek his own, but every man his neighbor's good fuanlnju're''
25 Whatever is sold in the market, you may eat, nor need you science of
, their weaker
26 ask for conscience' sake whence it came : JfOT fyt ZKXtq IB brethien-
27 tlje ITotj&'s, anb t\jt fulness thereof." 4 And if any unbeliever invites
you to a feast, and you are disposed to go, eat of all that is set before you,
28 asking no questions for conscience' sake ; but if any one should say to you,
" This has been offered to an idol," eat not of that dish, for the sake of
29 him who pointed it out, and for the sake of conscience.6 Thy neighbor's
conscience, I say, not thine own ; for [thou mayest truly say] " why is
30 my freedom condemned by the conscience of another ? and if I thank
fully partake, why am I called a sinner for that which I eat with thanks
giving ? " 6
31 Therefore, whether you eat or drink, or whatsoever you do, do all for
32 the glory of God.7 Give no cause of stumbling, either to Jews or Gen-
33 tiles, or to the Church of God. For so I also strive to please all men in
all things, not seeking my own good, but the good of all,8 that they may
ti. 1 be saved. I beseech you follow my example, as I follow the example
of Christ.
1 Deut. xxxii. 17: "They sacrificed to 4 Psalm xxiv. 1 (LXX.).
demons, not to God" (LXX). 6 The repeated quotation is omitted in the
2 This is addressed to those who were in best MSS.
the habit of accepting invitations to feasts cele- 6 Compare Rom. xiv. 16: "Let not your
brated in the temples of the heathen gods " sit- good be evil spoken of." Here, again, the hy-
ting in the idol's temple" (viii. 10). These pothesis that St. Paul is quoting from the let-
feasts were, in fact, acts of idolatrous worship ; ter of the Corinthians removes all difficulty.
the wine was poured in libation to the gods 7 i. e. that the glory of God may be manifested
("the cup of demons," v. 21), and the feast to men.
was given in honor of the gods. 8 The phrase denotes not many, but the
3 See vi. 12 and note. many, the whole mass of mankind.

FIRST EPISTLE TO THE CORINTHIANS.

445

Censure on
the custom
of women
nppeuringunveiled in
the assem
blies for pub'
lie worship.

I praise you, brethren, that' "you are always mindful of xi. 2
my teaching, and keep unchanged the rules which I delivered
to -you." But I would have you know that Christ is the 3
head of every man, and the man is the head of the woman,
as God is the head of Christ. If a man should pray or prophesy in the 4
congregation with a veil over his head, he would bring shame upon his
head2 [by wearing the token of subjection]. But if a woman prays or 5
prophesies with her head unveiled, she brings shame upon her head, as
much as she that is shaven. I say, if she cast off her veil, let her shave 6
her head at once ; but if it is shameful for a woman to be shorn or
shaven, let her keep a veil upon her head.3 For a man ought not to veil 7
his head, since he is the likeness of God, and the manifestation of God's
glory. But the woman's part is to manifest her husband's glory. For
the man was not made from the woman, but the woman from the man.
Nor was the man created for the sake of the woman, but the woman for
the sake of the man. Therefore, the woman ought to wear a sign 4 of 10
subjection upon her head, because of the angels.6 Nevertheless, in their 11
fellowship with the Lord, man and woman may not be separated the one
from the other." For as woman was made from man, so is man also 12
borne by woman ; and all things spring from God. Judge of this matter 13
by your own feeling. Is it seemly for a woman to offer prayers to God
unveiled? Or does not even nature itself teach you that long hair is 14
a disgrace to a man, but a glory to a woman ? for her hair has been 15

1 This statement was probably made in the
letter sent by the Corinthian Church to St.
Paul. 2 It appears from this passage that the Tal
lith which the Jews put over their heads when
they enter their synagogues (see p. 154) was
in the apostolic age removed by them when
they officiated in the public worship. Other
wise St. Paul could not, while writing to a
church containing so many born Jews as the
Corinthian, assume it as evidently disgraceful
to a man to officiate in the congregation with
veiled head. It is true that the Greek practice
was to keep the head uncovered at their reli
gious rites (as Grotius and Wetstein have re
marked), but this custom would not have af
fected the Corinthian synagogue, nor have in
fluenced the feelings of its members.
3 For the character of this veil (or hood), see
Canon Stanley's note in loco.

4 The word is often used for the dominion
exercised by those in laioful authority over their
subordinates (see Luke vii. 8.) Here it is used
to signify the sign of that dominion.
6 The meaning of this very difficult expres
sion seems to be as follows: — The angels are
sent as ministering servants to attend upon
Christians, and are especially present when the
churfch assembles for public worship ; and they
would be offended by any violation of decency
or order. For other explanations, and a full
discussion of the subject, the reader is referred
to Prof. Stanley's note.
6 In their relation to Christ, man and woman
are not to be severed the one from the other.
Compare Gal. iii. 28. St. Paul means to say
that the distinction between the sexes is one
which only belongs to this life.

8

9

44b' THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap. xv.
xi.16 given her for a veil. But if any one thinks to be contentious in de
fence of such a custom, let him know that it is disallowed by me,1 and
by all the Churches of God.
17 [I said that I praised you, for keeping the rules which censure on
their profana-
were delivered to you] ; but while I give you this command- 1*%g°* *he
ment I praise you not ; your solemn assemblies are for evil per-
18 rather than for good. For first, I hear that there are divisions among
you when your congregation assembles ; and this I partly believe.
19 For there must needs be not divisions only,2 but also adverse sects among
20 you, that so the good may be tested and made known. Moreover,3 when
21 you assemble yourselves together, it is not to eat the Lord's Supper ; for
each begins to eat [what he has brought for] his own supper, before
any thing has been given to others : and while some are hungry, others
22 are drunken.4 Have you, then, no houses to eat and drink in ? or do you
come to show contempt for the congregation of God's people, and to
shame the poor ? { What can I say to you ? Shall I praise you in this ?
23 I praise you not. For I myself6 received from the Lord that which 1
delivered to you, that the Lord Jesus, in the night when He was be-
24 trayed, took bread, and when He had given thanks, He brake it, and
said — " Take, eat ; this is my body, which is broken for you : this do in
25 remembrance of me." In the same manner also, He took the cup after
supper, saying, " This cup is the new covenant in my blood : this do ye,
26 as often as ye drink it, in remembrance of me." For as often as you eat
this bread and drink this cup, you openly show forth the Lord's death
27 until He shall come again. Therefore, whosoever shall eat this bread or
drink this cup of the Lord unworthily shall be guilty of profaning
28 the body and blood of the Lord. But let a man examine himself, and so
29 let him eat of this bread and drink of this cup. For he who eats and
drinks of it unworthily eats and drinks judgment against himself, not
1 Literally, that neither I, nor the churches of entertainment of frequent occurrence among
God, admit of such a custom. the Greeks, and known by the name of
2 " There must be also, &c." epavog.
8 The second subject of rebuke is intro- 6 Literally, Tlwse who have not houses to
duced here. eat in, and who therefore ought to have re-
4 For the explanation of this, see Chap. ceived their portion at the love-feasts from
Xin. It should be observed that a common their wealthier brethren.
meal, to which each of the guests contributed e The " I " is emphatic.
his own share of the provisions, was a form of

chap. xv. FIRST EPISTLE TO THE COKUSTTHIANS. 447
duly judging of the Lord's body.1 For this cause many of you are weak xi.30
and sickly, and many sleep. For if we had duly judged ourselves, we 31
should not have been judged. But now that we are judged, we are 32
chastened by the Lord, that we may not be condemned together with the
world. Therefore, my brethren, when you are assembling to eat, wait for 33
one another ; and if any one is hungry, let him eat at home, lest your 34
meetings should bring judgment upon you. The other matters I will set
in order when I come.
on the s irit Concerning those who exercise2 Spiritual Gifts, brethren, I xii. 1
uai Gifts. •vf-Quld not have you ignorant. You know that in the days 2
of your heathenism you were blindly 3 led astray to worship dumb and
senseless idols [by those who pretended to gifts from heaven]. This, 3
therefore, I call to your remembrance ; that no man who is inspired by
the Spirit of God can say " Jesus is accursed ; " and no man can say
" Jesus is the Lord," unless he be inspired by the Holy Spirit.4 More- 4
over, there are varieties of Gifts, but the same Spirit gives them all ; and
[they are given for] various ministrations, but all to serve the same 5
Lord ; and the working whereby they are wrought is various, but all 6
are wrought in all by the working of the same God.5 But the gift where- 7
by the Spirit becomes manifest is given to each for the profit of all. To 8
one 6 is given by the Spirit the utterance of Wisdom, to another the
1 If in this verse we omit, with the ma- extraordinary spiritual gifts which followed
jority of MSS., the words " unworthily" and Christian baptism in that age proceeded in all
" of the Lord," it will stand as follows : He cases from the Spirit of God, and not from the
who eats and drinks of it, not duly judging of Spirit of Evil. This is St. Paul's answer to a
[or discerning] the Body, eats and drinks judg- difficulty apparently felt by the Corinthians
merit against himself . The "not discerning" (and mentioned in their letter to him), whether
is explained by Canon Stanley, " if he does some of these gifts might not be given by the
not discern that the body of the Lord is in Author of Evil to confuse the Church. Prof.
himself aud in the Christian society ; " but Stanley observes that the words Jesus is ac-
the more usual and perhaps more natural cursed and Jesus is the Lord (according to the
explanation is, "if he does not distinguish reading of some of the best MSS., which pro-
between the Eucharistic elements and a com- duces a much livelier sense) "were probably
mon meal." well-known forms of speech ; the first for re-
2 The adjective is here taken as masculine, nouncing Christianity (compare maledicere
because this agrees best with the context, and Christo, Plin. Ep. x. 97), the second for pro-
also because another word is used in this fessing allegiance to Christ at baptism."
chapter for spiritual gifts. R It should be observed that the 4th, 5th,
3 As ye chanced to be led at the will of your and 6th verses imply the doctrine of the
leaders, i. c. blindly. Trinity.
4 i. e. the mere outward profession of 6 On this classification of spiritual gifts,
Christianity is (so far as it goes) a proof of see p. 372, note.
the Holy Spirit's guidance. Therefore the

448 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap. x*.
utterance of Knowledge l according to the working of the same Spirit.
<u. 9 To another Faith2 through the same Spirit. To another gifts of Healing
10 through the same Spirit. To another the powers which work Miracles ;
to another Prophecy ; to another the discernment of Spirits ; 3 to another
11 varieties of Tongues ; 4 to another the Interpretation of Tongues. But
all these gifts are wrought by the working of that one and the same
12 Spirit, who distributes them to each according to His will. For as the
body is one, and has many members, and as all the members, though
13 many,6 are one body ; so also is Christ. For in the communion of one
Spirit we all were 6 baptized into one body, whether we be Jews or Gen
tiles,7 whether slaves or freemen, and were all made to drink of the same
14 Spirit. For the body is not one member, but many. If8 the foot should
15 say, " I am not the hand, therefore I belong not to the body," does it
16 thereby sever itself from the body ? Or if the ear should say, " I am
not the eye, therefore I belong not to the body," does it thereby sever
17 itself from the body ? If the whole body were an eye, where would be
the hearing? If the whole body were an ear, where would be the
18 smelling ? But now God has placed the members severally in the body
19 according to His will. If all were one member, where would be the
20 body ? But now, though the members are many, yet the body is one.
21 And the eye cannot say to the hand, " I have no need of thee ; " nor
22 again the head to the feet, " I have no need of you." Nay, those parts
23 of the body which are reckoned the feeblest are the most necessary, and
those parts which we hold the least honorable, we clothe with the more
abundant honor, and the less beautiful parts are adorned with the greater
24 beauty ; whereas the beautiful need no adornment. But God has tem
pered the body together, and given to the lowlier parts the higher honor,
25 that there should be no division in the body, but that all its parts should
26 feel, one for the other, a common sympathy. And thus, if one member
1 Knowledge (gnosis) is the term nsed 6 Some words of the Received Text are
throughout this Epistle for a deep insight into omitted here by the best MSS.
divine truth ; Wisdom is a more general term, 6 The past tense is mistranslated in A. V. as
but here (as being opposed to gnosis) probably present. ' See note on Rom. i. 16.
means practical wisdom. s The resemblance between this passage
2 That is, wonder-working faith. See Ch. and the well-known fable of Menenius Agrippa
XIH. (Liv. n. 32) can scarcely be accidental; and
8 See Ch. XIII. may perhaps be considered another proof that
4 See Ch. XIII. for remarks on this and St. Paul was not unacquainted with classical
the other gifts mentioned in this passage. literature.

chap. rv. FIRST EPISTLE TO THE CORINTHIANS. 449
suffer, every member suffers with it ; or if one member be honored, xii
every member rejoices with it. Now ye are together the body of Christ, 27
and each one of you a separate member. And God has set the mem- 28
bers in the Church, some in one place, and some in another : 1 first,2
Apostles ; secondly, Prophets ; thirdly, Teachers ; afterwards Miracles ;
then gifts of Healing ; Serviceable Ministrations ; Gifts of Government ;
varieties of Tongues. Can all be Apostles ? Can all be Prophets ? 29
Can all be Teachers ? Can all work Miracles ? Have all the Gifts of 30
Healing ? Do all speak with Tongues ? Can all interpret the Tongues ?
But I would have you delight 3 in the best gifts ; and moreover, beyond 81
them all,4 1 will show you a path wherein to walk.
superiority of Though I speak in all the tongues of men and angels, if Ixiii.1
the extraor- have not love, I am no better than sounding brass or a tin-
dinary Gifts °
of the spirit, kling cymbal. And though I have the gift of prophecy, and 2
understand all the mysteries, and all the depths of knowledge ; and
though I have the fulness of faith,5 so that I could remove mountains ;
if I have 'hot love, I am nothing. And though I sell all my goods to feed 3
the poor, and though I give my body to be burned,6 if I have not love, 4
it profits me nothing. Love is long suffering ; love is kind ; love envies
not ; love speaks no vaunts ; love swells not with vanity ; love offends not 5
by rudeness ; love seeks not her own ; is not easily provoked ; bears no
malice ; 7 rejoices not over 8 iniquity, but rejoices in the victory of 6
1 The omission of the answering clause in the use of the words exceedingly sinful would
the Greek renders it necessary to complete the not explain the expression an exceedingly path.
sense by this interpolation. 6 i. e. the charism of wonder-working faith.
"On this classification, see p. 372, note; See Ch. XTH. The " removal of mountains "
on the particular charisms and offices men- alludes to the words of our Lord, recorded
tioned in it, see pp. 372-378. Matt. xvii. 20.
8 The verb means originally to fed intense 6 Some MSS. have " give my body that I
eagerness about a person or thing : hence its may boast," which gives a satisfactory sense.
different senses of love, jealousy, &c., are ' Literally, does not reckon the evil [against the
derived. Here the wish expressed is, that the evil-doer]. Compare 2 Cor. v. 19 : "not reck-
Corinthians should take that delight in the oning their sins." The Authorized Version
exercise of the more useful gifts, which hither- here, " thinketh no evil," is so beautiful that
to they had taken in the, more wonderful, not one cannot but wish it had been a correct
that individuals should " covet earnestly " for translation. The same disposition, however,
themselves gifts which God had not given is implied by the " believes all things " below.
them. Compare xiv. 39, and observe that the 8 This verb sometimes means to rejoice in
verb is a different one in xiv. 1. the misfortune of another, and the characteristic
4 This seems the meaning here. The of love here mentioned may mean that it does
phrase can scarcely be taken as an adjective not exult in the punishment of iniquity ; ox
with " path," as in A. V. Such an instance may simply mean that it does not delight in
as Rom. vii! 13 is not parallel. In English the contemplation of wickedness.
29

450 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap. xv.
xiii. 7 truth ; • foregoes all things,2 believes all things, hopes all things, endures
8 all things. Love shall never pass away ; but Prophecies shall vanish,
9 and Tongues shall cease, and Knowledge shall come to nought. For our
10 Knowledge is imperfect, and our prophesying is imperfect. But when
11 the perfect is come, the imperfect shall pass away. When I was a
child, my words were childish, my desires were childish, my judgments
were childish ; but being grown a man, I have done with the things of
12 childhood. So now we see darkly,3 by a mirror,4 but then face to face ;
now I know in part, but then shall I know, even as I now am5 known.
13 Yet while other gifts shall pass away, these three, Faith, Hope, and
Love, abide ; and the greatest of these is Love.
xiv.l Follow earnestly after Love ; yet delight in the spiritual fo'/tneTxer-cise of the
2 gifts, but especially in the gift of Prophecy. For he who |jft °a^0?he
speaks in a Tongue speaks not to men, but to God ; for no Tongues.
3 man understands him, but with his spirit he utters mysteries. But he
who prophesies speaks to men, and builds them up, with exhortation and
4 with comfort. He who speaks in a Tongue builds up himself alone ; but
5 he who prophesies builds up the Church. I wish that you all had the
gift of Tongues, but rather that you had the gift of Prophecy ; for he
who prophesies is above him who speaks in Tongues, unless he interpret,
6 that the Church may be built up thereby. Now, brethren, if when I
came to you I were to speak in Tongues, what should I profit you, unless
I should [also] speak either in Revelation or in Knowledge, either in
7 Prophesying or in Teaching ? Even if the lifeless instruments of sound,
the flute or the harp, give no distinctness to their notes, how can we
8 understand their music ? If the trumpet utter an uncertain note, how
9 shall the soldier prepare himself for the battle ? So also if you utter
unintelligible words with your tongue, how can your speech be under-
10 stood ? you will but be speaking to the air. Perhaps there may be as
many languages in the world [as the Tongues in which you speak] , and
1 Literally, rejoices when the Truth rejoices. 6 Literally, " I was known," i. e. when in
2 For the meaning, see note on ix. 12. this world, by God. The tense used retrospec-
8 Literally, in an enigma ; thus we see God tively ; unless it may be better to take it aa
(e.g.) in nature, while even revelation only the aorist used in a perfect sense, which is not
shows us His reflected likeness. There is, no uncommon in St. Paul's style.
doubt, an allusion to Numbers xii. 8.
* Not " through a glass," but by means of a
mirror.

-chap. xv. FIRST EPISTLE TO THE CORINTHIANS. 451 xiv.
none of them is unmeaning. If, then, I know not the meaning of the 11
language, I shall be as a foreigner to him that speaks it, and he will be
accounted a foreigner by me. Wherefore, in your own case (since you 12
delight in spiritual gifts) strive that your abundant possession of them
may build up the Church. Therefore, let him who speaks in a Tongue 13
pray that he may be able to interpret * what he utters. For if I utter 14
prayers in a Tongue, my spirit indeed prays, but my understanding bears
no fruit. What follows, then ? I will pray indeed with my spirit, but I 15
will pray with my understanding also ; I will sing praises with my spirit,
but I will sing with my understanding also. For if thou, with thy spirit, 16
offerest thanks and praise, how shall the Amen be said to thy thanksgiv
ing by those worshippers who take no part2 in the ministrations, while
they are ignorant of the meaning of thy words ? Thou indeed fitly 17
offerest thanksgiving, but thy neighbors are not built up. I offer thanks- 18
giving to God in private,3 speaking in Tongues [to Him], more than any
of you. Yet in the congregation I would rather speak five words with 19
my understanding so as to instruct others than ten thousand words in a
Tongue. Brethren, be not children in understanding ; but in malice be 20
children, and in understanding be men. It is written in the Law,4 21
" Wlity mm of o%r f01rgu.es una o%r lips twill Jf speak unto iljis
people ; ano get for all fyixk %g toill not frear me, saitlj % l^oxa."
So that the gift of Tongues is a sign 5 given rather to unbelievers than to 22
believers ; whereas the gift of Prophecy belongs to believers. When, 23
therefore, the whole congregation is assembled, if all the speakers speak
in Tongues, and if any who take no part in your ministrations, or who
are unbelievers, should enter your assembly, will they not say that you
are mad ? 6 But if all exercise the gift of Prophecy, then if any man 24
1 This verse distinctly proves that the gift 5 That is, a condemnatory sign.
of Tongues was not a knowledge of foreign Ian- 6 We must not be led, from any apparent
guages, as is often supposed. See Ch. XIII. analogy, to confound the exercise of the gift
2 Not the unlearned (A. V.), but him who of Tongues in the primitive Church with
takes no part in the particular matter in hand. modern exhibitions of fanaticism, which bear
8 This is evidently the meaning of the verse. a superficial resemblance to it. We must re-
Compare verse 2, " He who speaks in a tongue member that such modern pretensions to :his
speaks not to himself but to God," and verse gift must of course resemble the manifesta-
28 " Let him speak in private to himself and tions of the original gift in external features, be-
God alone." cause these very features have been the objects
4 Is. xxviii. 11. Not exactly according to of intentional imitation. If, however, the in-
the Hebrew or LXX. articulate utterances of ecstatic joy are followed

452 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap.xv,
who is an unbeliever, or who takes no part in your ministrations, should
enter the place of meeting, he is convicted in conscience by every speak-
25 er, he feels himself judged by all, and 1 the secret depths of his heart are
laid open ; and so he will fall upon his face and worship God, and report
26 that God is in you of a truth. What follows, then, brethren ? If, when
you meet together, one is prepared to sing a hymn of praise, another to
exercise his gift of Teaching, another his gift of Tongues, another to deliv
er a Revelation,2 another an Interpretation : let all be so done as to build
27 up the Church. If there be any who speak in Tongues, let not more
than two, or at the most three, speak [in the same assembly] ; and let
them speak in turn ; and let the same interpreter explain the words of
28 all. But if there be no interpreter, let him who speaks in Tongues keep
silence in the congregation, and speak in private to himself and God
29 alone. Of those who have the gift of Prophecy, let two or three speak
30 [in each assembly] , and let the rest 3 judge ; but if another of them,
while sitting as hearer, receives a revelation [calling him to prophesy],
31 let the first cease to speak. For so you can each prophesy in turn, that
32 all may receive teaching and exhortation ; and the gift of Prophecy does
33 not take from the prophets 4 the control over their own spirits. For God
is not the author of confusion, but of peace.
6 In your congregation, as in all the congregations of the The women
34 Saints, the women must keep silence ; for they are not per- ciate puwiciy
in the congre-
mitted to speak in public, but to show submission, as saith sation-
35 also the Law.6 And if they wish to ask any question, let them ask it of
their own husbands at home ; for it is disgraceful to women to speak in
36 the congregation. [Whence is your claim to change the rules delivered
to you ?] 7 Was it from you that the word of God went forth ? or are

(as they were in some of Wesley's converts) * Literally, " the spirits of the prophets are
by a life of devoted holiness, we should hesi- under the control of the prophets." This is a
tate to say that they might not bear some reason why the rule given above can easily be
analogy to those of the Corinthian Christians. observed. [This seems to modify what is said
1 The word *br "so" is omitted in best on p. 375. — h.]
MSS. 6 This translation places a full-stop in the
2 This would be an exercise of the gift of middle of the 33d verse, and a comma at the
"prophecy." end of it.
8 i. c. let the rest of the prophets judge 6 Gen. iii. 16: "Thy husband shall have
whether those who stand up to exercise the the dominion over thee."
gift have really received it. This is parallel to 7 The sentence in brackets, or something
the direction in 1 Thess. v. 21. equivalent, is implied in the ft which begins

•chap. xv. FIRST EPISTLE TO THE CORINTHIANS. 453 xiv.
you the only church which it has reached 1 Nay, if any think that he 37
has the gift of Prophecy, or that he is a spiritual l man, let him acknowl
edge the words which I write for commands of the Lord. But if any 38
man refuse this acknowledgment, let him refuse it at his peril.
Therefore, brethren, delight in the gift of Prophecy, and hinder not 39
the gift of Tongues. And let all be done with decency and order. 40
The doctrine Moreover, brethren, I call to your remembrance the Glad- xv. 1
of the Kesur- ' ' * T *
Seade8tab-the tidings which I brought you, which also you received, wherein 2
iu impufners. also you stand firm, whereby also you are saved,2 if you still
hold fast the words wherein I declared it to you ; unless, indeed, you
believed in vain. For the first thing I taught you was that which I had 3
myself been taught, that Christ died for our sins, according to the Scrip
tures ; 3 and that He was buried, and that He rose 4 the third day from 4
the dead, according to the Scriptures ; 8 and that He was seen by Cephas, 5
and then by The Twelve ; after that He was seen by about five hundred 6
brethren at once, of whom the greater part are living at this present
time, but some are fallen asleep.6 Next He was seen by James, and then 7
by all the Apostles ; and last of all He was seen by me also, who am 8
placed among the rest as it were by an untimely birth ; for I am the least 9
of the Apostles, and am not worthy to be called an Apostle, because I
persecuted the Church of God. But by the grace of God, I am what I 10
am ; and His grace which was bestowed upon me was not fruitless ; but
I labored more abundantly than all the rest ; yet not I, but the grace of
the next. " On was it from you," — i. e. " Or aorist : "He is risen," not " He was raised," or
if you set up your judgment against that of other (more literally) Se is awakened, not He was
¦Churches, was it from you, frc." awakened; because Christ, being once risen,
1 " Spiritual," the epithet on which the dieth no more. But this present-perfect can-
party of Apollos (the ultra-Pauline party) not here be retained in the English.
¦especially prided themselves. See chap. iii. 6 Among the " Scriptures " here referred
1-3 and Gal. vi. 1. to by St. Paul, one is the prophecy which he
a Literally, you are in the way of salvation. himself quoted in the speech at Antioch from
The words which follow (the words wherein, Ps. xvi. 10.
4-c.) were joined (in our first edition) with . 6 Can we imagine it possible that St. Paul
preached in the preceding verse, according to should have said this without knowing it to
Billroth's view. But further consideration be true ? or without himself having seen some
has led us to think that they may be more of these " five hundred brethren," of whom
naturally made dependent on hold fast, as they " the greater part " were alive when he wrote
are taken by De Wette, Alford, and others. these words ? The sceptical (but candid and
8 So our Lord quotes Is. liii. 12, in Luke honest) De Wette acknowledges this testimony
.. _ as conclusive.
JLXll. Ol.
* In the original it is the perfect, not the

454 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap.xv.
XV. 11 God which was with me. So then, whether preached by me, or them,
this is what we preach, and this is what you believed.
12 If, then, this be our tidings, that Christ is risen from the dead, how is
13 it that some among you say, there is no resurrection of the dead ? But
14 if there be no resurrection of the dead, then Christ is not risen ; and if
Christ be not risen, vain is the message we proclaim, and vain the faith
15 with which you heard it. Moreover, we are found guilty of false witness-
against God ; because we bore witness of God that He raised Christ from
16 the dead, whom He did not raise, if, indeed, the dead rise not. For if
17 there be no resurrection of the dead, Christ himself1 is not risen. And
if Christ be not risen, your faith is vain, you are still in2 your sins.
18 Moreover, if this be so, they who have fallen asleep in Christ perished
19 when they died. If in this life only we have hope in Christ, we are of
20 all men most miserable. But now, Christ is risen from the dead ; the
21 first-fruits 3 of all who sleep. For since by man came death, by man
22 came also the resurrection of the dead. For as, in Adam, all men die,
23 so, in Christ, shall all be raised to life. But each in his own order ;
Christ, the first-fruits ; afterwards they who are Christ's at His appear-
24 ing ; finally, the end shall come, when He shall give up His kingdom to
God His Fatlier, having destroyed all other dominion, and authority, and
25 power.4 For He must reign " fill ||e fjaijj put all enemies unber Pis
26 feet." 5 And last of His enemies, Death also shall be destroyed^ For
27 " Jpe {jatfr put all iljirtgs imber ||is feet."6 But in that saying, " all
flings are put Ultbetr Him," it is manifest that God is excepted, who
28 put all things under Him. And when all things are made subject to
Him, then shall the Son also subject Himself to Him who made them
subject, that God may be all in all.
1 This argument is founded on the union therefore is, " As the single sheaf of first-fruits
between Christ and His members : they so represents and consecrates all the harvest, so
share His life, that, because He lives forever, Christ's resurrection represents and involves
they must live also; and 'onversely, if we that of all who sleep in Him." It should be
deny their immortality, we deny His. • observed that the verb is not present (as in
2 Because we "are saved" from our sins A. V.), but past (not is become, but became),
" by His life." (Rom. v. 10.) and that the best MSS. omit it.
3 On the second day of the feast of Pass- * Compare Col. ii. 15 ; also Eph. i. 21.
over a sheaf of ripe corn was offered upon the 5 Ps. ex. 1 (LXX.). Quoted, and similarly
altar as a consecration of the whole harvest. applied, by our Lord himself, Matt. xxii. 44.
Till this was done it was considered unlawful 6 Ps. viii. 6, nearly after LXX. Quoted
to begin reaping. See Levit. xxiii. 10, 11, also as Messianic, Eph. i. 22, and Heb. ii. 8
and Joseph. Antiq. iii. 10. The metaphor See the note on the latter place.

FIRST EPISTLE TO THE CORINTHIANS.

455

Again, what will become of those who cause themselves to be baptized 29
for the dead,1 if the dead never rise again ' Why, then, do they submit
to baptism for the dead ?
And I too, why do I put my life to hazard every hour ? I protest by 30
my 2 boasting (which I have [not in myself, but] in Christ Jesus our 31
Lord) I die daily. If I have fought (so to speak) with beasts at Ephe- 32
sus,3 what am I profited if the dead rise not? " ^d US tut mb brink,
for to-morrofo toe bie."4 Beware lest you be led astray; " Converse 33
with evil men corrupts good manners." 5 Change your drunken revellings6
into the sobriety of righteousness, and live no more in sin ; for some of 34
you know not God ; I speak this to your shame.
But some one will say, " How are the dead raised up ? and with what 35
body do they come ? " ' Thou fool, the seed thou so west is not quick- 36

1 The only meaning which the Greek seems
to admit here is a reference to the practice of
submitting to baptism instead of some person
who had died unbaptized. Yet this explanation
is liable to very great difficulties. (1) How
strange that St. Paul should refer to such a
superstition without rebuking it! Perhaps, ,
however, he may have censured it in a former
letter, and now only refers to it as au argu-
mentum ad homines. It has, indeed, been
alleged that the present mention of it implies
a censure; but this is far from evident. (2)
If such a practice did exist in the Apostolic
Church, how can we account for its being dis
continued in the period which followed, when
a magical efficacy was more and more ascribed
to the material act of baptism? Yet the
practice was never adopted except by some
obscure sects of Gnostics, who seem to have
founded their custom on this very passage.
The explanations which have been adopted
to avoid the difficulty, such as " over the
graves of the dead," or " in the name of the
dead (meaning Christ)," &c, are all inadmissi
ble, as being contrary to the analogy of the
language. On the whole, therefore, the pas
sage must be considered to admit of no satis
factory explanation. It alludes to some prac
tice of the Corinthians, which has not been
recorded elsewhere, and of which every other
trace has perished. The reader who wishes to
see all that can be said on the subject should
consult Canon Stanley's note.

2 We read " our " with Griesbach, on the
authority of the Codex Alexandrinus. If
" your " be the true reading, it can scarcely be
translated (as has been proposed) " my boasting
of you." For though instances may be ad
duced (as Rom. xi. 31) when a possessive pro
noun is thus used objectively, yet they never
occur except where the context renders mis
take impossible. Indeed it is obvious that no
writer would go out of his way to use a
possessive pronoun in an unusual sense, when
by so doing he would create ambiguity which
might be avoided by adopting a usual form of
expression. 8 This is metaphorical, as appears by the
qualifying expression translated in A. V.,
" after the manner of men." It must refer to
some very violent opposition which St. Paul
had met with at Ephesus, the particulars of
which are not recorded.
1 Is. xxii. 13 (LXX.).
5 St. Paul here quotes a line from The
Thais, a comedy of Menander's : the line had
probably passed into a proverbial expression.
We see, from this passage, that the free-think
ing party at Corinth joined immoral practice
with their licentious doctrine ; and that they
were corrupted by the evil example of their
heathen neighbors.
6 Not awake (as in A. V.), but cease to be
drunken. And below, do not go on signing
(present). 7 The form of this objection is conclusive

456 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap.xv.
XV. 37 ened into life till it hath partaken of death. And that which thou sowest
has not the same body with the plant which will spring from it, but it is
38 mere grain, of wheat, or whatever else it may chance to be. But God
gives it a body according to His will ; and to every seed the body of its
39 own proper plant. For all flesh is not the same flesh ;' [but each body
is fitted to the place it fills] ; the bodies of men, and of beasts, of birds,
40 and of fishes, differ the one from the other. And there are bodies which
belong to heaven, and bodies which belong to earth ; but in glory the
41 heavenly differ from the earthly. The sun is more glorious than the
moon, and the moon is more glorious than the stars, and one star excels
another in glory. So likewise is the resurrection of the dead ; [they will
42 be clothed with a body fitted to their lot] ; it is sown in corruption, it
43 is raised in incorruption ; it is sown in dishonor, it is raised in glory ;
44 it is sown in weakness, it is raised in power ; it is sown a natural 2 body,
it is raised a spiritual body ; for as there are natural bodies, so there are
45 also spiritual bodies.3 And so it is written, " Cftt first matt %bnxn
bias mabe a libillO, Sflul," 4 the last Adam was made a life-giving spirit.
46 But the spiritual comes not till after the natural. The first man was made
47 of earthly clay, the second man was the Lord from heaven. As is the
48 earthly, such are they also that are earthly ; and as is the heavenly, such
49 are they also that are heavenly ; and as we have borne the image of the
60 earthly, we shall also bear the image of the heavenly. But this I say,
brethren, that flesh and blood5 cannot inherit the kingdom of God,
against the hypothesis of those who suppose * The difference of reading does not ma-
that these Corinthians only disbelieved the terially affect the sense of this verse.
Resurrection of the body; and that they be- 4 Gen. ii. 7, slightly altered from LXX.
lieved the Resurrection of the dead. St. Paul The second member of the antithesis is not a
asserts the Resurrection of the dead ; to which part of the quotation.
they reply, " How can the dead rise to life 6 The importance of the subject justifies
again, when their body has perished ? " This our quoting at some length the admirable
objection he proceeds to answer, by showing rem'arks of Dr. Burton (formerly Regius Pro-
that individual existence may continue, with- fessor of Divinity at Oxford) on this passage,
out the continuance of the material body. in the hope that his high reputation for learn-
1 Prof. Stanley translates " no flesh is the ing and for unblemished orthodoxy may lead
same flesh," which is surely an untenable propo- some persons to reconsider the loose and un-
sition, and moreover inconsistent with the scriptural language which they are in the habit
context ; though the words of the Greek no of using. After regretting that some of the
doubt admit of such a rendering. early Fathers have ( when treating of the
2 For the translation here, see note on ii. Resurrection of the Body) appeared to contra-
14. The reference to this of the following diet these words of St. Paul, Dr. Burton con-
" soul" (in the quotation) should be observed, tinues as follows: —
though it cannot be retained in English. " It is nowhere asserted in the New Testa-

FIRST EPISTLE TO THE CORINTHIANS.

457

XV.

neither can corruption inherit incorruption. Behold, I declare to you a 51
mystery ; we shall not 1 all sleep, but we shall all be changed, in a 52
moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the sound of the last trumpet ;
for the trumpet shall sound, and the dead shall be raised incorruptible,
and we shall be changed. For this corruptible must put on incorruption, 53
and this mortal must put on immortality.
But when this corruptible is clothed with incorruption, and this 54
mortal is clothed with immortality, then shall be brought to pass the
saying, which is written, " gfeatfjf is sfaallotoeb Up ill bifiorg."2 " # 55
beatjj, mjjere is tfrg sting?" "# grace, fofrere is % bixtorg?"3 56
The stint? of death is sin, and the strength of sin is the law;4 but 57

ment that we shall rise again with our bodies.
Unless a man will say that the stalk, the
blade, and the ear of corn, are actually the
same thing with the single grain which is put
into the ground, he cannot quote St. Paul as
saying that we shall rise again with the same
bodies ; or at least he must allow that the
future body may only be like to the present
one, inasmuch as both come under the same
genus ; i. e. we speak of human bodies, and we
speak of heavenly bodies. But St. Paul's
words do not warrant us in saying that the
resemblance between the present and future
body will be greater than between a man and
a star, or between a bird and a fish. Nothing
can be plainer than the expression which he
uses in the first of these two analogies, Thou
sowest not that body that shall be (xv. 37). He
says also, with equal plainness, of the body,
It is sown a natural body ; it is raised a spiritual
body : there is a natural body, and there is a
spiritual body (ver. 44). These words require
to be examined closely, and involve remotely
a deep metaphysical question. In common
language, the terms Body and Spirit are ac
customed to be opposed, and are used to
represent two things which are totally distinct.
But St. Paul here brings the two expressions
together, and speaks of a spiritual body. St.
Paul, therefore, did not oppose Body to Spirit;
and though the looseness of modern language
may allow us to do so, and yet to be correct in
our ideas, it may save some confusion if we
consider Spirit as opposed to Matter, and if
we take Body to be a generic term, which com
prises both. A body, therefore, in the language

of St. Paul, is something which has a distinct
individual existence.
" St. Paul tells us that every individual,
when he rises again, will have a spiritual
body: but the remarks which I have made
may show how different is the idea conveyed
by these words from the notions which some
persons entertain, that we shall rise again with
the same identical body. St. Paul appears ef
fectually to preclude this notion when he says,
Flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of
God " (ver. 50). — Burton's Lectures, pp. 429-
431. 1 The other reading (adopted by Lach-
mann) gives the opposite assertion, viz. " we
shall all sleep, but we shall not all be changed." It
is easy to understand the motive which might
have led to the substitution of this reading for
the other ; a wish, namely, to escape the infer
ence that St. Paul expected some of that gen
eration to survive until the general resurrec
tion. 2 Is. xxv. 8. Not quoted from the LXX.,
but apparently from the Hebrew, with some
alteration. 8 Hosea xiii. 14. Quoted, but not exactly,
from LXX., which here differs from the
Hebrew. 4 Why is the law called " the strength of
sin " ? Because the Law of Duty, being ac
knowledged, gives to sin its power to wound
the conscience ; in fact, a moral law of pre
cepts and penalties announces the fatal conse
quences of sin, without giving us any power
of conquering sin. Compare Rom. vii. 7-11.

XV.

458 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap. xv.
thanks be to God, who giveth us the victory, through our Lord Jesus
Christ.
58 Therefore, my beloved brethren, be ye steadfast, immovable, always ¦
abounding in the work of the Lord ; knowing that your labor is not in
. vain, in the Lord.
1 Concerning the collection for the saints [at Jerusalem] I Directionsconcerning
would have you do as I have enjoined upon the churches of ^^'^
2 Galatia. Upon the first day of the week, let each of you set ua™!1™"
apart whatever his gains may enable him to spare ; that there may be
3 no collections when I come. And when I am with you, whomsoever
you shall judge to be fitted for the trust I will furnish with letters,
4 and send them to carry your benevolence to Jerusalem ; or if there
shall seem sufficient reason for me also to go thither, they shall „t „ „ ,
° ' J St. Paul's fn-
5 go with me. But I will visit you after I have passed through turePlan8-
6 Macedonia (for through Macedonia I shall pass), and perhaps I shall
remain with you, or even winter with you, that you may forward me on
7 my farther journey, whithersoever I go. For I do not wish to see you
now for a passing l visit ; since I hope to stay some time with you, if the
8 Lord permit. But I shall remain at Ephesus until Pentecost, for a door
9 is opened to me both great and effectual ; and there are many adversaries,
10 [against whom I must contend]. If Timotheus come to you, Timotheoe.
be careful to give him no cause of fear 2 in your intercourse with him, for
11 he is laboring, as I am, in the Lord's work. Therefore, let no man de
spise himj but forward him on his way in peace, that he may come hither
to me ; for I expect him, and the brethren with him.
12 As regards the brother Apollos, I urged him much to visit Apoiios.
you with the brethren, [who bear this letter] ; 3 nevertheless, he was
resolved not to come to you at this time, but he will visit you at a more
convenient season.

1 i. e. St. Paul had altered his original in- and x. 1-12). He explains his reason for
tention, which was to go from Ephesus by sea postponing his visit in 2 Cor. i. 23. It was
to Corinth, and thence to Macedonia. For an anxiety to give the Corinthians time for
this change of purpose he was reproached by repentance, that he might not be forced to use
the Judaizing party at Corinth, who insin- severity with them.
uated that he was afraid to come, and that he 2 The youth of Timotheus accosts foi
dared not support the loftiness of his preten- this request. Compare 1 Tim. iv. 12.
sions by corresponding deeds (see 2 Cor. i. 17 8 See notes, pp. 403 and 460.

ju.ip.xv. FIRST EPISTLE TO THE CORINTHIANS. . 459 xvi
Exhortation Be watchful, stand firm in faith, be manful and stout- 13
hearted.' Let ali you do be done in love. 14
Stephanas, You know, brethren, that the house of Stephanas2 were the 15
Fortuniitus,
und Achates, first-fruits of Achaia, and that they have taken on themselves
the task of ministering to the saints. I exhort you, therefore, on your 16
part, to show submission towards men like these, and towards all who
work laboriously with them. I rejoice in the coming of Stephanas and 17
Fortunatus, and Achaicus, because they3 have supplied all which you
needed ; for they have lightened my spirit and yours.4 To such render 18
due acknowledgment.
fro'mtn'e3118 The Churches of Asia salute you. Aquila and Priscilla send 19
As?a.mct their loving salutation in the Lord, together with the Church
which assembles at their house. All the brethren here salute you. 20
Salute one another with the kiss of holiness.5
Autograph ^e salutation of me, Paul, with my own hand. Let him 21, 22
who loves not the Lord Jesus Christ be accursed. Cjie |£orb
tometJL6 The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you. My love be with you 23,24
all in Christ Jesus.7
In the concluding part of this letter we have some indication of the
A.postle's plans for the future. He is looking forward to a journey
through Macedonia (xvi. 5), to be succeeded by a visit to Corinth (ib.
2-7), and after this he thinks it prohable he may proceed to Jerusalem
(ib. 3,4). In the Acts of the Apostles the same intentions 8 are ex-
1 i. e. under persecution. iv. 5). Billroth thinks that he wrote it in
2 See p. 349. Hebrew characters, as a part of the autograph
8 Compare 2 Cor. xi. 9, and Phil. ii. 30. by which he authenticated this letter. See
It cannot well be taken objectively, as " my the Hebrew and Greek together at the end of
want of you ; " not only because " my " would this chapter. Buxtorf (Lex. Chald. 827) says
have been added, but also because the expres- it was part of a Jewish cursing formula, from
sion is used in eight passages by St. Paul, the " Prophecy of Enoch " (Jud. 14) ; but this
and in one by St. Luke, and the genitive con- view appears to be without foundation. In
nected with the word for " want " is subjec- fact, it would have been most incongruous to
tively used in seven out of these nine cases blend together a Greek word (ANATHEMA)
without question, and ought, therefore, also with an Aramaic phrase (MARAN ATHA),
to be so taken in the remaining two cases, and to use the compound as a formula of exe-
where the context is not equally decisive. cration. This was not done till (in later ages
* Viz. by supplying the means of our inter- of the Church) the meaning of the terms them-
course. 5 See note on 1 Thess. v. 25. selves was lost.
6 Maran-Atha means " The Lord cometh," 7 The " Amen " is not found in the best
and is used apparently by St. Paul as a kind MSS.
of motto: compare " the Lord is nigh '' (Phil. B The important application made in the

460 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap. xv.
pressed, with a stronger purpose of going to Jerusalem (xvi. 21), and with
the additional conviction that after passing through Macedonia and
Achaia, and visiting Palestine, he " must also see Rome " (ib.). He had
won many of the inhabitants of Asia Minor and Ephesus to the faith ;
and now, after the prospect of completing his charitable exertions for the
poor Christians of Judaea, his spirit turns towards the accomplishment
of remoter conquests. Far from being content with his past achieve
ments, or resting from his incessant labors, he felt that he was under a
debt of perpetual obligation to all the Gentile world.1 Thus he express
es himself, soon after this time, in the Epistle to the Roman Christians,
whom he had long ago desired to see (Rom. i. 10-15), and whom he
hopes at length to visit, now that he is on his way to Jerusalem, and is
looking forward to a still more distant and hazardous journey to Spain
(ib. xv. 22-29). The path thus dimly traced . before him, as he
thought of the future at Ephesus, and made more clearly visible, when
he wrote the letter at Corinth, was made still more evident 2 as he pro
ceeded on his course. Yet not without forebodings of evil,3 and much
discouragement,4 and mysterious delays,5 did the Apostle advance on his
courageous career. But we are anticipating many subjects which will
give a touching interest to subsequent passages of this history. Im
portant events still detain us in Ephesus. Though St. Paul's compan
ions 6 had been sent before in the direction of his contemplated journey
(Acts xix. 22), he still resolved to stay till Pentecost (1 Cor. xvi. 8). A
" great door " was open to him, and there were many " adversaries,"
against whom he had yet to contend.
ANA OEM a am pa
Anathema Maran -Atha}
Horos Paulina of these coincidences between a note, the probability that Titus was one of
the Acts and Corinthians, and again of those those who went to Corinth with the First
referred to below between the Acts and Ro- Epistle. See 1 Cor. xvi. 11, 12; 2 Cor. xii.
mans, need only be alluded to. 18. We find that this is the view of Mac-
1 "I am a debtor both to Greeks and Bar- knight. Transl., Sec, of the Apost. Epistles,vo\.
barians." Rom. i. 14. i. p. 451. If this view is correct, it is interest-
" By the vision at Jerusalem (Acts xxiii. ing to observe that Titus is at first simply
11), and on board the ship (xxvii. 23, 24). spoken of as " a brother," — but that gradually
8 Compare what he wrote to the Romans he rises into note with the faithful discharge
(Rom. xv. 30, 31) with what he said at Mile- of responsible duties. He becomes eminently
tus (Acts xx. 22, 23), and with the scene at conspicuous in the circumstances detailed be-
Ptolemais (ib. xxi. 10-14). low, Ch. XVII., and in the end he shares with
4 The arrest at Jerusalem. Timothy the honor of associating his name
6 The two-years' imprisonment at Csesarea, with the pastoral Epistles of St. Paul.
and the shipwreck. 7 See note, p. 459.
6 See p. 404. We have mentioned there, in

CHAPTER XVI.

Description of Ephesus. — Temple of Diana. — Her Image and Worship. — Political Constitu
tion ot Ephesus. — The Asiarchs. — Demetrius and the Silversmiths. — Tumult in the
Theatre. — Speech of the Town-Clerk. — St. Paul's Departure.
THE boundaries of the province of Asia,1 and the position of its chief
city Ephesus,2 have already been placed before the reader. It is
now time that we should give some description of the city itself, with a
notice of its characteristic religious institutions, and its political arrange
ments under the Empire.
No cities were ever more favorably placed for prosperity and growth
than those of the colonial Greeks in Asia Minor. They had the advan
tage of a coast-line full of convenient harbors, and of a sea which was
favorable to the navigation of that day ; and, through the long approaches
formed by the plains of the great western rivers, they had access to the
inland trade of the East. Two of these rivers have been more than once
alluded to, — the Hermus and the Maeander.3 The valley of the first
was bounded on the south by the ridge of Tmolus ; that of the second
was bounded on the north by Messogis. In the interval between these
two mountain-ranges was the shorter course of the river Cayster.4 A few
miles from the sea a narrow gorge is formed by Mount Pactyas on the
south, which is the western termination of Messogis, and by the preci
pices of Gallesus on the north, the pine-clad summits 5 of which are more
remotely connected with the heights of Tmolus. This gorge separates
the Upper " Caystrian meadows " 6 from a small alluvial plain1 by the
1 p. 205. 2 p. 410. Steep succeeded steep, as we advanced, and
8 See above, pp. 405, 410. 4 See p. 410. the path became more narrow, slippery, and
6 " Our road lay at the foot of Gallesus, uneven ... the known sureness of foot of
beneath precipices of » stupendous height, our horses being our confidence and security
abrupt and inaccessible. In the rock are by fearful precipices and giddy heights." — p.
many holes inhabited by eagles; of which 103. For the Cayster and the site of Ephesus,
several were soaring high in the air, with see p. 107. The approach from Sardis, by
crows clamoring about them, so far above us which St. Paul is supposed to have come (see
as hardly to be discernible." — Chandler, p. above, p. 405 J, was on this side: and part of
111. Of another journey he says : " We rode the pavement of the road still remains.
among the roots of Gallesus, or the Aleman, 6 For the " Asian meadow," see above, p.
through pleasant thickets abounding with gold- 205.
finches. The aerial summits of this immense 7 The plain is said by Mr. Arundell to be
mountain towered above us, clad with pines. about five miles long ; and the morass has
461

462 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap. xvi.
sea. Partly on the long ridge of Coressus, which is the southern boun
dary of this plain, — partly on the detached circular eminence of Mount
Prion, — and partly on the plain itself, near the windings of the Cayster,
and about the edge of the harbor, — were the buildings of the city.
Ephesus was not so distinguished in early times as several of her Ionian
sisters ; 1 and some of them outlived her glory. But, though Phocaea
and Miletus sent out more colonies, and Smyrna has ever remained a
flourishing city, yet Ephesus had great natural advantages, which were
duly developed in the age of which we are writing. Having easy access
through the defiles of Mount Tmolus to Sardis, and thence up the valley
of the Hermus far into Phrygia,2 — and again, by a similar pass through
Messogis to the Mseander, being connected with the great road through
Iconium to the Euphrates,3 — it became the metropolis of the province of
Asia under the Romans, and the chief emporium of trade on the nearer
side of Taurus. The city built by Androclus and his Athenian followers
was on the slope of Coressus ; but gradually it descended into the plain,
in the direction of the Temple of Diana. The Alexandrian age produced
a marked alteration in Ephesus, as in most of the great towns in the
East ; and Lysimachus extended his new city over the summit of Prion
as well as the heights of Coressus. The Roman age saw, doubtless, a
still further increase both of the size and magnificence of the place. To
attempt to reconstruct it from the materials which remain would be
a difficult task,4 — far more difficult than in the case of Athens, or even
Antioch ; but some of the more interesting sites are easily identified.
Those who walk over the desolate site of the Asiatic metropolis see piles
of ruined edifices on the rocky sides and among the thickets of Mount
Prion : 5 they look out from its summit over the confused morass which
once was the harbor,6 where Aquila and Priscilla landed ; and they visit
advanced considerably into the sea since the Though St. Paul may never have seen them,
flourishing times of Ephesus. they are interesting as connected with Epa-
1 The Ephesian Diana, however, was the phras and his other converts.
patroness of the Phocean navigators, even * A plan of the entire city, with a descrip-
when the city of Ephesus was unimportant. tive memoir, has been prepared by E. Falkener,
2 In this direction we imagine St. Paul to Esq., architect, but remains unpublished.
have travelled. See above, p. 405. 6 Hamilton's Researches in Asia Minor, p.
3 We have frequently had occasion to men- 23. Compare Chandler.
tion this great road. See pp. 231-234, 405. 6 " Even the sea has retired, from the scene
It was the principal line of communication of desolation, and a pestilential morass, cov-
with the eastern provinces ; but we have con- ered with mud and rushes, has succeeded to
jectured that St. Paul did not travel by it, the waters which brought up the ships laden
because it seems probable that he never was with merchandise from every country."— Arun-
at Colossa?. See p. 405. A description of the dell's Seven Churches, p. 27. Another occa-
route by Colossa? and Laodicea will be found sion will occur for mentioning the harbor,
in Arundell's Asia Minor. The view he gives which was very indifferent. Some attempt"
of the cliffs of Colossse should be noticed. to improve it were made about this time

CHAP. XVI.

EPHESUS.

463

in its deep recesses the dripping marble-quarries, where the marks of the
tools are visible still.1 On the outer edge of the same hill they trace the_
enclosure of the Stadium,2 which may have suggested to St. Paul many
of those images with which he enforces Christian duty, in the first letter
written from Ephesus to Corinth.3 Farther on, and nearer Coressus, the
remains of the vast Theatre 4 (the outline of the enclosure is still dis
tinct, though the marble seats are removed) show the place where the
multitude, roused by Demetrius, shouted out, for two hours, in honor of
Diana.5 Below is the Agora,6 through which the mob rushed up to the
well-known place of meeting. And in the valley between Prion and
Coressus is one of the Gymnasia,7 where the athletes were trained for
transient honors and a perishable garland. Surrounding and crowning
the scene are the long Hellenic walls of Lysimachus, following the ridge
of Coressus.8 On a spur of the hill, they descend to an ancient tower,
which is still called the Prison of St. Paul.9 The name is doubtless
legendary : but St. Paul may have stood here, and looked over the city
and the plain, and seen the Cayster winding towards him from the base
of Gallesus.10 Within his view was another eminence, detached from the

1 Chandler. A curious story is told of the
discovery of this marble. A shepherd named
Pixodorus was feeding his flock on the hill :
two of his rams fighting, one of them missed
his antagonist, and with his horn broke a
crust of the whitest marble. The Ephesians
were at this time in search of stone for the
building of their temple. The shepherd ran
to his fellow-citizens with the specimen, and
was received with joy. His name was changed
into Evangelus (giver of glad-tidings), and
divine honors were afterwards paid to him.
2 See Chandler, who measured the area,
and found it 687 feet in length. The side
next the plain is raised on vaults, and faced
with a strong wall.
8 1 Cor. ix. 24-27.
4 " Of the site of the theatre, the scene of
the tumult raised by Demetrius, there can be
no doubt, its ruins being a wreck of immense
grandeur. I think it must have been larger
than the one at Miletus, and that exceeds any
I have elsewhere seen in scale, although not in
ornament. Its form alone can now be spoken
of, for every seat is removed, and the prosce
nium is a hill of ruins." — Fel'.ows's Asia
Minor, p. 274. The Theatre of Ephesus is
said to be the largest known of any that have
remained to us from antiquity.
6 Acts xix. The second edition contains a

view (from Laborde), combining the steps of
the theatre with a general prospect towards the
sea. See also the art. Ephesus in the Diet, of
the Bible.
6 The Agora, with its public buildings,
would naturally be between the hill-side on
which the theatre and stadium stood, and the
harbor. For the general notion of a Greek
Agora, see the description of Athens.
i See an engraving of these ruins in the
second volume of Ionian Antiquities, published
by the Dilettanti Society.
8 " An interesting feature in these ruins is
the Hellenic wall of Lysimachus, ranging
along the heights of Coressus. It extends for
nearly a, mile and three-quarters, in a S. E.
and N. W. direction, from the heights imme
diately to the S. of the gymnasium to the
tower called the Prison of St. Paul, but which
is in fact one of the towers of the ancient wall.
... It is defended and strengthened by nu
merous square towers of the same character at
unequal distances." — Hamilton's Researclies,
vol. ii. p. 26. An engraving of one of the
gateways is given, p. 27.
9 Hamilton, as above.
io » This eminence (a root of Coressus run
ning out towards the plain) commands a lovely
prospect of the river Cayster, which there
crosses the plain from near Gallesus, with a

464 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap, xvl
city of that day, but which became the Mohammedan town when ancient
Ephesus was destroyed, and nevertheless preserves in its name a record
of another Apostle, the " disciple " St. John.1
But one building at Ephesus surpassed all the rest in magnificence and
in fame. This was the Temple of Artemis or Diana, which glittered in
brilliant beauty at the head of the harbor, and was reckoned by the an
cients as one of the wonders of the world. The sun, it was said, saw
nothing in his course more magnificent than Diana's Temple. Its honor
dated from a remote antiquity. Leaving out of consideration the earliest
temple, which was contemporaneous with the Athenian colony under
Androclus, or even yet more ancient, we find the great edifice, which
was anterior to the Macedonian period, begun and continued in the
midst of the attention and admiration both of Greeks and Asiatics. The
foundations were carefully laid, with immense substructions, in the
marshy ground.2 Architects of the highest distinction were employed.'
The quarries of Mount Prion supplied . the marble.4 All the Greek
cities of Asia contributed to the structure ; and Croesus, the king of
Lydia, himself lent his aid. The work thus begun before the Persian
war was slowly continued even through the Peloponnesian war ; and its
dedication was celebrated by a poet contemporary with Euripides.5 But
the building, which had been thus rising through the space of many
years, was not destined to remain long in the beauty of its perfection.
The fanatic Herostratus set fire to it on the same night in which Alex
ander was born. This is one of the coincidences of history, on which
the ancient world was fond of dwelling : and it enables us, with more
distinctness, to pursue the annals of " Diana of the Ephesians." The
temple was rebuilt with new and more sumptuous magnificence. The
ladies of Ephesus contributed their jewelry to the expense of the resto
ration. The national pride in the sanctuary was so great, that, when
Alexander offered the spoils of his eastern campaign if he might inscribe
his name on the building, the honor was declined. The Ephesians
never ceased to embellish the shrine of their goddess, continually adding
new decorations and subsidiary buildings, with statues and pictures by
the most famous artists. This was the temple that kindled the enthusi
asm of St. Paul's opponents (Acts xix.), and was still the rallying-point
small but full stream, and with many luxnri- 8 The first architect was Theodorus of
ant meanders." — Chandler. Samos. He was succeeded by Chersiphon of
1 Ayasaluk, which is a round hill like Gnossus, then by his son Metagenes. The
Prion, but smaller. Its name is said to be a building was completed by Demetrius and
corruption of b aymc QeoXoyog, " the holy Pseonius.
Theologian." Sup. 89. * See above.
2 Pliny says that it was built in marshy 5 Timotheus.
ground, lest it should be injured by earth
quakes.

chap. xvi. TEMPLE OF DIANA. 465
of Heathenism in the days of St. John and Polycarp. In the second
century we read that it was united to the city by a long colonnade. But
soon afterwards it was plundered and laid waste by the Goths, who came
from beyond the Danube in the reign of Gallienus.1 It sank entirely
into decay in the age when Christianity was overspreading the Empire ;
and its remains are to be sought for in mediaeval buildings, in the col
umns of green jasper which support the dome of St. Sophia, or even in
the naves of Italian cathedrals.2
Thus the Temple of Diana of Ephesus saw all the changes of Asia
Minor, from Croesus to Constantine. Though nothing now remains on the
spot to show us what or even where it was, there is enough in its written
memorials to give us some notion of its appearance and splendor. The
reader will bear in mind the characteristic style which was assumed by
Greek architecture, and which has suggested many of the images of the
New Testament.3 It was quite different from the lofty and ascending
form of those buildings which have since arisen in all parts of Christian
Europe, and essentially consisted in horizontal entablatures resting on
vertical columns. In another respect, also, the temples of the ancients
may be contrasted with our churches and cathedrals. They were not
roofed over for the reception of a large company of worshippers, but
were in fact colonnades 4 erected as subsidiary decorations round the cell
which contained the idol, and were, through a great part of their space,
open to the sky. The colonnades of the Ephesian Diana really consti
tuted an epoch in the history of Art, for in them was first matured that
graceful Ionic style, the feminine beauty of which was more suited to the
genius of the Asiatic Greek, than the sterner and plainer Doric, in
which the Parthenon and Propylaea of Athens were built. The scale on
which the Temple was erected was magnificently extensive. It was 425
feet in length and 220 in breadth, and the columns were 60 feet high.
The number of columns was 127, each of them the gift of a king ; and
36 of them were enriched with ornament and color. The folding-doors
were of cyprus-wood ; the part which was not open to the sky was roofed
over with cedar ; and the staircase was formed of the wood of one single
vine from the island of Cyprus. The value and fame of the Temple
were enhanced by its being the treasury where a large portion of the
wealth of Western Asia was stored up.5 It is probable that there was no
» Arundell's Seven Churches, p. 46. court of St. Ambrogio at Milan, which is a
3 Ibid. p. 47. colonnade west of the Church, itself enclosing
8 See, for instance, Gal. ii. 9, Rev. iii. 12, a large oblong space not roofed over.
also 1 Tim. iii. 15; comparing what has been 6 A German writer says that the temple of
¦aid above p, 195. 'be Ephesian Diana was what the Bank of
* A friend suggests one parallel in Chris- England is in the modern world.
«ian architecture, viz. the Atrium, or western
80

466 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap, xvi
religious building in the world in which was concentrated a greater
amount of admiration, enthusiasm, and superstition.
If the Temple of Diana at Ephesus was magnificent, the image enshrined
within the sumptuous enclosure was primitive and rude. We usually con
ceive of this goddess, when represented in art, as the tall huntress, eager
in pursuit, like the statue in the Louvre. Such was not the form of the
Ephesian Diana, though she was identified by the Greeks with their own
mountain-goddess, whose figure we often see represented on the coins of
this city.1 What amount of fusion took place, in the case of this worship,
between Greek and Oriental notions, we need not inquire. The image
may have been intended to represent Diana in one of her customary
characters, as the deity of fountains ; 2 but it reminds us rather of the
idols of the far East, and of the religions which love to represent the
life of all animated beings as fed and supported by the many breasts of
nature.3 The figure which assumed this emblematic form above was
terminated below in a shapeless block. The material was wood. A bar
of metal was in each hand. The dress was covered with mystic devices,
and the small shrine, where it stood within the temple, was concealed by
a cu rtain in front. Yet, rude as the image was, it was the object of the
utmost veneration. Like the Palladium of Troy — like the most ancienl
Minerva of the Athenian Acropolis,4 — like the Paphian Venus5 or
Cybele of Pessinus,6 to which allusion has been made, — like the Ceres
in Sicily mentioned by Cicero,7 — it was believed to have "fallen down
from the sky" (Acts xix. 35). Thus it was the object of the greater
veneration from the contrast of its primitive simplicity with the mod
ern and earthly splendor which surrounded it ; and it was the model
on which the images of Diana were formed for worship in other
cities. One of the idolatrous customs of the ancient world was the use of
portable images or shrines, which were little models of the more cele
brated objects of devotion. They were carried in processions, on journeys
1 Hence she is frequently represented as coin at the end of Ch. XIV. gives a general
the Greek Diana on coins of Ephesus. Some notion of the form of the image.
of these are given in the larger editions. 4 See above in the description of Athens,
2 This is the opinion of Guhl, whose elab- p. 309.
orate work on ancient Ephesus is referred to 6 See the description of Paphos above, p.
several times in the larger editions. 140.
3 The form of the image is described by * See Herodian, as referred to above, p.
Jerome : " Scribebat Paulus ad Ephesios Dia- 235.
nam colentes, non hanc venatricem, quae 7 Cic. in Verr. v. 187. To this list we may
arcum tenet atque succincta est, sed illam add, without any misrepresentation, the house
nmltimammiam, quam Grseci ¦Kokvpaarrrv vo- of our Lady of Loretto. See the Quarterly
cant."— Procem. ad Eph. Representations in Review for September, 1853, and the Chris
ancient sculpture are very frequent. The tian Remembrancer for April, 1855.

.wap. xvi. WORSHIP OF DIANA. 467
and military expeditions,1 and sometimes set up as household gods in
private dwellings. Pliny says that this was the case with the Temple of
the Cnidian Venus ; and other Heathen writers make allusion to the
" shrines " of the Ephesian Diana, which are mentioned in the Acts (xix.
24). The material might be wood, or gold, or " silver." The latter
material was that which employed the hands of the workmen of Demetrius.
From the expressions used by St. Luke, it is evident that an extensive and
lucrative trade grew up at Ephesus, from the manufacture and sale of
these shrines. Few of those who came to Ephesus would willingly go away
without a memorial of the goddess, and a model of her temple ; 2 and,
from the wide circulation of these works of art over the shores of the
Mediterranean, and far into the interior, it might be said, with little
exaggeration, that her worship was recognized by the " whole world"3
(Acts xix. 27).
The ceremonies of the actual worship at Ephesus were conducted by
the members of a twofold hierarchy. And here again we see the traces
of Oriental rather than Greek influences. The Megabyzi, the priests
of Diana, were eunuchs from the interior, under one at their head, who
bore the title of high priest, and ranked among the leading and most
influential personages of the city. Along with these priests were asso
ciated a swarm of virgin priestesses, consecrated, under the name of
Melissae, to the service 4 of the deity, and divided into three classes, and
serving, like the priests, under one head. And with the priests and
priestesses would be associated (as in all the great temples of antiquity)
a great number of slaves, who attended to the various duties connected
with the worship, down to the care of sweeping and cleaning the Temple.
This last phrase leads us to notice an expression used in the Acts of the
Apostles, concerning the connection of Ephesus with the Temple of
Diana. The term " Neocoros," or " Temple-sweeper " (vewxoqos, xix. 35),
originally an expression of humility, and applied to the lowest menials
engaged in the care of the sacred edifice,5 became afterwards a title of
the highest honor, and was eagerly appropriated by the most famous
1 We may compare Cicero's words of the Inscriptions might be quoted to the same
Roman legionary eagle, Cat. i. 9. effect.
2 We cannot be sure, in this case, whether * These priestesses belonged to the class of
by the word used here is meant the whole " sacred slaves." This class of devotees was
temple, or the small shrine which contained common in the great temples of the Greeks.
the image. Perhaps its form is that repre- Different opinions have been expressed on the
sented on the first coin engraved in Mr. Aker- character of those at Ephesus : but, knowing
man's paper in the Numismatic Chronicle. what we do of Heathenism, it is difficult to
8 We find the image of the Ephesian have a favorable view of them.
Diana on the coins of a great number of 6 The term properly denotes " sweeper of
other cities and communities, e.g. Hierapo- the temple," and is nearly synonymous with the
lis Mytilene, Perga, Samos, Marseilles, &c. Latin " asdituus," or the French " s&nristan."

468 THE LIFE AND ,EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap, xvi,
cities.1 This was the case with Ephesus in reference to her national
goddess. The city was personified as Diana's devotee. The title "Neo
coros " was boastfully exhibited on the current coins.2 Even the free
people of Ephesus were sometimes named " Neocoros." 3 Thus, the town-
clerk could with good reason begin his speech by the question, — " What
man is there that knows not that the city of the Ephesians is neocoros
of the great goddess Diana, and of the image which came down from
heaven ? "
The Temple and the Temple-services remained under the Romans as
they had been since the period of Alexander. If any change had taken
place, greater honor was paid to the goddess, and richer magnificence
added to her sanctuary, in proportion to the wider extent to which her
fame had been spread. Asia was always a favored province,4 and Ephe
sus must be classed among those cities of the Greeks, to which the
conquerors were willing to pay distinguished respect.8 Her liberties and
her municipal constitution were left untouched, when the province was
governed by an officer from Rome. To the general remarks which have
been made before in reference to Thessalonica,6 concerning the position
of free or autonomous cities under the Empire, something more may be
added here, inasmuch as certain political characters of Ephesus appear
on the scene which is described in the sacred narrative.
We have said, in the passage above alluded to, that free cities under
the Empire had frequently their senate and assembly. There is abun
dant proof that this was the case at Ephesus. Its old constitution was
democratic, as we should expect in a city of the Ionians, and as we are
distinctly told by Xenophon : and this constitution continued to subsist
under the Romans. The senate, of which Josephus speaks,7 still met in
the Senate-house, which is noticed by another writer,8 and the position of
which was probably in the Agora below the Theatre.9 We have still

1 Primarily the term was applicable to per- which is mentioned below, p. 471, n. 2. There
sons, but afterwards it was applied to communi- the Town-Clerk is called Munatius, and he is
ties, and more especially in the Roman period. also Asiarch. It is worth while to observe
A city might be Neocoros with respect to several that these are all Roman names.
divinities, and frequently the title had regard * The circumstances under which this prov-
to the defiled emperor. ince came under the Roman power were such
2 See, for instance, that engraved at the as to provoke no hostility. See pp. 206, 207.
end of this chapter. A great number of these 6 See p. 288.
coins are described in Mr. Akerman's paper, 6 See pp. 288-291, and compare p. 253.
in the Num. Chr. 1 Ant. xiv. 10, 12, also 2, 5, and xvi. 6,
3 On the opposite page an inscription is 4, 7.
given containing the words Neocoros, Proconsul, 8 Ach. Tat. viii.
and Town-Clerk. The Proconsul is Peducius 9 See the allusion to the Agora above, p.
Priscinus, the Town-Clerk is Tiberius Clau- 463.
¦lins Italicus. The other inscription is that

M. I. AYP. AIONYZION TON lEPOKHPYKA
KAI B A5IAPXON EK TSIN IAII1N T <t>A
MOYNATIOZ <MAOZEBAZTOZ O TPAM-
MATEYZ KAI AZIAPXHZAI.
H <J>IAOZEBAZTOZ E4>EZII1N BOYAH KAI
O NEflKOPOZ AHMOZ KAOIEPflZAN En I
ANQYnATOY riEAOYKAlOY IIPEIZKEINOY
M*H«J>IZAMENOY TIB. KA. ITAAIKOY TOY
TPAMMATEni TOY AHMOY.
Inscriptions from Ephesus.

chap. xvi. GOVERNMENT OF EPHESUS. 469
more frequent notices of the demus or people, and its assembly.1 Where-
ever its tjustomary place of meeting might be when legally and regularly
convoked (Iwojiog txxhjota, Acts xix. 39) , the theatre 2 would be an obvious
place of meeting, in the case of a tumultuary gathering, like that which
will presently be brought before our notice.
Again, like other free cities, Ephesus had its magistrates, as Thessa
lonica had its politarchs (pp. 289 and 290), and Athens its archons.
Among those which our sources of information bring before us are
several with the same titles and functions as in Athens.3 One of these
was that officer who is described as " town-clerk " in the authorized
version of the Bible (yqafiuanvg, Acts xix. 35). Without being able to
determine his exact duties, or to decide whether another term, such as
" Chancellor," or " Recorder," would better describe them to us,4 we may
assert, from the parallel case of Athens,5 and from the Ephesian records
themselves, that he was a magistrate of great authority, in a high and
very public position. He had to do with state-papers ; he was keeper of
the archives ; he read what was of public moment before the senate and
assembly ; he was present when money was deposited in the Temple :
and when letters were sent to the people of Ephesus, they were officially
addressed to him. Thus, we can readily account for his name appearing
so often on the coins 6 of Ephesus. He seems sometimes to have given
the name to the year, like the archons at Athens, or the consuls at Rome.
Hence no magistrate was more before the public at Ephesus. His very
aspect was familiar to all the citizens ; and no one was so likely to be
able to calm and disperse an angry and excited multitude. (See Acts
xix. 35-41.)
If we turn now from the city to the province of which it was the
metropolis, we are under no perplexity as to its relation to the imperial
government. From coins and from inscriptions,7 from secular writers
and Scripture itself (Acts xix. 38), we learn that Asia was & proconsular
province.8 We shall not stay to consider the question which has been
raised concerning the usage of the plural in this passage of the Acts '; for
1 In Josephus xiv., xvi. (as above), the sen- * In Luther's Bible the term " Canzler" is
ate and assembly are combined. We find nsed.
Sriuoc in inscriptions, and on coins, also 6 There were several ypapuareic at Athens
htiKknaia. The senate is sometimes povTiii, Some of them were state-officers of high im
sometimes yepovaia. portance.
2 For illustrations of the habit of Greek 6 The first coin described in Mr. Akermau'a
assemblies to meet in theatres, we may refer to paper exhibits to us the same man as upxiep. if
what Tacitus sayB of Vespasian at Antioch, and ypa/tuareic.
Hist. ii. 80 ; also to Joseph. Wars, vii. 3. 7 See, for instance, the coin p. 477, and the
8 For instance, besides the archons, strategi, inscription opposite.
gymnasiarchs, &c. 8 See a previous account of this province.

470 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap. xvj.
it is not necessarily implied that more than one proconsul was in Ephesus
at the time.1 But another subject connected with the provincial arrange
ments requires a few words of explanation. The Roman citizens in a
province were, in all legal matters, under the jurisdiction of the procon
sul ; and for the convenient administration of justice, the whole country
was divided into districts, each of which had its own assize town (forum
or conventus).2 The proconsul, at stated seasons, made a circuit through
these districts, attended by his interpreter (for all legal business in the
Empire was conducted in Latin) ,3 and those who had subjects of litigation,
or other cases requiring the observance of legal forms, brought them
before him or the judges whom he might appoint. Thus Pliny, after the
true Roman spirit, in his geographical description of the Empire, is
always in the habit of mentioning the assize-towns, and the extent of the
shires which surrounded them. In the province of Asia he takes especial
notice of Sardis, Smyrna, and Ephesus, and enumerates the various
towns which brought their causes to be tried at these cities. The official
visit of the proconsul to Ephesus was necessarily among the most impor
tant ; and the town-clerk, in referring to the presence of the proconsuls,
could remind his fellow-citizens in the same breath that it was the very
time of the assizes (uyoQaloi ayovxai, Acts xix. 38) .4
We have no information as to the time of the year 5 at which the
Ephesian assizes were held. If the meeting took place in spring, they
might then be coincident with the great gathering which took place at
the celebration of the national games. It seems that the ancient festival
of the United Ionians had merged into that which was held in honor of
the Ephesian Diana.6 The whole month of May was consecrated to the
1 "There are deputies (proconsuls)." It is assume that the assizes were taking place at
enough to suppose that we have here simply this particular time. See the note of Canon
the generic plural, as in Matt. ii. 20. In the Wordsworth, who gives the substance of the
Syriac version the word is in the singular. whole passage thus : " Assize-days or court-
Some suppose that this was the time when the days come round, and Proconsuls attend, be-
proc»nsulship was (so to speak) in commission fore whom the cause may be tried." The
under Celer and jElius, as mentioned by Taci- phrase ayopaiovg [ripepac] ayeiv is equivalent to
tus (Ann. xiii. 1). A more probable conjee- Caesar'3 conventus agere. and Cicero's forum
th.-e is that some of the governors of the agere. We find the same Greek phrase in Strabo.
neighboring provinces, such as Achaia, Cilicia, 6 We find Caesar in Gaul holding the con-
Cyprus, Bithynia, Pamphylia, might be pres- ventus in winter ; but this was probably be-
ent at the public games. The governors of cause he was occupied with military proceed-
neighboring provinces were in frequent com- ings in the summer, and need not be regarded
munication with each other. See p. 423. as a precedent for other provinces.
2 Conventus was used both for the assize- 6 What the festival of Delos was for the
town and the district to which its jurisdiction islands, the Panionian festival was for the
extended. It was also used to denote the mainland. But Ephesus seems ultimately to
actual meeting for the assizes. have absorbed and concentrated this celebra-
8 See pp. 404 and 423. tion. These games were called Artemisia,
* We are not, however, absolutely forced to Ephesia, and CEcumenica.

chap. xvi. THE ASIAKCHS. 471
glory of the goddess ; and the month itself received from her the name
of Artemision. The Artemisian festival was not simply an Ephesian
ceremony, but was fostered by the sympathy and enthusiasm of all the
surrounding neighborhood. As the Temple of Diana was called " the
Temple of Asia," so this gathering was called "the common meeting of
Asia." J Prom the towns on the coast and in the interior, the Ionians
came up with their wives and children to witness the gymnastic and
musical contests, and to enjoy the various amusements, which made the
days and nights of May one long scene of revelry. To preside over these
games, to provide the necessary expenses, and to see that due order was
maintained, annual officers were appointed by election from the whole
province. About the time of the vernal equinox, each of the principal
towns within the district called Asia chose one of its wealthiest citizens,
and, from the whole number thus returned, ten were finally selected to
discharge the duty of Asiarchs.2 We find similar titles in use in the
neighboring provinces, and read, in books or on inscriptions and coins,
of Bithyniarchs, Galatarchs, Lyciarchs, and Syriarchs. But the games
of Asia and Ephesus were pre-eminently famous ; and those who held
there the office of " Presidents of the Games " were men of high distinc
tion and extensive influence. Receiving no emolument from their office,
but being required rather to expend large sums for the amusement of
the people and their own credit,3 they were necessarily persons of wealth.
Men of consular rank were often willing to receive the appointment, and
it was held to enhance the honor of any other magistracies with which
they might be invested. They held for the time a kind of sacerdotal
position ; and when, robed in mantles of purple and crowned with gar
lands, they assumed the duty of regulating the great gymnastic contests,
and controlling the tumultuary crowd in the theatre, they might literally
be called the " Chief of Asia " (Acts xix. 31).
These notices of the topography and history of Ephesus, of its religious
institutions, and political condition under the Empire, may serve to clear
the way for the narrative which we must now pursue. We resume the his-

1 We find this expressed on coins. In in- in previous years and retained the title, like
scriptions the temple appears as " the temple the High Priest at Jerusalem. Among the
of Asia." Ephesian inscriptions one is given opposite
2 'Aaiapxat, Acts xix., translated "Chief p. 469, containing the words Asiarch and Town
of Asia " in the A. V. From what is said in Clerk. " Twice Asiarch " appears on a coin of
Eusebius (H. E. iv. 15) of one Asiarch pre- Hypressa, represented in Ak. Num. III. p. 51.
sidin°- at the martyrdom of Polycarp, it has s Compare the case of those who dis
been needlessly supposed that in this passage charged the state-services or liturgies at Athens
of the Acts we are to consider all but one to Such was often the position of the Roman
have been assessors of the chief Asiarch, or sediles : and the same may He said of the county
el«p. those to be meant who had held the office sheriffs in England.

472 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap. xvr.
tory at the twenty-second verse of the nineteenth chapter of the Acts, where
we are told of a continued stay ! in Asia after the burning of the books of
the magicians.2 St. Paul was indeed looking forward to a journey
through Macedonia and Achaia, and ultimately to Jerusalem and Rome
(v. 21) ; and in anticipation of his departure he had sent two of his com
panions into Macedonia before him (v. 22). The events which had pre
viously occurred have already shown us the great effects which his
preaching had produced both among the Jews and Gentiles.3 And those
which follow show us still more clearly how wide a " door " 4 had been
thrown open to the progress of the gospel. The idolatrous practices of
Ephesus were so far endangered, that the interests of one of the preva
lent trades of the place were seriously affected ; and meanwhile St.
Paul's character had risen so high, as to obtain influence over some of
the wealthiest and most powerful personages in the province. The scene
which follows is entirely connected with the religious observances of the
city of Diana. The Jews5 fall into the background. Both the danger
and safety of the Apostle originate with the Gentiles.
It seems to have been the season of spring when the occurrences took
place which are related by St. Luke at the close of the nineteenth chap
ter.6 We have already seen that he purposed to stay at Ephesus " till
Pentecost ; " 7 and it has been stated that May Was the " month of Diana,"
in which the great religious gathering took place to celebrate the games.8
If this also was the season of the provincial assize (which, as we have
seen, is by no means improbable) , the city would be crowded with various
classes of people. Doubtless those who employed themselves in making
the portable shrines of Diana expected to drive a brisk trade at such a
time ; and when they found that the sale of these objects of superstition
was seriously diminished, and that the preaching of St. Paul was the
cause of their merchandise being depreciated, " no small tumult arose
concerning that way " in which the new teacher was leading his disciples
(v. 23). A certain Demetrius, a master-manufacturer in the craft, sum
moned together his workmen, along with other artisans who were occu
pied in trades of the same kind — (among whom we may perhaps reckon
" Alexander the coppersmith " (2 Tim. iv. 14), against whom the Apostle
warned Timothy at a later period), — and addressed to them an inflam
matory speech. It is evident that St. Paul, though he had made no open
1 " He himself staid in Asia for a sea- dress at Miletus (xx. 19), St. Paul speaku
•on." especially of the temptations which befell him
2 Related above, Acts xix. 18-20. by the " lying-in-wait of the Jews."
8 See Ch. XIV. * 1 Cor. xvi. 9. « vv. 21-41.
6 Yet it seems that the Jews never ceased 7 See the end of the preceding chapter
from their secret machinations. In the ad- 8 See above.

chap. xvi. DEMETRIUS AND THE SILVERSMITHS. 473
and calumnious attack on the divinities of the place, as was admitted
below (j. 37), had said something like what he had said at Athens, that
we ought not to suppose that the deity is " like gold or silver carved with
the art and device of man " (Acts xvii. 29), and that " they are no gods
that are made with hands " (v. 26). Such expressions, added to the fail
ure in the profits of those who were listening, gave sufficient materials for
an adroit and persuasive speech. Demetrius appealed first to the interest
of his hearers,1 and then to their fanaticism.2 He told them that their
gains were in danger of being lost — and, besides this, that " the temple
of the great goddess Diana " (to which we can imagine him pointing as
he spoke) 3 was in danger of being despised, and that the honor of their
national divinity was in jeopardy, whom not only " all Asia," * but " all
the civilized world," 5 had hitherto held in the highest veneration. Such
a speech could not be lost, when thrown like fire on such inflammable
materials. The infuriated feeling of the crowd of assembled artisans
broke out at once into a cry in honor of the divine patron of their city
and their craft, — " Great is Diana of the Ephesians." 6
The excitement among this important and influential class of opera
tives was not long in spreading through the whole city.7 The infection
seized upon the crowds of citizens and strangers ; and a general rush was
made to the theatre, the most obvious place of assembly.8 On their way,
they seem to have been foiled in the attempt to lay hold of the person of
Paul,9 though they hurried with them into the theatre two of the
companions of his travels, Caius and Aristarchus, whose home was in
Macedonia.10 A sense of the danger of his companions, and a fearless
zeal for the truth, urged St. Paul, so soon as this intelligence reached
him, to hasten to the theatre and present himself before the people ; but
1 See w. 25, 26. 7 v. 29.
2 gee v- 27. 8 See aDove, p. 463.
8 See what is said above on the position of 9 Something of the same kind seems to
the Temple. It would probably be visible have happened as at Thessalonica (Acts xvii.
from the neighborhood of the Agora, where 5, 6), when the Jews sought in vain for Paul
we may suppose Demetrius to have harangned and Silas in the house of Jason, and therefore
the workmen dragged the host and some of the other Chris-
4 v. 27. Compare w. 10 and 26; also 1 tians before the magistrates. Perhaps the
Cor xvi 19 Seep. 413- house of Aquila and Priscilla may have been
6 " The world," v. 27. Compare the town- a Christian home to the Apostle at Ephesus,
clerk's words below, v. 35. lite Jason's house at Thessalonica. See Acts
• In an inscription which contains the words xviii. 18, 26, with 1 Cor. xvi. 19 ; and com-
ypauuarevc and aveimaroc, we find special men- pare Rom. xvi. 3, 4, where they are said to
tion of " the great goddess Diana before the city," have " laid down their necks " for St. Paul's
life.

and extracts might be given from ancient
authors to the same effect. In illustration of
this latter phrase, compare what has been said
of the I.ystrian Jupiter, p. 168. above of these companions of St. Paul p. 404

authors to the same effect. In illustration of 10 The Greek word is the same in Acts xix.
this latter phrase, compare what has been said 29, and 2 Cor. viii. 19. See what is said

474 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. coax. in.
the Christian disciples used all their efforts to restrain him. Perhaps
their anxious solicitude might have been unavailing l on this occasion, as
it was on one occasion afterwards,2 had not other influential friends in
terposed to preserve his safety. And now was seen the advantage which
is secured to a righteous cause by the upright character and unflinching
zeal of its leading champion. Some of the Asiarchs,3 whether converted
to Christianity or not, had a friendly feeling towards the Apostle ; and
well knowing the passions of an Ephesian mob when excited at one of
the festivals of Asia, they sent an urgent message to him to prevent him
from venturing into the scene of disorder and danger.4 Thus he reluc
tantly consented to remain in privacy, while the mob crowded violently
into the theatre, filling the stone seats, tier above tier, and rending the
air with their confused and fanatical cries.8
It was indeed a scene of confusion ; and never perhaps was the char
acter of a mob more simply and graphically expressed, than when it is
said, that " the majority knew not why they were come together" (v. 32).
At length an attempt was made to bring the expression of some articulate
words before the assembly. This attempt came from the Jews, who seem
to have been afraid lest they should be implicated in the odium which
had fallen on the Christians. By no means unwilling to injure the Apos
tle's cause, they were yet anxious to clear themselves, and therefore they
" put Alexander forward " to make an apologetic speech 6 to the multi
tude. If this man was really, as we have suggested, " Alexander the
coppersmith," he might naturally be expected to have influence with
1 The imperfect (v. 30) Simply expresses 6 " Some cried one thing and some an-
the attempt. 2 See Acts xxi. 13. other," v. 32. An allusion has been made
8 For the office of the Asiarchs, see above, (p. 118) to the peculiar form of Greek theatres,
p. 471. in the account of Herod's death at Caesarea.
4 v. 31. The danger in which St. Paul From the elevated position of the theatre at
was really placed, as well as other points in Ephesus, we may imagine that many of the
the sacred narrative, is illustrated by the ac- seats must have commanded an extensive view
count of Polycarp's martyrdom. "The pro- of the city and the plain, including the Tem-
consul, observing Polycarp filled with confi- pie of Diana.
dence and joy, and his countenance brightened 6 Our view of the purpose for which Alex-
with grace, was astonished, and sent the her- ander was put forward will depend upon
aid to proclaim, in the middle of the stadium, whether we consider him to have been a Jew,
"Polycarp confesses that he is a Christian. or a Christian, or a renegade from Christianity.
When this was declared by the herald, all the It is most natural to suppose that he was a
multitude, Gentiles and Jews, dwelling at Jew, that the Jews were alarmed by the tu-
Smyrna, cried out, ' This is that teacher of mult, and anxious to clear themselves from
Asia, the father of the Christians, the destroyer blame, and to show they had nothing to da
of our gods ; he that teaches multitudes not to with St. Paul. As a Jew, Alexander would
sacrifice, not to worship.' Saying this, they be recognized as an enemy to idolatry, and
cried out, and asked Philip the Asiarch to let naturally the crowd would not hear him.
a lion loose upon Polycarp." Euseb. H. E.
iv. 15.

-,hap. xvi. SPEECH OF THE TOWN-CLERK. 475
Demetrius and his fellow-craftsmen. But when he stood up and " raised
his hand " : to invite silence, he was recognized immediately by the mul
titude as a Jew. It was no time for making distinctions between Jews
and Christians ; and one simultaneous cry arose from every mouth,
" Great is Diana of the Ephesians ; " and this cry continued for two
hours. The excitement of an angry multitude wears out after a time, and a
period of re-action comes, when they are disposed to listen to words of
counsel and reproof. And, whether we consider the official position of
the " Town-clerk," or the character of the man as indicated by his
speech, we may confidently say that no one in the city was so well suited
to appease this Ephesian mob. The speech is a pattern of candid argu
ment and judicious tact. He first allays the fanatical passions of his
listeners by this simple appeal : 2 "Is it not known everywhere that
this city of the Ephesians is Neocoros of the great goddess Diana and of
the image that came down from the sky?" The contradiction of a few
insignificant strangers could not affect what was notorious in all the
world. Then he bids them remember that Paul and his companions had
not been guilty of approaching or profaning the temple,3 or of outraging
the feelings of the Ephesians by calumnious expressions against the god
dess.4 And then he turns from the general subject to the case of Deme
trius, and points out that the remedy for any injustice was amply
provided by the assizes which were then going on, — or by an appeal to
the proconsul. And reserving the most efficacious argument to the last,
he reminded them that such an uproar exposed the city of Ephesus to
the displeasure of the Romans : for, however great were the liberties
allowed to an ancient and loyal city, it was well known to the whole
population, that a tumultuous meeting which endangered the public
peace would never be tolerated. So, having rapidly brought his argu
ments to a climax, he tranquillized the whole multitude, and pronounced
the technical words which declared the assembly dispersed. (Acts xix.
41.) The stone seats were gradually emptied. The uproar ceased (ib.
xx. 1), and the rioters separated to their various occupations and amuse
ments. Thus God used the eloquence of a Greek magistrate to protect His
servant, as before He had used the right of Roman citizenship (p. 268),
1 The phrase is not quite identical with 3 The rendering in the Authorized Version,
that used of St. Paul (Acts xiii. 16, xxi. 40), "robbers of churches," is unfortunate. Wio
and of St. Peter (Acts xii. 17). See the re- lif has, more correctly, *' sacrilegious."
marks already made on the former passage. * " Blasphemers of your goddess."
2 For the Neocorate of Ephesus and its
notoriety, see above, pp. 467, 468.

476 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap. xvi.
and the calm justice of a Roman governor (p. 365). And, as in the
cases of Philippi and Corinth,1 the narrative of St. Paul's sojourn
at Ephesus concludes with the notice of a deliberate and affectionate
farewell. The danger was now over. With gratitude to that Heavenly
Master who had watched over his life and his works, and with a
recognition of that love of his fellow-Christians, and that favor of the
" Chief of Asia," which had been the instruments of his safety, he
gathered together the disciples (Acts xx. 1), and in one last affectionate
meeting — most probably in the school of Tyrannus — he gave them his
farewell salutations, and commended them to the grace of God, and
parted from them with tears.
This is the last authentic account which we possess, — if we except
the meeting at Miletus (Acts xx.), — of any personal connection of St.
Paul with Ephesus ; for although we think it may be inferred from the
Pastoral Epistles that he visited the metropolis of Asia again at a later
period, yet we know nothing of the circumstances of the visit, and even
its occurrence has been disputed. The other historical associations of
Christianity with this city are connected with a different Apostle and a
later period of the Church. Legend has been busy on this scene of
apostolic preaching and suffering. Without attempting to unravel what
is said concerning others who have lived and died at Ephesus,2 we are
allowed to believe that the robber-haunts 3 in the mountains around have
witnessed some passages in the life of St. John, that he spent the last
year of the first century in this " metropolis of the Asiatic Churches," 4
and that his body rests among the sepulchres of Mount Prion. Here we
may believe that the Gospel and Epistles were written, which teach us
that " love " is greater than " faith and hope " (1 Cor. xiii. 13) ; and
here, — though the " candlestick " is removed, according to the prophetic
word (Rev. ii. 5), — a monument yet survives, in the hill strewn with
the ruins of many centuries,5 of him who was called " John the
1 Acts xvi. 40, xviii. 18. the meaning of the term "Theologian," or
2 It is said that Timothy died at Ephesus, " Divine," as applied to St. John, see Stan-
and was buried, like St. John, on Mount ley's Sermons, p. 271.
Prion. It has been thought better to leave in
reverent silence all that has been traditionally Note. — (See the coin on p. 477.) — From
said concerning the Mother of our blessed Ak. Num. III. p. 55. This coin is peculiarly
Lord. interesting for many reasons. It has a rep-
3 Euseb. H. E. iii. 23, which should be resentation of the temple, and the portrait
compared with 2 Cor. xi. 26. See p. 145. and name of Nero, who was now reigning ;
4 Stanley's Sermons, Sec., on the Apostolic and it exhibits the words vtuitopoc (Acts
Age, p. 250. See the whole sermon, and the xix.) and avBinaTo; (ib.). The name of the
essay which follows it. Proconsul is Aviola. It is far f <om impossible
6 Ayasaluk. See above, p. 464, n. 1. For that he might hold that office while St. Paul

CHAP. xvi.

COIN OF EPHESUS.

477

Theologian," because he emphatically wrote of the " Divinity of our
Lord."

Coin of Ephesus.1

was at Ephesus (t. e. from the autumn of 54
to the spring of 57). We learn from Seneca,
Tacitus, and Suetonius, that a member of the

same family was consul in the year 54, when
Claudius died, and Nero became emperor.
1 See last note of p. 476.

CHAPTER XVU

St. Paul at Troas. — He passes over to Macedonia. — Causes of his Dejection. — He meets
Titus at Philippi. — Writes the Second Epistle to tlie Corinthians. — Collection for the Poor
Christians in Judaea. — Liberality of the Macedonians. — Titus. — Journey by Illyricum to
Greece.
AFTER his mention of the affectionate parting between St. Paul and
the Christians of Ephesus, St. Luke tells us very little of the Apos
tle's proceedings during a period of nine or ten months ; — that is, from
the early summer of the year a. d. 57, to the spring of a. d. 58.1 All
the information which we find in the Acts concerning this period is com
prised in the following words : — " He departed to go into Macedonia, and
when he had gone over those parts, and had given them much exhortation, he
came into Greece, and there abode three months."2 Were it not for the
information supplied by the Epistles, this is all we should have known of
a period which was, intellectually at least, the most active and influential
of St. Paul's career. These letters, however, supply us with many addi
tional incidents belonging to this epoch of his life ; and, what is more
important, they give us a picture drawn by his own hand of his state of
mind during an anxious and critical season ; they bring him before us in
his weakness and in his strength, in his sorrow and in his joy ; they
show the causes of his dejection and the source of his consolation.
In the first place, we thus learn what we should, a priori, have expected,
— that he visited Alexandria Troas on his way from Ephesus to Macedonia.
In all probability he travelled from the one city to the other by sea, as
we know he did 3 on his return in the following year. Indeed, in coun
tries in such a stage of civilization, the safest'and most expeditious route
from one point of the coast to another is generally by water rather than
by land ; 4 for the " perils in the sea," though greater in those times than
1 The date of the year is according to the 8 Except the small space from Troas to
calculations of Wieseler, of which we shall Assos by land, Acts xx. 13, 14.
say more when we come to the period upon * At the same time, it should be remembered
which they are founded. The season at which that this was the most populous part of one of
he left Ephesus is ascertained by St. Paul's the most peaceful provinces, and that one
own words (1 Cor. xvi. 8) compared with Acts of the great roads passed by Smyrna and Per-
xx. 1. The time of his leaving Corinth on gam us between Ephesus and Troas. A de-
liis return appears from Acts xx. 6. scription of the country will be found in Fel-
s Acts xx. 1-3. lows's Asia Minor, ch. i. and ii.
478

chap. xvii. ST. PAUL AT TROAS. 479
in ours, yet did not so frequently impede the voyager as the " perils of
rivers " and " perils of robbers " which beset the traveller by land.
We are not informed who were St. Paul's companions in this journey ;
but as we find that Tychicus and Trophimus (both Ephesians) were with
him at Corinth (Acts xx. 4) during the same apostolic progress, and
returned thence in his company, it seems probable that they accompanied
him at his departure. We find both of them remaining faithful to him
through all the calamities which followed ; both exerting themselves in
his service, and executing his orders to the last ; both mentioned as his
friends and followers, almost with his dying breath.1
In such company, St. Paul came to Alexandria Troas. We have already
described the position and character of this city, whence the Apostle of
the Gentiles had set forth when first he left Asia to fulfil his mission, —
the conversion of Europe. At that time, his visit seems to have been
very short, and no results of it are recorded ; but now he remained for
a considerable time ; he had meant to stay long enough to lay the founda
tion of a Church (see 2 Cor. ii. 12), and would have remained still long
er than he did, had it not been for the non-arrival of Titus, whom he had
sent to Corinth from Ephesus either with or soon after the First Epistle.
The object of his mission 2 was connected with the great collection now
going on for the Hebrew Christians at Jerusalem, but he was also
enjoined to enforce the admonitions of St. Paul upon the Church of Cor
inth, and endeavor to defeat the efforts of their seducers ; and then to
return with a report of their conduct, and especially of the ¦ effect upon
them of the recent Epistle. Titus was desired to come through Macedonia,
and to rejoin St. Paul (probably) at Troas, where the latter had intend
ed to arrive shortly after Pentecost ; but now that he was forced to leave
Ephesus prematurely, he had resolved to wait for Titus at Troas, expect
ing, however, his speedy arrival. In this expectation he was disappointed ;
week after week passed, but Titus came not. The tidings wjiich St. Paul
expected by him were of the deepest interest ; it was to be hoped that he
would bring news of the triumph of good over evil at Corinth : yet it
might be otherwise ; the Corinthians might have forsaken the faith of
their first teacher, and rejected his messenger. While waiting in this
uncertainty, St. Paul appears to have suffered all the sickness of hope
deferred. " My spirit had no rest, because I found not Titus my bro-
1 In the 2d Epistle to Timothy. For Ty- carried another letter to the Corinthians ; ii so,
chicus see Ac's xx. 4 ; Eph. vi. 21 ; Col. iv. it may be referred to in 2 Cor. ii. 3, and 2 Cor.
7 • 2 Tim. iv. 12 : Tit. Hi. 12. For Trophi- viii. 8 ; passages which some have thought too
mus see Act? xx. *4, ^.cts xxi. 29 ; 2 Tim. strong for the supposition that they only refer
j 20. * t0 the -^irst EPistle-
3 It is not impossible that Titus may have

480 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap. xvn.
ther." 1 Nevertheless, his personal anxiety did not prevent his laboring
earnestly and successfully in his Master's service. He " published the
Glad-tidings of Christ " 2 there as in other places, probably preaching as
usual, in the first instance, to the Jews in the Synagogue. He met with
a ready hearing ; " a door was opened to him in the Lord." 3 And thus
was laid the foundation of a Church which rapidly increased, and which
we shall find him revisiting not long afterwards. At present, indeed, he
was compelled to leave it prematurely ; for the necessity of meeting
Titus, and learning the state of things at Corinth, urged him forward.
He sailed, therefore, once more from Troas to Macedonia (a voyage
already described 4 in our account of his former journey), and, landing
at Neapolis, proceeded immediately to Philippi.5
We might have supposed that the warmth of affection with which he
was doubtless welcomed by his converts here would have soothed the
spirit of the Apostle, and restored his serenity. For, of all his converts,
the Philippians seem to have been the most free from fault, and the most
attached to himself. In the Epistle which he wrote to them, we find no
censure, and much praise ; and so zealous was their love for St. Paul,
that they alone (of all the Churches which he founded) forced him from
the very beginning to accept their contributions for his support. Twice,
while he was at Thessalonica,6 immediately after their own conversion,
they had sent relief to him. Again they did the same while he was at
Corinth,1 working for his daily bread in the manufactory of Aquila.
And we shall find them afterwards cheering his Roman prison by similar
proofs of their loving remembrance.8 We might suppose from this that
they were a wealthy Church ; yet such a supposition is contradicted by
the words of St. Paul, who tells us that " in the heavy trial which had
proved their steadfastness, the fulness of their joy Lad overflowed out
of the depth of their poverty, in the richness of their liberality." 9 In fact,
1 2 Cor. ii. 13. * 2 Cor. ii. 12. (2 Cor. xi. 9; we. find "Macedonia" used as
8 2 Cor. ii. 12. * See Ch. IX. equivalent co philippi (see note 7, below). We
" Philippi (of which Neapolis was the port) conclude, tnerefore, that the ancient tradition
was the first city of Macedonia which he (embodied in the subscription of 2 Cor.), ac-
would reach from Troas. See pp. 248-251. coming to which the Second Epistle to the
The importance of the Philippian Church Corinthians was written from Philippi, is cor-
would, of course, cause St. Paul to halt theto rect.
for some time, especially as his object was to 6 pmi# ;v 16 And see below, p. 512.
make a general collection for the poor Caria- i 2 Cor. xi. 9. The Macedonian contribu
tians of Jerusalem. Hence the scene of St. tions there mentioned must have been from
Paul's grief and anxiety (recorded, 2 Cor. vii. Philippi, because Philippi was the only Church
5, as occurring when he came into Macedonia) which at that time contributed to St Paul'*
must have been Philippi; and the same place support (Phil. iv. 15). •
seems (from the next verse) to have witnessed 8 Phil. iv. 16.
his consolation by the coming of Titus. So 9 2 Cor. viii. 2.

caAP.ivn. HIS RECEPTION IN MACEDONIA. 481
they had been exposed to very severe persecution from the first. " Unto
them it was given," so St. Paul reminds them afterwards, — "in the
behalf of Christ, not only to believe on Him, but also to suffer for His
sake." l Perhaps, already their leading members had been prosecuted
under the Roman law 2 upon the charge which proved so fatal in after
times, — of propagating a " new and illegal religion " (religio nova et
illicita) ; or, if this had not yet occurred, still it is obvious how severe
must have been the loss inflicted by the alienation of friends and connec
tions; and this would be especially the case with the Jewish converts,
such as Lydia,3 who were probably the only wealthy members of the
community, and whose sources of wealth were derived from the com
mercial relations which bound together the scattered Jews throughout
the Empire. What they gave, therefore, was not out of their abundance,
but out of their penury ; they did not grasp tenaciously at the wealth
which was slipping from their hands, but they seemed eager to get rid
of what still remained. They " remembered the words of the Lord
Jesus, how He said, It is more blessed to give than to receive." St.
Paul might have addressed them in the words spoken to some who
were like minded with them : — "Ye had compassion of me in my 4 bonds,
and took joyfully the spoiling of your goods, knowing that ye have in
heaven a better and au enduring substance."
Such were the zealous and loving friends who now embraced their
father in the faith ; yet the warmth of their welcome did not dispel the
gloom which hung over his spirit ; although amongst them 5 he found
Timotheus also, his " beloved son in the Lord," the most endeared to
him of all his converts and companions. The whole tone of the Second
Epistle to Corinth shows the depression under which he was laboring ;
and he expressly tells the Corinthians that this state of feeling lasted, not
only at Troas, but also after he reached Macedonia. "When first 1
i pjjjj ; 29. had been despatched on some commission into
* It must be remembered that Philippi was Macedonia shortly before Easter, and St. Paul
a Colonia ^ad then expected (but thought it doubtful)
3 Lydia had been a Jewish proselyte before that he would reach Corinth and return thence
her conversion. [We cannot assume that she to Ephesus ; and that he would reach it after
was a permanent resident at Philippi. See the reception at Corinth of the First Epistle to
Acts xvi 14.  H.l t*16 Corinthians (1 Cor. xvi. 10, 11). This,
* Or "on those in bonds," if we adopt the however, Timotheus seems not to have done;
reading of the best MSS. See note on Heb. for it was Titus, not Timotheus, who brought
„ . to St. Paul the first tidings of the reception of
6 This we infer because Timotheus was with the First Epistle at Corinth (2 Cor. vii. 6-11).
him when he began to write the Second Epistle Also, had Timotheus reached Corinth, he would
to Corinth (2 Cor. i. 1-), which (for the reasons have been mentioned 2 Cor. xii. 18. Hence it
mentioned in p. 480, n. 5) we believe to have would appear that Timotheus must have been
been written fit Philippi. Now Timotheus retained in Macedonia.
31

482 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap.xvii
came into Macedonia," he says, " my flesh had no rest; without were
fightings, within were fears." And this had continued until " God,
who comforts them that are cast down, comforted me by the coming of
Titus." It has been sometimes supposed that this dejection was occasioned by
an increase of the chronic malady under which St. Paul suffered ; : and
it seems not unlikely that this cause may have contributed to the result.
He speaks much, in the Epistle written at this time from Macedonia, of
the frailty of his bodily health (2 Cor. iv. 7 to 2 Cor. v. 10, and also
2 Cor. xii. 7-9, and see note on 2 Cor. i. 8) ; and, iii a very affecting pas
sage, he describes the earnestness with which he had besought his Lord
to take from him this " thorn in the flesh," — this disease which contin
ually impeded his efforts, and shackled his energy. We can imagine how
severe a trial, to a man of his ardent temper, such a malady must have
been. Yet this alone would scarcely account for his continued depres
sion, especially after the assurance he had received, that the grace of
Christ was sufficient for him, — that the vessel of clay 2 was not too fra
gile for the Master's work, — that the weakness of his body would but
the more manifest the strength of God's Spirit.3 The real weight which
pressed upon him was the " care of all the Churches ; " the real cause
of his grief was the danger which now threatened the souls of his con
verts, not in Corinth only, or in Galatia, but everywhere throughout the
Empire. We have already described the nature of this danger, and
seen its magnitude : we have seen how critical was the period through
which the Christian Church was now passing.4 The true question
(which St. Paul was enlightened to comprehend) was no less than this ;
— whether the Catholic Church should be dwarfed into a Jewish sect ;
whether the religion of spirit and of truth should be supplanted by the
worship of letter and of form. The struggle at Corinth, the result of
which he was now anxiously awaiting, was only one out of many similar
struggles between Judaism 5 and Christianity. These were the " fight
ings without " which filled him with " fears within ; " these were the
agitations which " gave his flesh no rest," and " troubled him on every
side." 6
1 We need not notice the hypothesis that St. 6 That the great opponents of St. Paul at
Paul's long-continued dejection was caused by Corinth were Judaizing emissaries, we have en-
the danger which he incurred on the day of the deavored to prove below ; at the same time a
tumult in the theatre at Ephesus ; a supposition complication was given to the struggle at Cor-
most unworthy of the character of him who inth by the existence of another element of
sustained such innumerable perils of a more error in the free-thinking party, whose theo-
deadly character with unshrinking fortitude. retic defence of their practical immorality we
2 See 2 Cor. iv. 7. have already noticed.
» 2 Cor. xii. 7-9. * Pp. 384-389. 6 2 Cor. vii. 5.

ohap.xvu. OPPONENTS OF ST. PAUL. 483
At length the long-expected Titus arrived at Philippi, and relieved the
anxiety of his master by better tidings than he had hoped to hear.1 The
majority of the Corinthian Church had submitted to the injunctions of
St. Paul, and testified the deepest repentance for the sins into which they
had fallen. They had passed sentence of excommunication upon the
incestuous person, and they had readily contributed towards the collec
tion for the poor Christians of Palestine. But there was still a minority,
whose opposition seems to have been rather imbittered than humbled by
the submission which the great body of the Church had thus yielded.
They proclaimed, in a louder and more contemptuous tone than ever,
their accusations against the Apostle. They charged him with craft in
his designs, and with selfish and mercenary motives ; — a charge which
they probably maintained by insinuating that he was personally interested
in the great collection which he was raising. We have seen2 what
scrupulous care St. Paul took to keep his integrity in this matter above
every shade of suspicion ; and we shall find still further proof of this as
we proceed. Meanwhile it is obvious how singularly inconsistent this
accusation was, in the mouths of those who eagerly maintained that Paul
could be no true Apostle, because he did not demand support from the
Churches which he founded. The same opponents accused him likewise
of egregious vanity, and of cowardly weakness ; they declared that he
was continually threatening without striking, and promising without per
forming ; always on his way to Corinth, but never venturing to come ;
and that he was as vacillating in his teaching as in his practice ; refusing
circumcision to Titus, yet circumcising Timothy ; a Jew among the Jews,
and a Gentile among the Gentiles.
It is an important question, to which of the divisions of the Corinthian
Church these obstinate opponents of St. Paul belonged. From the
notices of them given by St. Paul himself, it seems certain that they
were Judaizers (see 2 Cor. xi. 22) ; and still further, that they were of
the Christine section of that party (see 2 Cor. xi. 7). It also appears that
they were headed by an emissary from Palestine (2 Cor. xi. 4), who had
brought letters of commendation from some members of the Church at
1 Wieseler is of opinion that before the com- to topics which, in the earlier portion of the
ing of Titus St. Paul had already resolved to Epistle, he appeared to have dismissed ; and
send another letter to the Corinthians, perhaps from the manner in which the arrival of
by those two brethren who travelled with Titus Titus is mentioned at 2 Cor. vii. 4-7. On
soon after, bearing the Second Epistle ; and this hypothesis some other person from Cor-
that he wrote as far as the 2d verse of the 7th inth must have brought intelligence of the first
chapter of the Second Epistle to the Corinthi- impression produced on the Corinthians by the
ans before the appearance of Titus. He infers Epistle which had just reached them ; and
this from the change of tone which takes place Titus conveyed the further tidings of their
at this point, and from St. Paul's returning subsequent conduct. 2 1 Cor. xvi 3.

484 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap. xvii.
Jerusalem,1 and who boasted of his pure Hebrew descent, and his especial
connection with Christ himself.2 St. Paul calls him a false apostle, a
minister of Satan disguised as a minister of righteousness, and hints that
he was actuated by corrupt motives. He seems to have behaved at
Corinth with extreme arrogance, and to have succeeded, by his overbear
ing conduct, in impressing his partisans with a conviction of his impor
tance, and of the truth of his pretensions.3 They contrasted his confident
bearing with the timidity and self-distrust which had been shown by St.
Paul.4 And they even extolled his personal advantages over those of
their first teacher ; comparing his rhetoric with Paul's inartificial speech,
his commanding appearance with the insignificance of Paul's " bodily
presence." 5
Titus, having delivered to St. Paul this mixed intelligence of the state
of Corinth, was immediately directed to return thither (in company with
two deputies specially elected to take charge of their contribution by the
Macedonian Churches),6 in order to continue the business of the collec
tion. St. Paul made him the bearer of another letter, which is addressed
(still more distinctly than the First Epistle), not to Corinth only, but to
all the Churches in the whole province of Achaia, including Athens and
Cenchrea, and perhaps also Sicyon, Argos, Megara, Patrae, and other
neighboring towns ; all of which probably shared more or less in the
agitation which so powerfully affected the Christian community at
Corinth. The twofold character7 of this Epistle is easily explained by
the existence of the majority and minority which we have described in
the Corinthian Church. Towards the former the Epistle overflows with
love ; towards the latter it abounds with warning and menace. The
purpose of the Apostle was to encourage and tranquillize the great body
of the Church ; but, at the same time, he was constrained to maintain
his authority against those who persisted in despising the commands of
Christ delivered by his mouth. It was needful, also, that he should
notice their false accusations; and that (undeterred by the charge of
vanity which they brought) 8 he should vindicate his apostolic character
1 See 2 Cor. iii. 1. It may safely be assumed often said) that the portion before chap. x. is
that Jerusalem was the headquarters of the addressed to the obedient section of the Church
Judaizing party, from whence their emissaries and that after chap. x. to the disobedient. Po^
were despatched. Compare Gal. ii. 12; Acts lemical passages occur throughout the earlier
xv. 1, and xxi. 20. portion also; see i. 15-17, ii. 17, iii. 1 v 12
2 See 2 Cor. xi. 22. &c.
8 See 2 Cor. xi. 18-20, and the note there. 8 It is a curious fact, and marks the per-
4 1 Cor. ii. 3. sonal character of this Epistle, that the verb
6 2 Cor- x- 10> 16- for "boast" and its derivatives occur twenty-
6 See notes on 2 Cor. viii. 18, 22. nine times in it, and only twenty-six times in
7 This twofold character pervades the whole all the other Epistles of St. Paul put tr
Epistle; it is incorrect to say (as has been gether.

CHAP.xvn. SECOND EPISTLE TO THE CORINTHIANS. 485
by a statement of facts, and a threat of punishment to be inflicted on the
contumacious. With these objects, he wrote as follows : —
SECOND EPISTLE TO THE CORINTHIANS.1 i.l
salutation. PAUL, an Apostle of Jesus Christ by the will of God, and
Timotheus the Brother, TO THE CHURCH OF GOD WHICH IS IN
CORINTH, AND TO ALL THE SAINTS THROUGHOUT THE
WHOLE PROVINCE OF ACHAIA.
Grace be unto you and peace, from God our Father, and from our 2
Lord Jesus Christ.
Thanksgiving Thanks be to God the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the 3
for his deliv- 7
^atdan°ger father of compassion, and the God of all comfort, who con- 4
lar Asia. " soles me2 in all my tribulation, thereby enabling me to com
fort those who are in any affliction, with the same comfort wherewith I
am myself comforted by God. For as the sufferings of Christ3 have 5
come upon me above measure, so by Christ also my consolation is above
measure multiplied. But if, on the one hand, I am afflicted, it is for 6
your consolation and salvation (which works in you a firm endurance of
the same sufferings which I also suffer ; 4 so that my hope is steadfast on
your behalf) ; and if, on the other hand, I am comforted, it is for your
consolation,5 because I know that as you partake of my sufferings, so you 7
1 St. Paul has given us the following par- (5.) Some of the other topics mentioned in
ticulars to determine the date of this Epis- 1 Cor. are again referred to, especially the
tie : — punishment of the incestuous offender, in such
(1.) He had been exposed to great danger a manner as to show that no long interval had
in Proconsular Asia, i. e. at Ephesus (2 Cor. elapsed since the first Epistle.
i. 8). This had happened Acts xix. 23-41. 2 For the translation here, see the reasons
(2.) He had come thence to Troas, and given in the note on 1 Thess. i. 2. It is evi-
( after some stay there) had passed over to dent here that St. Paul considers himself alone
Macedonia. This was the route he took, Acts the writer, since Timotheus was not with him
xx. 1 . during the danger in Asia ; and, moreover, he
(3.) He was in Macedonia at the time of uses "I" frequently, interchangeably with
writing (2 Cor. ix. 2, the verb is in the present "we" (see verse 23) ; and when he includes
tense), and intended (2 Cor. xiii. 1) shortly to others in the "we " he specifies it, as in verse
visit Corinth. This was the course of his 19. See, also, other proofs in the note on vi.
journey, Acts xx. 2. 11.
(4.) The same collection is going on which » Compare Col. i. 24.
is mentioned in 1 Cor. (see 2 Cor. viii. 6, and * This is the order given by the MS. au-
2 Cor. ix. 2) ; and which was completed during thorities.
his three months' visit to Corinth (Rom. xv. 6 Here we follow Griesbach's text, on the
26) and taken up to Jerusalem immediately authority of the Alexandrian and other MSS.,
after, Acts xxiv. 17. and on grounds of context.

486 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap, xvd
i. 8 partake also of my comfort. For I would have you know, brethren, con
cerning the tribulation which befell me in the province of Asia,1 that I
was exceedingly pressed down by it beyond my strength to bear, so as to
9 despair even of life. Nay, by my own self I was already doomed to
10 death ; that I might rely no more upon myself, but upon God who raises
tne dead to life ; who delivered me from a death so grievous, and does
yet deliver me ; in whom I have hope that He will still deliver me for
11 the time to come ; you also helping me by your supplications for me, that
thanksgivings may from many tongues be offered up on my behalf, for
the blessing gained to me by many prayers.2
12 For this is my boast, the testimony of my conscience, that I Seif.defence
have dealt with the world, and above all with you, in godly satSonof0011"
double-deal-
honesty and singleness of mind,3 not in the strength of carnal ln«-
13 wisdom, but in the strength of God's grace. For I write nothing else to
you but what you read openly,4 yea, and what you acknowledge inwardly,
14 and I hope that even to the end you will acknowledge,5 as some of you6
have already acknowledged, that I am your boast, even as you are mine,
in the day of the Lord Jesus.7
15 And in this confidence it was my wish to come first8 to Keasonfor
you, that [afterwards] you might have a second benefit ; and mln^0oftph}«°'visit to
16 to go by you into Macedonia, and back again from Macedonia Corinth.
1 It has been questioned whether St. Paul " Literally, that from many persons the gift
here refers to the Ephesian tumult of Acts given to me by means of many may have thanks
xix. ; and it is urged that he was not then in returned for it on my behalf
danger of his life. But had he been found by 8 St. Paul here alludes to his opponents,
the mob during the period of their excitement, who accused him of dishonesty and inconsis-
there can be little doubt that he would have tency in his words and deeds. From what
been torn to pieces, or perhaps thrown to wild follows, it seems that he had been suspected
beasts in the Arena ; and it seems improbable of writing privately to some individuals in
that within so short a period he should again the church, in a different strain from that of
have been exposed to peril of his life in the his public letters to them.
same place, and that nothing should have been 4 The word properly means you read aloud,
said of it in the Acts. Some commentators viz. when the Epistles of St. Paul were pub-
have held (and the view has been ably advo- licly read to the congregation. Compare I
cated by Dean Alford) that St. Paul refers to Thess. v. 27.
a dangerous attack of illness. With this 6 There is a play upon the words here,
opinion we so far agree that we believe St. which it is difficult in English to imitate.
Paul to have been suffering from bodily illness 6 Compare chap. ii. 5, and Rom. xi. 25
when he wrote this Epistle. See the prelimi- 7 i. e. the day when the Lord Jesus will
nary remarks above. St. Paul's statement here come again.
that he was " self-doomed to death" certainly 8 i. e. before visiting Macedonia. Seep. 418
looks very like a reference to a very dangerous note.
illness, in which he had despaired of recovery.

chap.xvii. SECOND EPISTLE TO THE CORINTHIANS. 487
to you, and by you to be forwarded on my way to Judaea. Am I accused, i. 17
then, of forming this purpose in levity and caprice ? or is my purpose car
nal, to please all, by saying at once both yea and nay ?J Yet as God 18
is faithful, my words to you are2 no [deceitful] mixture of yea and nay.
For when the Son of God, Jesus Christ, was proclaimed among you by ID
us (by me, I say, and Silvanus, and Timotheus), in Him was found no
wavering between yea and nay, but in Him was yea alone ; for all the 20
promises of God have in Him the yea [which seals their truth] ; where
fore also through Him the Amen [which acknowledges their fulfilment]
is uttered to the praise of God by our voice.3 But God is He who keeps 21
both us and you steadfast to His anointed, and we also are anointed4 by
Him. And He has set His seal upon us, and has given us the Spirit to 22
dwell in our hearts, as the earnest5 of His promises. But for my6 own 23
part, I call God to witness, as my soul shall answer for it, that I gave up
my purpose 7 of visiting Corinth because I wished to spare you. I speak 24
not8 as though your faith was enslaved to my authority, but because I
desire to help your joy ;9 for your faith is steadfast. But I determined 10 ii. 1
not again n to visit you in grief ; for if I cause you grief, who is there to 2
cause me joy, but those whom I have grieved ? And for this very reason 8
1 This translation (the literal English being, 21, and 22, include Silvanus and Timotheun,
do I purpose my purposes carnally, that both yea, as is expressly stated verse 19.
yea, and nay, nay, may be [found] with me ?) ap- 6 Literally, the earnest money, i. e. a small sum
pears tc give the full force, as much as that of which was paid in advance, as the ratification
Chrysostom : " or must I hold to the purposes of a bargain ; a custom which still prevails in
which I have formed from fleshly fear, lest I be many countries. The gift of the Holy Spirit
accused of changing my yea into nay ? " which is in this life is said by St. Paul to be the earnest
advocated by Winer, but which does not agree • of their future inheritance ; he repeats the ex-
with the context. pression 2 Cor. v. 5, and Eph. i. 14, and
2 We follow here Lachmann, Tischendorf, expresses the same thing under a different meta-
and the best MSS. phor Rom. viii. 23.
8 In the present edition we have adopted 6 Thv, * I " here is emphatic.
Lachmann's reading. The Amen was that in 7 Thi A. V. " not yet " is a mistake for
which the whole congregation joined at the " no longer."
close of the thanksgiving, as described in 1 8 St. Paul adds this sentence to soften what
Cor. xiv. 16. It should also be remembered might seem the magisterial tone of the preced-
(as Canon Stanley observes), that it is the ing, in which he had implied his power to
Hebrew of "yea." punish the Corinthians.
4 The commentators do not seem to have 9 i. e. I desire not to cause you sorrow, but
remarked here the verbal connection. [This to promote your joy.
has been noticed by Prof. Stanley, since the 10 This can scarcely mean for my own sake
above was first published.] The anointing as Billroth and others propose to translate it
spoken of as bestowed on the Apostles was that u This alludes to the intermediate visit
grace by which they were qualified for their which St. Paul paid to Corinth. See p. 418,
office. The "we" and "us" in verses 20, note.

488 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap, xvii
I wrote l to you instead of coming, that I might not receive grief from
those who ought to give me joy ; and I confide in you all that my joy is
ii. 4 yours. For I wrote to you out of much affliction and anguish of heart,
with many tears ; not to pain you, but that you might know the abun
dance of my love.
5 As concerns him2 who has caused the pain, it is not me that pardon of
the incestuous
he has pained, but some of you ; 3 [some, I say,] that I may person.
6 not press too harshly upon all. For the offender 4 himself, this punish
ment, which has been inflicted on him by the sentence of the majority,5
7 is sufficient without increasing it. On the contrary, you ought rather to
forgive and comfort him, lest he should be overwhelmed by the excess of
8 his sorrow. Wherefore I beseech you fully to restore him to your love.
9 For the very end which I sought when I wrote before was to test you in
this matter, and learn whether you would be obedient in all things. But
10 whomsoever you forgive, I forgive also; for whatever6 I have forgiven,
11 I have forgiven on your account in the sight7 of Christ, that v- e 8 may not
be overreached by Satan ; for we are not ignorant of his device.
12 When I had come to Troas to publish the Glad-tidings of nause of ws
leaving Troas.
13 Christ, and a door was opened to me in the Lord, I had no rest
in my spirit because I found not Titus my brother ; so that I pai ted from
14 them,9 and came from thence into Macedonia. But thanks be to God, who
leads me on from place to place in the train of his triumph, to celebrate
his victory over the enemies of Christ ; 10 and by me sends forth the
1 1. e. the First Ep. Cor. xxii. 22, and 1 Cor. v. 5. It is not Mequately
2 Literally, " if any man has caused pain ; " represented by the English " such a wan."
a milder expression, which would not in Eng- 6 Not "many" (A. V.) ; but the majority.
lish bear so definite a meaning as it does in See, for the punishment, 1 Cor. v. 4.
the Greek. 6 The best MSS. have the neuter, not the
8 Such is the meaning according to the masculine.
punctuation we adopt. For the sense of one 7 Compare Proverbs viii. 30 (LXX.? The
phrase, see chap. i. 14, and Rom. xi. 25. expression is used somewhat differently in
With regard to the sentiment, St. Paul intends iv. 6.
to say that not all the Corinthian Church had 8 The we of this verse appears to include
been included in his former censure, but only the readers, judging from the change of per-
that part of it which had supported the offend- son before and after. They would all be
er ; and therefore the pain which the offender " overreached by Satan " if he robbed t hem of
had drawn down on the Church was not a brother.
inflicted on the whole Church, but only on 9 Namely, from the Christians of Troas.
that erring part of it. 10 The verb here used (which is mistrans-
4 The expression is used elsewhere for a lated in A. V. ) means to lead a man as captive
defiuite offending individual. Compare Acts in a triumphal procession; the full phrase mean*

chap xvn.

SECOND EPISTLE TO THE CORINTHIANS.

489

knowledge of Him, a steam of fragrant incense, throughout the world.
For Christ's is the fragrance ¦ which I offer up to God, whether among ii.16
those in the way of salvation,2 or among those in the way of perdition ;
hut to these it is an odor of death, to those of life.3 16
And [if some among you deny my sufficiency] who, then, 17
in wMchhe is sufficient for these things ? For I seek not profit (like
nuVoftoiic most) * by setting the word of God to sale,5 but I speak from
office, ana its
gicrycon- a single heart, from the command of God, as in God's pres-
Mosaic dls- ence, and in fellowship with Christ. Will you say that I am iii..l
again beginning to commend myself? Or think you that I
need letters of commendation (like some other men) either to you, or
from you ? Nay, ye are yourselves my letter of commendation, a letter 2
written on 6 my heart, known and read 7 by all men ; a letter 8 coming 3
manifestly from Christ, and committed to my charge ; written not with
ink, but with the Spirit of the living God ; not upon tablets of stone,9
but upon the fleshly tablets of the heart. But through Christ have I 4
this confidence 10 before God ; not thinking myself sufficient to gain wis- 5
dom by my own reasonings,11 as if it came from myself, but drawing my
sufficiency from God. For He it is who has made me suffice for the 6

to lead captive in a triumph over the enemies of
Christ. The metaphor is taken from the tri
umphal procession of a victorious general.
God is celebrating His triumph over His ene
mies ; St. Paul (who had been so great an op
ponent of the Gospel) is a captive following in
the train of the triumphal procession, yet (at
the same time, by a characteristic change of
metaphor) an incense-bearer, scattering in
cense (which was always done on these occa
sions) as the procession moves on. Some of
the conquered enemies were put to death
when the procession reached the Capitol; to
them the smell of the incense was " an odor of
death unto death;" to the rest who were
spared, " an odor of life unto life." The meta
phor appears to have been a favorite one with
St. Paul ; it occurs again Col. ii. 15.
1 Literally, Christ's fragrance am I, unto God.
* Not " who are saved" (A. V.). See note
on 1 Cor. i. 18.
s Literally, 10 these it is an odor of death, end
ing in death ; to those an odor of life, ending in
Hfe.

4 The mistranslation " many " (A.V.) ma
terially alters the sense. He evidently alludes
to his antagonists at Corinth ; see p. 483, and
xi. 13.
6 Literally, to seU by retail, including a notion
of fraud in the selling. Compare the similar
imputations against his Judaizing adversaries
in 1 Thess. ii. 3.
6 It is possible that in using the plural here
St. Paul meant to include Timotheus ; yet as
this supposition does not agree well with the
context, it seems better to suppose it used
merely to suit the plural form of the pro
noun. 7 The paronomasia cannot well be here imi
tated in English. Compare i. 14.
8 Literally, being manifestly shown to be a letter
of Christ conveyed by my ministration.
9 Like the law of Moses.
10 Viz. of his sufficiency; Compare ii. 16;
iii. 5, 6.
n Literally, to reach any conclusion by my own

490 THE LLPE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap, xvii
ministration of a new covenant, a covenant not of letter, but of spirit ;
Hi. 7 for the letter kills,1 but the spirit makes the dead to live. Yet if a
glory was shed upon the ministration of the law of death (a law written
in letters, and graven upon stones),2 so that the sons of Israel could not
fix their eyes on the face of Moses, for the glory of his countenance,
8 although its brightness was soon to fade ; 3 how far more glorious must
9 the ministration of the spirit be ! For if the ministration of doom had
glory, far more must the ministration of righteousness abound in glory.4
10 Yea, that which then was glorious has no glory now, because of5 the sur-
H passing glory wherewith it is compared. For if a glory shone upon that
which was doomed to pass away, much more doth glory rest 6 upon that
12 which remains forever. Therefore, having this hope, I speak and act
13 without disguise ; and not like Moses, who spread a veil over his face,
that 7 the sons of Israel might not see the end of that fading brightness.
14 But their minds were blinded ; yea, to this day, when they read in their
synagogues8 the ancient covenant, the same veil rests thereon, nor9 can
15 they see beyond it that the law is done away in Christ ; but even now,
when Moses is read in their hearing, a veil10 lies upon their heart.
6,17 But when their heart turns to the Lord, the veil is rent away.11 Now
the Lord is the Spirit ; and where the Spirit of the Lord abides, there
18 bondage gives place to freedom ; and we all, while with face unveiled
we behold in a mirror the glory of the Lord, are ourselves transformed

1 For the meaning, compare Rom. vii. 9- 8 In their synagogues is implied in the term
11. used here. Compare Acts xv. 21.
2 Literally, if the ministration of death in let- e We take the phrase absolutely ; literally,
ters, graven upon stones, was born in glory. itbeing not unveiled [i. e. not revealed to them] that
8 See note on 1 Cor. ii. 6. it [the ancient covenant] is done away in Christ.
4 The whole of this contrast between the " Done away " is predicated, not of the veil, but
glory of the new and the old dispensations of the old covenant. Compare the preceding
appears to confirm the hypothesis that St. verse and verses 7 and 1 1 .
Paul's chief antagonists at Corinth were of the 10 Perhaps there may be here an allusion tc
Judaizing party. the Tallith, which (if we may assume this prac-
6 Literally, for that which has been glorified in tice to be as old as the apostolic age) was worn
this particular has not been glorified, because of the in the synagogue by every worshipper, and was
glory which surpasses it. literally a veil hanging down over the breast.
6 "Rest upon — Shine upon." The preposi- See p. 154, and compare the note on 1 Cor.
tions in the original give this contrast. xi. 4.
7 See Exod. xxxiv. 35. St. Paul here (as u Alluding to Exod. xxxiv. 34, where it is
usual) blends the allegorical with the historical said, " When Moses went in before the Lord,
view of the passage referred to in the Old Tes- he rent away the veil." The most natural
tament. subject of the verb " turn " is " heart."

IV,

chap. xvn. SECOND EPISTLE TO THE CORINTHIANS. 49]
continually 1 into the same likeness ; and the glory which shines upon
us 2 is reflected by us, even as it proceeds from the Lord, the Spirit.
Therefore having this ministration,3 1 discharge it with no faint-hearted 1
fears, remembering the mercy which 1 4 received. I have renounced the 2
secret dealings of shame, I walk not in the paths of cunning, 1 5 adulter
ate not the word of God ; but openly setting forth the truth, as in the
sight of God, I commend myself to the conscience of all men. But if 8
there be still a veil 6 which hides my Glad-tidings from some who hear
me, it is among those 1 who are in the way of perdition ; whose unbeliev- 4
ing minds the God of this world 8 has blinded, and shut out the glorious
light of the Glad-tidings of Christ, who is the image of God. For I pro- 5
claim not myself, but Christ Jesus as Lord and Master,9 and myself your
bondsman for the sake of Jesus. For God, who called forth light out of 6
darkness, has caused His light to shine in my heart, that [upon others
also] might shine forth the knowledge of His glory manifested in the face
of Jesus Christ.10
in sickness But this treasure is lodged in a body of fragile clay,11 that so 7
andin dauger
I'ifrom tife tne surpassing might [which accomplishes the work] should be
Ch7i1t,°and God's, and not my own. I am hard pressed, yet not crushed ; 8
the hope of
eternal life, perplexed, yet not despairing ; persecuted, yet not forsaken ; 9
struck down, yet not destroyed.12 In my body I bear about continually 10
the dying of Jesus,13 that in my body the life also of Jesus might be
1 The tense is present. 8 See note on 1 Cor. i. 20.
2 "From glory'- indicates the origin of 9 "Lord "is the correlative of "slave "here;
this transformation, viz. the glory shining on us; compare Eph. vi. 5.
" To glory," the effect ; viz. the reflection of 10 For the meaning of " shine forth," com-
that glory by us. For the metaphor, compare pare verse 4.
1 Cor. xiii. 12, and note. We observe in both u The whole of this passage, from this
passages that even the representation of divine point to chap. v. 10, shows (as we have before
truth given us by Christianity is only a re- observed) that St. Paul was suffering from
flection of the reality. bodily illness when he wrote. See also chap.
3 Viz. " the ministration of the Spirit." xii. 7-9.
/;;;_ g 1 12 Observe the force of the present tense of
4 Viz. in his conversion from a state of Jew- all these participles, implying that the state of
ish unbelief. things described was constantly going on.
6 St. Paul plainly intimates here (as he 1S "Lord "is not found in the best MSS
openly states xi. 17) that some othd teachers The word translated "dying" here (as Prof.
were liable to these charges. See also ii. 17, Stanley observes) is properly Me deadness of a
and the note. corpse ; as though St. Paul would say, " my body
G In the participle used here, there is a refer- is no better than a corpse; yet a corpse which
ence to the preceding word " veil." shares the life-giving power of Christ's resurrec-
1 Compare ii. 15, 16. tion."

492 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap, j-.ii
iv.ll shown forth. For I, in the midst of life, am daily given over to death for
the sake of Jesus, that in my dying flesh the life whereby Jesus con
quered death x might show forth its power.
12 So, then, death working in me works life2 in you. Yet having the
13 same spirit of faith whereof it is written " Jf Miefreb", WCtb fytXt&Btt
I4 bib Jf sneak," 3 1 also believe, and therefore speak. For I know that
He who raised the Lord Jesus from the dead shall raise me also by
15 Jesus, and shall call me into His presence together with you ; for all
[my sufferings] are on your behalf, that the mercy which has abounded
above them all might call forth your thankfulness ; that so the fulness
of praise might be poured forth to God, not by myself alone, but multi-
16 plied by many voices.4 Wherefore I faint not ; but though my outward
17 man decays, yet my inward man is renewed from day to day. For my
light afflictions, which last but for a moment, work for me a weight of
18 glory, immeasurable and eternal. Meanwhile I look not to things seen,
but to things unseen : for the things that are seen pass away ; but the
v 1 things that are unseen endure forever. Yea, I know that if the tent s
which is my earthly house be destroyed, I have a mansion built by God, a
2 house not made with hands, eternal, in the heavens. And herein I groan
with earnest longings, desiring to cover' my earthly raiment with the
3 robes of my heavenly mansion. (If, indeed, I shall be found 7 still clad in
1 Literally, the life, as well as the death, of ing mansion ; the vile body of flesh and blood, to
Jesus. the spiritual body of the glorified saint.
2 Literally, while death works in me, life uxrrks 6 There is much force in " clothe upon " as
in you. I.e. the mortal peril to which St. distinguished from "clothe."
Paul exposed himself was the instrument of 7 Literally, " If indeed I shall be found clad,
bringing spiritual life to his converts. and not stripped of my clothing ;" i. e. " If, at
3 Ps. cxvi. 10 (LXX.). the Lord's coming, I shall be found still living
4 The literal translation would be, that the in the flesh." We know from other passages
favor which has abounded might, through the that it was a matter of uncertainty with St.
thanksgiving of the greater number, overflow to Paul whether he should survive to behold the
the praise of God. This takes the preposition second coming of Christ or not. Compare
as governing "thanksgiving" and the verb as 1 Thess. iv. 15, and 1 Cor. xv. 51. So, in the
intransitive ; and it must be remembered that next verse, he expresses his desire that his
this verb is used twenty-six times by St. Paul, fleshly body should be transformed into a
and only three times transitively. If, how- spiritual body, without being "unclad" by
ever, we make it transitive here, the sense will death. The metaphor of " nakedness " as
be, might by means of the greater number cause combined with " tent " seems suggested by the
the thanksgiving to overflow, Sec. ; which does oriental practice of striking the tent very early
not materially alter the sense. Compare the in the morning, often before the travellers are
similar sentiment at chap. i. 11. dressed. So we read in M'Cheyne's account
6 The shifting tent is here opposed to endur- of his journey through the desert, " When

chap. xvn. SECOND EPISTLE TO THE CORINTHIANS. 493
my fleshly garment.) For we who are dwelling in the tent groan and v. 4
are burdened ; not desiring to put off our [earthly] clothing, but to put
over it [our heavenly] raiment, that this our dying nature might be swal
lowed up by life. And He who has prepared me for this very end is God, 5
who has given me the Spirit as the earnest of my hope. Therefore, I am 6
ever of good courage, knowing that while my home is in the body, 1 am
in banishment from the Lord ; (for I walk by faith, not by sight). Yea, 7, 8
my heart fails me not, but I would gladly suffer banishment from the
body, and have my home with Christ.1 Therefore I strive earnestly that, 9
whether in banishment or at home, I may be pleasing in His sight. For 10
we must all be made manifest 2 without disguise before the judgment-seat
of Christ, that each may receive according to that which he has done in
the body, either good or evil.
nesVsprinm Knowing therefore the fearfulness of the Lord's judgment, 11
of°nisare8pon- though I seek to win men,3 yet my uprightness is manifest in
sibiUty to
Christ, whose tne sight of God ; and I hope also that it is manifested by the
commission o ? r j
bi umon and witness of your consciences. I write not thus to repeat my 12
witli whom . 1X _ . n
his whole own commendation, but that 1 may furnish you with a ground
nature has
changed of boasting on my behalf, that you may have' an answer for
those whose boasting is in the outward matters of sight, not in the inward
possessions of the heart. For if I be mad,5 it is for God's cause ; if 13
sober, it is for yours. For the love of Christ constrains me, because I 14
thus have judged,6 that if one died for all, then all died [in Him] ; 7 and 15
that He died for all, that the living might live no longer to themselves,
but to Him, who, for their sakes, died and rose again.8
morning began to dawn, our tents were taken ing to win men," and " trying to please men."
down. Often we have found ourselves shelter- See Gal. i. 10, and the note.
less before being fully dressed." (Life of * This alludes to the accusation of vanity
M'Cheyne, p. 92.) It should be observed that brought against him by his antagonists; com-
the original denotes simply dressed, clad, the an- pare iii. 1.
ti thesis to naked. Prof. Stanley's translation, 6 i. e. if I exalt myself (his opponents called
" in the hope that after having put on our him beside himself with vanity), it is for God's
heavenly garment we shall be found not naked, cause ; if I humble myself, it is for your sakes.
but clothed," involves a paralogism, being tan- * Or perhaps " / thus judged, viz. at the
tamount to sayipg, " in the hope that after time of my conversion ; " if we suppose th»
having clothed ourselves we shall be found to aorist used in its strict sense.
have clothed ourselves." 7 The original cannot mean all were dead
1 Literally, the Lord. (A. V.),butafi died. The death of all for whom
* The translation in the Authorized Ver- He died, was virtt.ally involved in His death.
sion is incorrect. 8 The best commentary on the 14th and
3 He was accused by the Judaizers of " try- 15th verses is Gal. ii. 20.

494 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL v chap, xvn
v. 16 I ' therefore, from henceforth, view no man carnally ; yea, though once
17 my view of Christ was carnal,2 yet now it is no longer carnal. Whoso
ever, then, is in Christ, is a new creation ; his old being has passed away,
18 and behold, all has become new. But all comes from God, for He it is
who reconciled me to Himself by Jesus Christ, and charged me with the
19 ministry of reconciliation ; for3 God was in Christ reconciling the world
to Himself, reckoning their sins no more against them, and having
20 ordained me to speak the word of reconciliation. Therefore I am an
ambassador for Christ, as though God exhorted you by my voice ; in
21 Christ's stead I beseech you, be ye reconciled to God. For Him who
knew no sin God struck with the doom of sin 4 on our behalf ; that we
vi. 1 might be changed into the righteousness of God in Christ. Moreover, as
working 5 together with Him, I also exhort you, that the grace which you
2 have received from God be not in vain. For He saith : " J> h&bt htuxb
%c in an acceptable time, antr in % irag of salbaiian \tuht Jf sat-
COXtb t\itt" 6 Behold, now is the acceptable time ; behold, now is the
day of salvation.
3 For I take heed to give no cause of stumbling, lest blame ^'"^"StS-
4 should be cast on the ministration wherein I serve ; but in all whu* he had
discharged
things I commend myself as one who ministers to God's ser- w8 duty, and
a •> appeal tot be
vice ; in steadfast endurance, in afflictions, in necessities, in hutonve?ts.
5 straitness of distress, in stripes, in imprisonments, in tumults, in labors,
6 in sleepless watchings, in hunger and thirst ; in purity, in knowledge, in
long-suffering, in kindness, in [the gifts of] the Holy Spirit, in love
7 unfeigned ; speaking the word of truth, working with the power of God,
fighting with the weapons of righteousness, both for attack and for

1 The pronoun is emphatic. * The word " sin " is used, for the sake of
2 We agree with Billroth, Neander, and De parallelism with the " righteousness " which fol-
Wette, that this cannot refer to any actual lows. God made Christ " Sin " that we might
knowledge which St. Paul had of our Lord be made " Righteousness."
when upon earth ; it would probably have 6 See note on 1 Cor. iii. 9. I "lso exhort re-
been "Jesus" had that been meant ; moreover, fers to the preceding, as though God exhorted
the preceding phrase does not refer to personal you. 6 Is. xlix. 8 (LXX.).
knowledge, but to a carnal estimate. For other 7 An allusion apparently to the "commend
reasons against such an interpretation, see myself" and the " commendatory letters ' of
p. 62. St. Paul's view of Christ was carnal iii. 1 ; as though he said, I commend myself, not
when he looked (like other Jews) for a Messiah by word, but by deed. [The stress is not on
who should be an earthly conqueror. " myself" here, as in the former case. The
8 " To wit that," " because that," pleonastic. order of the word shows this. — H.l

chap. xvu. SECOND EPISTLE TO THE CORINTHIANS. 495 vi
defence; through good report and evil, through honor and through 8
infamy ; counted as a deceiver, yet being true ; as unknown [by men] , 9
yet acknowledged l [by God] ; as ever dying, yet behold I live ; as chas
tened by suffering, yet not destroyed ; as sorrowful, yet ever filled with 10
joy ; as poor, yet making many rich ; as having nothing, yet possessing
all things.
Corinthians, my2 mouth has opened itself to you freely, — my heart n
is enlarged towards you. You find no narrowness in my love, but the 12
narrowness is in your own. I pray you therefore in return for my affec- 13
tion (I speak as to my children), let your hearts be opened in like
manner.
Exhortation Cease to yoke yourselves unequally in ill-matched inter- 14
party ("the course with unbelievers ; for what fellowship has righteousness
sou" "ii fei-° with unrighteousness ? what communion has light with dark- 15
lowship with
heathen vice. ness ? wnat concord has Christ with Belial ? what partnership
has a believer with an unbeliever? what agreement has the temple of 16
God with idols ? For ye are yourselves a temple of the living God, as
God said : " Jf mill buxell in %m, anb malh in %m, anb Jf toil! bt
fytxx (Sob, anb %g sfjall bt mg people."3 Wherefore, "Come 17
ont from among %m anb bt %t separate, mitfy % ITorb, anb iouilj
not % tmclean %ng, anb Jf twill xtmbt gon."4 And," J faill bt 18
nnto gotr a fa%r, anb gon sjjall bt mg sons anb bangjjtcrs, saiijj
the ITorb ^.Imig^tg." 5 Having therefore these promises, my beloved, vij. ]
let us cleanse ourselves from every defilement, either of flesh or spirit,
and perfect our holiness, in the fear of God
satisfaction 6 Qjve me a favorable hearing. I have wronged no man, I 2
byTitu8Urfom have ruined 7 no man, I have defrauded no man ; I say not 3
Corinth. 1 For the meaning, see 1 Cor. xiii. 12. and Jer. xxxi. 9, and xxxii. 38, contain the sub-
2 Observe, as a confirmation of previous re- stance of it St. Paul, as usual, quotes from
marks as to St. Paul's use of the singular and memory.
plural pronouns, verses 11,13; also vii. 2, 3, 4. fl It is not impossible that the preceding part
8 Levit. xxvi. 11, 12 (according to LXX., of the Epistle may have been written, as Wiese-
with slight variations). ler supposes, before the coming of Titus. See
4 Isaiah Hi. 11 (according to LXX., with al- above, p. 483, n. 1. But the opening words of
terations) ; the words " I will receive you " not this section are obviously connected with verses
being either in the LXX. or the Hebrew there, 12, 13, of the preceding chapter. The section
though found in Ezek. xx. 34. from vi. 14 to vii. 1 is entirely unconnected with
6 This passage is not to be fonnd exactly in what precedes and follows it.
tne Old Testament, although 2 Sam. vii. 14, 7 St. Paul appears frequently to use the

496 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap, xva
this to condemn you [as though I had myself been wronged by you] , foi
^ I have said before that I have you in my heart, to live and die with you.
4 Great is my freedom towards you, great is my boasting of you ; I am
filled with the comfort which you have caused me ; I have more than an
5 overweight of joy for all the affliction which has befallen me. When
first I came into Macedonia my flesh had no rest, but I was troubled on
6 every side ; without were fightings, within were fears. But God, who
comforts them that are cast down, comforted me by the coming of Titus ;
7 and not by his coming only, but by the comfort which he felt on your
account, and the tidings which he brought of your longing for my love,
your mourning for my reproof, your zeal for my cause ; so that my sor-
8 row has been turned into joy. For though I grieved you in my letter,1
I do not regret it ; but though I did regret it (for I see that grief was
9 caused you by that letter, though but for a season), I now rejoice ; not
because you were grieved, but because your grief led you to repent
ance ; 2 for the grief I caused you was a godly sorrow ; so that I might
10 nowise harm you [even when I grieved you]. For the work of godly
sorrow is repentance not to be repented of, leading to salvation ; but the
11 work of worldly sorrow is death. Consider what was wrought among
yourselves when you were grieved with a godly sorrow ; what earnest
ness it wrought in you, yea, what eagerness to clear yourselves from
blame, what indignation,3 what fear,4 what longing,5 what zeal,6 what
punishment of wrong. You have cleared yourselves altogether from
12 every stain of guilt in this matter. Know, therefore, that although I
original word in this sense (compare 1 Cor. same tense has to serve the purpose both of
iii. 17), and not in the ordinary meaning of aorist and perfect. See note on Rom. v. 5.
corrupt. We may remark here, that there is no [See note on Gal. ii. 10. This grammatical
need to suppose these aorists used aoristically question is discussed in the Cambridge Journal
(as they would be in classical Greek), since St. of Classical and Sacred Philology. — H.]
Paul constantly used the aorist for the perfect. * Viz. 1 Cor., unless we adopt the hypothesis
Even those commentators who are most anx- that another letter had been written in the in-
ious to force upon the Hellenistic of the New terval, according to the view mentioned p. 479,
Testament the nice observance of this classical n. 2.
distinction, are obliged sometimes to give up 2 The text of the whole passage, here
their consistency and translate the aorist as per- adopted, is the same as that of Prof. Stanley.
feet. In fact, the aorist is continually joined but punctuated differently.
with "now" (e.g. Matt. xxvi. 65; John xiii. s Indignation against the offender.
31; Rom. xi. 31 ; Eph. iii. 5), whichisof course 4 Fear of the wrath of God.
decisive. It is not wonderful that there should 6 Longing for restoration to St, Paul's ap-
be this ambiguity in the Hellenistic use of proval and love.
Greek tenses, considering that in Latin the ° Zeal on behalf of right, and against wrong. .

chap. xvii. SECOND EPISTLE TO THE CORIHTHIANS. 497
wrote tc [rebuke] you, it was not so much to punish the wrong-doer, nor
to avenge him r who suffered the wrong, but that my earnest zeal for you
in the sight of God might be manifest to yourselves.2 TO.
This, therefore, is the ground of my comfort ; but 3 besides my conso- 13
lation on your account, I was beyond measure rejoiced by the joy of
Titus, because his spirit has been refreshed by you all. For whatever 14
boast of you I may have made to him, I have not been put tq shame.
But as all I ever said to you was spoken in truth, so also my boasting of
you to Titus has been proved a truth. And his heart is more than ever 15
drawn towards you, while he calls to mind the obedience of you all, and
the fear and trembling 4 wherewith you received him. I rejoice that in 16
all things you give me ground for courage.8
Explanations ^- desire, brethren, to make known to you the manifestation viii.I
TOncemimr0119 of God's grace, which has been given in 6 the churches of Mace-
the collection
for the poor donia. For in the heavy trial which has proved their stead- 2
Christians in J l
Jerusalem." fastness, the fulness of their joy has overflowed, out of the
depth of their poverty, in the richness of their liberality.7 They have 3
given (I bear them witness) not only according to their means, but beyond
their means, and that of their own free will ; for they besought me with 4
much entreaty that they might bear their part 8 in the grace of ministering
to the saints. And far beyond my hope, they gave their very selves to the 5
Lord first, and to me also, by the will of God. So that I have desired 6
Titus [to revisit you] , that as he caused you to begin this work before, so
he may lead you to finish it, that this grace may not be wanting 9 in you ; "i

1 Viz. the father of the offender. We need 6 The great importance attached by St. Paul
not be perplexed at his wife's forming another to this collection, as manifested in the present
connection during his lifetime, when we con- section of this Epistle, may be explained not
sider the great laxity of the law of divorce merely by his desire to fulfil his share of the
among the Greeks and Romans. agreement mentioned, Gal. ii. 10, but also by
2 If we adopt the other reading (which his hope that such a practical proof of his love
transposes "you" and "us"), it will give the would reconcile the Judaizing Christians at
sense, that your zeal for me might be manifested to Jerusalem to himself and his Gentile converts.
yourselves ; which might be perhaps another See the conclusion of our preceding chapter.
(though an obscure) way of saying, in order to 6 The original here cannot mean " bestowed
bring out your zeal for me, so that you might all on " (A. V.).
perceive how the majority felt for me. 7 See note on 2 Cor. ix. 11.
6 The reading of the best MSS. gives this B The omission here is required by the best
order. MSS.
* For the meaning of this phrase, see 1 Cor. • Literally, this grace as well as other graces.
ii. 3 82

498 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. cbap. xvn.
but that, as you abound in all gifts, in faith and utterance, and knowl-
... edge, and earnest zeal, and in the love which joins J your hearts with
8 mine, so you may abound in this grace also. I say not this by way of
command ; but by the zeal of others I would prove the reality of your
9 love. For you know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, how, though
He was rich, yet for our sakes He became poor, that you, by His poverty,
10 might be made rich. And I give you my advice in this matter ; for it
becomes you to do thus, inasmuch as you began not only the contribution,
but the purpose of making it, before others,2 in the year which is passed
11 Now, therefore, fulfil your purpose by your deeds, that as you then
showed your readiness of will, so now you may finish the work, according
12 to your means. For if there be a willing mind, the3 gift is acceptable
13 when measured by the giver's power, and needs not to go beyond. Nor
[is this collection made] that others may be eased, and you distressed, but
14 to make your burdens equal, that as now your abundance supplies their
need, your own need may [at another time] be relieved in equal measure
15 by their abundance, as it is written, — " ||.e tfmt ga%wb Kinfy {lab
16 nothing abtx; anb \it fy&t ga%rcb little [rab no lack."4 But
thanks be to God, by whose gift the heart of Titus has the same zeal as
17 my own on your behalf; for he not only has consented to my desire, but
is himself very zealous in the matter, and departs 5 to you of his own
18 accord. And I have sent as his companion the brother who is with him,
whose praise in publishing the Glad-tidings 6 is spread throughout all the
19 churches ; who has moreover been chosen by the churches [of Macedo
nia] to accompany me in my journey (when I bear this gift, which I have
1 If we follow the Received Text, this is, lit- the act is looked upon, according to the classi
erally, the love which springs from you and dwells cal idiom, from the position of the reader.
in me ; if with Lachmann's text we transpose 6 The word here cannot refer, as some have
the pronouns, it will be, the love which I have imagined, to a written Gospel ; it is of constant
awakened in your hearts. [Lachmann's second occurrence in the New Testament (occurring
edition returns to the Received Text. — H.] sixty times in St. Paul's writings, and sixteen
3 " Began before ;" viz. before the Macedo- times in the other books), but never once in
nian churches. The meaning is that the Co- the supposed sense. Who the deputy here
rinthians had been the first not only to make mentioned was we have no means of ascertain-
the collection, but to propose it. ing. Probably, however, he was either Luke
* Literally, it is acceptable according to that (Acts xx. 6), or one of those, not Macedonians
which it possesses, not that which it possesses not. (ix. 4), mentioned Acts xx. 4; and possibly
4 Exodus xvi. 18, quoted according to LXX. may have been Tropbimus. See Acts xxi. 29.
The subject is the gathering of the manna. We may notice the coincidence between the
6 The tense in the original is past, because phrase here and in Acts xix. 29.

CHAF.xvn. SECOND EPISTLE TO THE CORINTHIANS. 499
undertaken to administer) ; that the Lord might be glorified, and that ! I ...
might undertake the task with more good will. For I guard myself 20
against all suspicion which might be cast upon me in my administration
of this bounty with which I am charged ; being " nrooibent of goob 21
report " not only " in % sigljt of t\t Ifrrrb," but also " in % sigjil
of men." 2 The brother 3 whom I have sent likewise with them is one 22
whom I have put to the proof in many trials, and found always zealous
in the work, but who is now yet more zealous from the full trust which
he has in you. Concerning Titus, then (on the one hand), he is partner 23
of my lot, and fellow-laborer with me for your good ; concerning our
brethren (on the other hand), they are ambassadors of the churches —
a manifestation of the glory of Christ. Show them, therefore, the proof 24
of your love, and justify my boasting on your behalf, in the sight of the
churches.4 For of your ministration to the saints [at Jerusalem] it is ix. 1
needless that I should write to you ; since I know the forwardness of your 2
mind, and boast of it to the Macedonians on your behalf, saying that
Achaia has been ready ever since last year ; and the knowledge of your
zeal has roused the most of them. But I have sent the brethren,5 lest 3
my report of you in this matter should be turned into an empty boast ;
that you may be truly ready, as I declared you to be. Lest, perchance, 4
the Macedonians who may come with me to visit you should find you not
yet ready, and so shame should fall upon me (for I will not say upon you)
in this ground of my boasting.6 Therefore, I thought it needful to desire 6
these brethren to visit you before my coming, and to arrange beforehand
the completion of this bounty which you before promised to have in
1 The reading of the best MSS. gives the 4 "To them" is contrasted with " to the
sense as follows, — to promote my willingness of saints " in the following verse ; the connection
mind, i. e. to render me more willing to undertake being, Show kindness to the deputies ; for as to
the administration of the alms, which St. Paul the collection, I need not ask you to show zeal
would have been unwilling to do without coad- for that, Sec. The " and " in the last clause is
jutors elected by the contributors, lest he should omitted by all the best MSS.
incur unworthy suspicions. 6 Viz. Titus and the other two.
2 The quotation is from Prov. iii. 4 (LXX.), " Literally the word means, Me groundwork
cited also Rom. xii. 17. on which some superstructure is founded. His
8 There is even less to guide us in our con- appeal to the Macedonians was grounded on
lectures as to the person here indicated than this readiness of the Corinthians. If (with
in the case of the other deputy mentioned the best MSS.) we omit "of my boasting,"
above. Here, also, the emissary was elected the meaning will be unaltered. Compare xi.
bv some of the Churches who had contributed to 1 7, and note on Heb. iii. 14.
the collection. He may have been either Luke,
Gains. Tychicus, or Trophimus (Acts xx. 4).

500 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap, xvii
. readiness ; so it be really given by your bounty, not wrung fi :>m your
6 covetousness. But remember, he 1 who sows sparingly shall reap sparing-
7 ly ; and he who sows bountifully shall reap bountifully. Let each do
according to the free choice of his heart ; not grudgingly, or of necessity ;
8 for " (gnb lofretjl a C^ierfhl giber." 2 And God is able to give you an
overflowing measure of all good gifts, that all your wants of every kind
may be supplied at all times, and you may give of your abundance to
9 every good work. As it is written, — " C^W goob man |mijj BtztttXtb
abroab, lot \i\t\ gifren to % poor; jjis righteousness remained
10 f0r.etr.er."3 And He who furnisheth " si>eb ta % sourer, anb breab
for fyt foob of man," 4 will furnish5 you with plenteous store of seed,
11 and bless your righteousness with fruits of increase ; being enriched with
all good things, that you may give ungrudgingly ; 6 causing thanksgivings
12 to God from ' those to whom I bear your gifts. For the ministration of
this service not only fills up the measure of the necessities of the saints,
13 but also overflows beyond it, in many thanks to God ; while they 8 praise
God for the proof thus given of the obedience wherewith you have con
sented to the Glad-tidings of Christ, and for the single-mindedness of your
14 liberality both to them, and to all. Moreover, in their prayers for you
they express the earnest longings of their love towards you, caused by the
15 surpassing grace of God manifested in you. Thanks be to God for His
unspeakable gift !
s. 1 Now I, Paul, myself exhort you by the meekness and g* Swn^S-
gentleness of Christ — (I, who am mean, forsooth, and lowly serviMB vrfth
1 The same expression occurs Gal. vi. 7. 6 In the best MSS. the verbs in this verse
3 Prov. xxii. 8 (according to LXX., with are future, not optative.
slight variation). 6 The word here properly denoting singlc-
8 Ps. cxii. 9 (LXX.). The subject of the ness means, when applied to the mind, a dis-
verb " scattered " in the psalm is " the good position free from arrieres-pense'es, either of
man " (in the fifth verse), which St. Paul duplicity, selfishness, or grudging ; thus it
leaves to be supplied by the memory of his might naturally acquire the meaning of liberal-
readers. To represent the quotation accurate- ity, which it has in the eighth and ninth chap-
ly to an English reader, it is necessary to insert ters in this Epistle, and perhaps in Rom.
this word, otherwise it would seem as if xii. 8.
" God " were the subject of the verb. 7 Literally, that you may give with liberality;
4 These words are an exact quotation from which works thanksgiving to God by my instni'
Isaiah lv. 10 (LXX.). Ignorance of this fact mentality.
has caused an inaccuracy in A. V. The literal 8 Literally, they, by the proof of this minis-
translation of the remainder of the verse is, — tration, praising God, i. e. being caused to praise
" Furnish and make plenteous your seed, and God for the obedience, &c.
increase the fruits springing from your righteous
ness."

chap. xvn. SECOND EPISTLE TO THE CORINTHIANS. 501
fai°e\each'eers iQ outward presence,1 while I am among you, yet treat you
dated him. boldly when I am absent) — I beseech you (I say), that you x. 2
will not force me to show, when I am present, the bold confidence in my
power, wherewith I reckon to deal with some who reckon 2 me by the
standard of the flesh. For, though living in the flesh, my warfare is 3
not waged according to the flesh. For the weapons which I wield are 4
not of fleshly weakness, but mighty in the strength of God to overthrow
the strongholds of the adversaries. Thereby can I overthrow the reason- 5
ings of the disputer, and pull down all lofty bulwarks that raise them
selves against the knowledge of God, and bring every rebellious thought
into captivity and subjection to Christ. And when the obedience of 6
your 3 church shall be complete, I am ready to punish all who may be
disobedient.4 Do you look at matters of outward advantage ? If there be any among 7
you who confidently assumes that he belongs [above the rest] to Christ8
let him reckon anew by his own reason,6 that if he belong to Christ, so
do I no less. For although I were to boast somewhat highly concerning 8
the authority which the Lord has given me (not to cast you down, but to
build you up), my words would not be shamed by the truth. I say this, 9
lest you should imagine that I am writing empty threats. " For his 10
letters," says one,1 " are weighty and powerful, but his bodily presence is
1 The phraseology is similar here, and in v. sary from the Judaizers of Palestine, who is
12 and x. 7. Compare also x. 10. especially referred to in this chapter.
2 Literally, who reckon me as walking accord- 6 In the former edition this phrase was
ing to the flesh. The verses which follow ex- translated consider. Dr. Alford has expressed
plain the meaning of the expression. an opinion that this translation is " surely
8 " Your." Compare ii. 5. He means that inadmissible," and that it " entirely omits of
the disobedient minority would be chastised. himself." Yet it is in fact equivalent to his
4 [We should notice in verses 3-6 the com- own translation, " let him reckon out of his
pleteness of the military allegory. The image own mind," (for what is considering but reek-
is that of a campaign against rebels: rock- oning out of one's own mind?) Nevertheless it
forts (such as those on St. Paul's own Cilician must be admitted that the former translation
coast) must be cast down : and when the gen- did not give sufficient emphasis to " of himself."
eral obedience of the country is secured, those 7 Literally, " says he ; " but it is occasion-
who are still rebellious must be summarily ally used impersonally for " they say ; " yet
punished. We should observe too the new as, in that sense, the plural would be more
turn given to one phrase (not casting down, but naturally used, the use of " says he " and of
building up) in verse 8, and even in xiii. 10. " such a man," in the next verse, seems to point
See also xii. 19. — H.] to a single individual at the head of St. Paul's
6 The party who said "I of Christ." (1 opponents. See last note and p. 484, and com-
Cor. i. 12.) See Ch. XIIL As we have pare the use of " such a man " for the single
remarked above, p. 484, this party at Corinth incestuous person (2 Cor. ii. 7), and for St
aeems to have been formed and led by an emis- Paul himself (2 Cor. xii. 2).

502 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap. xvn.
x 11 weak, and his speech contemptible." Let such a man assure himself
that the words which I write while absent I will bear out by my deeds
12 when present.1 For I venture not to number or compare myself with
certain of the self-commenders ; nay, they, measuring themselves by
themselves, and comparing themselves with themselves, are guilty of
13 folly.2 But I, for my part, will not let my boasting carry me beyond
measure, but will confine it within that measure given me by God, who
14 made my line reach even to you. For I stretch not myself beyond due
bounds (as though I reached you not) ; for I have already come as far
15 even as Corinth3 to publish the Glad-tidings of Christ. I am not boast
ing beyond measure, in the labors of others ; 4 but I hope that as your
faith goes on increasing among5 yourselves, I shall be still further
16 honored within my appointed limits, by bearing the Glad-tidings to the
countries beyond you ; not by boasting of work made ready to my hand
17 within another man's limit. Meantime, " |p.e tfral boasletjj, let fritf!
18 boast in t\t |fbrb."6 For a man is proved worthy, not when he com
mends himself, but when he is commended by the Lord.
xi. 1 Would that ye could bear with me a little in my folly ! Yea, ye
2 already bear with me. For I love you with a godly jealousy, because I
betrothed you to one only husband, even to Christ, that I might present
3 you unto Him in virgin purity ; but I fear lest, as Eve was beguiled by the
craftiness of the serpent, so your imaginations should be corrupted, and
you should be seduced from your single-minded faithfulness to Christ.
4 For if he that comes among you is preaching another Jesus, whom I
preached not, or if you are receiving [from him] another Spirit, which
yon received not before, or a new Glad-tidings, which you accepted not
5 before, you would do well to bear with me ; 7 for I reckon myself no whit
1 Literally, Let such a man reckon, that such apparently been caused by the difficulty of the
as I am in word by letters while absent, such will Hellenistic form.
/ be also in deed when present." 8 " You."
2 The Greek word here is a Hellenistic 4 This was the conduct of St Paul's Juda-
form of the 3d pi. ind. present, and occurs izing antagonists.
Mat. xiii. 13. Hence we need not take it here 6 Instead of " by you " we translate " in
for the dative plural. If the latter view were you," and connect it with " increased."
correct, the translation would be, " but I meas- 6 Quoted, according to the sense, from Jer.
ure myself by my own standard, and compare ix. 24 (LXX.) ; " in the Lord " being substi-
myself with myself alone, unwise as I am." tuted for a longer phrase. Quoted also 1 Cor.
But this translation presents several difficul- i. 31.
ties, both in itself, and considered in reference 7 Lachmann (with the Vatican Manu-
to the context. Lachmann's reading has script) has the verb in the present, which

shaf.xvji. SECOND EPISTLE TO THE CORINTHIANS. 503 XI.
behind your super-eminent Apostles.1 Yea, though I be unskilled in the 6
arts of speech, yet I am not wanting in the gift of 2 knowledge ; but I
have manifested 3 it towards you in all things, and amongst all men. Or 7
is it a sin [which must rob me of the name of Apostle],4 that I proclaimed
to you, without fee or reward, the Glad-tidings of God, and abased5
myself that you might be exalted ? Other churches I spoiled, and took 8
their wages to do you service. And when I was with you, though I was 9
in want, I pressed not upon any of you ; for the brethren,6 when they
came from Macedonia, supplied my needs ; and I kept and will keep
myself altogether from casting a burden upon you. As the truth of 10
Christ is in me, no deed of mine shall rob me 7 of this boasting in the
region of Achaia. And why ? Because I love you not ? God knows 11
my love. But what I do I will continue to do, that I may cut off all 12
ground from those who wish to find some ground of slander ; and let
them show the same cause for their boasting ' as I for mine.8 For men 13
like these are false Apostles, deceitful workmen, clothing themselves in
the garb of Christ's Apostles. And no wonder ; for even Satan can 14
transform himself into an angel of light. It is not strange, then, if his 15
servants disguise themselves as servants of righteousness ; but their end
shall be according to their works.
makes the coincidence with v. 1 more exact; factories in those times) his fellow-workmen in
but if we keep the aorist, it may bear the sense Aquila's tent-manufactory were slaves. Com-
here given it, on the same principle on which pare Phil. iv. 12, "I know how to be abased."
erat is often used for esset, «a&fuerat for fuisset. 6 Probably Timotheus and Silvanus, who
We understand " bear with me " (not " bear may have brought the contribution sent by
with him," with most commentators), because the Philippians. The A. V. " which came "
this agrees better with the context (the prepo- is incorrect.
sition "for" following), and with the first verse 7 According to the true reading here the
of the chapter. literal English would be, " this boasting shall not
1 This phrase (which occurs only in this be stopped for me."
Epistle) is ironical, as is evident from the 8 The literal English of this difficult pas-
epithet "the super-apostolic Apostles." He sage is, "that they, in the ground of their boasting,
refers to the Judaizing emissaries from Pales- may be found even as I." De Wette refers
tine who had arrived at Corinth. " wherein they glory " to the Apostolic Office.
2 The gift of " Gnosis " was a deep insight We take it more generally. A more obvious
into spiritual truth. See Ch. XI IT. p. 372, way would be to take the phrase (with Chrys-
note. ostom and the older interpreters) to mean
8 This is according to the reading, sup- their abstaining from receiving maintenance ;
ported by the preponderating weight of MS. bat we know that the false teachers at Corinth
authority. did not do tn's (compare v. 20 below), but,
4 Seep. 381. on tne contrary, boasted of their privilege,
5 i. e. by working with his hands for his and alleged that St. Paul, by not claiming it,
dailv bread. See p. 337. In all probability showed his consciousness that he was nol
( judging fro™ wnat we know of other manu- truly sent by Christ. See 1 Cor. ix.

504 THE LIFE AN'D EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap.xvti.
xi. 16 I entreat you all once more ' not to count me for a fool ; or, if you
think me such, yet bear with me in my folly, that I, too, may boast a
17 little of myself. But, in so doing, I. speak not in the spirit of the Lord,
but, as it were, in folly, while we stand upon this ground2 of boasting;
18 for, since many are boasting in the spirit of the flesh, I will boast like-
19 wise. And I know that you bear kindly with fools as beseems the wise.3
20 Nay, you bear with men though they enslave you, though they devour
you, though they entrap you, though they exalt themselves over you,
21 though they smite you on the face, to degrade you.4 I say that I was
weak ; 5 and yet, if any have ground of boldness, I too (I speak in folly)
22 have ground to be as bold as they. Are they Hebrews ? so am I. Are
23 they sons of Israel ? so am I. Are they the seed of Abraham ? so am I.
Are they servants of Christ ? (I speak as though I were beside myself)
such, far more, am I. In labors more abundant, in stripes above measure,
24 iii prisons more frequent,' in deaths oft. (Five times I received from
25 Jews the forty stripes save one ; thrice I was scourged with the Roman
rods ; once I was stoned ; thrice I suffered shipwreck ; 6 a night and a day
26 have I spent in the open 7 sea.) In journeyings often ; in perils of rivers,
in perils of robbers ; in perils from my countrymen, in perils from the
heathen ; in perils in the city, in perils in the wilderness, in perils in the
27 sea ; in perils among false brethren. In toil and weariness, often in sleep
less watchings ; in hunger and thirst, often without bread to eat ; in cold
28 and nakedness. And besides all the rest,8 there is the crowd9 which
29 presses upon me daily, and the care of all the churches. Who is weak,10
1 Literally, " / say once more, let none count Lystra. What a life of incessant adventure
me," &c. and peril is here disclosed to us ! And when
2 See note on 2 Cor. ix. 4. we remember that he who endured and dared
8 This is ironical. So " ye are wise " in all this was a man constantly suffering from
1 Cor. iv. 10. infirm health (see 2 Cor. iv. 7-12, and 2 Cor.
4 Literally, in the way of degradation. The xii. 7-10, and Gal. iv. 13, 14), such heroic
punctuation we adopt gives a simpler and self-devotion seems almost superhuman.
more natural sense than that adopted in the 7 Probably in a small boat (or perhaps on
first edition ; and it also better suits the use a plank), escaping from one of the wrecks.
of the pleonastic phrase here and in 2 Cor. v. 8 Not " those things that are without " as in
19 and 2 Thess. ii. 2. A. V.
0 This refers to the acknowledgments he 9 For this meaning of the wcrd compare
has previously made of weakness in outward Acts xxiv. 12. If we adopt another reading,
advantages, e. g. at xi. 6 and x. 1. which has the greater weight of existing MSS.
* The five Jewish scourgings, two of the in its favor, but patristic authority against it,
three Roman beatings with rods (one being the meaning will be nearly the same; se«
at Philippi), and the three shipwrecks, are all Canon Stanley's note.
unrecorded in the Acts. The stoning was at v> For the way in which St. Paul shared

CLAr xvn. SECOND EPISTLE TO THE CORINTHIANS. 505
but I share his weakness ? Who is caused to fall, but I burn with indig- .
nation ? If I must needs boast, I will boast of my weakness God, who 30,31
is tho Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, He who is blessed forever, knows
that I lie not.1
In Damascus, the governor under Aretas,2 the king, kept watch over 32
the city with a garrison, purposing to apprehend me ; and I was let down 33
by the wall, through a window, in a basket, and thus [not by my strength,
Lut by my weakness] I escaped his hands. It is not for me, then, to xii. 1
boast. '
But I will come also to visions and revelations of the Lord. I know 4
a man who was caught up fourteen years ago (whether in the body or 2
out of the body I cannot tell; God knoweth), caught up, I say, in the
power of Christ,5 even to the third heaven. And I know that such a man 3
(whether in the body or out of the body I cannot tell ; God knoweth)
was caught up into Paradise,6 and heard unspeakable words, which it is 4
not lawful for man to utter. Of such a man I will boast ; but of myself 5
I will not boast, save in the tokens of my weakness. If I should choose 6
to boast, I should not be guilty of empty vanity, for I should speak the
truth ; but I forbear to speak, that I may not cause any man to think of
the weakness of the "weaker brethren," see ious to himself? This seems the best view,
p. 390, and the passages there referred to. but it is far from satisfactory. There is some-
1 This solemn oath, affirming his veracity, thing most disappointing in his beginning thus
probably refers to the preceding statements of to relate in detail the first in that series of
his labors and dangers. Compare Gal. i. 20. wonderful escapes of which he had just before
If, however, wo should suppose that the next given a rapid sketch, and then suddenly and
two verses were originally intended to be the abruptly breaking off; leaving our curiosity
beginning of a narrative of all his sufferings roused and yet ungratified. We cannot agree
from the beginning, then we might refer the with De Wette in considering the Damascene
asseveration to such intended narrative. escape to be introduced as the climax of all
A For the historical questions connected the other perils mentioned, nor in referring to
with this incident, see p. 93. [A note on the it the solemn attestation of v. 31.
word Ethnarch will be found on p. 100. — H.] 4 The mistranslation of the verb in A. V.
8 We r"t"er the reading of the Textns (knew for know) very seriouly affects the sense :
Receptus '" nicl. i.-also adopted by Chrysostom nor is there any thing in the Greek correspond
and by T^he-dorf) to that of the Vatican ing to " about."
Manuscript, adopted by Lachmann. On the 6 We take " in Christ " with " caught up,"
other hand, for what follows we take Lach- which would have come immediately after the
mann's reading, on the authority of the Co- date, had it not been intercepted by the paren-
dex Vaticanus, instead of the Textus Receptus. thetic clause. To translate " a Christian man "
The whole passage is most perplexing, from (as some commentators have done) is hardly
the obscurity of its connection with what pre- justified by such analogies as " they that are
cedes and what follows. Why did St. Paul in Christ."
mention his escape from Damascus in so much 6 Compare Luke xxiii. 43, To^hxy shalt
detail t Was it merely as an event ignomin- thou be with me in Paradise, and Rev. ii. 7

506 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap. xvii.
.. me more highly than when he sees my deeds or hears my teaching.1
7 And lest, through the exceeding greatness of these revelations, I should
be lifted up with pride, there was given me a thorn in the flesh,2 a mes-
8 senger of Satan, to buffet me, to keep down my pride. And thrice I
9 besought the Lord 3 concerning it, that it might depart from me. But
He hath said to me, " My grace is sufficient for thee ; for my strength ia
mighty 4 in weakness." Most gladly, therefore, will I boast rather in my
weakness than in my strength, that the strength of Christ may rest upoD
10 me, and dwell in me.5 Therefore I rejoice in signs of weakness, in out
rage, in necessities, in persecutions, in straitness of distress, endured for
Christ ; for when I am weak, then am I strong.6
11 I have been guilty of folly, but you forced me to it ; for I ought myself
to have been commended by you : for I came no whit behind your super-
12 eminent 7 Apostles, though I be of no account. The marks, at least, of
an Apostle were seen in the deeds which I wrought among you, in signs,
and wonders, and miracles, with steadfast endurance of persecution.8
13 Wherein had you the disadvantage of other churches, unless, indeed, that
I did not burden you with my own maintenance ? forgive me this wrong.
14 Behold I am now for the third time 9 preparing to visit you, and I purpose
to cast no burden upon you ; for I seek not your substance, but yourselves.
Since children should not lay up wealth for parents, but parents for cliil-
15 dren. Nay, rather, most gladly will I spend, yea, and myself be spent,
for your souls, though the more abundantly I love you, the less I be
loved.
16 But though it be granted that I did not burden you myself, yet per-
17 chance this was my cunning, whereby I entrapped your simplicity. Did
I defraud you of your wealth by some of the messengers whom I sent to
1 He alludes to the low opinion expressed 6 The full meaning is, to come to a place for
by his adversaries at Corinth of his personal the purpose of fixing one's tent there. Compare
qualifications and teaching; compare x. 10. (with the whole verse) iv. 7.
2 The original is perhaps not adequately rep- 6 i. e. the more he was depressed by suffer-
resented by the word thorn, although the thorns ing and persecution, the more was he enabled
of the East are far more formidable than those to achieve by the aid of Christ. See a very
of England. Stake is probably a more accu- striking sermon of A. Monod (in his Discours
rate translation. See Prof. Stanley's note on sur St. Paul) on this text.
the passage. A painful bodily infirmity is 7 See note on xi. 5.
meant. See Gal. iv. 13, 14, and p. 236. 8 The word here (in St. Paul's language)
8 That is, the Lord Jesus, as appears by means steadfastness under persecution. Some
' Christ " in the next verse. of the persecutions referred to are recorded in
4 Has its full development. Acts xviii. 9 See note on xiii. 1

chap. xvu. SECOND EPISTLE TO THE CORINTHIANS. 507 xii.
you ? I desired Titus to visit you, and with him I sent the brother, his 18
fellow-traveller. Did Titus defraud you ? Did we not act in the same
spirit ? Did we not walk in the same steps ?
He warns the Do you again imagine that it is before you I defend myself? 19
factious and XT
immoral mi- Way, before God I speak, in Christ ; but all, beloved, for your
noi-ity that he 1-77 j
strained t°n' sakes, that you may be built up. For I fear lest perchance 20
& they persist when I come I should find you not such as I could wish, and
iu their dis
obedience, that you also should find me other than you desire. I fear to
find you full of strife, jealousies, passions, intrigues,1 slanderings, back-
bitings, vaunting, sedition. I fear lest, when I come, my God will again 21
humble me 2 by your faults, and I shall mourn over many among those
who have sinned before,3 and who have not repented of the uncleanness,
and fornication, and wantonness which they committed.
I now come to you for the third time.4 " ®ut of t\t maufy ai tfoo xiii.1
or tjjoe foiiness.es sjjall tbtxv, toorb bt confirnteb."5 I have warned 2
you formerly, and I now forewarn you, as when 6 1 was present the
second time, so now, while I am absent, saying to those who had sinned
before [my last visit] , and to all the rest of the offenders, — " If I come
again I will not spare." ' Thus you shall have the proof you seek of 3
tb ! power of Christ, who speaks in me ; for He shows no weakness towards
you, but works mightily among you. For although He died upon the 4
cross through the weakness of the flesh,8 yet now He lives through the
power of God. And so I, too, share the weakness of His body ; 9 yet I
1 For thi word here, see note on Rom. ii. 8. upon due evidence." Or else (perhaps), " I
2 Literally, humble me in respect of you. See shall now assuredly fulfil my threats."
on this verse p. 418, note. * This passage, in which the word for "I
8 Sinned " before : " viz. before my last write " is omitted by the best MSS., seems
Tjsjt conclusive for the intermediate journey. What
4 " This third time I am coming to you." would be the meaning of saying, "I forewarn
This could scarcely mean merely, " I am for you as if I were present the second time, now
the third time preparing to visit you," although also while I am absent " ? which is the trans-
2 Cor. xii. 14 might imply no more than that. lation that we must adopt if we deny the in-
See p. 418, note. Prof. Stanley (who ignores termediate visit. Also the "they who had
the intermediate visit) can only get over this sinned before " contrasted with the " all the
argument by supposing that St. Paul is here rest " (v. 2), seems inexplicable except on this
" reckoning his Second Epistle as virtually a hypothesis.
second visit." (Stanley's Corinthians, vol. ii. 7 The conjunction here (as frequently) is
ggj \ equivalent to a mark of quotation.
5 Dent. xix. 15 (from LXX. nearly verba- 8 The word here properly means weakness
tim), meaning, " I will judge not without ex- of the body.
amination, nor will I abstain from punishing 9 This is another reference to the dispara-

508 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap. xvu.
y, shall share also the power of God, whereby He lives, when ! I come to
5 deal with you. Examine 2 [not me, but] yourselves, whether you are
truly in the faith ; put yourselves to the proof [concerning Christ's
presence with you which ye seek in me]. Know ye not of your own
selves, that Jesus Christ is dwelling in you ? unless, perchance, when
6 thus proved, you fail to abide the proof.3 But I hope you will find
7 that I, for my part, abide the proof.4 Yet I pray to God that you ,
may do no evil ; 5 desiring not that my own power may be clearly
proved, but that you may do right, although I should seem unable
8 to abide the proof ; for I have no power against the truth, but only for
9 the truth's defence. I rejoice, I say, when I am powerless [against you],
and you are strong ; yea, the very end of my prayers is your perfect
10 reformation. Therefore I write this to you while absent, that, when
present, I may not deal harshly with you in the strength of that authority
which the Lord has given me, not to cast down,6 but to build up.
11 Finally, brethren, farewell. Reform what is amiss in your- conclusion.
> selves,7 exhort one another, be of one mind, live in peace ; so shall the
12 God of love and peace be with you. Salute one another with the kiss of
13 holiness.8 All the saints here salute you.
14 The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, and the love of God, Autograph
benediction.
and the communion of the Holy Spirit, be with you all.9

ging reflections (see x. 10) cast upon him by reference to the context (see preceding note).
his Corinthian opponents. He says virtually, A paronomasia on the same words occurs
" You say that I am weak in bodily presence, Rom. i. 28.
and contemptible in personal accomplishments ; 4 Viz. the proof that Christ's power is with me.
so also Christ was weak in the flesh, and suf- 6 This may be translated (as it is by Grotius
fered a shameful death upon the cross ; yet He and Billroth, and was in our former edition),
triumphed over His adversaries, and now shows " that I may not harm you ; " for the verb used
His victorious power ; and so shall I do, in the here sometimes takes a double accusative in
same strength." The sentiment is the same as N. T. ; e.g. Matt, xxvii. 22. Yet this con-
in iv. 10. struction so seldom occurs, that it seems better
1 " Towards you." The literal English of to adopt the more obvious meaning, although
the above passage is as follows : For if He it does not so clearly suit the context.
was crucified through weakness, yet He lives 6 Compare x. 8. [And see note on x. 6.
through the power of God ; for I also am weak This is the last echo of the military allegory ;
in Him, but I shall live with Him, through the but with the threatening turned into encour-
power of God towards you . agement. — H.]
2 "Proof" and "prove" would give the 7 The substantive corresponding to tliii
verbal connection between v. 3 and v. 5. verb is found in verse 9 ; and see 1 Cor. i. 10.
8 The Greek means, to fail when tested; this 8 See note on 1 Thess. v. 25.
was the original meaning of the English to be 9 The " Amen " is not found in the be*
reprobate (A. V.). Observe here, again, the MSS.

chap. xvu. CONTRIBUTIONS FOR THE POOR IN JUDAEA. 509
In this letter we find a considerable space devoted to subjects con
nected with a collection now in progress for the poor Christians in
Judaea.1 It is not the first time that we have seen St. Paul actively
exerting himself in such a project.2 Nor is it the first time that this par
ticular contribution has been brought before our notice. At Ephesus, in
the First Epistle to the Corinthians, St. Paul gave special directions as to
the method in which it should be laid up in store (1 Cor. xvi. 1-4).
Even before this period similar instructions had been given to the
Churches of Galatia (ib. 1). And the whole project was in fact the ful
filment of a promise made at a still earlier period, that, in the course of
his preaching among the Gentiles, the poor in Judasa should be remem
bered (Gal. ii. 10).
The collection was going on simultaneously in Macedonia and Achaia ;
and the same letter gives us information concerning the manner in which
it was conducted in both places. The directions given to the Corinthians
were doubtless similar to those under which the contribution was made
at Thessalonica and Philippi. Moreover, direct information is inciden
tally given of what was actually done in Macedonia ; and thus we are
furnished with materials for depicting to ourselves a passage in the
Apostle's life which is not described by St. Luke. There is much
instruction to be gathered from the method and principles according to
which these funds were collected by St. Paul and his associates, as well
as from the conduct of those who contributed for their distant and suf
fering brethren.
Both from this passage of Scripture and from others we are fully made
aware of St. Paul's motives for urging this benevolent work. Besides
his promise made long ago at Jerusalem, that, in his preaching among the
Gentiles, the poor Jewish Christians should be remembered,3 the poverty
of the residents in Judaea would be a strong reason for his activity in
collecting funds for their relief among the wealthier communities who
were now united with them in the same faith and hope.4 But there was
a far higher motive, which lay at the root of the Apostle's anxious and
energetic zeal in this cause. It is that which is dwelt on in the closing
verses of the ninth chapter of the Epistle which has just been read,5 and
is again alluded to in words less sanguine in the Epistle to the Romans.6
A serious schism existed between the Gentile and Hebrew Christians,7
1 The whole of the eighth and ninth chap- ence to the early jealousy between thu Chris-
ters. tians of Aramaic and Hellenistic descent,
2 See the account of the mission of Barna- p. 61.
bas and Saul to Jerusalem in the time of the 6 2 Cor. ix. 12-15.
famine, Ch. IV. 6 Bom. xv. 30-31.
8 Gal. ii. 10, above quoted. Seep. 195. 7 Seethe remarks on this snbject in Ch.
* See the remarks on this subject, in refer- Vii.

510 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap. xvu.
which, though partially closed from time to time, seemed in danger of
growing continually wider under the mischievous influence of the Juda
izers. The great labor of St. Paul's life at this time was directed to
the healing of this division. He felt that if the Gentiles had been made
partakers of the spiritual blessings of the Jews, their duty was to contrib
ute to them in earthly blessings (Rom. xv. 27), and that nothing would
be more likely to allay the prejudices of the Jewish party than charitable
gifts freely contributed by the Heathen converts.1 According as cheerful
or discouraging thoughts predominated in his mind, — and to such alter
nations of feeling even an apostle was liable, — he hoped that " the minis
tration of that service would not only fill up the measure of the necessities
of Christ's people" in Judaea, but would "overflow" in thanksgivings
and prayers on their part for those whose hearts had been opened to bless
them (2 Cor. ix. 12-15), or he feared that this charity might be rejected,
and he entreated the prayers of others, " that he might be delivered
from the disobedient in Judaea, and that the service which he had under
taken for Jerusalem might be favorably received by Christ's people"
(Rom. xv. 30, 31).
Influenced by these motives, he spared no pains in promoting the
work ; but every step was conducted with the utmost prudence and deli
cacy of feeling. He was well aware of the calumnies with which his
enemies were ever ready to assail his character ; and, therefore, he took
the most careful precautions against the possibility of being accused of
mercenary motives. At an early stage of the collection, we find him
writing to the Corinthians, to suggest that " whomsoever they should
judge fitted for the trust should be sent to carry their benevolence to
Jerusalem " (1 Cor. xvi. 3) ; and again he alludes to the delegates com
missioned with Titus, as " guarding himself against all suspicion which
might be cast on him in his administration of the bounty with which he
was charged," and as being " careful to do all things in a seemly manner.
not only in the sight of the Lord, but also in the sight of men " (2 Cor.
viii. 20, 21). This regard to what was seemly appears most strikingly in
his mode of bringing the subject before those to whom he wrote and
spoke. He lays no constraint upon them. They are to give " not grudg
ingly or of necessity," but each " according to the free choice of his heart :
for God loveth a cheerful giver" (2 Cor. ix. 7). " If there is a willing
mind, the gift is acceptable when measured by the giver's power, and
needs not to go beyond" (2 Cor. viii. 12). He spoke rather as giving
"advice" (viii. 10) than a "command;"2 and he sought to prove the re-
1 See p. 120. sake he rather besought him," v. 9. See the
2 Compare his language to Philemon, whom Introduction.
he " might have commanded," but " for love's

chap.xvh. LIBERALITY OF THE MACEDONIANS. 511
ality of his converts' love by reminding them of the zeal of others (viii. 8).
In writing to the Corinthians, he delicately contrasts their wealth with
the poverty of the Macedonians. In speaking to the Macedonians them
selves, such a mode of appeal was less natural, for they were poorer and
more generous. Yet them also he endeavored to rouse to a generous
rivalry, by telling them of the zeal of Achaia (viii. 24, ix. 2). To them
also he would doubtless say that " he who sows sparingly shall reap spar
ingly, and he who sows bountifully shall reap bountifully " (ix. 6), while
he would gently remind them that God was ever able to give them an
overflowing measure of all good gifts, supplying all their wants, and en
abling them to be bountiful J to others (ib. 8). And that one overpower
ing argument could never be forgotten, — the example of Christ, and
the debt of love we owe to Him, — " You know the grace of our Lord
Jesus Christ, how, though He was rich, yet for our sakes He became poor,
that you, by His poverty, might be made rich " (viii. 9). Nor ought we,
when speaking of the instruction to be gathered from this charitable un
dertaking, to leave unnoticed the calmness and deliberation of the method
which he recommends of laying aside, week by week,2 what is devoted
to God (1 Cor. xvi. 2), — a practice equally remote from the excite
ment of popular appeals, and the mere impulse of instinctive benevo
lence. The Macedonian Christians responded nobly to the appeal which was
made to them by St. Paul. The zeal of their brethren in Achaia " roused
the most of them to follow it" (2 Cor. ix. 2). God's grace was abun
dantly " manifested in the Churches " 3 on the north of the ^Egean (ib.
viii. 1). Their conduct in this matter, as described to us by the Apostle's
pen, rises to the point of the highest praise. It was a time, not of pros
perity, but of great affliction, to the Macedonian Churches ; nor were they
wealthy communities like the Church of Corinth ; yet, " in their heavy
trial, the fulness of their joy overflowed out of the depth of their poverty
in the riches of their liberality" (ib. viii. 2). Their contribution was no
niggardly gift, wrung from their covetousness (viii. 5) ; but they gave
honestly " according to their means " (ib. 3), and not only so, but even
" beyond their means " (ib.) ; nor did they give grudgingly, under the
pressure of the Apostle's urgency, but" of their own free will, beseeching
him with much entreaty that they might bear their part in the grace of
ministering to Christ's people " (ib. 3, 4). And this liberality arose from
1 Compare what was said at Miletus, Acts remarks in the Horce Paulines on 2 Cor. The
xx. 35 ' also Eph. iv. 28. same plan had been recommended in Galatia,
2 From 2 Cor. viii. 10, ix. 2, it would seem and probably in Macedonia.
that the plan recommended in 1 Cor. xvi. 2 8 See p. 497, n. 6.
had been carried into effect. See Paley's

512 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap, xvu
that which is the basis of all true Christian charity. " They gave them
selves first to the Lord Jesus Christ, by the will of God " (ib. 5).
The Macedonian contribution, if not complete, was in a state of much
forwardness,1 when St. Paul wrote to Corinth. He speaks of liberal funds
as being already pressed upon his acceptance (2 Cor. viii. 4), and the
delegates who were to accompany him to Jerusalem had already been
chosen (2 Cor. viii. 19, 23). We do not know how many of the Churches
of Macedonia took part in this collection,2 but we cannot doubt that
that of Philippi held a conspicuous place in so benevolent a work. In the
case of the Philippian Church, this bounty was only a continuation of the
benevolence they had begun before, and an earnest of that which glad
dened the Apostle's heart in his imprisonment at Rome. " In the begin
ning of the Gospel " they and they only had sent once and again 3 to
relieve his wants, both at Thessalonica and at Corinth (Philip, iv. 15,
16) ; and " at the last " their care of their friend and teacher " flourished
again" (ib. 10), and they sent their gifts to him at Rome, as now they
sent to their unknown brethren at Jerusalem. The Philippians are in
the Epistles what that poor woman is in the Gospels, who placed two
mites in the treasury. They gave much, because they gave of their
poverty ; and wherever the Gospel is preached throughout the whole
world, there shall this liberality be told for a memorial of them.
If the principles enunciated by the Apostle in reference to the collec
tion command our devout attention, and if the example of the Macedonian
Christians is held out to the imitation of all future ages of the Church,
the conduct of those who took an active part in the management of the
business should not be unnoticed. Of two of these the names are
unknown to us,4 though their characters are described. One was a
brother, " whose praise in publishing the Gospel was spread throughout
the Churches," and who had been chosen by the Church of Macedonia to
accompany St. Paul with the charitable fund to Jerusalem (2 Cor. viii.
18, 19). The other was one " who had been put to the proof in many
trials, and always found zealous in the work" (ib. 22). But concerning
Titus, the third companion of these brethren, " the partner of St. Paul's
1 The aorist in 2 Cor. viii. 2 docs not ne- communication among them was easy along
cessarily imply that the collection was closed ; the Via Egnatia ; as when the first contribu-
and the present in ix. 2 rather implies the tions were sent from Philippi to St. Paul at
contrary. Thessalonica. See p. 284.
''¦ In 2 Cor. xi. 9 we find Philippi used as s See above, p. 480. For the account of this
equivalent to Macedonia (pp.480, 481), and so relief being sent to St. Paul, see p. 284; and
it may be here. But it is not absolutely cer- p. 338, n. 4, in reference to Phil. iv. 10, and
tain (ibid.) that the Second Epistle to the 2 Cor. xi. 9.
Corinthians was written at Philippi. The 4 See the notes on 2 Cor. viii.
Churches in Macedonia were only few, and

CHAP. XVII.

TITUS. 513

lot, and his fellow-laborer for the good of the Church," we have fuller
information ; and this seems to be the right place to make a more par
ticular allusion to him, for he was nearly concerned in all the steps of
the collection now in progress.
Titus does not, like Timothy, appear at intervals through all the pas
sages of the Apostle's life. He is not mentioned in the Acts at all, and
this is the only place where he comes conspicuously forward in the
Epistles ; l and all that is said of him is connected with the business of
the collection.2 Thus we have a detached portion of his biography, which
is at once a thread that guides us through the main facts of the contribu
tion for the Judaean Christians, and a source whence we can draw some
knowledge of the character of that disciple, to whom St. Paul addressed
one of his pastoral Epistles. At an early stage of the proceedings he
seems to have been sent, — soon after the First Epistle was despatched
from Ephesus to Corinth (or perhaps as its bearer), — not simply to
enforce the Apostle's general injunctions, but3 to labor also in forward
ing the collection (2 Cor. xii. 18). Whilst he was at Corinth, we find
that he took an active and zealous part at the outset of the good work
(ib. viii. 6). And now that he had come to Macedonia, and brought the
Apostle good news from Achaia, he was exhorted to return, that he might
finish what was so well begun, taking with him (as we have seen) the
Second Epistle to the Corinthians, and accompanied by the two deputies
who have just been mentioned. It was a task which he was by no means
unwilling to undertake. God " put into his heart the same zeal " which
Paul himself had ; he not only consented to the Apostle's desire, but was
" himself very zealous in the matter, and went of his own accord " (2
Cor. viii. 16, 17). If we put together these notices, scanty as they are,
of the conduct of Titus, they set before us a character which seems to
claim our admiration for a remarkable union of enthusiasm, integrity,
and discretion.
After the departure of Titus, St. Paul still continued to prosecute the
labors of an evangelist in the regions to the north of Greece. He was
unwilling as yet to visit the Corinthian Church, the disaffected members
- f which still caused him so much anxiety, — and he would doubtless
gladly employ this period of delay to accomplish any plans he might have
1 See p. 187, n. 12. It is observed there of St. Paul's life. This question will be dis-
that the only epistles in which he is mentioned cnssed afterwards.
are Gal., 2 Cor., and 2 Tim. See also p. 460, " See above, p. 479. The fact that the mis-
n# g sion of Titus had something to do with the
" The prominent appearance of Titus in collection, might be inferred from 2 Cor. xii.
this part of the history has been made an 18: "Did Titus defraud you?" We do not
argument for placing the Epistle to Titus, as know who the " brother" was that was sent
"Wieseler and others have done, about this part with him on that occasion from Ephesus.
S3

514 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap. xvii.
formed and left incomplete on his former visit to Macedonia. On that
occasion he had been persecuted in Philippi,1 and had been forced to
make a precipitate retreat from Thessalonica ; 2 and from Beroea his
course had been similarly urged to Athens and Corinth.3 Now he was
' able to embrace a wider circumference in his Apostolic progress. Taking
Jerusalem as his centre,4 he had been perpetually enlarging the circle of
his travels. In his first missionary journey he had preached in the
southern parts of Asia Minor and the northern parts of Syria : in his
second journey, he had visited the Macedonian towns which lay near the
shores of the iEgean : and now on his third progress he would seem to
have penetrated into the mountains of the interior, or even beyond them
to the shores of the Adriatic, and " fully preached the Gospel of Christ
round about unto Illyricum " (Rom. xv. 19).
We here encounter a subject on which some difference of opinion must
unavoidably exist. If we wish to lay down the exact route of the
Apostle, we must first ascertain the meaning of the term " Illyricum "
as used by St. Paul in writing to the Romans : and if we find this im
possible, we must be content to leave this part of the Apostle's travels iD
some degree of vagueness; more especially as the preposition (" unto,"
jttsjjpO employed in the passage is evidently indeterminate.
The political import of the word " Illyricum " will be seen by referring
to what has been written on the province of Macedonia 5 in an earlier
chapter. It has been there stated that the former province was contigu
ous to the north-western frontier of the latter. It must be observed, '
however, that a distinction was anciently drawn between Greek Illyricum,
a district on the south, which was incorporated by the Romans with
Macedonia, and formed the coast-line of that province where it touched
the Adriatic,6 — and Barbarous, or Roman Illyricum, which extended
towards the head' of that gulf, and was under the administration of a
separate governor. This is " one of those ill-fated portions of the earth,
which, though placed in immediate contact with civilization, have
remained perpetually barbarian." 7 For a time it was in close connec
tion, politically and afterwards ecclesiastically, with the capitals both of
the Eastern and Western empires : but subsequently it relapsed almost
into its former rude condition, and " to this hour it is devoid of illustrious
names and noble associations." 8 Until the time of Augustus, the

1 P- 257. « P. 272, &c. See our map of St. Paul's
2 P. 286. third missionary journey.
" P. 295. 6 For the seaboard of Macedonia on the
4 Notice the phrase, " from Jerusalem, and Adriatic, see pp. 273, 274.
in a circle" &c. Rom. xv. 19 ; and see the 7 Arnold's Rome, vol. i. p. 495.
Herat Paulinos. 8 Ibid.

ciiap. xvii. ILLYRICUM. 515
Romans were only in possession of a narrow portion along the coast,
which had been torn during the wars of the Republic from the piratic
inhabitants.1 But under the first Emperor a large region, extending far
inland towards the valleys of the Save and the Drave, was formed into a
province, and contained some strong links of the chain of military posts,
which was extended along the frontier of the Danube.2 At first it was
placed under the Senate : but it was soon found to require the presence
of large masses of soldiers : the Emperor took it into his own hands, and
inscriptions are still extant on which we can read the records of its
occupation by the seventh and eleventh legions.3 Dalmatia, which is
also mentioned by St. Paul (2 Tim. iv. 10), was a district in the southern
part of this province ; and after the final reduction of the Dalmatian
tribes, the province was more frequently called by this name than by that
of Illyricum.4 The limits of this political jurisdiction (to speak in
general terms) maybe said to have included Bosnia, and the modern5
Dalmatia, with parts of Croatia and Albania.
But the term Illyricum was by no means always, or even generally,
used in a strictly political sense. The extent of country included in the
expression was various at various times. The Illyrians were loosely
spoken of by the earlier Greek writers as the tribes which wandered on
the eastern shore of the Adriatic. The Illyricum which engaged the
arms of Rome under the Republic was only a narrow strip of that shore
with the adjacent islands. But in the Imperial times it came to be used
of a vast and vague extent of country lying to the south of the Danube,
to the east of Italy, and to the west of Macedonia.8 So it is used by
Strabo in the reign of Augustus, and similarly by Tacitus in his account
of the civil wars which preceded the fall of Jerusalem ; 7 and the same
phraseology continues to be applied to this region, till the third century
of the Christian era. We need not enter into the geographical changes
which depended on the new division of the empire under Constantine, or
into the fresh significance which, in a later age, was given to the ancient
names, when the rivalry of ecclesiastical jurisdictions led to the schism
1 It extended from the river Drilon to tne * Dalmatia is a name unknown to the
Istrian peninsula. earlier Greek writers.
2 One of the most important of these mili- 6 The modern name of Illyria has again
tary posts was Siscia, in the Pannonian coun- contracted to a district of no great extent in
try, on the Save. The line was continued by the northern part of the ancient province.
Augustus through Moesia, though the reduc- 6 See Gibbon's first chapter.
tion of that region to a province was later. 7 Tac. Hist. i. 2, 76, &c, where under the
Six legions protected the frontier of the Dan- term Illyricum are included Dalmatia, Panno-
ube. nia, and Moesia : and this, it must be remem-
8 Josephus alludes to these legions, War, bered, is strictly contemporaneous with the
ii. 16. His language on geographical subjects is apostle.
always important as an illustration of the Acts.

516 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap, xvii
of Eastern and Western Christendom.1 We have said enough to show
that it is not possible to assume that the Illyricum of St. Paul was a
definite district, ruled as a province by a governor from Rome.
It seems by far the most probable that the terms "Illyricum" and
" Dalmatia" are both used by St. Paul in a vague and general sense : as
we have before had occasion to remark in reference to Asia Minor, where
many geographical expressions, such as " Mysia," " Galatia," and
" Phrygia," were variously used, popularly and politically.2 It is indeed
quite possible that St. Paul, not deeming it right as yet to visit Corinth,
may have pushed on by the Via Egnatia,3 from Philippi and Thessalonica,
across the central mountains which turn the streams eastward and west
ward, to Dyrrhachium, the landing-place of those who had come by the
Appian Road from Rome to Brundusium.4 Then, though still in the
province of Macedonia, he would be in the district called Greek Elyri-
cum: 5 and he would be on a line of easy communication with Nicopolis6
on the south, where, on a later occasion, he proposed to winter (Tit. iii.
12) ; and he could easily penetrate northwards into Roman or Barbarous
Illyricum, where was that district of Dalmatia,1 which was afterwards
visited by his companion Titus, whom, in the present instance, he had
despatched to Corinth. But we must admit that the expression in the
Romans might have been legitimately 8 used, if he never passed beyond
the limits of Macedonia, and even if his Apostolic labors were entirely to
the eastward of the mountains, in the country watered by the Strymon
and the Axius.9
Whether he travelled widely and rapidly in the regions to the north of
Greece, or confined his exertions to the neighborhood of those churches
which he had previously founded, — the time soon came when he deter
mined to revisit that Church, which had caused him so much affliction
not unmixed with joy. During the course of his stay at Ephesus, and in
all parts of his subsequent journey in Troas and Macedonia, his heart
had been continually at Corinth. He had been in frequent communica-
1 A geographical account of Illyricum in B Nicopolis was in Epirus, which, it will be
its later ecclesiastical sense, and of the dioceses remembered (see above under Macedonia), was
which were the subjects of the rival claims of in the province of Achaia.
Rome and Constantinople, will be found in 7 See above, p. 515. It is indeed possible
Nealc's History of the Eastern Church. that the word Dalmatia in this Epistle may be
2 See pp. 204, 237. used for the province (of Illyricum or Dalma-
8 See the account of the Via Egnatia, p. 274. tia), and not a subordinate district of what
4 It has been said above (p. 274) that when was called Illyricum in the wider sense.
St. Paul was on the Roman way at Philippi 8 The preposition need not denote any
he was really on the road which led to Rome. thing more than that St. Paul came to the
The ordinary ferry was from Dyrrhachium to frontier.
Brundusium. 9 See what has been said of these rivers in
5 See above, p. 514 comparing pp. 272, 273. Ch TX

CHAP, XVU.

JOURNEY SOUTHWARD TO CORINTH.

517

tion with his inconsistent and rebellious converts. Three letters l had
been written to entreat or to threaten them. Besides his own personal
visit 2 when the troubles were beginning, he had sent several messengers,
who were authorized to speak in his name. Moreover, there was now a
special subject in which his interest and affections were engaged, the con
tribution for the poor in Judaea, which he wished to " seal " to those for
whom it was destined (Rom. xv. 28) before undertaking his journey to
the West.
Of the time and the route of this southward journey we can only say
that the most probable calculation leads us to suppose that he was travel
ling with his companions toward Corinth at the approach of winter;
and this makes it likely that he went by land rather than by sea.4 A
good road to the south had long been formed from the neighborhood of
Bercea,8 connecting the chief towns of Macedonia with those of Achaia.
Opportunities would not be wanting for preaching the Gospel at every
stage in his progress ; and perhaps we may infer from his own expression
in writing to the Romans (xv. 23), — "I have no more place in those
parts," — either that churches were formed in every chief city between
Thessalonica and Corinth, or that the Glad-tidings had been unsuccess
fully proclaimed in Thessaly and Bceotia, as on the former journey they
had found but little credence among the philosophers and triflers of
Athens.6

1 The question of the lost letter has been
discussed in Ch. XV. p. 421.
2 See again, on this intermediate visit, the
beginning of Ch. XV.
8 For the project of this westward journey,
§ee the end of Ch. XV. above.
4 See Acts xxvii. 9.
6 The roads through Dium have been al
luded to p. 296 ; and compare p. 292, n. 7.

6 Athens is never mentioned again after
Acts xviii. 1, 1 Thess. iii. 1. We do not
know that it was ever revisited by the Apos
tle, and in the second century we find that
Christianity was almost extinct there. See
p. 331 . At the same time, nothing would be
more easy than to visit Athens, with other
" Churches of Achaia," during his resident*
at Corinth. See p. 338, n. 5 ; and p. 484

Coin of Macedonia.

CHAPTER XVIIL
St. Paul's Return to Corinth. — Contrast with his First Visit. — Bad News from Galatia. -
He writes the Epistle to the Galatians.
IT was probably already winter when St. Paul once more beheld in
the distance the lofty citadel of Corinth towering above the isthmus
which it commands. The gloomy season must have harmonized with his
feelings as he approached. The clouds which, at the close of autumn,
so often hang round the summit of the Acro-Corinthus, and cast their
shadow upon the city below, might have seemed to typify the mists of
vice and error which darkened the minds even of its Christian citizens.
Their father in the faith knew that, for some of them at least, he had
labored in vain. He was returning to converts who had cast off the
morality of the Gospel ; to friends who had forgotten his love ; to ene •
mies who disputed his divine commission. It is true, the majority of the
Corinthian Church had repented of their worst sins, and submitted to his
Apostolic commands. Yet what was forgiven could not entirely be for
gotten ; even towards the penitent he could not feel all the confidence of
earlier affection ; and there was still left an obstinate minority, who would
not give up their habits of impurity, and who, when he spoke to them of
righteousness and judgment to come, replied either by openly defending
their sins, or by denying his authority and impugning his orthodoxy.
He now came prepared to put down this opposition by the most decisive
measures ; resolved to cast out of the Church these antagonists of truth
and goodness, by the plenitude of his Apostolic power. Thus he warned
them a few months before (as he had threatened when present on an
earlier occasion), " when I come again, I will not spare " (2 Cor. xiii. 2).
He declared his determination to punish the disobedient (2 Cor. x. 6). He
" boasted" of the authority which Christ had given him (2 Cor. x. 8).
He besought them not to compel him to use the weapons intrusted to him
(2 Cor. x. 2), weapons not of fleshly weakness, but endowed with the
might of God (2 Cor. x. 4). He pledged himself to execute by his
deeds, when present, all he had threatened by his words when absent (2
Cor. x. 11).
As we think of him, with these purposes of severity in his mind, ap
sis

chap, xviii. FEELINGS ON APPROACHING CORINTH 519
proaching the walls of Corinth, we are irresistibly reminded of the event
ful close of a former journey, when Saul, " breathing out threatenings
and slaughter against the disciples of the Lord," drew nigh to Damas
cus. How .strongly does this accidental resemblance bring out the essen
tial contrast between the weapons and the spirit of Saul and Paul ! Then
he wielded the sword of the secular power — he travelled as the proud
representative of the Sanhedrin — the minister of human cruelty and
injustice: he was the Jewish Inquisitor, the exterminator of heretics,
seeking for victims to imprison or to stone. Now he is meek and lowly,1
travelling in the humblest guise of poverty, with no outward marks of
pre-eminence or power ; he has no jailers at his command to bind his
captives, no executioners to carry out his sentence. All he can do is to
exclude those who disobey him from a society of poor and ignorant out
casts, who are the objects of contempt to all the mighty, and wise, and
noble, among their countrymen. His adversaries despise his apparent in
significance ; they know that he has no outward means of enforcing his
will ; they see that his bodily presence is weak ; they think his speech
contemptible. Yet he is not so powerless as he seems. Though now he
wields no carnal weapons, his arms are not weaker, but stronger, than
they were of old. He cannot bind the bodies of men, but he can bind
their souls. Truth and love are on his side ; the Spirit of God bears
witness with the spirits of men on his behalf. His weapons are " migh,ty
to overthrow the strongholds of the adversaries ; " " thereby " he could
" overthrow the reasonings of the disputer, and pull down the lofty bul
warks which raise themselves against the knowledge of God, and bring
every rebellious thought into captivity and subjection to Christ." 2
Nor is there less > difference in the spirit of his warfare than in the
character of his weapons. Then he " breathed out threatenings and
slaughter ; " he " made havoc of the Church ; " he " haled men and women
into prison ; " he " compelled them to blaspheme." When their sentence
was doubtful, he gave his vote for their destruction ; 3 he was " exceedingly
mad against them." Then his heart was filled with pride and hate, un-
charitableness and self-will. But now his proud and passionate nature is
transformed by the Spirit of God ; he is crucified with Christ ; the fervid
impetuosity of his character is tempered by meekness and gentleness ; his
very denunciations and threats of punishment are full of love ; he grieves
over his contumacious opponents ; the thought of their pain fills him with
sadness. "For if I cause you grief, who is there to cause me joy?"4
He implores them, even at the eleventh hour, to save him from the neces-

1 See 2 Cor. x. 1. " Acts xxvi. 10.
2 2 Cor. x. 4, 5. 4 2 Cor. ii. 2.

520 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUI chap. xvra.
sity of dealing harshly with them ; he had rather leave his authority
doubtful, and still remain liable to the sneers of his adversaries, than
establish it by their punishment (2 Cor. xiii. 7-9). He will condescend
to the weakest prejudices rather than cast a stumbling-block in a brother's
path ; he is ready to become " all things to all men," that he may " by
all means save some."
Yet all that was good and noble in the character of Saul remains in
Paul, purified from its old alloy. The same zeal for God burns in his
heart, though it is no longer misguided by ignorance or warped by party-
spirit. The same firm resolve is seen in carrying out his principles to
their consequences, though he shows it not in persecuting, but in suffering.
The same restless energy, which carried him from Jerusalem to Damas
cus that he might extirpate heresy, now urges him from one end of the
world to the other,1 that he may bear the tidings of salvation.
The painful anticipations which saddened his return to Corinth were
not, however, altogether unrelieved by happier thoughts. As he ap
proached the well-known gates, in the midst of that band of faithful
friends who accompanied him from Macedonia, his memory could not but
revert to the time when first he entered the same city, a friendless and
lonely 2 stranger. He could not but recall the feelings of extreme depres
sion with which he first began his missionary work at Corinth, after his
unsuccessful visit to Athens. The very firmness and bold confidence
which now animated him — the assurance which he felt of victory over
the opponents of truth — must have reminded him by contrast of the
anxiety and self-distrust' which weighed him down at his first intercourse
with the Corinthians, and which needed a miraculous vision4 for its
removal. How could he allow discouragement to overcome his spirit,
when he remembered the fruits borne by labors which had begun in so
much sadness and timidity ? It was surely something that hundreds of
believers now called on the name of the Lord Jesus, who, when he first
came among them, had worshipped nothing but the deification of their
own lusts. Painful no doubt it was to find that their conversion had
been so incomplete ; that the pollutions of heathenism still defiled those who
had once washed away the stains 5 of sin : yet the majority of the Church
had repented of their offences ; the number who obstinately persisted in sin
was but small ; and if many of the adult converts were so tied and bound

1 He was at this very time intending to go 2 He was left at Athens alone (1 Thess. iii.
first to Jerusalem, thence to Rome, and thence 1), and so remained till Timotheus and Silai
to Spain ; that is, to travel from the Eastern rejoined him at Corinth.
to the Western extremities of the civilized 8 See 1 Cor. ii. 1-3.
world. See Rom. xv. 28. Compare the con- 4 Acts xviii. 9.
elusion of Ch. XVII. 6 i cor Tj u

oHAP.xvm. BAD NEWS FROM GALATIA. 521
by the chains of habit, that their complete deliverance could scarce be
hoped for, yet at least their children might be brought up in the nurture
and admonition of the Lord. Moreover, there were some, even in this
erring church, on whom St. Paul could think with unmingled satisfaction;
some who walked in the Spirit, and did not fulfil the lust of the flesh ;
who were created anew in Christ Jesus ; with whom old things had
passed away, and all things had become new ; who dwelt in Christ, and
Christ in them. Such were Erastus the treasurer, and Stephanas, the
first-fruits of Achaia ; such were Fortunatus and Achaicus, who had lately
travelled to Ephesus on the errand of their brethren ; such was Gaius,1
who was even now preparing to welcome beneath his hospitable roof the
Apostle who had thrown open to himself the door of entrance into the
Church of Christ. When St. Paul thought of " them that were such,"
and of the many others " who worked with them and labored," 2 as he
threaded the crowded streets on his way to the house of Gaius, doubtless
he " thanked God and took courage."
But a painful surprise awaited him on his arrival. He found that intel
ligence had reached Corintli from Ephesus, by the -direct route, of a more
recent date than any which he had lately received; and the tidings
brought by this channel concerning the state of the Galatian churches
excited both his astonishment and his indignation.3 His converts there,
whom he seems to have regarded with peculiar affection, and whose love
and zeal for himself had formerly been so conspicuous, were rapidly for
saking his teaching, and falling an easy prey to the arts of Judaizing
missionaries from Palestine. We have seen the vigor and success with
which the Judaizing party at Jerusalem were at this period pursuing their
new tactics, by carrying the war into the territory of their great opponent,
and endeavoring to counterwork him in the very centre of his influence,
in the bosom of those Gentile Churches which he had so lately founded.
We know how great was the difficulty with which he had defeated (if
indeed they were yet defeated) the agents of this restless party at Cor
inth ; and now, on his reaching that city to crush the last remains of
their opposition, he heard that they had been working the same mischief
in Galatia, where he had least expected it. There, as in most of the
early Christian communities, a portion of the Church had been Jews by
birth ; and this body would afford a natural fulcrum for the efforts of the
1 It would be more correct to write this 8 This is oa the assumption that the Epistle
name Caius ; but as the name under its Greek to the Galatians was written soon after St.
form of Gaius has become naturalized in the Paul's arrival at Corinth on the present occa-
English language as a synonyme of Christian sion. For the reasons in favor of this hypothe-
bospitality, it seems undesirable to alter it. sis, see the note upon the date of the Epistle
4 1 Cor xvi. 16. below.

522 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap. xvm.
Judaizing teachers ; yet we cannot suppose that the number of Jews resi
dent in this inland district could have been very large.1 And St. Paul
in addressing the Galatians, although he assumes that there were some
among them familiar with the Mosaic Law, yet evidently implies that the
majority were converts from heathenism.2 It is remarkable, therefore,
that the Judaizing emissaries should so soon have gained so great a hold
over a church consisting mainly of Gentile Christians ; and the fact that
they did so proves not only their indefatigable activity, but also their
skill in the arts of conciliation and persuasion. It must be remembered,
however, that they were by no means scrupulous as to the means which
they employed to effect their objects. At any cost of falsehood and
detraction, they resolved to loosen the hold of St. Paul upon the affection
and respect of his converts. Thus to the Galatians they accused him of
a want of uprightness in observing the Law himself whilst among the
Jews, yet persuading the Gentiles to renounce it ; 3 they argued that his
motive was to keep his converts in a subordinate state, excluded from the
privileges of a full covenant with God, which was enjoyed by the circum
cised alone ; 4 they declared that he was an interested flatterer,5 " becom
ing all things to all men," that he might make a party for himself; and
above all, they insisted that he falsely represented himself as an apostle of
Christ, for that he had not, like the Twelve, been a follower of Jesus
when He was on earth, and had not received His commission ; that, on the
contrary, he was only a teacher sent out by the authority of the Twelve,
whose teaching was only to be received so far as it agreed with theirs, and
was sanctioned by them ; whereas his doctrine (they alleged) was now in
opposition to that of Peter and James, and the other " Pillars " of the
Church.6 By such representations they succeeded, to a great extent, in
alienating the Galatian Christians from their father in the faith ; already
many of the recent converts submitted to circumcision,1 and embraced
the party of their new teachers with the same zeal which they had for
merly shown for the Apostle of the Gentiles ; 8 and the rest of the Church
was thrown into a state of agitation and division.
On receiving the first intelligence of these occurrences, St. Paul
hastened to check the evil before it should have become irremediable.
He wrote to the Galatians an Epistle which begins with an abruptness and
severity showing his sense of the urgency of the occasion and the great
ness of the danger. It is also frequently characterized by a tone of sad-
1 On the probable character of the Jewish 6 Ibid. i. 10.
population of Galatia, see p. 212. 6 See the whole of the first two chapters of
2 See Gal. iv. 8. the Epistle.
8 Gal. v. 11. 7 6al. vi. i3-
4 Gal. iv. 16, compared with ii. 17. » Gal. iv. 14, 15.

CHAP, xviii.

EPISTLE TO THE GALATIANS

523

ness, such as would naturally be felt by a man of such war.aa affections
when he heard that those whom he loved were forsaking his cause, and
believing the calumnies of his enemies. In this letter his principal
object is to show that the doctrine of the Judaizers did in fact destroy the
very essence of Christianity, and reduced it from an inward and spiritual
life to an outward and ceremonial system ; but in order to remove the seeds
of alienation and distrust which had been designedly planted in the minds
of his converts, he begins by fully contradicting the falsehoods which had
been propagated against himself by his opponents, and especially by vin
dicating his title to the Apostolic office as received directly from Christ,
and exercised independently of the other Apostles. Such were the cir
cumstances and such the objects which led him to write the following
Epistle : -
EPISTLE TO THE GALATIANS1

PAUL, an Apostle, sent not from men nor by man, but by i. 1

Defence of
his independ-
authority0110 Jesus Christ, and God the Father, who raised Him from the

1 The date of this Epistle cannot be so
clearly demonstrated as that of most of the
others ; but we conclude that it was written at
the time assumed in the text on the following
grounds : —
1st. It was not written till after St. Paul's
second visit to the Galatians. This is proved
(A) by his speaking of their conversion as
having'oceurred at his first visit (iv. 13) ; im
plying that he had paid them a second visit.
(B) (iv. 16) : "Am I now become your enemy
by speaking truth among you ? " implies that
there had been a second visit in which he had
offended them, contrasted with the first when
he was so welcome.
2dly. It is maintained by many eminent
authorities that it was written soon after his
second visit. This St. Paul (they argue) ex
pressly says ; he marvels that the Galatians
are so soon (i. 6) forsaking his teaching. The
question is (according to these writers), within
what interval of time would it have been pos
sible for him to use this word " soon " ? Now
this depends on the length of their previous
Christian life; for instance, had St. Paul
known them as Christians for twenty years,
and then after an absence of four years heard
of their perverskn, he might have said their
abandonment of the truth was marvellously
soon after their possession of it ; but if they

had been only converted to Christianity for
three years before his second visit (as was
really the case), and he had heard of their per
version not till four years after his second
visit, he could scarcely, in that case, speak of
their perversion as having occurred soon, after
they had been in the right path, in reference
to the whole time they had been Christians.
He says virtually, " You are wrong now : you
were right a short time ago." The natural im
pression conveyed by this language (consider
ing that the time of their previous steadfast
ness in the true faith was only three years
altogether) would certainly be, that St. Paul
must have heard of their perversion within
about a year from the time of his visit. At
that time he was resident at Ephesus, where
he would most naturally and easily leceive
tidings from Galatia. Hence they consider
the Epistle to have been written at Ephesus
during the first year of St. Paul's residence
there. But in answer to these arguments it
may be replied, that St. Paul does not say
the Galatians were perverted soon after his own
last visit to them. His words are, in fact, " 1
wonder that you are so quickly shifting your
ground." The same word is used in 2 Thess.
ii. 2, where he exhorts the Thessalonians " not
rashly to let themselves be shaken ; " where
the adverb refers not so much to the time as

524

THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL.

chap, xviii

i 2 dead ; — with all the brethren ' in my company
Churches op Galatia.
3 Grace be to you and peace from God our Father, and our nisTommls-

TO THE against the
Judaizing teachers, and
historical

sion was not
4 Lord Jesus Christ ; who gave himself for our sins, that He Mother""™
might deliver us from this present evil world, according to the Ap08tles-
5 will of our God and Father ; to whom be glory, even unto the ages of
ages. Amen.
6 I marvel that you are so soon shifting 2 your ground, aud forsaking

to the manner in which they were affected, like
the English hastily. But even supposing it, in
Gal. i. 6, to refer simply to time, and to be
translated quickly or soon, we still (if we would
fix the date from it) must ask, " quickly after
what event 9 " — " soon after what event f "
And it is more natural (especially as the verb
is in the present tense) to understand " soon
after the entrance of the Judaizing teachers,"
than to understand " soon after my last visit."
Hence there seems nothing in this adverb
to fix the date of the Epistle; nor is there
any other external evidence of a decisive na
ture supplied by the Epistle. But,
3dly. The internal evidence that the Epistle
was written nearly at the same time with that
to the Romans is exceedingly strong. Exam
ples of this are Rom. viii. 15 compared with
Gal. iv. 6, Rom. vii. 14-25 compared with Gal.
v. 17, Rom. i. 17 compared with Gal. iii. 11,
and the argument about Abraham's faith in
Rom. iv. compared with Gal. iii. But the com
parison of single passages does not so forcibly
impress on the mind the parallelism of the
two Epistles, as the study of each Epistle as a
whole. The more we examine them, the
more we are struck by the resemblance ; and
it is exactly that resemblance which would
exist between two Epistles written nearly at
the same time, while the same line of argu
ment was occupying the writer's mind, and
the same phrases and illustrations were on his
tongue. This resemblance, too, becomes more
striking when we remember the very different
circumstances which called forth the two Epis
tles ; that to the Romans being a deliberate
exposition of St. Paul's theology, addressed
to a Church with which he was personally un
acquainted ; that to the Galatians being an
indignant rebuke, written on the urgency of
the occasion, to check the perversion of his
children in the faith.

This internal evidence, therefore, leads us
to suppose that the Epistle to the Galatians
was written within a few months of that to
the Romans ; and most probably, therefore,
from Corinth during the present visit (al
though there is nothing to show which of the
two was written the first). The news of the
arrival of the Judaizers in Galatia would
reach St. Paul from Ephesus ; and (consider
ing the commercial relations between the two
cities) there is no place where he would be so
likely to hear tidings from Ephesus as at
Corinth. And since, on his arrival at the
latter city, he would probably find some intel
ligence from Ephesus waiting for him, we
have supposed, in the text, that the tidings of
the perversion of Galatia met him thus on his
arrival at Corinth.
1 Some of these "brethren in St. Paul's
company " are enumerated in Acts xx. 4 :
Sopater of Bercea ; Aristarchus and Secundus
of Thessalonica ; Gaius of Derbe ; Timothe
us ; and Tychicus and Trophimus from Pro
consular Asia. The junction of their names
with that of Paul in the salutation of this
Epistle, throws light on the junction of the
names of Timotheus, Sosthenes, Silvanus, &c,
with Paul's in the salutation at the head of
some other Epistles ; showing us more clearly
that these names were not joined with that of
St. Paul as if they were joint authors of the
several Epistles referred to. This clause also
confirms the date we have assigned to the
Epistle, since it suits a period when he had au
unusual number of travelling companions, iu
consequence of the collection which they aud
he were jointly to bear to Jerusalem. See th«
last chapter.
2 For the translation of this, see the nott
on the date of this Epistle, above.

chap. xvin. EPISTLE TO THE GALATIANS. 525
Him ¦ who called you 2 in the grace of Christ, for a new Glad-tidings ;
which is nothing else 3 but the device of certain men who are troubling i. 7
you, and who desire to pervert the Glad-tidings of Christ. But even 8
though I myself, or an angel from heaven, should declare to you any
other Glad-tidings than that which I declared,, let him be accursed. As 9
1 have said before, so now I say again, if any man is come to you with a
Glad-tidings different from that which you received before, let him be
accursed. Think ye that man's 4 assent, or God's, is now my object ? or 10
is it that I seek favor with men ? Nay, if I still sought favor with men,
I should not be the bondsman of Christ.
For I certify you, brethren, that the Glad-tidings which I brought you 11
is not of man's devising. For I myself received it not from man, nor 12
was it taught me by man's teaching, but by the revelation of Jesus
Christ. For you have heard of my former behavior in the days of my 13
Judaism, how I persecuted beyond measure the Church of God, and
strove 5 to root it out, and outran in Judaism many of my own age and 14
nation, being more exceedingly zealous6 for the traditions of my fathers.
But when it pleased Him who set me apart1 from my mother's womb, and 15
called me by His grace, to reveal His Son in me, that I might proclaim 16
His Glad-tidings among the Gentiles, I did not take counsel with flesh
and blood, nor yet did I go up to Jerusalem to those who were Apostles 17
before me, but I departed immediately into Arabia,8 and from thence
returned to Damascus. Afterwards, when three years had passed, I went 18
up to Jerusalem, that I might know Cephas 9 and with him I remained

1 " Him who called you." St. Paul proba- contrast between his position before and since
bly means God. Compare Rom. ix. 24. his conversion. Compare chap. v. 11.
2 " In the grace of Christ." The preposi- 6 The verb is in the imperfect.
tion here cannot mean into; Christians are 6 This term ("Zealot") was, perhaps,
called to salvation in the grace of Christ. already adopted (as it was not long after,
8 The Authorized Version, "which is not Joseph. War, iv. 6) by the Ultra-Pharisaical
another," does not correctly represent the origi- party. Cf. Acts xxi. 20.
nal : the word translated "another" being 7 Compare Rom. i. 1.
not the same in the two verses. 8 The immediately belongs to departed, as if
4 This alludes to the accusations brought it were printed immediately (I conferred not . . .
against him. See above, pp. 521, 522; also but) departed. On the events mentioned in this
2 Cor. v. 11 ; and for the words, compare Col. verse, see pp. 90, 91.
iii. 22. His answer is, that, had popularity 9 Cephas, not Peter, is the reading of the
and power been his object, he would have best MSS. throughout this Epistle, as well as
remained a member of the Sanhedrin. The in the Epistles to Corinth ; except in one pas-
adverbs of time mark the reference to this sage, Gal. ii. 7, 8. St. Petsr was ordinarily

52G THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap, xmu
i. 19 fifteen days ; ¦ but other of the Apostles saw I none, save only James,''
20 the brother of the Lord. (Now in this which I write to you, behold 1
21 testify before God that I lie not.) After this I came into the regions of
22 Syria and Cilicia ; 3 but I was still unknown by face to the Churches uf
23 Christ in Judaaa : tidings only were brought them from time to time,'
saying, " He who was once our persecutor now bears the Glad-tidingf
24 of that Faith, which formerly he labored to root out." And they
glorified God in me.
h. 1 Then fourteen 5 years after, I went up again to Jerusalem The counoil
2 with Barnabas, and took Titus with me also. At that time I ° erusalem
went up in obedience to a revelation, and I communicated to the brethren
in Jerusalem 6 the Glad-tidings which I proclaim among the Gentiles ;
but to the chief brethren I communicated it privately,1 lest perchance my
3 labors, either past or present, might be fruitless.8 Yet not even Titus,
my own companion (being a Greek), was compelled to be circumcised.
4 But this communication9 [with the Apostles in Judsea] I undertook on
account of the false brethren who gained entrance by fraud, for they
crept in among us to spy out our freedom 10 (which we possess in Christ
5 Jesus) that they might enslave us under their own yoke. To whom I
yielded not the submission they demanded ; u no, not for an hour ; that
the truth of the Glad-tidings might stand unaltered for your benefit.
6 But from those who were held in chief reputation — it matters not to
me of what account they were, — God is no respecter of persons — those
(I say) who were the chief in reputation gave me no new instruction ;

known up to this period by the Syro-Chaldaic the public assembly of the Church, see p.
form of his name (the name actually given by 190.
our Lord), and not by its Greek equivalent. 8 Literally, lest perchance I should be running,
It is remarkable that he himself, in his Epis- or had run, in vain.
ties, uses the Greek form, perhaps as a mark 9 Something must be supplied here to coru-
of his antagonism to the Judaizers, who natu- plete the sense ; we understand " communi-
rally would cling to the Hebraic form. cated " from v. 2 ; others supply " was not
1 See pp. 94-96. circumcised," " but I refused to circumcise him
2 See note on 1 Cor. ix. 5. (which otherwise I would have done) on
8 See p. 97. account of the false brethren, that I might not
4 Lit. " They continued to hear." seem to yield to them." Others again supply
6 See the discussion of this passage, Ap- " was circumcised," which gives an opposite
pendix I. sense. The interpretation here adopted agrees
6 " To them.'' Compare the preceding best with the narrative in Acts xv.
Terse. w Viz. from the ordinances of the Mosaic
' On these private conferences preceding law. u The article implies this meaning.

chap.xviti. EPISTLE TO THE GALATIANS. 527
but, on the contrary, when they saw that I had1 been charged to preach ii. 7
tlie Glad-tidings to the uncircumcised, as Peter to the circumcised (for 8
He who wrought in Peter for the Apostleship of the circumcision
wrought also in me for the Gentiles), and when they had learned the 9
grace which had been given me, — James, Cephas, and John, who were
accounted chief pillars, gave to me and Barnabas the right hand of fellow
ship, purposing that we should go to the Gentiles, and they to the Jews ;
provided only, that we should remember the poor,2 which I have accord- 10
ingly 3 endeavored to do with diligence.
But when Cephas came to Antioch, I withstood him to the 11
ot. re ter at
Antioch. face^ bec<aUse he had incurred 4 reproach ; for before the com- 12
ing of certain [brethren] from James, he was in the habit of eating with
the Gentiles ; but when they came, he began to draw back, and to
separate himself from the Gentiles, for fear of the Jewish brethren. And 13
he was joined in his dissimulation by the rest of the Jews [in the Church
of Antioch] , so that even Barnabas was drawn away with them to dis
semble in like manner. But when I saw that they were walking in a 14
crooked path,5 and forsaking the truth of the Glad-tidings, I said to
The Jewish Cephas before them all, " If thou, being born a Jew, art wont
renounced the to live according to the customs of the Gentiles, and not of the
rigbteousneBB
of the law. Jews, how is it that thou constrainest the Gentiles to keep the
ordinances of the Jews ? We are Jews by birth, and not unhallowed 15
Gentiles ; yet,6 knowing that a man is not justified by the works of the 16
Law, but by the faith of Jesus Christ, we ourselves also have put our
faith in Christ Jesus, that we might be justified by the faith of Christ, and

1 The perfect is used because the charge Gal. i. 13, iii. 3, iii. 27, and many other pas-
¦srill continued. sages. For the proofs of this use of the aorist,
2 Namely, the poor Christians in Judosa. see notes on 2 Cor. vii. 2, and Rom. v. 5.]
We hs-ve seen in the preceding chapters how For the phrase translated accordingly (to which
fully St. Paul had carried out this part of his it is nearly equivalent), compare 2 Cor. ii. 3,
agreement. and Phil. i. 6.
8 The A. V. here is probably incorrect. * The remarkable expression here is not
The aorist here seems to be used for the per- equivalent to the Authorized translation, " he
feet, as it often is in N. T. [Mr. Ellicott, in was to be blamed." For the history, see Ch.
his very valuable commentary on Galatians, VH.
disputes this, and even calls the above asser- 6 The Greek verb, found only here, means
tion " an oversight." He expresses his opin- to walk in a straight path.
ion that the aorist is never used for the perfect 6 We follow Tischendorf and the best
in N. T. Yet Mr. Ellicott himself repeatedly MSS.
translates the aorist as perfect, for example in

528 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap, j rm.
not by the works of the Law ; for by the works of the Law ' SgSlI tTfJ
flesl} bt jusiifietr.' " ]
ii. 17 But what if,2 while seeking to be justified in Christ, we have indeed
reduced3 ourselves also to the sinful state of unhallowed4 Gentiles? Is
Christ then a minister of sin ? God forbid ! 5
18 For if I again build up that [structure of the Law] which I have over-
19 thrown, then I represent myself as a transgressor. Whereas 6 1, through
the operation 7 of the Law, became dead to the Law, that I might live to
20 God. I am crucified with Christ ; it is no more I that live, but Christ
is living in me ; 8 and my outward life which still remains, I live in the
21 faith of the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me. I frus
trate not God's gift of grace [like those who seek righteousness in the
Law] ; for if the Law can make men righteous, then Christ died in vain.
iii. 1 0 foolish Galatians, who has bewitched you?9 — you, be- Appeal to the
. experience of
fore whose eyes was held up the picture 10 of Jesus Christ upon the Galatians.
2 the cross. One question I would ask you. When you received the Spirit,
was it from the works of the Law, or the preaching n of Faith ? Are you
3 so senseless ? Having begun in the Spirit, would you now end in the
4 Flesh ? Have you received so many benefits 12 in vain — if indeed it has
5 been in vain ? Whence, I say, are the gifts of Him who furnishes you
1 Ps. cxliii. 2 (LXX.) ; quoted also more passage is illustrated by the similar mode in
fully, Rom. iii. 20. which he answers the objections of the same
2 The construction is like that in Rom. party, Rom. iii. 3-8. See note on the phrase
ix. 22. rendered " God forbid " below, chap. iii. 21.
8 Literally, been found sinners ourselves, as 6 In this "for" (A. V.) is virtually con-
well as other men. tained the suppressed clause " but the abolition
4 " Unhallowed." Compare " unhallowed of the law does not make me a transgressor, for."
Gentiles " above. 7 This thought is fully expanded in the 7th
5 Neander thinks that the 17th verse also of Romans.
ought to be included in the speech of St. Paul, 8 It is with great regret that we depart
and much might be said in favor of his view. from the A. V. here, not only because of its
Still, on the whole, we think the speech more extreme beauty, but because it must be so dear
naturally terminates with v. 16. See p. 201, to the devotional feelings of all good men.
n. 2. The hypothesis in v. 17 is that of the Yet the words cannot be translated nevertheless
Judaizers, refuted (after St. Paul's manner) 7" live, yet not I."
by an abrupt reductio ad absurdum. The 9 The words " that ye should not obey the
Judaizer objects, " You say you seek righteous- truth " are not found in the best MSS., and
ness in Christ, but in fact you reduce yourself to " among you " is also omitted.
the state of a Gentile ; you are farther from God, 10 This is the literal sense.
and therefore farther from righteousness, tlian you n Compare Rom. x. 17, and 1 Thess. ii. 13.
were before." To which St. Paul only replies, 12 Literally, have you experienced so many
" On your hypothesis, then, wemust conclude Christ things [or such great things] % The context is
to be the minister of sin I God forbid." This against the translation of the verb by suffered.

chap.xvhi. EPISTLE TO THE GALATIANS. 529
with the fulness of the Spirit, and works in you the power of miracles ? '
From the deeds of the Law, or from the preaching of Faith ?
Faith, ana not So likewise " iinrafmm fratfr faitlj in (Soil, mb it toas 6
thl^our'ceof xttkantb ratio bint for riobteousness.'' 2 Know, therefore, 7
righteousness. u °
that they only are the sons of Abraham who are children of
Faith. And the Scripture, foreseeing that God through Faith justifies 8
[not the Jews only, but] the Gentiles, declared beforehand to Abraham
the Glad-tidings, saying, " §JI t\t nations of % ^mtlltB sjjall bt
bltBBtb in t\tt."z So, then, they who are children of Faith [whether 9
they be Jews or Gentiles] are blessed with faithful Abraham.
For all they who rest upon 4 the works of the Law are under a curse ; 10
for it is written, " €uxBta xb tbtxn, am tjjat .coniintteif* not in all
ijjinp bfyify uxt farittm in % book of % ITabj to ba %m." 5
And it is manifest that no man is counted righteous in God's judgment 11
under the conditions of the Law ; for it is written, " ^g faitfjf sjtall t\lt
XXafyttaKB lib*."6 But the Law rests not on Faith, but declares, " C|* 12
man ifrat frai^ bant fytBt things s^all lib* %ran." 7 Christ has 13
redeemed us from the curse of the Law, having become accursed for our
sakes8 (for it is written, " &UXBtb IB tbtXQ ant tjjat fjanptjj Oil U
tXtt ")>' to the end that in Christ Jesus the blessing of Abraham might 14
come unto the Gentiles ; that through Faith we might receive the prom
ise of the Spirit.
The Law Brethren — I speak in man's language 10 — nevertheless, — a 15
abrogatethe man's covenant, when ratified, cannot by its giver be annulled,
prior promise #
to Abraham. 0r set aside by a later addition. Now God's promises were 1%
made to Abraham and to his seed ; the Scripture says not " anb ta
1 The phrase is exactly similar in 1 Cor. 7 Levit. xviii. 5 (LXX.) ;. quoted also
xii. 10. Rom. x. 5.
2 Gen. xv. 6 (LXX.); quoted also Rom. 8 "A curse for us." The sentiment and
iv. 3. expression strongly resembles, " sin for us,"
8 Gen. xii. 3, from the LXX., but not ver- 2 Cor. v. 21 ; which epistle was very nearly
batim. Compare the similar quotation, Rom. contemporaneous with this, if the date of the
iv. 17. Galatians above adopted is correct.
4 Literally, who have their root in the works 9 Deut. xxi. 23. Nearly verbatim from
of the Law, or, according to the Hebrew image, LXX.
the children of the works of the Law. i° This parenthetical phrase here, in St
6 Deut. xxvii. 26. Nearly verbatim from Paul's style, seems always to mean, I use a
LXX. comparison or illustration drawn from human
8 Hab. ii. i (LXX.) ; quoted also Rom. i. affairs or human language. Compare Rom. iii.
1 7, and Heb. x. 38. 5, and 1 Cor. xv. 32.
84

530 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap.xvhi.
- Bttbs," as if it spoke of many, but as of one, " anb to tjjtl Bttb ) "
17 and this seed is Christ. But this I say ; a covenant which had been rati
fied before by God, to be fulfilled in Christ, the Law which was given
four hundred and thirty2 years afterwards cannot make void, to the an-
18 nulling of the promise. For if the inheritance comes from the Law, it
comes no longer from promise ; whereas God has given it to Abraham
freely by promise.
19 To what end, then, was the Law ? it was 3 added because of the trans
gressions 4 of men, till the Seed should come, to whom belongs the prom
ise ; and it was enacted by the ministration of angels 5 through the hands
20 of [Moses,6 who was] a mediator [between God and the people] . Now
where 7 a mediator is, there must be two parties. But God is one [and
there is no second party to His promise] .
21 Do I say, then, that the Law contradicts the promises of God ? Relation of
Judaism to
that be far from me ! 8 For had a Law been given which could Christianity.
raise men from death to life, then would righteousness be truly from the
22 Law. But9 the Scripture (on the other hand) has shut up the whole
world together under sin, that from Faith in Jesus Christ the promise
might be given to the faithful.

1 Gen. xiii. 15 (LXX.). The meaning of ter to depend upon an unconditional promise
the argument is, that the recipients of God's of God than upon a covenant made between
promises are not to be looked on as an aggre- God and man ; for in the latter case the con-
gate of different individuals, or of different ditions of the covenant might be broken by
races, but are all one body, whereof Christ is man (as they had been), and so the blessings
the head. Compare "you are the seed," v. 29. forfeited; whereas in the former case, God
2 With regard to the chronology, see p. being immutable, the blessings derived from
157, n. 2. His promise remain steadfast forever." The
8 This is according to the reading of the passage is parallel with Rom. iv. 13-16.
best MSS. 8 The expression occurs fourteen times in
1 Compare Rom. v. 20 : " The Law was St. Paul ; viz. three times in Galatians, ten
added that sin might abound," which must be times in Romans (another example of the simi-
taken with Rom. v. 13, and Rom. vii. 13. larity between these Epistles), and once in 1
6 Compare Acts vii. 53. Corinthians. In one of these cases (Gal. vi
*¦ Moses is called "the Mediator" by the 14) it is not interjectional ; in another (1 Cor.
Rabbinical writers. See several passages vi. 15), it repels a direct hypothesis, "Shall I
quoted by Schoettgen on this passage. do (so and so)? God forbid." But in all the
7 St. Paul's argument here is left by him other instances it is interjectional, and rebuts
exceedingly elliptical, and therefore very ob- an inference deduced from St. Paul's doctrine
scure ; as is evident from the fact that more by an opponent. So that the question which
than two hundred and fifty different explana- precedes the phrase is equivalent to Do I,
tions of the passage have been advocated by then, infer that f "
different commentators. The most natural 9 The connection of the argument is, that
meaning appears to be as follows : " It is bet- if the Law could give men spiritual life, and

•chap. xvm. EPISTLE TO THE GALATIANS. 531
iii.
But before Faith came we were shut up in prison, in ward under the 23
Law, in preparation for the Faith which should afterwards be revealed.
Thus, even as the slave l who leads a child to the house of the schoolmas- 24
ter, so the Law has led us to [our teacher] Christ, that by Faith we might
be justified ; but now that Faith is come, we are under the slave's care no 25
longer. For you are all the sons of God, by your faith in Christ Jesus ; 26
yea, whosoever among you have been baptized unto Christ have clothed 27
yourselves with Christ.2 In Him there is neither Jew nor Gentile, 28
neither slave nor freeman, neither male nor female ; for you all are one
in Christ Jesus. And if you are Christ's, then you are Abraham's seed, 29
and heirs of the blessing by promise.
Now I say, that the heir, so long as he is a child, has no more freedom iv. 1
than a slave, though he is owner of the whole inheritance ; buthe is under 2
overseers and stewards until the time appointed by his father. And so 3
we also [who are Israelites] when we were children were in bondage,
under our childhood's lessons of outward ordinances.8 But when the 4
appointed time was fully come, God sent forth His Son, who was born of
a woman, and born subject to the Law ; that He might redeem from their fj
slavery the subjects of the Law, that we 4 might be adopted as the sons of
God. And because you are the sons of God, He has sent forth the Spirit 6
of His Son into your hearts, crying unto Him " Jfat^r." 5 Wherefore 7
thou [who canst so pray] art no more a slave, but a son; and if a son,
then an heir of God through Christ.
so enable them to fulfil its precepts, it would was born of a woman, that all the sons of wo-
give them righteousness : but it does not pre- men might by union with Him become the
tend to do this ; on the contrary, it shows the sons of God.
impotence of their nature by the contrast of 6 " Abba " is the Syro-Chaldaic word for
its requirements with their performance. This Father, and it is the actual word with which
verse is parallel with Rom. xi. 32. the Lord's prayer began, as it was uttered by
1 The inadequate translation here in the our Lord himself. The " Father " which fol-
Authorized Version has led to a misconcep- lows is only a translation of " Abba," inserted
tion of the metaphor. See note on 1 Cor. iv. as translations of Aramaic words often are by
;5. Compare also Hor. Sat. i. 6 (81). the writers of the New Testament, but not
2 The only other place where this expres- used along with " Abba." This is rendered
sion occurs is Rom. xiii. 14 ; another instance evident by Mark xiv. 36, when we remember
of resemblance between the two Epistles. that our Lord spoke in Syro-Chaldaic. More-
3 The phrase literally means the elementary over, had it been used vocatively (as in A. V.)
lessons of outward things. Compare Col. ii. 8 along with Abba, the Greek would have been
amj 20. different. Rom. viii. 15 is exactly parallel with
4 We, namely, all Christians, whether Jews the present passage.
or Gentiles. In other words, the Son of God

532

THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL.

CHAP, xviii

iv. 8 But formerly, when you knew not God, you were in bondage H^fencon1*
9 to gods that have no real being.1 Yet now, when you have mum to an
outward and
gained the knowledge of God, — or rather, when God has ac- fc£mal wor-
knowledged you,2 — how is it that you are turning backwards to those
childish lessons, weak and beggarly as they are ; 3 eager to place yourselves
10 once more in bondage under their dominion ? Are you observing days,4
11 and months,5 and seasons,6 and years ?' I am fearful for you, lest I have
12 spent my labor on you in vain. I beseech you, brethren, to become as I
am [and seek no more a place among the circumcised] ; for I too have
become as you 8 are [and have cast away the pride of my circumcision] .
13 You have never wronged me : 9 on the contrary, although it was sickness
(as you know) which caused 10 me to preach the Glad-tidings to you at my
14 first visit, yet you neither scorned nor loathed the bodily infirmity which
was my trial ; " but you welcomed me as an angel of God, yea, even as
15 Christ Jesus. Why, then, did you think yourselves so happy ? (for I bear
you witness that, if it had been possible, you would have torn out your

1 This is of course addressed to Heathen
converts. 2 Compare 1 Cor. viii. 3.
8 Literally, the weak and beggarly rudiment
ary lessons.
* The Sabbath days. Compare Col. ii. 16.
[Also Rom. xiv. 6. See notes on those pas
sages. — H.]
6 The seventh months.
0 The seasons of the great Jewish feasts.
7 The Sabbatical and Jubilee years. From
this it has been supposed that this Epistle must
have been written in a Sabbatical year. But
this does not necessarily follow, because the
word may be merely inserted to complete the
sentence ; and of course those who observed
the Sabbaths, festivals, &c, would intend to
observe also the Sabbatical years when they
came. The plural " years " favors this view.
8 This is addressed (as above) to the Gen
tile converts.
9 The aorist used as perf. (cf. notes on 2
Cor. vii. 2, and Rom. v. 5). It might, how
ever, perhaps be here rendered, Ye did me no
wrong [when I first came to you].
10 i. e. by keeping him in their country
against his previous intention. See p. 235.
The literal English of this is, You have in

jured me in nothing ; but you know that because
of bodily sickness I preached the Glad-tidings
to you on the first occasion, and you neither, Sec.
We are glad to find thai Dean Ellicott, in
his recent valuable and accurate commentary,
expresses his opinion that "the only gram
matically correct translation is propter corporis
infirmitatem." The contrary view of Professor
Jowett, who translates "amid infirmity," is
defended only by a mistaken parallel from
Phil. i. 15. See Quarterly Review for Decem
ber, 1855, p. 153, note 2.
u This was probably the same disease men
tioned 2 Cor. xii. 7. It is very unfortunate
that the word temptation has so changed ite
meaning in the last two hundred and fifty
years, as to make the Authorized Version of
this verse a great source of misapprehension
to ignorant readers. Some have even been led
to imagine that St. Paul spoke of a sinful
habit in which he indulged, and to the do
minion of which he was encouraged (2 Cor.
xii 9 ) contentedly to resign himself ! We
should add, that if, with some of the best MSS.,
we read " your," it makes no very material
difference in the sense; St. Paul's sickness
would then be called the trial of the Galatians.

CHAF.xvm. EPISTLE TO THE GALATIANS. 533 iv.
own eyes1 and given them to me.) Am I then become your enemy 2 because 16
I tell you the truth ? They [who call me so] show zeal for you with no 17
good intent ; they would shut you out from others, that your zeal may
be for them alone. But it is good to be zealous 3 in a good cause, and 18
that at all times, and not when zeal lasts only [like yours] while I am
present with you. My beloved children, I am again bearing the pangs of 19
travail for you, till Christ be fully formed within you. I would that I 20
were present with you now, that I might change my tone ; for you fill me
with perplexity.
The allegory Tell me, ye that desire to be under the Law, will you not 21
Sarah teaches hear the Law ? For therein it is written that Abraham had 22
the same les-
eontothejew. two sons ; 4 one by the bond-woman, the other by the free.
But the son of the bond-woman was born to him after the flesh ; whereas 23
the son of the free-woman was born by virtue of the promise. Now, all 24
this is allegorical ; for these two women are the two covenants ; the first
given from Mount Sinai, whose children are born into bondage, which is
Hagar (for the word Hagar 5 in Arabia signifies Mount Sinai) ; and she 25
answers to the earthly Jerusalem, for6 she is in bondage with her children.
But [Sarah 7 is the second covenant in Christ, and answers to the heav- 26
enly Jerusalem ; for] the heavenly Jerusalem is free ; which is the
mother of us all.8 And so it is written " l^joke, fyau barrm tfiat 27
1 This certainly seems to confirm the view 6 The word Hagar in Arabic means " a
of those who suppose St. Paul's malady to rock," and some authorities tell us that Mount
have been some disease in the eyes. The Sinai is so called by the Arabs. The lesson
" your" appears emphatic, as if he would say, to be drawn from this whole passage, as re-
you would have torn out your own eyes to supply gards the Christian use of the Old Testament,
the lack of mine. is of an importance which can scarcely be
2 The Judaizers accused St. Paul of desir- over-rated.
ing to keep the Gentile converts in an inferior 6 All the best MSS. read " for " Hagar be-
position, excluded (by want of circumcision) ing, both herself and her children, in bondage,
from full covenant with God ; and called him, corresponds to the earthly Jerusalem : by which
therefore, their enemy. latter expression is denoted the whole system
8 The expression would more naturally of the Mosaic law, represented by its local cen-
mean, " to be the object of zeal," as many in- tre, the Holy City. To this latter is opposed
terpreters take it ; but, on the whole, the other the "city to come" (Heb. xii. 22), where
interpretation (which is that of the older in- Christians have their " citizenship in heaven "
terpreters and of Olshausen) seems to suit the (Phil. iii. 20).
context better. Perhaps, also, there may be i This clause in brackets is implied, though
an allusion here to the peculiar use of the not expressed, by St. Paul, being necessary for
word " Zealot." Compare Gal. i. 14. the completion of the parallel.
* With this passage compare Rom. ix. 8 The weight of MS. authority is rather
7_9, against the " all " of the received text ; yet it

534 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap. xvm.
btuxtBt not ; br^ak forty into scouting, tyon tyai trabailest not ;
iv for t\t btBalutt fiaty mang maxt tfylbxm tyan slj* btyity fjaty tyr
28 Jmgbanb"."1 Now, we, brethren, like Isaac, are children [born not nat-
29 urally, but] of God's promise. Yet, as then the spiritual seed of Abra-
30 ham was persecuted by his natural seed, so it is also now. Nevertheless,.
what says the Scripture? " Cast ont ty* bonb-fooman anb \tx son ;
for ty* son of ty* bonb-tooman sfrall not bt fyrir foity fyt son of
31 tht frw-hJOttian."2 Wherefore, brethren, we are not children of the
v. 1 bond-woman, but of the free. Stand fast, then, in the freedom which
Christ has given us, and turn not back again to entangle yourselves in
the yoke of bondage.
2 Lo, I Paul declare unto you, that, if you cause yourselves to be circum-
3 cised, Christ will profit you nothing. I testify again to every man who
submits to circumcision, that he thereby lays himself under obligation
4 to fulfil the whole Law. If you rest your righteousness on the Law, you
5 are cut off from Christ,3 you are fallen from His gift of grace. For we,,
through the Spirit 4 [not through the Flesh] , from Faith [not works] , look
6 eagerly for the hope 5 of righteousness. For in Christ Jesus neither cir
cumcision avails any thing, nor uncircumcision ; but Faith, whose work is-
Love.
7 You were running the race well : who has cast a stumbling- Warning against the
block in your way ? who has turned you aside from your obedi- f^ehere^and
8 ence to the truth ? The counsel which you have obeyed 6 came not IfviSonf. y
9 from Him who called1 you. " A little leaven leavens the whole lump."8
bears an emphatic sense if retained, viz. "us present to St. Paul's mind) "flesh" or"let-
all, whether Jews or Gentiles, who belong to the ter," and " law " or " works," respectively.
Israel of God." Compare Gal. vi. 16. 6 i. e. the hope of eternal happiness promised to
1 Isaiah liv. 1 (LXX.). Quoted as a pro- righteousness. Compare Rom. viii. 24, 25, where
phetic testimony to the fact that the spiritual the same verb is used.
seed of Abraham should be more numerous 6 There is a paronomasia here, expressed by
than his natural seed. " obedience " and " obeyed."
2 Gen. xxi. 10 from LXX., but not quite ver- 7 The participle used substantively. Com-
batim. pare i. 6, and note.
8 This phrase (meaning literally to be can- 8 This proverb is quoted also 1 Cor. v. 6.
celled from a thing, i. e. to have utterly lost all con- Its application here may be, " Your seducers-
nection with it) is only found in this passage, are few, but yet enough to corrupt vou all ; "
and in Rom. vii. 2 and 6. Another instance or it may be "circumcision is a small part of
of resemblance between the two Epistles. the law, but yet its observance is sufficient to
4 In the words " spirit " and " faith," a tacit place you altogether under the legal yoke."
reference is made to their antitheses (constantly

chap.xvhi. EPISTLE TO THE GALATIANS. 535
As for me, I rely upon you, in the Lord, that you will not be led astray ; v. 1 o
but he that is troubling you, whosoever he be, shall bear the blame.
But if I myself also [as they say] still preach circumcision,1 why am I 11
still persecuted ? for if I preach circumcision, then the cross, the stone at
which they stumble,2 is done away.
I could wish that these agitators who disturb your quiet would execute 12
upon themselves not only circumcision, but excision also.3
Exhortation For you, brethren, have been called to freedom ; 4 only make 13
to the more * ' ' '
partyb noTto not vour freedom a vantage-ground for the Flesh, but rather
freedom. enslave yourselves one to another by the bondage of love. For 14
all the Law is fulfilled in this one saying, " C§Ott sfialt lobt tyg ntiajg- 15
bor as tygSrlf."5 But if you bite and devour one another, take heei
lest you be utterly destroyed by one another's means.
beatweenethe But thlS 1 S&y> Walk in the SPirit» and yOU shall not fulfil 16
fK""1 e the desire of the Flesh ; for the desire of the Flesh fights 17
against the Spirit, and the desire of the Spirit fights against the Flesh ;
and this variance tends to hinder 6 you from doing what you wish to do.
But, if you be led by the Spirit, you are not under the Law.7 Now the 18,1
works of the Flesh are manifest, which are such as these ; fornication,

1 This accusation might naturally be made 6 Not " so that you cannot do " (A. V.), but
by St. Paul's opponents, on the ground of his "tending to prevent you from doing."
circumcising Timothy, and himself still con- 7 To be " under the yoke of the Law," and
tinuing several Jewish observances. See Acts " under the yoke of the Flesh," is in St. Paul's
xx. 6, and Acts xxi. 24. The first " still " in language the same ; because, for those who are
this verse is omitted by some MSS., but re- under the Spirit's guidance, the Law is dead
tained by the best. (v. 23) ; they do right, not from fear of the
2 Literally, the stumbling-stone of the cross ; Law's penalties, but through the influence of
i.e. the cross which is their stumbling-stone. Com- the Spirit who dwells within them. This, at
pare 1 Cor. i. 23. The doctrine of a crucified least, is the ideal state of Christians. Com-
Messiah was a stumbling-block to the national pare Rom. viii. 1-14. St. Paul here, and else-
pride of the Jews ; but if St. Paul would have where in his Epistles, alludes thus briefly to un
consented to make Christianity a sect of Juda- portant truths, because his readers were already
ism (as he would by "preaching circumcis- familiar with them from his personal teaching.
ion"), their pride would have been satisfied. By the " flesh " St. Paul denotes not merely the
But then, if salvation were made to depend on sensual tendency, but generally that which is
outward ordinances, the death of Christ would earthly in man as opposed to what is spiritual.
be rendered unmeaning. It should be observed, that the 17th verse is
8 Observe the force of the " also " and of a summary of the description of the struggle
tho middle voice here ; the A.V. is a mistrans- between flesh and spirit in Rom. vii. 7-25 ;
lation. and verse 18th is a summary of the description
4 Literally, on terms of freedom of the Christian's deliverance from this struggle.
* Levit. xix. 18 (LXX.). Rom. viii. 1-14.

536 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chai xviii.
t. 20 impurity, lasciviousness ; idolatry, witchcraft ; l enmities, strife, jealousy,
passionate anger ; intrigues,2 divisions, sectarian parties ; envy, murder ;
21 drunkenness, revellings, and such like. Of which I forewarn you (as I told
you also in times past), that they who do such things shall not inherit the
22 kingdom of God. But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, long-suf-
23 fering, kindness, goodness, trustfulness,8 gentleness, self-denial. Against
such there is no Law.
24 But they who are Christ's have crucified * the Flesh, with its warning to
the more
25 passions and its lusts. If we live by the Spirit, let our steps part^ag'ainst
26 be guided by the Spirit. Let us not become vainglorious, pro- pnoe."*'
vi. 1 voking one another to strife, regarding one another with envy. Brethren,
— I speak to you who call yourselves the Spiritual,5 — even if any one
be overtaken in a fault, do you correct such a man in a spirit of meekness ;
2 and take thou heed to thyself, lest thou also be tempted. Bear ye one
S another's burdens, and so fulfil the law of Christ. For, if any man
exalts himself, thinking to be something when he is nothing, he deceives
4 himself with vain imaginations. Rather let every man examine his own
work, and then his boasting will concern himself alone, and not his neigh-
5 bor ; for each will bear the load [of sin] which is his own,6 [instead of
magnifying the load which is his brother's] .
6 Moreover, let him who is receiving instruction in the Word ' Provision to
be made for
give to his instructor a share in all the good things which he toemainte-
^ o o nance or the
7 possesses. Do not deceive yourselves — God cannot be de- ?Setors™Cto"
8 frauded.8 Every man shall reap as he has sown. The man who now
1 The profession of magical arts. The his- as used for the perfect. See notes on 2 Cor.
tory of the times in which St. Paul lived is vii. 2, and Rom. v. 5.
full of the crimes committed by those who pro- 6 " Ye that are spiritual." See p. 391.
fessed such arts. We have seen him brought 6 The allusion here is apparently to JEsop's
into contact with such persons at Ephesus well-known fable. It is unfortunate, that, in
already. They dealt in poisons also, which the Authorized Version, two words (v. 2) are
accounts for the use of the term etymologi- translated by the same term burden, which
cally. seems to make St. Paul contradict himself.
2 For this word, compare Rom. ii. 8, and His meaning is, that self-examination will pre-
note. Also 2 Cor. xii. 20. vent us from comparing ourselves boastfully
3 The word seems to have this meaning with our neighbor : we shall have enough to do
here ; for faith (in its larger sense) could not with our own sins, without scrutinizing his.
be classed as one among a number of the con- * By the Word is meant the doctrines of Chris-
stituent parts of love. See 1 Cor. xiii. tianity.
4 Some translate this aorist " crucified the " Literally, " God is not mocked,'- i. e. God
flesh [at the time of their baptism or their con- is not really deceived by hypocrites, who think
version.] " But it is more natural to take it to reap where they have not sown.

chap. xvm.

EPISTLE TO THE GALATIANS.

537

Autographconclusion.

sows for his own Flesh shall reap therefrom a harvest doomed l to perish ;
but he who sows for the Spirit shall from the Spirit reap the harvest of life
eternal. But let us continue in well-doing, and not be weary : 2 for in 9
due season we shall reap, if we faint not. Therefore, as we have oppor- 10
tunity,3 let us do good to all men, but especially to our brethren in the
household of Faith.
Observe the size 4 of the characters in which I write 5 to you 11
with my own hand.
I tell you that they who wish to have a good repute in things pertain- 12
ing to the Flesh, they, and they alone,6 are forcing circumcision upon
you ; and that only to save themselves from the persecution which 7
Christ bore upon the cross. For even they who circumcise themselves do 13
not keep the Law ; but they wish to have you circumcised, that your
obedience 8 to the fleshly ordinance may give them a ground of boasting.
But as for me, far be it from me to boast, save only in the cross 9 of our 14
Lord Jesus Christ ; whereby the world is crucified unto me, and I unto
the world. For in Christ Jesus neither circumcision is any thing, nor 15

1 See Rom. viii. 21 .
2 Compare 2 Thess. iii. 13, where the ex
pression is almost exactly the same.
8 This opportunity (time) is suggested by the
preceding season (time}; but the verbal identity
cannot with advantage be retained here in
English. 4 Thus we must understand the phrase,
unless we suppose (with Tholuck) that " how
large " is used for " what kind of," as in the
later Greek of the Byzantine writers. To take
" characters " as equivalent to " letter " appears
inadmissible. St. Paul does not here say that
he wrote the whole Epistle with his own hand ;
but this is the beginning of his usual autograph
postscript, and equivalent to the " so I write "
in 2 Thess. iii. 17. We may observe as a fur
ther confirmation of this view, that scarcely any
Epistle bears more evident marks than this
of having been written from dictation. The
writer of this note received a letter from the
venerable Neander a few months before his
death, which illustrated this point in a manner
the more interesting, because he (Neander)
takes a different view of this passage. His let
ter is written in the fair and flowing hand of
an amanuensis, but it ends with a few irregular

lines in large and rugged characters, written
by himself, and explaining the cause of his
needing the services of an amanuensis, namely,
the weakness of his eyes (probably the very
malady of St. Paul). It was impossible to
read this autograph without thinking of the
present passage, and observing that he might
have expressed himself in the very words of
St. Paul : " Behold 1 in what large characters
I have written to thee with my own hand."
[The words are given in uncial characters on
the next page. — h.]
6 The past tense, used, according to the
classical epistolary style, from the position of
the readers.
6 The " they " is emphatic.
7 Literally, that they may not be persecuted
with the cross of Christ. Cf. 2 Cor. i. 5 (the
sufferings of Christ).
8 Literally, that they may boast in your flesh.
9 To understand the full force of such ex
pressions as " to boast in the cross," we must
remember that the cross (the instrument of
punishment of the vilest malefactors) was asso
ciated with all that was most odious, contempti
ble, and horrible in the minds of that genera
tion, just as the word gibbet would be now.

538

THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL.

CHAP. XVTU,

VI. 16 uncircumcision ; but a new creation.1 And whosoever shall walk by this
rule, peace and mercy be upon them, and upon all the Israel of God.2
17 Henceforth, let no man vex me ; for I bear in my body the scars '
which mark my bondage to the Lord Jesus.
18 Brethren, the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with your spirit.
Amen. IAETE nHAIKOIS TMIN TPAMMASIN ETPA*A TH EMH XEIPI.4

1 Cf. 2 Cor. v. 17.
2 Compare ch. iii. v. 9.
8 Literally, the scars of the wounds made
upon the body of a slave by the branding-iron,
by which he was marked as belonging to his
master. Observe the emphatic " I : " whatever
others may do, I at least bear in my body the
true marks which show that I belong to Christ ;

the scars, not of circumcision, but of wounds
suffered for His sake. Therefore let no man
vex me by denying that I am Christ's servant,
and bear His commission. Cf. 2 Cor. xi. 23.
4 [The words used by St. Paul (Gal. vi
11), as they appear in the Uncial MSS., t. g
the Codex Ephraemi Rescreptus (C). — h]

CHAPTER XIX.

St Paul at Corinth. — Punishment of Contumacious Offenders. — Subsequent Character of the
Corinthian Church. — Completion of the Collection. — Phoebe's Journey to Rome. — She
bears tlie Epistle to the Romans.
IT was probably about the same time when St. Paul despatched to
Ephesus the messengers who bore his energetic remonstrance to the
Galatians, that he was called upon to inflict the punishment which he had
threatened upon those obstinate offenders who still defied his censures at
Corinth. We have already seen that these were divided into two classes :
the larger consisted of those who justified their immoral practice by
Antinomian1 doctrine, and, styling themselves "the Spiritual," considered
the outward restrictions of morality as mere carnal ordinances, from
which they were emancipated ; the other and smaller (but more obstinate
and violent) class, who had been more recently formed into a party by
emissaries from Palestine, were the extreme Judaizers,2 who were taught
to look on Paul as a heretic, and to deny his apostleship. Although the
principles of these two parties differed so widely, yet they both agreed in
repudiating the authority of St. Paul ; and, apparently, the former party
gladly availed themselves of the calumnies of the Judaizing propagan
dists, and readily listened to their denial of Paul's divine commission ;
while the Judaizers, on their part, would foster any opposition to the
Apostle of the Gentiles, from whatever quarter it might arise.
But now the time was come when the peace and purity of the Co
rinthian Church was to be no longer destroyed (at least openly) by either
of these parties. St. Paul's first duty was to silence and shame his lead
ing opponents by proving the reality of his Apostleship, which they
denied. This he could only do by exhibiting " the signs of an Apostle,"
which consisted, as he himself informs us, mainly in the display of
miraculous powers (2 Cor. xii. 12). The present was a crisis which
required such an appeal to the direct judgment of God, who could alone
1 In applying this term Antinomian to the their characteristic (which was a belief that the
" all things lawful " party at Corinth, we do restraints of outward law were abolished for
not of course mean that all their opinions Christians) seems more accurately expressed
were the same with those which have been by the term Antinomian than by any other.
held by modern (so-called) AntinomianB. But 2 See above, Ch. XVII. 589

540 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap, xis
decide between conflicting claimants to a Divine commission. It was a
contest like that between Elijah and the prophets of Baal. St. Paul had
already in his absence professed his readiness to stake the truth of his
claims on this issue (2 Cor. x. 8, and xiii. 3-6) ; and we may be sure
that now, when he was present, he did not shrink from the trial. And,
doubtless, God, who had sent him forth, wrought such miracles by his
agency as sufficed to convince or to silence the gainsayers. Perhaps the
Judaizing emissaries from Palestine had already left Corinth after fulfil
ling their mission by founding an anti-Pauliue party there. If they had
remained, they must now have been driven to retreat in shame and con
fusion. All other opposition was quelled likewise, and the whole Church
of Corinth were constrained to confess that God was on the side of Paul.
Now, therefore, that " their obedience was complete," the painful task
remained of " punishing all the disobedient" (2 Cor. x. 6). It was not
enough that those who had so often offended and so often been pardoned
before should now merely profess once more a repentance which was only
the offspring of fear or of hypocrisy, unless they were willing to give
proof of their sincerity by renouncing their guilty indulgences. They
had long infected the Church by their immorality ; they were not merely
evil themselves, but they were doing harm to others, and causing the
name of Christ to be blasphemed among the heathen. It was necessary
that the salt which had lost its savor should be cast out, lest its putres
cence should spread to that which still retained its purity (2 Cor. xii.
21). St. Paul no longer hesitated to stand between the living and the
dead, that the plague might be stayed.1 We know, from his own descrip
tion (1 Cor. v. 3-5), the very form and manner of the punishment
inflicted. A solemn assembly of the Church was convened ; the presence
and power of the Lord Jesus Christ was especially invoked ; the cases of
the worst offenders were separately considered, and those whose sins
required so heavy a punishment were publicly cast out of the Church,
and (in the awful phraseology of Scripture) delivered over to Satan.
Yet we must not suppose that even in such extreme cases the object of the
sentence was to consign the criminal to final reprobation. On the con
trary, the purpose of this excommunication was so to work on the
offender's mind as to bring him to sincere repentance, " that his spirit
might be saved in the day of the Lord Jesus." 2 If it had this happy
effect, and if he manifested true contrition, he was restored (as we have
already seen in the case of the incestuous person)3 to the love of the
brethren and the communion of the Church.

1 We here assume that some of the Corin- * 1 Cor. v. 5.
thian Church remained obstinate in their of- * 2 Cor. ii. 6-8.
fences, as St. Paul expected that they would.

chap. xix. CHARACTER OF THE CORINTHIAN CHURCH. 541
We should naturally be glad to know whether the pacification and
purification of the Corinthian Church thus effected was permanent ; or
whether the evils which were so deeply rooted sprang up again after St.
Paul's departure. On this point Scripture gives us no further informa
tion, nor can we find any mention of this Church (which has hitherto
occupied so large a space in our narrative) after the date of the present
chapter, either in the Acts or the Epistles. Sach silence seems, so far
as it goes, of favorable augury. And the subsequent testimony of
Clement (the " fellow-laborer " of Paul, mentioned Phil. iv. 3) confirms
this interpretation of it. He speaks (evidently from his own personal
experience) of the impression produced upon every stranger who visited
the Church of Corinth, by their exemplary conduct ; and specifies particu
larly their possession of the virtues most opposite to their former faults.
Thus, he says that they were distinguished for the ripeness and sound
ness of their knowledge in contrast to the unsound and false pretence of
knowledge for which they were rebuked by St. Paul. Again, he praises
the pure and blameless lives of their women ; which must therefore have
been greatly changed since the time when fornication, wantonness, and
impurity (2 Cor. xii. 21) were the characteristics of their society. But
especially he commends them for their entire freedom from faction and
party-spirit, which had formerly been so conspicuous among their faults.
Perhaps the picture which he draws of this golden age of Corinth may
be too favorably colored, as a contrast to the state of things which he
deplored when he wrote. Yet we may believe it substantially true, and
may therefore hope that some of the worst evils were permanently cor
rected ; more particularly the impurity and licentiousness which had
hitherto been the most flagrant of their vices. Their tendency to party-
spirit, however (so characteristic of the Greek temper), was not cured;
on the contrary, it blazed forth again with greater fury than ever, some
years after the death of St. Paul. Their dissensions were the occasion
of the letter of Clement already mentioned ; he wrote in the hope of
appeasing a violent and long-continued schism which had arisen (like
their earlier divisions) from their being " puffed up in the cause of one
against another." ' He rebukes them for their envy, strife, and party-
spirit ; accuses them of being devoted to the cause of their party-leaders
rather than to the cause of God; and declares that their divisions were
rending asunder the body of Christ, and casting a stumbling-block in the way
of many.2 This is the last account which we have of the Corinthian
Church in the Apostolic age ; so that the curtain falls upon a scene of
l j c01\ iv. 6. ham Clement's first epistle, ch. i., ii., iii,, xiv.,
2 The passages in Italics are quotations xlvi., liv.

542 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap, xix
unchristian strife, too much like that upon which it rose. Yet, though
this besetting sin was still unsubdued, the character of the Church, as a
whole, was much improved since the days when some of them denied
the resurrection, and others maintained their right to practise un chastity.
St. Paul continued three months l resident at Corinth ; or, at least, he
made that city his headquarters during this period. Probably he made
excursions thence to Athens and other neighboring Churches, which (as
we know) 2 he had established at his first visit throughout all the region
of Achaia, and which, perhaps, needed his presence, his exhortations,
and his correction, no less than the metropolitan Church. Meanwhile,
he was employed in completing that great collection for the Christians of
Palestine, upon which we have seen him so long engaged. The Chris
tians of Achaia, from whose comparative wealth much seems to have
been expected, had already prepared their contributions, by laying aside
something for the fund on the first day of every week ; 3 and, as this had
been going on for more than a year,4 the sum laid by must have been
considerable. This was now collected from the individual contributors,
and intrusted to certain treasurers elected by the whole Church,5 who
were to carry it to Jerusalem in company with St. Paul.
While the Apostle was preparing for this journey, destined to be so
eventful, one of his converts was also departing from Corinth, in an
opposite direction, charged with a commission which has immortalized
her name. This was Phcebe, a Christian matron resident at Cenchrea,
the eastern port of Corinth. She was a widow6 of consideration and
wealth, who acted as one of the deaconesses ' of the Church, and was
how about to sail to Rome, upon some private business, apparently con
nected with a lawsuit in which she was engaged.8 St. Paul availed him
self of this opportunity to send a letter by her hands to the Roman
Church. His reason for writing to them at this time was his intention
of speedily visiting them on his way from Jerusalem to Spain. He
desired, before his personal intercourse with them should begin, to give
them a proof of the affectionate interest which he felt for them, although
they " had not seen his face in the flesh." We must not suppose, how
ever, that they were hitherto altogether unknown to him ; for we see,
from the very numerous salutations at the close of the Epistle, that he
1 Acts xx. 3. 8 She could not (according to Greek man-
2 See 2 Cor. i. 1, and 2 Cor. xi. 10 (" The ners) have been mentioned as acting in the in-
regions of Achaia"). Compare, however, the dependent manner described (Rom. xvi. 1-2),
remarks at the end of Ch. X. and Ch. XVII. either if her husband had been living or ii she
3 1 Cor. xvi. 2. had been unmarried.
4 2 Cor. viii. 10, and 2 Cor. ix. 2. ' On this appellation, however, see p. 379.
6 " Whomsoever ye shall approve." 1 Cor. n. 7 ; also p. 381, n. 1.
xvi. 3. (See the translation of the verse.) s See note on Rom. xvi. 1.

chap. xix. THE ROMAN CHURCH. 543
was already well acquainted with many individual Christians at Rome.
From the personal acquaintance he had thus formed, and the intelligence
he had received, he had reason to entertain a very high opinion of the
character of the Church ; x and accordingly he tells them (Rom. xv.
14-16) that, in entering so fully in his letter upon the doctrines and
rules of Christianity, he had done it not so much to teach as to remind
them ; and that he was justified in assuming the authority so to exhort
them, by the special commission which Christ had given him to the
Gentiles. The latter expression shows us that a considerable proportion, if not
the majority, of the Roman Christians were of Gentile origin,2 which is
also evident from several other passages in the Epistle. At the same
time, we cannot doubt that the original nucleus of the Church there, as
well as in all the other great cities of the Empire, was formed by converts
(including more Gentile proselytes than Jews) who had separated them
selves from the Jewish synagogue.3 The name of the original founder
of the Roman Church has not been preserved to us by history, nor even
celebrated by tradition. This is a remarkable fact, when we consider
how soon the Church of Rome attained great eminence in the Christian
world, both from its numbers, and from the influence of its metropolitan
rank. Had any of the Apostles laid its first foundation, the fact could
scarcely fail to have been recorded. It is therefore probable that it was
formed, in the first instance, of private Christians converted in Palestine,
who had come from the eastern 4 parts of the Empire to reside at Rome,
or who had brought back Christianity with them, from some of their
periodical visits to Jerusalem, as the " Strangers of Rome," from the
great Pentecost. Indeed, among the immense multitudes whom political
and commercial reasons constantly attracted to the metropolis of the
1 Rom. i. 8 : " Your faith is spoken of did not understand that language, interpreters
throughout the whole world." were not wanting in their own body who
2 See also Rom. i. 13. could explain it to them. Unquestionably,
8 This is evident from the familiarity with however, he assumes that his readers are fa-
the Old Testament which St. Paul assumes in miliar with the Septuagint (Rom. iv. 18). It
the readers of the Epistle to the Romans ; is rather remarkable that Tertius, who acted
also from the manifest reference to Jewish as St. Paul's amanuensis, was apparently (to
readers in the whole argument of chapters iii. judge from his name) a Roman Christian of
and iv., and again of chapters ix., x., and xi. the Latin section of the Church. It canno.,
See, moreover, the note on Rom. iv. 18 below. of course, be supposed that all the Roman
4 We cannot, perhaps, infer any thing as to Christians were of Oriental origin and Greciau
the composition of the Church at Rome, from speech. Yet it is certain (as Dean Milman,
the fact that St. Paul writes to them in Greek in his " Latin Christianity," has lately ob-
instead of Latin; because Hellenistic Greek served) that Greek remained the prevailing
was (as we have seen, p. 36) his own native language in the Church of Rome for several
tongue, in which he seems always to have centuries.
written ; and if any of the Roman Christians

544 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. eui.ia.
world, there could not fail to be representatives of every religion Wu.icb
had established itself in any of the provinces.
On this hypothesis, the earliest of the Roman Christians were Jew& by
birth, who resided in Rome, from some of the causes above alluded to.
By their efforts, others of their friends and fellow countrymen (virho were
very numerous at Rome) l would have been led to embrace the Gospel.
But the Church so founded, though Jewish in its origin, was remarkably
free from the predominance of Judaizing tendencies. This is osident from
the fact that so large a proportion of it at this early period «r jre already
of Gentile blood ; and it appears still more plainly from tho tone assumed
by St. Paul throughout the Epistle, so different from tha*; in which he
addresses the Galatians, although the subject-matter is often nearly
identical. Yet, at the same time, the Judaizing element, though not pre
ponderating, was not entirely absent. We find that t/',er3 were oppo
nents of the Gospel at Rome, who argued against it on tho ground of the
immoral consequences which followed (as they thought) from the doc
trine of Justification by Faith ; and even charged St. Paul himself with
maintaining that the greater man's sin, the greater was God's glory.
(See Rom. iii. 8.) Moreover, not all the Jewish members of the Church
could bring themselves to acknowledge their uncircumcised Gentile
brethren as their equals in the privileges of Christ' a' kingdom (Rom. iii.
9 and 29, xv. 7-11) ; and, on the other hand, the more enlightened
Gentile converts were inclined to treat the lingering Jewish prejudices
of weak consciences with scornful contempt (Rom. xiv. 3). It was the
aim of St. Paul to win the former of these parties to Christian truth, and
the latter to Christian love ; and to remove the stumbling-blocks out of
the way of both, by setting before them that grand summary of the
doctrine and practice of Christianity which is contained in the follow ing
Epistle : — EPISTLE TO THE ROMANS.2
L 1 PAUL, a bondsman of Jesus Christ, a called Apostle, set apart Salutation.
2 to publish the Glad-tidings of God  which he promised of old by
1 With regard to the Jews in Rome, see months' residence at Corinth. See Acts xix.
the beginning of Ch. XXIV. 21.
2 The date of this Epistle is very precisely (3.) He was going to bear a collection of
fixed by the following statements contained in alms from Macedonia and Achaia to Jerusalem
it:— (xv. 26 and 31). This he did carry from Cor-
(1.) St. Paul had never yet been to Rome inth to Jerusalem at the close of this three-
(1.11,13,15). months' visit. See Acts xxiv. 17.
(2.) He was intending to go to Rome, (4.) When he wrote the Epistle, Timotheus,
after first visiting Jerusalem (xv. 23-28). Sosipater, Gaius, and Erastus were with him
This was exactly his purpose during his three- (xvi. 21, 23) ; of these, the first three are ex-

chap. xn. EPISTLE TO THE ROMANS. 545
His Prophets in the Holy Scriptures, concerning His Son (who was born i. 3
of the seed of David according to the flesh, but was marked out1 as the 4
Son of God with mighty power, according to the spirit of holiness, by
resurrection from the dead),2 even Jesus Christ, our Lord and Master.3
By whom I received grace and apostleship, that I might declare His name 5
among all the Gentiles, and bring them to the obedience of faith. Among 6
whom ye also are numbered, being called by Jesus Chris*  to all 7
God's beloved, called to be Saints,4 who dwell in Rome.5
Grace be to you, and peace from God our Father, and from our Lord
Jesus Christ.
intention of First I thank my God throiigh Jesus Christ for you all, 8
Rome to because the tidings of your faith are told throughout the whole
declare the
Giad-udings. WOrld. For God is my witness (whom I serve with the wor- 9
ship 6 of my spirit, in proclaiming the Glad-tidings of His Son) how
unceasingly I make mention of you at all times in my prayers, beseech- lfl
ing Him that, if it be possible, I might now at length have a way open to
me, according to the will of God, to come and visit you. For I long to 11
see you, that I may impart to you some spiritual gift, for the establish
ment of your steadfastness ; that I may share with you (I would say) in 12
mutual encouragement, through the faith both of you and me together,
one with another. But I would not have you ignorant, brethren, that I 13

pressly mentioned in the Acts as having been ing taken place could not " define " our Lord
with him at Corinth during the three-months' to be the Son of God.
visit (see Acts xx. 4) ; and the last, Erastus, 8 " Lord " seems to require this translation
was himself a Corinthian, and had been sent here, especially in connection with " bonds-
shortly before from Ephesus (Acts xix. 22) man," v. 1. 4 See note on 1 Cor. i. 2.
with Timotheus on the way to Corinth. Com- 6 If this introductory salutation appears
pare 1 Cor. xvi. 10, 11. involved and parenthetical, it the more forcibly
(5.) Phoebe, a deaconess of the Corinthian recalls to our mind the manner in which it
port of Cenchrea, was the bearer of the was written ; namely, by dictation from the
Epistle (xvi. 1 ) to Rome. mouth of St. Paul. Of course an extempo-
1 " Defined," here equivalent, as Chrysos- rary spoken composition will always be more
torn says, to " marked out.'' We may observe full of parentheses, abrupt transitions, and
that the notes which marked Jesus as the Son broken sentences, than a treatise composed in
of God are here declared to be power and writing by its author.
holiness. Neither would have been sufficient 6 The addition of " with my spirit " quali-
without the other. ties the verb, which was generally applied to
2 " Resurrection of the dead" had already acts of outward worship. As much as to say,
become a technical expression, used as we use " My worship of God is not the outward ser-
" Resurrection : " it cannot here mean the vice of the temple, but the inward homage of
general resurrection of the dead (as Prof. the spirit." See the corresponding snbstan-
Jowctt supposes), because that event not hav- tive similarly qualified, chap. xii. 1.
35

546 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap. xix.
have often purposed to come to you (though hitherto I have been
hindered), that I might have some fruit among you also, as I have
L 14 among the other Gentiles. I am a debtor both to Greeks and Barbarians,
15 both to wise and foolish ; tlierefore, as far as in me lies, I am ready to
declare the Glad-tidings to you that are in Rome, as well as to others.
16 For [even in the chief city of the world] I am not ashamed of the Glad-
tidings of Christ, seeing it is the mighty power whereby God brings salva
tion to every man that has faith therein, to the Jew first, and Thl8 Glad.
17 also to the Gentile.1 For therein God's righteousness 2 is re- sistsmtherevelation of
vealed, a righteousness which springs from Faith, and which ^°™Perfeet
Faith receives ; as it is written, " ^g faiifr gjmll t\jt Xiafyt- Told'Htglt-

urn^e irWft"3 which faith Is
*nUf) ll.U I. the condition
18 For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all recipient.
° For by God's
ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who keep 4 down the faaon°UoDiye'
truth [which they know] by the wickedness wherein they live.5 tion ofsm had
heen revealed.
19 Because that which can be known6 of God is manifested in Thus the law
of conscience
20 their hearts, God himself having shown it to them ; for His revelation to
i i n n i , ,...,, the Gentiles,
eternal power and Godhead, though they be invisible, yet are and had heen
seen ever since the world was made, being understood by His ^med^T*
works, that they [who despised Him] might have no excuse ; corruptr»tateof the heathen
21 because, although they knew God, they glorified Him not as world-
God, nor gave Him thanks, but in their reasonings they went astray after
22 vanity, and their senseless heart was darkened. Calling themselves wise,
23 they were turned into fools, and forsook the glory ' of the imperishable

1 St. Paul uses the word for " Greek " as tion of mind called faith. Under the second
the singular of the word for " Gentiles," be- aspect, it is regarded as something reckoned by
cause the singular of the latter is not used in the God to the account of man — an acquittal of
sense of a Gentile. Also the plural " Greeks " past offences.
is used when individual Gentiles are meant; 3 Habakkuk ii. 4 (LXX.). Quoted also
"Gentiles" when Gentiles collectively are Gal. iii. 11, and Heb. x. 38.
spoken of. 4 For this meaning of the verb, compare
2 God's righteousness. Not an attribute of 2 Thess. ii. 6.
God, but the righteousness which God con- 6 By living in wickedness.
siders such ; and which must, therefore, be the 6 That which can be known by men as
perfection of man's moral nature. This right- men, without special supernatural communica-
eousness may be looked on under two aspects : tion.
1. in itself, as a moral condition of man; 2. 7 This is nearly a quotation from Ps. cvi
in its consequences, as involving a freedom from 20 (LXX.). The phrase used there and here
guilt in the sight of God. Under the first meaning to forsake one thing for another; tt
aspect, it is the possession of a certain disposi- change one thing against another.

-chap. xrx. EPISTLE TO THE ROMANS. 547
God for idols graven in the likeness of perishable men, or of birds .
and beasts, and creeping things. Therefore God also gave them up 24
to work uncleanness according to their hearts' lust, to dishonor their
bodies one with another ; seeing they had bartered the truth of God 25
for lies, and reverenced and worshipped the things made instead of the
Maker, who is blessed forever, Amen. For this cause God gave them 26
up to shameful passions ; for on the one hand their women changed
the natural use into that which is against nature ; and on the other hand 27
their men, in like manner, leaving the natural use of the woman, burned
in their lust one toward another, men with men working abomination,
and receiving in themselves the due recompense of their transgression.
And as they thought fit to cast out the acknowledgment of God, God 28
gave them over to an outcast ' mind, to do the things that are unseemly.
They are filled with all unrighteousness, fornication, depravity, covetous- 29
ness,2 maliciousness. They overflow with envy, murder, strife, deceit,
malignity. They are whisperers, backbiters, God-haters ; 3 outrageous, 30
overweening, false boasters ; inventors of wickedness ; undutiful to par
ents ; bereft of wisdom ; breakers of covenanted faith ; devoid of natural 31
affection ; ruthless, merciless. Who knowing the decree of God,4 where- 32
by all that do such things are worthy of death, not only commit the
sins, but delight in their fellowship with the sinners.
itwas also Wherefore, thou, 0 man, whosoever thou art that iudgest U. 1
violated by ' ' ' J &
knowildled0' others, art thyself without excuse ; 5 for in judging thy neigh-
Jwhethff1011 bor thou condemnest thyself, since thy deeds are the same
Jews or
heathen which in him thou dost condemn. And we know that God 2
philosophers).
Id^e^n0wl" judges them who do such wickedness, not6 by their words, but

1 There is a play upon the words here 4 How did they know this? By the law
{cast out — outcast). A translation should, if of conscience (see ii. 14), confirmed by the
possible, retain such marked characteristics of laws of nature (i. 20).
St. Paul's style. A paronomasia upon the 6 Inexcusable in doing evil (not in judging)
same words is found 2 Cor. xiii. 6, 7. is evidently meant, just as it is before (i. 20)
* Perhaps this may be here used for lust, as by the same word. St. Paul does not here
it is at Eph. v. 3 and elsewhere ; see the notes mean that " ccnsoriousness_ is inexcusable; "
there, and also see Hammond, and Jowett, in but he says " thy power to judge the immo-
loco. ralities of others involves thy own guilt ; for
8 We venture to consider this adjective thou also violatest the laws of thy con-
active, against the opinion of Winer, Meyer, science."
and De Wette ; relying first, on the authority 6 This appears to be the meaning of " ac-
of Suidas ; and secondly, on the context wording to truth."

548 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap. six.
ii. 3 by their deeds. But reckonest thou, 0 thou that condemnest ^naGod's
such evil-doers, and doest the like thyself, that thou shalt ms judgment
would depend
4 escape the judgment of God ? or does the rich abundance of ™„t hefween
His kindness and forbearance and long-suffering cause thee to andathe°iaw
. revealed, whe-
despise1 Him? and art thou ignorant that God, by His kind- therout-
r D ' ¦* wardly (as to
ness [in withholding punishment], strives to lead thee to jnwaraTy^M
5 repentance ? But thou, in the hardness and impenitence of then).
thy heart, art treasuring up against thyself a store of wrath, which will
be manifested in 2 the day of wrath, even the day when God will reveal 3
6 to the sight of men the righteousness of His judgment. For He will pay
7 to all their due, according to their deeds ; to those who with steadfast
8 endurance in well-doing seek glory and honor 4 incorruptible, He will
give life eternal ; but for men of guile,5 who are obedient to unrighteous-
9 ness, and disobedient to the truth, indignation and wrath, tribulation and
anguish, shall6 fall upon them; yea, upon every soul of man that does
10 the work of evil, upon the Jew first, and also upon the Gentile. But
glory and honor and peace shall be given to every man who does the
11 work of good, to the Jew first, and also to the Gentile ; for there is no
respect of persons with God.
12 For they who have sinned without [the knowledge of] the Law shall
perish without [the punishment of] the Law ; and they who have sinn(d
13 under the Law shall be judged by the Law.7 For not the hearers cf
the Law8 are righteous in God's sight, but the doers of the Law shall be
14 counted righteous. For when the Gentiles, having not the Law, do 1 y
nature the works of the Law, they, though they have not the Law, are a
1 Literally, " is it the rich abundance of His The history of this word seems to bear a
kindness, <J-c, which thou despisest ? " strong analogy to that of our term job.
2 Not against, but manifested in. 8 Observe the change of construction here.
8 This means to disclose to sight what has The nouns in the latter clause are in the nom-
been hidden ; the word reveal does not by itself inative.
represent the full force of the original term, ' We have remarked elsewhere (but the
although etymologically it corresponds with it. remark may be repeated with advantage)
4 " Glory and honor and immortality," an that the attempts which were formerly made
hendiadys for " immortal glory and honor." to prove that vouoc, when used with and with-
6 This noun seems to mean selfish party in- out the article by St. Paul, meant in the for-
trigue, conducted in a mercenary spirit, and more mer case a moral law in general, and in the
generally, selfish cunning; being derived from latter only the Mosaic Law, have now been
u verb denoting to undertake a work for hire. abandoned by the best interpreters. See note
It occurs also 2 Cor. xii. 20 ; Phil. i. 16, Phil. on iii. 20.
ii. 3 ; Gal. v. 20. The participle is used for 8 The Jews were "hearers of the Law" in
intriguing partisans by Aristotle (Polit. v. 3). their synagogues, every Sabbath.

jhap.xix. EPISTLE TO THE ROMANS. 549 ii.
Law to themselves ; since they manifest the work of the Law written in 15
their hearts ; while their conscience also bears its witness, and their
inward thoughts, answering one to the other, accuse, or else defend them ;
[as will be seen] 1 in that day when God shall judge the secret coun- 16
sels of men by Jesus Christ, according to the Glad-tidings which I
preach.
Norwouidthe Behold 2 thou callest thyself a Jew, and restest in the Law, 17
Jews be * ' '
Seirdboastym and boastest of God's favor, and knowest the will of God, and 18
tbly broke'the givest 3 judgment upon good or evil, being instructed by the
Law ; nor by
their outward teaching of the Law. Thou deemest thyself a guide of the 19
consecration ° jo

trutcircum-6 blind, a light to those who are in darkness, an instructor of
cision is that ,,., , <.,, . . , T
of the heart, the simple, a teacher of babes, possessing in the Law the per- 20
feet pattern of knowledge and of truth. Thou therefore that teachest thy 21
neighbor, dost thou not teach thyself ? thou that preachest a man should
not steal, dost thou steal ? thou that sayest a man should not commit 22
adultery, dost thou commit adultery ? thou that abhorrest idols, dost thou
rob * temples ? thou that makest thy boast in the Law, by breaking the 23
Law dost thou dishonor God ? Yea, as it is written, " ^roiig^ giro IB 24
t\t ntxmt at dob Masjrfr.euUu' nmona, fyt <&tntxltB." 6
For circumcision avails if thou keep the Law ; but if thou be a break- 25
er of the Law, thy circumcision is turned into uncircumcision. If, then, 26
the uncircumcised Gentile keep the decrees of the Law, shall not his
uncircumcision be counted for circumcision ? And shall not he, though 27
naturally uncircumcised, by fulfilling the Law, condemn thee, who with
Scripture and circumcision dost break the Law ? For he is not a Jew who 28
is one outwardly ; nor is that circumcision which is outward in the flesh ;

1 The clause in brackets (or some equiva- callest thyself," &c. ; the apodosis beginning
lent) must be interpolated, to render the con- with verse 21.
nection clear to an English reader. The verbs 8 The verb means to test (as a metal by fire).
are in the present, because the conscientious See 1 Peter i. 7. Hence to give judgment upon
judgment described takes place in the present (here). " Things that are excellent," or
time; yet they are connected with in the Day rather "things that differ," mean (as ex-
<as if they had been in the future), because plained by Theophylact), " what we ought to
the manifestation and confirmation of that do and what we ought not to do." The same
judgment belongs to " the Day of the phrase occurs Phil. i. 10. See also Rom.
Lord." xii. 2.
2 If we follow some of the best MSS., the 4 Compare Acts xix. 37. [See above, p.
translation must run thus • " But what, if thou 475. — h.] 6 Isaiah Iii. 5 (LXX.).

550 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap. iu.
ii.
29 but he is a Jew who is one inwardly, and circumcision is that of the
heart, in the spirit, not in the letter ; whose praise comes not from man,1,
but from God.
iii. 1 " But if this be so, what advantage has the Jew, and what The advan-
' ° ' tage of the
2 has been the profit of circumcision?" Much every way. S&'eir1""
, , -, /. being intrust-
First, because to their keeping were intrusted the oracles oi ed with the
x outward reve-
3 God. For what, though some of them were faithless2 to the {f^^
trust? shall we say3 that their faithlessness destroys the faith- less^essto"this trust only-
4 fulness4 of God? That be far from us. Yea, be sure that ^J1^^.
God is true, though all mankind be liars, as it is written: Si^the"
, occasion for
" Cfrat %tt mig^st toe justitatr ra tgg sajjragB, mb %$g£&
5 mightest 0bf£rrome b%n fyau art juirpir."5 " But if the «sXdfh>m
righteousness of God is established by our unrighteousness ^e%™t
[His faithfulness being more clearly seen by our faithless- no°eonse-m quences (how-
ness] , must we not say that God is unjust " (I speak as men ^ega°wronn'
6 do)6 "in sending the punishment?" That be far from us; aotion right-
7 for [if this punishment be unjust] how shall God, judge the world ? since '
[of that judgment also it might be said] ," If God's truth has by the
occasion of my falsehood more fully shown itself, to the greater manifes-
8 tation of His glory, why am I still condemned as a sinner ? and why 8'
should we not say" (as I myself am slanderously charged with saying)-
" let us do evil that good may come ? " Of such men9 the doom is just.
1 The Pharisees and Pharisaic Judaizers ings, and mightest overcome when Thou art
sought to gain the praise of men by their out- judged."
ward show of sanctity ; which is here contrasted 6 For this phrase, see note on Gal. iii. 15.
with the inward holiness which seeks no praise And compare also 1 Cor. xv. 32, and Bom.
but that of God. The same contrast occurs vi. 19.
in the Sermon on the Mount. 7 In this most difficult passage we must.
2 " Faithless to the trust " refers to the pre- bear in mind that St. Paul is constantly refer-
ceding "intrusted." For the meaning of the ring to the arguments of his opponents, which
word, compare 2 Tim. ii. 13. were familiar to his readers at Rome, but are
8 See note on Gal. iii. 21. not so to ourselves. Hence the apparently
4 That is, shall we imagine that God will abrupt and elliptical character of the argu-
break His covenant with the true Israel, be- ment, and the necessity of supplying some-
cause of the unfaithfulness of the false Israel ? thing to make the connection intelligible.
Compare Eom. xi. 1-5. 8 The ellipsis is supplied by understanding
5 Ps. Ii. 4 (LXX.). The whole context is " why " from the preceding clause, and " say "
as follows : " / acknowledge my transgression, from the following ; the complete expression'
and my sin is ever before me ; against Thee only would have been, " why should we not say t '
have I sinned, and done this evil in Thy sight; 9 Viz., men who deduce immoral conse-
that Thou mightest be justified in Thy say- quences from sophistical arguments.

chap. xix. EPISTLE TO THE EOMANS. 551 iii
rfflSjIwf6" What sha11 we sa7 taen [having gifts above the Gentiles] ? 9
moral pre-110 have we the pre-eminence over them ? No, in no wise ; for
eminence over
tneirLaw111 we k-ave alreauy charged all, both Jews aud Gentiles, with the
°himCotViTd guilt of sin. And so it is written, " Cfxer* is nam Xia^ttOUB, 10
na, not ant ; fytxt is nam ifrat nnbtXBtunbtfy, %r* is non* tfral 11
Bttbtfy after (&ab, %jt ar* all gone ant of % iaag, ifien ar* alio- 12
g*%r bttanxt unprofitable, tytxt is non* tfral bo*lfr gootr, no, not
on*. Cfr*ir throat is an op*n &tnnlt\ixt, toilfr %ir tongn* 1|j*jj 13
frao* ns*o b*r*it, % poison of asps is nnbtx %ir lips. Cfr*ir 14
xnant\ is full of .cursing ano bitterness. Cfreir f**t txxt shrift to 15
&\itb blaab. gl*strafiion antr nris*rjr ar* in %ir pa%, ano % im»
toaj/ of p*ar* frao* %g not knoton. Cjr*r* is no fear of (loir 18
b*for* t§"*ir *2J*S."1 Now we know that all the sayings of the Law are 19
spoken to those under the Law [these things therefore are spoken to
the Jews], that every mouth might be stopped, and the whole world
might be subjected to the judgment of God. For2 through the works 20
of the Law " sjjall no fieS^ bt jnstifi*b in f|is sigjjt," 3 because by
the Law is wrought [not the doing of righteousness, but] the acknowl
edgment of sin.
Hence aii But now, not by the Law, but by another way,4 God's 21
men, heing
thestandMdy righteousness is brought to light, whereto the Law and the
whichthey prophets bear witness ; God righteousness (I say) which 22
possessed,
must be made comes by faith in Jesus Christ, for all and upon all, who have
righteous in J 7 i ?
a^wi'y duTcr-in faith ; 6 for there is no difference [between Jew and Gentile] ,
of the Law; since all have sinned, and none have attained the glorious like- 23
i. e. not by
nepw,u£nPdrfo ness s of God. But they are justified freely by His grace 24
1 This whole passage is quoted (and all for in Thy sight shall no man be justified."
but verses 10 and 11 verbatim) from Ps. xiv. No doubt the preceding words were in St.
1 2, 3 (LXX.). Portions of it also occur Paul's recollection, and are tacitly referred to,
in Ps. liii. 3, Ps. v. 9, Ps. cxl. 3, Ps. x. 7 ; being very suitable to his argument.
Isaiah lix. 7 ¦ Ps. xxxvi. 1. i Not by the Law, but by something else. See
2 See note on ii. 12. That the absence of iii. 28, and iv. 6.
the article makes no difference is shown by 6 In order to render more clear the con
verses 28 and 29. At the same time, it must nection between the words for "faith" and
be observed that the Law is spoken of as a " believe," it is desirable to translate the latter
moral, not as a ceremonial law. have faith (instead of believe) wherever it is
8 Ps. cxliii. 2, almost verbatim from LXX. possible.
' Enter not into judgment with Thy servant ; 6 Literally, all fall short of the glory of God.

552

THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL.

CHAP. XIX.

25 through the ransom which is paid in Christ Jesus. For him |ft°ieaIbut>by
hath God set forth, in His blood to be a propitiatory sacrifice by Christ, and by
receiving a
means of Faith, thereby to manifest the righteousness of God ; gratuitous
r J o ? pardon for
because in His forbearance God had passed over the former Tifeeacrmc*'of Christ
26 sins of men 1 in the times that are gone by. [Him CI say) showed that
° J L \ JS this pardon
hath God set forth] in this present time to manifest His ffigg^,™1
righteousness, that he might be just, and [yet] might justify 2 sin.
27 the children3 of Faith. Where, then, is the 4 boasting [of the Jew] ? It
has been 5 shut out. By what law ? by the law of works ? no, but by
28 the law of Faith. For we reckon6 that by Faith a man is justified, and
not by7 the works of the Law ; else God must be the God of the Jews
29 alone ; but is He not likewise the God of the Gentiles ? Yea, He is the
30 God of the Gentiles also. For God is one [for all men] , and He will
justify through Faith the circumcision of the Jews, and by their Faith
will He justify also the uncircumcision of the Gentiles.
31 Do we, then, by Faith bring to nought the Law ? That be far jj*^ * °^eo_
from us ! Yea, we establish the Law. o^§Testta-the
ment and the

We have " God's glory '' as analogous to
" Christ's glory" (2 Cor. viii. 23, or 2 Cor. iii.
18). It may also mean God's heavenly glory
(Rom. v. 2, and 2 Thess. ii. 14). Meyer and
others render it " the praise which comes from
God," which is contrary to St. Paul's use of
the phrase. Indeed St. John is the only
writer in the New Testament who furnishes
any analogy for this rendering (John xii.
43). 1 The A. V. here is a mistranslation. Cf.
Acts xvii. 30, and the note on St. Paul's
speech at Lystra, p. 172, n. 2.'
2 The first wish of a translator of St.
Paul's Epistles would be to retain the same
English root in all the words employed
as translations of the various derivatives
of dinawc, viz. diKaiooivn, iixavovv, 6in.cu.upa,
Sixaiuaif, duaiag, and SucauMpusia. But this is
impossible, because no English root of the
same meaning has these derivatives ; for exam
ple, taking righteous to represent i'mavoc, we
have righteousness for 6matoavv7j, but no verb
from the same root equivalent to imaiovv.
Again, taking just for 6'maio(, we have justify
for 6ixaiovv, but no term for Swaioavvri, which
is by no means equivalent to justice, nor even

to justness, in many passages where it occurs.
The only course which can be adopted, there
fore, is to take that root in each case which
seems best to suit the context, and bring out
the connection of the argument.
8 The original is not fully represented by
the A. V. It means " him whose essential
characteristic is faith,'' " the child of fairh."
Compare Gal. iii. 7, and Gal. iii. 9. The word
" Jesus " is omitted by some of the best MSS.,
and is introduced in others with variations,
which looks as if it had been originally an in
terpolation. It is omitted by Tischendorf.
4 The Greek has the article before the
word for " boasting."
6 The aorist seems used here (as often) in
a perfect sense. See note on 2 Cor. vii. 2,
and on Rom. v . 5.
6 We have adopted the reading " for "
instead of " therefore," because the authority
of MSS. and Fathers is pretty equally divided
between the two readings, and it suits the con
text better to make this clause a proposition
supporting the preceding, and defended by
the following, than to make it the conclusion
from the preceding arguments.
7 See note on verse 21.

ch>p.xix. EPISTLE TO THE ROMANS. 553 iv
ASam°f What, then,1 can we say that our father Abraham gained by 2 1
fled", not by3 the fleshly ordinance ? For if Abraham was justified by works, 2
tircumcision,
tut before he has a ground of boasting. But he has no ground of boast-
circumcision. ° ° °
4SnGod'B ing with God ; for what says the Scripture? " ^bxajfKm |mir 3
promises fore-
ciriTanfaith, faiijx in (§ob, anb it toas r*rhon*b ratio fjirn for rigjjleons-
Christians be- ,, „
ing, by virtue xitBB. ' Now, if a man earn his pay by his work, it is not 4
chiiSen'of" " r*ckon*0 lo bim " as a favor, but it is paid him as a debt ;
Abraham , and °
heirs of the but jf he earns nothing by his work, but puts faith in Him who 5
promises. ° -1 L
justifies 4 the ungodly, then his faith is " r*ckon*b ta fyxm for rigIjt*OUS-
n*SS." In like manner David also tells the blessedness of the man to 6
whom God reckoneth righteousness, not by works, but by another way,5
saying, " §I*ss*b ar* %o fagose iniqixiti*s ar* forgib*n, anb tofms* 7
sins ar* xofreteb. §Iess*b is t\t man against ia\anx tfr* ITorb sjrall 8
not r*rkon sin." 8 Is this blessing, then, for the circumcised alone ? or 9
does it not belong also to the uncircumcised ? for we say, " |jis faitjj
toas r*rkon*b ta %bxix\i\nx for righteousness." 7 How, then, was it 10
reckoned to him ? when he was circumcised, or uncircumcised ? Not in
circumcision, but in uncircumcision. And he received circumcision as an 11
outward sign 8 of inward things, a seal to attest the righteousness which
belonged to his Faith while he was yet uncircumcised. That so he might
be father of all the faithful who are uncircumcised, that the righteousness
[of Faith] might be reckoned to them also ; — and father of circumcision 12
to those 9 who are not circumcised only in the flesh, but who also tread in
the steps of that Faith which our father Abraham had while yet uncir
cumcised. For the promise 10 to Abraham and his seed that he should inherit the 18
1 The " therefore" here is very perplexing, 8 Gen. xv. 6 (LXX.).
as the argument seems to require " for." Nor * See note on iii. 26.
is the difBculty removed by saying dogmati- 6 See again note on iii. 21.
cally that this passage is "not a proof but a 6 Ps. xxxii. 1, 2 (LXX.).
consequence " of the preceding. For it is un- 7 Gen. xv. 6 (LXX.), repeated.
questionably given by St. Paul as & proof that 8 The full meaning of sign is an outward
the law is consistent with his doctrine of faith. sign of things unseen.
The " therefore " is probably repeated from ° Viz., the faithful of Jewish birth.
the preceding " therefore,'' just as "for" is 10 "The land which thou seest, to thee will I
repeated in v. 7. gii>e it, and to thy seed for ever," Gen. xiii. 15.
2 Literally, gained in the way of the flesh. St. Paul (according to his frequent practice ia
The order of the Greek forbids us to join dealing with the Old Testament) allegorizes
" after the flesh " with " father," as in A. V. this promise. So that, as Abraham is (al-

554 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap m,
iv. 14 world came not by the Law, but by the righteousness of Faith. For, if this
inheritance belong to the children of the Law, Faith is made of no account,
15 and the promise is brought to nought; because the Law brings [not
blessings but] punishment1 (for where there is no law, there can be no
16 law-breaking) . Therefore the inheritance belongs to Faith, that it might
be a free gift ; that so the promise 2 [not being capable of forfeiture]
might stand firm to all the seed of Abraham, not to his children of the
Law alone, but to the children of his Faith ; for he is the Father of us all
17 [both Jews and Gentiles] (as it is written, " Jj jrafr* mab* fytt t\t
fyfytX of mang nations ") 3 in the sight of God, who saw his faith,
even God who makes the dead to live, and calls the things that are not as
18 though they were. For Abraham had faith in hope beyond hope, that he
might become t\t fatfier of mang nations ; 4 as it was said unto him,
" %aa\\ iotoarb [reaoen, anb 1*11 % stars if t\an bt abl* ta nnmbtt
19 t{j*m ; tbtn SO SJjall %r S*«b b*." 6 And having no feebleness in his
faith, he regarded not his own body which was already dead (being about
20 a hundred years old), nor the deadness of Sarah's womb; at the
promise of God (I say) he doubted not faithlessly, but 6 was filled with
21 the strength of Faith, and gave glory to God ; being fully persuaded that
22 what He has promised, He is able also to perform. Therefore " bis
23 faitjj foas r*tkon*b lo [rim for rig{rt*onsn*ss." But these words were
24 not written for his sake only, but for our sakes likewise ; for it will be
" Xttbamb fax righteousness " to us also, who have faith in Him that
legoncally viewed) the type of Christian faith, 6 Gen. xv. 5 (LXX.). In such quotations,
he is also the heir of the world, whereof the a few words were sufficient to recall the whole
sovereignty belongs to his spiritual children, passage to Jewish readers ; therefore, to make
by virtue of their union with their Divine them intelligible to modern readers, it is some
Head. times necessary to give the context. It should
1 Literally, wrath ; i. e. the wrath of God be observed that this quotation alone is suffi-
punishing the transgressions of the Law. cient to prove that the majority of those to
2 This passage throws light on Gal. iii. 18 whom St. Paul was writing were familiar with
and 20. It should be observed that St. Paul the Septuagint version ; for to none others
restricts " the seed of Abraham " to the inherit- could such a curtailed citation be intelligible.
ors of his faith ; and to all this seed (he declares) The hypothesis that the Eoman Christians had
the promise must stand firm. originally been Jewish proselytes, of Gentile
8 Gen. xvii. 5 (LXX.).. It is impossible birth, satisfies this condition. See the intro-
to represent in the English the full force of ductory remarks to this epistle.
the Greek, when the same word means nations 6 Literally, he was in-strengthened (i. e.,
and Gentiles. strengthened inwardly) by faith.
4 Gen. xvii. 5. See the previous note.

«iap. xix. EPISTLE TO THE ROMANS. 555 iv.
raised from the dead our Lord Jesus ; who was given up to death for our 25
transgressions, and raised again to life for our justification.1
Through faith Therefore, being justified by Faith, we have peace with v.l
In Christ, then, -~, -, ,, , T
christians are bod, through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom also we 2
justified; and ' °
the mfistrf™ have received entrance into this grace 2 wherein we stand ;
sulfonics™ and we exult in hope of the glory of God. And not only so, 3
being filled J '
TiousnesTor but we exult also in our sufferings ; for we know that by suf-
uieds'airincen fering is wrought steadfastness, and steadfastness is the proof 4
of Christ for
tnem^Forby of soundness, and proof gives rise to hope ; and our hope 5
chrfstfthef cannot shame us in the day of trial ; because the love of God
to God; and is shed forth in our hearts by the Holy Spirit, who has been3
by partaking
christftheyf giYen unto us- For while we were yet helpless [in our sins], 6
Christ at the appointed time died for sinners. Now hardly 7
for a righteous man will any be found to die (although some, perchance,
would even endure death for the good), but God gives proof of His own 8
love to us, because, while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. Much 9
more, now that we have been justified in His blood,4 shall we be saved
through Him from the wrath5 to come. For if, when we were His 10
enemies, we were reconciled to God by the death of His Son, much more,
being already reconciled, shall we be saved by sharing in6 His life.
Nor is this our hope only for the time to come ; but also [in our present 11
sufferings] we exult in God, through Jesus Christ our Lord, by whom we
have now received reconciliation with God.
ms »"» This, therefore, is like the case ' when, through one man U
1 i. e. that we might have an ever-living other (in the 9th verse) " having been justified,"
Saviour as the object of our faith, and might and an aorist verb (11th verse) " we have re-
through that faith be united with Him, and ceived," and to consent to the junction of both
partake of His life, and thus be justified, or ac- these aorists with " now," a junction which is
counted righteous, and (for St. Paul does not, conclusive as to its perfect use.
like later theologians, separate these ideas) 4 Justified in His blood, i. e. by participation
have the seed of all true moral life implanted in His blood; that is, being made partakers of His
in u,i. Compare v. 10. death. Compare Rom. vi. 3-8; also Gal. ii.
2 " By faith " is omitted in the best MSS. 20.
8 Olshausen translates "was given unto 6 The original has the article before "wrath."
us,'- viz. on the day of Pentecost. But we 6 This "in "should be distinguished from
have elsewhere shown the mistake of those who the preceding " by."
will never allow St. Paul to use the aorist in a 7 Much difficulty has been caused to inter-
perfect sense. See note on 2 Cor. vii. 2. Dr. pretershere by the "as" (which introduces the
Alford, who objects to translate one aorist par- first member of the parallel) having no answer-
ticiple (in the 5th verse) "having been given," is ing "so " (nor any thing equivalent to it) to
obliged himself inconsistently to translate an- introduce the second. The best view of the

556 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap. xix.
[Adam], sin entered into the world, and by sin death ; and so son was the
V. J representative
13 death spread to all mankind, because all committed sin. For f,0Ya^ttion'd
before the Law was given [by Moses], there was sin in the for condemna
tion. The
world ; but sin is not reckoned against the sinner, when there Mosaic Law
° 7 was added to
14 is no law [forbidding it] ; nevertheless death reigned from scfe1nc",0in0011'
Adam till Moses, even over those whose sin [not being the migbt be feit
to be a trans-
breach of law] did not resemble the sin of Adam. Now, 1^™!°/^
15 Adam is an image of Him that was to come. But far greater thus the gift"
of spiritual
is the gift than was the transgression ; for if by the sin of the {j*> Jjj Christ
one man [Adam] death came upon the many,1 much more in freparedto11
„ feel their need
the grace of the one man Jesus Christ has the freeness of of it, so that
man's sin
16 God's2 bounty overflowed unto the many. Moreover, the boon f^^ffi
[of God] exceeds the fruit3 of Adam's sin; for the doom
came, out of one offence, a sentence of condemnation ; but the gift
17 comes, out of many offences, a sentence of acquittal. For if the reign
of death was established by the one man [Adam] , through the sin of
him alone ; far more shall the reign of life be established in those who
receive the overflowing fulness of the free gift of righteousness by the
8 one man Jesus Christ. Therefore, as the fruit of one offence reached to
all men, and brought upon them condemnation [the source of death] ;
so likewise the fruit of one acquittal shall reach 4 to all, and shall bring
19 justification, the source 5 of life. For as, by the disobedience of the one,
the many were made sinners ; so by the obedience of the one, the many
20 shall be made righteous. And the Law was added, that sin might
abound ; 6 but where sin abounded, the gift of grace has overflowed
passage is to consider " as " as used elliptically * We take StKauJija here in the same sense
for [the case is] as what follows ; in which sense as in verse 1 6, because, first, it is difficult to
it is used Matt. xxv. 14, where it is similarly suppose the same word used in the very same
without any answering " so." Another view passage in two such different meanings as Recte
is to suppose the regular construction lost sight factum, and Decretum absolutorium (which Wahi
of in the rapidity of dictation : the second and most of the commentators suppose it to
member of the parallel being virtually supplied be). And, secondly, because otherwise it is
in verses 15 to 20. necessary to take "one " differently in two par-
1 Not " many " ( A. V.), but the many, nearly allel phrases (masculine in the one, and neuter
equivalent to all. in the other), which is unnatural.
2 We take grace and gift together. Com- 6 Literally, appertaining to life.
pare the same expression below, in verse 17 ; 6 A light is thrown on this very difficult
literally, the free gift and the boon of God, an expression by vii. 13 ; see note on that verse.
hendiadys for the freeness of God's bounty.
8 Literally, the boon is not as [that which was]
wrought by one man who sinned.

cnAP. xix.

EPISTLE TO THE ROMANS.

557

beyond [the outbreak of sin] ; that as sin has reigned in death, so grace 21
might reign through righteousness unto life eternal, by the work of
Jesus Christ our Lord.
itisaseif-con- What shall we say then? shall we1 persist in sin that the vi. 1
tradictory
perversion of gift of grace may be more abundant ? God forbid ! We who 2
thisr-uthto ° ° J
iTthat wefrom naYe died 2 to sin, how can we any longer live in sin ? or have
in sin in order you forgotten that all of us, when we were baptized into fel- 3
to call forth J ° c
buion^fexhi" l°wship with Christ Jesus, were baptized into fellowship with
to? spiritual' His death? With Him, therefore, we were buried by the 4
life (which is
the grace) baptism wherein we shared His death [when we sank beneath
cannot co- L l-
spirSh the waters] ; 3 that even as Christ was raised up from the
dead by the glory of the Father, so we likewise might walk in
newness of life. For if we have been grafted 4 into the likeness of His 5
death, so shall we also share His resurrection. For we know that our 6
old man was crucified5 with Christ, that the sinful body [of the old
man] 6 might be destroyed, that we might no longer be the slaves of sin ;
(for he that is dead is justified1 from sin). Now, if we have shared the 7, 8
death of Christ, we believe that we shall also share His life ; knowing 9
'hat Christ, being raised from the dead, can die no more ; death has no
nore dominion over Him. For He died once, and once only, unto sin ; 10
>ut He lives [forever] unto God. Likewise reckon ye also yourselves to n
je dead indeed unto sin, but living unto God in Christ Jesus.8 Let not 12

1 This was probably an objection made by
Judaizing disputants (as it has been made by
their successors in other ages of the Church)
against St. Paul's doctrine. They argued that
if (as he said) the sin of man called forth so
glorious an exhibition of the pardoning grace
of God, the necessary conclusion must be, that
the more men sinned the more God was glori
fied. Compare iii. 7-8, and verse 15 below.
We know, also, that this inference was actually
deduced by the Antinomian party at Corinth
(see p. 392), and therefore it was the more
necessary for St. Paul to refute it.
2 The A. V. " are dead " does not preserve
the reference in the original to a past transac
tion. We might here keep the aorist to its
classical use, by translating (as in our former
edition) who died to sin [when we became follow
ers of Christ] ; but this rendering is less simple
and natural than the other.
8 This clause, which is here left elliptical,

is fully expressed in Col. ii. 12. This passage
cannot be understood unless it be borne in
mind that the primitive baptism was by im
mersion. See p. 384.
4 Literally, have become partakers of a vital
union [as that of a graft with the tree into
which it is grafted] of the representation of his
death [in baptism]. The meaning appears to
to be, if we have shared the reality of his death,
whereof we have undergone the likeness.
6 Observe the mis-translation in the A.V.
" is crucified."
6 With " body of sin " compare " body of
flesh," Col. ii. 11.
1 Is justified, meaning that if a criminal,
charge is brought against a man who died be
fore the perpetration of the crime, he must be
acquitted, since he could not have committed
the act charged against him.
8 The best MSS. omit ' our Lord."

558 THE LIFE AJSD EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap, xu
. sin therefore reign in your dying body, causing you to obey its lusts ;
13 nor give up your members to sin, as instruments of unrighteousness ; but
give yourselves to God, as being restored to life from the dead, and your
14 members to His service as instruments of righteousness ; for sin shall
not have the mastery over you, since you are not under the Law,1 but
under grace.
15 What then? shall we sin2 because we are not under the S-s'froeaom
16 Law, but under grace ? God forbid! Know ye not that He conTists^n'™living in the
to whose service you give yourselves is your real master, ""JJ0^
whether sin, whose end is death, or obedience, whose end is i^penTiLes,but as neccs-
17 righteousness? But God be thanked that you, who were once sary fruits of
° * the spiritual
the slaves of sin, obeyed from your hearts the teaching ^^1^
18 whereby you were moulded anew ;3 and when you were freed nencelhe slaves of sin
from the slavery of sin, you became the bondsmen of righteous- e™^^°
19 ness. (I speak the language of common life, to show the theLawistnc*
they are still
weakness of your fleshly nature4 [which must be in bondage subject to the
either to the one, or to the other].) For as once you gave up ^hiciTr'othe
the members of your body for slaves of uncleanness and licen- results"? sin.
tiousness, to work the deeds of license ; so now must you give them up
20 for slaves of righteousness to work the deeds of holiness. For when you
were the slaves of sin, you were free from the service of righteousness.
21 What fruit, then, had you 5 in those times, from the deeds whereof you
22 are now ashamed ? yea, the end of them is death. But now, being freed
from the bondage of sin, and enslaved to the service of God, your fruit is
23 growth in holiness,6 and its end is life eternal. For the wage of sin is
death ; but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord and
Master.1 1 To be " under the law," in St. Paul's Ian- 5 It has been alleged that " fruit " (in N. T. )
guage, means to avoid sin from fear of penal- always means " actions ; the fruit of a man con •
ties attached to sin by the law. This principle sidered as a tree ; " and that it never means " the
of fear is not strong enough to keep men in fruit of his actions." But in fact the metaphor
the path of duty. Union with Christ can alone is used both ways : sometimes a man is consid-
give man the mastery over sin. ered as producing fruit ; sometimes as gathering
2 See note on first verse of this chapter. or storing fruit. In the former case " bear
8 Literally, the mould of teaching into which fruit," in the latter "have fruit," is appropri-
you were transmitted. The metaphor is from the ately used. Compare Rom. i. 13, and also
casting of metals. Rom. xv. 28 ; Phil. i. 22 ; 2 Tim. ii. 6.
4 There is a striking resemblance between 6 Literally, the fruit which you possess tends
this passage and the words of Socrates recorded to produce holiness. In other words, the reward
by Xenophon Mem. I. 5. For the apologetic of serving God is growth in holiness.
phrase here, compare Rom. iii. 5 aDd Gal. iii. 15. 7 We must give " Lord " its full meaning

more.

CHAP.xrx. EPISTLE TO THE ROMANS. 559 vii.
As above said, [I say that you are not under the Law] ; or1 are you igno- 1
LaVu-nfoerthe rant' Drethren (for I speak to those who know the Law), that
toatLt Sinful the dominion of the Law over men lasts only during their life ?
earthly nature
to which they thus the married woman is bound by the Law to her husband 2
have died by '
chrisSrieatti, while he lives, but if her husband be dead, the law which
admitted to a bound her to him has lost its hold upon her ; so that while her 3
better spirit-
tiSir u'iuon by husband is living, if she be joined to another man, she will be
Se, so' that tL counted an adulteress ; but if her husband be dead, she is free
ains of which
the Law was from the Law, so as to be no adulteress, although ioined to
formerly the 7 7 D J
comettemTo" another man. Wherefore you also, my brethren, were made 4
dead to the Law by [union with] the body of Christ ; that
you might be married to another, even to Him who was raised from the
dead ; that we might bring forth fruit unto God. For when we were in 5
the flesh, the sinful passions occasioned by the Law wrought in our mem
bers, leading us to bring forth fruit unto death. But now that we have 6
died [with Christ] 2 the Law wherein we were formerly held fast has lost
its hold upon us : so that we are no longer in the old bondage of the
letter, but in the new service of the spirit.
behenLaWa9 What sha11 We Sa7 then ? that the LaW is Sin ? That be far 7
occasion of from us ! But then I should not have known what sin was,
sin. For
cchts awfken except through the Law ; thus I should not have known the
tolTeDns°eonfCe sin of coveting, unless the Law had said CgOU Syalt Udt
duty, the sins
weredone0™ tabtt.* But when sin had gained by the commandment a 8
here. Sin was our master (verses 16, 17) : it is both typified and realized when he is
Christ is now our master. buried beneath the baptismal waters. But no
1 Or are you ignorant ? the or (which is omit- sooner is he thus dead with Christ than he
ted in A.V.) referring to what has gone be- rises with Him ; he is made partaker of Christ's
fore, and implying, if you deny what I have said, resurrection ; he is united to Christ's body ; he
you must be ignorant of, &c. ; or, in other words, lives in Christ, and to Christ ; he is no longer
you must acknowledge what I say, or be ignorant " in the flesh," but " in the spirit."
of, &c. The reference here is to the assertion 2 The best MSS. have the participle in the
in verses 14 and 15 of the preceding chapter, nom. plural. It is opposed to "when we were
that Christians " are not under the law." For in the flesh," of the preceding verse. To
the argument of the present passage, see the make it clear, this verse should have a comma
marginal summary. St. Paul's view of the after the Greek participle. As to the sense in
Christian life, throughout the sixth, seventh, which Christians are " dead," see the preced-
and eighth chapters, is that it consists of a ing note.
death and a resurrection; the new-made Chris- s Exod. xx. 17 (LXX.). This illustration
tian dies to sin, to the world, to the flesh, and appears conclusive against the view of Eras-
to the Law ; this death he undergoes at his mus and others who understood the following
first entrance into communion with Christ, and statement ("without the Law, sin is dead") to

560

THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL.

.. vantage-ground [against me] , it wrought in me all manner of ignorance are
Vll. . now done in
9 coveting (for where there is no law, sin is dead). And I r^j^^f
felt ' that I was alive before, when I knew no law ; but when Fo°\Chenc°arnainature of the
10 the commandment came, sin rose to life, and I died ; and the natural man
' fulfils the evil
very commandment whose end is life was found to me the e^wtuar
11 cause of death ; for sin, when it had gained a vantage-ground demns.
by the commandment, deceived me to my fall, and slew me fuced'uT
ii,,, « , , T which the
by ' the sentence ot the Law. worse part in
_^^ man triumphs
12 Wherefore the Law indeed is holy, and its commandments over the bet-
J ' ter, the law of
13 are holy and just and good. Do I say, then, that Good became the hfvfof ws
to me Death ? 3 ¦ Far be that from me ! But I say that sin man in him-
J self (/ myself,
wrought this ; that so it might be made manifest as sin, in rheheip^f011*
working Death to me through [the knowledge of] Good ; that mu"t continue
the slave of
sin might become beyond measure 4 sinful, by the command- WlLBhfful

ment.

earthlynature.

14 For we know that the Law is spiritual ; 6 but for me, I am carnal,6 a

mean that the Law irritates and provokes sin
into action, on the principle of " nitimur in
vetitum." For the lust of concupiscence is
quite as active in an ignorant Heathen as in
an instructed Pharisee.
1 For this meaning of "live" sre 1 Thess.
iii. 8.
2 Literally, by the commandment ; which de
nounced death against its violators. See note
on 1 Cor. xv. 56.
8 Literally, is it become ? equivalent to do I
say that it became? If with several good MSS.
we replace the perfect by the aorist, the diffi
culty is removed. We must supply " become
death " again after " sin."
4 This explains Rom. v. 20. In both pas
sages, St. Paul states the object of the law
to be to lay down, as it were, a boundary line
which should mark the limits of right and
wrong ; so that sin, by transgressing this line,
might manifest its real nature, and be distinctly
recognized for what it is. The Law was not
given to provoke man to sin (as some have
understood, Rom. v. 20), but to stimulate
the conscience into activity.
5 It may be asked, how this is consistent
with many passages where St. Paul speaks of
the Law as a carnal ordinance, and opposes it
as letter to spirit ? The answer is, that here he

speaks of the Law under its moral aspect, as
is plain from the whole context.
6 Scarcely any thing in this Epistle has
caused more controversy than the question
whether St. Paul, in the following description
of the struggle between the flesh and the
spirit, wherein the flesh gains the victory,
meant to describe his own actual state. The
best answer to this question is a comparison
between vi. 17 and 20 (where he tells the Ro
man Christians that they are no longer the slaves
of sin), vii. 14 (where he says lam carnal, u
slave sold into the captivity of sin), and viii. 4
(where he includes himself among those who
live not the life of the flesh, but the life of the
spirit, i. e. who are not carnal). It is surely
clear that these descriptions cannot be meant
to belong to the same person at the same time.
The best commentary on the whole passage (vii.
7 to viii. 13) is to be found in the condensed
expression of the same truths contained in Gal.
v. 16-18 : Walk in the spirit, and ye shall
NOT FULFIL THE DESIRE OF THE FLESH ; for
the desire of the flesh fights against the spirit,
and tlie desire of the spirit fights against the
flesh ; and this variance between the flesh and the
spirit would hinder you from doing that which your
will prefers ; but if you be led by the spirit, you
are not under the Law.

CHAP. XIX.

EPISTLE TO THE ROMANS.

561

slave sold into the captivity of sin. What I do, I acknowledge not ; for I 15
do not what I would, but what I hate. But if my will is against my 16
deeds, I thereby acknowledge the goodness of the Law. And now it is 17
no more I myself who do the evil, but it is the sin which dwells in me.
For I know that in me, that is, in my flesh, good abides not ; for to will 18
is present with me, but to do the right is absent ; the good that I would, 19
I do not ; but the evil which I would not, that I do. Now if my own ' 20
will is against my deeds, it is no more I myself who do them, but the sin
which dwells in me. I find, then, this law, that though my will is to do 21^
good, yet evil is present with me ; for I consent gladly to the law of God 22
in my inner man ; but I behold another law in my members, warring 23
against the law of my mind, and making me captive to the law of sin
which is in my members. 0 wretched man that I am ! who shall deliver 24
me from this body of death ?
I thank God [that He has now delivered me] through Jesus Christ our 25
Lord. So, then, in myself,2 though I am subject in my mind to the law of God,
yet in my flesh I am subject to the law of sin

1 The " I " in I will is emphatic.
2 Aurdc lyi>, I in myself, i. e. without the
help of God. This expression is the key to
the whole passage. St. Paul, from verse 14
to verse 24, has been speaking of himself as
he was in himself, i. e. in his natural state of
helplessness, with a conscience enlightened,
but a will enslaved ; the better self struggling
vainly against the worse. Every man must
continue in this state, unless he be redeemed
from it by the Spirit of God. Christians are
(so far as God is concerned) redeemed already
from this state ; but in themselves, and so far as
they live to themselves, they are still in bond
age. The redemption which they (potentially,
if not actually) possess is the subject of the
8th chapter. Leighton (though his view of
the whole passage would not have entirely
coincided with that given above) most beauti
fully expresses the contrast between these two
states (of bondage and deliverance) in his ser
mon on Rom. viii. 35 : " Is this he that so
latelv cried out, 0 wretched man that I am !
who shall deliver me ? that now triumphs, O
happy man ! who shall separate us from the love
of Christ ? Yes, it is the same. Pained then
36

with the thoughts of that miserable conjunc
tion with a body of death, and so crying out,
who will deliver ? Now he hath found a de
liverer to do that for him, to whom he is for
ever united. So vast a difference is there be
twixt a Christian taken in himself and in
Christ." Against the above view of verse 25,
it may be said that the more natural and ob
vious meaning of ofirdc eyu is " / Paul my
self," " I myself who write this ; " as has lately
been urged with much force by Dean Alford.
He advocates the distinction between this verse
and viii. 4, which is maintained by Olshausen
and others, who think the spiritual man is
described as " serving the flesh by the law of
sin," but yet as " not walking after the flesh."
According to this interpretation, St. Paul here
declares that he himself is in bondage to the law
of sin, in his flesh ; but means only that " the
flesh is still, even in the spiritual man, subject
(essentially, not practically) to the law of sin.''
(Alford). We would not venture dogmati
cally to pronounce this view untenable : yet
its advocates must acknowledge that it is ex
tremely difficult to reconcile it with the slavery
of vi. 17-20.

562 THE LLFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap, xix
viii. 1 Now, therefore, there is no condemnation to those who are But with that
help this fiin-
2 in Christ Jesus ; ' for the law of the Spirit of life in Christ ^i earthly
7 rr nature is van-
3 Jesus 2 has freed me from the law of sin and death. For God chrisua™ *a
he is enabled
(which was impossible to the Law, because by the flesh it had to live, not ac-
v r J cording to the
no power) , by sending His own Son in the likeness of sinful jSu'frefbut
4 flesh, and on behalf of sin, overcame 3 sin in the flesh ; 4 to the the. spiritual
part. God's
end that the decrees of the Law might be fulfilled in us, who Ire^oleon'iy
5 walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit.5 For they who enabled by^e
indwelling
live after the flesh mind fleshly things ; but they who live after cSt to con-
the Spirit mind spiritual things : and 6 the fleshly mind is death ; Siiy eir
nature.
6, 7 but the spiritual mind is life and peace. Because the fleshly
mind is enmity against God ; for it is not subject to the law of God, nor
8, 9 can be ; and they whose life is in the flesh cannot please God. But your life
is not in the flesh, but in the Spirit, if indeed the Spirit of God be dwell
ing in you ; and if any man has not the Spirit of Christ, he is not
10 Christ's. But if Christ be in you, though your body be dead, because of
sin [to which its nature tends], yet your spirit is life,7 because of right-
11 eousness [which dwells within it] ; yea, if the Spirit of Him who raised
Jesus from the dead be dwelling in you, He who raised Christ from the
dead shall endow with life also your dying bodies, by His 8 Spirit which
1 The clause which follows, from " who forms an excellent commentary on this part of
walk " to " Spirit," is omitted in the best the Epistle. See a fuller extract in the larger
MSS., having (it would seem) been introduced editions.
by a clerical error from verse 4. 6 Winer sneers at Tholuck's remark
2 Winer wishes to join in " Christ Jesus " (which the latter has since modified), that the
with the verb "freed," not with the preceding conjunction (for, A. V.) is a mere transition
words ; but there are so many examples of a particle here ; but yet what else is it. when it
similar construction in St. Paul's style, that does not introduce a reason for a preceding
we think his reasons insufficient to justify a proposition ? In these cases of successive
departure from the more obvious view. clauses each connected thus with the preceding,
3 Literally, condemned, i. e. put it to rebuke, they all appear to refer back to the first pre-
worsted it. Compare Heb. xi. 7. ceding clause, and therefore all but the first
4 " In the flesh," that is to say, in the very conjunction might be represented by and.
seat of its power. Just in the same way as but is used in English ;
5 The contrast between the victory thus as, for example, " But ye are washed, but ye
obtained by the spirit, with the previous sub- are sanctified."
jection of the soul to the flesh, is thus beauti- t The word here used is in St. Paul's writ-
fully described by Tertullian : — " When the ings scarcely represented adequately by life ,- it
Soul is wedded to the Spirit, the Flesh fol- generally means more than this, viz. life tri-
lows — Hke the handmaid who follows her umphant over death.
wedded mistress to the husband's home — be- 8 The MSS. are divided here. One read
ing thenceforward no longer the servant of the ing must be translated because of instead of hy.
Soul, but of the Spirit." The whole passage This will make the clause exactly parallel wi-i

chap. xix. EPISTLE TO THE ROMANS. 563 viii.
dwells within you. Therefore, brethren, we are debtors bound not to the 12
Flesh, that we should live after the Flesh [but to the Spirit] ; for if you 13
live after the Flesh, you are doomed to die ; but if by the Spirit you de
stroy the deeds of the body, in their death * you will attain to life.
«uch persons For all who are led by God's Spirit, and they alone,2 are the 14
ward con- sons of God. For you have not received a Spirit of bondage, 15
sciousness of
to Godke l0Te *aa* y°u sa0lu(l go back again to the state of slavish fear,3 but
they6 tnticl? you have received a Spirit of adoption wherein we cry [unto
pate a future
feet Sate per' God] > saying " Jfa%r." 4 The Spirit itself bears witness with 16
^tionto'ooa our own spirit, that we are the children of God. And if chil- 17
will have its ,
full develop- dren, then heirs, heirs of God, and loint heirs with Christ;
ment And their"55' that if now we share His sufferings, we should hereafter share
future perfec- His glory. For I reckon that the sufferings of this present 18
tion is shared ox
beings°upond ^me are nothing worth, when set against the glory which shall
discontent at soon 5 be revealed unto us. For the longing of the creation 19
presentimper-fection points looks eagerly for the time when [the glory of] the sons of God
from evud shall be revealed. For the creation was made subject to decay,6 20
And this feel- . , , _ XT. , , . , .
ing is (26, 27) not by its own will, but because ox Him who subjected it
implanted in
ahespMtSofy thereto,7 in hope : for 8 the creation itself also shall be deliv- 21
ge°sts tb.eirUg" ered from its slavery to death, and shall gain the freedom of
firayers and
ongiugs. the sons of God when they are glorified.9 For we know that 22
the whole creation is groaning together, and suffering the pangs of labor,
the end of verse 10. Tholuck gives an able St. Paul leaves unsolved; but he tells us to
summary of the arguments in favor of the wait patiently for its solution, and encouraget
accusative reading. us to do so by his inspired declarations, in this
1 This translation js necessary to represent and other places (as 1 Cor. xv. 25, &c.), that
the reference to death as expressed in the pre- the reign of evil will not be eternal, but that
ceding verb (mortify, A. V.). good will ultimately and completely triumph.
2 They and they alone, they and not the carnal It should be observed that Evil is always rep-
¦seed of Abraham. resented in Scripture as in its nature opposed
3 Back again. Compare Gal. iv. 9. to God, not as included necessarily in His
4 See note on Gal. iv. 6. plan ; even where God is represented as sub-
5 Which is about to be revealed, which shall jecting His creatures to its temporary domin
ion be revealed. ion.
6 The word used here (vanity, A. V.) means 8 We agree with Dean Alford that it is
the transitory nature which causes all the ani- better here not to render, as some do, " in hope
mated creation so rapidly to pass away. that ; " for, were this correct, the words " the
7 God is probably meant by " him who creation itself" would not be so emphatically
subjected." The difficulties which have been repeated. See his commentary on the pas-
felt with regard to this expression are resolva- sage.
ble (like all the difficulties of Theism) into 9 Literally, the freedom which belongs to the
the permission of evil. This awful mystery glorification of the Sons of God.

564

THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL.

vm

23 which T have not yet brought forth the birth. And not only they, but our
selves also, who have received the Spirit for the first-fruits 2 [of our inherit
ance] , even we ourselves are groaning inwardly, longing for the adoption 9
24 which shall ransom our body from its bondage. For our salvation 4 lies in
hope ; but hope possessed is not hope, since a man cannot hope for what he
"25 sees in his possession ; but if we hope for things not seen, we steadfastly 5
26 endure the present, and long earnestly for the future. And, even as6 we
long for our redemption, so the Spirit gives help to our weakness ; for
we know not what we should pray for as we ought ; but the Spirit itself
makes intercession for us, with groans [for deliverance] which words can-
27 not utter. But He who searches our hearts knows [though it be un
spoken] what is the desire of the Spirit,1 because He intercedes for the
saints according to the will of God.

1 Literally, continuing to suffer the pangs of
labor even until now. St. Paul here suggests
an argument as original as it is profound.
The very struggles which all animated beings
make against pain and death show (he says)
that pain and death are not a part of the
proper laws of their nature, but rather a
bondage imposed upon them from without.
Thus every groan and tear is an unconscious
prophecy of liberation from the power of evil.
St. Augustine extends the same argument in
the Confessions (book xm.) as follows: —
" Even in that miserable restlessness of the
spirits, who fell away and discovered their
own darkness when bared of the clothing of
Thy light, dost Thou sufficiently reveal how
noble Thou madest the reasonable creature;
to which nothing will suffice to yield a happy
rest, less than Thee." See also De Civ. Dei,
1. 22, c. 1 : — " The nature which enjoyed
God shows that it was formed good, even by
its very defect, in that it is therefore miserable
because it enjoyeth not God." (Oxford trans
lation, Library of Fathers. )
2 See note on 1 Cor. i. 22.
3 Adoption to sonship ; by which a slave
was emancipated, and made " no longer a slave,
but a son." (Gal. iv. 7.) In one sense St.
Paul taught that Christians had already
received this adoption (compare (Rom. vii. 15,
Gal. iv. 5, Eph. i. 5) ; they were already made
the sons of God in Christ. (Rom. viii. 16,
G al. iii. 26. ) So, in a yet lower sense, the Jews

nnder the old dispensation had the adoption to
sonship; see ix. 4. But in this passage he
teaches us that this adoption is not perfect
during the present life ; there is still a higher
sense, in which it is future, and the object of
earnest longing to those who are already in the
lower sense the sons of God.
4 Literally, we were saved, i. e. at our con
version ; for the context does not oblige us to
take the aorist here as a perfect. The exact
translation would be, " the salvation whereto we
were called lies in hope."
5 The verb denotes, we long earnestly for the
future ; the prepositional phrase implies, with
steadfast endurance of the present.
6 After in like manner, we must supply as
we long from the preceding clause; and the
object of long is our redemption (by verse 23).
7 This passage is well explained by Arch
bishop Leighton, in the following beautiful
words : " The work of the Spirit is in excit
ing the heart, at times of prayer, to break
forth in ardent desires to God, whatsoever the
words be, whether new or old, yea possibly
without words ; and then most powerful when
it words it least, but vents in sighs and groans
that cannot be expressed. Our Lord under
stands the language of these perfectly, and
likes it best ; He knows and approves the
meaning of His own Spirit ; He looks not to
the outward appearance, the shell of words,
as men do." Leighton's Exposition of Lord'i

chaf.xtx. EPISTLE TO THE ROMANS. 565
viii.
midsTof aeir Moreover, we know that all things ' work together for good 28
cnristiansMe to those who love God, who have been called according to His
more than
forTeer°feei PurPose- For those whom He foreknew, He also predestined 29
SgetheX*8 to be made like 2 to the pattern of His Son, that many breth-
their good.
God has ren might be joined to Him, the first-born. And those whom 30
called them to ° J '
g?ory,iSnIdino ^e predestined, them He also called ; and whom He called,
ers or judges, them He also justified ; and whom He justified, them He also
no earthly suf-
pwelVSie gl°rmeu- What shall we say, then, to these things? If God 31
ura'cansepa- be for us, who can be against us ? He that spared not His own 32
rate them
fromHisiove. Son, but gave Him up for us all, how shall He not with Him
also freely give us all things ? What accuser can harm God's chosen ? it 33
is God who justifies them.3 What judge can doom us ? It is Christ who 34
died, nay, rather, who is risen from the dead ; yea, who is at the right
hand of God, who also makes intercession for us. Who can separate us 35
from the love of Christ ? Can suffering, or straitness of distress, or per
secution, or famine, or nakedness, or the peril of our lives, or the swords
of our enemies? [though we may say], as it is written, "JfuT •Sbg 36
sake bit nxt hxlltb all % bag lana, ; to txxt uaattnttb as Bfyttu fax
fyt slaughter." 4 Nay, in all these things we are more than conquerors 37
through Him that loved us. For I am persuaded that neither death, nor 38
life, nor all the 5 Principalities and Powers of Angels, nor things present,
nor things to come, nor things above, nor things below, nor any power in 39
the whole creation, shall be able to separate us from the love of God
which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.
1 All things, viz. whether sad or joyful. tribunals. No accusers could harm them,
We must remember that this was written in because God acquitted them ; no judicial con-
the midst of persecution, and in the expects- demnation could injure them, because Christ
tion of bonds and imprisonment. See verses was the assessor of that tribunal before which
17, 18, and 35, and Acts xx. 23. they must be tried. The beauty and eloquence
2 Like in suffering seems meant. Compare of the passage (as well as its personal refer-
Phil. iii. 10 : " The fellowship of His suffer- ence to the circumstances of its writer and its
ings, being made conformable to His death." readers) are much marred by placing marks
[Does not this limit it too much 1 Compare of interrogation after justifies and died.
2 Cor. iii. 18 : " We are gradually transformed 4 Ps. xliv. 22 (LXX.).
into the same likeness." And see also 1 Cor. 6 The expressions principalities and powers
xv. 49. — H.] were terms applied in the Jewish theology to
8 St. Paul is here writing and thinking of divisions of the hierarchy of angels, and, as
his own case, and that of his brethren, liable such, were familiar to St. Paul's Jewish read-
daily to be dragged by their accusers before the ers. Compare Eph. i. 21, and Col. i. 16.

566 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap, xix
IX. 1 I speak the truth in Christ — (and my conscience bears me The fact that
God has
2 witness, with the Holy Spirit's testimony, that I lie not) — I christians a»
3 have great heaviness, and unceasing sorrow in my heart ; yea, pe'o/ie^anaf
. rejected the
I could wish that I myself were cast out from Christ as an Jews from
* their exclu-
accursed thing, for the sake of my brethren, my kinsmen ac- feges^Tsln ac
4 cording to the flesh ; who are the seed of Israel, whom God ma former'
dealings. For
adopted for His children, whose were the glory of the Shechi- ™enalS£oi
nah, and the Covenants, and the Lawgiving, and the service oniy^eTe'cte*
.^ portion of
5 of the temple, and the promises of blessing. Whose fathers ^em, were
r ' L ° chosen by
were the Patriarchs, and of whom (as to His flesh) was born God'
the Christ who is over all, God blessed forever. Amen.
6 Yet I speak not as if the promise of God had fallen to the ground ; for
7 not all are Israel who are of Israel ; nor, because all are the seed of Abra
ham, are they all the children of Abraham ; but " Jfix Jfsaar sjiall t{rg
8 Bttb bt Chllltb." * That is, not the children of the flesh of Abraham are
the sons of God, but his children of the promise are counted for his seed.
9 For thus spake the word of promise, saying, "%t ttylB t'lmt toll J camt,
Unb §>%'§,%'§ sjjall (rafat a SOll"2 [so that Ishmael, although the
10 son of Abraham, had no part in the promise] . And not only so, but
[Esau likewise was shut out'; for] when Rebekah had conceived two
H sons by the same husband, our forefather Isaac, yea, while they were not
yet born, and had done nothing either good or bad (that God's purpose
according to election might abide, coming not from the works of the 3
12 called, but from the will of The Caller), it was declared unto her, " %\n
13 tlbtX S§"aII Btxbt % g0Utt0£r;''4 according to that which is written,
"Iamb- | labtb, but fart $ ^uttb."*
14 What shall we say, then ? Shall we call God uniust l~be- The jews can-
•> L not deny
cause He has cast off the seed of Abraham]? That be far £jert2£2to
j, ii-i ir tt • 44 <w c *tt i and select oth-
15 from us ! For to Moses He saith, J toll qubt mtXtlt an ShE"^118

1 Gen. xxi. 12 (LXX.). Compare Gal. iv. 8 Literally, coming not from works, but from
22. The context is, " Let it not be grievous in the Caller.
thy sight, because of the lad [Ishmael] and because 4 Gen. xxv. 23 (LXX.). The context is,
of thy bond-woman [Hagar], for in Isaac shall " The two nations are in thy womb, and the
thy seed be called." shall serve the younger."
2 Gen. xviii. 10, from LXX., not verbatim, 6 Mai. i. 2, 3 (LXX.).
but apparently from memory.

EPISTLE TO THE EOMANS.

567

since it is as
serted in their
own Scrip
tures in the
case of Pha
raoh. It may
be objected
that such a
view repre
sents G-od's
will as the ar
bitrary cause
of .nan's ac
tions; the an
swer is, that
tho created
being cannot
investigate the causes
which may
have deter
mined the will
of his Creator.

thou that

fojjora Jf toll frata mrag, anb J toll jjata xompassbn .
on tofram Jf toll {jafre rmnpassian."1 So, then, the 16
choice comes not from man's will, nor from man's speed, but
from God's mercy. And thus the Scripture says to Pha- 17
raoh, " (&btn fax ifjis tnb bib Jf rais* t\tt xxa, iljai Jf
mxafet B^aia mg fjrjtor in %e, anb ifrai mg name mxajgt
bt bwlareb %nng{pirt all %.earlfr."2 According to His 18
will, therefore, He has mercy on one, and hardens another.
Thou wilt say to me, then,3 " Why does God still blame us ? 19
for who can resist His will ? " Nay, rather, 0 man, who art 20
disputest against God ? " j§ frail fyt ifrrag fortneb sag ta

i Exod. xxxiii. 19 (LXX.).
2 Exod. ix. 16, according to LXX., with
two slight changes.
8 " Thou wilt say." . . . Here comes the
great question — no longer made from the
standing-point of the Jew, but proceeding
from the universal feeling of justice. St.
Paul answers the question by treating the sub
ject as one above the comprehension of the
human intellect when considered in itself ob
jectively. If it be once acknowledged that
there is any difference between the character
and ultimate fate of a good and a bad man,
the intellect is logically led, step by step, to
contemplate the will of the Creator as the
cause of this difference. The question " why
hast thou made me thus ? " will equally occur
and be equally perplexing in any system of
religion, either natural or revealed. It is in
fact a difficulty springing at once from the
permitted existence of evil. Scripture con
siders men under two points of view ; first, as
created by God; and secondly, as free moral
agents themselves. These two points of view
are, to the intellect of man, irreconcilable ; yet
both must be true, since the reason convinces
us of the one, and the conscience of the other.
St. Paul here is considering men under the
first of these aspects, as the creatures of God,
entirely dependent on God's will. It is to be
observed that he does not say that God's will
is arbitrary, but r^aly that men are entirely
dependent on God's will. The reasons by
which God's will itself is determined are left

in the inscrutable mystery which conceals
God's nature from man.
The objection and the answer given to it,
partly here and partly chap. iii. 6, may be
stated as follows : —
Objector. — If men are so entirely depend
ent on God's will, how can He with justice
blame their actions f
Answer. — Ey the very constitution of thy
nature thou art compelled to acknowledge the
blame-worthiness of certain actions and the
justice of their punishment (iii. 6) ; therefore
it is self-contradictory to say that a certain
intellectual view of man's dependence on God
would make these actions innocent ; thou art
forced to feel them guilty whether thou wilt or
no, and (ix. 20) it is vain to argue against the
constitution of thy nature, or its Author.
The metaphysical questions relating to this
subject which have divided the Christian world
are left unsolved by Scripture, which does not
attempt to reconcile the apparent inconsistency
between the objective and subjective views of
man and his actions. Hence many have been
led to neglect one side of the truth for the sake
of making a consistent theory : thus the Pela
gians have denied the dependence of man's
will on God, and the Fatalists have denied the
freedom of man's moral agency.
We may further observe that St. Paul does
not here explicitly refer to eternal happiness
or to its opposite. His main subject is the na
tional rejection of the Jews, and the above mora
general topics are only incidentally introduced.

56? THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap.xu,
ix. 21 frim ffrai farnub if, lEfrg frasi ffran mabs m* ifrus ?" 1 " Jpalfr not
fyt gutter natatX Obtx % dag," 2 to make out of the same lump one ves-
22 sel for honor, and one for dishonor ? But what if God (though willing to
show forth His wrath, and to make known His power) endured with
much long-suffering vessels of wrath, fitted for destruction [and cast
23 them not at once away] ? And what if thus He purposed to make
known the riches of His glory bestowed upon vessels of mercy, which He
24 had before prepared for glory ? And such are we, whom He has called
not only from among the Jews, but from among the Gentiles, as He saith
25 also in Hosea, " Jf mill rail tbm mg ntanlt mfrirfr tor* Aisothejew-
ish Scriptures
nat mg ntanlt, anb frer btlabtb mfritfr mas not Maixeb ; Skg°onhe
26 anb if sfrall tamt ta pass tfrat in % nhtt iafrm it mas £°3lsX,
saib unto %m, §> are nat mg ntanlt, t\txt sfrall %g dtont Jew8-
27 bt mlltb tfre SanS af % lining (Sab." 4 But Esaias cries concerning
Israel, saying, " Cfrangfr % nwmlxer af tfre sans ef Jfsra.el bt as tfre
2s sanb af % sea [anlg] tfre remnant 5 sfrall bt Btxbtb ; fax Jf* botfy
ramplete His xttkanxna,, anb ratteffr it sfrart in rigfrteettsiiess ; gea,
a sfrart xttkarixwx toll % |£arb nxubt nnan tfr* *arlfr." 6 And as
1 Isaiah xiv. 9. Not literally from either a nation and concerning a kingdom, to pluck up
LXX. or Hebrew, but apparently from memo- and to pull down and to destroy it ; if that nation
ry out of LXX. There is also a very similar against whom I have pronounced turn from their
passage in Isaiah xxix. 16, where, however, evil, I will repent of the evil that I thought to do
the context has less bearing on St. Paul's unto them. And at what instant I shall speak
subject than in the place above cited. concerning a nation and concerning a kingdom, to
2 Jeremiah xviii. 6, not quoted literally, but build and to plant it ; if it do evil in my sight,
according to the sense. In this and in other that it obey not my voice, then I will repent of the
similar references to the Old Testament, a good wherewith I said I would benefit them.
few words were sufficient to recall the whole Similar passages might be quoted from the
passage to St. Paul's Jewish readers (compare Apocryphal books ; and it might be said that
Rom. iv. 18) ; therefore, to comprehend his the above-cited passage of Isaiah was referred
argument, it is often necessary to refer to the to here. Yet this from Jeremiah is so apposite
context of the passage from which he quotes. to St. Paul's argument, that he probably refers
The passage in Jeremiah referred to is as fol- especially to it.
lows : — Then I went down to the potter's house, 8 Hosea ii. 23 (LXX. almost verbatim).
and behold he wrought a work on the wheels. And * Hosea i. 10 (LXX.).
the vessel that lie made of clay was marred in the 6 Compare remnant, xi. 5, left a remnant, xi
hands of the potter: so he made it again another 4, and left a seed remaining, ix. 29; all refer-
vessel, as seemed good to the potter to make it. 0 ring to the same subject, viz. the exclusion of
house of Israel, cannot I do with you as this pot- the majority of the Israelites from God's
ter ? saith the Lord. Behold, as the clay is in the favor.
potter's hand, so are ye in my hand, 0 house of 6 l8aiah x. 22> 23 (LXX. almost verbatim)
Israel. Al what instant I shall speak concerning

CHAP. XIX.

EPISTLE TO THE KOMANS.

569

it not by Faith, but thought to gain it by the works of the

IA.
Esaias had said before, " (&mnt tfre ITarb af jimlraaifr frab Mt ws a 29
seeb remaining, to frab bttn as Sabam, anb frab heen mabe like
unfa ^amarrafr."1
The cause of What shall we say, then? We say that the Gentiles, 30
of'thcfjews11 though they sought not after righteousness, have attained to
was, that they '"
Fakefdla of a righteousness, even the righteousness of Faith ; but that the 31
a^cOTshrting' house of Israel, though they sought a law of righteousness,
works and have not attained thereto. And why ? Because 2 they sought 32
1*1168, ;iitO
refused the
true right-
manifested to Law ; for they stumbled against the stone of stumbling, as it 33
them in
was'tne'end is written, " §efralb Jf lag in Wian a stane af stumbling,
kwLfuiers anb a ™tk a% affenxe ; anb na man tfral fralfr faitfr in
righteousneBB «*>? r yy Y f v v »» 3
as the out- fflim spall be ranfannbeb.
ward obedi- >°^ o
eSaotoente8,10 Brethren, my heart's desire and my prayer to God for Israel x. 1
ciiristdan'con- is, that they may be saved ; for I bear them witness that they 2
aiders right-
eousness as nave a zeal for God, yet not guided by knowledge of God ; 4
lardfeithof for because they knew not the righteousness of God, and 3
whoever' has sought to establish their own righteousness, therefore they
Ihis faith, ° °
"rbGentiie submitted not to the righteousness of God. For the end of the 4
mitted into" Law is Christ, that all may attain righteousness who have faith
God's favor. * , _
in Him. For Moses writes concerning the righteousness of the 5
Law, saying, " ®fre man tfral fralfr bane Ifrese tfrings sfrall litre tfrere-
in;"5 but the righteousness of Faith speaks in thiswise. Say not in 6
thine heart, " lEfra sfrall asrenb inta freaaen ? " 6 that is, " Who can

i Isaiah i. 9 (LXX.).
2 Observe that in the preceding part of the
chapter God is spoken of as rejecting the Jews
according to His own will ; whereas here a
moral reason is given for their rejection. This
illustrates what was said in a previous note of
the difference between the objective and sub
jective points of view.
3 Isaiah xxviii. 16, apparently from LXX.,
but not verbatim, "stone of stumbling and
rock of offence " being interpolated, and not
found exactly anywhere in Isaiah, though in
viii. 14 there are words nearly similar. Com
pare also Matt. xxi. 44.
* The word for knowledge here is very forci

ble ; and is the same which is used in 1 Cor.
xiii. 12, Rom. i. 28, and Col. i. 10.
8 Levit. xviii. 5 (LXX.) ; quoted also Gal.
iii. 12.
15 Deut. xxx. 12. St. Paul here, though he
quotes from the LXX. (verse 8 is verbatim),
yet slightly alters it, so as to adapt it better to
illustrate his meaning. His main statement is,
" the Glad-tidings of salvation is offered, and
needs only to be accepted ; " to this he transfers
the description which Moses has given of the
Law, viz., " the Word is nigh thee," &c. ;
and the rest of the passage of Deuteronomy
he applies in a higher sense than that in which
Moses had written it (according to the true

570 THE LIEE AND EPISTLES OP ST. PAUL. chap. xii.
x. 7 bring down Christ from heaven ? " nor say, " SEfra sfrall besmtb iltffj
8 tfre abgSS ?" that is, " Who can raise up Christ from the dead ?" But
how speaks it ? "%\t WLaxb is nigfr tfree, eben in ffrg mantfr ana irt
9 tfrg freart ; " — that is, the Word Faith which we proclaim, saying, " If
with thy mouth thou shalt confess Jesus for thy lord, and shalt have faith
in thy heart that God raised Him from the dead, thou shalt be saved."
10 For faith unto righteousness is in the heart, and confession unto salvation
11 is from the mouth. And so says the Scripture, " |t# |$l^||| ffrat fratfr
12 faitfr in ||im sfrall be tanfaunbeb ; " 1 for there is no distinction be
tween Jew and Gentile, because the same [Jesus] is Lord over all, and
13 He gives richly to all who call upon Him ; for " @|T<2£§i§ gjt&U fofra
sfrall call nnan tfre name af tfre ITarb sfrall be sabeb."2
14 How, then, shall they call on Him in whom they have put no in order,
in, . therefore, that
faith : And how shall they put faith in Him whom they never aiimaybeso
J r J admitted, the
15 heard ? And how shall they hear of Him if no man bear the beuevemult
tidings ? And who shall bear the tidings if no messengers be pro^ataed; y
and it has
sent forth ? 3 As it is written, " fato beautifnl are tfre feet SS
af tl^tnx ffrat bear <§>Jab-libinp af nmtt, tfrat bear (Slab- sHp0/e
16 tibinp af gaab Ifrinp ! " 4 Yet some have not hearkened to especially as

the Glad-tidings; as saith Esaias, 4"$axb, fofra fratfr Jjiben wSgWrejectionbefore in ih
own Scrip-

17 faitfr fa anT teatfrhuj? "6 So, then, faith comes by teach- jjf^ll thei'

18 ing ; 6 and our teaching comes by the Word of God. But I tare8'
say, have they not heard [the voice of the teachers] ? Yea, " Cbeir
sannb fras gane fartfr into all tfre earffr, anb tfreir toarbs nnia tfre
19 enbS af tfre toarlb." 7 Again I say, did not Israel know [the purpose
Christian mode of using the Old Testament), i Isaiah xxviii. 16 (LXX.). See ix. 33.
not to the Mosaic Law, but to the Gospel of 2 Joel ii. 32 (LXX.).
Christ. The passage in Deuteronomy is as 8 This is » justification of the mission of
follows : — " This commandment which I com- the Apostles to the Gentiles, which was an of-
mand thee this day is not hidden from thee, neither fence to the Jews. See Acts xxii. 22.
is it far off. It is not in heaven, that thou 4 Isaiah Iii. 7, apparently from the Hebrew,
shouldst say, Who shall go up for us to heaven and not LXX.
and bring it unto us, that we may hear it and 6 Isaiah liii. 1 (LXX.).
do it f Neither is it beyond the sea, that thou 6 There is no English word which precisely
shouldest say, who shall go over the sea for us and represents a/cor) in its subjective as well as ob-
bring it unto us, that we may hear it and do it ? jective meaning. See note on 1 Thess. ii. 13.
But the word is very nigh unto thee, in thy mouth i Ps. xix. 4 (LXX.). In the psalm this ii
and in thy heart, that thou mayest do it." said of " the heavens," which by their wonder

chap. iu. EPISTLE TO THE EOMANS. 571
of God] ? yea, it is said first by Moses, " Jf faill make jjatt jealous
against tfrem tofricfr are na peaple, against a Gentile natian toiifr-
eut urtbersfanbing toill Jf make gan toralfr."1 But Esaias speaks 20
boldly, saying, " Jf toas fannb af tfrem tfral sangfri me nat; Jf toas
mabe manifest ante tfrem tfrat askeb nat after me." 2 But unto 21
Israel he says, " %ll bag lang frabe | spreab fartfr mg arms 3 nnta
a bisabebient anb gainsaging ntanlt." i
The jews, I say, then, — must we5 think that God has cast off His xi
however, are
not au re- people ? 6 That be far from us ; for I am myself also an
jected ; those L L J
Chrisbthave!i11 Israelite, of the seed of Abraham, of the tribe of Benjamin.
by God God has not cast off His people whom He foreknew. Yea, 2
(L\6yv) r r -it
an^oniy^e6' know ye not what is said in the Scriptures of Elias, how he
unbelieving . . n-. . i r r
?ectednre" intercedes with God against Israel, saying, %axb, tfreg frabe 3
killeb Cfrg prapfrefs, anb biggeb baton Cfrine altars, anb
| anlg frabe been left, anb tfreg seek nxn life alsa." 7 But what says 4
the answer of God to him ? " Jf 8 frabe ntt left ta mgself a remnant,9
eben seben tfransanb nxtn, tofra frabe nat batoeb tfre knee ta '§aal."
So likewise at this present time there is a remnant [of the house of 5
Israel] chosen by gift of grace. But if their choice be the gift of grace, 6
it can no more be deemed the wage of works ; for the gift that is earned
is no gift : or if it be gained by works, it is no longer the gift of grace ;
for work claims 10 wages, and not gifts. What follows then ? That which 7
ful phenomena declare the glory of their * Is. lxv. 2 (LXX.).
Creator. There seems to be no comparison in ° The particle here asks a question expect-
the psalm (as some have thought) between the ing a negative answer = ts it true that ? must
heavens and the word of God. St. Paul here we think that? Also see note on Gal. iii. 21.
quotes the Old Testament (as he so often 6 Alluding to Psalm xciv. 14: "Jehovah
does), not in its primary meaning, but apply- shall not utterly cast out his people." (LXX.)
ing it in a higher sense, or perhaps only as a No doubt St. Paul's antagonists accused him
poetical illustration. As to the assertion of of contradicting this prophecy.
the universal preaching of the Gospel, Dean 7 1 Kings xix. 10. (LXX., but not verba-
Alford well observes that it is not made in a tim. )
geographical, but in a religious sense. The Gos- 8 1 Kings xix. 18, more nearly according to
pel was now preached to all nations, and not the Hebrew than LXX.
to the Jews alone. 9 The verb corresponds to the noun in the
1 Deut. xxxii. 21 (LXX.). next verse and in ix. 27. See note there.
2 Is. lxv. 1 (LXX. with transposition). 10 By work is here meant work which earns
3 The metaphor is of a mother opening wages. Compare iv. 4-5. The latter clause
her arms to call back her child to her embrace. of this verse, however, is omitted by the best
In this attitude the hands are spread open, and MSS.
hence the " hands."

572 THE LIPE AND EPISTLES OP ST. PAUL. chap. xix.
. Israel seeks, Israel has not won ; but the chosen have won it, and the rest
xi. 8 were blinded, as it is written, " (Sob fralfr giben tfrem a spirit af
slumber, eges ffrat tfreg sfranlb naf see, anb ears ffrat t^txr sfraufb
9 naf frear, nnta tfris bag."1 And David says, " |Tet tfreir table be
mabe a snare anb a trap, anb a slnmbling-blatk anb a retampense
io unfa tfrem. |£el tfreir eges be barkeneb tfrat tfreg mag nat see, anb
bato baton tfreir baek altoag." 2
11 Shall we say,3 then, " they have stumbled to the end that Nori8the
they might fall ? " That be far from us ; but rather their thiTnbeiiev-ing Jews final,
stumbling has brought salvation to the Gentiles, " fa 4 nxn- 'hide them1
12 bake Jfsrael ta jealansg." Now if their stumbling enriches j^™*^
the world, and if the lessening of their gain gives wealth to fnto'o'od"^
the Gentiles, how much more must their fulness do ! the Gentiie
unbelievers
13 For to you who are Gentiles I say that, as Apostle of the ^llefVe^1?
14 Gentiles, I glorify my ministration for this end, if perchance I thfchriTtian
Church, which
might prabake ta jealansg " my kinsmen, and save some ^nautock
15 among them. For if the casting of them out is the reconcila- church,6™^
more would
tion of the world [to God] , what must the gathering of them b^^raon
in be but life from the dead ? JSsSK"
16 Now, if the first of the dough be hallowed,5 the whole mass from which
° ' they had been
is thereby hallowed ; and if the root be hallowed, so are also brol£eQOff-
17 the branches. But if some of the branches were broken off, and thou
being of the wild olive stock wast grafted in amongst them, and made to
18 share the root and richness of the olive, yet boast not over the branches:
but — if thou art boastful — thou bearest not the root, but the root thee.
19 Thou wilt say then, " The branches were broken off that I might be
20 grafted in." It is true, — for lack of faith they were broken off, and by
21 faith thou standest in their place : be not high-minded, but fear ; for if
God spared not the natural branches, take heed lest He also spare not
1 This quotation seems to be compounded * Deut. xxxii. 21 (LXX.), quoted above,
of Deut. xxix. 4, and Isaiah xxix. 10 (LXX.), ch. x. 19.
though it does not correspond verbatim with 6 gt. Paul blades to the heave^ffering. pre-
either- scribed Numbers xv. 20: " Ye shall offer up
2 Ps. lxix. 23, 24 (LXX. nearly verbatim). a cake of the first of your dough for « heavo-
8 Literally, I say then, shall we conclude that, offering."
fcc. See note on verse 1 .

chap. xix. EPISTLE TO THE ROMANS. 573 xi.
thee. Behold, therefore, the goodness and the severity of God ; towards 22
them who fell, severity, but towards thee, goodness, if thou continue
steadfast to His goodness ; for otherwise thou too shalt be cut off. And 23
they also, if they persist not in their faithlessness, shall be grafted in :
for God is able to graft them in where they were before. For if thou 24
wast cut out from that which by nature was the wild olive, and wast
grafted against nature into the fruitful olive, how much more shall these,
the natural branches, be grafted into the fruitful stock from whence they
sprang !
iaus God's ^or * would n0* nave you ignorant, brethren, of this mys- 25
Seenf nouo tery, lest you should be wise in your own conceits ; that blind-
reject any, but
to show ness has fallen upon a part 1 of Israel until the full body of
mercy upon L x J
nisTurpo^' the Gentiles shall have come in. And so all Israel shall be 26
has been to (( -~ . „ ,-j,, r *y h /»
thfje'wish* saved' as xt 1S wrltten> wm af sian sfrall tame tfre gelib- 27
cauai'lGen. erer, anb He sball tnrn atoag nngabliness fram Jfarab.
tiles into His fo ° <*. u k_,
WiES* %rib tfris is mg rabenant toitfr tfrem." 2 "Whtn J sball 28
sion of the r . , „ °
roeu?"theto lake atoag tfreir Sins. In respect of the Glad-tidings,
1™*™. [that it might be borne to the Gentiles], they are God's
sage, that all _ .
might at enemies lor your sakes; but in respect oi Gods choice, they
length receive J
His mercy. are jjjs beloved for their fathers' sakes : for no change of pur- 29
pose can annul God's gifts and call. And as in times past you were your- 30
selves4 disobedient to God, but have now received mercy upon their dis
obedience ; so in this present time they have been disobedient, that upon 31
your obtaining mercy they likewise might obtain mercy. For God has 32
shut up 5 all together under disobedience, that He might have mercy upon
all. 0 depth of the bounty, and the wisdom and the knowledge of God ! 33
how unfathomable are His judgments, and how unsearchable His paths ! 34
Yea, " ®fra fratfr knaton tfre minb af tfre ifcrrb, ar tofra fratfr been
Pis rennsellar ? " 8 Or " Mfra fralfr first giben nnta (Sab, tfral fre 35
1 Por the phrase used here, compare 2 Cor. were equivalent to unbelief, which it is not.
i 14, 2 Cor. ii. 5, Rom. xv. 15. Compare i. 30 : " disobedient to parents."
2 Isaiah lix. 20 (LXX. almost verbatim). 6 "Shut up.'' Compare Gal. iii. 22.
8 Isaiah xxvii. 9 (LXX. nearly verbatim). 6 Isaiah xl. 13 (LXX. nearly verbatim).
4 Throughout this passage in the A. V., Quoted also (omitting the middle and adding
the word for disobedience is translated as if it the end of the verse) 1 Cor. ii. 16.

574 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OP ST. PAUL. chap. xix.
36 sfraulb beserbe a rerampense? " 1 For from Him is the beginning, and
by Him the life, and in Him the end of all things.
Unto Him be glory forever. Amen.

xu

1 I exhort you, therefore, brethren, as you would acknowledge Exhortations
... . n , -, to the content
the mercies of God, to offer your bodies a living sacrifice, holy edandeames.
•" performance
and well-pleasing unto God, which is your reasonable 2 worship, beionging'to
2 And be not conformed to the fashion of this 3 world, but be gifts and ra
callings, and
transformed by the renewing of your mind, that by an unerr- £° j"^™"688
ing test4 you may discern the will of God, even that which is to obedient
to the civil
3 good, and acceptable, and perfect. For through the grace be- magistrates as
stowed upon me [as Christ's Apostle], I warn every man ge°n'e'raii^d
among you not to think of himself more highly than he ought love,' as com-
° J ° prehendingall
to think, but to seek a sober mind, according to the measure na'gbb0r°Aii
4 of faith 5 which God has given him. For as we have many should bVper-
formed (xiii.
limbs, which are all members of the same body, though they n-i4)asin
tne expects.-
5 have not all the same office ; so we ourselves are all 6 one body ^nsft
6 in Christ, and fellow-members one of another ; but we have ing? y
gifts differing according to the grace which God has given us.' He that
has the gift of prophecy, let him exercise it8 according to the proportion
7 of his faith. He that has the gift of ministration, let him minister ; let
8 the teacher labor in teaching ; the exhorter, in exhortation. He who
gives, let him give in singleness of mind. He who rules, let him rule
9 diligently. He who shows pity, let him show it gladly. Let your love be
1 Job xii. 11 (according to the sense of the The expression is so perplexing, that one is
Hebrew, but not LXX.). almost tempted to conjecture that the words
2 Reasonable worship, as contrasted with the crept into the text here by mistake, having
unreasonable worship of those whose faith rest- been originally a marginal explanation of " the
ed only on outward forms. See note on i. 9. proportion of faith " just below.
8 See note on 1 Cor. i. 20. 6 Literally " the many."
4 See note on ii. 18. 7 The construction and the parallel both
5 " Measure of faith " here seems (from the seem to require a comma at the end of verse
context of the following verses) equivalent to 5, and a full stop in the middle of verse 6.
" charism " as Chrysostom takes it. The par- 8 We think it better to take these elliptical
ticular talent given by God may be called a clauses as all imperative (with the A. V.)
measure of faith, as being that by the use of • rather than to consider them (with De Wette
which each man's faith will be tried. (Com- and others) as "descriptive of the sphere of
pare, as to the verbal expressions, 2 Cor. x. the gift's operation " up to a certain point,
13.) This explanation is, perhaps, not very and then passing into the imperative. The
satisfactory; but to understand measure as participles in verses 9, 16, and 17, seem to
meaning amount is still less so, for a double refute De Wette's arguments.
gift of prophecy did not imply a double faith.

chap. xix. EPISTLE TO THE ROMANS. 575
without feigning. Abhor that which is evil ; cleave to that which is good. .
° xn.
Be kindly affectioned one to another in brotherly love ; in honor let each 10
6et his neighbor above himself. Let your diligence be free from sloth, let 11
your spirit grow with zeal ; be true bondsmen of your Lord. In your 12
hope be joyful ; in your sufferings be steadfast ; in your prayers be un
wearied. Be liberal to the needs of the saints. And show hospitality 1 3,1
to the stranger. Bless your persecutors ; yea, bless, and curse not. 15
Rejoice with them that rejoice, and weep with them that weep. Be of 16
one mind amongst yourselves. Set not your heart on high things, but
suffer yourselves to be borne along l with the lowly. Be not wise in your
own conceits. Repay no man evil for evil. " ^e prafaibenl af gaab 17
reparl in tfre Sigfrt af all men." 2 If it be possible, as far as lies in 18
yourselves, keep peace with all men. Revenge not yourselves, beloved, 1 9
but give place to the wrath [of God] ; 3 for it is written, " Vengeance is
mine; $ toill repag, saitfr tfre ITarb."4 Therefore, " Jf tfrine enemg 20
frmiger, feeb frim ; if fre tfrirsf , gibe frim brink ; far, in sa baing,
tfran sfrall freap orals af firenpan fris freab."5 Be not overcome by 21
evil, but overcome evil with good.
' => xui
Let every man submit himself to the authorities of government ; for all 1
authority comes from God, and the authorities which now are have been
set in their place by God : therefore, he who sets himself against the au- Si
thority resists the ordinance of God ; and they who resist will bring
judgment upon themselves. For the magistrate is not terrible to good 3
works,6 but to evil. Wilt thou be fearless of his authority ? do what is
good, and thou shalt have its praise. For the magistrate is God's minis- 4
ter to thee for good. But if thou art an evil doer, be afraid ; for not by
chance does he bear the sword [of justice] , being a minister of God, ap-

1 This is the literal translation. melting of metals. It is obvious that " thou
2 This is a quotation nearly verbatim from shalt heap coals of fire on his head " could
Prov. iii. 4 (LXX.). See note on 2 Cor. viii. 21. never have meant " thou shalt destroy him ; "
3 Such is the interpretation of Chrysostom, because to feed an enemy could in no sense
and is supported by the ablest modern inter- destroy him.
prefers. Por " wrath " in this sense, compare 6 We must remember that this was written
Rom. v. 9, 1 Thess. ii. 16. before the Imperial Government had begun to
4 Deut. xxxii. 35 (LXX., but not verba- persecute Christianity. It is a testimony in
tim) ; see note on Heb. x. 30. favor of the general administration of the
6 Prov. xxv. 21 (LXX.). There can be lit- Roman criminal law.
tie doubt that the metaphor is taken from the

V
576 THE LIEE AND EPISTLES OP ST. PAUL. chap, xix,
xiii. 5 pointed to do vengeance upon the guilty. Wherefore you must needs
6 submit, not only for fear, but also for conscience' sake ; for this also is the
cause why you pay tribute, because the authorities of government are
7 officers of God's will, and this is the very end of their daily work. Pay,
therefore, to all their dues ; tribute to whom tribute is due ; customs to.
8 whom customs ; fear to whom fear ; honor to whom honor. Owe no debt
to any man, save the debt of love alone ; for he who loves his neighbor
9 has fulfilled the law. For the law which says, " Cfratt sfrall naf COm-
mit abnlterg ; Cfran sfrall ba na mnrber ; Cfran sfralt nat steal ;
&\au sfralt nat bear false witness ; Cfrau sfralt naf rabef " 1 (and
whatsoever other commandment there be), is all contained in this one
io saying, " Cfrau sfrall labe tfrg neigfrber as tfrgself." 2 Love works
no ill to his neighbor ; therefore Love is the fulfilment of the Law.
11 This do, knowing the season wherein we stand, and that for us it is high
time to awake out of sleep, for our salvation is already nearer than when
12 we first believed. The night is far spent, the day is at hand ; let us there
fore cast off the works of darkness, and let us put on the armor of light.
13 Let us walk (as in the light of day) in seemly guise ; not in rioting and
drunkenness, not in dalliance and wantonness, not in strife and envying.
14 But clothe yourselves with the Lord Jesus Christ, and take no thought to
please your fleshly lusts.

xiv.

1 Him who is weak in his faith receive into your fellowship, tians who'stiu
clung to su-
imposing no determinations of doubtful questions.3 Some nersutious
1 u x distinctions
have faith that they may eat all things : others, who are weak,4 mtate and
eat herbs alone. Let not him who eats despise him who ab- betteat«d with indul-
stains, nor let him who abstains judge him who eats, for God ^reenuu-
has received him among5 His people. Who art thou, that sholud treat1
1 Exod. xx. 13-17 (LXX.). altogether. Thus Josephus (Life, § 3, quoted
2 Levit. xix. 18 (LXX.). by Tholuck) mentions some Jewish priests
8 Literally, not acting so as to make distinc- who, from such conscientious scruples, ab-
tions [or determinations] which belong to disputa- stained while prisoners in Eome from all ani-
tious reasonings. The same word is used in mal food. So Daniel and his fellow-captives
Phil. ii. 14. in Babylon refused the king's meat and wine,
4 These were probably Christians of Jew- and ate pulse alone, that they might not defile
ish birth, who so feared lest they should (with- themselves (Dan. i. 8-12). The tone and
out knowing it) eat meat which had been precepts of this 14th chapter of the Epistle
offered to idols or was otherwise ceremonially correspond with 1 Cor. viii.
unclean (which might easily happen in such a 6 Literally, received him unto Himself.
place as Rome), that they abstained from meat

ckap.xix. EPISTLE TO THE BOMANS^. 577
with charity judgest another's servant ? To his own master he must stand
fromcon-ar or fall ; but he shall be made to stand, for God is able to ^
demning one ,.*
another, set bim up. There are some who esteem one day above &
whether Jews r J
smceecM8t another ; and again tb.ere are some who esteem all days alike ; '
both into ms let each be fully persuaded in his own mind. He who regards ®
favor as their * x °
common faQ <jay regards it unto the Lord ; and he who regards it not,
disregards it unto the Lord.2 He who eats, eats unto the Lord, for he
gives God thanks ; and he who abstains, abstains unto the Lord, and gives
thanks to God likewise. For not unto himself does any one of us either *
live or die ; but whether we live, we live unto the Lord, or whether we 8
die, we die unto the Lord ; tlierefore, living or dying, we are the Lord's.
For to this end Christ died, and3 lived again, that He might be Lord both 9
of the dead and of the living. But thou, why judgest thou thy brother ? 10
Or thou, why despisest thou thy brother ? for we shall all stand before the H
judgment-seat of Christ. And so it is written, " ^s <f libe, Sailfr tfre
farb, eberg knee sfrall bato ia me, anb eberg tannnt sfrall arknatol-
fcbge (Sab."4 So, then, every one of us shall give account to God [not 12
of his brethren, but] of himself. Let us, then, judge each other no more, 13
but let this rather be your judgment, to put no stumbling-block or cause
of falling in your brother's way. I know and am persuaded in the Lord 1"*
Jesus, that nothing is in itself unclean ; but whatever a man thinks un
clean is unclean to him. And if for meat thou grievest thy brother, thou IS
hast ceased to walk by the rule of love. Destroy not him with thy meat
for whom Christ died.
I say, then, let not your good be evil spoken of.5 For the kingdom of i6,ii
God is not meat and drink, but righteousness, and peace, and joy in the
Holy Spirit ; and he who lives in these things as Christ's bondsman is 18
well-pleasing to God, and cannot be condemned 6 by men. Let us there- 19
fore follow the things which make for peace, such as may build us up
1 Compare Col. ii. 16. Dean Alford has 8 "Eose again" is omitted by tne best
an excellent note on this verse. [Here, as at MSS.
Gal. iv. 10, we may refer to the additional note * Isaiah xiv. 23 (LXX. not accurately, but
on Col. ii. 16. — H.J apparently from memory).
2 This negative clause is omitted by the 6 Compare 1 Cor. x. 29.
majority of MSS., but is sanctioned by Chrys- 6 Literally, is capable cf standing any test to
ostom and other fathers, and retained in the which he may be put.
text by Tischendorf: Griesbach and Lachmann
omit it. 87

578 THE LIPE AND EPISTLES OP ST. PAUL. chap, xii
xiv together into one. Destroy not thou the work of God for a meal of meat.
20 All things indeed [in themselves] are pure ; but to him that eats with
21 stumbling all is evil. It is good neither to eat flesh, nor to drink ' wine,
nor to do any 2 other thing, whereby thy brother is made to stumble.3
22 Hast thou faith [that nothing is unclean] ? keep it for thine own comfort
23 before God. Happy is he who condemns not himself by his own judg-
XT ment.4 But he who doubts is thereby condemned if he eats, because ho
1 has not faith5 that he may eat ; and every faithless deed 6 is sin. And we,
who are strong, 7 ought to bear the infirmities of the weak, and not to
2 please ourselves. Let each of us please his neighbor for good ends, to
3 build him up. For so 8 Christ pleased not Himself, but in Him was ful
filled that which is written, " Cfre repraacfres af tfrem tfral reajraaefreb
4 tfree fell naan me." 9 For our instruction is the end of all which was
written of old ; that by steadfast endurance, and by the counsel of the
5 Scriptures, we may hold fast our hope. Now may God, from whom both
6 counsel and endurance come, grant you to be of one mind together, ac
cording to the will of Christ, that you may all [both strong and weak] ,
with one heart and voice, glorify the God and Father of our Lord Jesus
7 Christ. Wherefore, receive one another into fellowship, to the glory of
God, even as Christ also received you.10
8 For u I say that Jesus Christ came to be a minister of the circumcision,
9 to maintain the truthfulness of God, and confirm the promises made to
our fathers ; and that the Gentiles should praise God for His mercy, as it
is written, " Jfar Ifris ranse $ toill aeknatolebge tfree amang tfre <§en-
1 This does not necessarily imply that any 6 Literally, he eats not from faith.
of the weaker brethren actually did scruple to 6 Literally, every deed which springs not from
drink wine ; it may be put only hypothetically. faith [that it is a right deed] is sin.
But it is possible that they may have feared to 7 Literally, " We the strong." St. Paul
taste wine, part of which had been poured in here addresses the same party whom he so
libation to idols. Daniel (in the passage above often exhorts to patience and forbearance ;
referred to) refused wine. those who called themselves " the spiritual "
2 It is strange that no critic has hitherto (Gal. vi. 1, 1 Cor. iii. 1), and boasted of their
proposed the simple emendation of reading iv "knowledge " (1 Cor. viii. 1). See p. 390.
instead of kv, which avoids the extreme awk- 8 The " even " of A. V. is not in the origi-
wardness of the ellipsis necessitated by the nal. " For Christ also " is the literal English.
Received Text. Compare John i. 3. The q Ps. Ixix. 9 (LXX).
construction of the last clause is similar to i» "You" (not "us") is the reading of the
that in ix. 32. best MSS.
8 We adopt the reading sanctioned by Tis- u The reading of the MSS. is " for." not
chendorf, which omits one or two words. " but ''
4 See note on ii. 18

chap. xix. EPISTLE TO THE F.OMANS. 579 XT
tiles, anb toill sing nnta tfrg name." 1 And again it is said, " lJLejai.ce, 10
ge Gentiles, toitfr pis ntanlt;"2 and again, "praise tfre farb, ail n
ge (lenities, anb lanb Jpim, all ge peaples ; " 3 and again Esaias saith,
" ©frere sfrall tame tfre raat af Jf esse, anb fre tfrat sfrall rise ia reign 12
aber tfre (Sentries : in frim sfrall tfre (Senfiles frape." 4 Now may the 131
God of hope5 fill you with all joy and peace in believing, that you may
abound in hope, through the mighty working of the Holy Spirit.
st Paul gives -^u* -^ am persuaded, my brethren, not only by the reports 14
tio^boidiyto of others,6 but by my own judgment, that you are already full
tlie Koman
christians, as 0f goodness, filled with all knowledge, and able, of yourselves,
Gratis0* He to admonish one another. Yet I have written to you some- 15
intends soon , ii-i-i- n r n i • i -% -t i-i
to visit them what boldly in parts1 [01 this letter], to remind you [rather
had'ai'ready118 than *° teach you] , because of that gift of grace which 16
Apostolic " God bestowed upon me that I should be a minister of
commission
in the eastern Jesus Christ to the Gentiles, serving in the Glad-tidings
parts of the ' ° °
™t£%TataT of God, that I might present the Gentiles to God, as a
was not occu- .
pied hy other priest presents the offering, a sacrifice well pleasing unto
ever!'he°must Him> hallowed by the working of the Holy Spirit. I have 17
Pem to convey therefore the power of boasting in Christ Jesus, concerning
the Greek '
thHheir'Um0ns *ne *nmgs °f ®°& ; for I will not dare [as some do] to glorify 13
daggers which my self for the labors of others,9 but I will speak only of the
he expects to . . _,
meet there. works which Christ has wrought by me, to bring the Gentiles
to obedience, by word and deed, with the might of signs and wonders, 19
the might of the Spirit of God ; so that going forth from Jeru
salem, and round about as far as 10 Ulyrieum, I have fulfilled my task in
bearing the Glad-tidings of Christ. And my ambition was to bear it 20
1 Ps. xviii. 49 (LXX.). but that this is already expressed in " some-
9 Deut. xxxii. 43 (LXX.). See note on what boldly." The word " brethren " is
ix. 25. omitted in the best MSS.
3 Ps. cxvii. 1 (LXX). 8 Literally, "a minister of Jesus Christ unto
4 Isaiah xi. 10 (LXX.). the Gentiles, u priest presenting an offering in
6 The reference of this to the preceding respect of the Glad-tidings of God, that the Gen-
quotation is lost in A. V. through the trans- tiles might be offered up as an offering well pleasr
lation of the verb and noun for " hope" by ing unto Him." The same thing is said under
'¦ hope " and "trust " respectively. a somewhat different metaphor, 2 Cor. xi. 2.
6 Observe the force of the " I myself also." 9 Compare 2 Cor. x. 15, the whole ef which
1 Por the meaning here, see 2 Cor. i. 14, passage is parallel to this.
2 Cor. ii. 5. It might here be translated in some 10 See the remarks on this in Chap. XVTL
measure (as Neander proposes, compare v. 24), p. 514.

580 THE LIPE AND EPISTLES OP ST. PAUL. chap. xix.
according to this rule, [that I should go], not where the name of Christ
21 was known (lest I should be building on another man's foundation), but
[where it was unheard] ; as it is written, " ®fl fofrattt Jfe toas nat
shaken af, tfreg sfrall see ; anb tfre ntanlt tofra frabe nat frearb sfrad
nnberstanb."1
22 This is the cause why I have often been hindered from coming to you.
23 But now that I have no longer room enough [for my labors] in these
24 regions, and have had a great desire to visit you these many years, so
soon as I take my journey into Spain I will come to you ; 2 for I hope to
see you on my way, and to be set forward on my journey thither by you,
25 after I have in some measure satisfied my desire of your company. But
now I am going to Jerusalem, being employed 3 in a ministration to the
26 saints. For the provinces of Macedonia and Achaia have willingly
undertaken to make a certain contribution for the poor among the saints
27 in Jerusalem. Willingly, I say, they have done this ; and indeed they
are their debtors ; for since the Gentiles have shared in the spiritual
goods of the brethren in Jerusalem, they owe it in return to minister to
28 them in their earthly goods. When, therefore, I have finished this task,
and have given to them in safety the fruit of this collection, I will come
29 from thence, by you, into Spain. And I am sure that when I come to
30 you, my coming will receive the fulness4 of Christ's5 blessing. But I
beseech you, brethren, by our Lord Jesus Christ, and by the love which
the Spirit gives, to help me in my conflict with your prayers to God on
31 my behalf, that I may be delivered from the disobedient in Judaea, and
that the service which I have undertaken for Jerusalem may be favorably
32 received by the Saints ; that so I may come to you in joy, by God's will,
33 and may be refreshed in your companionship. The God of peace be with
you all. Amen.
1 I commend to you Phoebe our sister, who is6 a ministering oommenda-
2 servant of the Church at Cenchrea; that you may receive Su&Eato
1 Isaiah Hi. 15 (LXX.). * Literally, I shall come in the fulness, &c.
2 This "I will come to you" is probably « "Gospel" is not in' any of the best
an interpolation, as it is omitted by the best MSS.
MSS. ; but it makes no difference in the 6 Aiaicovov (Deaconess). See p. 379, n. 7 1
sense. also p. 381, n. 1.
8 The present participle, not (as in A. V.)
the future.

xvi.

EPISTLE TO THE ROMANS.

581

iK^Chris- ^er "* *^e ^ord, as tue saints should receive one another, and
l* ' aid her in any business1 wherein she needs your help; for
she has herself aided many, and me also among the rest.
Greet Priscilla and Aquila,2 my fellow-laborers in the work of Christ
Jesus, who, to save my life, laid down their own necks ; who are thanked,
not by me alone, but by all the Churches of the Gentiles. Greet like
wise the Church which assembles at their house.
Salute Epaenetus my dearly-beloved, who is the first-fruits of Asia3
unto Christ.
Salute Mary, who labored much for me.
Salute Andronicus and Junias, my kinsmen and fellow-prisoners,4 who
are well known among the Apostles, and who were also in Christ before
me. Salute Amplias, my dearly-beloved in the Lord.
Salute Urbanus, my fellow-workman in Christ's service, and Stachys
my dearly-beloved.

1 From the use of legal terms here, it would
seem that the business on which Phoebe was
visiting Borne was connected with some trial
at law. 2 The most ancient MSS. read Prisca for
Priscilla here; the names being the same.
Concerning these distinguished Christians, see
p. 336. When and where they risked their
lives for St. Paul, we know not, but may con
jecture at Ephesus. We see here that they had
returned to Rome (whence they had been driven
by the edict of Claudius) from Ephesus, where
we left them last. It is curious to observe the
wife mentioned first, contrary to ancient usage.
Throughout this chapter we observe instances
of courtesy towards women sufficient to refute
the calumnies of a recent infidel writer, who
accuses St. Paul of speaking and feeling
coarsely in reference to women ; we cannot but
add our astonishment that the same writer
should complain that the standard of St. Paul's
ethics, in reference to the sexual relations, is
not sufficiently elevated, while at the same time
he considers the instincts of the German race
to have first introduced into the world the true
morality of these relations. One is inclined to
ask whether the present facility of divorce in
Germany is a legitimate development of the

SV1 3

Teutonic instinct ; and if so, whether the law
of Germany, or the law of our Saviour (Mark
x. 12), enforced by St. Paul (1 Cor. vii. 10), ex
presses the higher tone of morality, and tends
the more to elevate the female sex. '
8 Asia, not Achaia, is the reading of the
best MSS. Compare p. 349, note 2. The
province of proconsular Asia is of course
meant. 4 When were they St. Paul's fellow-pris
oners ? Probably in some of those imprison
ments not recorded in the Acts, to which he
alludes 2 Cor. xi. 23. It is doubtful whether
in calling them his " kinsmen " St. Paul means
that they were really related to him, or only
that they were Jews. (Compare Rom. ix. 3.)
The latter supposition seems improbable, be
cause Aquila and Priscilla, and others in this
chapter, mentioned without the epithet of kins
men, were certainly Jews ; yet, on the other
hand, it seems unlikely that so many of St.
Paul's relations as are here called " kinsmen"
(verses 7, 11, 21) should be mentioned in a
single chapter. Perhaps we may take a middle
course, and suppose the epithet to denote that
the persons mentioned were of the tribe of
Benjamin.

6 7

582 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OP ST. PAUL. chap, xu
avi. 10 Salute Apelles, who has been tried and found trustworthy in Christ's
work. Salute those who are of the household of Aristobulus.1
11 Salute Herodion, my kinsman.
Salute those of the household of Narcissus 2 who are in the Lord's fel
lowship.
12 Salute Tryphena and Tryphosa, the faithful laborers in the Lord's
service. Salute Persis the dearly-beloved, who has labored much in the
Lord.
13 Salute Rufus,3 the chosen in the Lord and his mother, who is also
mine.
14 Salute Asyncritus, Phlegon, Hermas, Patrobas, Hermes, and the
brethren who are with them.
15 Salute Philologus, and Julia, Nereus and his sister, and Olympas, and
all the saints who are with them.
16 Salute one another with the kiss of holiness.4
The Churches of Christ [in Achaia] salute you.
17 I exhort you, brethren, to keep your eyes upon those who warning against self-
cause divisions, and cast stumbling-blocks in the way of interested
J J partisans.
others, contrary to the teaching which you have learned.
18 Shun them that are such ; for the master whom they serve is not our
Lord Jesus Christ, but their own belly : and by their fair speaking and
19 flattery they deceive the hearts of the guileless. I say this, because the

1 This Aristobulus was probably the great- this Epistle was written : the other wao a
grandson of Herod the Great, mentioned by favorite of Nero's, and is probably the peison
Josephus and Tacitus, to whom Nero in a. r>. here named. Some of his slaves or freedmen
55 gave the government of Lesser Armenia. had become Christians. This Narcissus was
He had very likely lived previously at Rome, put to death by Galba (Dio. Ixiv. 3).
and may still have kept up an establishment 3 St. Mark (xv. 21) mentions Simon of
there, or perhaps had not yet gone to his gov- Cyrene as " the father of Alexander ana Ru-
ernment. See Tac. Ann. xiii. 7, and Joseph. fus ; " the latter, therefore, was a Christian well
Ant. xx. 5. known to those for whom St. Mark wrote, aud
2 There were two eminent persons of the probably is the same here mentioned, ft is
name of Narcissus at Rome about this time ; gratifying to think that she whom St. Paul
one the well-known favorite of Claudius mentions here with such respectful affection
(Suet. Claud. 28, Tac. Ann. xii. 57, 65, xiii. 1 ), was the wife of that Simon who bort our
who was put to death by Nero, a. d. 54, soon Saviour's cross.
after the death of Claudius, and therefore before 4 See note on 1 Thess. v. 26

chap. xix. EPISTLE TO THE ROMANS. 583
tidings of your obedience have been told throughout the world. On your
own behalf, therefore, I rejoice : but I wish you not only to be simple in
respect of evil, but to be wise for good. And the God of peace shall 20
bruise Satan under your feet speedily.
The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you.
salutations Timotheus, my fellow-laborer, and Lucius, and Jason,1 and 21
from Chris-
Corinth to Sosipater,2 my kinsmen, salute you.
Eome'at I) Tertius, who have written this letter, salute you in the 22
Lord. Gaius,3 who is the host, not of me alone, but also of the whole Church, 23
salutes you.
Erastus,4 the treasurer of the city, and the brother Quartus, salute
you.
condusion. ^he grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you all. 24
Now I commend you 5 unto Him who is able to keep you steadfast, 25
according to my Glad-tidings, and the preaching 6 of Jesus Christ 
whereby is unveiled the mystery which was kept secret in eternal times 7
of old, but has now been brought to light, and made known to all the 26
Gentiles by the Scriptures of the Prophets, by command of the eternal
God ; that the Gentiles might be led to the obedience of faith 
1 Jason is mentioned as a Thessalonian, (with the great majority of MSS.) we must
Acts xvii. 5 ; he had probably accompanied supply " I commend " or something equivalent
St. Paul from Thessalonica to Corinth. here, or else leave the whole passage anaco-
2 Sosipater is mentioned as leaving Corinth luthical. Examples of a similar commendation
with St. Paul, soon after this epistle was writ- to God at the conclusion of a letter or speech
ten (Acts xx. 4). are frequent in St. Paul. Compare 1 Thess.
8 This Gaius (or Caius) is no doubt the v. 23, 2 Thess. ii. 16, and especially the con
same mentioned (1 Cor. i. 14) as baptized at elusion of the speech (so nearly contempora
Corinth by St. Paul with his own hands. In neous with this Epistle) at Miletus, Acts xx.
Acts xx. 4 we find " Gaius of Derbe " leaving' 32. The complicated and involved construc-
Corinth with St. Paul, soon after (fce writing tion reminds us of the Salutation commencing
of this Epistle, but this may perhaps have been this Epistle, and of Eph. i.
a different person ; although this is not certain, 6 Literally, proclamation.
considering how the Jews migrated from one 7 Meaning, probably, the times of the Ancient
place to another, of which Aquila and Priscilla Dispensation. Compare the use of the same
are an obvious example. expression, Tit. i. 2. There is no inconsis-
4 Erastus is again mentioned (as stopping tency in saying that this mystery was " kept
at Corinth) in 2 Tim. iv. 20. Probably the secret" under the Old Dispensation, and yet
same Erastus who went with Timotheus from confirmed by the Prophetical Scriptures ; for
Ephesus to Macedonia, on the way towards it was hidden from the Gentiles altogether, and
Corinth (Acts xix. 22). the prophetical intimations of it were not un-
6 If we retain the " to whom " in verse 27 derstood by the Jews.

584

THOB LIFE AND EPISTLES OP ST. PAUL.

27 unto Him, the only wise God,1 1 commend you through Jesus Christ ;
to whom be glory forever. Amen.2

Corinthian coin representing Cenchrea;'

1 If we were (on the authority of the Codex
Vaticanus) to omit the "to whom" in this
passage, the last three verses would become a
continuous doxology. The translators of the
A. V. have tacitly omitted this " to whom,"
although professing to follow the Textus Re
ceptus. 2 Some MSS. insert the verses 25, 26, 27,
after xiv. 23, instead of in this place ; but the
greater weight of MS. authority is in favor of
their present position. A good refutation of
the objections which have been made against
the authenticity of the last two chapters is
given by De Wette and Neander ; but, above
all, by Paley's Horoe Paulinos, inasmuch as
these very chapters furnish four or five of the
most striking undesigned coincidences there
mentioned. 8 Little has been said as yet concerning

Cenchrea, and some interest is given to the place
both by the mention of its Church in the pre
ceding Epistle (Rom. xvi. 1), and by the de
parture of St. Paul from that port at the close
of his first visit to Achaia ( Acts xviii. 18). We
have seen (p. 360) that it was seventy stadia,
or nearly nine miles distant from Corinth, and
(p. 367) that its position is still pointed out by
the modern Kikries, where some remains of the
ancient town are visible. The road is described
by Pausanias as leading from Corinth through
an avenue of pine-trees, and past many tombs,
among which two of the most conspicuous
were those of the cynic Diogenes and the prof
ligate Thais. The coin here engraved is that
to which allusion was made p. 367, n. 5. It is
a colonial coin of Antoninus Pius, and repre
sents the harbor of Cenchrea exactly as it is
described by Pausanias.

CHAPTER XX.
Isthmian Games. — Route through Macedonia. — Voyage from Philippi. — Sunday at Troas
— Assos. — Voyage by Mitylene and Trogyllium to Miletus. — Speech to the Ephesian
Presbyters. — Voyage by Cos and Rhodes to Patara. — Thence to Phoenicia. — Christians at
Tyre. — Ptolemais. — Events at Cajsarea. — Arrival at Jerusalem.
IN the Epistles which have been already set before the reader in the
course of this biography, and again in some of those which are to
succeed, St. Paul makes frequent allusion to a topic which engrossed the
interest, and called forth the utmost energies, of the Greeks. The
periodical games were to them rather a passion than an amusement :
and the Apostle often uses language drawn from these celebrations,
when he wishes to enforce the zeal and the patience with which a
Christian ought to strain after his heavenly reward. The imagery he
employs is sometimes varied. In one instance, when he describes the
struggle of the ipirit with the flesh, he seeks his illustration in the
violent contest of the boxers (1 Cor. ix. 26). In another, when he
would give a strong representation of the perils he had encountered at
Ephesus, he speaks as one who had contended in that ferocious sport
which the Romans had introduced among the Greeks, the fighting of
gladiators with wild beasts (ib. xv. 32). But, usually, his reference is
to the foot-race in the stadium, which, as it was the most ancient, con
tinued to be the most esteemed, among the purely Greek athletic
contests.1 If we compare the various passages where this language is
used, we find the whole scene in the stadium brought vividly before
us, — the herald 2 who summons the contending runners, — the course,
which rapidly diminishes in front of them as their footsteps advance to
the goal,3 — the judge* who holds out the prize at the end of the course,
1 The victory in the stadium at Olympia 2 "Having heralded." 1 Cor. ix. 27.
was nsed in the formula for reckoning Olym- Plato says that the herald summoned the can-
piads. The stadium was the Greek unit for didates for the foot-race first into the stadium.
the measurement of distance. With St. Paul's 8 " Forgetting the things that are behind,
frequent reference to it in the epistles, 1 Cor. and striving after the things that are before."
ix. 24, Rom. ix, 16, Gal. ii. 2, v. 7, Phil. ii. 16, Phil. iii. 14. For the Course, see Phil. ii. 16,
2 Tim. iv. 7, 8, should be compared two pas- and 2 Tim. iv. 7, besides Acts xx. 24, which is
sages in the Acts, xx. 24, where he speaks of particularly noticed below, p. 602, n. 3.
himself, and xiii. 25, where he speaks of John * 2 Tim. iv. 8.
the Baptist. 685

686 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OP ST. PAUL. chap, xx
— the prize itself, a chaplet of fading leaves, which is compared with
the strongest emphasis of contrast to the unfading glory with which the
faithful Christian will be crowned,1 — the joy and exultation of the victor,
which the Apostle applies to his own case, when he speaks of his converts
as his "joy and crown," the token of his victory and the subject of his
boasting.2 And under the same image he sets forth the heavenly prize,
after which his converts themselves should struggle with strenuous and
unswerving zeal, — with no hesitating step (1 Cor. ix. 26), — pressing
forward, and never looking back (Phil. iii. 13, 14), — even to the disre
gard of life itself (Acts xx. 24). And the metaphor extends itself
beyond the mere struggle in the arena, to the preparations which were
necessary to success, — to that severe and continued training? which,
being so great for so small a reward, was a fit image of that " training
unto godliness," which has the promise not only of this life, but of that
which is to come, — to the strict regulations * which presided over all the
details, both of the contest and the preliminary discipline, and are used
to warn the careless Christian of the peril of an undisciplined life, — to
the careful diet,5 which admonishes us that, if we would so run that we
may obtain, we must be " temperate in all things." 6
This imagery would be naturally and familiarly suggested to St. Paul
by the scenes which he witnessed in every part of his travels. At his
own native place on the banks of the Cydnus,7 in every city throughout
Asia Minor,8 and more especially at Ephesus, the stadium, and the train-
1 See 1 Cor. ix. 24, Phil. iii. 14. It was a He was disqualified by certain moral and po-
chaplet of green leaves, "a fading crown." litical offences. He was obliged to take an
1 Cor. ix. 25. (Cf. 2 Tim. ii. 5, iv. 8; also oath that he had been ten months in training,
1 Pet. v. 4.) The leaves varied with the locality and that he would violate none of the regula-
where the games were celebrated. At the tions. Bribery was punished by a fine. The
Isthmus they were those of the indigenous candidate was obliged to practise again in the
pine. For a time, parsley was substituted for gymnasium immediately before the games,
them ; but in the Apostle's day the pine-leaves under the direction of judges or umpires, who
were used again. were themselves required to be instructed for
2 Phil. iv. 1. 1 Thess. ii. 19. This subject ten months in the details of the games.
illustrates the frequent use of the word " boast " 6 xhe physician Galen gives an account of
by St. Paul. this prescribed diet. See Hor. A. P. 414.
8 1 Tim. iv. 7, 8. The Gymnasium or train- Tertullian describes the self-restraint of the
ing-ground was an important feature of every Athletes.
Greek city. The word is not found in the 6 In the larger editions is an energetic pas-
New Testament, but we find it in 1 Mace. i. 14 sage on this subject from St. Chrysostom, who
and 2 Mace. iv. 9, where allusion is made to was very familiar with all that related to pub-
places of Greek amusement built at Jerusa- lie amusements, both at Antioch and Constan-
lem- tinople.
4 " Except a man strive lawfully." 2 Tim. t It is worth observing, that the only in-
ii. 5. The following were among the regula- scription from Tarsus published by Boeckh
tions of the athletic contests. Every candidate relates to the restoration of the stadium.
was required to be of pure Hellenic descent. » Nothing is more remarkable than the

chap, xx ISTHMIAN GAMES. 587
ing for the stadium,1 were among the chief subjects of interest to the
whole population. Even in Palestine, and at Jerusalem itself, these
busy amusements were well known.2 But Greece was the very home
from which these institutions drew their origin ; and the Isthmus of
Corinth was one of four sanctuaries, where the most celebrated games
were periodically held. Now that we have reached the point where St.
Paul is about to leave this city for the last time, we are naturally led to
make this allusion : and an interesting question suggests itself here, viz.,
whether the Apostle was ever himself present during the Isthmian games.
It might be argued d priori that this is highly probable ; for great
numbers came at these seasons from all parts of the Mediterranean to
witness or take part in the contests ; and the very fact that amusement
and ambition brought some, makes it certain that gain attracted many
others ; thus it is likely that the Apostle, just as he desired to be at
Jerusalem during the Hebrew festivals, so would gladly preach the
Gospel at a time when so vast a concourse met at the Isthmus, — whence,
as from a centre, it might be carried to every shore with the dispersion
of the strangers. But, further, it will be remembered, that, on his first
visit, St. Paul spent two years at Corinth ; and though there is some
difficulty in determining the times at which the games were celebrated,
yet it seems almost certain that they recurred every second year, at the
end of spring, or the beginning of summer.3 Thus it may be con
fidently concluded that he was there at one of the festivals. As regards
the voyage undertaken from Ephesus (p. 418), the time devoted to it
was short ; yet that time may have coincided with the festive season ;
and it is far from inconceivable that he may have sailed across the iEgean
in the spring, with some company of Greeks who were proceeding to
the Isthmian meeting. On the present occasion he spent only three of
the winter months in Achaia, and it is hardly possible that he could
have been present during the games. It is most likely that there were
no crowds among the pine-trees 4 at the Isthmus, and that the stadium at
number and magnitude of the theatres and Olympian and Pythian games took place every
stadia in the ruins of the great cities of Asia fourth year, the Nemean and Isthmian every
Minor. A vast number, too, of the inscrip- second ; the latter in the third and first year of
tions relate to the public amusements. It is each Olympiad. The festival was held in the
evident, as a traveller remarks, that these year 53 a. d., which is the first of an Olympiad;
amusements must have been one of the chief and (as we have seen) there is good reason for
employments of the population. believing that the Apostle came to Corinth in
1 See above, p. 586, n. 3. the autumn of 52, and left it in the spring of
2 See the reference to Herod's theatre and 54.
amphitheatre, p. 2. Hence the significance of * This pine (ireint$) still retains its ancient
such a passage as Heb. xii. 1, 2, to the Hebrew name. See Sibthorpe's Flora Grceca, as re-
Christians of Palestine. ferred to by Canon Stanley in his Introd. to
8 Of the four great national festivals, the 1 Cor.

588

THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL.

the Sanctuary of Neptune was silent and unoccupied when St. Paul
passed by it along the northern road, on his way to Macedonia.1
His intention had been to go by sea to Syria,2 as soon as the season of
safe navigation should be come ; and in that case he would have embarked
at Cenchrea, whence he had sailed during his second missionary jour
ney, and whence the Christian Phoebe had recently gone with the letter
to the Romans.3 He himself had prepared his mind for a journey to
Rome ; * but first he was purposed to visit Jerusalem, that he might con
vey the alms which had been collected for the poorer brethren in Mace
donia and Achaia. He looked forward to this expedition with some mis
giving ; for he knew what danger was to be apprehended from his Jewish
and Judaizing enemies ; and even in his letter to the Roman Christians,
he requested their prayers for his safety. And he had good reason to
fear the Jews ; for ever since their discomfiture under Gallio they had
been irritated by the progress of Christianity, and they organized a plot
against the great preacher when he was on the eve of departing for Syria.
We are. not informed of the exact nature of this plot ; 5 but it was proba-

1 A full account, both of the description
which Pausanias gives of the sanctuary and of
present appearances, may be seen in Leake.
In our account of Corinth (Ch. XI., XH.),
we have entered into no inquiry concerning
the topography of the scene of the Isthmian
games. (See p. 362.) Since St. Paul (as we
have seen) makes many allusions to the
athletic contests of the Greeks, and since we
are now come to the point in his life when he
leaves Corinth for the last time, it seems right
that we should state what is known on the
subject. No complete topographical delineation of
the Isthmus exists. This district was omitted
in the French Expedition de la Moree. We
have given opposite the plan of the ground
near the sanctuary from Col. Leake's third
volume, which accurately represents the rela
tive positions of the stadium, the theatre, and'
the temple. But we must add, that, since our
last edition was published, the ground has
been more exactly examined by the Rev. W.
G. Clark, and a careful plan given in his
Peloponnesus (1858).
The Posidonium, or Sanctuary of Neptune,
is at the narrowest part of the Isthmus, close
by Schcenus, the present Kalamaki (see p. 360,
n.7); and modern travellers may visit the
ruins on their way between Kalamaki and
Lutraki, from one steamboat to the other. St.

Paul would also pass by this spot if he went
by land from Athens (p. 356, n. 5). The dis
tance from Corinth is about eight miles ; and
at Hexamili, near Corinth, the road falls into
that which leads to Cenchrea. (See p. 584,
and Leake, iii. 286.) The military wall, which
crossed the Isthmus to Lechaeum, abutted on
the Sanctuary (p. 358, n. 1 ), and was for some
space identical with the sacred enclosure. At
no great distance are the traces of the canal
which Nero left unfinished about the time of
St. Paul's death (p. 360) ; and in many places
along the shore, as any traveller may see on
his way from Kalamaki to Lutraki, are those
green pine-trees, whose leaves wove the " fad
ing garlands" which the Apostle contrasts
with the " unfading crown," the prize for
which he fought.
2 Acts xx. 3.
8 For Cenchrea, see the note at the end of
the preceding chapter. Phoebe was a resident
at Cenchrea. When she went to Rome, she
probably sailed from LechEeum.
4 See the end of Ch. XV.
6 " The Jews generally settled in great
numbers at seaports for the sake of commerce,
and their occupation would give them peculiar
influence over the captains and owners of
merchant- vessels, in which St. Paul must have
sailed. They might, however, form the pro
ject of seizing him or murdering him at Cen-

POSIDONIUM AT THE ISTHMUS.
(From Colonel Leake's Morea )

chap. xx. ROUTE THKOUGH MACEDONIA. 589
bly a conspiracy against his life, like that which was formed at Damascus
soon after his conversion (Acts ix. 23, 2 Cor. xi. 32), and at Jerusalem,
both before and after the time of which we write (Acts ix. 29, xxiii. 12),
and it necessitated a change of route, such as that which had once saved
him on his departure from Beroea (Acts xvii. 14).
On that occasion his flight had been from Macedonia to Achaia ; now it
was from Achaia to Macedonia. Nor would he regret the occasion which
brought him once more among some of his dearest converts. Again he
saw the Churches on the north of the iEgean, and again he went through
the towns along the line of the Via Egnatia.1 He re-appeared in the scene
of his persecution among the Jews of Thessalonica, and passed on by
Apollonia and Amphipolis to the place where he had first landed on the
European shore. The companions of his journey were Sopater the son
of Pyrrhus,2 a native of Bercea, — Aristarchus and Secundus, both of
Thessalonica, — with Gaius of Derbe and Timotheus, — and two Chris
tians from the province of Asia, Tychicus and Trophimus, whom we
have mentioned before (p. 479), as his probable associates when he
last departed from Ephesus. Prom the order in which these disciples
are mentioned, and the notice of the specific places to which they be
longed, we should be inclined to conjecture that they had something to do
with the collections which had been made at the various towns on the
route. As St. Luke does not mention the collection,3 we cannot expect
to be able to ascertain all the facts. But since St. Paul left Corinth
sooner than was intended, it seems likely that all the arrangements were
not complete, and that Sopater was charged with the responsibility of
gathering the funds from Bercea, while Aristarchus and Secundus took
charge of those from Thessalonica. St. Luke himself was at Philippi:
and the remaining four of the party were connected with the interior or
the coast of Asia Minor.4
The whole of this company did not cross together from Europe to Asia ;
but St. Paul and St. Luke lingered at Philippi, while the others preceded
them to Troas.5 The journey through Macedonia had been rapid, and
chrea with great probability of success." disciple of the same name who is mentioned
Comm. on Hie Acts, by Rev. F. C. Cook, 1850. before along with Aristarchus (" Gaius and
1 For the Via Egnatia and the stages be- Aristarchus, Macedonians,'' xix. 29). But it
tween Philippi and Beroea, see pp. 275, 277, is almost certain that Timotlieua was a native
293. of Lystra, and not Derbe (see p. 227, n. 1) ,
2 Such seems to be the correct reading; and Gaius [or Caius, see above, p. 426] was so
and the addition may be made to distinguish common a name, that this need cause us no
him from Sosipater. (Rom. xvi. 21.) difficulty.
8 Except in one casual allusion at a later 5 It is conceivable, but not at all probable,
period. Acts xxiv. 17. that these companions sailed direct from Cor-
4 Some would read " and Timothy of inth to Troas, while Paul went through Mace-
Derbe," in order io identify Gains with the donia. Some would limit " these " to Trophi-

590

THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OP ST. PAUL.

the visits to the other Churches had been short. But the Church at Phil
ippi had peculiar claims on St. Paul's attention : and the time of his
arrival induced him to pause longer than in the earlier part of his jour
ney. It was the time of the Jewish passover. And here our thoughts
turn to the passover of the preceding year, when the Apostle was at
Ephesus (p. 432). We remember the higher and Christian meaning
which he gave to the Jewish festival. It was no longer an Israelitish
ceremony, but it was the Easter of the New Dispensation. He was not
now occupied with shadows ; for the substance was already in possession.
Christ the Passover had been sacrificed, and the feast was to be kept with
the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth. Such was the higher
standing-point to which he sought to raise the Jews whom he met, in Asia
or in Europe, at their annual celebrations.
Thus, while his other Christian companions had preceded him to Troas,
he remained with Luke some time longer at Philippi, and did not leave
Macedonia till the passover moon was waning. Notwithstanding this
delay, they were anxious, if possible, to reach Jerusalem before Pentecost.1
And we shall presently trace the successive days through which they were
prosperously brought to the fulfilment of their wish.2 Some doubt has
been thrown on the possibility of this plan being accomplished in the in-

mus and Tychicus; but this is quite unnatural.
,The expression "as far as Asia" seems to
imply that St. Paul's companions left him at
Miletus, except St. Luke (who continues the
narrative from this point in the first person)
and Trophimus (who was with him at Jerusa
lem, xxi. 29), and whoever might be the other
deputies who accompanied him with the alms.
(2 Cor. viii. 19-21.)
1 Acts xx. 16.
2 It may be well to point out here the gen
eral distribution of the time., spent on the
voyage. Forty-nine days intervened between
Passover and Pentecost. The days of unleav
ened bread [Mark xiv. 12, Luke xxii. 7, Acts
xii. 3, 1 Cor. v. 8] succeeded the Passover.
Thus, St. Paul staid at least seven days at
Philippi after the Passover (v. 6), — five days
were spent on the passage to Troas (ib.), —
six days (for so we may reckon them) were
spent at Troas (ib.), — four -were occupied on
the voyage by Chios' to Miletus (vv. 13-15, see
below), — two were spent at Miletus, — in three
days St. Paul went by Cos and Rhode to
Patara (xxi. 1, see below), — two days would
suffice for the voyage to Tyre (w. 2, 3), — six
days were spent at Tyre (v. 4), two were taken

up in proceeding by Ptolemais to Csesarea
(w. 7, 8). This calculation gives us thirty-
seven days in all ; thus leaving thirteen before
the festival of Pentecost, after the arrival at
Cassarea, which is more than the conditions
require. We may add, if necessary, two or
three days more during the voyage in the
cases where we have reckoned inclusively.
The mention of the Sunday spent at Troas
fixes (though not quite absolutely) the day of
the week on which the Apostle left Philippi.
It was a Tuesday or a Wednesday. We might,
with considerable probability, describe what
was done each day of the week during the
voyage; but we are not sure, in all cases,
whether we are to reckon inclusively or exclu
sively, nor are we absolutely certain of the
length of the stay at Miletus.
It will be observed that all we have here
said is independent of the particular year in
which we suppose the voyage to have been
made, and of the day of the week on which the
14th of Nisan occurred. Greswell and Wiese
ler have made the calculation for the years 56
and 58 respectively, and both have shown that
the accomplishment of St. Paul's wish was
practicable. Both too have allowed more tinv

chap. xx. VOYAGE FROM PHILIPPI. 591
terval ; for they did not leave Philippi till the seventh day after the four
teenth of Nisan was past. It will be our business to show that the plan
was perfectly practicable, and that it was actually accomplished, with
some days to spare.
The voyage seemed to begin unfavorably. The space between Neapo
lis and Troas could easily be sailed over in two days with a fair wind ;
and this was the time occupied when the Apostle made the passage on
his first coming to Europe.1 On this occasion the same voyage occupied
five days. We have no means of deciding whether the ship's progress
was retarded by calms, or by contrary winds.2 Either of these causes
of delay might equally be expected in the changeable weather of those
seas. St. Luke seems to notice the time in both instances, in the manner
of one who was familiar with the passages commonly made between
Europe and Asia : 3 and something like an expression of disappointment
is implied in the mention of the " five days" which elapsed before the
arrival at Troas.
The history of Alexandria Troas, first as a city of the Macedonian
princes, and then as a favorite colony of the Romans,4 has been given
before ; but little has been said as yet of its appearance. From the
extent and magnitude of its present ruins (though for ages it has been a
quarry both for Christian and Mohammedan edifices) we may infer what
it was in its flourishing period. Among the oak-trees, which fill the vast
enclosure of its walls, are fragments of colossal masonry. Huge
than needful for the voyage between Patara mand of her movements. This would be
and Tyre. highly unlikely for a person under the circum-
We may observe here, that many commen- stances of St. Paul ; and we shall see that it
tators write on the nautical passages of the was not the case in the present voyage, during
Acts as if the weather were always the same which, as at other times, he availed himself of
and the rate of sailing uniform, or as if the the opportunities offered by merchant-vessels
Apostle travelled in steamboats. His motions or coasters.
were dependent on the wind. He might be 1 Acts xvi. 11.
detained in harbor by contrary weather. Noth- 2 The course is marked in our map with a
ing is more natural than that he should be five zigzag line. If the wind was contrary, the
days on one occasion, and two on another, in vessel would have to beat. The delay might
passing between Philippi and Troas ; just as equally have been caused by calms.
Cicero was once fifteen, and once thirteen, in s It has been remarked above (p. 270) that
passing between Athens and Ephesus. So St. St. Luke'B vocation as a physician may have
Paul might sail in two days from Patara to caused him to reside at Philippi and Troas,
Tyre, though under less favorable circum- and made him familiar with these coasts. The
stances it might have required four or five, autoptical style (see p. 244) is immediately re-
or even more. It is seldom that the same sumed with the change of the pronoun.
passage is twice made in exactly the same time 4 For the history of the foundation of the
by any vessel not a steamer. city under the successors of Alexander, and of
Another remark may be added, that com- the feelings of Romans towards it, see the
mentators often write as though St. Paul had concluding part of Ch. VIU.
chartered his own vessel, and had the full com-

592 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OP ST. PAUL. chap. xx.
columns of granite are seen lying in the harbor, and in the quarries on
the neighboring hills.1 A theatre, commanding a view of Tenedos and
the sea, shows where the Greeks once assembled in crowds to witness
their favorite spectacles. Open arches of immense size, towering from
the midst of other great masses of ruin, betray the hand of Roman
builders. These last remains — once doubtless belonging to a gym
nasium or to baths, and in more ignorant ages, when the poetry of
Homer was better remembered than the facts of history, popularly
called " The Palace of Priam " 2 — are conspicuous from the sea. We
cannot assert that these buildings existed in the day of St. Paul, but we
may be certain that the city, both on the approach from the water, and
to those who wandered through its streets, must have presented an
appearance of grandeur and prosperity. Like Corinth, Ephesus, or
Thessalonica, it was a place where the Apostle must have wished to lay
firmly and strongly the foundations of the Gospel. On his first visit,
as we have seen (pp. 241-245), he was withheld by a supernatural
revelation from remaining ; and on his second visit (pp. 478-480),
though a door was opened to him, and he did gather together a com
munity of Christian disciples, yet his impatience to see Titus compelled
him to bid them a hasty farewell.3 Now, therefore, he would be the
more anxious to add new converts to the Church, and to impress deeply,
on those who were converted, the truths and the duties of Christianity :
and he had valuable aid, both in Luke, who accompanied him, and the
other disciples who had preceded him.
The labors of the early days of the week that was spent at Troas are
not related to us ; but concerning the last day we have a narrative which
enters into details with all the minuteness of one of the Gospel histories.
It was the evening which succeeded the Jewish Sabbath.4 On the Sun-
1 Alexandria Troas must have been, like 2 Dr. Clarke regards these ruins as the re-
Aberdeen, a city of granite. The hills which mains of Alexandria Troas. He says that
supplied this material were to the N. E. and " these three arches of the building make a
S. E. Dr. Clarke (vol. ii. p. 149) mentions a conspicuous figure from a considerable dis-
Btupendous column, which is concealed among tance at sea, like the front of a magnificent
some trees in the neighborhood, and which he palace ; and this circumstance, connected with
compares to the famous column of the Egyp- the mistake so long prevalent concerning the
tian Alexandria. Fellows (p 58) speaks of city itself [viz. that it was the ancient Troy],
hundreds of columns, and says that many are gave rise to the appellation of ' The Palace of
bristling among the waves to a considerable Priam,' bestowed by mariners upon these
distance out at sea. He saw seven columns ruins." See p. 242, n. 4.
lying with their chips in a quarry, which is 3 2 Cor. ii. 13.
connected by a paved road with the city. * " The first day of the week," v. 7. This
Thus granite seems to have been to Alexandria is a passage of the utmost importance, as
Troas what marble was to Athens. The showing that the observance of Sunday was
granite columns of Troas have been used for customary. Cf. 1 Cor. xvi. 2. See p. 385.
making cannon-balls for the defence of the
Dardanelles.

chap. xx. SUNDAY AT TROAS. 593
day morning the vessel was about to sail.1 The Christians of Troas
were gathered together at this solemn time to celebrate that feast of love
which the last commandment of Christ has enjoined on all His followers.
The place was an upper room, with a recess or balcony 2 projecting over
the street or the court. The night was dark: three weeks had not
elapsed since the Passover,3 and the moon only appeared as a faint
crescent in the early part of the night. Many lamps were burning in
the room where the congregation was assembled.4 The place was hot
and crowded. St. Paul, with the feeling strongly impressed on his mind
that the next day was the day of his departure, and that souls might be
lost by delay, was continuing in earnest discourse, and prolonging it
even till midnight,6 when an occurrence suddenly took place, which filled
the assembly with alarm, though it was afterwards converted into an
occasion of joy and thanksgiving. A young listener, whose name was
Eutychus, was overcome by exhaustion, heat, and weariness, and sank
into a deep slumber.6 He was seated or leaning in the balcony ; and,
falling down in his sleep, was dashed upon the pavement below, and was
taken up dead.7 Confusion and terror followed, with loud lamenta
tion.8 But Paul was enabled to imitate the power of that Master whose
doctrine he was proclaiming. As Jesus had once said9 of the young
maiden, who was taken by death from the society of her friends, " She
is not dead, but sleepeth," so the Apostle of Jesus received power to
restore the dead to life. He went down and fell upon the body, like
Elisha of old,10 and, embracing Eutychus, said to the bystanders, "Do
not lament ; for his life is in him."
1 " About to depart on the morrow," ib. tire scene to which he refers stood now with
See v. 13. By putting all these circumstances such minuteness and vividness before his
together, we can almost certainly infer the day mind." Hackett on the Acts, Boston, U. S.,
of the week on which St. Paul left Troas. 1852. [See a similar instance in the case of
See above. the mention of the proseucha at Philippi, Acts
2 The word used here denotes an aperture xvi. 13.]
closed by a wooden door, doubtless open in 6 " He continued his discourse till mid-
this case because of the heat. See the note and night," v. 7. " While Paul was long dis-
woodcut in the Pictorial Bible. These upper coursing," v. 9.
rooms of the ancients were usually connected 6 The present participle in v. 9 seems to
with the street by outside stairs, such as those denote the gradual sinking into sleep, as op-
of which we see traces at Pompeii. posed to the sudden fall implied by the aorist
8 See above, p. 590. participle in the next phrase.
* V. 8. Various reasons have been sng- 7 It is quite arbitrary to qualify the words
gested why this circumstance should be men- by supposing that he was only apparently
tioned. Meyer thinks it is given as the dead.
reason why the fate of the young man was 8 This is implied in the " Trouble not your-
perceived at once. But it has much more the selves " below. The word denotes a loud and
appearance of having simply " proceeded from violent expression of grief, as in Matt. ix. 23,
an eye-witness, who mentions the incident, not Mark v. 39.
for the purpose of obviating a difficulty which 9 Matt. ix. 24; Mark v. 39.
might occur to the reader, but because the en- 10 2 Kings iv. 34. In each ease, as Prof.

594

THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL.

With minds solemnized and filled with thankfulness by this wonderful
token of God's power and love, they celebrated the Eucharistic feast.1
The act of Holy Communion was combined, as was usual in the
Apostolic age, with a common meal : 2 and St. Paul now took some
refreshment after the protracted labor of the evening,3 and then con
tinued his conversation till the dawning of the day.4
It was now time for the congregation to separate. The ship was about
to sail, and the companions of Paul's journey took their departure to go
on board.5 It was arranged, however, that the Apostle himself should
join the vessel at Assos, which was only about twenty miles 6 distant by
the direct road, while the voyage round Cape Lectum was nearly twice
as far. He thus secured a few more precious hours with his converts at
Troas ; and eagerly would they profit by his discourse, under the feeling
that he was so soon to leave them : and we might suppose that the
impression made under such circumstances, and with the recollection
of what they had witnessed in the night, would never be effaced from the
minds of any of tuem, did we not know, on the highest authority, that
if men believe not the prophets of God, neither will they believe " though
one rose from the dead."
But the time came when St. Paul too must depart. The vessel might
arrive at Assos before him ; and, whatever influence he might have with

Hackett remarks, the act appears to have been
the sign of a miracle.
1 V. 11, compared with v. 7.
2 See p. 385.
3 When he had eaten, v. 1 1 . This is distin
guished in the Greek from the breaking bread.
i Having talked a long while. This, again,
is distinguished from the preaching mentioned
above. 6 We might illustrate what took place at
this meeting by the sailing of the Bishop of
Calcutta from Plymouth in 1829. "He and
his chaplain made impressive and profitable
addresses to us, the first part of the meeting,
as they had received orders to embark the
same morning. I began then to speak, and in
the middle of my speech the captain of the
frigate sent for them, and they left the meet
ing." — Memoir of Rev. E. Bickersteth, vol. i.
p. 445. 6 See p. 240. The impression derived from
modern travellers through this neglected re
gion is, that the distance between Assos and
Troas is rather greater. Sir C. Fellows reck
ons it at 30 miles, and he was in the saddle
from half-past eight to five. Dr. Hunt, in

Walpole's Memoirs, was part of two days on
the road, leaving Assos in the afternoon ; but
he deviated to see the hot springs and salt
works. Mr. Weston (MS. journal) left Assos
at three in the afternoon, and reached Troas
at ten the next morning ; but he adds, that it
was almost impossible to find the road without
a guide. In a paper on " Recent Works on Asia Mi
nor," in the Bibliotheca Sacra for October, 1851,
it is 6aid that Assos is nine miles from Troas.
This must be an oversight. It is, however,
quite possible that Mitylene might have been
reached, as we have assumed below, on the
Sunday evening. If the vessel sailed from
Troas at seven in the morning, she would
easily be round Cape Lectum before noon.
If St. Paul left Troas at ten, he might arrive
at Assos at four in the afternoon ; and the
vessel might be at anchor in the roads of
Mitylene at seven. Greswell supposes that
they sailed from Assos on the Monday. This
would derange the days of the week as we
have given them below, but would no' affect
the general conclusion.

chap. xx. ASSOS. 595
the seamen, he could not count on any long delay. He hastened, there
fore, through the southern gate, past the hot springs,1 and through the
oak-woods,2 — then in full foliage,3 — which cover all that shore with
greenness and shade, and across the wild water-courses on the western
side of Ida.4 Such is the scenery which now surrounds the traveller on
his way from Troas to Assos. The great difference then was, that there
was a good Roman road,5 which made St. Paul's solitary journey both
more safe and more rapid than it could have been now. We have seldom
had occasion to think of the Apostle in the hours of his solitude. But
such hours must have been sought and cherished by one whose whole
strength was drawn from communion with God, and especially at a time
when, as on this present journey, he was deeply conscious of his weak
ness, and filled with foreboding fears.6 There may have been other rea
sons why he lingered at Troas after his companions : but the desire for
solitude was (we may well believe) one reason among others. The dis
comfort of a crowded ship is unfavorable for devotion : and prayer and
meditation are necessary for maintaining the religious life even of an
Apostle. That Saviour to whose service he was devoted had often prayed
in solitude on the mountain, and crossed the brook Kedron to kneel
under the olives of Gethsemane. And strength and peace were surely
sought and obtained by the Apostle from the Redeemer, as he pursued
his lonely road that Sunday afternoon in spring, among the oak-woods
and the streams of Ida.
No delay seems to have occurred at Assos. He entered by the Sacred
Way among the famous tombs,7 and through the ancient gateway, and
proceeded immediately to the shore. We may suppose that the vessel
was already hove to and waiting when he arrived ; or that he saw her
approaching from the west, through the channel between Lesbos and the
main. He went on board without delay, and the Greek sailors and the

1 Mentioned by Fellows and Hunt. 6 Compare Rom. xv. 30, 31, Acts xx. 3,
2 All travellers make mention of the woods with Acts xx. 22-25, xxi. 4, 13.
of Vallonea oaks in the neighborhood of 7 This Street of Tombs ( Via Sacra) is one
Troas. The acorns are used for dyeing, and of the most remarkable features of Assos. It
form an important branch of trade. The col- is described by Fellows in his excellent ac-
lecting of the acorns, and shells, and gall-nuts, count of Assos. The Street of Tombs ex-
cmploys the people during a great part of the tends to a great distance across the level
year. One traveller mentions an English ves- ground to N. W. of the city. Some of the
sel which he saw taking in a load of these tombs are of vast dimensions, and formed
acorns. each of one block of granite. These remains
8 The woods wore in full foliage on the are the more worthy of notice because the
18th of March. Hunt. word sarcophagus was first applied in Roman
4 For the streams of this mountain, see p times to this stone of Assos (lapis Assius),
240 n. 5. from the peculiar power it was supposed to
6 See note on the preceding page. possess of aiding the natural decay of corpses.

596

THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL.

Apostolic missionaries continued their voyage. As to the city of Assoa
itself, we must conclude, if we compare the description of the ancients
with present appearances, that its aspect as seen from the sea waf
sumptuous and grand. A terrace with a long portico was raised by a
wall of rock above the water-line. Above this was a magnificent gate,-
approached by a flight of steps. Higher still was the theatre, which com
manded a glorious view of Lesbos and the sea, and those various build
ings which are now a wilderness of broken columns, triglyphs, and friezes.
The whole was crowned by a citadel of Greek masonry on a cliff of gran
ite. Such was the view which gradually faded into indistinctness as the
vessel retired from the shore, and the summits of Ida rose in the evening
sky.2 The course of the voyagers was southwards, along the eastern shore
of Lesbos. When Assos was lost, Mitylene, the chief city of Lesbos,
came gradually into view. The beauty of the capital of Sappho's island
was celebrated by the architects, poets, and philosophers of Rome. Like
other Greek cities, which were ennobled by old recollections, it was
honored by the Romans with the privilege of freedom.3 Situated on the
south-eastern coast of the island, it would afford a good shelter from the
north-westerly winds, whether the vessel entered the harbor or lay at an
chor in the open roadstead.4 It seems likely that the reason why they lay

1 The view opposite is from a drawing by
the Rev. G. F. Weston, who visited Assos in
1845. In his MS. journal he speaks of it as
follows : " Proceeding 300 or 400 yards [from
the theatre] in a N. W. direction, you come to
the great gate of the city, a very interesting
specimen of Greek architecture. An arch is
formed by one stone overlapping that beneath
it. There are remains also of two flanking
towers with splayed loopholes, and the wall
running up to the precipices of the Acropolis
is almost perfect. Higher up, towards the
Acropolis, are two more curious arches. Run
ning N. W. from the great gate is the Via
Sacra." See the preceding note.
2 The travellers above mentioned speak in
strong terms of the view from the Acropolis
towards Lesbos and the sea. Towards Ida
and the land side the eye ranges over the
windings of a river through a fruitful plain.
Fellows conceives that the remains here
mentioned have been preserved from the dep
redations committed on other towns near the
coast, in consequence of the material being
the " same gray stone as the neighboring rock,
and not having intrinsic value as marble."

He observed "no trace of the Romans."
Leake says 'that the "hard granite of Mount
Ida " has furnished the materials for many of
the buildings, and even the sculptures ; and he
adds that " the whole gives perhaps the most
perfect idea of a. Greek city that anywhere
exists." 8 For a sketch of the history of Mitylene,
and for remarks on the orthography of the
word, see Smith's Diet, of Geography. In our
larger editions is a view of the town with the
mountains behind.
* " The chief town of Mitylene is on the
S. E. coast, and on a peninsula (once an is
land) forming two small harbors : of these the
northern one is sheltered by a pier to the
north, and admits small coasters. . . . The
roadstead, which is about seven miles N. from
the S. E. end of the island, is a good summer
roadstead, but the contrary in winter, being
much exposed to the S. E. and N. E. winds,
which blow with great violence." — Purdy's
Sailing Directory, p. 154. It should be par
ticularly observed that St. Paul's ship would
be sheltered here from the N. W. We shall
see, as we proceed, increasing reason for be-

chap. xx. CHIOS. — SAMOS. 597
here for the night was, because it was the time of dark moon,1 and they
would wish for daylight to accomplish safely the intricate navigation
between the southern part of Lesbos and the mainland of Asia Minor.
In the course of Monday they were abreast of Chios (v. 15). The
weather in these seas is very Variable : and, from the mode of expression
employed by St. Luke, it is probable that they were becalmed. An
English traveller under similar circumstances has described himself as
" engrossed from daylight till noon " by the beauty of the prospects with
which he was surrounded, as his vessel floated idly " on this channel
between Scio and the continent.2 On one side were the gigantic masses
of the mainland : on the other were the richness and fertility of the
island, with its gardens of oranges,3 citrons, almonds, and pomegranates,
and its white scattered houses overshadowed by evergreens. Until the
time of its recent disasters, Scio was the paradise of the modern Greek :
and a familiar proverb censured the levity of its inhabitants,4 like that
which in the Apostle's day described the coarser faults of the natives of
Crete (Tit. i. 12).
The same English traveller passed the island of Samos after leaving
that of Chios. So likewise did St. Paul (v. 15). But the former sailed
along the western side of Samos, and he describes how its towering cloud-
capped heights are contrasted with the next low island to the west.5 The
Apostle's course lay along the eastern shore, where a much narrower
" marine pass " intervenes between it and a long mountainous ridge of
the mainland, from which it appears to have been separated by some
violent convulsion of nature.6 This high promontory is the ridge of
Moving that the wind blew from this quar- changes are subsequent to the discovery of
ter. America. See p. 20, n. 1. The wines of
1 The moon would be about six days old Chios were always celebrated. Its coins dis-
(see above), and would set soon after mid- play an amphora and a bunch of grapes.
night. We are indebted for this suggestion 4 The proverb says that it is easier to find
to Mr. Smith (author of the Voyage and Ship- a green horse than a sober-minded Sciot.
wreck of St. Paul), and we take this oppor- 6 See the view which Dr. Clarke gives of
tunity of acknowledging our obligations to his this remarkable " marine pass," vol. ii. p. 192.
MS. notes in various parts of this chapter. The summit of Samos was concealed by a thick
2 Dr. Clarke's Travels, vol. ii. p. 188. See covering of clouds, and he was told that its
the whole description. This applies to a period heights were rarely unveiled. See again vol.
«ome years before the massacre of 1822. For iii. pp. 364-367. Compare Norie's Sailing Di-
notices of Scio, and a description of the rectory, p. 150. " Samos, being mountainous,
icenery in its naatical aspect, see the Sailing becomes visible twenty leagues off; and the
Directory, pp. 124-128. summit of Mount Kerki retains its snow
8 It must be remembered that the vegeta- throughout the year." The strait through
tion, and with the vegetation the scenery, of which Dr. Clarke sailed is called the Great
the shores of the Mediterranean, have varied Boghaz, and is ten miles broad. The island to
with the progress of civilization. It seems the west is Icaria.
that the Arabians introduced the orange in 6 This strait is the Little Boghaz, which is
the early part of the middle ages. Other reckoned at about a mile in breadth both by

598 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap.xx
Mycale, well known in the annals of Greek victory over the Persians.
At its termination, not more than a mile from Samos, is the anchorage
of Trogyllium. Here the night of Tuesday was spent ; apparently for
the same reason as that which caused the delay at Mitylene. The moon
set early : and it was desirable to wait for the day before running into the
harbor of Miletus.1
The short voyage from Chios to Trogyllium had carried St. Paul
through familiar scenery. The bay across which the vessel had been
passing was that into which the Cayster2 flowed. The mountains on the
mainland were the western branches of Messogis and Tmolus,3 the ranges
that enclose the primeval plain of " Asia." The city, towards which it
is likely that some of the vessels in sight were directing their course, was
Ephesus, where the Apostolic labors of three years had gathered a com
pany of Christians in the midst of unbelievers. One whose solicitude was
so great for his recent converts could not willingly pass by and leave
them unvisited : and had he had the command of the movements of the
vessel, we can hardly believe that he would have done so. He would
surely have landed at Ephesus, rather than at Miletus. The same wind
which carried him to the latter harbor would have been equally advan
tageous for a quick passage to the former. And, even had the weather
been unfavorable at the time for landing at Ephesus, he might easily have
detained the vessel at Trogyllium ; and a short journey by land north
ward would have taken him to the scene of his former labors.4
Yet every delay, whether voluntary or involuntary, might have been
fatal to the plan he was desirous to accomplish. St. Luke infoims us
Strabo and Chandler. We shall return pres- of Trogyllium, bearing the name of " St.
ently to this ridge of Mycale in its relation Paul's Port."
to the interior, when we refer to the journey of 2 See what is said of the Cay&,wr, pp. 410,
the Ephesian elders to Miletus. It was evident- 461 .
ly a place well known to sailors, from Strabo's 8 See again, on these Ephesian mountains,
reckoning the distance from hence to Sunium p. 462.
in Attica. * Trogyllium, as we have setjn, is at the
1 We should observe here again that Tro- point where the coast projects and forms a
gyllium, though on the shore of the mainland, narrow strait between Asia Minor and Samos.
is protected by Samos from the north-westerly The coast recedes northwards towards Ephe-
winds. With another wind it might have sus, and southwards towards Miletus; each
been better to have anchored in a port to the of these places being about equidistant from
N. E. of Samos, now called Port Vathy, which Trogyllium. Up to this point from Chios, St.
is said, in the Sailing Directory (p. 119), to be Paul had been nearly following the line of the
"protected from every wind but the N. W." Ephesian merchant-vessels up what is now
We may refer here to the clear description called the gulf of Scala Nuova. By compar
and map of Samos by Tournefort, Voyage du ing the Admiralty Chart witn Strabo and
Levant,^, pp. 156, 157. But the Admiralty Chandler, a very good notion is obtained of
Charts (1530 and 1555) should be consulted the coast and country between Ephesus and
for the soundings, &c. An anchorage will Miletus.
be seen just to the east of the extreme point

dhap. xx. MILETUS. — TROGYLLIUM. 599
here (and the occurrence of the remark shows us how much regret was
felt by the Apostle on passing by Ephesus) that his intention was, if
possible, to be in Jerusalem at Pentecost (v. 16). Even with a ship at
his command, he could not calculate on favorable weather, if he lost his
present opportunity : nor could he safely leave the ship which had con
veyed him hitherto ; for he was well aware that he could not be certain
of meeting with another that would forward his progress. He deter
mined, therefore, to proceed in the same vessel, on her southward course
from Trogyllium to Miletus. Yet the same watchful zeal which had
urged him to employ the last precious moments of the stay at Troas in
his Master's cause suggested to his prompt mind a method of re-impress
ing the lessons of eternal truth on the hearts of the Christians at
Ephesus, though he was unable to revisit them in person. He found that
the vessel would be detained at Miletus J a sufficient time to enable him
to send for the presbyters of the Ephesian Church, with the hope of their
meeting him there. The distance between the two cities was hardly
thirty miles, and a good road connected them together.2 Thus, though
the stay at Miletus would be short, and it might be hazardous to attempt
the journey himself, he could hope for one more interview, — if not
with the whole Ephesian Church, at least with those members of it
whose responsibility was the greatest.
The sail from Trogyllium, with a fair wind, would require but little
time. If the vessel weighed anchor at daybreak on Wednesday, she
would be in harbor long before noon.3 ' The message was doubtless sent
to Ephesus immediately on her arrival ; and Paul remained at Miletus
waiting for those whom the Holy Spirit, by his hands, had made " over
seers " over the flock of Christ (v. 28). The city where we find the
Christian Apostle now waiting, while those who had the care of the
vessel were occupied with the business that detained them, has already
been referred to as more ancient than Ephesus,4 though in the age of St.
1 It is surely quite a mistake to suppose, in consequence of the state of the weather or
with some commentators, that St. Paul had the darkness.
the command of the movements of the vessel. 2 Pliny says that Magnesia is fifteen miles
His influence with the captain and the seamen from Ephesus, and Magnesia was about equi-
might induce them to do all in their power to distant from Ephesus, Tralles, and Miletus.
oblige him ; and perhaps we may trace some For further notices of the roads, we must refer
such feeling in the arrangements at Assos, to our larger editions.
just as afterwards at Sidon (Acts xxvii. 3), 8 The distance is about seventeen nautical
when on his voyage to Rome. But he mus. miles and a half. If the vessel sailed at .six in
necessarily have been content to take advan- the morning from Trogyllium, she would easily
ta<*e of such opportunities as were consistent be in harbor at nine.
with the business on which the vessel sailed. i See above, p. 410. Comjarep. 462. Thus
She evidently put in for business to Troas, the imperial coins of Miletus are rare, and the
Miletus, and Patara. At the other places she autonomous coins begin very early.
seems to have touched merely for convenience,

600 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap, xx
Paul inferior to it in political and mercantile eminence. Even in Homer,
the " Carian Miletus " appears as a place of renown. Eighty colonies
went forth from the banks of the Maeander, and some of them were
spread even to the eastern shores of the Black Sea, and beyond the
Pillars of Hercules to the west. It received its first blow in the Persian
war, when its inhabitants, like the Jews, had experience of a Babylonian
captivity.1 It suffered once more in Alexander's great campaign ; 2 and
after his time it gradually began to sink towards its present condition of
ruin and decay, from the influence, as it would seem, of mere natural
causes, — the increase of alluvial soil in the delta having the effect of
removing the city gradually farther and farther from the sea. Even in
the Apostle's time, there was between the city and the shore a considera
ble space of level ground, through which the ancient river meandered in
new windings, like the Forth at Stirling.3 Pew events connect the
history of Miletus with the transactions of the Roman Empire. When
St. Paul was there, it was simply one of the second-rate seaports on this
populous coast, ranking, perhaps, with Adramyttium or Patara, but
hardly with Ephesus or Smyrna.4
The excitement and joy must have been great among the Christians of
Ephesus, when they heard that their honored friend and teacher, to whom
they had listened so often in the school of Tyrannus, was in the harbor
of Miletus, within the distance of a few miles. The presbyters mtfst
have gathered together in all haste to obey the summons, and gone with
eager steps out of the southern gate, which leads to Miletus. By those
who travel on such an errand, a journey of twenty or thirty miles is not
regarded long and tedious, nor is much regard paid to the difference
between day and night.6 The presbyters of Ephesus might easily reach
1 Herod, v. 30, vi. 18. ward to the time when Samos and other
2 Arrian, Anab. i. 19, 20. islands will unite with the shore, and the pres-
8 This is the comparison of Sir C. Fellows. ent promontories will be seen inland. See
The Majander was proverbial among the an- Kiepert's Hellas, for a representation of the
cients, both for the sinuosities of its course, coast as it was in the early Greek times ; and
and the great quantity of alluvial soil brought for a true delineation of its present state, see
down by the stream. Pliny tells us that is- the Admiralty Chart, No. 1555.
lands near Miletus had been joined to the 4 For Smyrna, see again pp. 410, 462.
continent, and Strabo relates that Priene, once 6 Strabo says that Miletus had four har-
a seaport, was in his time forty stadia from the bors, one of which was for vessels of war.
sea. Fellows says that Miletus was once a No trace of them is to be seen now.
headland in a bay, which is now a " dead flat " 6 For a notion of the scenery of this jour-
ten miles in breadth. Chandler (p. 202), on ney of the presbyters over or round the ridge
looking down from Priene on the " bare and of Mycale, and by the windings of the Msean-
marshy plain," says, " How different its aspect der, the reader may consult Chandler and Fel-
when the mountains were boundaries of a lows. The latter describes the extensive view
gulf, and Miletus, Myus, and Priene, maritime in each direction from the summit of the
cities!" — And again (p. 207), he looks for- range. The former was travelling, like these

chap. xx. SPEECH TO THE EPHESIAN PRESBYTERS. 601
Miletus on the day after that on which the summons was received.1 And
though they might be weary when they arrived, their fatigue would soon
be forgotten at the sight of their friend and instructor ; and God, also,
" who comforts them that are cast down " (2 Cor. vii. 6), comforted him
by the sight of his disciples. They were gathered together — probably in
some solitary spot upon the shore — to listen to his address. This little
company formed a singular contrast with the crowds which used to as
semble at the times of public amusement in the theatre of Miletus.2 But
that vast theatre is now a silent ruin, — while the words spoken by a care
worn traveller to a few despised strangers are still living as they were that
day, to teach lessons for all time, and to make known eternal truths to all
who will hear them, — while they reveal to us, as though they were merely
human words, all the tenderness and the affection of Paul, the individual
speaker. AcTS XX.
Brethren,3 ye know yourselves,4 from the first day that I 18
He reminds r j j j
p^uabora9 came into Asia, after what manner I have been with you
throughout all the time; serving the Lord Jesus5 with all6 19
lowliuess of mind, and with many tears 7 and trials which befell me through
the plotting8 of the Jews. And how I kept9 back none of those things 20
which are profitable for you, but declared them to you, and taught you
both publicly and from house 10 to house ; testifying both to Jews and 21
Gentiles their ll need of repentance towards God, and faith in our Lord
Jesus Christ. And now, as for me,12 behold I go to Jerusalem 13 in spirit 22
presbyters, in April ; and " the weather was * " Ye yourselves," emphatic.
unsettled ; the sky was blue and the sun shone, 6 " The Lord," as Col. iii. 24. With this
but a wet wintry north wind swept the clouds self-commendation Tholuck compares 1 Thess.
along the top of the range of Mycale." ii. 10, and 2 Cor. vi. 3, 4. See note on verse
1 We may remark here, in answer to those 33 below. " Felix," says Bengel, " qui sic exor-
who think that the imoncmoi mentioned in this diri potest conscientiam auditorum testando."
passage were the, bishops of various places in 6 " AU." Tholuck remarks on the charac-
the province of Asia, that there was evidently teristic use of " all " in St. Paul's Epistles.
no time to summon them. On the convert!- ' " Tears." Compare 2 Cor. ii. 4, and Phil.
bility of birioiumoc and rrpeo/BiiTepo;, see below. iii. 18.
2 In our larger editions is a view of Miletus 8 "Plotting of Jews." Compare 1 Cor. xv.
from Laborde. The two conspicuous features 81.
are the great theatre and the windings of the 9 " Kept back nothing." Compare 2 Cor. iv.
Maeander towards the sea. 2, and 1 Thess. ii. 4.
8 " Brethren " is found here in the Uncial w "House to house." ComparelThess.ii.il.
Manuscript D (Codex Bezae) and in some u Observe that the definite article is used
early versions ; and we have adopted it, be- here. The repentance (which they ought to
cause it is nearly certain that St. Paul would have) towards God, Sec.
not have begun his address abruptly without 12 See next note.
some such word. Compare all his other re- 18 The order of the words, according to the
corded speeches in the Acts. true reading, giv-o this turn to 'he passage.

602

THE LIFE AJ D EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL.

foredoomed to chains ; yet 1 d_ow n it the things which shall befall me
23 there, save that in every city1 the Holy Spirit gives the same testimony,
24 that bonds and afflictions abide me. But none of these things move me,2
neither count I my life dear unto myself, so that I might finish my course
with joy,3 and the ministry which I received from the Lord Jesus to testify
the Glad-tidings of the grace of God.
25 And now, behold I know that ye all,4 among whom I have „. ,
' •> ' ° Hia farewell
gone from city to city, proclaiming the kingdom of God, shall warnms-
26 see my face no more. Wherefore I take you to witness this day, that I
27 am clear from the blood 5 of all. For I have not shunned to declare unto
28 you all the counsel of God. Take heed, therefore, unto yourselves, and
to all the flock in which the Holy Spirit has made you overseers,6 to feed
29 the Church of God,7 which He purchased with His own blood. For this I
know, that after my departure grievous wolves shall enter in among you,
30 who will not spare the flock. And from your own selves will men arise
speaking perverted words, that they may draw away the disciples after
31 themselves.8 Therefore, be watchful, and remember that for the space of

St. Paul was " bound," i. e. a prisoner in chains,
but as yet only in the spirit, not in body. This
is not the Holy Spirit, from which it is dis
tinguished by the addition of " Holy " in the
verse below. This explanation of the passage
(which agrees with that of Grotius and Chrys
ostom) seems the natural one, in spite of the
objections of De Wette and others.
1 We have two examples of this afterwards,
namely, at Tyre (Acts xxi. 4) and at Caesarea
(Acts xxi. 10, 11). And from the present
passage we learn that such warnings had been
given in many places during this journey.
St. Paul's own anticipations of danger appear
Rom. xv. 31.
2 The reading adopted by Tischendorf
here, though shorter, is the same in sense.
8 Compare 2 Tim. iv. 7, and Phil. ii. 16.
See the remarks which have been made in the
early part of this chapter on this favorite
metaphor of St. Paul, especially p. 585, n. 1.
[See also p. 157, n. 6. — H.]
4 This " all " includes not only the Ephe
sian presbyters, but also the brethren from
Macedonia. (See Acts xx. 4.) The " gone "
is, literally, " gone through." With regard to
the expectation expressed by St. Paul, it must

be regarded as a human inference from the
danger which he knew to be before him. If
(as we think) he was liberated after his first
imprisonment at Rome, he did see some of his
present audience again. Tholuck compares
Phil. i. 20, i. 25, and ii. 24.
0 See xviii. 6. " Your blood be upon your
own heads : I am clean."
6 'Ema/COTTOUf. It is scarcely necessary to
remark, that in the New Testament the words
imaiconot;- and npeo/3vTepo^ are convertible.
Compare verse 17 and Tit. i. 5, 7, and see p.
378. Tholuck remarks that this reference to
the Holy Spirit as the author of church gov
ernment is in exact accordance with 1 Cor. xii.
8, 11, and 28.
* We have retained the T. R. here since
the MSS. and fathers are divided between the
readings " God " and " Lord." At the same
time, we must acknowledge that the balance of
authority is rather in favor of " Lord." A
very candid and able outline of the evidence
on each side of the question is given by Mr.
Humphry. The sentiment exactly agrees with
1 Cor. vi. 20.
8 We read " themselves " with Lachmann
on the authority of some of the best MSS.

GRIEF OF SEPARATION.

603

Final com
mendation to
Ood, and ex
hortation to
disinterestedexertion.

three years l I ceased not to warn every one of you, night and day, with
tears.2 And3 now, brethren, I commend you to God, and to the 32
word of His grace ; even to Him who is able to build you up
and to give you an inheritance among all them that are sancti
fied. When I was with you,4 1 coveted no man's silver or gold,
or raiment. Yea, ye know yourselves5 that these hands ministered to 34
my necessities, and to those who were with me.6 And all this I did for 35
your example ; to teach you that so laboring ye ought to support the
helpless,1 and to remember the words of the Lord Jesus, how He said, " It
IS MORE BLESSED TO GIVE THAN TO RECEIVE."

XX.

33

The close of this speech was followed by a solemn act of united suppli
cation (Acts xx. 36). St. Paul knelt down on the shore with all those
who bad listened to him, and offered up a prayer to that God who was
founding His Church in the midst of difficulties apparently insuperable ;
and then followed an outbreak of natural grief, which even Christian
faith and resignation were not able to restrain. They fell on the Apos
tle's neck and clung to him, and kissed him again and again,8 sorrowing
most because of his own foreboding announcement, that they should
never behold that countenance again, on which they had often gazed9
with reverence and love (ib. 37, 38). But no long time could be devoted
to the grief of separation. The wind was fair,10 and the vessel must

1 This space of three years may either be
used (in the Jewish mode of reckoning) for
the two years and upwards which St. Paul
spent at Ephesus ; or, if we suppose him, to
speak to the Macedonians and Corinthians also
(who were present), it may refer to the whole
time (about three years and a half), since he
came to reside at Ephesus in the autumn of
54 A. D.
2 See p. 601, n. 7. We have much satis
faction in referring here to the second of A.
Monod's recently published sermons. (Saint
Paul, Cinq Discours. Paris, 1851.)
8 This conclusion reminds us of that of the
letter to the Romans so recently written. Com
pare Rom. xvi. 25.
4 This is the force of the aorist, unless we
prefer to suppose it used (as often by St. Paul)
for a perfect.
6 This way of appealing to the recollection
of his converts in proof of his disinterested
ness is highly characteristic of St. Paul. Com

pare 1 Thess. ii. 5-11, 2 Thess. iii. 7-9, 1 Cor.
ix. 4-15, 2 Cor. xii. 14, &c.
6 This mention of his companions and
attendants is characteristic. St. Paul seems
always to have been accompanied by a band of
disciples, who helped him in the discharge of
the many duties in which he was involved by
" the care of all the churches." Compare Gal.
i. 2 for the expression.
7 " The weak," i. e. the poor. This inter
pretation is defended by Chrysostom, and con
firmed by Aristophanes, quoted by Wetstein.
The interpretation of Calvin (who takes it as
the weak in faith), which is supported by Ne
ander and others, seems hardly consistent with
the context.
8 The Greek verb (v. 37) is in the imper
fect. 9 " Gaze on his face," v. 38. The expres
sion is stronger than that used by St. Paul
himself, v. 25.
10 See below.

604 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap.xx
depart They accompanied the Apostle to the edge of the water
(ib. 38) -1 The Christian brethren were torn away from the embrace of
their friends ; 2 and the ship sailed out into the open sea, while the pres
byters prepared for their weary and melancholy return to Ephesus.
The narrative of the voyage is now resumed in detail. It is quite
clear, from St. Luke's mode of expression, that the vessel sailed from
Miletus on the day of the interview. With a fair wind she would easily
run down to Cos in the course of the same afternoon. The distance is
about forty nautical miles ; the direction is due south. The phrase used
implies a straight course and a fair wind,3 and we conclude, from the
well-known phenomena of the Levant, that the wind was north-westerly,
which is the prevalent direction in those seas.4 With this wind the vessel
would make her passage from Miletus to Cos in six hours, passing the
shores of Caria, with the high summits of Mount Latmus on the left, and
with groups of small islands (among which Patmos (Rev. i. 9) would be
seen at times)5 studding the sea on the right. Cos is an island about
twenty-three miles in length, extending from south-west to north-east,
and separated by a narrow channel from the mainland.6 But we should
rather conceive the town to be referred to, which lay at the eastern
extremity of the island. It is described by the ancients as a beautiful
and well-built city : and it was surrounded with fortifications erected by
Alcibiades towards the close of the Peloponnesian war. Its symmetry
had been injured by an earthquake, and the restoration had not yet been
effected ; but the productiveness of the island to which it belonged, and
its position in the Levant, made the city a place of no little consequence.
The wine and the textile fabrics of Cos were well known among the
imports of Italy. Even now no harbor is more frequented by the mer-
chant^vessels of the Levant.7 The roadstead is sheltered by nature from
all winds except the north-east, and the inner harbor was not then, as is
is now, an unhealthy lagoon.8 Moreover, Claudius had recently bestt wed
1 Prof. Hackett notices how the phrase, 6 This is to be distinguished from the chan
tey accompanied him to the ship, suits the place, nel mentioned below, between the souther n side
which had then a long level between the town of Cos and Cape Crio.
and the anchorage. i " No place in the Archipelago is mwrefre-
2 The English translation of xxi. 1, "got- quented by merchant-vessels than this port."
ten from them," is too weak. Purdy, p. 115.
8 They ran before the wind, xxi. 1. See 8 See the description of the town and anchor-
what has been said before on this nautical age in Purdy : — " The town is sheltered from
phrase, p. 246. westerly winds by very high mountains," p.
4 For what relates to this prevalent wind, 114. " The road is good in all winds except
see below. the E. N. E.," p. 115. A view of the modern
5 Dr. Clarke describes a magnificent even- city of Cos from the anchorage, as well as the
ing, with the sun setting behind Patmos, present soundings, and the traces of tho au-
which he saw on the voyage from Samos to cient port, is given in the Admiralty Chart
Cos. No. 1550.

RHODES.

605

peculiar privileges on the city.1 Another circumstance made it the
resort of many strangers, and gave it additional renown. It was the seat
of the medical school traditionally connected with .^Esculapius ; and the
temple of the god of healing was crowded with votive models, so as to
become in effect a museum of anatomy and pathology.2 The Christian
physician St. Luke, who knew these coasts so well, could hardly be
ignorant of the scientific and religious celebrity of Cos. We can imagine
the thankfulness with which he would reflect — as the vessel lay at
anchor off the city of Hippocrates — that he had been emancipated from
the bonds of superstition, without becoming a victim to that scepticism
which often succeeds it, especially in minds familiar with the science of
physical phenomena.3
On leaving the anchorage of Cos, the vessel would have to proceed
through the channel which lies between the southern shore of the island
and that tongue of the mainland which terminates in the Point of
Cnidus. If the wind continued in the north-west, the vessel would be
able to hold a straight course from Cos to Cape Crio (for such is the
modern name of the promontory of Triopium, on which Cnidus was
built), and after rounding the point she would run clear before the wind
all the way to Rhodes.4 Another of St. Paul's voyages will lead us to

1 Tac Ann. xii. 61.
2 See p. 271, n. 1. Perhaps the fullest
account of Cos is that given by Dr. Clarke,
vol. ii. pp. 196-213, and again after his return
from Egypt, vol. iii. pp. 321-329. He de
scribes the celebrated plane-tree, and from this
island he brought the altar which is now in
the Public Library at Cambridge. We may
refer also to a paper on Cos by Col. Leake in
the second volume of the Transactions of the
Royal Society of Literature. See Smith's Diet.
of Geog.8 If we attached any importance to the tra
dition which represents St. Luke as a painter,
we might add that Cos was the birthplace of
Apelles as well as of Hippocrates.
4 We shall return again to the subject of
the north-westerly winds which prevail during .
tlie fine season in the Archipelago, and espe
cially in the neighborhood of Rhodes. For the
present the following authorities may suffice.
Speaking of Rhodes, Dr. Clarke says (vol. ii.
p. 223), " The winds are liable to little varia
tion; they are N. or N. W. during almost
every month, but these winds blow with great
violence : " and again, p. 230, " A N. wind has
prevailed from the time of our leaving the

Dardanelles." Again (vol. iii. p. 378), in the
same seas he speaks of a gale from the N.
W. : — "It is surprising for what a length of
time, and how often, the N. W. rages in the
Archipelago. It prevails almost unceasingly
through the greater part of the year," 380.
And in a note he adds, " Mr. Spencer Smith,
brother of Sir Sidney Smith, informed the
author that he was an entire month employed in
endeavoring to effect a passage from Rhodes to
Stanchw [ Cos] : the N. W. wind prevailed all
the time with such force that the vessel in which he
sailed could not double Cape Crio." We find
the following in Norie's Sailing Directory, p.
127 : — " The Etesian winds, which blow from
the N. E. and N. W. quarters, are the mon
soons of the Levant, which blow constantly
during the summer, and give to the climate
of Greece so advantageous a temperature. At
this season the greatest part of the Mediter
ranean, but particularly the eastern half, in
cluding the Adriatic and Archipelago, are
subject to N. W. winds. . . . When the sun,
on advancing from the north, has begun to
rarefy the atmophere of southern Europe, the
Etesians of spring commence in the Mediter
ranean Sea. These blow in Italy during

606 THE LIPE AND EPISTLES OP ST. PAUL. chap.xx,
make mention of Cnidus.1 We shall, therefore, only say, that the
extremity of the promontory descends with a perpendicular precipice to
the sea, and that this high rock is separated by a level space from the
main, so that, at a distance, it appears like one of the numerous islands
on the coast.2 Its history, as well as its appearance, was well impressed
on the mind of the Greek navigator of old ; for it was ' the scene of
Conon's victory ; and the memory of their great admiral made the south
western corner of the Asiatic peninsula to the Athenians what the
south-western corner of Spain is to us, through the memories of St. Vin
cent and Trafalgar.
We have supposed St. Paul's vessel to have rounded Cape Crio, to have
left the western shore of Asia Minor, and to be proceeding along the
southern shore. The current between Rhodes and the main runs strongly
to the westward ; 3 but the north-westerly wind 4 would soon carry the
vessel through the space of fifty miles to the northern extremity of the
island, where its famous and beautiful city was built.
Until the building of its metropolis, the name of this island was com
paratively unknown. But from the time when the inhabitants of the
earlier towns were brought to one centre,5 and the new city, built by
Hippodamus (the same architect who planned the streets of the Piraeus),
rose in the midst of its perfumed gardens and its amphitheatre of hills,
with unity so symmetrical that it appeared like one house,6 — Rhodes has
held an illustrious place among the islands of the Mediterranean. Prom
the very effect of its situation, lying as it did on the verge of two of the
basins of that sea, it became the intermediate point of the eastern and
western trade.7 Even now it is the harbor at which most vessels touch
on their progress to and from the Archipelago.8 It was the point from
March and April." In Purdy's Sailing Direc- Cos and Cnidus. It was about the time of
tory, p. 122, it is said of the neighborhood of the Peloponnesian war that the three earlier
Smyrna and Ephesus : " The northerly winds cities of Lindus, Ialysus, and Camirus were
hereabout continue all the summer, and some- centralized in the new city of Rhodes. " We
times blow with unremitting violence for sev- find the Rhodian navy rising in strength and
eral weeks." See again what Admiral Beau- consequence towards the time of Demosthe-
fort says of the N. W. wind at Patara. nes ; '' and, after this period, it " makes nearly
1 See Acts xxvii. 7. as great a figure in history as Venice does in
2 In the Admiralty Chart of the gulf of the annals of Modern Europe."
Cos, &c. (No. 1604), averygood view of Cape 8 This is the phrase of Diodorus Siculus.
Crio is given. We shall speak of Cnidus i An interesting illustration of the trade
more fully hereafter. Meantime we may refer of Rhodes will be found in vol. iii. of the
to a view in Laborde, which gives an admira- Trans, of the Royal Society of Literature, in a
ble representation of the passage between Cos paper on some inscribed handles of wine-ves-
and Cape Crio. Bel8 found at Alexandria. We shall refer to
3 Purdy' * See ab0Te- this paper again when we come to speak of
6 Herodotus simply mentions Rhodes as Cnidus.
forming part of the Dorian confederacy with 8 " Vessels bound to the ports of Karamania

chap. xx. RHODES. 607
which the Greek geographers reckoned their parallels of latitude and
meridians of longitude. And we may assert that no place has been so
long renowned for ship-building, if we may refer to the " benches, and
masts, and ship-boards " of " Dodanim and Chittim," with the feeble con
structions of the modern Turkish dockyard, as the earliest and latest efforts
of that Rhodian skill, which was celebrated by Pliny in the time of St.
Paul. To the copious supplies of ship-timber were added many other
physical advantages. It was a proverb, that the sun shone every day in
Rhodes ; and her inhabitants revelled in the luxuriance of the vegetation
which surrounded them. We find this beauty and this brilliant atmosphere
typified in her coins, on one side of which is the head of Apollo radiated
like the sun, while the other exhibits the rose-flower, the conventional
emblem which bore the name of the island.1 But the interest of what is
merely outward fades before the moral interest associated with its history.
If we rapidly run over its annals, we find something in every period, with
which elevated thoughts are connected. The Greek period is the first, —
tamous not merely for the great Temple of the Sun, and the Colossus,
which, like the statue of Borromeo at Arona, seemed to stand over the
city to protect it,2 — but far more for the supremacy of the seas, which
was employed to put down piracy, for the code of mercantile law, by
which the commerce of later times was regulated, and for the legislative
enactments, framed almost in the spirit of Christianity, for the protection
of the poor. This is followed by the Roman period, when the faithful ally,
which had aided by her naval power in subduing the East, was honored
by the Senate and the Emperors with the name and privileges of freedom : 3
and this by the Byzantine, during which Christianity was established in
the Levant, and the city of the Rhodians, as the metropolis of a province
of islands, if no longer holding the empire of the Mediterranean, was at
as well as to those of Syria and Egypt gene- been alluded to before in reference to Athens,
rally touch here for pilots or for intelligence." p. 326 ; and in height they were nearly identi-
Beaufort. " The southern harbor is generally cal, the latter being 106 feet, the former 105
full of merchant-vessels." Purdy, p. 232. (70 cubits). See the paper referred to, p. 606,
" The chief source of what little opulence it n. 7.
still enjoys is in the number of vessels which 8 After the defeat of Antiochus, Rhodes
touch here on their passage from the Archi- received from the Roman senate some valua-
pelago to the eastward." Ib. ble possessions on the mainland, including
1 One of these coins is given in the larger part of Caria and the whole of Lycia. See
editions. what has been said on the province of Asia,
2 The Colossus was in ruins even in Stra- pp. 206, 207, comparing p. 209. These con-
bo's time. It had been overthrown by an tinental possessions were afterwards with-
earthquake according to Polybius. It seems drawn ; but the Rhodians were still regarded
to be a popular mistake that this immense as among the allies of Rome. They rendered
statue stood across the entrance of one of the valuable aid in the war against Mithridates,
harbors. The only parallel in modern times is and were not reduced to the form of a prov-
the statue of San Carlo Borromeo, which has ince till the reign of Vespasian.

608 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OP ST. PAUL. chap, xx,
least recognized as the Queen of the ^Egean.1 During the earlier portion
of the middle ages, while mosques were gradually taking the place of
Byzantine churches, Rhodes was the last Christian city to make a stand
against the advancing Saracens ; and again during their later portion, she
re-appears as a city ennobled by the deeds of Christian chivalry ; so that,
ever since the successful siege of Solyman the Magnificent, her fortifica
tions and her stately harbor, and the houses in her streets, continue to be
the memorials of the Knights of St. John. Yet no point of Rhodian
history ought to move our spirits with so much exultation as that day,
when the vessel that conveyed St. Paul came round the low northern point2
of the island to her moorings before the city. We do not know that he
landed like other great conquerors who have visited Rhodes. It would
not be necessary even to enter the harbor, for a safe anchorage would be
found for the night in the open roadstead.3 " The kingdom of God
cometh not with observation ; " and the vessel which was seen by the
people of the city to weigh anchor in the morning was probably undis
tinguished from the other coasting craft with which they were daily
familiar. No view in the Levant is more celebrated than that from Rhodes towards
the opposite shore of Asia Minor. The last ranges of Mount Taurus4
come down in magnificent forms to the sea ; and a long line of snowy
summits is seen along the Lycian coast, while the sea between is often an
unruffled expanse of water under a blue and brilliant sky. Across this
expanse, and towards a harbor near the farther edge of these Lycian
mountains, the Apostle's course was now directed (Acts xxi. 1). To the
eastward of Mount Cragus, — the steep sea-front of which is known to
the pilots of the Levant by the name of the " Seven Capes," 5 — the river
Xanthus winds through a rich and magnificent valley, and past the ruins
of an ancient city, the monuments of which, after a long concealment,
have lately been made familiar to the British public.6 The harbor of the
city of Xanthus was situated a short distance from the left bank of the
river. Patara was to Xanthus what the Piraeus was to Athens;1 and

1 It was then the metropolis of the " Prov- 6 " These capes (called in Italian, the usual
ince of the Islands." language of the pilots, sette capi) are the ex-
2 Compare Purdy's Sailing Directory with tremities of high and rugged mountains, occu-
the Admiralty Chart (No. 1639), attached to pying a space of ten miles." Purdy, p. 236.
which is an excellent view of Rhodes. « The allusion is of course to the Xanthian
3 See Purdy, p. 231. room in the British Museum.
4 Compare p. 19. For the appearance of ' Thus Appian speaks of Patara as the
this magnificent coast on a nearer approach, port of Xanthus, B. C. iv. 81. In the Mow-
see Dr. Clarke. For a description of these ing chapter he says that Andriace had the
south-western mountains of Asia Minor, the same relation to Myra. (Acts xxvii. 5.1
Travels of Spratt and Forbes may be consulted.

CHAP. XX.

PATARA.

609

though this comparison might seem to convey the idea of an importance
which never belonged to the Lycian seaport, yet ruins still remain to
show that it was once a place of some magnitude and splendor. The bay
into which the river Xanthus flowed is now a " desert of moving sand."
which is blown by the westerly wind into ridges along the shore, and is
gradually hiding the remains of the ancient city ; x but a triple archway
and a. vast theatre have been described by travellers.2 Some have even
thought that they have discovered the seat of the oracle of Apollo, who
was worshipped here, as his sister Diana was worshipped at Ephesus or
Perga : 3 and the city walls can be traced among the sand-hills with the
castle * that commanded the harbor. In the war against Antiochus, this
harbor was protected by a sudden storm from the Roman fleet, when
Livius sailed from Rhodes.5 Now we find the Apostle Paul entering it
with a fair wind, after a short sail from the same island.
It seems that the vessel in which St. Paul had been hitherto sailing
either finished its voyage at Patara, or was proceeding farther eastward
along the southern coast of Asia Minor, and not to the ports of Phoenicia.
St. Paul could not know in advance whether it would be " possible " for

1 Admiral Beaufort was the first to describe
Patara. Karamania, chap. i. It was also visit
ed by the Dilettanti Society. It is described
by Sir C. Fellows both in his Lycia and
his Asia Minor. In the Travels of Spratt
and Forbes the destruction of the harbor and
the great increase of sand are attributed to the
rising of the coast. The following passage is
transcribed at length from this work : — "A day
was devoted to an excursion to Patara, which
lies on the coast at some distance from the left
bank of the river, about ten miles from Xan
thus. We rode along the river-side to the
sand-hills, passing large straw-thatched villages
of gypsies on the way, and then crossed the
sand-hills to the sea-side. ... At Patara is
the triple arch, which formed the gate of the
city, the baths, and the theatre, admirably
described long ago by Captain Beaufort. The
latter is scooped out of the side of a hill, and
is remarkable for the completeness of the pro
scenium and the steepness and narrowness of
the marble seats. Above it is the singular pit
excavated on the summit of the same hill,
with its central square column, conjectured
with probability, by Admiral Beaufort, to have
been the seat of the oracle of Apollo Patareus.
The stones of which the column is built are
displaced from each other in a singular man
ner, as if by the revolving motion of an earth-
39

quake. A fine group of palm-trees rises
among the ruins, and the aspect of the city
when it was flourishing must have been very
beautiful. Now its port is an inland marsh,
generating poisonous malaria ; and the mari
ner sailing along the coast would never guess
that the sand-hills before him blocked up the
harbor into which St. Paul sailed of old."
2 A drawing of the gateway is given by
Beaufort, p. 1. Views of the theatre, &c, of
Patara will be found in the first volume of the
Ionian Antiquities, published by the Dilettanti
Society. 8 See pp. 143, 144, and p. 464, &c. The
coins of Patara show the ascendency of Apollo
in the district. One is given in the larger edi
tions. * Beaufort, p. 3.
0 The Roman fleet had followed nearly the
Bame course as the Apostle from the neighbor
hood of Ephesus, the following places being
mentioned in order, — Miletus, Cnidus, Cos,
Rhodes, Patara. Liv. xxxvii. 16. We may
add another illustration from Roman history,
in Pompey's voyage, where the same places
are mentioned in a similar order. After de
scribing his departure from Mitylene, and his
passing by Asia and Chios, Lucan proceeds to
enumerate Ephesus, Cos, Cnidus, and Rhodes.
Phars. viii.

610 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap.xi
him to arrive in Palestine in time for Pentecost (xx. 16) ; but an oppor
tunity presented itself unexpectedly at Patara. Providential circum
stances conspired with his own convictions to forward his journey,
notwithstanding the discouragement which the fears of others had thrown
across his path. In the harbor of Patara they found a vessel which was
on the point of crossing the open sea to Phoenicia (xxi. 2). They went
on board without a moment's delay ; and it seems evident from the.mode
of expression that they sailed the very day of their arrival.1 Since
tlie voyage lay across the open sea,2 with no shoals or rocks to be dreaded,
and since the north-westerly winds often blow steadily for several days in
the Levant during spring,3 there could be no reason why the vessel should
not weigh anchor in the evening, and sail through the night.4
We have now to think of St. Paul as no longer passing through nar
row channels, or coasting along in the shadow of great mountains, but
as sailing continuously through the midnight hours, with a prosperous
breeze filling the canvass, and the waves curling and sounding round the
bows of the vessel. There is a peculiar freshness and cheerfulness in
the prosecution of a prosperous voyage with a fair wind by night. The
sailors on the watch, and the passengers also, feel it, and the feeling is
often expressed in songs or in long-continued conversation. Such cheer
fulness might be felt by the Apostle and his companions, not without
thankfulness to that God " who giveth songs in the night " (Job xxxv.
10), and who hearkeneth to those who fear Him, and speak often to one
another, and think upon His name (Mai. iii. 16). If we remember, too,
that a month had now elapsed since the moon was shining on the snows
of Haemus,5 and that the full moonlight would now be resting on the great
sail 6 of the ship, we are not without an expressive imagery, which we may
allowably throw round the Apostle's progress over the waters between
Patara and Tyre.
The distance between these two points is three hundred and forty geo
graphical miles ; and if we bear in mind (what has been mentioned more
than once) that the north-westerly winds in April often blow like mon
soons in the Levant, and that the rig of ancient sailing vessels was
peculiarly favorable to a quick run before the wind,7 we come at once to
the conclusion that the voyage might easily be accomplished in forty-eight
hours.8 Every thing in St. Luke's account gives a strong impression that
1 This is shown not only by the expression 4 For this and other points connected with
" we went aboard," but by the omission of the navigation of the ancients, we must refer
any phrase for " next day," such as we find in to Ch. XXIII.
*-x- 15- 6 See above, p. 590.
2 It is said that the ship was on the point 6 See Smith's Voyage and Shipwreck, p. 151.
of sailing over or " crossing " to Phoenicia. 7 Smith, p. 180.
8 See above, p. 605, s ,-, „. th'e rate would b(J rather mQre than

chap. xx. TYRE. 611
the weather was in the highest degree favorable ; and there is one pic
turesque phrase employed by the narrator, which sets vividly before us
some of the phenomena of a rapid voyage.1 That which is said in the
English version concerning the " discovering " of Cyprus, and " leaving
it on the left hand," is, in the original, a nautical expression, implying
that the land appeared to rise quickly,2 as they sailed past it to the south
ward.3 It would be in the course of the second day (probably in the
evening) that " the high blue eastern land appeared." The highest
mountain of Cyprus is a rounded summit, and there would be snow upon
it at that season of the year.4 After the second night, the first land in
sight would be the high range of Lebanon5 in Syria (xxi. 3), and they
would easily arrive at Tyre before the evening.
So much has been written concerning the past history and present con
dition of Tyre, that these subjects are familiar to every reader, and it is
unnecessary to dwell upon them here.6 When St. Paul came to this city,
it was neither in the glorious state described in the prophecies of Ezekiel
and Isaiah,' when " its merchants were princes, and its traffickers the
honorable of the earth," nor in the abject desolation in which it now ful
fils those prophecies, being " a place to spread nets upon," and showing
only the traces of its maritime supremacy in its ruined mole, and a port
hardly deep enough for boats.8 It was in the condition in which it had
been left by the successors of Alexander, — the island, which once held
the city, being joined to the mainland by a causeway, — with a harbor
on the north, and another on the south.9 In honor of its ancient great-
seven knots an hour. The writer once asked grammar are common in the language of sail-
the captain of a vessel engaged in the Medi- ors. Thus an English seaman speaks of
terranean trade, how long it would take to "rising the land," which is exactly what is
sail with a fair wind from the Seven Capes to meant here.
Tyre ; and the answer was, " About thirty 2 Mr. Smith says in a MS. note : " The
hours, or perhaps it would be safer to say term indicates both the rapid approach to
forty-eight." Now, vessels rigged like those land, and that it was seen at a distance by
of the ancients, with one large mainsail, would daylight."
run before the udtui more quickly than our own 3 We shall hereafter point out the contrast
merchantmen, 'x'hose who have sailed before between this voyage and that which is men-
the monsoons iu the China seas have seen tioned afterwards in Acts xxvii. 4.
junks (wkich arc rigged in this respect like 4 The island is traversed by two chains
Greek and Roiuan merchantmen) behind them running nearly east and west, and they are
in the norizoa in the morning, and before covered with snow in winter. Norie, p. 144.
them in ihe hum-on in the evening. The writer has been niformed by Captain
1 The wort, in reference to sea-voyages, Graves, R. N., that the highest part is of a
means " to see lane, to bring land into view," rounded form. 6 Compare pp. 19, 49.
by a similar figure \-f speech to that in which 6 One of the fullest accounts of Tyre will
our sailors speak oi 'making land." So "ape- be found in Dr. Robinson's third volume.
rire " is used in i-»\fn, and " open " by our 7 Ezek. xxvi., xxvii., Isa. xxiii.
own sailors. The grammatical construction 8 SaUing Directory, p. 259.
in the Greek is puuliar; but confusions of 9 Old Tyre was destroyed. New Tyre was

612 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap. aa.
ness, the Romans gave it the name of a free city ; 1 and it still commanded
some commerce, for its manufactures of glass and purple were not yet
decayed,2 and the narrow belt of the Phoenician coast between the moun
tains and the sea required that the food for its population should be partly
brought from without.3 It is allowable to conjecture that the ship, which
we have just seen crossing from Patara, may have brought grain from the
Black Sea, or wine from the Archipelago,4 — with the purpose of taking
on from Tyre a cargo of Phoenician manufactures. We know that, what
ever were the goods she brought, they were unladed at Tyre (v. 3) , and
that the vessel was afterwards to proceed5 to Ptolemais (v. 7). For this
task of unlading, some days would be required. She would be taken into
the inner dock ; 6 and St. Paul had thus some time at his disposal, which
he could spend in the active service of his Master. He and his companions
lost no time in " seeking out the disciples." It is probable that the Chris
tians at Tyre were not numerous ; 7 but a Church had existed there
ever since the dispersion consequent upon the death of Stephen (pp.
75, 109), and St. Paul and himself visited it, if not on his mission of
charity from Antioch to Jerusalem (p. 118), yet doubtless on his way
to the Council (p. 187). There were not only disciples at Tyre, but
prophets. Some of those who had the prophetical power foresaw the
danger which was hanging over St. Paul, and endeavored to per
suade him to desist from his purpose of going to Jerusalem. We see
that different views of duty might be taken by those who had the same
spiritual knowledge, though that knowledge were supernatural. St. Paul
looked on the coming danger from a higher point. What to others was
an overwhelming darkness, to him appeared only as a passing storm.
And he resolved to face it, in the faith that He who had protected him
hitherto would still give him shelter and safety.
built on a small island, separated by a very ward-bound Alexandrian ship in one of the
narrow channel from the mainland, with which harbors of Lycia. Acts xxvii. 5 6.
it was united by a dam in Alexander's siege; & We infer that St. Paul proceeded in the
and thenceforward Tyre was on a peninsula. same vessel to Ptolemais, partly because the
1 For the general notion of a free city phrase in v. 6 means " we went on board the
(libera civitas) under the Empire, see p. 288. ship," and partly because it is not said that
Tyre seems to have been honored, like Athens, the vessel was bound for Tyre, but simply that
for the sake of the past. she was to unlade there.
2 For the manufactures of Tyre at a much « Scylax mentions a harbor within the
later period, see p. 18{j, n. 2. walls.
8 The dependence of Phoenicia on other 1 "Having sought out the disciples" is
countries for grain is alluded to in Acts xii. the literal translation. Some search was re-
20. (Seep. 118, n. 8.) quired before the Christians were found
4 For the wine trade of the Archipelago, Perhaps the first inquiries would be made. at
see what has been said in reference to Rhodes. the synagogue. [See p. 388 n. 5.1 For a
We need not suppose that the vessel bound notice of the Jews at Tyre in later times, we
for Phoenicia sailed in the first instance from may again refer to p. 188 n. 2.
Patara. St. Paul afterwards found a west-

chap. xx. PTOLEMAIS. 613
The time spent at Tyre in unlading the vessel, and probably taking in
a new cargo, and possibly, also, waiting for a fair wind,1 was " seven
days," including a Sunday.2 St. Paul " broke bread " with the disciples,
and discoursed as he had done at Troas (p. 256) ; and the week-days,
too, would afford many precious opportunities for confirming those who
were already Christians, and for making the Gospel known to others, both
Jews and Gentiles. When the time came for the ship to sail, a scene
was witnessed on the Phoenician shore like that which had made the
Apostle's departure from Miletus so impressive and affecting.3 There
attended him through the city gate,4 as he and his companions went out
to join the vessel now ready to receive them, all the Christians of Tyre,
and even their " wives and children." And there they knelt down and
prayed together on the level shore.5 We are not to imagine here any
Jewish place of worship, like the proseucha at Philippi ; 6 but simply that
they were on their way to the ship. The last few moments were precious,
and could not be so well employed as in praying to Him who alone can
give true comfort and protection. The time spent in this prayer was
soon passed. And then they tore themselves from each other's embrace ;
the strangers went on board,1 and the Tyrian believers returned home
sorrowful and anxious, while the ship sailed southwards on her way to
Ptolemais. There is a singular contrast in the history of those three cities on the
Phoenician shore, which are mentioned in close succession in the conclud
ing part of the narrative of this Apostolic journey. Tyre, the city from
which St. Paul had just sailed, had been the seaport whose destiny
formed the burden of the sublimest prophecies in the last days of the
Hebrew monarchy. Caesarea, the city to which he was ultimately bound,
was the work of the family of Herod, and rose with the rise of Chris
tianity. Both are fallen now into utter decay. Ptolemais, which was the
intermediate stage between them, is an older city than either, and has
outlived them both. It has never been withdrawn from the field of
history ; and its interest has seemed to increase (at least in the eyes of
• x These suppositions, however, are not 6 The word here used is the same as in
necessary; for the work of taking the cargo Acts xxvii. 39, 40, and denotes a sandy or
from the hold of a merchant-vessel might pebbly beach, as opposed to a rocky shore.
easily occupy six or seven days. 6 Hammond supposes that there was a pro-
2 This, however, need not mean more than seucha near the place of embarkation. But
"six days." Some think that by "accomplish- we need not suppose any reference to a Jewish
ing the days " is meant that they " employed place of worship either here or at Miletus,
the time in making ready for the journey," though it is interesting to bear in mind the
comparing 2 Tim. iii. 17. [See on v. 15.] orationes littorales of the Jeivs. See p. 256.
8 See above, p. 603. 7 See above, p. 612.
4 The Greek expresses this more fully and
vividly than the English.

614 THE LIFE AND FPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap, xx
Englishmen) with the progress of centuries. Under the ancient name
of Acco, it appears in the book of Judges (i. 31) as one of the towns of
the tribe of Assher. It was the pivot of the contests between Persia and
Egypt. Not unknown in the Macedonian and Roman periods, it re
appears with brilliant distinction in the middle ages, when the Crusaders
called it St. Jean d'Acre. It is needless to allude to the events which
have fixed on this sea-fortress, more than once, the attention of our own
generation.1 At the particular time when the Apostle Paul visited this
place, it bore the name of Ptolemais,2 — most probably given to it by
Ptolemy Lagi, who was long in possession of this part of Syria,3 — and it
had recently been made a Roman colony by the Emperor Claudius.4 It
shared with Tyre and Sidon,5 Antioch and Caesarea, the trade of the
eastern coast of the Mediterranean Sea. With a fair wind, a short day's
voyage separates it from Tyre. To speak in the language of our own
sailors, there are thirteen miles from Tyre to Cape Blanco, and fifteen
from thence to Cape Carmel ; and Acre — the ancient Ptolemais — is
situated on the farther extremity of that bay, which sweeps with a wide
curvature of sand to the northwards, from the headland of Carmel.6 It
is evident that St. Paul's company sailed from Tyre to Ptolemais within
the day.1 At the latter city, as at the former, there were Christian dis
ciples,8 who had probably been converted at the same time and under the
same circumstances as those of Tyre. Another opportunity was afforded
for the salutations and encouragement of brotherly love ; but the mis
sionary party staid here only one day.9 Though they had accomplished
the voyage in abundant time to reach Jerusalem at Pentecost, they
hastened onwards, that they might linger some days at Caesarea.10
One day's travelling by land11 was sufficient for this part of their
journey. The distance is between thirty and forty miles.12 At Caesarea
1 The events at the close of the last cen- ' V. 7. Instead of the words "we that
tury and others still more recent. It is surely were of Paul's company," the best MSS. have
well that we should be able to associate this simply " we," which seems to have been altered
place with the Apostle of the Gentiles as much into the longer phrase, as being the opening
as with Sir Sidney Smith and Sir Charles of a separate section for reading in churches.
Napier. The meaning of what begins the 7 th verse
2 So it is called in 1 Mace. v. 15, x. 1, &c. seems to be " thus accomplishing our voyage."
8 See his life in Smith's Dictionary ofBiog- The rest of the journey was by land.
raphy. 4 Pliny, v. 19, 17. 8 Both here and in v. 4 the Greek has the
5 In the Acts of the Apostles, we find Tyre definite article.
mentioned in connection with the voyages of 9 V. 7. io See below v. 10.
merchantmen, xxi. 3, and Sidon, xxvii. 3. u " The next day we departed," v. 8. We
6 For a nautical delineation of this bay, may observe, that the word used here is far
with the anchorage, Haifa, &c, see the Admi- more suitable to a departure by land than by
ralty Chart. The travellers who have described sea.
the sweep of this bay from Carmel are so nu- i2 The Jerusalem Itinerary gives the dis-
merous, that they need not be specified. tance as thirty-one miles, the stages being

chap. xx. C^SAREA. 615
there was a Christian family, already known to us in the earlier passages
of the Acts of the Apostles, with whom they were sure of receiving a
welcome. The last time we made mention of Philip the Evangelist
(p. 74) was when he was engaged in making the Gospel known on
the road which leads southwards by Gaza towards Egypt, about the
time when St. Paul himself was converted on the northern road, when
travelling to Damascus. Now, after many years, the Apostle and the
Evangelist are brought together under one roof. On the former occa
sion, we saw that Caesarea was the place where the labors of Philip on
that journey ended.1 Thenceforward it became his residence if his life
was stationary, or it was the centre from which he made other missionary
circuits through Judaea.2 He is found, at least, residing in this city by
the sea, when St. Paul arrives in the year 58 from Achaia and Mace
donia. His family consisted of four daughters, who were an example
of the fulfilment of that prediction of Joel, quoted by St. Peter, which
said, that, at the opening of the new dispensation, God's Spirit should
come on His " handmaidens " as well as His bondsmen, and that the
" daughters," as well as the sons, should prophesy.3 The prophetic
power was granted to these four women at Caesarea, who seem to have
been living that life of single devotedness4 which is commended by
St. Paul in his first letter to the Corinthians (1 Cor. vii.), and to have
exercised their gift in concert for the benefit of the Church.
It is not improbable that these inspired women gave St. Paul some
intimation of the sorrows which were hanging over him.5 But soon a
more explicit voice declared the very nature of the trial he was to
expect. The stay of the Apostle at Caesarea lasted some days (v. 10).
He had arrived in Judaea in good time before the festival, and haste was
now unnecessary. Thus news reached Jerusalem of his arrival ; and a
prophet named Agabus — whom we have seen before (p. 117) coming
from the same place on a similar errand — went down to Caesa
rea, and communicated to St. Paul and the company of Christians
by whom he was surrounded a clear knowledge of the impending
danger. His revelation was made in that dramatic form which im
presses the mind with a stronger sense of reality than mere words can
twelve, three, eight, and eight. The Ante- 1 Cor. xiv. 34 ; 1 Tim. ii. 12 ; and see p.
nine Itinerary makes the distance greater, viz. 375.
twenty-four and twenty. 4 It is difficult not to see some emphasis in
1 Acts viii. 40. Seep. 75, n. 1. the word " virgins." See Matt. xix. 12.
2 The term "Evangelist" seems to have 6 Perhaps the force of "who did prophesy"
been almost synonymous with our word (v. 9 ) is to be found in the fact that they did
" Missionary." It is applied to Philip and to foretell what was to come. The word, how-
Timothy. See p. 381 ; also p. 380, note. ever, has not necessarily any relation to the
8 Joel ii. 28, 29; Acts ii. 17, 18. Compare future.

616 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap.xx
do, and which was made familiar to the Jews of old by the practice of
the Hebrew prophets. As Isaiah (ch. xx.) loosed the sackcloth from
his loins, and put off his shoes from his feet, to declare how the Egyp
tian captives should be led away into Assyria naked and barefoot, — or
as the girdle of Jeremiah (ch. xiii.), in its strength and its decay, was
made a type of the people of Israel in their privilege and their fall, —
Agabus, in like manner, using the imagery of action,1 took the girdle of
St. Paul, and fastened it round his own2 hands and feet, and said,
" Thus saith the Holy Ghost : So shall the Jews at Jerusalem bind the
man to whom this girdle belongs, and they shall deliver him into the
hands of the Gentiles."
The effect of this emphatic prophecy, both on Luke, Aristarchus, and
Trophimus,3 the companions of St. Paul's journey, and those Christians
of Caesarea,4 who, though they had not travelled with him, had learnt
to love him, was very great. They wept,5 and implored him not to go to
Jerusalem.6 But the Apostle himself could not so interpret the super
natural intimation. He was placed in a position of peculiar trial. A
voice of authentic prophecy had been so uttered, that, had he been
timid and wavering, it might easily have been construed into a warning
to deter him. Nor was that temptation unfelt which arises from the
sympathetic grief of loving friends. His affectionate heart was almost
broken7 when he heard their earnest supplications and saw the sorrow
that was caused by the prospect of his danger ; but the mind of the Spirit
had been so revealed to him in his own inward convictions, that he could
see the Divine counsel through apparent hinderances. His resolution was
" no wavering between yea and nay, but was yea in Jesus Christ." 8 His
deliberate purpose did not falter for a moment.9 He declared that he
was " ready not only to be bound, but to die at Jerusalem for the name
of the Lord Jesus." And then they desisted from their entreaties.
Their respect for the Apostle made them silent. They recognized the
will of God in the steady purpose of His servant, and gave their
acquiescence in those words in which Christian resignation is best
expressed: " The will of the Lord be done."
The time was now come for the completion of the journey. The fes-
1 See another striking instance in Ezek. iv. 8 For the companions of St. Paul at thil
Compare what has been said before in refer- moment, see p. 589, and n. 5.
ence to the gestures of Paul and Barnabas 4 " Both we and they of the place," v. 12.
when they departed from Antioch in Pisidia, 6 " What mean ye to weep," &c, v. 13.
p. 162. " V. 12.
2 It would be a mistake to suppose that 7 V. 13.
Agabus bound Paul's hands and feet. Besides, 8 2 Cor. i. See above, p. 487.
Agabus says, not " the man whom I bind," 8 This is implied in the present tense, »
but " the man whose girdle this is." 14.

chap.xx. JOURNEY TO JERUSALEM. 617
tival was close at hand. Having made the arrangements that were
necessary with regard to their luggage,1 — and such notices in Holy
Scripture 2 should receive their due attention, for they help to set before
us all the reality of the Apostle's journeys, — he and the companions
who had attended him from Macedonia proceeded to the Holy City.
Some of the Christians of Caesarea went along with them, not merely, as
it would seem, to show their respect and sympathy for the Apostolic com
pany,3 but to secure their comfort on arriving, by taking him to the house
of Mnason, a native of Cyprus, who had been long ago converted to
Christianity,4 — possibly during the life of our Lord Himself,5 — and
who may have been one of those Cyprian Jews who first made the Gospel
known to the Greeks at Antioch.
Thus we have accompanied St. Paul on his last recorded journey to
Jerusalem. It was a journey full of incident ; and it is related more
minutely than any other portion of his travels. We know all the places
by which he passed, or at which he staid ; and we are able to connect
them all with familiar recollections of history. We know, too, all the
aspect of the scenery. He sailed along those coasts of Western Asia, and
among those famous islands, the beauty of which is proverbial. The very
time of the year is known to us. It was when the advancing season was
clothing every low shore, and the edge of every broken cliff, with a beau
tiful and refreshing verdure ; when the winter storms had ceased to be
dangerous, and the small vessels could ply safely in shade and sunshine
between neighboring ports. Even the state of the weather and the direc
tion of the wind are known. We can point to the places on the map where
the vessel anchored for the night,6 and trace across the chart the track that
was followed, when the moon was full.1 Yet more than this. We are
made fully aware of the state of the Apostle's mind, and of the burdened

i " We weran made redi." Wich.. "We 4 " An old disciple." The Greek adjective
made oure selfes redy." Tyndale. "Wee reminds us of Acts vi. 15.
toke up oure burthens." Cranmer. " We 6 He can hardly have been converted by St.
trussed up our fardeles." Geneva. " Being Paul during his journey through Cyprus, or
prepared." Rheims. The word "carriage" St. Paul would have been acquainted with him,
in the Authorized Version is used as in Judg. which does not appear to have been the case.
xviii. 21, 1 Sam. xvii. 22. Greswell sees, in He may have been converted by Barnabas.
the allusion to the baggage, some indication (See Acts xv. 39.) But he was most probably
of haste ; but the contrary seems rather im- one of the earliest disciples of Christ. As to
plied. the construction, see the article on this name
2 See, for instance, 2 Tim. iv. 13. in the Diet, of the Bible. [See p. 109, and Ch
8 The frequent use of the word denoting V.]
" to conduct " or " to accompany," in the ac- 6 See pp. 597, 598.
counts of the movements of the Apostles and 7 See p. 610.
their companions, is worthy of observation.
See Acts xv. 3, xx. 38 ; Rom. xv. 24, &c.

618 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap. xx.
feeling under which this journey was accomplished. The expression of
this feeling strikes us the more from its contrast with all the outward
circumstances of the voyage. He sailed in the finest season, by the
brightest coasts, and in the fairest weather ; and yet his mind was occu
pied with forebodings of evil from first to last ; — so that a peculiar shade
of sadness is thrown over the whole narration. If this be true, we should
expect to find some indications of this pervading sadness in the letters
written about this time ; for we know how the deeper tones of feeling
make themselves known in the correspondence of any man with his
friends. Accordingly, we do find in The Epistle written to the Romans,
shortly before leaving Corinth, a remarkable indication of discourage
ment, and almost despondency, when he asked the Christians at Rome to
pray that, on his arrival in Jerusalem, he might be delivered from the
Jews who hated him, and be well received by those Christians who dis
regarded his authority.1 The depressing anxiety with which he thus
looked forward to the journey would not be diminished, when the very
moment of his departure from Corinth was beset by a Jewish plot against
his life.2 And we find the cloud of gloom, which thus gathered at the
first, increasing and becoming darker as we advance. At Philippi and
at Troas, indeed, no direct intimation is given of coming calamities ; but
it is surely no fancy which sees a foreboding shadow thrown over that
midnight meeting, where death so suddenly appeared among those that
were assembled there with many lights in the upper chamber, while the
Apostle seemed unable to intermit his discourse, as " ready to depart on
the morrow." For indeed at Miletus he said, that already " in every
city " 3 the Spirit, had admonished him that bonds and imprisonment
were before him. At Miletus it is clear that the heaviness of spirit
under which he started had become a confirmed anticipation of evil.
When he wrote to Rome, he hoped to be delivered from the danger he
had too much reason to fear. Now his fear predominates over hope ; 4
and he looks forward, sadly but calmly, to some imprisonment not far
distant. At Tyre, the first sounds that he hears on landing are the echo
of his own thoughts. He is met by the same voice of warning, and the
same bitter trial for himself and his friends. At Ccesarea his vague fore
bodings of captivity are finally made decisive and distinct, and he has a

1 Rom. xv. 31. We should remember that 8 Seep. 602.
he had two causes of apprehension, — one 4 Acts xx. 23 should be closely compared
arising from the Jews, who persecuted him with Rom. xv. 30, 31. See also the note
everywhere; the other from the Judaizing above (p. 601) on "bound in spirit." St. Paul
Christians, who sought to depreciate his apos- seems to have suffered extremely both from the
tolic authority. anticipation and the experience of imprison-
2 See p. 589. ment.

PAUL'S TRUST IN GOD.

619

last struggle with the remonstrances of those whom he loved. Never
had he gone to Jerusalem without a heart full of emotion, — neither in
those early years, when he came an enthusiastic boy from Tarsus to the
school of Gamaliel, — nor on his return from Damascus, after the greatest
change that could have passed over an inquisitor's mind, — nor when he
went with Barnabas from Antioch to the Council, which was to decide an
anxious controversy. Now he had much new experience of the insidious
progress of error, and of the sinfulness even of the converted. Yet his
trust in God did not depend on the faithfulness of man ; and he went to
Jerusalem calmly and resolutely, though doubtful of his reception among
the Christian brethren, and not knowing what would happen on the
morrow.

CHAPTER XXL
Reception at Jerusalem. — Assembling of the Presbyters. — Advice given to St. Paul. — The
Four Nazarites. — St. Paul seized at the Festival. — The Temple and the Garrison. — He
brew Speech on the Stairs. — The Centurion and the Chief Captain. — St. Paul before the
Sanhedrin. — The Pharisees and Sadducees. — Vision in the Castle. — Conspiracy. — St
Paul's Nephew. — Letter of Claudius Lysias to Felix. — Night Journey to Antipatris.—
Caesarea.
" TTTHEN we were come to Jerusalem, the Brethren received us glad-
VV ly." Such is St. Luke's description of the welcome which met the
Apostle of the Gentiles on his arrival in the metropolis of Judaism. So
we shall find afterwards l " the brethren" hailing his approach to Rome,
and " coming to meet him as far as Appii Forum." Thus wherever he
went, or whatever might be the strength of hostility and persecution
which dogged his footsteps, he found some Christian hearts who loved the
Glad-tidings which he preached, and loved himself as the messenger of
the grace of God.
The Apostle's spirit, which was much depressed, as we have seen,2 by
anticipations of coldness and distrust on the part of the Church at Jeru
salem, must have been lightened by his kind reception. He seems to
have spent the evening of his arrival with these sympathizing brethren ;
but on the morrow, a more formidable ordeal awaited him. He must
encounter the assembled Presbyters of the Church ; and he might well
doubt whether even the substantial proof of loving interest in their wel
fare, of which he was the bearer, would overcome the antipathy with
which (as he was fully aware) too many of them regarded him. The
experiment, however, must be tried ; for this was the very end of his
coming to Jerusalem at all, at a time when his heart called him to Rome.3
His purpose was to endeavor to set himself right with the Church of
Jerusalem, to overcome the hostile prejudices which had already so much
impeded his labors, and to endeavor, by the force of Christian love and
forbearance, to win the hearts of those whom he regarded, in spite of all
1 Acts xxviii. 15. The same expression is 2 See the preceding chapter, pp. 588, 601-
used in both cases. This is sufficient to refute 603,612,615,616,617,619.
the cavils which have been made, as though 8 See Acts xix. 21, Rom. i 10-15, xv. 23-
this verse (xxi. 17) implied unanimous cordi- 29.
ality on the part of the Church at Jerusalem.
620

chap. xxi. ASSEMBLING OF THE PRESBYTERS. 621
their weaknesses and errors, as brethren in Christ Jesus. Accordingly,
when the morning came,1 the Presbyters or Elders of the Church were
called together by James 2 (who, as we have before mentioned, presided
over the Church of Jerusalem) to receive Paul and his fellow-travellers,
the messengers of the Gentile Churches. We have already seen how
carefully St. Paul had guarded himself from the possibility of suspicion
in the administration of his trust, by causing deputies to be elected by
the several churches whose alms he bore, as joint trustees with himself
of the fund collected. These deputies now entered together with him 3
into the assembly of the Elders, and the offering was presented, — a
proof of love from the Churches of the Gentiles to the mother Church,
whence their spiritual blessings had been derived.
The travellers were received with that touching symbol of brotherhood,
the kiss of peace,4 which was exchanged between the Christians of those
days on every occasion of public as well as private meeting. Then the
main business of the assembly was commenced by an address from St.
Paul. This was not the first occasion on which he had been called to
take a similar part, in the same city, and before the same audience. Our
thoughts are naturally carried back to the days of the Apostolic Council,
when he first declared to the Church of Jerusalem the Gospel which he
preached among the Gentiles, and the great things which God had
wrought thereby.5 The majority of the Church had then, under the in
fluence of the Spirit of God, been brought over to his side, and had
ratified his views by their decree. But the battle was not yet won ; he
had still to contend against the same foes with the same weapons.
We are told that he now gave a detailed account6 of all that " God had
wrought among the Gentiles by his ministry " since he last parted from
Jerusalem four years before.1 The foundation of the great and flourish
ing Church of Ephesus doubtless furnished the main interest of his nar
rative ; but he would also dwell on the progress of the several Churches
in Phrygia, Galatia, and other parts of Asia Minor, and likewise those in
Macedonia and Achaia, from whence he was just returned. In such a
discourse, he could scarcely avoid touching on subjects which would
excite painful feelings, and rouse bitter prejudice in many of his audience.
He could hardly speak of Galatia without mentioning the attempted per
version of his converts there. He could not enter into the state of

i " The day following," v. 18. 6 See p. 191, &c.
2 See p. 190. 6 "Particularly," v. 19.
8 " Paul with us," ib. 7 He had then endeavored to reach Jerusa-
4 So we understand when he had saluted lem by the feast of Pentecost (Acts xviii. 21,
them, v. 19. See 1 Thess. v. 26, and the note and see Wieseler), as on the present occa-
p. 347 tion.

622 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chat, xxi
Corinth without alluding to the emissaries from Palestine, who had intro
duced confusion and strife among the Christians of that city. Yet we
cannot doubt that St. Paul, with that graceful courtesy which distin
guished both his writings and his speeches, softened all that was dis
agreeable, and avoided what was personally offensive to his audience, and
dwelt, as far as he could, on topics in which all present would agree.
Accordingly, we find that the majority of the assembled Elders were
favorably impressed by his address, and by the tidings which he brought
of the progress of the Gospel. The first act of the assembly was to
glorify God for the wonders He had wrought.1 They joined in solemn
thanksgiving with one accord ; and the Amen (1 Cor. xiv. 16) which
followed the utterance of thanks and praise from apostolic lips was
swelled by many voices.
Thus the hope expressed by St. Paul on a former occasion,2 concerning
the result of this visit to Jerusalem, was in a measure fulfilled. But
beneath this superficial show of harmony there lurked elements of dis
cord, which threatened to disturb it too soon. We have already had
occasion to remark upon the peculiar composition of the Church at Jeru
salem, and we have seen that a Pharisaic faction was sheltered in its
bosom, which continually strove to turn Christianity into a sect of
Judaism. We have seen that this faction had recently sent emissaries
into the Gentile Churches, and had endeavored to alienate the minds of
St. Paul's converts from their converter. These men were restless
agitators, animated by the bitterest sectarian spirit ; and although they
were numerically a small party, yet we know the power of a turbulent
minority. But besides these Judaizing zealots, there was a large propor
tion of the Christians at Jerusalem, whose Christianity, though more
sincere than that of those just mentioned, was yet very weak and imper
fect. The " many thousands of Jews which believed " had by no means
all attained to the fulness of Christian faith. Many of them still knew
only a Christ after the flesh, — a Saviour of Israel, — a Jewish Messiah.
Their minds were in a state of transition between the Law and the
Gospel, and it was of great consequence not to shock their prejudices too
rudely, lest they should be tempted to make shipwreck of their faith, and
renounce their Christianity altogether. Their prejudices were most
wisely consulted in things indifferent by St. James ; who accommodated
himself in all points to the strict requirements of the Law, and thus dis
armed the hostility of the Judaizing bigots. He was, indeed, divinely
ordained to be the Apostle of this transition-Church. Had its councils
been less wisely guided, had the Gospel of St. Paul been really repudiated
1 V- 20 a 2 Cor, ix 12

chap. xxi. ILL-FEELING AGAINST ST. PAUL. 623
by the Church of Jerusalem, it is difficult to estimate the evil which
might have resulted. This class of Christians was naturally very much
influenced by the declamation of the more violent partisans of Judaism.
Their feelings would be easily excited by an appeal to their Jewish
patriotism. They might without diffcult be roused to fury against one
whom they were taught to regard as a despiser of the Law, and a reviler
of the customs of their forefathers. Against St. Paul their dislike had
been long and artfully fostered ; and they would from the first have
looked on him perhaps with some suspicion, as not being, like themselves,
a Hebrew of the Holy City, but only a Hellenist of the Dispersion.
Such being the composition of the great body of the Church, we cannot
doubt that the same elements were to be found amongst the Elders also.
And this will explain the resolution to which the assembly came, at the
close of their discussion on the matters brought before them. They
began by calling St. Paul's attention to the strength of the Judaical party
among the Christians of Jerusalem. They told him that the majority
even of the Christian Church had been taught to hate his very name, and
to believe that he went about the world " teaching the Jews to forsake
Moses, saying that they ought not to circumcise their children, neither to
walk after the customs." They further observed that it was impossible
his arrival should remain unknown ; his renown was too great to allow
him to be concealed : his public appearance in the streets of Jerusalem
would attract a crowd1 of curious spectators, most of whom would be
violently hostile. It was therefore of importance that he should do
something to disarm this hostility, and to refute the calumnies which had
been circulated concerning him. The plan they recommended was, that
he should take charge of four Jewish Christians,2 who were under a
Nazaritic vow, accompany them to the temple, and pay for them the
necessary expenses attending the termination of their vow. Agrippa I.,
not long before, had given the same public expression of his sympathy
with the Jews, on his arrival from Rome to take possession of his throne.3
And what the King had done for popularity it was felt that the Apostle
might do for the sake of truth and peace. His friends thought that he
would thus, in the most public manner, exhibit himself as an observer of
the Mosaic ceremonies, and refute the accusations of his enemies. They
added, that, by so doing, he would not countenance the errors of those
1 " A multitude," v. 22. Not " the multi- 2 That these Nazarites were Christians is
tude," nor the laity of the Church, as some evident from the words " We have."
have imagined. Were such the meaning, the 8 " On arriving at Jerusalem, he offered
Greek would have had the definite article. many sacrifices of thanksgiving : wherefore
There seems to be some doubt about the also he ordered that many of the Nazarites
genuineness of the clause. See Tischen- should have their heads shorn." Joseph. Ant-
dorf. xix. 6, 1.

624 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap, xxi
who sought to impose the Law upon Gentile converts ; because it had
been already decided by the Church of Jerusalem, that the ceremonial
observances of the Law were not obligatory on the Gentiles.1
It is remarkable that this conclusion is attributed expressly, in the
Scriptural narrative, not to James (who presided over the meeting), but
to the assembly itself. The lurking shade of distrust implied in the terms
of the admonition was certainly not shared by that great Apostle who had
long ago given to St. Paul the right hand of fellowship. We have already
seen indications, that, however strict might be the Judaical observances of
St. James, they did not satisfy the Judaizing party at Jerusalem, who
attempted, under the sanction of his name,2 to teach doctrines and enforce
practices of which he disapproved. The partisans of this faction, indeed,
are called by St. Paul (while anticipating this very visit to Jerusalem)
" the disobedient party." 3 It would seem that their influence was not
unfelt in the discussion which terminated in the resolution recorded. And
though St. James acquiesced (as did St. Paul) in the advice given, it
appears not to have originated with himself.
The counsel, however, though it may have been suggested by suspicious
prejudice, or even by designing enmity, was not in itself unwise. St.
Paul's great object (as we have seen) in this visit to Jerusalem was
to conciliate the Church of Palestine. If he could win over that Church
to the truth, or even could avert its open hostility to himself, he would
be doing more for the diffusion of Christianity than even by the conver
sion of Ephesus. Every lawful means for such an end he was ready
gladly to adopt. His own principles, stated by himself in his Epistles,
required this of him. He had recently declared that every compliance
in ceremonial observances should be made, rather than cast a stumbling-
block in a brother's way.4 He had laid it down as his principle of action
to become a Jew to Jews that he might gain the Jews, as willingly as
he became a Gentile to Gentiles that he might gain the Gentiles.5 He
had given it as a rule, that no man should change his external observ
ances because he became a Christian ; that the Jew should remain a Jew
in things outward.6 Nay more, he himself observed the Jewish festivals,
had previously countenanced his friends in the practice of Nazaritic vows,1
and had circumcised Timothy, the son of a Jewess. So false was the
1 V. 25, comparing xv. 28 7 Acts xviii. 1 8, which we conceive to refer
2 Acts xv. See Gal. ii. 12 to Aquila. (See p. 368.) But many inter-
" Rom. xv. 31. preters of the passage think that St. Paul him-
4 Rom. xiv. 6 See 1 Cor. ix. 20. self made the vow. We cannot possibly as-
6 1 Cor. vii. 17-19. Such passages are the sent to Mr. Lewin's view, that St. Paul was
best refutation of those who endeavor to repre- still, on his arrival at Jerusalem, under the
sent the conduct here assigned to St. Paul as obligation of a vow taken in consequence of
inconsistent with his teaching. See the dis- his escape at Ephesus.
cussion pp. 229, 230.

chap. xxi. NATURE OP THE NAZARITIC VOW. 625
charge that he had forbidden the Jews to circumcise their children.1 In
fact, the great doctrine of St. Paul concerning the worthlessness of cere
monial observances rendered him equally ready to practise as to forsake
them. A mind so truly catholic as his was necessarily free from any
repugnance to mere outward observances ; a repugnance equally super
stitious with the formalism which clings to ritual. In his view, circum
cision was nothing, and uncircumcision was nothing ; but faith, which
worketh by love. And this love rendered him willing to adopt the most
burdensome ceremonies, if by so doing he could save a brother from stum
bling. Hence he willingly complied with the advice of the assembly, and
thereby, while he removed the prejudices of its more ingenuous members,
doubtless exasperated the factious partisans who had hoped for his refusal.
Thus the meeting ended amicably, with no open manifestation of that
hostile feeling towards St. Paul which lurked in the bosoms of some who
were present. On the next day, which was the great feast of Pentecost,2
St. Paul proceeded with the four Christian Nazarites to the Temple. It
is necessary here to explain the nature of their vow, and of the office
which he was to perform for them. It was customary among the Jews
for those who had received deliverance from any great peril, or who from
other causes desired publicly to testify their dedication to God, to take
upon themselves the vow of a Nazarite, the regulations of which are
prescribed in the sixth chapter of the book of Numbers.3 In that book no
rule is laid down as to the rime during which this life of ascetic rigor
was to continue : 4 but we learn from the Talmud and Josephus 6 that
1 It has been argued that this charge was rate themselves to vow a vow of a Nazarite, to
true, because the logical inference from St. separate themselves unto the Lord, he shall
Paul's doctrines was the uselessness of circum- separate himself from wine and strong drink.
cision. But it might as well be said that the . . . All the days of the vow of his separation
logical inference from the decree of the Coun- there shall no razor come upon his head : until
cil of Jerusalem was the uselessness of circum- the days be fulfilled in the which he sepa-
cision. The continued observance of the law rateth himself unto the Lord, he shall be
was of course only transitional. holy, and shall let the locks of the hair of his
2 This mode of settling the vexed question head grow." Numb. vi. 2-5.
of the " seven days " entirely removes the diffi- 4 Sometimes the obligation was for life, as
culty arising out of the "twelve days," of in the cases of Samson, Samuel, and John the
which St. Paul'speaks (xxiv. 11) in his speech Baptist. That " seven days" in the instance
before Felix. Yet it cannot be denied that, before us was the whole duration of the vow,
on reading consecutively the twenty-sixth and seems impossible, for this simple reason, that
twenty-seventh verses of the twenty-first chap- so short a time could produce no perceptible
ter, it is difficult (whether or not we identify effect on the hair. Hemsen makes a mistake
" the days of purification " with " the seven here in referring to the " seven days " in
davs") to believe that the same day is referred Numb. vi. 6, which contemplates only the ex-
to in each verse. And when we come to xxiv. ceptional case of defilement in the course of
1 1, we shall see that other modes of reckoning the vow.
the time are admissible. 6 Josephus states this after mentioning
" " When either man or woman shall sepa- Berenice's vow, War, ii. 15, 1.
40

626

THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OP ST. PAUL.

cnAP. xxi.

thirty days was at least a customary period. During this time the Naza
rite was bound to abstain from wine, and to suffer his hair to grow uncut.
At the termination of the period, he was bound to present himself in the
Temple with certain offerings, and his hair was then cut off and burnt
upon the altar. The offerings required l were beyond the means of the
very poor, and consequently it was thought an act of piety for a rich
man 2 to pay the necessary expenses, and thus enable his poorer country
men to complete their vow. St. Paul was far from rich ; he gained his
daily bread by the work of his own hands ; and we may therefore natu
rally ask how he was able to take upon himself the expenses of these
four Nazarites. The answer probably is, that the assembled Elders had
requested him to apply to this purpose a portion of the fund which he
had placed at their disposal. However this may be, he now made him
self responsible for these expenses, and accompanied the Nazarites to the
Temple, after having first performed the necessary purifications together
with them.3 On entering the Temple, he announced to the priests that
the period of the Nazaritic vow which his friends had taken was accom
plished, and he waited 4 within the sacred enclosure till the necessary
offerings were made for each of them, and their hair cut off and burnt
in the sacred fire.

1 "And this is the law of the Nazarite,
when the days of his separation are fulfilled :
he shall be brought unto the door of the tab
ernacle of the congregation ; and he shall offer
his offering unto the Lord, one he-lamb of the
first year without blemish for a burnt-offering,
and one ewe-lamb of the first year without
blemish for a. sin-offering, and one ram with
out blemish for peace-offerings, and » basket
of unleavened bread, cakes of fine flour
mingled with oil, and wafers of unleavened
bread anointed with oil, and their meat-offer
ing, and their drink-offerings. And the priest
shall bring them before the Lord, and shall
offer his sin-offering and his burnt-offering :
and he shall offer the ram for a sacrifice of
peace-offerings unto the Lord, with the basket
of unleavened bread : the priest shall offer also
his meat-offering and his drink-offering. And
the Nazarite shall shave the head of his separa
tion at the door of the tabernacle of the con
gregation, and shall take the hair of the head
of his separation, and put it in the fire which
is under the sacrifice of the peace-offerings."
Numb. vi. 13-18.
2 Compare the case of Agrippa mentioned
above.

8 Purify thyself with them (xxi. 24), when
purified he went in (26), they found me purified
(xxiv. 18). We do not agree with those com
mentators who interpret the first expression to
mean " dedicate thyself as a Nazarite along
with them." We doubt whether it could bear
this meaning. At all events, the other is by
far the most natural and obvious, and it cor
responds with the Septuagintal use of the
same verb in Numbers xix. 12.
4 The obvious translation of v. 26 seems to
be, " He entered into the Temple, giving 'pub
lic notice that the days of purification were
fulfilled [and staid there] till the offering for
each one of the Nazarites was brought." The
emphatic force of each one should be noticed.
Publicity is implied in the wprd for giving
notice. The persons to whom notice was given
were the priests.
This interpretation harmonizes with Wiese-
ler's view of the whole subject. If we believe
that several days were yet to elapse before the
expiration of the Nazaritic ceremonies, we
must translate, with Mr. Humphry — " mak
ing it known that the days of separation which
must be fulfilled before the offering should be
made were in the course of completion."

chap. xxi. ST. PAUL SEIZED AT THE PESTIVAL. 627
He might well have hoped, by thus complying with the legal cere
monial, to conciliate those, at least, who were only hostile to him because
they believed him hostile to their national worship. And, so far as the
great body of the Church at Jerusalem was concerned, he probably suc
ceeded. But the celebration of the festival had- attracted multitudes to
the Holy City, and the Temple was thronged with worshippers from
every land ; and amongst these were some of those Asiatic Jews who
had been defeated by his arguments in the Synagogue of Ephesus,
and irritated against him during the last few years daily more and more,
by the continual growth of a Christian Church in that city, formed in
great part of converts from among the Jewish Proselytes. These men,
whom a zealous feeling of nationality had attracted from their distant
home to the metropolis of their faith, now beheld, where they least ex
pected to find him, the apostate Israelite, who had opposed tlieir teach
ing and seduced their converts. An opportunity of revenge, which they
could not have hoped for in the Gentile city where they dwelt, had
suddenly presented itself. They sprang upon their enemy, and shouted
while they held him fast, " Men of Israel, help. This is the man that
teacheth all men everywhere against the People and the Law, and this
Place."1 Then as the crowd rushed tumultuously towards the spot, they
excited them yet further by accusing Paul of introducing Greeks into
the Holy Place, which was profaned by the presence of a Gentile. The
vast multitude which was assembled on the spot, and in the immediate
neighborhood, was excited to madness by these tidings, which spread
rapidly through the crowd. The pilgrims who flocked at such seasons
to Jerusalem were of course the most zealous of their nation ; very
Hebrews of the Hebrews. We may imagine the horror and indignation
which would fill their minds when they heard that an apostate from the
faith of Israel had been seized in the very act of profaning the Temple
at this holy season. A furious multitude rushed upon the Apostle ; and
it was only their reverence for the holy place which preserved him from
being torn to pieces on the spot. They hurried him out of the sacred
enclosure, and assailed him with violent blows.2 Their next course might
have been to stone him or to hurl him over the precipice into the valley
below. They were already in the Court of the Gentiles, and the heavy
gates3 which separated the inner from the outer enclosure were shut by
1 " This place," v. 28, " this holy place," — must have remembered Stephen, and felt as
ib. We should compare here the accusation though this attack on himself were a. retribu-
against Stephen, vi. 13. " He ceaseth not to tion. See below on xxii. 20. Cf. p. 65.
speak blasphemous words against this holy 2 See Acts xxi. 31, 32.
place." The two cases are in many respects 8 For an account of these gates, see be-
parallel. We cannot but believe that Paul low.

628 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap, xxi,
the Levites, — when an unexpected interruption prevented the murderous
purpose. It becomes desirable here to give a more particular description than
we have yet done of the Temple-area and the sanctuary which it enclosed.
Some reference has been made to this subject in the account of St.
Stephen's martyrdom (p. 65), especially to that "Stone Chamber" —
the Hall Gazith — where the Sanhedrin held their solemn conclave.
Soon we shall see St. Paul himself summoned before this tribunal, and
hear his voice in that hall where he had listened to the eloquence of the
first martyr. But meantime other events came in rapid succession, for
the better understanding of which it is well to form to ourselves a clear
notion of the localities in which they occurred.
The position of the Temple on the eastern side of Jerusalem, the rela
tion of Mount Moriah to the other eminences on which the city was built,
the valley which separated it from the higher summit of Mount Zion,
and the deeper ravine which formed a chasm between the whole city and
the Mount of Olives, — these facts of general topography are too well
known to require elucidation.1 On the other hand, when we turn to the
description of the Temple-area itself and that which it contained, we are
met with considerable difficulties. It does not, however, belong to our
present task to reconcile the statements in Josephus 2 and the Talmud >
with each other and with present appearances.4 Nor shall we attempt
to trace the architectural changes by which the scene has been modified,
in the long interval between the time when the Patriarch built the altar
on Moriah for his mysterious sacrifice,5 and our own day, when the same
spot6 is the " wailing-place " of those who are his children after the flesh,
but not yet the heirs of his faith. Keeping aloof from all difficult details,
and withdrawing ourselves from the consideration of those events which
have invested this hill with an interest unknown to any other spot on the
earth, we confine ourselves to the simple task of depicting the Temple
of Herod as it was when St. Paul was arrested by the infuriated Jews.
1 Among the materials used in our account because of his general accuracy, and against
of the Temple, we may particularly mention Middoth, because the Rabbis could write only
Dr. Robinson's Researches, the memoir on from tradition.
Jerusalem with the plan of the Ordnance Sur- 6 Gen. xxii.
vey, published separately by Mr. G. Williams, 6 See Robinson, i. 350. "It is the nearest
and Mr. Thrupp's Ancient Jerusalem. point in which the Jews can venture to ap-
2 The two places in Josephus where proaeh their ancient temple ; and, fortunately
Herod's Temple is described at length are for them, it is sheltered from observation by
Ant. xv. 11, and War, v. 5. See also Ant. the narrowness of the land and the dead walls
xx. 9, 7. around." It seems that the custom is nen-
8 The tract Middoth (Measures) in the tioned even by Benjamin of Tudela in the
Mischna treats entirely of this subject. twelfth century.
4 Mr. Thrupp argues in favor of Josephus,

chap. xxi. THE TEMPLE OP HEROD. 629
That rocky summit, which was wide enough for the threshing-floor of
Araunah,1 was levelled after David's death, and enlarged by means of
laborious substructions, till it presented the appearance of one broad
uniform area.2 On this level space the temples of Solomon and Zerub-
babel were successively built : and in the time of the Apostles there were
remains of the former work in the vast stones which formed the support
ing wall on the side of the valley of Jehoshaphat,3 and of the latter in
the eastern gate, which in its name and its appearance continued to be
a monument of the Persian power.4 The architectural arrangements
of Herod's Temple were, in their general form, similar to the two which
had preceded it. When we think of the Jewish sanctuary, whether in
its earlier or later periods, our impulse is to imagine to ourselves some
building like a synagogue or a church : but the first effort of our
imagination should be to realize the appearance of that wide open space,
which is spoken of by the prophets as the " Outer Court " or the " Court
of the Lord's House ; " 5 and is named by Josephus the " Outer Temple,"
and, both in the Apocrypha and the Talmud, the " Mountain of the
House."6 That which was the " House" itself, or the Temple, properly
so called,1 was erected on the highest of a series of successive terraces,
which rose in an isolated mass from the centre of the Court, or rather
nearer to its north-western corner.8
In form, the Outer Court was a square ; a strong wall enclosed it ; the
sides corresponded to the four quarters of the heavens, and each was a
stadium or a furlong in length.9 Its pavement of stone was of various
colors : 10 and it was surrounded by a covered colonnade, the roof of which
was of costly cedar, and was supported on lofty and massive columns of
the Corinthian order, and of the whitest marble.11 On three sides there
1 1 Chron. xxi. 18 ; 2 Chron. iii. 1. 7 In the LXX. we find ot/coc and vair; used
2 See the description of this work in Jose- for that which was properly the Temple The
phus, War, v. 5, 1. Ant. xv. 11,8. expression to lepdv, in the N. T., is a general
8 The lower courses of these immense term, inclusive of the whole series of courts.
stone3 still remain, and are described by all So it is used by Josephus, who speaks of the
travellers. Outer Court as the first lepov, the outer Itpbv,
4 The Shushan Gate, which had a sculp- while he uses vabc for the Temple itself.
tured representation of the city of Susa, and 8 In Middoth it is distinctly said that the
was preserved from the time of Zerubbabel. space from the east and south is greater than
Middoth. That which is now called the that from the west and north.
Golden Gate, " a highly ornamental double 9 We do not venture to touch the difficul-
gateway of Roman construction," is doubtless ties connected with the dimension of the Tem-
on the same spot. pie. Josephus is inconsistent both with the
5 Ezek. xl. 17 ; Jer. xix. 14, xxvi. 2. In Talmud and himself. In one of his estimates
2 Chron. iv. 9, it is called the Great Court. of the size of the whole area, the ground on
6 The term with which we are most famil- which Antonia stood is included.
iar, — "The Court of the Gentiles," — is 10 War, v. 5, 2.
never applied to this space by Jewish writers. n Ant. xv. 11,5. He adds that the height

631) THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OP ST. PAUL. chap.xx.,
were two rows of columns : but on the southern side the cloister deepened
into a fourfold colonnade, the innermost supports of the roof being pilas
ters in the enclosing wall. About the south-eastern angle, where the
valley was most depressed below the plateau of the Temple, we are to
look for that " Porch of Solomon " (John x. 23, Acts iii. 11) which it
familiar to us in the New Testament : l and under the colonnades, or on the
open area in the midst, were the " tables of the money-changers and the
seats of them who sold doves," which turned that which was intended for a
house of prayer into a " house of merchandise " (John ii. 16), and " a den
of thieves" (Matt. xxi. 13). Free access was afforded into this wide en
closure by gates 2 on each of the four sides, one of which on the east was
called the Royal Gate, and was perhaps identical with the " Beautiful
Gate " of Sacred History,3 while another on the west was connected with
the crowded streets of Mount Zion by a bridge over the intervening
valley.4 Nearer (as we have seen) to the north-western corner than the centre
of the square, arose that series of enclosed terraces on the summit of
which was the sanctuary. These more sacred limits were fenced off by a
low balustrade of stone, with columns at intervals, on which inscriptions
in Greek and Latin warned all Gentiles against advancing beyond them
on pain of death.5 It was within this boundary that St. Paul was accused
of having brought his Heathen companions. Besides this balustrade, a
separation was formed by a flight of fourteen steps leading up to the firs!
platform,6 which in its western portion was a narrow terrace of fifteen feel
of the columns was 25 cubits (f), and their in the sacred limits : "Was it not yourselves,
number 162, while each column was so wide ye wretches, who raised this fence before your
that it required three men with outstretched sanctuary? Was it not yourselves that set the
arms to embrace it. pillars therein at intervals, inscribed with
1 See Joseph. Ant. xx. 9, 7. Groek characters and our characters, and for-
2 The statements of Josephus and Middoth bidding any one to pass the boundary ? And
with regard to the gates into the Outer Court was it not we that allowed you to kill any one
are absolutely irreconcilable. so transgressing, though he were a Roman 1 "
8 The Shushan Gate, mentioned above. War, vi. 2, 4. From this it appears that the
4 The supposed remains of this bridge, Jews had full permission from the Romans to
with some of the different theories respecting kill even a Roman, if he went beyond the
them, have been alluded to before. See p. 25, boundary. These inscriptions have been al
and the engraving. luded to before in this work, p. 3.
5 Joseph. War, v. 5, 2. In the Antiquities 6 With this platform begins what is called
(xv. 11, 7) he does not say that the inscription "the second lepbv" by Josephus. For the
was in different languages, but he adds that fourteen steps see War, v. 5, 2. In Middoth
it announced death as the penalty of trans- the steps are twelve. Leaving aside the dis-
gression. A similar statement occurs in cordance as to numbers, we may remark that
P*"10- we are left in doubt as to whether the. balus-
This fence is mentioned again by Josephus trade was above or below the steps. Mr.
in a striking passage, where Titus says to the Thrupp places the steps within the barrier, p
Jews, after a horrible scene cf bloodshed with- 328.

chap. xxi. THE TEMPLE OF HEROD. 631
wide round the walls of the innermost sanctuary, — while the eastern
portion expanded into a second court, called the Court of the Women.1
By this term we are not to understand that it was exclusively devoted to
that sex, but that no women were allowed to advance beyond it. This
court seems to have contained the treasury2 (Mark xii. 41, Luke xxi. 1)
and various chambers, of which that at the south-eastern corner should
be mentioned here, for there the Nazarites performed their vows ; 3 and
the whole court was surrounded by a wall of its own, with gates on each
side, — the easternmost of which was of Corinthian brass, with folding-
doors and strong bolts and bars, requiring the force of twenty men to
close them for the night.4 We conceive that it was the closing of these
doors by the Levites, which is so pointedly mentioned by St. Luke (Acts
xxi. 30) : and we must suppose that St. Paul had been first seized within
them, and was then dragged down the flight of steps into the Outer
Court. The interest, then, of this particular moment is to be associated with
the eastern entrance of the Inner from the Outer Temple. But to com
plete our description, we must now cross the Court of the Women to its
western gate. The Holy Place and the Holy of Holies were still within and
above the spaces we have mentioned. Two courts yet intervened between
the court last described and the Holy House itself. The first was the
Court of Israel, the ascent to which was by a flight of fifteen semicircular
steps ; 5 the second, the Court of the Priests, separated from the former
by a low balustrade.6 Where these spaces bordered on each other, to the
south, was the hall Gazith,7 the meeting-place of the Sanhedrin, partly in
one court and partly in the other. A little farther towards the north
were all those arrangements which we are hardly able to associate with
the thoughts of worship, but which daily reiterated in the sight of the
1 War, v. 5, 2. See Ant. xv. 11,5. from the east, by Ant. xv. 11. Such is the
2 In Joseph. War, v. 5, 2, we find " Treas- position assigned to the gate of Corinthian brass
nries " in the plural. Compare vi. 5, 2. by L'Empereur and Winer. Others (Light-
L'Empereur, who edited the tract Middoth, foot, De Wette, Williams) makes it the west-
placw the treasury, or treasuries, in the wall ern gate of the Court of the Women.
of the Court of the Women, but facing the 6 War, v. 5, 3, also -Middoth.
Outer Court. 6 The information which Josephus gives
8 Middoth. concerning these two courts (or rather two
* We can hardly doubt that this is the gate parts of one con rt) is scanty. Under the
mentioned by Josephus, War, vi. 5,3: "The Court of Israel were rooms for the musical
Eastern gate, made of brass, and very strong, instruments of the priests. Middoth.
shut at nightfall with difficulty by twenty 7 Middoth. Reference has been made be-
men." And this, we think, must be identical fore to this hall, in the narrative of Stephen's
with that of War, v. 8, 3 : " One gate outside trials. P. 65, n. 4. See below, p. 642. Rab-
the Temple, made of Corinthian brass." binical authorities say that the boundary-line
This again is determined to be the gate by of Judah and Benjamin passed between Gazith
which the Court of the Women was entered and the Holy Place.

632 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap. in.
Israelites that awful truth that " without shedding of blood there is no
remission," — the rings at which the victims were slaughtered, — the
beams and hooks from which they were suspended when dead, — and the
marble tables at which the entrails were washed : 1 — here, above all, was
the Altar, the very place of which has been plausibly identified by the
bore in the sacred rock of the Moslems, which appears to correspond
exactly with the description given in the Mischna of the drain and cesspool
which communicated with the sewer that ran off into the Kedron.2
The house itself remains to be described. It was divided into three
parts, the Vestibule, the Holy Place, and the Holy of Holies. From the
Altar and the Court of the Priests to the Vestibule was another flight of
twelve steps, the last of the successive approaches by which the Temple
was ascended from the east. The Vestibule was wider 3 than the rest of
the House : its front was adorned with a golden vine of colossal propor
tions : 4 and it was separated by a richly-embroidered curtain or veil from
the Holy Place, which contained the Table of Show-bread, the Candle
stick, and the Altar of Incense. After this was the " second veil " (Heb.
ix. 3), closing the access to the innermost shrine, which in the days of
the Tabernacle had contained the golden censer and the ark of the cove
nant, but which in Herod's Temple was entirely empty, though still
regarded as the " Holiest of All." (Ib.) The interior height of the
Holy Place and the Holy of Holies was comparatively small : but above
them and on each side were chambers so arranged that the general
exterior effect was that of a clere-story 5 rising above aisles : and the whole
was surmounted with gilded spikes,6 to prevent the birds from settling on
the sacred roof.
Such is a bare outline of the general plan of the Jewish Temple.
Such was the arrangement of its parts, which could be traced, as in a
map, by those who looked down from the summit of the Mount of Olives,
1 Middoth. The position of these rings, 8 Josephus says that there were shoulders
&c., was on the north side of the altar of on each side.
burnt-offering, — to which the ascent was by a 4 Ant. xv. 11, 3. War, v. 5, 4. Compare
gradual slope on the south side. Middoth : " Vitis aurea expandebatur J.fcuper
2 This is the view of Prof. Willis. See portam templi ; " also Tactius : " Vitis aurea
Williams' Memoir, p. 95. But it cannot be templo reperta." Hist. v. 5.
regarded as absolutely certain. Mr. Thrupp 6 Williams, p. 97.
(p. 317) objects that it is difficult to under- 6 War, v. 5, 6. Lightfoot (ch. xi.) thinks
stand how so elevated a rock can be identical that the roof had pinnacles, " as King's Col-
with the threshing floor of Araunah, which ledge Chapelle in Cambridge is decked in
must have been levelled. He thinks the per- like manner, to its great beauty : " and he
foration was the secret passage made by Herod adds that the roof was not flat, but rising in
from Antonia. Joseph. Ant. xv, 11, 7. The the middle, " as King's Colledge Chapelle may
only authentic account of the "Rock of the be herein a parallel also."
Sakrah " is that of Mr. Catherwood, given in
Bartlett's Walks about Jerusalem. See Stan
ley's Sinai and Palestine, p. 177.

chap. xxi. THE FORTRESS ANTONIA, 6b3
as the modern traveller looks now from the same place upon the Mosque
of Omar and its surrounding court. As seen from this eminence, —
when the gilded front of the vestibule flashed back the rays of the sun,
and all the courts glittered (to use the comparison of Josephus) with
the whiteness of snow, — while the column of smoke rose over all, as a
perpetual token of acceptable sacrifice, — and worshippers were closely
crowded on the eastern steps and terraces in front of the Holy House,
and Pilgrims from all countries under heaven were moving through the
Outer Court and flocking to the same point from all streets in the city, —
the Temple at the time of a festival must have been a proud spectacle to
the religious Jew. It must have been with sad and incredulous wonder
that the four Disciples heard from Him who wept over Jerusalem, that
all this magnificence was presently to pass away.1 None but a Jew can
understand the passionate enthusiasm inspired by the recollections and
the glorious appearance of the national Sanctuary. And none but a
Jew can understand the bitter grief and deep hatred which grew out of
the degradation in which his nation was sunk at that particular time.
This ancient glory was now under the shadow of an alien power. The
Sanctuary was all but trodden under foot by the Gentiles. The very
worship was conducted under the surveillance of Roman soldiers. We
cannot conclude this account of the Temple without describing the for
tress which was contiguous, and almost a part of it.
If we were to remount to the earlier history of the Temple, we might
perhaps identify the tower of Antonia with the " palace " of which we
read in the book of Nehemiah (ii. 8, vii. 2). It was certainly the build
ing which the Asmonean princes erected for their own residence under
the name of Baris.2 Afterwards rebuilt with greater strength and
splendor by the first Herod, it was named by him, after his Romanizing
fashion, in honor of Mark Antony.3 Its situation is most distinctly
marked out by Josephus, who tells us that it was at the north-western 4
corner of the Temple-area, with the cloisters of which it communicated
by means of staircases (Acts xxi. 35, 40).5 It is difficult, however, to
define the exact extent of ground which it covered in its renewed form
during the time of the Herods. There is good reason for believing that
it extended along the whole northern side of the great Temple court,
1 Matt. xxiv. 2, 3 ; Mark xiii. 2, 3; Luke 4 Compare War, v. 5, 8, with Ant. xv. 11,
xxi. 6. 2 Joseph. Ant. xv. 11, 4. 4, and War, i. 5, 4 ; i. 21, 1 ; also v. 4, 2.
8 Josephus says of it: — " It was of old 6 Seethe next note but two for the clear
called Baris, but afterwards named Antonia description which Josephus gives of this com-
during the time of Antony's ascendency, mnnication between the fortress and the clois-
just as Sebaste and Agrippias gained their ters.
later names from Sebastus [Augustus] and
Agrippa." War, i. 5, 4. See p. 25.

634 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap.xx.
from the north-western corner where it abutted on the city, to the north
eastern where it was suddenly stopped by the precipice which fronted the
valley : and that the tank, which is now popularly called the Pool of
Bethesda, was part of the fosse which protected it on the north.1
Though the ground on which the tower of Antonia stood was lower than
that of the Temple itself, yet it was raised to such a height, that at least
the south-eastern of its four turrets 2 commanded a view of all that went
on within the Temple, and thus both in position and in elevation it was
in ancient Jerusalem what the Turkish governor's house is now, —
whence the best view is obtained over the enclosure of the Mosque of
Omar. But this is an inadequate comparison. If we wish to realize
the influence of this fortress in reference to political and religious
interests, we must turn rather to that which is the most humiliating
spectacle in Christendom, the presence of the Turkish troops at the
Church of the Holy Sepulchre, where they are stationed to control the
fury of the Greeks and Latins at the most solemn festival of the Chris
tian year. Such was the office of the Roman troops that were quartered
at the Jewish festivals in the fortress of Antonia.3 Within its walls there
were barracks for at least a thousand soldiers.4 Not that we are to sup
pose that all the garrison in Jerusalem was always posted there. It is
probable that the usual quarters of the " whole cohort " (Matt, xxvii. 27),
or the greater part of it, were towards the western quarter of the city,
in that " praetorium " (John xviii. 28) or official residence5 where JesuS
was mocked by the soldiers, and on the tessellated pavement6 in front of
which Pilate sat, and condemned the Saviour of the world. But at the
time of the greater festivals, when a vast concourse of people, full of
religious fanaticism and imbittered by hatred of their rulers, flocked into
1 This view is ably advocated by Dr. Robin- vals watching the people, lest any insurrec-
son in his account of Antonia (Res. i. pp. 431- tionary movement should arise. Ib. [The
436), and, as Mr. Williams remarks (Memoir, word rdypa seems to be loosely used in Jose-
p. 100), this reservoir (the Birket-Israel) may phus and elsewhere. See 1 Cor. xv. 23.]
still be the Bethesda of the Gospel. See a 4 See below, p. 647, note on oneipa.
confirmation of Dr. Robinson's hypothesis, 6 This Praetorium seems to have been the
from the observations of Mr. Walcott, Bib. old palace of Herod, connected with the tower
Sac. i. p. 29. called Hippicus, which is identified by existing
2 It had four smaller towers rising from its remains. It was on the western side of the
angles, like the Tower of London, save that city, and is one of our fixed points in tracing
that on the S. E. was higher than the others. the course of the ancient walls.
War, v. 5, 8. 6 He took his seat on a tribunal at a place
3 Where it joined the two colonnades of called " the Pavement," and in Hebrew, " Gab-
the Temple, it had passages leading down to batha." John xix. 13. Something has been
them both, through which the guard (for a said before (p. 364, u. 7) on the (Hipa or tribu-
Roman legion was always quartered in the nal as the symbol of Roman power in the
fort) went down, so as to take various posi- provinces.
tions along the colonnades, in arms, at festi-

chap. xxi. THE FORTRESS ANTONIA., 635
the Temple courts, it was found necessary to order a strong military'
force into Antonia, and to keep them under arms, so that they might act
immediately and promptly in the case of any outbreak.
A striking illustration of the connection between the Fortress and the
Temple is afforded by the history of the quarrels which arose in reference
to the pontifical vestments. These robes were kept in Antonia during
the time of Herod the Great. When he died, they came under the super
intendence of the Roman procurator. Agrippa I., during his short reign,
exercised the right which had belonged to his grandfather. At his death
the command that the Procurator Cuspius Fadus should take the vest
ments under his care raised a ferment among the whole Jewish people ;
and they were only kept from an outbreak by the presence of an
overwhelming force under Longinus, the Governor of Syria. An embassy
to Rome, with the aid of the younger Agrippa, who was then at the
imperial court, obtained the desired relaxation : and the letter is still
extant in which Claudius assigned to Herod, King of Chalcis, the privi
lege which had belonged to his brother.1 But under the succeeding
Procurators, the relation between the fortress Antonia and the religious
ceremonies in the Temple became more significant and ominous. The
hatred between the imbittered Jews and those soldiers who were soon to
take part in their destruction grew deeper and more implacable. Under
Ventidius Cumanus,2 a frightful loss of life had taken place on one occa
sion at the passover, in consequence of an insult perpetrated by one of
the military.3 When Felix succeeded him, assassination became frequent
in Jerusalem : the high priest Jonathan was murdered, like Becket, in
the Temple itself, with the connivance of the Procurator : 4 and at the
very moment of which we write, both the soldiers and the populace were
in great excitement in consequence of the recent " uproar " caused by
an Egyptian impostor (Acts xxi. 38), who had led out a vast number of
fanatic followers " into the wilderness " to be slain or captured by the
troops of Felix.5
This imperfect description of the Temple-area and of the relations
subsisting between it and the contiguous fortress is sufficient to set the
scene before us, on which the events we are now to relate occurred in
rapid succession. We left St. Paul at the moment when the Levites had
1 Joseph. Ant. xx. 1, 2. The letter is shall recur to the series of procurators in the
quoted in the fifteenth chapter of Mr. Lewin's beginning of the next chapter.
work on the Life and Epistles of St. Paul, a 8 Joseph. Ant. xx. 5, 2. War, ii. 12, 1.
chapter which contains much miscellaneous in- In this narrative the tower of Antonia and its
formation concerning Jerusalem and the Jews guards are particularly mentioned.
at this time. 4 War, ii. 13, 3.
2 Tiberius Alexander, a renegade Jew, in- 6 The passages in Josephus which relate to
ter»ened between Fadus and Cumanus. We this Egyptian, are Ant. xx. 8, 6 ; War, ii. 13, 5.

636 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap. xxi.
closed the gates, lest the Holy Place should be polluted by murder, —
and when the infuriated mob were violently beating the Apostle, with the
full intention of putting him to death. The beginning and rapid prog
ress of the commotion must have been seen by the sentries on the
cloisters and the tower : and news was sent up : immediately to Claudius
Lysias, the commandant of the garrison, that " all Jerusalem was in an
uproar" (v. 31). The spark had fallen on materials the most inflam
mable, and not a moment was to be lost if a conflagration was to be
averted. Lysias himself rushed down instantly, with some of his sub
ordinate officers and a strong body of men,2 into the Temple court. At
the sight of the flashing arms and disciplined movements of the imperial
soldiers, the Jewish mob desisted from their murderous violence. " They
left off beating of Paul." They had for a moment forgotten that the
eyes of the sentries were upon them : but this sudden invasion by their
hated and dreaded tyrants reminded them that they were " in danger to
be called in question for that day's uproar." (Acts xix. 40.)
Claudius Lysias proceeded with the soldiers promptly and directly to
St. Paul,3 whom he perceived to be the central object of all the excite
ment in the Temple court : and in the first place he ordered him to be
chained by each hand to a soldier : 4 for he suspected that he might be
the Egyptian rebel,5 who had himself baffled the pursuit of the Roman
force, though his followers were dispersed. This being done, he proceed
ed to question the bystanders, who were watching this summary pro
ceeding, half in disappointed rage at the loss of their victim, and half in
satisfaction that they saw him at least in captivity. But " when Lysias
demanded who he was and what he had done, some cried one thing, and
some another, among the multitude " (v. 33, 34) ; and when he found
that he could obtain no certain information in consequence of the tumult,
he gave orders that the prisoner should be conveyed into the barracks
within the fortress.6 The multitude pressed and crowded on the soldiers,
as they proceeded to execute this order : so that the Apostle was actually
" carried up " the staircase in consequence of the violent pressure from
below.1 And meanwhile deafening shouts arose from the stairs and from
the court, — the same shouts, which, nearly thirty years before, sur-
1 Literally "came up," v. 31. Compare 4 " Two chains." So St. Peter was bound.
this with " ran down," in the next verse, and Acts xii.
the " stairs," mentioned below. 6 This is evident from his question below,
2 v. 32. If the word (chiliarch) translated v. 38.
" chief captain " is to be understood literally 6 The word used here, v. 34, and below,
of the commander of 1,000 men, the full com- xxii. 24, xxiii. 16, denotes, not " the castle,"
plement of centurions in the castle would be but soldiers' " barracks " within it. It is the
ten. word used of the camp of the Israelites in th*
8 " Then the chief captain drew near." Wilderness. (LXX.'- 7 V. 35.

chap. xxi. HEBREW SPEECH TO THE PEOPLE. 637
rounded the praetorium of Pilate,1 — " Away with him, away with
him!" At this moment,2 the Apostle, with the utmost presence of mind, turned
to the commanding officer who was near him, — and, addressing him in
Greek, said respectfully, " May I speak with thee ? " Claudius Lysias was
startled when he found himself addressed by his prisoner in Greek, and
asked him whether he was then mistaken in supposing he was the Egyp
tian ringleader of the late rebellion. St. Paul replied calmly that he was
no Egyptian, but a Jew ; and he readily explained his knowledge of Greek,
and at the same time asserted his claim to respectful treatment,3 by saying
that he was a native of " Tarsus in Cilicia, a citizen of no mean city : "
and he proceeded to request that he might be allowed to address the peo
ple. The request was a bold one ; and we are almost surprised that
Lysias should have granted it : but there seems to have been something
in St. Paul's aspect and manner, which from the first gained an influence
oeer the mind of the Roman officer ; and his consent was not refused.
And now the whole scene was changed in a moment. St. Paul stood
upon the stairs and turned to the people, and made a motion with the
hand,4 as about to address them. And they too felt the influence of his
presence. Tranquillity came on the sea of heads below : there was " a
great silence : " and he began, saying, — .
xxii
Brethren and Fathers,5 hear me, and let me now defend myself before 1
you. The language which he spoke was Hebrew.6 Had he spoken in Greek,
the majority of those who heard him would have understood his words :
but the sound of the holy tongue in that holy place fell like a calm on the
troubled waters. The silence became universal and breathless : and the
Apostle proceeded to address his countrymen as follows : —
„. ,_._,. * I am myself7 an Israelite, born indeed at Tarsus in Cilicia, 3
His birth and J ' '
education. ^ br0llgafj Up m ^jg G[ij^ an(j taught at the feet of Gamaliel,
1 Compare Luke xxiii. 18, John xix. 15. perhaps members of the Sanhedrin, ancient
2 " When he was on the point of being led Scribes and Doctors of the Law, who were
in," v. 37. stirring up the people against the heretic.
8 We need not repeat all that has been said The phrase generally translated in A. V.
before concerning the importance of Tarsus. " Men and brethren," literally, " Men who are
See pp. 20, 45-48, 98, 99, 220, 221. my brethren," may be equally translated
4 V. 40. Compare xiii. 16, xxvi. 1, also "Brethren."
KXj 34, 6 That is, it was the Hebraic dialect popu-
D To account for this peculiar mode of ad- larly spoken in Judaea, which we now call
iress, we must suppose that mixed with the Syro-Chaldaic.
crowd were men of venerable age and dignity, 7 The pronoun is emphatic.

638 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap. xxi.
« in the s trictest doctrine of the law of our fathers ; and was zealous ' in
4 the cause of God, as ye all are this day. And I persecuted this me persecu
tion of the
sect unto the death, binding with chains and casting into christians.
5 prison both men and women. And of this the High Priest is my witness,
and all the 2 Sanhedrin ; from whom, moreover, I received letters to the
brethren,3 and went4 to Damascus, to bring those also who were there to
Jerusalem, in chains, that they might be punished.
6 But it came to pass that as I journeyed, when I drew nigh
to Damascus, about mid-day, suddenly there shone from heaven 8ion'
7 a great light round about me. And I fell to the ground, and heard a
8 voice saying unto me, Saul, Saul, why persecutest thou me ? And I an
swered, Who art thou, Lord? and He said unto me, I am Jesus of Naza-
9 reth,s whom thou persecutest. And the men who were with me saw the
light, and were terrified ;6 but they heard not the voice of Him that spake
10 unto me. AniIsaid,WhatshallIdo,Lord? And the Lord said unto me,
Arise and go into Damascus, and there thou shalt be told of all things which
are appointed for thee to do.
11 And when I could not see, from the brightness of that light, ms bundnem,
cure, and
my companions led me by the hand, and so I entered into baptism.
12 Damascus. And a certain Ananias, a devout7 man according to the law,
well reported of by all the Jews who dwelt there, came and stood beside
13 me, and said to me, Brother Saul, receive thy sight ; and in that instant T
14 received my sight,8 and looked upon him. And he said, The Cod of our
15 Fathers hath ordained thee to know His will, and to behold the Just One, and to
hear the voice of Sis mouth. For thou shalt be His witness to all the world '
1 See the note on Gal. i. 14. ' The corresponding Greek word is omitted
2 The Presbytery. Compare Luke xxii. in some of the best MSS. (and altered in
66. The high priest here appealed to was the others), probably because the copyists were
person who held that offiee at the time of St. perplexed at finding it not here used in its
Paul's conversion, probably Theophilus, who usual technical sense of a Jewish Proselyte.
was high priest in 37 and 38 a. d. 8 The verb here has the double meaning of
8 i. e. the Jews resident at Damascus. to recover sight and to look up ; in the former
4 Literally, I was on my road (imperf.). of which it is used in the accounts of blind
6 Literally, Jesus the Namrene. Saul was men healed in the Gospels. Here the A. V.
going to cast the Nazarenes (so the Christians translates the same verb by two different
were called, see Acts xxiv. 5) into chains and words.
dungeons when he was stopped by the Lord » The meaning rather stronger than "all
announcing Himself from heaven to be Jesus men."
the Nazarene.
6 The clause " and were terrified " is omit
ted in some of the best MSS.

chap. xxi. HIS ADDRESS SUDDENLY INTERRUPTED. 639
of what thou hast seen and heard. And now, why dost thou delay f Arise 16
and be baptized l and wash away thy sins, calling on the name of Jesus.2
Hisretnmto '^Jlu ** came *° pass, after I had returned to Jerusalem, and 17
Jerusalem. -while I was praying in the Temple, that I was in a trance, and
saw Him saying unto me, Make haste and go forth quickly from Jerusalem; 18
He is com- for ^H m'^ no*' rece^ve *% testimony concerning me. And I 19
vMo^togo to said,3 Lord, they themselves know that I continually 4 imprisoned
the Gentiles. and scourged in every synagogue the believers in Thee. And 20
when the blood of thy martyr 5 Stephen was shed, I myself also was standing
by and consenting gladly 6 to his death,"1 and keeping the raiment of them who
slew him. And He said unto me, Depart ; for I will send thee far hence 21
unto the G-entiles.
At these words St. Paul's address to his countrymen was suddenly in
terrupted. Up to this point he had riveted their attention.8 They listened,
while he spoke to them of his early life, his persecution of the Church,
his mission to Damascus. Many were present who could testify, on their
own evidence, to the truth of what he said. Even when he told them of
his miraculous conversion, his interview with Ananias, and his vision in
the Temple, they listened still. With admirable judgment he deferred
till the last all mention of the Gentiles.9 He spoke of Ananias as, a
" devout man according to the law" (v. 12), as one " well reported of by
all the Jews " (ib.), as one who addressed him in the name of " the God
1 Jjitersllj, cause thyself to bebaptized (mid.). 7 " To his death," though omitted in the
With the following compare 1 Cor. vi. 11. best MSS., is implied in the sense.
2 The best MSS. read "His name," and 8 The verb for listening is in the imperfect;
not " the Lord's name." The reference is to that for the outbreak is in the aorist. See the
the confession of faith in Jesus, which pre- remarks on Stephen's speech, p. 66.
ceded baptism. 9 As an illustration of St. Paul's wisdom, it
3 St. Paul expected at first that the Jews is instructive to observe that in xxvi. 17 it is
at Jerusalem (the members of his own party) distinctly said that Jesus himself announced
would listen to him readily, because they could from heaven Paul's mission to the Gentiles ;
not be more violent against the Nazarenes and that in ix. 15 the same announcement is
than they knew him to have been : and he made to Ananias, — whereas in the address to
therefore thought that they must feel that the Jews this is kept out of view for the mo-
nothing short of irresistible truth could have ment, and reserved till after the vision in the
made him join the sect which he had hated. Temple is mentioned. And again we should
4 Literally, / was imprisoning, I kept on im- observe that while, in ix. 10, Ananias is spoken
prisoning. of as a Christian (see 13), here he is described
6 This word (literally Witness) had not yet as u. strict and pious Jew. He was, in fact,
acquired its technical sense, but here it may be both the one and the other. But, for the pur-
translated Martyr, because the mode in which poses of persuasion, St. Paul lays stress here
Stephen bore testimony was by his death. on the latter point.
6 Compare Bom. i. 32.

640 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap. xn.
of their Fathers " (v. 14). He showed how in his vision he had pleaded
before that God the energy of his former persecution as a proof that his
countrymen must surely be convinced by his conversion : and when he
alluded to the death of Stephen, and the part which he had taken himself
in that cruel martyrdom (v. 20), all the associations of the place where
they stood 1 must (we should have thought) have brought the memory of
that scene with pathetic force before their minds. But when his mission
to the G-entiles was announced, — though the words quoted were the words
of Jehovah spoken in the Temple itself, even as the Lord had once spoken
to Samuel,2 — one outburst of frantic indignation rose from the Temple-
area and silenced the speaker on the stairs. Their national pride bore
down every argument which could influence their reason or their rever
ence. They could not bear the thought of uncircumcised Heathens being
made equal to the sons of Abraham. They cried out that such a wretch
ought not to pollute the earth with his presence — that it was a shame to
have preserved his life : 3 and in their rage and impatience they tossed off
their outer garments (as on that other occasion, when the garments were
laid at the feet of Saul himself),4 and threw up dust into the air with
frantic violence.5 This commotion threw Lysias into new perplexity. He
had not been able to understand the Apostle's Hebrew speech : and, when
he saw its results, he concluded that his prisoner must be guilty of some
enormous crime. He ordered him therefore to be taken immediately
from the stairs into the barracks;6 and to be examined by torture,7 in
order to elicit a confession of his guilt. Whatever instruments wore ne
cessary for this kind of scrutiny would be in readiness within a Roman
fortress; and before long the body8 of the Apostle was " stretched out,"
like that of a common malefactor, " to receive the lashes," with the
officer standing by,9 to whom Lysias had intrusted the superintendence of
this harsh examination.
1 See above, p. 627, n. 1. place themselves near the gate of the palace,
2 1 Sam. iii. where they suppose they are most likelj to be
8 The correct reading appears to put the seen and heard, and then set up a horrid out
verb in the past. It will be remembered that cry, rend their garments, and throw dust into
they were on the point of killing St. Paul, the air, at the same time demanding justice."
when Claudius Lysias rescued him, xxi. 31. Hackett.
4 Compare xxii. 23 with vii. 58. We need 6 See above, p. 636.
not, however, suppose that this tossing of the T v. 24.
garments and throwing of dust was precisely 8 We take the phrase to mean "for the
symbolical of their desire to stone Paul. It thongs," {. e. the straps of which the scourges
denoted simply impatience and disgust. were made. Others consider the word to de-
5 " Sir John Chardin, as quoted by Harmer note the thongs or straps with which the of-
(Obs. iv. 203), says that it is common for the fender was fastened to the post or pillar. In
peasants in Persia, when they have a complaint either case, the use of the article is explained,
to lay before their governors, to repair to them » We see this from v. 25, " he said to the
by hundreds, or a thousand, at once. They centurion, who stood by." Claudius Lysiat

chap. xxi. HIS IMPRISONMENT. 641
Thus St. Paul was on the verge of adding another suffering and disgrace
to that long catalogue of afflictions, which he had enumerated in the last
letter he wrote to Corinth, before his recent visit to that city (2 Cor. xi.
23-25) . Five times scourged by the Jews, once beaten with rods at Phil
ippi, and twice on other unknown occasions, he had indeed been " in stripes
abo^e measure." And now he was in a Roman barrack, among rude
soldiers, with a similar indignity 1 in prospect ; when he rescued himself,
and at the same time gained a vantage-ground for the Gospel, by that ap
peal to his rights as a Roman citizen under which he had before sheltered
his sacred cause at Philippi.2 He said these few words to the centurion
who stood by : " Is it lawful to torture one who is a Roman citizen, and
uncondemned ? " The magic of the Roman law produced its effect in a
moment. The centurion immediately reported the words to his com
manding officer, and said significantly, " Take heed what thou doest : for
this man is a Roman citizen." Lysias was both astonished and alarmed.
He knew full well that no man would dare to assume the right of citizen
ship if it did not really belong to him ; 3 and he hastened in person to his
prisoner. A hurried dialogue took place, from which it appeared, not
only that St. Paul was indeed a Roman citizen, but that he held this
privilege under circumstances far more honorable than his interrogator ;
for while Claudius Lysias had purchased 4 the right for " a great sum,"
Paul5 " was free-born." Orders were instantly given6 for the removal of
the instruments of torture : and those who had been about to conduct the
examination retired. Lysias was compelled to keep the Apostle still in
custody ; for he was ignorant of the nature of his offence : and indeed
this was evidently the only sure method of saving him from destruction
by the Jews. But the Roman officer was full of alarm ; for in his treat
ment of the prisoner 7 he had already been guilty of a flagrant violation
of the law.
himself was not on the spot (see v. 26), but 5 It is unnecessary to repeat here what has
had handed over the Apostle to a centurion been said concerning the citizenship of Paul
who " stood by," as in the case of a military and his father. See pp. 42, 43. For the laws
flogging with us. relating to the privileges of citizens, see again
1 We must distinguish between the scour- p. 269.
ging here (24, 25) and the beating with rods (Acts 6 This is not expressed, but it is implied
xvi. 22; 2 Cor. xi. 25). In the present in- by what follows. "Immediately they went
stance the object was not punishment, but ex- away," &c.
amination. 7 Lysias was afraid, because he had so
2 See p. 269. " bound " the Apostle, as he could not have
8 Such pretensions were liable to capital ventured to do, had he known he was a Roman
punishment. citizen. It seems, that in any case it would
* We learn from Dio Cassius, that the have been illegal to have had immediate re-
civitas of Rome was, in the early part of the course to torture. Certainly it was contrary
reign of Claudius, sold at a high rate, and to the Roman law to put any Roman citizen
afterwards for a mere trifle. to the torture, either by scourging or in any
41

642 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap, xxv
On the following day1 the commandant of the garrison adopted a
milder method of ascertaining the nature of his prisoner's offence. He
summoned a meeting of the Jewish Sanhedrin with the high priests, and
brought St. Paul down from the fortress and set him before them, —
doubtless taking due precautions to prevent the consequences which
might result from a sudden attack upon his safety. Only a narrow space
of the Great Temple Court intervened2 between the steps which led
down from the tower Antonia and those which led up to the hall
Gazith, the Sanhedrin's accustomed place of meeting. If that hall was
used on this occasion, no Heathen soldiers would be allowed to enter it ;
for it was within the balustrade which separated the sanctuary from the
Court. But the fear of pollution would keep the Apostle's life in safety
within that enclosure. There is good reason for believing that the Sanhe
drin met at that period in a place less sacred,3 to which the soldiers would
be admitted ; but this is a question into which we need not enter. Wher
ever the council sat, we are suddenly transferred from the interior of a
Roman barrack to a scene entirely Jewish.
Paul was now in presence of that council, before which, when he
was himself a member of it, Stephen had been judged. That moment
could hardly be forgotten by him : but he looked steadily at his inquisi
tors ; 4 among whom he would recognize many who had been his fellow-
pupils in the school of Gamaliel, and his associates in the persecution of
the Christians. That unflinching look of conscious integrity offended
them, — and his confident words — " Brethren,5 1 have always lived a
conscientious6 life before God, up to this very day" — so enraged the
high priest, that he commanded those who stood near to strike him on the
mouth. This brutal insult roused the Apostle's feelings, and he exclaimed,
" God shall smite thee, thou whited wall : 7 sittest thou to judge me
according to the law, and then in defiance of the law dost thou command
me to be struck ? " If we consider these words as an outburst of natural
indignation, we cannot severely blame them, when we remember St.
Paul's temperament,8 and how they were provoked. If we regard them
other way. Under the Imperial regime, how- 6 This assertion of habitual conscientious-
ever, so early as the time of Tiberius, this rule ness is peculiarly characteristic of St. Paul.
was violated ; and torture was applied to citi- See 2 Tim. i. 3, where there is also a reference
zens of the highest rank, more and more to his forefathers, as in v. 6 below. Compare
freely. ch. xxvi.
1 V. 30. i With " whited wall " compare Our Sa-
2 See above. 8 See p. 65. viour's comparison of hypocrites with " whited
4 Acts xxiii. 1. Seep. 134, n. 1. sepulchres" (Matt, xxiii. 27). Lightfoot goes
8 It should be observed, that, both here and so far here as to say that the words them-
below (vv. 5, 6), he addresses the Sanhedrin as selves mean that Ananias had the semblance
equals, — " Brethren," — whereas in xxii. 1 he of the high priest's office without the reality.
says, " Brethren and Fathers." 8 See p. 46.

chap. xxi. ST. PAUL BEFORE THE SANHEDRIN. 643
as a prophetic denunciation, they were terribly fulfilled when this hypo
critical president of the Sanhedrin was murdered by the assassins in the
Jewish war.1 In whatever light we view them now, those who were
present in the Sanhedrin treated them as profane and rebellious. " Revi-
lest thou God's high priest ? " was the indignant exclamation of the
bystanders. And then Paul recovered himself, and said, with Christian
meekness and forbearance, that he did not consider2 that Ananias was
high priest ; otherwise he would not so have spoken, seeing that it is
written in the Law,3 " ®&<M Sfoatt not mitt* tUt vvAtx oi tltt} people." But
the Apostle had seen enough to be convinced that there was no prospect
before this tribunal of a fair inquiry and a just decision. He therefore
adroitly adopted a prompt measure for enlisting the sympathies of those
who agreed with him in one doctrine, which, though held to be an open
question on Judaism, was an essential truth in Christianity.4 He knew
that both Pharisees and Sadducees were among his judges, and well
aware that, however united they might be in the outward work of perse
cution, they were divided by an impassable line in the deeper matters of
religious faith, he cried out, " Brethren, I am a Pharisee, and all my
forefathers were Pharisees : 5 it is for the hope of a resurrection from the
dead that I am to be judged this day." This exclamation produced
an instantaneous effect on the assembly. It was the watchword which
marshalled the opposing forces in antagonism to each other.6 The Phari
sees felt a momentary hope that they might use their ancient partisan as
a new weapon against their rivals ; and their hatred against the Sadducees
was even greater than their hatred of Christianity. They were vehement
in their vociferations ; 7 and their language was that which Gamaliel had
used more calmly many years before 8 (and possibly the aged Rabban may
have been present himself in this very assembly) : 9 "If this doctrine be
1 He was killed by the Sicarii. Joseph. know from Josephus, that there was the great-
War, ii. 17, 9. est irregularity in the appointments about this
2 The use of this English word retains time. Lastly, it has been suggested (p. 134,
something of the ambiguity of the original. n. 1), that the imperfection of St. Paul's vision
It is difficult to decide positively on the mean- (supposed to be implied in xxiii. 1 ) was the
ing of the words. Some think that St. Paul cause of the mistake. 8 Ex. xxii. 28.
meant to confess that he had been guilty of a 4 For these two sects, see the early part of
want of due reflection, — others that he spoke Ch. H.
ironically, as refusing to recognize a man like 6 " Pharisees," not " Pharisee," is the read-
Ananias as high priest, — others have even ing best supported by MSS., and the plural is
thought that there was in the words an in- far more forcible. See pp. 31, 32.
spired reference to the abolition of the sacerdo- 6 " There arose a discussion, . . . and the
tal system of the Jews, and the sole priesthood multitude was divided," v. 7. Compare " they
of Christ. Another class of interpreters re- strove," v. 9.
gard St. Paul as ignorant of the fact that An- ' " There arose a great cry," v. 9.
anias was high priest, or argue that Ananias B Acts v. 39.
was not really installed in his ofiice. And we ° It appears that he died about two years

644 THE LIFE AND- EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap. xxi.
of God, ye cannot destroy it : beware lest ye be found to be fighting
against God." '"' We find no fault in this man : what, if (as he says) 1 an
angel or a spirit have indeed spoken to him "  The sentence was
left incomplete or unheard in the uproar.2 The judgment-hall became a
scene of the most violent contention ; and presently Claudius Lysias
received information of what was taking place, and fearing lest the Roman
citizen, whom he was bound to protect, should be torn in pieces between
those who sought to protect him, and those who thirsted for his destruc
tion, he ordered the troops to go down instantly, and bring him back into
the soldiers' quarters within the fortress.3
So passed this morning of violent excitement. In the evening, when
Paul was isolated both from Jewish enemies and Christian friends, and
surrounded by the uncongenial sights and sounds of a soldier's barrack,
— when the agitation of his mind subsided, and he was no longer strung
up by the presence of his persecutors, or supported by sympathizing
brethren, — can we wonder that his heart sank, and that he looked with
dread on the vague future that was before him ? Just then it was that
he had one of those visions by night, which were sometimes vouchsafed
to him at critical seasons of his life, and in providential conformity with
the circumstances in which he was placed. The last time when we were
informed of such an event was when he was in the house of Aquila and
Priscilla at Corinth, and when he was fortified against the intimidation
of the Jews by the words, " Fear not : for I am with thee." (Acts xviii.
9, 10.) The next instance we shall have to relate is in the worst part of
the storm at sea, between Fair Havens and Malta, when a similar assur
ance was given to him: " Fear not : thou must stand before Caesar."
(Ib. xxvii. 24.) On the present occasion, events were not sufficiently
matured for him to receive a prophetic intimation in this explicit form.
He had, indeed, long looked forward to a visit to Rome : but the pros-
after this time. See p. 53. We may refer ¦ doctrine of the resurrection (v. 30). When
here to the observations of Mr. Birks in the Gamaliel interposes, it is noted that he was a
Horce Apostolicce (No. xvi.) appended to his re- Pharisee, &c." (v. 34).
cent edition of the Horce Paulinos, where he 1 There is probably a tacit reference to what
applies the jealousy and mutual antipathy of St. Paul had said, in his speech on the stairs,
the Sadducees and Pharisees, to explain the concerning his vision in the Temple.
conduct of Gamaliel at the former trial, and 2 There seems no doubt that the words "let
thus traces " an unobtrusive coincidence " be- us not fight against God," ought not to be in
tween this passage and the narrative in Acts the text ; and that there is an aposiopesis,
v. " First, the leaders in the persecution were either voluntary for the sake of emphasis, or
Sadducees (v. 17). In the next place, it was compulsory because of the tumult. Perhaps
a doctrinal offence which was charged upon the phrase " fighters against God," in Acts v.
them (v. 28). Again, the answer of Peter, 39, may have led to the interpolation.
while an explicit testimony to the claims of 8 xxiii. 10.
Jesus, is an equally plain avowal of the

chap, in CONSPIRACY. 645
pect now seemed farther off than ever. And it was at this anxious time
that he was miraculously comforted and strengthened by Him who is
44 the confidence of all the ends of the earth, and of them that are afar
off upon the sea ; who by His strength setteth fast the mountains ; who
stilleth the noise of the seas and the tumult of the people." In the
visions of the night, the Lord -himself stood by him, and said, " Be of
good cheer, Paul ; for as thou hast testified of me at Jerusalem, so must
thou testify also at Rome." (Ib. xxiii. 11.)
The contrast is great between the peaceful assurance thus secretly
given to the faith of the Apostle in his place of imprisonment, and the
active malignity of his enemies in the city. When it was day, more than
forty of the Jews entered into a conspiracy to assassinate Paul : J and,
that, they might fence round their crime with all the sanction of religion,
they bound themselves by a curse, that they would eat and drink nothing
till the deed was accomplished.2 Thus fortified by a dreadful oath, they
came before the chief priests and members of the Sanhedrin,3 and pro
posed the following plan, which seems to have been readily adopted.
The Sanhedrists were to present themselves before Claudius Lysias, with
the request that he would allow the prisoner to be brought once more
before the Jewish Court, that they might enter into a further investiga
tion : 4 and the assassins were to lie in wait, and murder the Apostle on
his way down 5 from the fortress. The plea to be brought before Lysias
was very plausible : and it is probable, that, if he had received no
further information, he would have acted on it : for he well knew that
the proceedings of the Court had been suddenly interrupted the day
before,6 and he would be glad to have his perplexity removed by the
1 With the direct narrative, v. 12-15, we only momentary, and that the temporary
should compare closely the account given by schism had been healed in the common wish to
St. Paul's nephew, vv. 20, 21. destroy him. The Pharisees really hated him
2 So we are told by Josephus that ten Jews the most. It would seem, moreover, from
bound themselves by a solemn oath to as- xxiv. 15, that Pharisees appeared as accusers
sassinate Herod, and that before their execution before Felix.
they maintained "that their oath had been 4 Or rather "that he might enter, &c."
well and piously taken." Ant. xv. 8, 3, 4. Such seems the true reading. See the next
Hackett quotes from Philo a formal justifica- note but two.
tion of such assassinations of apostates. In 6 "Bringdown," v. 15 and v. 20. So "take
illustration of the form of the oath, Lightfoot down,'' v. 10, and "bringing down," xxii. 30.
shows from the Talmud that those who were The accurate use of these words should be
implicated in such an oath could obtain absolu- compared with what is said by Josephus and
tion. by St. Luke himself of the stairs between the
8 Most of the commentators are of opinion Temple and the fortress. They present us
that only the Sadducean party is contemplated with an undesigned consistency in a matter of
here, the Pharisees having espoused St. Paul's topography ; and they show that the writer
cause. But it is far more natural to suppose was familiar with the place he is describing.
that their enthusiasm in his behalf had been 6 See above.

646 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap, xxi
results of a new inquiry.1 The danger to which the Apostle was exposed
was most imminent : and there has seldom been a more horrible example
of crime masked under the show of religious zeal.
The plot was ready : 2 aiid the next day 3 it would have been carried
into effect, when God was pleased to confound the schemes of the conspir
ators. The instrument of St. Paul's safety was one of his own relations,4
the son of that sister whom we have before mentioned (p. 46) as the
companion of his childhood at Tarsus. It is useless to attempt to
draw that veil aside which screens the history of this relationship from
our view, though the narrative seems to give us hints of domestic inter
course at Jerusalem,5 of which, if it were permitted to us, we would
gladly know more. Enough is told to us to give a favorable impression,
both of the affection and discretion of the Apostle's nephew : nor is he
the only person the traits of whose character are visible in the artless
simplicity of the narrative. The young man came into the barracks,
and related what he knew of the conspiracy to his uncle ; to whom he
seems to have had perfect liberty of access.6 Paul, with his usual prompti
tude and prudence, called one of the centurions to him, and requested
him to take the youth 7 to the commandant, saying that he had a commu
nication to make to him.8 The officer complied at once, and took the
young man with this message from " the prisoner Paul " to Claudius
Lysias ; who — partly from the interest he felt in the prisoner, and
partly, we need not doubt, from the natural justice and benevolence of
his disposition — received the stranger kindly, " took him by the hand,
and led him aside, and asked him in private " to tell him what he had to
say. The young man related the story of the conspiracy in full detail,
and with much feeling. Lysias listened to his statement and earnest
entreaties ; 9 then, with a soldier's promptitude, and yet with the caution
of one who felt the difficulty of the situation, he decided at once on what
1 If the Sanhedrin were about to investi- Paul's sister and nephew resided at Jerusalem,
gate (see v. 15), it would be in order that and, if so, why he lodged, not with them, but
Claudius Lysias might obtain more informa- with Mnason (above, p. 617).
tion : and it would be more natural for the 6 So afterwards at Csesarea, xxiv. 23.
young man to put the matter before him in this "Felix commanded to let him have liberty,
point of view. and that he should forbid none of his acquaint-
2 Observe the young man's words, v. 21 : ance to minister or come to him." See the
" and now are they ready, looking for a prom- next chapter for a description of the nature
ise from thee." of the Custodia, in which St. Paul was kept,
8 " To-morrow," v. 20. It is in the young both at Jerusalem and Cassarea.
man's statement that this precise reference to 7 The word for " young man " is indeter-
time occurs. In v. 15, the word appears to be minate, but the whole narrative gives the im-
an interpolation. pression that he was a very young man. See
4 vv. 16-22. p. 99) n. 4.
6 Two questions easily asked, but not easily 8 w. 17, 18.
answered, suggest themselves — whether St. 9 "But do not thou yield unto them," t 21.

<ihap.xxi. A NIGHT JOURNEY. 647
he would do, but without communicating the plan to his informant. He
simply dismissed him, with a significant admonition, — " Be careful that
thou tell no man that thou hast laid this information before me."
When the young man was gone, Claudius Lysias summoned one or two
of his subordinate officers,1 and ordered them to have in readiness two
hundred of the legionary soldiers, with seventy of the cavalry, and
two hundred spearmen ; 2 so as to depart for Caesarea at nine in the
evening,3 and take Paul in safety to Felix the governor. The journey
was long, and it would be requisite to accomplish it as rapidly as possible.
He therefore gave directions that more than one horse should be provided
for the prisoner .4 We may be surprised that so large a force was sent to
secure the safety of one man ; but we must remember that this man was
a Roman citizen, while the garrison in Antonia, consisting of more than a
thousand men,5 could easily spare such a number for one day on such a
service ; and further, that assassinations, robberies, and rebellions were
frequent occurrences at that time in Judaea,6 and that a conspiracy also
wears a formidable aspect to those who are responsible for the public
peace. The utmost secrecy, as well as promptitude, was evidently re
quired ; and therefore an hour was chosen, when the earliest part of the
night would be already past. At the time appointed, the troops, with St.
Paul in the midst of them, marched out of the fortress, and at a rapid
pace took the road to Caesarea.
It is to the quick journey and energetic researches of an American
traveller that we owe the power of following the exact course of this
night-march from Jerusalem to Caesarea.7 In an earlier part of this
1 The full complement of centurions would ten cohorts in a legion ; and each legion con-
be ten. See below, p. 650, u. 8. tained more than 6,000 men, besides an equal
2 The rendering in the Authorized Version number of auxiliaries and a squadron of
is probably as near as any other to the true horse : but see the next chapter, especially p.
meaning. The singular word used here dis- 656. 6 See the next chapter.
tino-uishes the soldiers in question from legion- ' See " A Visit to Antipatris," by the Rev.
ary soldiers and from cavalry, and tlierefore Eli Smith, missionary in Palestine, in the
doubtless means light-armed troops. Moreover Bibliotheca Sacra, vol. i. pp. 478-496. The
the word seems to imply the use of some wea- journey was expressly taken (on the way from
pon simply carried in the right hand. As to Jerusalem to Joppa) for the purpose of ascer-
the mixture of troops in the escort sent by taining St. Paul's route to Antipatris ; and
Claudius Lysias, we may remark that he sent the whole of this circuitous route to Joppa
forces adapted to act on all kinds of ground, was accomplished in two days. The article is
and from the imperfect nature of his informa- followed by some valuable remarks by Dr.
tion he could not be sure that an ambuscade Robinson, who entirely agrees with Mr. E.
might not be laid in the way; and at least Smith, though he had previously assumed
banditti were to be feared. See p. 656. (Bibl. Res. iii. 46, 60) that St. Paul's escort
8 "And at the third hour of the night," v. had gone by the pass of Bethoron, a route
23, sometimes used, as by Cestius Gallius on his
* V. 24. . march from Caesarea by Lydda to Jerusalem.
6 The oireipa was a cohort. There were Joseph. War, ii. 19, 1.

648

THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL.

work, we have endeavored to give an approximate representation of the
Roman roads as they existed in Palestine ; l and we have had occasion
more than once to allude to the route which lay. between the religious and
political capitals of the country.2 To the roads previously mentioned we
must add another, which passes, not by Lydda3 (or Diospolis), but more
directly across the intermediate space from Gophna to Antipatris. We
have thus the whole route to Caesarea before us ; and we are enabled to
picture to ourselves the entire progress of the little army, which took St.
Paul in safety from the conspiracies of the Jews, and placed him under
the protection of Felix the governor.
The road lay first, for about three hours, northwards,4 along the high
mountainous region which divides the valley of the Jordan from the
great western plain of Judaea.5 About midnight they would reach
Gophna.6 Here, after a short halt, they quitted the northern road which
leads to Neapolis 7 and Damascus, once travelled by St. Paul under widely
different circumstances, — and turned towards the coast on the left.
Presently they began to descend among the western eminences and
valleys of the mountain-country,8 startling the shepherd on the hills of
Ephraim, and rousing the village peasant, who woke only to curse his

1 Ch. IJI. In the larger editions these roads
are shown in a map.
2 Pp. 50, 97, 370, 617.
8 See Acts ix. 32. For geographical illus
tration, we may refer to the movements of
Peter in reference to Lydda, Joppa, Caesarea,
and Jerusalem (ix. 38, x. 23, 24, xi. 2), and
also those of Philip in reference to Sebaste ("!)
in Samaria, Azotus, Gaza, and Caesarea (viii).
4 This part of the road has been mentioned
before (p. 78) as one where Dr. Robinson fol
lowed the line of a Roman pavement. With
the very full description in his third volume,
pp. 75-80, the map in the first volume should
be compared. Mr. E. Smith mentions this
part of the route briefly, B. S. pp. 478, 479.
6 P. 78.
6 " We rode hastily to Bireh . . . reached
Bireh in 2 h. 20 m  35 m. from Bireh,
we came to ruins. Here we found we had
mistaken our path. . . . 30 m. from hence we
took the following bearings, &c. . . . reached
Jufna in 30 m." B. S. 479. Compare the
time in Dr. Robinson's account.
7 P. 78.
8 " We started [from Jufna] by the oldest
road to Kefr Saba. ... In 20 m. reached Bir
Zeit. In this distance, we found evident re

mains of the pavement of a Roman road, af
fording satisfactory proof that we had not
mistaken our route." B. S. 480. " The whole
of our way down the mountain was a very
practicable, and, for the most part, a very easy
descent. It seemed formed by nature for a
road ; and we had not descended far from the
point where our observations were made, be
fore we came again upon the Roman pave
ment. This we continued to find at intervals
during the remainder of the day. In some
places, for a considerable distance, it was
nearly perfect ; and then, again, it was en
tirely broken up, or a turn in our path made
us lose sight of it. Yet we travelled hardly
half an hour at any time without finding dis
tinct traces of it. I do not remember observ
ing anywhere before so extensive remains of
a, Roman road," p. 482. " A few minutes be
yond the village [Um Sufah], a branch of the
road led off to the right, where, according to
our guides, it furnishes a more direct route to
Kefr Saba. But just at this point the Roman
road was fortunately seen following the path
on the left;, and thus informed us very dis
tinctly that this was the direction for us to
take," p. 483,

CHAP. xxi.

ANTIPATRIS

649

oppressor, as he heard the hoofs of the horses on the pavement, and the
well-known tramp of the Roman soldiers. A second resting-place might
perhaps be found at Thamna,1 a city mentioned by Josephus in the Jewish
wars, and possibly the " Timnath Heres," where Joshua 2 was buried " in
Mount Ephraim, in the border of his inheritance." And then they
proceeded, still descending over a rocky and thinly-cultivated tract,3 till
about daybreak they came to the ridge of the last hill,4 and overlooked
" the great plain of Sharon coming quite up to its base on the west."
The road now turned northwards,5 across the rich land of the plain
of Sharon, through fields of wheat and barley,6 just then almost ready
for the harvest. " On the east were the mountains of Samaria, rising
gradually above each other, and bounding the plain in that direction :
on the left lay a line of low wooded hills, shutting it in from the
sea." Between this higher and lower range, but on the level ground, in
a place well watered and richly wooded, was the town of Antipatris.
Both its history and situation are described to us by Josephus. The
ancient Caphar-Saba, from which one of the Asmonean princes had dug
a trench and built a wall to Joppa, to protect the country from inva-

1 One of the collateral results of Mr. Eli
Smith's journey is the identification of the
Bite of this city — not the Timnath of Josh.
xv. 10 — but a place mentioned in the follow
ing passages of Josephus, Ant. xiv. 11, 2;
War, iii. 3, 5, iv. 8, 1 : also 1 Mace. ix. 50.
The ruins are now called Tibneh.
2 Josh. xix. 49, 50, xxiv. 30 ; Judg. ii. 8,
9. Mr. E. Smith observed some remarkable
sepulchres at Tibneh.
8 B. S. 486, 487. The traveller was still
guided by the same indications of the ancient
road. " Hastening on [from Tibneh], and pass
ing occasionally portions of the Roman road, we
reached in 40 m. the large town of Abud. . . .
To the left of our road we passed several se
pulchral excavations, marking this as an' an
cient place. Our path led us for a considera
ble distance down a gentle but very rocky
descent, which was the beginning of a Wady.
Through nearly the whole of it, we either rode
upon or by the side of the Roman road. At
length the Wady became broader, and with its
declivities was chiefly occupied with fields of
grain and other cultivation. . . . After clear
ing the cultivation in the neighborhood, we
passed over a hilly tract, with little cultivation,
and thinly sprinkled with shrubbery. ... In
our descent, which was not great, we thought
we could discern further traces of the Roman

road. But it was nearly dark, and we may
possibly have been mistaken."
* At this point is the village of Mejdel
Yaba in the province of Nablous. " It stands
on the top of a hill, with the valley of Belat on
the south, a branch Wady running into it
on the east, and the great plain of Sharon
coming quite up to its base on the west," p.
488. Mr. E. Smith arrived there at eight in
the evening, having ridden about thirty miles
since the morning. The next day he says :
" I was disappointed in not procuring so many
bearings from Mejdel Yaba as I had hoped.
The rising sun shooting his rays down the
side of the mountain prevented our seeing
much in that direction," p. 490.
6 From Mejdel Yaba Mr. E. Smith did not
take the direct route to Kefr Saba, "which
would have led northward, probably in the
direction of the Roman road," but went more
to the west, by Ras-el-Ain, and across the river
Anjeh near its source, and then by Jiljulieh.
6 " Its soil is an inexhaustible black loam,
and nearly the whole of it was now under
cultivation, presenting a scene of fertility and
rural beauty rarely equalled. Immense fields
of wheat and barley, waving in the breeze,
were advancing rapidly to maturity," p. 491.
This was on the 27th of April, almost the
exact time of St. Paul's journey.

050 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap. xx,.
sion,1 was afterwards rebuilt by Herod, and named in honor of his father
Antipater.2 It is described in one passage as being near the mountains ; 3
and in another, as in the richest plain of his dominions, with abundance
both of water and wood.4 In the narrative of the Jewish war, Antipatris
is mentioned as one of the scenes of Vespasian's first military proceed
ings.5 It afterwards disappears from history ; 6 but the ancient name is
still familiarly used by the peasantry, and remains with the physical
features of the neighborhood to identify the site.1
The foot-soldiers proceeded no farther than Antipatris, but returned
from thence to Jerusalem (xxiii. 32). They were no longer necessary to
secure St. Paul's safety ; for no plot by the way was now to be appre
hended ; but they might very probably be required in the fortress of
Antonia.8 It would be in the course of the afternoon that the remaining
soldiers with their weary horses entered the streets of Cassarea. The
centurion who remained in command of them 9 proceeded at once to the
governor, and gave up his prisoner ; and at the same time presented the
despatch,10 with which he was charged by the commandant of the garrison
at Jerusalem.
We have no record of the personal appearance of Felix ; but if we
may yield to the impression naturally left by what we know of his sensual
and ferocious character,11 we can imagine the countenance with which he
read the following despatch.12 " Claudius Lysias sends greeting to the
most Excellent 13 Felix the governor. This man was apprehended by the
Jews, and on the point of being killed by them, when I came and rescued
him with my military guard : 14 for L learnt that he was a Roman citizen.19
And wishing to ascertain the charge which they had to allege against him, I
1 Joseph. Ant. xiii. 15, 1 ; War, i. 4, 7. others returned. Possibly he is the same officer
2 Ant. xvi. 5, 2 ; War, i. 21, 9. 3 War, i. 4, 7. who is mentioned xxiv. 23. i0 Acts xxiii. 33.
4 Ant. xvi. 5, 2 ; War, i. 21, 9. n See next chapter. « Acts xxiii. 26.
6 Hearing of the revolt of Vindex from i8 "His Excellency the Governor." This
Nero, " he moved his forces in spring from is apparently an official title. Tertullus uses
Cassarea towards Antipatris." — War, iv. 8, 1. the .same style, in addressing Felix, xxiv. 3,
6 It is mentioned by Jerome as a, " small and Paul himself, in addressing Festus, xxvi.
town half ruined." It occurs in Jerusalem 25. Hence we may suppose Theophilus (who
Itinerary between Caesarea and Jerusalem; is thus addressed, Luke i. 3) to have been a
and the distances are given. man holding official rank.
? The existence of a place called Kafar « In A. V. (through forgetfulness of the
Saba in this part of the plain was known to definite article) this is unfortunately translated
Prokesch, and its identity with Antipatris " with an army."
was suggested by Raumer, Rob. Bib. Res. iii. u This statement was dexterously inserted
45-47. This identity may be considered now by Claudias Lysias to save himself from dis-
as proved beyond a doubt. For some remarks grace. But it was false ; for it is impossible not
on minor difficulties, see our note here in the to see " I learnt " intends to convey the im-
larger editions. pression that Paul's Roman citizenship was the
8 It is explicitly stated that they came back cause of the rescue, whereas this fact did not
to their quarters at Jerusalem. come to his knowledge till afterwards. Some
9 One centurion would remain while the of the commentators have justly observed that

FELIX.

651

took him down ! to their Sanhedrin : and there I found that the charge had
reference to certain questions of their law, and that he was accused of no
offence worthy of death or imprisonment. And now, having received infor
mation that a plot is about to be formed against the man's life, I send2 him
to thee forthwith, and I have told his accusers that they must bring their
charge before thee? Farewell.'" 4
Felix raised his eyes from the paper, and said, " To what province does
he belong ? " It was the first question which a Roman governor would
naturally ask in such a case. So Pilate had formerly paused, when he
found he was likely to trespass on " Herod's jurisdiction." Besides the
delicacy required by etiquette, the Roman law laid down strict rules for
all inter-provincial communications. In the present case there could be
• no great difficulty for the moment. A Roman citizen with certain vague
charges brought against him was placed under the protection of a pro
vincial governor, who was bound to keep him in safe custody till the
cause should be heard. Having therefore ascertained that Paul was a
native of the province of Cicilia,5 Felix simply ordered him to be kept in
" Herod's praetorium," and said to Paul himself, " I will hear and decide
thy cause6 when thy accusers are come." Here, then, we leave the Apos
tle for a time. A relation of what befell him at Caesarea will be given in
another chapter, to which an account of the political state of Palestine,
and a description of Herod's city, will form a suitable introduction.

this dexterous falsehood is an incidental proof
of the genuineness of the document.
1 " Took down." Here we may repeat what
has been said above concerning the topography
of Antonia and the Temple.
2 This is the natural English translation.
Our letters are expressed as from the writer's
point of view : those of the ancients were adapt
ed to the position of the reader.
8 " Before thee," at the termination, emphatic.
4 " Farewell." The MSS. vary as to the gen
uineness of this word. If the evidence is equally

balanced, we should decide in its favor ; for it
is exactly the Latin " Vale." Such despatches
from a subordinate to a commanding officer
would naturally be in Latin. See p. 2.
6 The word here is tnapxia, v. 34. It has
already been observed (pp. 130, 131) that this
is a general term for both the Emperor's and
the Senate's provinces, just as fryeuuv is a
general term for the government of either.
For the province of Cilicia, see p. 214.
6 Such is the meaning of the phrase, v. 35.
So in xxiv. 22.

View of Caesarea.

CHAPTER XXn.
History of Judaea resumed. — Roman Governors. — Felix. — Troops quartered in Palestine. -
Description of Cassarea. — St. Paul accused there. — Speech before Felix. — Continued Im
prisonment. — Accession of Festus. — Appeal to the Emperor. — Speech before Agrippa.
WE have pursued a long and varied narrative since we last took a
general view of the political history of Judaea. The state of this
part of the Empire in the year 44 was briefly summed up in a previous
chapter (Ch. IV.). It was then remarked that this year and the year 60
were the two only points which we can regard as fixed in the annals of
the earliest Church, and, therefore, the two best chronological pivots
of the Apostolic history.1 We have followed the life of the Apostle Paul
through a space of fourteen years from the former of these dates ; and
now we are rapidly approaching the second. Then we recounted the
miserable end of King Agrippa I. Now we are to speak of Agrippa II.,
who, like his father, had the title of King, though his kingdom was not
identically1 the same.2
The life of the second Agrippa ranges over the last period of national
Jewish history, and the first age of the Christian Church ; and both his
life and that of his sisters Drusilla and Berenice are curiously connected,
by manifold links, with the general history of the times. This Agrippa
saw the destruction of Jerusalem, and lived till the first century was
closed in the old age of St. John, — the last of a dynasty eminent for
magnificence and intrigue. Berenice concluded a life of profligacy by a
criminal connection with Titus, the conqueror of Jerusalem.8 Drusilla
1 We assume that Festus succeeded Felix Berenice is so mixed up with the history of
in the year 60. In support of this opinion we the times, and she is so often mentioned, both
must refer to the note (C) upon the Chrono- by Josephus and by Roman writers, that it is
logical Table, Appendix III. desirable to put together here some of the
2 Agrippa II. was made king of Chalcis principal notices of her life and character,
a.d. 48 — he received a further accession of She was first married to her uncle, Herod, king
territory a. d. 53, and died, at the age of 70, of Chalcis ; and after his death she lived with
a. d. 99. He was intimate with Josephus, and her brother, Agrippa, not without suspicion of
was the last prince of the Herodian house. the most criminal intimacy. (Joseph. Ant. xx.
8 Titus seems to have been only prevented 7,3.) Compare Juvenal, vi. 155.
from marrying this beautiful and profligate It was during this period of her life that she
princess by the indignant feeling of the Ro- made that marriage with Polemo, king of
mans. See Dio Cass. lxvi. 15. The name of Cilicia, which has been alluded to in the earlier
652

"«ap. xxn. JUDJEA. 653
hecame the wife of Felix, and perished with the child of that union in
the eruption of Vesuvius.
We have said that the kingdom of this Agrippa was not coincident
with that of his father. He was never, in fact, King of Judma. The
three years during which Agrippa I. reigned at Caesarea were only an
interpolation in the long series of Roman procurators who ruled Judaea,
in subordination to the governors of Syria, from the death of Herod the
Great to the final destruction of Jerusalem. In the year 44, the second
Agrippa was only sixteen years old, and he was detained about the court
of Claudius, while Cuspius Fadus was sent out to direct the provincial
affairs at Caesarea.1 It was under the administration of Fadus that those
religious movements took place, which ended (as we have seen above,
p. 635) in placing under the care of the Jews the sacred vestments kept
in the tower of Antonia, and which gave to Herod king of Chalcis the
management of the Temple and its treasury, and the appointment of the
high priests. And in other respects the Jews had reason to remember
his administration with gratitude ; for he put down the banditti which
had been the pest of the country under Agrippa ; and the slavish com
pliment of Tertullus to Felix (Acts xxiv. 2, 3) might have been
addressed to him with truth, — that " by him the Jews enjoyed great
quietness, and that very worthy deeds had been done to the nation by
his providence." He was succeeded by Tiberius Alexander, a renegade
Alexandrian Jew, and the nephew of the celebrated Philo.2 In relation
to the life of this, official in Judaea, there are no incidents worth record
ing : at a later period we see him at the siege of Jerusalem in command
of Roman forces under Titus : 3 and the consequent inscriptions in his
honor at Rome served to point the sarcasm of the Roman satirist.4 Soon
after the arrival of Ventidius Cumanus to succeed him as governor 5 in
the year 48, Herod king of Chalcis died, and Agrippa II. was placed on
his throne, with the same privileges in reference to the Temple and its
worship which had been possessed by his uncle. " During the govern
ment of Cumanus, the low and sullen murmurs which announced the
approaching eruption of the dark volcano, now gathering its strength in
Palestine, became more distinct. The people and the Roman soldiery
part of this work. (p. 23.) Soon she left on the occasion alluded to, p. f 25. (See
Polemo, and returned to her brother: and Joseph. War, ii. 15, 16.)
then it was that St. Paul was brought before * Joseph. Ant. xix. 9, xx. 5, 1. War, ii.
them at Caesarea. After this time, she became 11, 6.
a partisan of Vespasian. Tac. Hist. ii. 81. 2 Joseph. Ant. xx. 5, 2.
Her connection with Vespasian's son is men- 8 War, v. 1,6. Compare ii. 18, 7 ; and Iv.
tioned by Suetonius and by Tacitus, as well as 10, 6.
by Dio Cassius. The one redeeming passage * Juv. i. 129.
in her life is the patriotic feeling she displayed 6 Ant. xx. 5, 2. War, ii. 12, 1.

654 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap, xxi
began to display mutual animosity." ' One indication of this animosity
has been alluded to before,2 — the dreadful loss of life in the Temple which
resulted from the wanton insolence of one of the soldiers in Antonia at
the time of a festival. Another was the excitement which eu?ued after
the burning of the Scriptures by the Roman troops at Beth-Horou, on the
road between Jerusalem and Caesarea. An attack made by the Samari
tans on some Jews who were proceeding through their country to a
festival led to wider results.3 Appeal was made to Quadratus, governor
of Syria ; and Cumanus was sent to Rome to answer for his conduct to
the Emperor. In the end he was deposed, and Felix, the brother of
Pallas the freedman and favorite of Claudius, was (partly by the influ
ence of Jonathan the high priest) appointed to succeed him.4
The mention of this governor, who was brought into such intimate
relations with St. Paul, demands that we should enter now more closely
into details. The origin of Felix and the mode of his elevation would
prepare us to expect in him such a character as that which is condensed
into a few words by Tacitus,5 — that, " in the practice of all kinds of lust
and cruelty, he exercised the power of a king with the temper of a
slave." The Jews had, indeed, to thank him for some good services to
their nation. He cleared various parts of the country from robbers;8
and he pursued and drove away that Egyptian fanatic,1 with whom
Claudius Lysias too hastily identified St. Paul.8 But the same historian
from whom we derive this information gives us a terrible illustration of
his cruelty in the story of the murder of Jonathan, to whom Felix was
partly indebted for his own elevation. The high priest had presumed to
expostulate with the governor on some of his practices, and assassins
were forthwith employed to murder him in the sanctuary of the Temple.9
And as this crime illustrates one part of the sentence, in which Tacitus
describes his character, so we may see the other parts of it justified and
elucidated in the narrative of St. Luke ; — that which speaks of him as a
voluptuary, by his union with Drusilla, whom he had enticed from her
husband by aid of a magician, who is not unreasonably identified by some
with Simon Magus,10 — and that which speaks of his servile meanness,
1 Milman's Hist, of the Jews, ii. 203. Felix, it has been supposed that he was manu-
2 See the preceding chapter, p. 635. For mitted by Antonia, the mother of Claudius.
Beth-Horon, see p. 647, n. 7. 6 Hist. v. 9. See Ant. xii. 54.
8 Ant. xx. 6. War, ii. 12. 8 War, ii. 13, 2.
4 Josephus and Tacitus differ as to the cir- 7 Ant. xx. 8, 6. War, ii. 13, 5.
cumstances of his first coming into the East. 8 See the preceding chapter.
According to one account, he was joint-pro- • Ant. xx. 8, 5. His treachery to Eleazar
/ curator for a time with Cumanus, the latter the arch-robber, mentioned by Josephus in tb«
holding Galilee, the former Samaria. From same section, should not be unnoticed
the circumstance of his being called Antonius 10 See p. 74, n. 3.

chap. xxn. THE ROMAN ARMY. 655
by his trembling without repentance at the preaching of Paul, and by
his detention of him in prison from the hope of a bribe. When he
finally left the Apostle in bonds at Caesarea, this also (as we shall see)
was done from a mean desire to conciliate those who were about to
accuse him at Rome of mal-administration of the province. The final
breach between him and the provincials seems to have arisen from a
quarrel at Caesarea between the Jewish and Heathen population, which
grew so serious, that the troops were called out into the streets, and both
slaughter and plunder was the result.
The mention of this circumstance leads us to give some account of
the troops quartered in Palestine, and of the general distribution of the
Roman army, without some notion of which no adequate idea can be
obtained of the Empire and the Provinces. Moreover, St. Paul is
brought, about this part of his life, into such close relations with different
parts of that military service, from which he draws some of his most
forcible imagery,1 that our narrative would be incomplete without some
account both of the Praetorian guards and the legionary soldiers. The
latter force may be fitly described in connection with Caesarea, and we
shall see that it is not out of place to allude here to the former also,
though its natural association is with the city of Rome.
That division between the armed and unarmed provinces, to which
attention has been called before (pp. 129-131) ,2 will serve to direct us to
the principle on which the Roman legions were distributed. They were
chiefly posted in the outer provinces or along the frontier, the immediate
neighborhood of the Mediterranean being completely subdued under the
sway of Rome. The military force required in Gaul and Spain was much
smaller than it had been in the early days of Augustus. Even in Africa
the frontier was easily maintained ; for the Romans do not seem to have
been engaged there in that interminable war with native tribes which
occupies the French in Algeria. The greatest accumulation of legions
was on the northern and eastern boundaries of the Empire, — along the
courses of the three frontier rivers, the Rhine, the Danube, and the
Euphrates ; 3 and, finally, three legions were stationed in Britain, and
three in Judaea. We know the very names of these legions. Just as we
find memorials of the second, the ninth, and the twentieth in connection
1 See especially Eph. vi. 10-18; also 1 Cor. " In the time of Augustus we find four
xiv. 8 ; 1 Thess. v. 8 ; and 2 Tim. ii. 3, 4. legions in the neighborhood of the Euphrates,
2 We may add here, that the division of eight on the Rhine frontier, and six along the
the provinces under the Emperors arose out of Danube (two in Moesia, two in Pannonia, and
an earlier division under the Republic, when a two in Dalmatia). In that of Hadrian, the
Proconsul with a large military force was sent force on each of these rivers was considerably
to some provinces, and a Propraetor with u greater.
smaller force to others.

656 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap. xxii.
with Chester1 or York, so by the aid of historians or historic monuments
we can trace the presence of the fifth, the tenth, and the fifteenth in
Caesarea, Ptolemais, or Jerusalem.2 And here two principles must be
borne in mind which regulated the stations of the legions. They did not
move from province to province, as our troops are taken in succession
from one colony to another ; but they remained on one station for a vast
number of years. And they were recruited, for the most part, from the
provinces where they were 'posted : for the time had long passed away
when every legionary soldier was an Italian and a freeborn Roman
citizen.3 Thus Josephus tells us repeatedly that the troops quartered in
his native country were re-enforced from thence ; 4 not indeed from the
Jews, — for they were exempt from the duty of serving,5 — but from the
Greek and Syrian population.
But what were these legions ? We must beware of comparing them
too exactly with our own regiments of a few hundred men ; for they
ought rather to be called brigades, each consisting of more than 6,000
infantry, with a regiment of cavalry attached. Here we see the explana
tion of one part of the force sent down by Claudius Lysias to Antipatris.6
Within the fortress of Antonia were stables for the horses of the troopers,
as well as quarters for a cohort of infantry. But, moreover, every legion
had attached to it a body of auxiliaries levied in the province, of almost
equal number ; and here, perhaps, we find the true account of the 200
" spearmen," who formed a part of St. Paul's escort, with the 200 legion
ary soldiers. Thus we can form to ourselves some notion of those troops
(amounting, perhaps, to 35,000 men), the presence of which was so
familiar a thing in Judaea, that the mention of them appears in the most
1 Antiquarians acquainted with the monu- began with Marius. The alauda of Cassar was
ments of Chester are familiar with the letters formed of strangers : but these troops after-
Leg. xx. v. v. (Valens Victrix). wards received the Roman citizenship. With the
2 In the History of Tacitus (v. 1 ) these three distinction between the Praetorian and legionary
legions are expressly mentioned. Compare i. soldiers, all necessary connection between citi-
10, ii. 4. The same legions are mentioned by zenship and military service ceased to exist.
Josephus. See, for instance, War, v. 1, 6, v. In strict conformity with this state of things
2,3. We have also notices of them on Syrian we find that Claudius Lysias was a citizen by
coins and inscriptions. purchase, not because he was a military officer.
It should be noticed that the passages just 4 Ant. xiv. 15, 10. War, i. 17, 1.
adduced from Josephus and Tacitus refer to 6 Jos. Ant. xiv. 10, 11-19.
the time when the Jewish war was breaking 6 What is written here and in the preceding
out. Judasa may have been garrisoned, not by chapter is based on the assumption that the
legions, but by detached cohorts, during the cohort under the command of Claudius Lysias
rule of Felix and Festus. was a legionary cohort. But it is by no means
3 At first under the Republic all Roman certain that it was not an independent cohort,
soldiers were Roman citizens. " But in propor- like those called "Augustan" and "Italic."
tion as the public freedom was lost in extent of It appears that such cohorts really contained
conquest, war was gradually improved into an 1,000 men each.
art and degraded into a trade." The change

chap.xxii. THE ROMAN ARMY. 657
solemn passages of the Evangelic and ApostoUc history,1 while a Jewish
historian gives us one of the best accounts of their discipline and exer
cises.2 But the legionary soldiers, with their cavalry and auxiliaries, were not
the only military force in the Empire, and, as it seems, not the only one
iii Judaea itself. The great body of troops at Rome (as we shall see
when we have followed St. Paul to the metropolis) were the Praetorian
Guards, amounting at this period to 10,000 men.3 These favored forces
were entirely recruited from Italy ; their pay was higher, and their time
of service shorter ; and, for the most part, they were not called out on
foreign service.4 Yet there is much weight in the opinion which regards
the Augustan Cohort of Acts xxvii. 1 as a part of this Imperial Guard.5
Possibly it was identical6 with the Italic Cohort of Acts x. 1. It might
well be that the same corps might be called " Italic," because its men
were exclusively Italians ; and " Augustan," because they were properly
part of the Emperor's guard, though some of them might occasionally be
attached to the person of a provincial governor. And we observe that,
while Cornelius (x. 1) and Julius (xxvii. 1) are both Roman names, it
is at Caesarea that each of these cohorts is said to have been stationed.
As regards the Augustan cohort, if the view above given is correct, one
result of it is singularly interesting ; for it seems that Julius the centu
rion, who conducted the Apostle Paul to Rome, can be identified with a
1 It must be borne in mind that some of torians, and accompanied Nero to Greece.
the soldiers mentioned in the Gospels belonged The date of their enrolment constitutes a diffi-
to Herod's military force : but since his troops culty. But might not the cohort in question
were disciplined on the Roman model, we need be some other detachment of the Praetorian
hardly make this distinction. Guards 1
2 War, iii. 5. It appears from Joseph. War, iii. 4, 2,
8 Under Augustus there were nine cohorts. that five cohorts (independently of the le-
Under Tiberius they were raised to ten. The gions) were regularly stationed at Caesarea, and
number was not increased again till after St. the Augustan cohort may very well have been
Paul's time. one of them. But we are not by any means
4 Such a general rule would have excep- limited to those. Dean Alford remarks, very
tions, — as in the case of our own Guards at justly, that we must not assume, as too many
Waterloo and Sebastopol. commentaiors have done, that this cohort was
6 This is a question of some difficulty. resident at Caesarea.
Two opinions held by various commentators 6 See p. 26, n. 4, also p. 108, n. 3, (in the
may, we think, readily be dismissed. 1. This account of Cornelius,) where it is shown that
cohors Augusta was not a part of any legio Au- this corps cannot have been a cohort of Nero's
gusta. 2. It was not identical with the Sebasteni Legio prima Italica. One objection to the
(so named from Sebaste in Samaria) men- view of Meyer, who identifies the two, is that
tioned by Josephus : for, in the first place, this Judaea was not under procurators at the
was a troop of horse ; and secondly, we should time of the conversion of Cornelius. But
expect a different term to be used. there is great obscurity about the early dates
Wieseler thinks this cohort was a special in the Acts. IS the " Augustan cohort " is
corps enrolled by Nero under the name of identical with the Augustani of Nero, it is clear
Augustani. They were the elite of the Prae- that the " Italic cohort " is not the same.
42

658 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OP ST. PAUL. chap.xxh
high degree of probability with Julius Priscus, who was afterwards pre
fect of the Praetorian Guards under the Emperor Vitellius.1
This brief notice may suffice, concerning the troops quartered in Pales
tine, and especially at Caesarea. The city itself remains to be described.
Little now survives on the spot to aid us in the restoration of this hand
some metropolis. On the wide area once occupied by its busy population
there is silence, interrupted only by the monotonous washing of the sea ;
and no sign of human life, save the occasional encampment of Bedouin
Arabs, or the accident of a small coasting vessel anchoring off the shore.
The best of the ruins are ingulfed by the sand, or concealed by the en
croaching sea. The nearest road passes at some distance, so that com
paratively few travellers have visited Caesarea.2 Its glory was short-lived.
Its decay has been complete, as its rise was arbitrary and sudden. Strabo,
in the reign of Augustus, describes at this part of the inhospitable coast of
Palestine nothing but a landing-place, with a castle called Strato's Tower.
Less than eighty years afterwards we read in Tacitus and Pliny of a city
here, which was in possession of honorable privileges, which was the
" Head of Judaea," as Antioch was of Syria. Josephus explains to us
the change which took place in so short an interval, by describing the
work which Herod the Great began and completed in twelve years.3
Before building Antipatris in honor of his father (see p. 650), he built on
the shore between Dora and Joppa, where Strato's castle stood, near the
boundary of Galilee and Samaria, a city of sumptuous palaces in honor
of Augustus Cassar. The city was provided with every thing that could con
tribute to magnificence,4 amusement,5 and health.6 But its great boast
was its harbor, which provided for the ships which visited that dangerous
coast a safe basin, equal in extent to the Piraeus.7 Vast stones were sunk
in the sea to the depth of twenty fathoms,8 and thus a stupendous break
water 9 was formed, curving round so as to afford complete protection from

1 The argument is given in full by Wieseler. (p. 119). Some traces of it are said to re-
2 Thus Dr. Robinson was prevented from main.
visiting or describing what remains. The full- 6 The arrangement of the sewers is partic-
est account is perhaps that in Buckingham's ularly mentioned by Josephus. The remains
Travels (i. 197-215). See also Irby and Man- of the aqueducts are still visible.
gles, and Lamartine. There is an excellent 7 This is the comparison of Josephus,
description of the place, with illustrations, at Antiq. In' the " War " he says it was greater
the end of the first volume of Dr. Traill's than the Piraeus.
Josephus. We may refer now to the views in s Most of the stones were 50 feet long, 1 8
Van de Velde's Pays d 'Israel. feet broad, and 9 feet deep. Josephus, how-
3 Antiq. xv. 9, 6. War, i. 21, 5-8. ever, is not quite consistent with himself in
4 The buildings were of white stone. his statement of the dimensions.
" It contained both a theatre and an amphi- 9 This breakwater has been compared to
theatre. The former possesses great interest for that of Plymouth : but it was more like that
us, as being the scene of the death of Agrippa of Cherbourg, and the whole harbor may more

chap. xxn. C^ISAREA. 659
the south-westerly winds,1 and open only on the north. Such is an im
perfect description of that city, which in its rise and greatest eminence is
exactly contemporaneous with the events of which we read in the Gospels
and the Acts of the Apostles. It has, indeed, some connection with later
history. Vespasian was here declared emperor, and he conferred on it the
title of a colony, with the additional honor of being called by his own
name. Here Eusebius 2 and Procopius were born, and thus it is linked
with the recollections of Constantine and Justinian. After this time its
annals are obscured, though the character of its remains — which have
been aptly termed " ruins of ruins " — show that it must have long been
a city of note under the successive occupants of Palestine.3 Its chief
association, however, must always be with the age of which we are writing.
Its two great features were its close connection with Rome and the empe
rors, and the large admixture of Heathen strangers in its population.
Not only do we see here the residence of Roman procurators,4 the quar
ters of imperial troops,5 and the port by which Judaea was entered from
the west, but a Roman impress was ostentatiously given to every thing that
belonged to Caesarea. The conspicuous object to those who approached
from the sea was a temple dedicated to Caesar and to Rome : 6 the harbor
was called the " Augustan harbor : " 7 the city itself was " Augustan
Caesarea." 8 And, finally, the foreign influence here was so great, that
the Septuagint translation of the Scriptures was read in the Synagogues.9
There was a standing quarrel between the Greeks and the Jews, as to
fitly be compared to the harbors of refuge a quarry, furnishing shafts and ready-wrought
now (1852) in construction at Holyhead and blocks, &c, for public buildings at Acre and
Portland. elsewhere.
1 Josephus particularly says that the places 4 We are inclined to think that the " prae-
on this part of the coast were " bad for anchor- torium " or " palace " of Herod (Acts xxiii.
age on account of the swell towards (i. e. 35) was a different building from the official
from) the S. W." — a passage which deserves residence of Felix and Festus. This seems to
careful attention, as illustrating Acts xxvii. be implied in xxiv. 24 and xxv. 23. We shall
12. have occasion again to refer to the word
2 He was the first biblical geographer (as npairupiov, Ch. XXVI.
Forbiger remarks in his account of Caesarea), 6 See above on the Augustan cohort.
and to him we owe the Onomasticon, translated 6 This temple has been alluded to before,
by Jerome. This place was also one of the p. 107. Josephus says that in the temple were
scenes of Origen's theological labors. two statues, one of Rome and one of Caesar.
8 See the Appendix of Dr. Traill's Jose- Ant. In War, he says that the statues were
phus, vol. I. xlix-lvi, where a very copious colossal, that of Caesar equal in size to the
account is given of the existing state of Csesa- Olympian Jupiter, and that of Rome to the
rea. Its ruins are described as " remains from Argive Juno.
which obtrude the costly materials of a succes- 7 We find this term on coins of Agrippa I.
6ion of structures, and which furnish a sort One of them is given in our larger editions.
of condensed commentary upon that series of 8 So it is called by Josephus. Ant. xv. 1,
historical evidence which we derive from 51.
books." Of late years they have been used as 9 Lightfoot on Acts vi. 1. See p. 34, n. .1

660 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap.xxii
whether it was a Greek city or a Jewish city. The Jews appealed to the
fact that it was built by a Jewish prince. The Greeks pointed to the
temples and statues.1 This quarrel was never appeased till the great war
broke out, the first act of which was the slaughter of 20,000 Jews in the
streets of Caesarea.2
Such was the city in which St. Paul was kept in detention among the
Roman soldiers, till the time should come for his trial before that un
scrupulous governor, whose character has been above described. His
accusers were not long in arriving. The law required that causes should
be heard speedily ; and the Apostle's enemies at Jerusalem were not
wanting in zeal. Thus, " after five days," 3 the high priest Ananias and
certain members of the Sanhedrin4 appeared, with one of those advo
cates who practised in the law courts of the provinces, where the forms
of Roman law were imperfectly known, and the Latin language imper
fectly understood.5 The man whose professional services were engaged
on this occasion was called Tertullus. The name is Roman, and there
is little doubt that he was an Italian, and spoke on this occasion in
Latin.6 The criminal information was formally laid before the govern
or.7 The prisoner was summoned,8 and Tertullus brought forward the
charges against him in a set speech, which we need not quote at length,
He began by loading Felix with unmerited praises,9 and then proceeded
to allege three distinct heads of accusation against St. Paul, — charging
him, first with causing factious disturbances among all the Jews through
out the Empire 10 (which was an offence against the Roman Government,
and amounted to Majestas or treason against the Emperor) , — secondly
with being a ringleader of " the sect of the Nazarenes " u (which involved
1 Ant. xx. 8, 7. War, ii. 13, 7. the law courts in every part of the Empire
2 War, ii. 18, 1. See p. 665. See p. 2.
8 It is most natural to reckon these five 6 See again p. 2, for remarks on Tertullus
days from the time of St. Paul's departure and the peculiarly Latin character of the
from Jerusalem. speech here given.
4 " With the Elders ; " by which we are to t " They laid information before the gover-
understand representatives or deputies from nor against Paul," xxiv. 1 . See xxv. 2.
the Sanhedrin. s « When he was summoned," v. 2. The
6 The accuser and the accused could plead presence of the accused was required by the
in person, as St. Paul did here : but advocati Roman law.
((gropes) were often employed. It was a com- 9 See above. It is worth while to notice
mon practice for young Roman lawyers to go here one phrase which is exactly the Latin tua
with consuls and praetors to the provinces, and providentia. It may be illustrated by the in
to " qualify themselves by this provincial prac- scription : provid. Aug. on the coin of Com-
tice for the sharper struggles of the forum at modus in the titlepage of this edition.
home." We have an instance in the case of 10 A mover of sedition among all the Jews
Caelius, who spent his youth in this way in throughout the world.
Africa. Cic. pro Cod. 30. It must be remem- u A ringleader of the sect of the Nazarenes
oered that Latin was the proper language of On the word for sect, see below, note, on v. 14

chap, xxn. SPEECH BEFORE FELLX. 661
heresy against the law of Moses), — and thirdly with an attempt to
profane the Temple at Jerusalem ' (an offence not only against the
Jewish, but also against tlie Roman Law, which protected the Jews iu
the exercise of their worship) . He concluded by asserting (with serious
deviations from the truth) that Lysias, the commandant of the garrison,
had forcibly taken the prisoner away, when the Jews were about to
judge him by their own ecclesiastical law, and had thus improperly
brought the matter before Felix.2 The drift of this representation was
evidently to persuade Felix to give up St. Paul to the Jewish courts, in
which case his assassination would have been easily accomplished.3 And
the Jews who were present gave a vehement assent to the statements of
Tertullus, making no secret of their animosity against St. Paul, and
asserting that these things were indeed so.
The governor now made a gesture * to the prisoner to signify that he
might make his defence. The Jews were silent ; and the Apostle, after
briefly expressing his satisfaction that he had to plead his cause before
one so well acquainted with Jewish customs, refuted Tertullus step by
step. He said that on his recent visit to Jerusalem at the festival (and
he added that it was only " twelve days " since he had left Cassarea for
that purpose),6 he had caused no disturbance in any part of Jerusalem,
— that, as to heresy, he had never swerved from his belief in the Law
and the Prophets, and that, in conformity with that belief, he held the
doctrine of a resurrection, and sought to live conscientiously before the
God of his fathers,6 — and as to the Temple, so far from profaning it, he
had been found in it deliberately observing the very strictest ceremonies.
The Jews of " Asia," he added, who had been his first accusers, ought to
The Authorized Version unfortunately renders 6 In reckoning these twelve days (v. 11) it
the same Greek word, in one case by " sect," would be possible to begin with the arrival
in the other " heresy," and thus conceals the in Jerusalem instead of the departure for
link of connection. As regards " Nazarene," Caesarea, — or we might exclude the days after
this is the only place where it occurs in this the return to Caesarea. Wieseler's arrange-
sense. In the mouth of Tertullus it was a ment of the time is as follows. 1st day : De-
term of reproach, as " Christian " below (xxvi. parture from Caesarea. 2d : Arrival at Jera-
28) in that of Agrippa. salem. 3d : Meeting of the Elders. 4th
1 Who hath also gone about to profane the (Pentecost) : Arrest in the Temple. 5th : Tri-
Temple. al before the Sanhedrin. 6th (at night) : De-
2 We have before observed that the Sanhe- parture to Csssarea. 7th : Arrival. 12th (five
drin was still allowed to exercise criminal days after) : Ananias leaves Jerusalem. 13th:
jurisdiction over ecclesiastical offenders. Ananias reaches Caesarea. Trial before Felix.
8 Compare the two attempts, xxiii. 15 and 6 It has been well observed that the classi-
xxv. 3. cal phrase "our hereditary God " (v. 14) was
4 V. 10. It is some help towards our real- judiciously employed before Felix. " The
izing the scene in our imagination, if we re- Apostle asserts that, according to the Roman
member that Felix was seated on the tribunal law which allowed all men to worship the gods
(flr)/ja) like Gallio (xviii. 12) and Festus (xxv. of their own nation, he is not open to any
6). charge of irreligion." Humphry.

662 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap. xxrr.
have been present as witnesses now. Those who were present knew full
well that no other charge was brought home to him before the Sanhe
drin, except what related to the belief that he held in common with the
Pharisees. But, without further introduction, we quote St. Luke's sum-
kCTj3 mary of his own words : —
Kxiv. 10 Knowing, as I do, that thou hast been judge over this nation He denies the
for many years, I defend myself in the matters brought against asain8t Wm-
11 me with greater confidence. For1 it is in thy power to learn that only
12 twelve days have passed since I went up to Jerusalem to worship. And
neither in the temple, nor in the synagogues, nor in the streets, did they
find me disputing with any man, or causing any disorderly concourse 2 of
13 people ; nor can they prove against me the things whereof they now
accuse me.
14 But this I acknowledge to thee, that I follow the opinion,3 ms own state
ment of his
which they call a sect,4 and thus worship the God of my ca8e-
fathers. And I believe all things which are written in the Law and in
15 the Prophets ; and I hold a hope towards God, which my accusers them
selves 5 entertain, that there will be a resurrection of the dead, both of
16 the just and of the unjust. Wherefore 6 1 myself also 7 strive earnestly
to keep a conscience always void of offence 8 towards God and man.
17 Now after several 9 years I came 10 hither, to bring alms " to my nation,
1 The connection of this with the preceding the same toleration which is extended by the
is that Felix, having so long governed the prov- Roman law to the others. I claim the right
ince, would know that Paul had been resident which you allow to all the nations under your
there before, during several years; besides government, of worshipping their national
which he could easily ascertain the date of his gods."
recent arrival. 5 This shows that the Pharisees were the
2 This is a Pauline word found nowhere principal accusers of St. Paul ; and that the
else in N. T. except 2 Cor. xi. 28. The literal effect produced upon them by his speech before
translation would be a mob. the Sanhedrin was only momentary.
3 Way, i. e. a religious opinion or sect. 6 Compare 2 Cor. v. 9, where the same con-
(See chap. xxii. 4.) elusion is derived from the same premises.
4 Properly a. sect or religious party ; not 7 The best MSS. have also.
nsed in a bad sense. See Acts v. 17 and xv. 8 Literally, containing no cause of stumbling.
5, and especially xxvi. 5, where the same word This also is a Pauline word, occurring onlj
is used. St. Paul means to say (or rather did 1 Cor. x. 32, and Phil. i. 10, in N. T.
say in the argument of which St. Luke here 9 " Several," not so strong as " many."
gives the outline) : " Our nation is divided into 10 " I came into this country."
religious parties which are called sects ; thus n This is the only mention of this collec-
there is the sect of the Pharisees and the sect tion in the Acts, and its occurrence here is a
of the Sadducees, and so now we are called striking undesigned coincidence between the
the sect of the Nazarenes. I do not deny that Acts and Epistles.
I belong to the latter sect ; but I claim for it

chap. un. CONTINUED IMPRISONMENT. 663 xxiv
and offerings to the Temple.1 And they found me so doing in the 18
Temple, after I had undergone purification ; not gathering together a
multitude, nor causing a tumult ; but certain Jews from Asia discovered
me, who ought to have been here before thee to accuse me, if they had 19
any thing to object against me.
hit rStic10 0r let tnese mv accusers themselves say whether they found 20
sanhedrin. e me guilty of any offence when I stood before the Sanhedrin ;
except it be for these words only which I cried out as I stood in the 21
midst of them : " Concerning the resurrection of the dead, I am called
in question before you this day."
There was all the appearance of truthfulness in St. Paul's words ; and
they harmonized entirely with the statement contained in the despatch
of Claudius Lysias. Moreover, Felix had resided so long in Caesarea,2
where the Christian religion had been known for many years,8 and had
penetrated even among the troops,4 that " he had a more accurate
knowledge of their religion " (v. 22) than to be easily deceived by the
misrepresentations of the Jews.5 Thus a strong impression was made
on the mind of this wicked man. But his was one of those characters
which are easily affected by feelings, but always drawn away from right
action by the overpowering motive of self-interest. He could not make
ap his mind to acquit St. Paul. He deferred all inquiry into the case
for the present. " When Lysias comes down," he said, " I will decide
finally6 between you." Meanwhile he placed the Apostle under the
charge of the centurion who had brought him to Caesarea,1 with directions
that he should be treated with kindness and consideration. Close con
finement was indeed necessary, both to keep him in safety from the Jews,
1 Offerings. We need not infer that St. some of the best commentators. Or they may
Paul brought offerings to the temple with him be taken to denote that he was too well in-
from foreign parts ; this in itself would have formed concerning the Christian religion to re-
been not unlikely, but it seems inconsistent quire any further information that might be
with St. James's remarks (Acts xxi. 23,24). elicited by the trial: it was only needful to
The present is only a condensation for " I wait for the coming of Lysias.
came to Jerusalem to bring alms to my nation, 6 This is more correct than the A. V.
and I entered the t/ mple to make offerings to 7 Not " a centurion," as in A. V. A natn-
the temple." ral inference from the use of the article is, that
2 If these events took place in the yeai 58 it was the same centurion who had brought St.
i D., he had been governor six years. Paul from Antipatris (see above), and Mr.
8 See Acts viii. 40. Birks traces here an undersigned coincidence.
4 Acts x. Besides other means of infor- But no stress can be laid on this view. The
mation, we must remember that Drusilla, his officer might be simply the centurion who was
present wife, was a Jewess. present and on duty at the time
6 Such is the turn given to the words by

664 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap.xxti,
and because he was not yet acquitted ; but orders were given that he
should have every relaxation which could be permitted in such a case,1
and that any of his friends should be allowed to visit him, and to minister
to his comfort.2
We read nothing, however, of Lysias coming to Caesarea, or of any
further judicial proceedings. Some few days afterwards 3 Felix came
into the audience-chamber 4 with his wife Drusilla, and the prisoner was
summoned before them. Drusilla, " being a Jewess " (v. 24), took a
lively interest in what Felix told her of Paul, and was curious to hear
something of this faith which had " Christ " for its object.5 Thus Paul
had an opportunity in his bonds of preaching the Gospel, and such an
opportunity as he could hardly otherwise have obtained. His audience
consisted of a Roman libertine and a profligate Jewish princess : and he
so preached, as a faithful Apostle must needs have preached to such hear
ers. In speaking of Christ, he spbke of " righteousness and temperance,
and judgment to come ; " and while he was so discoursing, " Felix
trembled." Yet still we hear of no decisive result. " Go thy way for this
time : when I have a convenient season, I will send for thee," — was the
response of the conscience-stricken but impenitent sinner, — the response
which the Divine Word has received ever since, when listened to in a
like spirit.
We are explicitly informed why this governor shut his ears to convic
tion, and even neglected his official duty, and kept his prisoner in cruel
suspense. " He hoped that he might receive from Paul a bribe for his
liberation." He was not the only governor of Judaea against whom a
similar accusation is brought : 6 and Felix, well knowing how the Chris
tians aided one another in distress, and possibly having some information
of the funds with which St. Paul had recently been intrusted,7 and
ignorant of those principles which make it impossible for a true Christian
to tamper by bribes with the course of law, — might naturally suppose
that he had here a good prospect of enriching himself. " Hence he

1 See below. doubtless familiarly known at Caesarea. And
2 V. 23. 8 V. 24. a Jewish princess must necessarily have been
4 We must understand that Felix and curious to hear some account of what professed
Drusilla came to some place convenient for an to be the fulfilment of Jewish prophecy.
audience, probably the hall mentioned below Compare xxv. 22.
(xxv. 23) where the Apostle spoke before Fes- 6 Albinus, who succeeded Festus, is said to
tus with Drusilla's brother and sister, Agrippa have released many prisoners, but those only
and Berenice. from whom he received a bribe. Joseph. Ant.
6 Observe the force of being a Jewess. We xx. 8, 5. War, ii. 14, 1.
should also notice the phrase by which the 7 This suggestion is made by Mr. Birks.
Gospel is here described, the faith in Christ or For the contributions which" St. Paul had re-
the Messiah The name " Christian " was cently brought to Jerusalem, see above.

cHAP.xxn. CONTINUED IMPRISONMENT. 665
frequently sent for Paul, and had many conversations1 with him." But
his hopes were unfulfilled. Paul, who was ever ready to claim the pro
tection of the law, would not seek to evade it by dishonorable means : 2
and the Christians, who knew how to pray for an Apostle in bonds (Acis
xii.), would not forget the duty of " rendering unto Caesar the things
that are Caesar's." Thus Paul remained in the Praetorium ; and the
suspense continued " two years."
Such a pause in a career of such activity, — such an arrest of the
Apostle's labors at so critical a time, — two years taken from the best
part of a life of such importance to the world, — would seem to us a
mysterious dispensation of Providence, if we did not know that God has
an inner work to accomplish in those who are the chosen instruments for
effecting His greatest purposes. As Paul might need the repose of prep
aration in Arabia, before he entered on his career,3 so his prison at
Caesarea might be consecrated to the calm meditation, the less inter
rupted prayer, — which resulted in a deeper experience and knowledge
of the power of the Gospel. Nor need we assume that his active exer
tions for others were entirely suspended. " The care of all the churches "
might still be resting on him : many messages, and even letters,4 of
which we know nothing, may have been sent from Caesarea to brethren
at a distance. And a plausible conjecture fixes this period and place for
the writing of St. Luke's Gospel under the superintendence of the
Apostle of the Gentiles.
All positive information, however, is denied us concerning the employ
ments of St. Paul while imprisoned at Caesarea. We are the more
disposed, therefore, to turn our thoughts to the consideration of the
nature and outward circumstances of his confinement ; and this inquiry
is indeed necessary for the due elucidation of the narrative.
When an accusation was brought against a Roman citizen, the magis
trate, who had criminal jurisdiction in the case, appointed the time for
hearing the cause, and detained the accused in custody during the inter
val. He was not bound to fix any definite time for the trial, but might
defer it at his own arbitrary pleasure ; and he might also commit the
prisoner at his discretion to any of the several kinds of custody recognized
1 We may contrast the verb here (v. 26) of moral duty in the Heathen philosopher
with that for continuous address (v. 25), as we with the clear and lofty perception of eternal
have done before in the narrative of the night- realities in the inspired Apostle.
service at Troas, xx. 9, 11. 8 See pp. 89, 90.
2 It is allowable here to refer to the words 4 It is well known that some have thought
in which Socrates refused the aid of his friends, that the Ephesians, Colossians, and Philemon
who urged him to escape from prison : while were written here. This question will be con-
in comparing the two cases we cannot but »idered hereafter.
contrast the vague though overpowering sense

666 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap.axh.
i
by the Roman law. These were as follows : — First, confinement in the
public jail (custodia publico,), which was the most severe kind ; the
common jails throughout the Empire being dungeons of the worst
description, where the prisoners were kept in chains, or even bound in
positions of torture. Of this we have seen an example in the confine
ment of Paul and Silas at Philippi. Secondly, free custody (custodia
libera), which was the mildest kind. Here the accused party was com
mitted to the charge of a magistrate or senator, who became responsible
for his appearance on the day of trial ; but this species of detention was
only employed in the case of men of high rank. Thirdly, military
custody (custodia militaris), which was introduced at the beginning of the
Imperial regime. In this last species of custody, the accused person was
given in charge to a soldier, who was responsible with his own life for the
safe keeping of his prisoner. This was further secured, by chaining the
prisoner's right hand to the soldier's left. The soldiers of course relieved
one another in this duty. Their prisoner was usually kept in their bar
racks, but sometimes allowed to reside in a private house under their
charge. It was under this latter species of custody that St. Paul was now
placed by Felix, who " gave him in charge to the centurion, that he
should be kept in custody " (Acts xxiv. 23) ; but (as we have seen) he
added the direction, that he should be treated with such indulgence l as
this kind of detention permitted. Josephus tells us that, when the
severity of Agrippa's imprisonment at Rome was mitigated, his chain was
relaxed at meal times.2 This illustrates the nature of the alleviations
which such confinement admitted ; and it is obvious that the centurion
might render it more or less galling, according to his inclination, or the
commands he had received. The most important alleviation of St. Paul's
imprisonment consisted in the order, which Felix added, that his friends
should be allowed free access to him.
1 Acts xxiv. 23. Meyer and De Wette trating that of St. Paul at Rome. There was,
have understood this as though St. Paul was indeed, a lighter form of custodia militaris
committed to the custodia libera ; but we have sometimes employed, under the name of ob-
seen that this kind of detention was only em- servatio, when the soldier kept guard over his
ployed in the case of men of rank, and moreover prisoner, and accompanied him wherever he
the mention of the centurion excludes it. But went, but was not chained to him. To this
besides this, it is expressly stated (Acts xxiv. we might have supposed St. Paul subjected,
27) that Felix left Paul chained. The same both at Caesarea and at Rome, were not such
Greek word (meaning relaxation) is applied to an hypothesis excluded as to Caesarea by Acts
the mitigation of Agrippa's imprisonment xxiv. 27, xxvi. 29, and as to Rome by Eph. vi.
(Jos. Ant. xviii. 6, 10) on the accession of 20, Phil. i. 13. Compare Acts xxviii. 16, 31.
Caligula, although Agrippa was still left under 2 Such seems the meaning of " relaxation at
custodia militaris, and still bound with a chain. to eating " in the passage of Josephus, referred
We shall have occasion to refer again to this to in the preceding note.
relaxation of Agrippa's imprisonment as illus-

«hap. xxii. CONTINUED IMPRISONMENT 667
Meantime, the political state of Judaea grew more embarrassing. The
exasperation of the people under the mal-administration of Felix became
increasingly implacable ; and the crisis was rapidly approaching. It was
during tlie two years of St. Paul's imprisonment that the disturbances,
to which allusion has been made before, took place in the streets of
Caesarea. The troops, who were chiefly recruited in the province, frater
nized with the Heathen population, while the Jews trusted chiefly to the
influence of their wealth. In the end Felix was summoned to Rome,
and the Jews followed him with their accusations. Thus it was that he
was anxious, even at his depa^'ure, " to confer obligations upon them "
(v. 27), and one effort to diminish his unpopularity was " to leave Paul
in bonds." In so doing, he doubtless violated the law, and trifled with
the rights of a Roman citizen ; but the favor of the provincial Jews was
that which he needed ; and the Christians were weak in comparison with
them ; nor were such delays in the administration of justice unprece
dented, either at Rome or in the provinces. Thus it was, that, as another
governor of Judaea1 opened the prisons that he might make himself popu
lar, Felix, from the same motive, riveted the chains of an innocent man.
The same enmity of the world against the Gospel, which set Barabbas
free, left Paul a prisoner.
No change seems to have taken place in the outward circumstances of
the Apostle when Festus came to take command of the province. He
was still in confinement as before. But immediately on the accession of
the new governor, the unsleeping hatred of the Jews made a fresh
attempt upon his life ; and the course of their proceedings presently
changed the whole aspect of his case, and led to unexpected results.
When a Roman governor came to his province, — whether his character
was coarse and cruel, like that of Felix, or reasonable and just, as that of
Festus seems to have been, — his first step would be to make himself
acquainted with the habits and prevalent feelings of the people he was
come to rule, and to visit such places as might seem to be more peculiar
ly associated with national interests. The Jews were the most remarka
ble people in the whole extent of the Roman provinces ; and no city was
to any other people what Jerusalem was to the Jews. We are not sur
prised therefore to learn that " three days " after his arrival at the political
metropolis, Festus " went up to Jerusalem." Here he was immediately
met, by an urgent request against St. Paul,2 preferred by the chief priests
1 Albinus. See above, p. 664. Josephus 2 See v. 2 and v. 1 5. We should compare
says that, though he received bribes for open- St. Luke's statement with the two accounts
in" the prisons, he wished by this act to make given by Festus himself to Agrippa, below.
himself popular, when he found he was to be
superseded by Gessius Floras.

THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap.xxh
and leading men among the Jews,1 and seconded, as it seems, by a general
concourse of the people, who came round him with no little vehemence
and clamor.2 They asked as a favor 3 (and they had good reason to
hope that the new governor4 on his accession would not refuse it) that
he would allow St. Paul to be brought up to Jerusalem. The plea,
doubtless, was, that he should be tried again before the Sanhedrin. But
the real purpose was to assassinate him 5 on some part of the road over
which he had been safely brought by the escort two years before. So bit- *
ter and so enduring was their hatred against the apostate Pharisee. The
answer of Festus was dignified and just, and worthy of his office. He said
that Paul was in custody 6 at Caesarea, and that he himself was shortly
to return thither (v. 4) , adding that it was not the custom of the Romans
to give up an uncondemned person as a mere favor7 (v. 16). The
accused must have the accuser face to face,8 and full opportunity must
be given for a defence (ib.). Those, therefore, who were competent to
undertake the task of accusers,9 should come down with him to Caesarea,
and there prefer the accusation (v. 5) .
Festus remained " eight or ten days " in Jerusalem, and then returned
to Caesarea ; and the accusers went down the same day.10 No time was
lost after their arrival. The very next day u Festus took his seat on the
judicial tribunal,12 with his assessors near him (v. 12), and ordered Paul
to be brought before him. " The Jews who had come down from Jeru
salem" stood round, bringing various heavy accusations against him
(which, however, they could not establish),13 and clamorously asserting
that he was worthy of death.14 We must not suppose that the charges
now brought were different in substance from those urged by Tertullus.
The prosecutors were in fact the same now as then, namely, delegates
from the Sanhedrin ; and the prisoner was still lying under the former

1 Again we should compare v. 2 and v. 15. » See above, v. 11. Compare the case of
Thus the accusers were again representatives Pilate and Barabbas.
of the Sanhedrin. 8 V. 16. Compare the following passages ••
2 See the second account given by Festus Acts xxiii. 30, xxiv. 19, xxv. 5.
himself to Agrippa, below, v. 24. " All the B V. 5.
multitude of the Jews dealt with me, both in k> The course of the narrative shows that
Jerusalem and also here, crying that he ought they went immediately. This is also asserted
not to live any longer." in the phrase " go down with me," which does
8 V. 3. See v. 16. not necessarily imply that they went down in
4 Compare the conduct of Albinus and the same company with Festus.
Agrippa I., alluded to before. n "The next day," v. 6.; "without any
5 v- 3- delay on the morrow," v. 17.
6 The English version " should be kept " w gee again vv. 6, 17. 18 V. 7.
is rather too peremptory. Festus doubtless 14 See v. 24, where the demand for his
expresses this decision, but in the most con- death is said to have taken place both at Jern-
ciliating form. salem and Caesarea.

chap. xxii. APPEAL TO THE EMPEROR. 669
accusation, which had never been withdrawn.1 We see from what is
said of Paul's defence, that the charges were still classed under the same
three heads as before ; viz. Heresy, Sacrilege, and Treason.2 But Festus
saw very plainly that the offence was really connected with the religious
opinions of the Jews, instead of relating, as he at first expected, to some
political movement (vv. 18, 19) ; and he was soon convinced that St.
Paul had done nothing worthy of death (v. 25). Being, therefore, in
perplexity (v. 20), and at the same time desirous of ingratiating himself
with the provincials (v. 9), he proposed to St. Paul that he should go up
to Jerusalem, and be tried there in his presence, or at least under his
protection.3 But the Apostle knew full well the danger that lurked in
this proposal, and, conscious of the rights' which he possessed as a Roman
citizen, he refused to accede to it, and said boldly to Festus, — Acts xxv.
I stand before Caesar's tribunal, and there ought my trial to be. To io
the Jews I have done no wrong, as thou knowest full well. If I am u
guilty, and have done any thing worthy of death, I refuse not to die :
but if the things whereof these men accuse me are nought, no man can
give me up to them. I APPEAL UNTO CAESAR.
Festus was probably surprised by this termination of the proceedings ;
but no choice was open to him. Paul had urged his prerogative as a
Roman citizen, to be tried, not by the Jewish, but by the Roman law ; 4
a claim which, indeed, was already admitted by the words of Festus, who
only proposed to transfer him to the jurisdiction of the Sanhedrin with
his own consent.5 He ended by availing himself of one of the most
important privileges of Roman citizenship, the right of appeal. By the
mere pronunciation of these potent words, " I appeal unto Caasar," 6 he
instantly removed his cause from the jurisdiction of the magistrate
before whom he stood, and transferred it to the supreme tribunal of the
Emperor at Rome.
To explain the full effect of this proceeding, we must observe that, in
the provinces of Rome, the supreme criminal jurisdiction (both under
the Republic and the Empire) was exercised by the Governors, whether
i At this period, an accused person might 4 V. 10. 6 " Wilt thou," &c.
be kept in prison indefinitely, by the delay of 6 The expression here used (equivalent to
the accuser, or the procrastination of the ma- the Latin appellare) was the regular technical
gistrate. See our remarks on this subject, at phrase for lodging an appeal. The Roman
the beginning of Ch. XXV. law did not require any written appeal to be
2 Acts xxv. 8,(1) "the Law," (2) "the lodged in the hands of the Court ; pronuncia-
Temple," (3) " Caesar." tion of the single word Appello was sufficient
8 V. 9. In v. 20 this is omitted. to suspend all further proceedings.

670 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap. xxi.
they were Proconsuls, Propraetors, or (as in the case of Judaea) Procu
rators. To this jurisdiction the provincials were subject without appeal,
and it is needless to say that it was often exercised in the most arbitrary
manner. But the Roman citizens in the provinces, though also liable to
be brought before the judgment-seat of the Governor, were protected
from the abuse of his authority ; for they had the right of stopping his
proceedings against them by appealing to the Tribunes, whose interven
tion at once transferred the cognizance of the cause to the ordinary
tribunals at Rome.1 This power was only one branch of that prerogative
of intercession (as it was called) by which the Tribunes could stop the
execution of the sentences of all other magistrates. Under the Imperial
regime, the Emperor stood in the place of the Tribunes ; Augustus and
his successors being invested with the Tribunician power, as the most
important of the many Republican offices which were concentrated in
their persons. Hence the Emperors constitutionally exercised the right
of intercession, by which they might stop the proceedings of inferior
authorities. But they extended this prerogative much beyond the limits
which had confined it during the Republican epoch. They not only
arrested the execution of the sentences of other magistrates, but claimed
and exercised the right of reversing or altering them, and of re-hearing2
the causes themselves. In short, the Imperial tribunal was erected into
a supreme court of appeal from all inferior courts either in Rome or in
the provinces.
Such was the state of things when St. Paul appealed from Festus to
Caesar. If the appeal was admissible, it at once suspended all further
proceedings on the part of Festus. There were, however, a few cases
in which the right of appeal was disallowed ; a bandit or a pirate, for
example, taken in the fact, might be condemned and executed by the
Proconsul, notwithstanding his appeal to the Emperor. Accordingly, we
read that Festus took counsel with his Assessors-,3 concerning the admis
sibility of Paul's appeal. But no doubt could be entertained on this
1 We must not confound this right of Ap- case as early as the time of Augustus. It may
pellatio to the Tribunes with the right of be doubted whether the Emperor at first
appeal (Provocatio) to the Comitia, which be- claimed the right of reversing the sentences
longed to every Roman citizen. This latter pronounced by the judices of the Quaestiones
right was restricted, even in the Republican Perpetuae, which were exempt from the Inter-
era, by the institution of the Quozstiones Per- cessio of the Tribune. But this question is of
pet,ia> ; because, the judices appointed for less importance, because the system of Quaes
those Quaestiones being regarded as representa- tiones Perpetuae was soon superseded under
fives of the Comitia, there was no appeal from the Empire, as we shall afterwards have an
their decisions. In the time of the Emperors, opportunity of remarking.
the Comitia themselves being soon discon- 8 E0r a notice of such consiliarii in a pro-
tinued, this right of Provocatio could be no vince, see Sueton. Tib. 33. Their office was
longer exercised. cailed assmura. Sueton Gaft. 14-
2 According to Dio, this was already the

chap. xxn. HEROD AGRIPPA. 671
head ; and he immediately pronounced the decision of the Court. " Thou
hast appealed1 unto Caasar : to Cassar thou shalt be sent."
Thus the hearing of the cause, as far as Festus was concerned, had
terminated. There only remained for him the office of remitting to the
supreme tribunal, before which it was to be carried, his official report2
upon its previous progress. He was bound to forward to Rome all the
acts and documents bearing upon the trial, the depositions of the wit
nesses on both sides, and the record of his own judgment on the case.
And it was his further duty to keep the person of the accused in safe
custody, and to send him to Rome for trial at the earliest opportunity.
Festus, however, was still in some perplexity. Though the appeal
had been allowed, yet the information elicited on the trial was so vague,
that he hardly knew what statement to insert in his despatch to the
Emperor : and it seemed " a foolish thing to him to send a prisoner to
Rome without at the same time specifying the charges against him "
(v. 27). It happened about this time that Herod Agrippa II., King of
Chalcis, with his sister Berenice, came on a complimentary visit to the
new governor, and staid " some days " at Caesarea.3 This prince had
been familiarly acquainted from his youth with all that related to the
Jewish law, and moreover was at this time (as we have seen) 4 superin
tendent of the Temple, with the power of appointing the high priest.
Festus took advantage of this opportunity of consulting one better in
formed than himself on the points in question. He recounted to Agrippa
what has been summarily related above ; 5 confessing his ignorance of
Jewish theology, and alluding especially to Paul's reiterated assertion 6
concerning " one Jesus who had died and was alive again." This can
not have been the first time that Agrippa had heard of the resurrection
of Jesus, or of the Apostle Paul.7 His curiosity was aroused, and he
expressed a wish to see the prisoner. Festus readily acceded to the
request, and fixed the next day for the interview.
At the time appointed, Agrippa and Berenice came with great pomp and
display, and entered into the, audience-chamber, with a suite of military
officers and the chief men of Caesarea ; 8 and at the command of Festus,
Paul was brought before them. The proceedings were opened by a cere-
1 The sentence is not interrogative, as in the lamented Prof. Blunt, in his Scriptural
A. V., but the words express a solemn de- Coincidences, pp. 358-360.
¦cision of the Procurator and his Assessors. 4 See above, p. 653.
2 This report was termed Apostoli, or literal b Vv. 14-21.
Jimissorice. 6 The form of the verb implies this reitera-
3 Some illustrations of peculiar interest tion.
from Josephus, as regards both the compli- 7 The tense (v. 22) might seem to imply
mentary character of this visit and the position that he had long wished to see St. Paul.
of Berenice in the matter, are pointed out by 8 For the audience-hall, see above We

672 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap.xxu.
monious speech from Festus himself,1 describing the circumstances under
which the prisoner had been brought under his notice, and ending with a
statement of his perplexity as to what he should write to " his Lord " ?
the Emperor. This being concluded, Agrippa said condescendingly to St.
Paul, that he was now permitted to speak for himself. And the Apostle,
" stretching out the hand " which was chained to the soldier who guarded
A.CTghim, spoke thus: —
Xxvi. 2 I think myself happy, King Agrippa, that I shall defend compliment*
J l L * ry address to
myself to-day, before thee, against all the charges of my Jew- Agrippa.
3 ish accusers ; especially because thou art expert in all Jewish customs
and questions. Wherefore, I pray thee to hear me patiently.
4 My3 life and conduct from my youth, as it was at first He defends
himself
among my own nation at Jerusalem, is known to all the. Jews, against i&e
5 They know me of old 4 (I say) from the beginning, and can here8y-
testify (if they would) that, following the strictest sect of our religion, I
6 lived a Pharisee. And now I stand here to be judged, for the hope of the
7 promise5 made by God unto our fathers. Which promise is the end
whereto, in all their zealous worship,6 night and day, our twelve tribes
hope to come. Yet this hope, 0 King Agrippa, is charged against me as
8 a crime, and that by Jews.7 What ! 8 is it judged among you a thing in
credible that God should raise the dead ? 9
9 Now I myself10 determined, in my own mind, that I ought ^^^J'8'
10 exceedingly to oppose the name of Jesus the Nazarene. And christian™0
may remark that the presence of several Chil- 6 This properly means to perform the out-
iarchs implies that the military force at Caesa- ward rites of worship : see note on Rom. i. 19.
rea was considerable. The five resident co- 7 Here again the best MSS. read Jews with-
horts mentioned by Josephus have been noticed out the.
above, p. 657, n. 5. l Vv. 24-27. 8 The punctuation adopted is, a note of in-
2 The title Lord applied here to the Em- terrogation after what. Compare the use of
peror should be noticed. Augustus and Tibe- the same word by St. Paul in Eom. iii. 3, iii.
rius declined a title which implied the relation 9, vi. 15, Phil. i. 18.
of master and slave, but their successors sane- 9 This is an argumentum ad homines to the
tioned the use of it, and Julian tried in vain Jews, whose own Scriptures furnished them
to break through the custom. with cases where the dead had been raised, as
3 The Greek particles here are rightly left for example by Elisha. The Authorized Ver-
untranslated in A. V. They form a conjunc- sion is perfectly correct, notwithstanding the
tion, denoting that the speaker is beginning a objections which have been made against it.
new subject, used where no conjunction would The Greek idiom of " if" with an indicative
be expressed in English. cannot be better represented in English than
4 The tense is present. by " that " with "should."
6 The promise meant is that of the Mes- io The pronoun, from its position, must be
siah. Compare what St. Paul says in the emphatic.
speech at A»tioch in Pisidia. Acts xiii. 32.
Compare also Rom. xv. 8

chap. xxn. SPEECH BEFORE AGRIPPA. 673 XXVI.
this I did in Jerusalem, and many of the saints J I myself shut up in
prison, having received from the chief priests authority so to do ; 2 and
when they were condemned 3 to death, I gave my vote against them. And ll
in every synagogue I continually punished them, and endeavored4 to com
pel them to blaspheme ; and being exceedingly mad against them, I went
even to foreign cities to persecute them.
ms conver- With this purpose I was on my road to Damascus, bearing 12
Bion and divine °
commission. my authority and commission from the chief 5 priests, when I 13
saw in the way, 0 King, at mid-day,6 a light from heaven, above the
brightness of the sun, shining round about me and those who journeyed
with me. And when we all were fallen to the earth, I heard a voice 14
speaking to me, and saying in the Hebrew tongue, Saul, Saul, why perse
cutest thou me f it is hard for thee to kick against the goad. And I said, 15
Who art thou, Lord f And the Lord 7 said, I am Jesus whom thou perse
cutest. But rise and stand upon thy feet; for to this end I have appeared 16
unto thee, to ordain 8 thee a minister and a witness both of those things which
thou hast seen, and of those things wherein I shall appear unto thee. And 17
thee have I chosen9 from the house of Israel™ and from among the Gentiles ;
unto whom now I send thee, to open their eyes, that they may turn11 from 18
darkness to light, and from the power of Satan unto Cod ; that they may
receive forgiveness of sins, and an inheritance among the sanctified, by faith in
me. 1 This speech should be carefully compared 6 The circumstance of the light overpower-
with that in chap, xxii., with the view of ob- ing even the blaze of the mid-day sun is men-
serving St. Paul's judicious adaptation of his tioned before (Acts xxii. 6).
statements to his audience. Thus, here he 7 All the best MSS. read " the Lord said."
calls the Christians " Saints," which the Jews This also agrees better with what follows,
in the Temple would not have tolerated. See where St. Paul relates all which the Lord had
some useful remarks on this subject by Mr. revealed to him, both at the moment of his
Birks. Hor. Ap. vii. viii. conversion, and, subsequently, by the voice of
2 " The authority," — " this authority." Ananias, and by the vision at Jerusalem. See
8 Literally, when they were being destroyed. Acts xxii. 12-21.
On the " giving his vote," see p. 72. 8 We have here the very words of Ananias
* Imperfect. (Acts xxii. 14, 15). The same very unusual
6 By Chief Priests here, and above, verse word for " ordain " is used in both places.
10, is meant (as in Luke xxii. 52, Acts v. 24) 9 " Choosing," not "delivering" (A. V.).
the presidents of the 24 classes into which the 10 " The people." See on the speech at
priests were divided. These were ex officio Antioch, p. 158, note 2.
members of the Sanhedrin. In the speech on n Neuter, not active as in A. V. Compare,
the stairs accordingly St. Paul states that he for the use of this word by St. Paul (to signify
had received his commission to Damascus from the conversion of the Gentiles), 1 Thess. i. 9
the high-priest and Sanhedrin (Acts xxii. 5). and Acts xiv. 15. Also below, Terse 20.
43

67-4 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap.xxu
XXVI. 19 Whereupon, 0 King Agrippa, I was not disobedient to the msraecuuon
20 heavenly vision. But first * to those at Damascus and Jerusa- ^f^'011
lem, and throughout all the land of Judaea,2 and also to the Jews. °
Gentiles, I proclaimed the tidings, that they should repent and turn to
God, and do works worthy of their repentance.
21 For these causes the Jews, when they caught me in the Temple,
endeavored to kill me.
22 Therefore,3 through the succor which I have received from yet his teach-
God, I stand firm unto this day, and bear my testimony both with the
Jewish Scrip-
to small and great ; but I declare nothing else than what the ture9-
23 Prophets and Moses foretold, That4 the Messiah should suffer, and that
He should be the first5 to rise from the dead, and should be the messen
ger 6 of light to the house of Israel, and also to the Gentiles.
Here Festus broke out into a loud exclamation,7 expressive of ridicule
and surprise. To the cold man of the world, as to the inquisitive Athe
nians, the doctrine of the resurrection was foolishness : and he said,
" Paul, thou art mad : thy. incessant study 8 is turning thee to madness."
The Apostle had alluded ih his speech to writings which had a mysteri
ous sound, to the prophets and to Moses9 (vv. 22, 23) ; and it is reason
able to believe that in his imprisonment, such " books and parchments,"
as he afterwards wrote for in his second letter to Timotheus,10 were brought
to him by his friends. Thus Festus adopted the conclusion that he had
before him a mad enthusiast, whose head had been turned by poring over
1 This does not at all prove, as has some- oar "that" ("if, as they assert"). Compare
times been supposed, that Saul did not preach note on Acts xxvi. 8 above.
in Arabia when he went there soon after his 6 Compare Col. i. 18. Also 1 Cor. xv. 20.
conversion ; see pp. 89, 90. 6 Something more than merely " show "
2 How are we to reconcile this with St. (A. V.).
Paul's statement (Gal. i. 22) that he continued ' Observe the mention of the " loud voice,"
personally unknown to the churches of Judaea coupled with the fact that Paul " was speak-
for many years after his conversion 1 We ing for himself." Both expressions show that
must either suppose that, in the present pas- he was suddenly interrupted in the midst of
sage, he means to speak not in the order of his discourse.
time, but of all which he had done up to the 8 The original has the definite article here.
present date ; or else we may perhaps suppose 9 See again v. 27, where St. Paul appeals
that St. Luke did not think it neccessary to again to the prophets, the writings to which he
attend to a minute detail of this kind, relating had alluded before.
to a period of St. Paul's life with which he 10 2 Tim. iv. 13. These, we may well bo-
was himself not personally acquainted, in giv- lieve, would especially be the Old Testament
ing the general outline of this speeeh. Scriptures, — perhaps Jewish commentaries
3 The conjunction here cannot mean " how- on them, and possibly also the works of
ever." Heathen poets and philosophers.
4 The "if" in the original is equivalent to

chap.xxti. SPEECH BEFORE AGRIPPA. 675 ,
strange learning. The Apostle's reply was courteous and self-possessed,
but intensely earnest. xxvi
I am not mad, most noble Festus, but speak forth the words of truth 25
and soberness. For the king has knowledge of these matters ; and more- 26
over I speak to him with boldness ; because I am persuaded that none
of these things is unknown to him, — for this has not been done in a
corner. Then, turning to the Jewish voluptuary who sat beside the Governor,
he made this solemn appeal to him : —
King Agrippa, believest thou the prophets? I know that thou be- 27
lievest. The King's reply was : " Thou wilt soon x persuade me to be a Chris
tian." The words were doubtless spoken ironically and in contempt:
but Paul took them as though they had been spoken in earnest, and made
that noble answer, which expresses, as no other words ever expressed them,
that union of enthusiastic zeal with genuine courtesy, which is the true
•characteristic of " a Christian."
I would to God, that whether soon or late, not only thou, but also all 29
who hear me to-day, were such as I am ; excepting these chains.
This concluded the interview. King Agrippa had no desire to hear
more ; and he rose from his seat,2 with the Governor and Berenice and
those who sat with them. As they retired, they discussed the case with
one another,3 and agreed that Paul was guilty of nothing worthy of death
or even imprisonment. Agrippa said positively to Festus, " This man 4
might have been set at liberty,5 if he had not appealed to the Emperor."
But the appeal had been made. There was no retreat either for Festus or
for Paul. On the new Governor's part there was no wish to continue the
1 The phrase here cannot mean " almost," present tense, and that the title " Christian "
as it is in the Authorized Version. It might was one of contempt. See 1 Pet. iv. 16.
mean either " in few words" (Eph. iii. 3), or 2 V. 30.
"in a small measure," or " in a small time." 8 V. 31.
The latter meaning agrees best with the fol- 4 Again the expression is contemptuous.
lowin" "in little or in much." We might See the remarks on Acts xvi. 35 (p. 268).
render the passage thus : " Thou thinkest to Caludius Lysias uses a similar expression in
make me a Christian with little persuasion." his letter to Felix, xxiii. 27.
We should observe that the verb is in the 6 Compare xxviii. 18.

676

THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL.

CHAP. T-m

procrastination of Felix ; and nothing now remained but to wait for a
convenient opportunity of sending his prisoner to Borne.

Coin of Nero and Herod Agrippa n.1

1 From the British Museum. Mr. Aker-
man describes it thus. " This prince, notwith
standing the troubles which now began to af
flict his ill-fated country, spent large sums in
improving and beautifying Jerusalem, Bery-
tus, and Caesarea Philippi. Of the latter

there is a coin extant, bearing the head of
Nero: reverse EIII BASIAE ArPIIHIA NE-
PQNIE, within a laurel garland, confirming the
account of Josephus (Ant. xx. 9, 8), who says
Herod enlarged and called the city Neronias,
ia honor of the Emperor." Num. III. p. 57.

CHAPTER XXIH
Ships and Navigation of the Ancients. — Roman Commerce in the Mediterranean. — Coin-
Trade between Alexandria and Puteoli. — Travellers by Sea. — St. Paul's Voyage from
Caesarea, by Sidon, to Myra. — From Myra, by Cnidus and Cape Salmone, to Fair Havens. —
Phoenix. — The Storm. — Seamanship during the Gale. — St. Paul's Vision. — Anchoring in
the Night. — Shipwreck. — Proof that it took Place in Malta. — Winter in the Island.
— Objections considered. — Voyage, by Syracuse and Rheginm, to Puteoli.
BEFORE entering on the narrative of that voyage J which brought the
Apostle Paul, through manifold and imminent dangers, from
Caesarea to Rome, it will be convenient to make a few introductory
remarks concerning the ships and navigation of the ancients. By fixing
clearly in the mind some of the principal facts relating to the form and
structure of Greek and Roman vessels, the manner in which these vessels
were worked, the prevalent lines of traffic in the Mediterranean, and the
opportunities afforded to travellers of reaching their destination by sea,
— we shall be better able to follow this voyage without distractions or
explanations, and with a clearer perception of each event as it occurred.
With regard to the vessels and seamanship of the Greeks and Romans,
many popular mistakes have prevailed, to which it is hardly necessary to
allude, after the full illustration which the subject has now received.2
1 The nautical difficulties of this narrative subject (Longmans, 1848) has already obtained
hare been successfully explained by two inde- a European reputation. Besides other valua-
pendent inquirers ; and, so far as we are ble aid, Mr. Smith has examined the sheets
aware, by no one else. A practical knowledge of this chapter, as they have passed through
of seamanship was required for the elucida- the press. We have also to express our ac
tion of the whole subject ; and none of the knowledgments for much kind assistance re-
ordinary commentators seem to have looked ceived from the late Admiral Moorsom and
on it with the eye of a sailor. The first who other naval officers.
examined St. Paul's voyage in a practical 2 The reference here is to the Dissertation
spirit was the late Admiral Sir Charles Pen- on " The Ships of the Ancients " in Mr.
rose, whose life has been lately published Smith's work on the Voyage and Shipwreck of
(Murray, 1851). His MSS. have been kindly St. Paul, pp. 140-202. The treatise may be
placed in the hands of the writer of this chap- regarded as the standard work on the subject,
ter, and they are frequently referred to in the not only in England, but in Europe. It has
notes A similar investigation was made sub- been translated into German by H. Thiersch,
sequently, but independently, and more mi- and it is adduced in Hermann's well-known
nutely and elaborately, by James Smith, Esq., work on Greek Antiquities as the decisive au-
of Jordanhill, whose published work on the thority on the difficult points connected with
677

678 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OP ST. PAUL. chap. xxni.
We must not entertain the notion that all the commerce of the ancients
was conducted merely by means of small craft, which proceeded timidly
in the day-time, and only in the summer season, along the coast from
harbor to harbor, — and which were manned by mariners almost ignorant
of the use of sails, and always trembling at the prospect of a storm. We
cannot, indeed, assert that the arts either of ship-building or navigation
were matured in the Mediterranean so early as the first century of the
Christian era. The Greeks and Romans were ignorant of the use of
the compass : 1 the instruments with which they took observations must
have been rude compared with our modern quadrants and sextants ; 2 and
we have no reason to believe that their vessels were provided with nautical
charts ; 3 and thus, when " neither sun nor stars appeared," and the sky
gave indications of danger, they hesitated to try the open sea.4 But the
ancient sailor was well skilled in the changeable weather of the Levant,
and his very ignorance of the aids of modern science made him the more
observant of external phenomena, and more familiar with his own
coasts.5 He was not less prompt and practical than a modern seaman in
the handling of his ship, when overtaken by stormy weather on a danger
ous coast.
The ship of the Greek and Roman mariner was comparatively rude,
both in its build and its rig. The hull was not laid down with the fine
lines with which we are so familiar in the competing vessels of England
and America,6 and the arrangement of the sails exhibited little of that
the study of ancient ship-building. It is " We are apt to consider the ancients as timid
hardly necessary to refer to any of the older and unskilful sailors, afraid to venture out of
works on the subject. A full catalogue is sight of land, or to make long voyages in the
given in Mr. Smith's Appendix. winter. I can see no evidence that this was
1 See Humboldt's Kosmos, vol. ii., for the the case. The cause of their not making
main facts relating to the history of the com- voyages after the end of summer arose, in a
pass. great measure, from the comparative obscurity
2 We have no information of any nautical of the sky during the winter, and not from
instruments at the time when we read of the gales which prevail at that season. With
Ptolemy's mural quadrant at Alexandria ; nor no means of directing their course, except by
is it likely that any more effectual means of observing the heavenly bodies, they were neces-
taking exact observations at sea, than the sim- sarily prevented from putting to sea when they
pie quadrant held in the hand, were in use be- could not depend on their being visible." —
fore the invention of the reflecting quadrants Smith, p. 180.
and sextants by Hooke and Hadley The 6 See again what is said below in reference
want of exact chronometers must also be borne to Acts xxvii. 12.
in mind. 6 " As both ends were alike, if we suppose
8 The first nautical charts were perhaps a full-built merchant-ship of the present day,
those of Marinus of Tyre (a. d. 150), whom cut in two, and the stern half replaced by one
Forbiger regards as the founder of mathema- exactly the same as that of the bow, we shall
tical geography. See the life of Ptolemy in have a pretty accurate notion of what these
Dr. Smith's Dictionary. Bhips were." — Smith, p. 141.
4 See Acts xxvii. 9-12, also xxviii. 11.

chap. xxra. SHIPS OF THE ANCIENTS. 679
complicated distribution yet effective combination of mechanical forces
which we admire in the East-Indiaman or modern frigate. With the
war-ships1 of the ancients we need not here occupy ourselves or the
reader : but two peculiarities in the structure of Greek and Roman mer
chantmen must be carefully noticed ; for both of them are much con
cerned in the seamanship described in the narrative before us.
The ships of the Greeks and Romans, like those of the early North
men,2 were not steered by means of a single rudder, but by two paddle-
rudders, one on each quarter. Hence " rudders " are mentioned in the
plural 3 by St. Luke (Acts xxvii. 40) as by Heathen writers ; and the fact
is made still more palpable by the representations of art, as in the coins
of Imperial Rome or the tapestry of Bayeux : nor does the hinged-rud-
der appear on any of the remains of antiquity till a late period in the
Middle Ages.4
And as this mode of steering is common to the two sources, from which
we must trace our present art of ship-building, so also is the same mode
of rigging characteristic of the ships both of the North Sea and the
Mediterranean.5 We find in these ancient ships one large mast, with
strong ropes rove through a block at the mast-head, and one large sail,
fastened to an enormous yard.6 We shall see the importance of attend
ing to this arrangement when we enter upon the incidents of St. Paul's
voyage (xxvii. 17, 19). One consequence was, that instead of the strain
being distributed over the hull, as in a modern ship, it was concentrated
upon a smaller portion of it : and thus in ancient times there must have
been a greater tendency to leakage than at present ; 7 and we have the
testimony of ancient writers to the fact, that a vast proportion of the ves
sels lost were by foundering. Thus Virgil,8 whose descriptions of every
1 For a full description and explanation of to the gold nobles of our king Edward III.,
ancient triremes, See., see Mr. Smith's Dis- and infers that " the change in the mode of
sertation. steering must have taken place about the end
2 See Vorsaee on the Danes and Northmen of the thirteenth, or early in the fourteenth
in England. He does not describe the struc- century."
ture of their ships ; but this peculiarity is evi- 6 See Vorsaee, as above, and the representa-
dent in the drawing given at p. Ill, from the tions of classical ships in Mr. Smith's work.
Bayeux tapestry. " By this it is not meant that topsails were
8 " The fastenings of the rudders." The not used, or that there were never more masts
fact of " rudders " being in the plural is lost than one. Topsails (suppara) are frequently al-
sight of in the English version ; and the impres- luded to : and we shall have occasion hereafter
sion is conveyed of a single rudder, worked to refer particularly to a second mast, besides
by tiller-ropes, which, as we shall see, is quite the mainmast. See Mr. Smith's Dissertation,
erroneous. Compare the use of "guberna" p. 151, and the engraving there given from
in Lucretius; and see Smith, p. 143, and Dr. M. Jal's Archeologie Navale.
Smith's Dictionary of Antiquities, under " Gu- 7 See Smith, p. 63.
bernaculum." 8 Laxis laterum compagibus omnes
4 Smith, p. 146. He traces the representa- Accipiuntinimicum imbrem, rimisque fatiscunt
¦ion of ancient rudders from Trajan's column

680 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap, xxm
thing which relates to the sea are peculiarly exact, speaks of the ships in
the fleet of iEneas as lost in various ways, some on rocks, and some on
quicksands, but " all with fastenings loosened ; " and Josephus relates
that the ship from which he so narrowly escaped foundered 1 in " Adria,"
and that he and his companions saved themselves by swimming2 through
the night, — an escape which found its parallel in the experience of the
Apostle, who in one of those shipwrecks, of which no particular narra
tion has been given to us, was " a night and a day in +he deep " (2 Cor.
xi. 25) . The same danger was apprehended in the ship of Jonah, from
which " they cast forth the wares that were in the ship into the sea to
lighten it " (i. 5) ; as well as in the ship of St. Paul, from which, after
having " lightened " it the first day, they " cast out the tackling " on the
second day, and finally " threw out the cargo of wheat into the sea "
(xxvii. 18, 19, 38).
This leads us to notice what may be called a third peculiarity of the
appointments of ancient ships, as compared with those of modern times.
In consequence of the extreme danger to which they were exposed from
leaking, it was customary to take to sea, as part of their ordinary gear,
"undergirders" (mo^auaza) , which were simply ropes for passing round
the hull of the ship, and thus preventing the planks from starting.3 One
of the most remarkable proofs of the truth of this statement is to be found
in the inscribed marbles dug up within the last twenty years at the
Piraeus, which give us an inventory of the Attic fleet in its flourishing
period ; 4 as one of the most remarkable accounts of the application of
1 Life, c. 3. Mr. Smith remarks here (p. 62) of the sea." In most of the European lan-
that, since Josephus and some of his compan- guages the nautical term is, like the Greek, ex-
ions saved themselves by swimming, " the pressive of the nature of the operation. Fr.
ship did not go down during the gale, but in ceintrer; Ital. cingere ; Germ, umgurten ; Dutch
consequence of the damage she received dur- omgorden ; Norw. omgyrte; Portug. cintrar. In
ing its continuance." For the meaning of the Spanish the word is tortorar : a circumstance
word " Adria," see below. which possesses some etymological interest,
2 Probably with the aid of floating spars, since the word used by Isidore of Seville for
&c. See note on 2 Cor. xi. 25. a rope used in this way is tormentum. See the
8 This is what is called "frapping " by sea- next note.
men in the English navy, who are always 4 The excavations were made in the year
taught how to frap a ship. The only differ- 1 834 ; and the inscriptions were published, in
ence is, that the practice is now resorted to 1840, at Berlin, by A. Bockh. A complete ac-
much less frequently, and that modern ships count is given of every thing with which the
are not supplied with " undergirders " specially Athenian ships were supplied, with the name
prepared. The operation and its use are thus of each vessel, &c. ; and we find that they all
described in Falconer's Marine Dictionary: carried "undergirders," which are classed
" To frap a ship is to pass four or five turns of among the hanging gear, as opposed to what
a large cable-laid rope round the hull or frame was constructed of timber. In commenting on
of a ship, to support her in a great storm, or one passage having reference to the ships
otherwise, when it is apprehended that she is which were on service in the Adriatic, and
not strong enough to resist the violent efforts which carried several " undergirders," Bockh

chap, xxiii. SHIPS OF THE ANCIENTS. 681
these artificial " helps " (xxvii. 17) in a storm is to be found in the nar
rative before us.
If these differences between ancient ships and our own are borne in
mind, the problems of early seamanship in the Mediterranean are nearly
reduced to those with which the modern navigator has to deal in the same
oeas. The practical questions which remain to be asked are these, What
were the dimensions of ancient ships ? how near the wind could they
sail ? and, with a fair wind, at what rate ?
As regards the first of these questions, there seems no reason why we
should suppose the old trading-vessels of the Mediterranean to be much
smaller than our own. We may rest this conclusion both on the character
of the cargoes with which they were freighted,1 and on the number of
persons we know them to have sometimes conveyed. Though the great
ship of Ptolemy Philadelphus 2 may justly be regarded as built for osten
tation rather than for use, the Alexandrian vessel which forms the subject
of one of Lucian's dialogues,3 and is described as driven by stress of
weather into the Piraeus, furnishes us with satisfactory data for the calcu
lation of the tonnage of ancient ships. Two hundred and seventy-six
souls 4 were on board the ship in which St. Paul was wrecked (xxvii. 37 ),
and the " Castor and Pollux " conveyed them, in addition to her own
crew, from Malta to Puteoli (xxviii. 11) ; while Josephus informs us 5 that
there were six hundred on board the ship from which he, with about
eighty others, escaped. Such considerations lead us to suppose that the
burden of many ancient merchantmen may have been from five hundred
to a thousand tons.
A second question, of greater consequence in reference to the present
subject, relates to the angle which the course of an ancient ship could be
made to assume with the direction of the wind, or, to use the language fi
of English sailors (who divide the compass into thirty-two points), within
shows that these were ropes passed round the allow at the rate of a ton and a half to each
body of the ship, but he strangely supposes man, and as the ship we are considering was
that they were passed from stem to stern. not expressly fitted for passengers, we may
1 See below on the traffic between the conclude that her burden was fully, or at least
provinces and Rome. nearly double, the number of tons to the souls
2 Described in Athenaeus. on board, or upwards of 500 tons." — Penrose,
8 From the length and breadth of this ship MS.
as given by Lucian, Mr. Smith infers that her 5 Life, c. 3.
burden was between 1,000 and 1,100 tons, pp. 6 As it is essential, for the purpose of eluci-
147-150 dating the narrative, that this language should
4 " The ship must have been of considera- be clearly understood, a compass has been in-
ble burden, as we find there were no less than serted at p. 619, and some words of e.tplana-
276 person's embarked on board her. To af- tion are given, both here and below. This will
ford fair accommodation for troops in a trans- be readily excused by those who are familiar
port expressly fitted for the purpose, we should with nautical phraseology

682 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OP ST. PAUL. chap. xxm.
how many points of the wind she would sail. That ancient vessels could
not work to windward is one of the popular mistakes1 which need not be
refuted. They doubtless took advantage of the Etesian winds,2 just as
the traders in the Eastern Archipelago sail with the monsoons : but those
who were accustomed to a seafaring life could not avoid discovering that a
ship's course can be made to assume a less angle than a right angle with
the direction of the wind, or, in other words, that slie can be made to
sail within less than eight points of the wind : 3 and Pliny distinctly says,
that it is possible for a ship to sail on contrary tacks.4 The limits of
this possibility depend upon the character of the vessel and the violence
of the gale. We shall find, below, that the vessel in which St. Paul was
wrecked " could not look at the wind," — for so the Greek word (xxvii.
15) may be literally translated in the language of English sailors, —
though with a less violent gale an English ship, well managed, could
easily have kept her course. A modern merchantman, in moderate
weather, can sail within six points of the wind. In an ancient vessel the
yard could not be braced so sharp, and the hull was more clumsy ; and
it would not be safe to say that she could sail nearer the wind than within
seven points.6
To turn now to the third question, the rate of sailing, — the very
nature of the rig, which was less adapted than our own for working to
windward, was peculiarly favorable to a quick run before the wind. In
the China seas, during the monsoons, junks have been seen from the deck
of a British vessel behind in the horizon in the morning, and before in
the horizon in the evening.6 Thus we read of passages accomplished of
old in the Mediterranean, which would do credit to a well-appointed
modern ship. Pliny, who was himself a seaman, and in command of a
fleet at the time of his death, might furnish us with several instances.
We might quote the story of the fresh fig, which Cato produced in the
senate at Rome, when he urged his countrymen to undertake the third
Punic war, by impressing on them the imminent nearness of their enemy.
" This fruit," he says, " was gathered fresh at Carthage three days ago." 7
Other voyages, which he adduces, are such as these, — seven days from
Cadiz to Ostia, — seven days from the straits of Messina to Alexandria, —
1 Yet we sometimes find the mistake when 8 See Smith, p. 178.
we should hardly expect it. Thus, Hemsen 4 " Iisdem ventis in contrarium navigator
says, in reference to Acts xxvii. 7, that it is prolatis pedibus." — H. N. ii. 48.
"doubtful whether the ancients were ac- ° Smith, p. 178.
quainted with the way of sailing against the 6 See above, p. 610, n. 8.
wind." 7 pi;n. jj_ ^V. XVi 2o. We may observe
2 The classical passages relating to these that the interval of time need not be regarded
winds — the monsoons of the Levant — are as so much as three entire days.
collected in Forbiger's work on Ancient Geog
raphy.

chap. xxm. NAVIGATION OP THE ANCIENTS. 683
nine days from Puteoli to Alexandria. These instances are quite in
harmony with what we read in other authors. Thus Rhodes and Cape
Salmone, at the eastern extremity of Crete, are reckoned by Diodorus
and Strabo as four days from Alexandria : Plutarch tells us of a voyage
within the day from Brundusium to Corcyra : Procopius describes Belisa-
rius as sailing on one day with his fleet from Malta, and landing on the
next day some leagues to the south of Carthage.1 A thousand stades
(or between 100 and 150 miles) is reckoned by- the geographers a com
mon distance to accomplish in the twenty-four hours.2 And the conclu
sion to which we are brought is, that with a fair wind an ancient
merchantman would easily sail at the rate of seven knots an hour, — a
conclusion in complete harmony both with what we have observed in a
former voyage of St. Paul (Ch. XX.), and with what will demand our
attention at the close of that voyage which brought him at length from
Malta by Rhegium to Puteoli (Acts xxviii. 13).
The remarks which have been made will convey to the reader a suffi
cient notion of the ships and navigation of the ancients. If to the above-
mentioned peculiarities of build and rig we add the eye painted at the
prow, the conventional ornaments at stem and stern, which are familiar
to us in remaining works of art,3 and the characteristic figures of
Heathen divinities,4 we shall gain a sufficient idea of an ancient mer
chantman. And a glance at the chart of the Mediterranean will enable
us to realize in our imagination the nature of the voyages that were most
frequent in the ancient world. With the same view of elucidating the
details of our subject beforehand, we may now devote a short space to the
prevalent lines of traffic, and to the opportunities of travellers by sea, in
the first century of the Christian era.
Though the Romans had no natural love for the sea, and though a
commercial life was never regarded by them as an honorable occupation,
and thus both experience of practical seamanship and the business of
the carrying-trade remained in a great measure with the Greeks, yet a
vast development had been given to commerce by the consolidation of the
Roman Empire. Piracy had been effectually put down before the close
of the Republic.5 The annexation of Egypt drew towards Italy the rich
trade of the Indian seas. After the effectual reduction of Gaul and Spain,

1 This is one of the passages which will be stern or prow, in the form of the neck of a
referred to hereafter, in considering thebounda- water-fowl, see Smith, p. 142, and the Dictiona
ries of the sea called Adria (Acts xxvii. 27). ry of Antiquities, under " Aplustre."
2 Herodotus reckons a day and a night's 4 " Whose sign was Castor and Pollux,"
sail in the summer time, aud with a favorable Acts xxviii. 11. This might be abundantly.
wind at 1,300 stadia, or 162 Roman miles. illustrated from classical authors.
8 For the xvv'talt't> a **" ornament at the 6 Compare pp. 19, 20.

684 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap, xxm,
Roman soldiers and Roman slave-dealers ! invaded the shores of Britain.
The trade of all the countries which surrounded the Mediterranean began
to flow towards Rome. , The great city herself was passive, for she had
nothing to export. But the cravings of her luxury, and the necessities
of her vast population, drew to one centre the converging lines of a busy
traffic from a wide extent of provinces. To leave out of view what
hardly concerns us here, the commerce by land from the North,2 some of
the principal directions of trade by sea may be briefly enumerated as fol
lows. The harbors of Ostia and Puteoli were constantly full of ships
from the West, which had brought wool and other articles from Cadiz : 3
a circumstance which possesses some interest for us here, as illustrating
the mode in which St. Paul might hope to accomplish his voyage to Spain
(Rom. xv. 24). On the South was Sicily, often called the Store-house
of Italy, — and Africa, which sent furniture-woods to Rome, and heavy
cargoes of marble and granite. On the East, Asia Minor was the inter
mediate space through which the caravan-trade 4 passed, conveying silks
and spices from beyond the Euphrates to the markets and wharves of
Ephesus. We might extend this enumeration by alluding to the fisheries
of the Black Sea, and the wine-trade of the Archipelago. But enough
has been said to give some notion of the commercial activity of which
Italy was the centre : and our particular attention here is required only
to one branch of trade, one line of constant traffic across the waters of
tlie Mediterranean to Rome.
Alexandria has been mentioned already as a city, which, next after
Athens, exerted the strongest intellectual influence over the age in which
St. Paul's appointed work was done ; and we have had occasion to notice
some indirect connection between this city and the Apostle's own labors.5
But it was eminent commercially not less than intellectually. The pro
phetic views of Alexander were at that time receiving an ampler fulfil
ment than at any former period. The trade with the Indian seas, which
had been encouraged under the Ptolemies, received a vast impulse in the
reign of Augustus : and under the reigns of his successors, the valley of
the Nile was the channel of an active transit trade in spices, dyes, jewels,
1 See the passage in Pitt's speeches, re- of the mouth of the Tiber. See the article
ferred to in Milman's Gibbon, i. p. 70. " Ostia" in Dr. Smith's Diet, of Geography.
2 For example, the amber trade of the 4 There seem to have been two great lines
Baltic, and the importing of provisions and of inland trade through Asia Minor, one near
rough cloths from Cisalpine Gaul. the southern shore of the Black Sea, through
3 We may refer here, in illustration, to the the districts opened by the campaigns of Pom-
coin representing Ostia below, p. 743. It was pey, and the other through the centre of the
about this time that the new harbor of Portus country from Mazaca, on the Euphrates, to
(a city not unconnected with ecclesiastical his- Ephesus.
torv> was completed by Nero on the north side 6 See pp. 8, 9, 33, 407.

chap. xxin. FACILITIES OFPERED TO TRAVELLERS. 685
and perfumes, which were brought by Arabian mariners from the far
East, and poured into the markets of Italy.1 But Egypt was not only the
medium of transit trade. She had her own manufactures of linen,
paper, and glass, which she exported in large quantities. And one
natural product of her soil has been a staple commodity from the time of
Pharaoh to our own. We have only to think of the fertilizing inunda
tions of the Nile, on the one hand, and, on the other, of the multitudes
composing the free and slave population of Italy, in order to comprehend
the activity and importance of the Alexandrian corn-trade. At a later
period the Emperor Commodus established a company of merchants to
convey the supplies from Egypt to Rome ; and the commendations which
he gave himself for this forethought may still be read in the inscription
round the ships represented on his coins.2 The harbor to which the
Egyptian corn-vessels were usually bound was Puteoli. At the close of
this chapter we shall refer to some passages which give an animated pic
ture of the arrival of these ships. Meanwhile, it is well to have called
attention to this line of traffic between Alexandria and Puteoli ; for in so
doing we have described the means which Divine Providence employed
for bringing the Apostle to Rome.
The transition is easy from the commerce of the Mediterranean to the
progress of travellers from point to point in that sea. If to this enume
ration of the main lines of traffic by sea we add all the ramifications of
the coasting-trade which depended on them, we have before us a full
view of the opportunities which travellers possessed of accomplishing
their voyages. Just in this way we have lately seen Si Paul completing
the journey, on which his mind was set, from Philippi, by Miletus and
Patara, to Caesarea (Ch. XX.). We read of no periodical packets for
the conveyance of passengers sailing between the great towns of the
Mediterranean. Emperors themselves were usually compelled to take
advantage of the same opportunities to which Jewish pilgrims and Chris
tian Apostles were limited. When Vespasian went to Rome, leaving
Titus to prosecute the siege of Jerusalem, " he went on board a mer
chant-ship, and sailed from Alexandria to Rhodes," and thence pursued
his way through Greece to the Adriatic, and finally went to Rome through
Italy by land.3 And when the Jewish war was ended, and when, sus
picions having arisen concerning the allegiance of Titus to Vespasian, the
son was anxious " to rejoin his father," he also left Alexandria * in a
" merchant-ship," and " hastened to Italy," touching at the very places
i See the history of this trade in Dean Vin- a Joseph. War, vii. 2, 1.
cent's Commerce and Navigation of the Ancients. 4 Snet. Tit. c. 5.
2 One of them is given (from Mr. Smith's
work) on the titlepage.

686 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap. inn.
at which St. Paul touched, first at Rhegium (xxviii. 13), and then at
Puteoli (lb.).
If such was the mode in which even royal personages travelled from
the provinces to the metropolis, we must of course conclude that those
who travelled on the business of the state must often have been content
to avail themselves of similar opportunities. The sending of state
prisoners to Rome from various parts of the Empire was an event of
frequent occurrence. Thus we are told by Josephus,1 that Felix, " for
some slight offence, bound and sent to Rome several priests of his ac
quaintance, honorable and good men, to answer for themselves to Caesar."
Such groups must often have left Caesarea and the other Eastern ports, in
merchant-vessels bound for the West ; and such was the departure of St.
Paul, when the time at length came for that eventful journey, which had
been so long and earnestly cherished in his own wishes ; 2 so emphatically
foretold by divine revelation ; 3 and which was destined to involve such
great consequences to the whole future of Christianity.
The vessel in which he sailed, with certain other state prisoners, was
" a ship of Adramyttium " apparently engaged in the coasting-trade,4
and at that time (probably the end of summer or the beginning of au
tumn) 5 bound on her homeward voyage. Whatever might be the harbors
at which she intended to touch, her course lay along the coast of the
province of Asia.6 Adramyttium was itself a seaport in Mysia, which
(as we have seen) was a subdivision of that province : and we have
already described it as situated in the deep gulf which recedes beyond
the base of Mount Ida, over against the island of Lesbos, and as connected
by good roads with Pergamus and Troas on the coast, and the various
marts in the interior of the peninsula.7 Since St. Paul never reached the
1 Joseph. Life, c. 3. the New Testament, we need only refer again
2 Rom. xv. 23. to p. 205, &c. It is of the utmost consequence
8 Acts xix. 21 ; xxiii. 11. See xxvii. 24. to bear this in mind. If the continent of Asia
4 The words "meaning to sail by the coasts were intended, the passage would be almost
of Asia" (v. 2) should rather be applied to unmeaning. Yet Falconer says (Diss, on St.
the ship (" about to sail," &c.)r They seem to Paul's Voyage, on the wind Euroclydon, and the
imply that she was about to touch at several Apostle's shipwreck on the Island Melita, by a
places on her way to Adramyttium. Proba- Layman. Oxf. 1817), " They who conducted
bly she was a small coaster, similar to those the ship meant to sail on their return by the
of the modern Greeks in the same seas : and coasts of Asia ; accordingly, the next day after
doubtless the Alexandrian corn-ship mentioned they set sail, they touched at Sidon," p. 4.
afterwards was much larger. Nor are we to suppose Asm Minor intended,
5 This we infer, partly because it is reasona- which seems to be the supposition even of
ble to suppose that they expected to reach some of the most careful commentators.
Italy before the winter, partly because of the ' P. 240 ; and see p. 596. We need hardly
delays which are expressly mentioned before allude to the error of Grotius, who supposed
the consultation at Fair Havens. See p. 696. Adrumetum, on the African coast, to be meant.
6 For the meaning of the word " Asia " in ' Mr. Lewin assumes that the intention of Julius

chap, xxm, CAESAREA TO SIDON. 687
place, no description of it is required.1 It is only needful to observe that
when the vessel reached the coast of " Asia," the travellers would be
brought some considerable distance on their way to Rome ; and there
would be a good prospect of finding some other westward-bound vessel,
in which they might complete their voyage, — more especially since the
Alexandrian corn-ships (as we shall see) often touched at the harbors in
that neighborhood.
St. Paul's two companions — besides the soldiers, with Julius their
commanding officer, the sailors, the other prisoners, and such occasional
passengers as may have taken advantage of this opportunity of leaving
Caesarea — were two Christians already familiar to us, Luke the Evan
gelist, whose name, like that of Timotheus, is almost inseparable from
the Apostle, and whom we may conclude to have been with him -since his
arrival in Jerusalem,2 — and " Aristarchus the Macedonian, of Thessalo
nica," whose native country and native city have been separately men
tioned before (Acts xix. 29, xx. 4), and who seems, from the manner in
which he is spoken of in the Epistles written from Rome (Philem. 24, Col.
iv. 10), to have been, like St. Paul himself, a prisoner in the cause of the
Gospel. On the day after sailing from Cassarea the vessel put into Sidon (v. 3).
This may be readily accounted for, by supposing that she touched there for
the purposes of trade, or to land some passengers. Or another hypothesis
is equally allowable. Westerly and north-westerly winds prevail in the
Levant at the end of summer and the beginning of autumn ; 3 and we
was to proceed (like those who afterwards from the journal written by Lord de Sau-
took Ignatius to his martyrdom) by the Via marez, on his return from Aboukir, in the
Egnatia through Macedonia ; but the narrative months of August and September, 1798. He
gives no indication of such a plan : and indeed stood to the north towards Cyprus, and was
the hypothesis is contradicted by the word in compelled to run to the south of Crete. " The
xxvii. 1 . wind continues to the westward. I am sorry
1 A short notice of it is given by Sir. C. Fel- to find it almost as prevailing as the trade-
lows (A. M. p. 39). Mr. Weston, in his MS. winds (July 4). . . . We have just gained
journal, describes it as a filthy town, of about sight of Cyprus, nearly the track we followed
1,500 houses, 150 of which are inhabited by six weeks ago; so invariably do the westerly
Greeks, and he saw no remains of antiquity. winds prevail at this season (Aug. 19). . . .We
It was a flourishing seaport in the time of the are still off the island of Rhodes. Our pres-
kings of Pergamus ; and Pliny mentions it as ent route is to the northward of Candia
the seat of a conventus juridicus. In Pococke's (Aug. 28). . . . After contending three days
Travels (II. ii. 16), it is stated that there is against the adverse winds which are almost in-
much boat-building still at Adramyti. variably encountered here, and getting suffi-
2 See above. ciently to the northward to have weathered
8 See the quotation already given from the small islands that lie more immediately
Norie's Sailing Directions in this volume, p. 605, between the Archipelago and Candia, the wind
n. 4. A similar statement will be found in set in so strong from the westward, that I was
Purdy, p. 59. Mr. Smith (pp. 22, 23, 27, 41 ) compelled to desist from that passage, and to
gives very copious illustrations of this point, bear up between Scarpanto and Saxo."

688 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap. xxm.
find that it did actually blow from these quarters soon afterwards, in the
course of St. Paul's voyage. Such a wind would be sufficiently fair for a
passage to Sidon : and the seamen might proceed to that port in the hope
of the weather becoming more favorable, and be detained there by tin
wind continuing in the same quarter.1 The passage from Caesarea to
Sidon is sixty-seven miles, a distance easily accomplished, under favora
ble circumstances, in less than twenty-four hours. In the course of the
night they would pass by Ptolemais and Tyre, where St. Paul had visited
the Christians two years before.2 Sidon is the last city on the Phoenician
shore in which the Apostle's presence can be traced. It is a city associ
ated, from the earliest times, with patriarchal and Jewish history. The
limit of " the border of the Canaanites " in the description of the peo
pling of the earth after the Flood (Gen. x. 19), — " the haven of the sea,
the haven of ships," in the dim vision of the dying Patriarch (Ib. xlix.
13), — the "great Sidon" of the wars of Joshua (Josh. xi. 8), — the
city that never was conquered by the Israelites (Judg. i. 31), — the home
of the merchants that "passed over the sea" (Isa. xxiii.), — its history
was linked with all the annals of the Hebrew race. Nor is it less famil
iarly known in the records of Heathen antiquity. Its name is celebrated
both in the Iliad and the Odyssey, and Herodotus says that its sailors
were the most expert of all the Phoenicians. Its ' strong and massive
fortifications were pulled down, when this coast fell under the sway of
the Persians ; but its harbor remained uninjured till a far later period.
The Prince of the Druses, with whose strange and brilliant career its more
recent history is most closely connected, threw masses of stone and earth
into the port, in order to protect himself from the Turks : 3 — and houses
are now standing on the spot where the ships of King Louis anchored in
the last Crusade,4 and which was crowded with merchandise in that age,
when the geographer of the Roman Empire spoke of Sidon as the best
harbor of Phoenicia.5
Nor is the history of Sidon without a close connection with those years
in which Christianity was founded. Not only did its inhabitants, with
those of Tyre, follow the footsteps of Jesus, to hear His words, and to
be healed of their diseases (Luke vi. 17), but the Son of David Himself
visited those coasts, and there rewarded the importunate faith of a Gen
tile suppliant (Matt, xv., Mark vii.) ; and soon the prophecy which lay,
1 "They probably stopped at Sidon for the 8 A compendious account of Fakriddin will
purposes of trade." — Smith, p. 23. " It may be found in the Modern Traveller.
be concluded that they put in because of con- 4 For the history of Sidon during the Mid
trary winds." — Penrose MS. die Ages, see Dr. Robinson's third volume.
2 See what has been said above on these 6 Strabo, xvi.
two cities, Ch. XX. p. 613, &c.

chap. xxm. SIDON TO MYRA. 689
as it were, involved in this miracle, was fulfilled by the preaching of
Evangelists and Apostles. Those who had been converted during the
dispersion which followed the martyrdom of Stephen were presently.
visited by Barnabas and Saul (Acts xi.). Again, Paul with Barnabas
passed through these cities on their return from the first victorious jour
ney among the Gentiles (Ib. xv. 3). Nor were these the only journeys
which the Apostle had taken through Phoenicia ; 1 so that he well knew,
on his arrival from Caesarea, that Christian brethren were to be found in
Sidon. He, doubtless, told Julius that he had " friends " there, whom he
wished to visit, and, either from special commands which had been given
by Festus in favor of St. Paul, or through an influence which the Apostle
had already gained over the centurion's mind, the desired permission was
granted. If we bear in our remembrance that St. Paul's health was
naturally delicate, and that he must have suffered much during his long
detention at Caesarea, a new interest is given to the touching incident, with
which the narrative of this voyage opens, that the Roman officer treated
this one prisoner " courteously, and gave him liberty to go unto his friends
to refresh himself." We have already considered the military position of
this centurion, and seen that there are good grounds for identifying him
with an officer mentioned by a Heathen historian.2 It gives an additional
pleasure to such investigations, when we can record our grateful recollec
tion of kindness shown by him to that Apostle, from whom we have
received our chief knowledge of the Gospel.
On going to sea from Sidon, the wind was unfavorable. Hence, what
ever the weather had been before, it certainly blew from the westward
now. The direct course from Sidon to the " coasts of Asia " would have
been to the southward of Cyprus, across the sea over which the Apostle
had sailed so prosperously two years before.3 Thus when St. Luke says
that " they sailed under the lee* of Cyprus, because the winds were con
trary," he means that they sailed to the north-east and north of the island.
If there were any doubt concerning his meaning, it would be made clear
by what is said afterwards, that they " sailed through5 the sea which is over
against Cilicia and Pamphylia." The reasons why this course was taken
will be easily understood by those who have navigated those seas in modern
1 See p. 370. led by his view of the meaning of the word
2 See the preceding chapter. " Asia." They sailed, in fact, so that the
8 See Ch. XX. wind blew from the island towards the ship.
* This is the strict meaning of the term. The idea of sailing near the coast is no doubt
So it is used below, v. 7, and the sense is the included .- but the two things are distinct.
same, v. 16. It is a confusion of geographical 6 Through or across. The meaning is simi-
ideas to suppose that a south shore is neces- lar in v. 27. We should observe the order in
sarily meant. Falconer, who imagines the which the following words occur. Cilicia is
south coast of Cyprus to be intended, was mis- mentioned first.
44

690

THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL.

CHAP. XXU1.

times. By standing to the north, the vessel would fall in with the cur
rent which sets in a north-westerly direction past the eastern extremity
©f Cyprus, and then westerly along the southern coast of Asia Minor, till
it is lost at the opening of the Archipelago.1 Aud besides this, as the
land was neared, the wind would draw off the shore, and the water would
be smoother ; and both these advantages would aid the progress of the
vessel.2 Hence she would easily work to windward,3 under the moun
tains of Cilicia, and through the bay of Pamphylia, — to Lycia, which
was the. first district in the province of Asia.4 Thus we follow the Apos
tle once more across the sea over which he had first sailed with Barnabas
from Antioch to Salamis, — and within sight of the summits of Taurus,
which rise above his native city, — and close by Perga and Attaleia, —
till he came to a Lycian harbor not far from Patara, the last point at
which he had touched on his return from the third missionary journey.
The Lycian harbor, in which the Adramyttian ship came to anchor on
this occasion, after her voyage from Sidon, was Myra, a city which has
been fully illustrated by some of those travellers, whose researches have,
within these few years, for the first time provided materials for a detailed
geographical commentary on the Acts of the Apostles.5 Its situation
was at the opening of a long and wonderful gorge, which conducts the
traveller from the interior of the mountain-region of Lycia to the sea.6

1 " From Syria to the Archipelago there is
a constant current to the westward, slightly
felt at sea, but very perceptible near the shore,
along this part of which [Lycia] it runs with
considerable but irregular velocity : between
Adratchan Cape and the small adjacent island
we found it one day almost three miles an
hour. . . . The great body of water, as it
moves to the westward, is intercepted by the
western coast of the Gulf of Adalia ; thus
pent up and accumulated, it rushes with aug
mented violence towards Cape Khelidonia,
where, diffusing itself in the open sea, it again
becomes equalized." Beaufort's Karamania,
p. 41. See pp. 127,606. [Of two persons
engaged in the merchant-service, one says
that he has often " tricked other fruit-vessels "
in sailing westward, by standing to the north
to get this current, while they took the mid-
channel course ; the other, that the current is
sometimes so strong between Cyprus and the
main, that he has known " a steamer jammed "
there, in going to the East.]
'! It is said in the Sailing Directory (p. 243),
bat " at night the great northern valley con-
iui'f.s the land-wind from the cold mountains

of the interior to the sea ; " and again (p. 241 ),
that " Capt. Beaufort, on rounding Cape Khe
lidonia, found the land-breezes, which had
generally been from the west, or south-west,
coming down the gulf of Adalia from the
northward." 8 The vessel would [probably] have to beat
up to Myra. This is indicated in the map.
The wind is assumed to be N. W. : and the
alternate courses marked are about N. N. E.
on the larboard tack, and W. S. W. on the
starboard tack.
4 Lycia was once virtually a part of the
province of Asia (p. 207) ; but shortly before
the time of St. Paul's voyage to Rome it
seems to have been united under one jurisdic
tion with Pamphylia (p. 209). The period
when it was a separate province, with Myra
for its metropolis, was much later.
6 The two best account* of Myra will be
found in Fellows's Asia Minor, pp. 194, &c,
and Spratt and Forbes's Lycia, vol. i. ch. iii.
6 This gorge is described in striking lan
guage, both by Sir C. Fellows and by SpraW
and Forbes.

chap. xxm. MYRA TO CNIDUS. 691
A wide space of plain intervened between the city and the port. Strabo
says that the distance was twenty stadia, or more than two miles.1 If we
draw a natural inference from the magnitude of the theatre,2 which
remains at the base of the cliffs, and the traces of ruins to some distance
across the plain, we should conclude that Myra once held a considerable
population : while the Lycian tombs, still conspicuous in the rocks, seem
to connect it with a remote period of Asiatic history.3 We trace it, on
the other hand, in a later though hardly less obscure period of history :
for in the Middle Ages it was called the port of the Adriatic, and was
visited by Anglo-Saxon travellers.4 This was the period when St. Nicho
las, the saint of the modern Greek sailors, — born at Patara, and buried
at Myra, —had usurped the honor which those two cities might more
naturally have given to the Apostle who anchored in their harbors.5 In
the seclusion of tne deep gorge of Dembra fs a magnificent Byzantine
church," - — probably the cathedral of the diocese, when Myra was the
ecclesiastical and political metropolis of Lycia.7 Another building, hard
ly less conspicuous, is a granary erected by Trajan near the mouth of the
little river Andraki.8 This is the ancient Andriace, which Pliny mentions
as the port of Myra, and which is described to us by Appian, in his nar
rative of the Civil Wars of Rome, as closed and protected by a chain.9
Andriace, the port of Myra, was one of the many excellent harbors
which abound in the south-western part of Asia Minor. From this cir
cumstance, and from the fact that the coast is high, and visible to a great
distance, — in addition to the local advantages which we have mentioned
above, the westerly current, and the offshore wind, — it was common for
ships bound from Egypt to the westward to be found in this neighborhood

1 See note 4. St. Petersburg by a Russian frigate during the
2 Mr. Cockerell remarks that we may infer Greek revolution, and a gaudy picture sent in-
something in reference to the population of an stead. Sp. & F. Compare Fellows.
ancient city from the size of its theatre. A 8 See the description of this grand and
plan of this theatre is given in Leake's Asia solitary building, and the vignette, in Spratt
Minor, and also in Texier's Asie Mineure. and Forbes. They remark that " as Myra was
8 It is well known that there is much differ- the capital of the bishopric of Lycia for many
ence of opinion concerning the history of centuries afterwards, and as there are no re-
Lycian civilization, and the date of the existing mains at Myra itself indicating the existence
remains. of a cathedral, we probably behold in this ruin
4 Early Travels in Palestine, quoted by Mr. the head-church of the diocese, planted here
Lewin, vol. ii. p. 716. It is erroneously said from motives of seclusion and security." — Vol.
there that Myra was at that time the metropolis i. p. 107.
¦of Lvcia on the authority of the Synecdemus, 7 Hierocl. Synecd. See Wesseling's note, p.
which belongs to a period much later. The 684.
river Andriaki is also incorrectly identified 8 The inscription on the frranary is given
with the Limyrus. by Beaufort.
5 The relics of St. Nicholas were taken to 9 See above p. 608, n. 7.

692 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OP ST. PAUL. chap. xxii.
when the winds were contrary.1 It was therefore a natural occurrence,
and one which could have caused no surprise, when the centurion met
in the harbor at Myra with an Alexandrian corn-ship on her voyage to
Italy (v. 6). Even if business had not brought her to this coast, she was
not really out of her track in a harbor in the same meridian as that of
her own port.2 It is probable that the same westerly winds which had
hindered St. Paul's progress from Cassarea to Myra had caused the Alex
andrian ship to stand to the north.
Thus the expectation was fulfilled which had induced the centurion to
place his prisoners on board the vessel of Adramyttium.3 That vessel
proceeded on her homeward route up the coast of the .^Egean, if the
weather permitted ; and we now follow the Apostle through a more event
ful part of his voyage, in a ship which was probably much larger than
those that were simply engaged in the coasting-trade. From the total
number of souls on board (v. 37), and the known fact that the Egyptian
merchantmen were among the largest in the Mediterranean,4 we conclude
that she was a vessel of considerable size. Every thing that relates to
her construction is interesting to us, through the minute account which is
given of her misfortunes from the moment of her leaving Myra. The
weather was unfavorable from the first. They were " many days " before
reaching Cnidus (v. 7) : and since the distance from Myra to this place
is only a hundred and thirty miles, it is certain that they must have
sailed " slowly" (ib.). The delay was of course occasioned by one of
two causes, — by calms or by contrary winds. There can be no doubt
that the latter was the real cause, not only because the sacred narrative
states that they reached Cnidus5 " with difficulty," but because we are
informed that, when Cnidus was reached, they could not make good their
course6 any farther, " the wind not suffering them" (ibid.). At this
1 See the references to Socrates, Sozomen, 8 See above, p. 685.
and Philo, in Wetstein. It is possible, as 4 A quotation to this effect is given by
Kuinoel suggests, that the ship might have Wetstein.
brought goods from Alexandria to Lycia, and 6 The Greek word here is only imperfectly
then taken in a fresh cargo for Italy ; but not rendered by " scarce " in the English version.
very probable, since she was full of wheat It is the same word which is translated " hard-
when the gale caught her. [A captain in the ly " in v. 8, and it occurs again in v. 16.
merchant-service told the writer, that, in com- 6 Their direct course was about W. by S. .
ing from Alexandria in August, he has stood to and, when they opened the point, they were
the north towards Asia Minor for the sake of under very unfavorable circumstances even for
the current, and that this is a very common beating. The words " the wind not suffering
course.] us/' Mr. Smith understands to mean that the
2 Mr. Lewin supposes that the plan of wind would not allow the vessel to hold on
Julius was changed, in consequence of this her course towards Italy, after Cnidus was
ship being found in harbor here. " At Myra passed. So Sir C. Penrose, in whose MS. we
the centurion most unluckily changed his find the following : " The course from Myra
plan," &c, vol. ii. p. 716. towards Italy was to pass close to the Island

chap. xxm. CNIDUS. 693
point they lost the advantages of a favoring current, a weather-shor« and
smooth water, and were met by all the force of the sea from the westward ;
and it was judged the most prudent course, instead of contending with a
head sea and contrary winds, to run down to the southward, and after
rounding Cape Salmone, the easternmost point of Crete, to pursue the
voyage under the lee of that island.1
Knowing, as we do, the consequences which followed this step, we are
inclined to blame it as imprudent, unless, indeed, it was absolutely
necessary. For while the south coast of Crete was deficient in good har
bors, that of Cnidus was excellent, — well sheltered from the north-west
erly winds, fully supplied with all kinds of stores, and in every way
commodious, if needful, for wintering.2
And here, according to our custom, we pause again in the narrative,
that we may devote a few lines to the history and description of the place.
In early times it was the metropolis of the Asiatic Dorians, who wor
shipped Apollo, their national Deity, on the rugged headland called the
Triopian3 promontory (the modern Cape Crio), which juts out beyond
the city to the West. From these heights the people of Cnidus saw that
engagement between the fleets of Pisander and Conon, which resulted in
the maritime supremacy of Athens.4 To the north-west is seen the
island of Cos (p. 604) ; to the south-east, across a wider reach of sea,
is the larger island of Rhodes (p. 606), with which, in their weaker
and more voluptuous days,5 Cnidus was united in alliance with Rome, at
the beginning of the struggle between Italy and the East.6 The posi- ,
tion of the city of Cnidus is to the east of the Triopian headland, where
a narrow isthmus unites the promontory with the continent, \nd separates
of Cythera (Cerigo), or the south point of the shore could not come to and warp it." If,
Morea ; the Island of Rhodes lying in the di- however, it were true that they could not get
rect track. It appears that the ship passed to into Cnidus, it would equally follow that .he
the northward of that island, having sailed wind was blowing hard from the N. W.
slowly many days from the light and baffling * See above.
winds, usual in those seas and at that season. 2 If the words " the wind not suffering u.<"
Having at last got over against Cnidus (C. really mean that the wind would not allow
Crio), the wind not suffering them to get on in the them to enter the harbor of Cnidus, these re
direct course, it having become steady from the marks become unnecessary.
west or north-west, they sailed southwards, 8 For a view of this remarkable promon
till, coming near to the east end of Crete, they tory, which is the more worthy of notice, sinee
&c. St. Paul passed it twice (Acts xxi. 1, xxvii. 7).

The words at first sight seem to mean that see the engraving in the Admiralty Chart, No
the wind would not allow them to put into the 1604. * See above, p. 604.
harbor of Cnidus : and so they are understood 6 We can hardly avoid making some allti
by Meyer, De Wette, Humphry, and Hackett. sion here to the celebrated Venus of Praxiteles
But in a case of this kind nautical considera- This object of universal admiration was at Cni-
tions must be taken into account. A friend dns when St. Paul passed by.
remarks in a letter that " a ship on a weather- " It was afterwards made " a free city."

694 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap, xxm
the two harbors which Strabo has described.1 " Few places bear more
incontestable proofs of former magnificence ; and fewer still of the ruffian
industry of their destroyers. The whole area of the city is one promis
cuous mass of ruins ; among which may be traced streets and gateways,
porticoes and theatres." 2 But the remains which are the most worthy
to arrest our attention are those of the harbors ; not only because Cnidus
was a city peculiarly associated with maritime enterprise,3 but because
these remains have been less obliterated by violence or decay. " The
smallest harbor has a narrow entrance between high piers, and was evi^
dently the closed basin for triremes, which Strabo mentions." But it
was the southern and larger port which lay in St. Paul's course from
Myra, and in which the Alexandrian ship must necessarily have come
to anchor, if she had touched at Cnidus. " This port is formed by two
transverse moles ; these noble works were carried into the sea to a depth
of nearly a hundred feet ; one of them is almost perfect ; the other,
which is more exposed to the south-west swell, can only be seen under
water."4 And we may conclude our description by quoting from
another traveller, who speaks of " the remains of an ancient quay on the
S.W., supported by Clycopean walls, and in some places cut out of the
steep limestone rocks, which rise abruptly from the water's edge." 5
This excellent harbor, then, from choice or from necessity, was left
behind by the seamen of the Alexandrian vessel. Instead of putting
back there for shelter, they yielded to the expectation of being able to
pursue their voyage under the lee of Crete, and ran down to Cape Sal-
mone : after rounding which, the same " difficulty " would indeed recur
(v. 8), but still with the advantage of a weather-shore. The statements
at this particular point of St. Luke's narrative enable us to ascertain, with
singular minuteness, the direction of the wind : and it is deeply interest
ing to observe how this direction, once ascertained, harmonizes all the
inferences which we should naturally draw from other parts of the con
text. But the argument has been so well stated by the first writer who
1 The ruins are chiefly on the east side of Pharos of Alexandria. The same place gave
the Isthmus (see Hamilton, as referred to be- birth to Ctesias and Agatharchides, and others
low). Pausanias says that the city was di- who have contributed much to geographical
vided into two parts by an Euripus, over knowledge.
which a bridge was thrown ; one half being 4 Here and above we quote from Beaufort.
towards the Triopian promontory, the other See his Sketch of the Harbor. The same
towards the east. may be seen in the Admiralty Chart, No. 1533.
'- Beaufort's Karamania, p. 81. The fullest Another chart gives a larger plan of the ruins,
iccount of the ruins will be found in the third &c. Other references might easily be given.
/olume of the Transactions of the Dilettanti Perhaps there is no city in Asia Minor which
Society, and in Hamilton's Asia Minor, vol. i has , been more clearly displayed, both by de-
i>p. 39-45. scription and engravings.
8 It was Sostratus of Cnidus who built the 6 Hamilton, p. 39.

chap. xxm. FAIR HAVENS. 69o
has called attention to this question, that we will present it in his words
rather than our own.1 " The course of a ship on her voyage from Myra
to Italy, after she has reached Cnidus, is by the north side of Crete,
through the Archipelago, W. by S. Hence a ship which can make good a
course of less than seven points from the wind would not have been pre
vented from proceeding on her course, unless the wind had been to the
west of N.N.W. But we are told that she ' ran under Crete, over against
Salmone,' which implies that she was able to fetch that cape, which bears
about S.W. by S. from Cnidus ; but, unless the wind had been to the
north of W.N.W., she could not have done so. The middle point
between N.N.W. and W.N.W. is north-west, which cannot be more than
two points, and is probably not more than one, from the true direction.
The wind, therefore, would in common language have been termed north
west." 2 And then the author proceeds to quote, what we have quoted
elsewhere (p. 605, n. 4), a statement from the English Sailing Directions
regarding the prevalence of north-westerly winds in these seas during
the summer months ; and to point out that the statement is in complete
harmony with what Pliny says of the Etesian monsoons.
Under these circumstances of weather, a consideration of what has
been said above, with the chart of Crete before us, will show that the
voyage could have been continued some distance from Cape Salmone
under the lee of the island, as it had been from Myra to Cnidus,3 — bu1
that at a certain point (now called Cape Matala) , where the coast trends
suddenly to the north, and where the full force of the wind and sea from
the westward must have been met, this possibility would have ceased
once more, as it had ceased at the south-western corner of the Peninsula.
At a short distance to the east of Cape Matala is a roadstead,4 which was
then called " Fair Havens," and still retains the same name,5 and which
the voyagers successfully reached and came to anchor. There seems to
have been no town at Fair Havens : but there was a town near it called
1 For what may be necessary to explain name of Aiueoveg KdTiavg, and also the Calis-
the nautical terms, see the compass on p. 619. mene spoken of in the voyage of Rauwolf (in
2 Smith, p. 35. Ray's Collection), and the Calis Miniones of
8 See above. It is of importance to observe Fynes Morison. In ancient sailing directions,
here that the pronoun " it " in v. 8 refers, not Dutch and French, it is described as " een
to Salmone, but to Crete. With the wind from schoone bay, — une belle baie." See all these
the N. W. they would easily round the point : references in Smith, pp. 30, 38, 44. The place
but after this they would "beat up with diffi- was visited by Mr. Pashley, but is not described
culty along the coast " to the neighborhood of by him. Meyer considers the name euphemis-
Cape Matala. tie- -4-s regards winter ing, the place was cer-
4 In our larger editions, a view is given tainly "not commodious;" but as regards
from Schranz's drawing, in Mr. Smith's work. shelter from some winds 'including N. W * ='
6 It is no doubt the same place which is was a good anchorage.
mentioned by Pococke (ii. 250) under the

696 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap.xxu.
Lasasa,1 a circumstance which St. Luke mentions (if we may presume tc
say so), not with any view of fixing the locality of the roadstead, but
simply because the fact was impressed on his memory.2 If the vessel
was detained long at this anchorage, the sailors must have had frequent
intercourse with Lasaea, and the soldiers too might obtain leave to visit
it ; and possibly also the prisoners, each with a soldier chained to his
arm. We are not informed of the length of the delay at Fair Havens :
but before they left the place, a " considerable time " had elapsed since
they had sailed, from Caesarea3 (v. 9); and they had arrived at that
season of the year when it was considered imprudent to try the open sea.
This is expressed by St. Luke by saying that " the fast was already past ; "
a proverbial phrase among the Jews, employed as we should employ the
phrase " about Michaelmas," and indicating precisely that period of the
year.4 The fast of expiation was on the tenth of Tisri, and corresponded
to the close of September or the beginning of October ; 5 and is exactly
the time when seafaring is pronounced to be dangerous by Greek and
Roman writers.6 It became, then, a very serious matter of consultation
whether they should remain at Fair Havens for the winter, or seek some
better harbor. St. Paul's advice was very strongly given that they should
remain where they were. He warned them that if they ventured to
pursue their voyage, they would meet with violent weather,7 with great
injury to the cargo and the ship, and much risk to the lives of those on
board. It is sufficient if we trace in this warning rather the natural pru-
1 Mr. Smith says that Lasaea is not men- ous remains of a considerable town were dis-
tioned by any ancient writer. It is, however, covered. The peasants who came down from
probably the Lasia of the Peutingerian Tables, the hills said that the name of the place was
stated there to be sixteen miles to the east of Lasaea. Cape Leonda lies five miles east of
Gortyna. Fair Havens. Mr. Brown's letter has been
[We are now able with great satisfaction to placed at our disposal by Mr. Smith, who will
state that the city of Lasaea has been discov- give fuller details in the second edition of his
ered. The Rev. G. Brown, with some com- work on St. Paul's Shipwreck. (This edition
panions, has recently visited this coast in the is now published. 1861.)]
yacht St. Ursula; and a letter written by him 2 The allusion is, in truth, an instance of
from Fair Havens on January 18th, 1856, the autoptic style of St. Luke, on which we
supplies the following facts. When the party have remarked in the narrative of what took
landed at Fair Havens the question was asked, place at Philippi.
"Where is Lasaa? " to which it was answered 8 When they left Caesarea they had every
at once, that it was now a deserted place about reasonable prospect of reaching Italy before
two hours to the eastward, close to Cape Le- the stormy season ; but since then " much time
onda. On receiving this information they i an had been spent."
along the coast before a S. W. wind ; and 4 Just so Theophrastus reckons from a
just after passing the Cape, the eye of one of Heathen festival, when he says " that the sea
the party was caught by " two white pillars is navigable after the Dionysia."
standing on a brae-side near the shore." On 6 Levit. xvi. 29, xxiii. 27.
approaching and landing, the beach was found 6 Authorities are given in the larger editions
to be lined with masses of masonry, and vari- i See v. 10, and v. 21.

chap. xxm.

PHOSNIX.

697

dence and judgment of St. Paul than the result of any supernatural
revelation : though it is possible that a prophetic power was acting 1 in
combination with the insight derived from long experience of " perils in
the sea" (2 Cor. xi. 26). He addressed such arguments to his fellow-
voyagers as would be likely to influence all : the master2 would naturally
avoid what might endanger the ship : the owner 3 (who was also on
board) would be anxious for the cargo : to the centurion and to all, the
risk of perilling their lives was a prospect that could not lightly be re
garded. That St. Paul was allowed to give advice at all implies that
he was already held in a consideration very unusual for a prisoner in the
custody of soldiers ; and the time came when his words held a command
ing sway over the whole crew : yet we cannot be surprised that on this
occasion the centurion was more influenced 4 by the words of the owner
and the master than those of the Apostle. There could be no doubt that
their present anchorage was " incommodious to winter in " (v. 12), and
the decision of " the majority " was to leave it so soon as the weather
should permit.
On the south coast of the island, somewhat farther to the west, was a
harbor called Phoenix,5 with which it seems that some of the sailors were
familiar.6 They spoke of it in their conversation during the delay at

1 Observe the vagueness of the words " a
certain island."
2 The same word is translated " shipmas
ter " in Rev. xviii. 17.
8 He might be the skipper, or little more
than supercargo.
4 The imperfect tense is used here. [It
appears from Mr. Brown's letter that St.
Paul's counsel was not unwise even in the
nautical sense. For further details we must
again refer to Mr. Smith's second edition.
We may just add that Mr. Brown was told at
Lutro that the "Holy Apostle Paul" had
visited Calolimounias and baptized many people
there ; and that near the latter place he saw the
ruins of a monastery bearing the Apostle's
name.] 5 So the name is written by St. Luke and
by Strabo. See below. The name was proba
bly derived from the palm-trees, which are
said by Theophrastus and Pliny to be indige
nous in Crete.
6 At the time when Mr. Smith's work was
published, our information regarding the coast
of Crete was very imperfect ; and he found it
to be the general impression of several officers
acquainted with the navigation of those seas

[and the writer of this note may add thai he
has received the same impression from persons
engaged in the merchant-service, and familiar
with that part of the Levant], that there are
no ship-harbors on the south side of the island.
Mr. Smith's conviction, however, was that at
Lutro there was a harbor satisfying all tho
conditions, and the writer of this note was
enabled, in April, 1 852, to confirm this convic
tion in a very satisfactory manner. The
Admiralty drawings of the south coast of
Crete had just then arrived, and the soundings
of Lutro were decisive. These were exhibited
in our earlier editions from a tracing made at
the Admiralty. The position of the harbor is
Bhown by the anchor in the chart opposite
p. 698. Previously, however, Mr. Smith had re
ceived a letter from Mr. Urquhart, M.P., allud
ing to what occurred to him, when on board a
Greek ship of war and chasing a pirate. "Lu
tro is an admirable harbor. You open it like
a box; unexpectedly, the rocks stand apart,
and the town appears within. . . . We thought
we had cut him off, and that we were driving
him right upon the rocks. Suddenly he dis
appeared ; — and, rounding m after him, like a

698

THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL.

chap, xxm.

Fair Havens, and they described it as " looking 1 toward the south-west
wind and the north-west wind"." If they meant to recommend a harbor,
into which these winds blew dead on shore, it would appear to have been
unsailor-like advice : and we are tempted to examine more closely whether
the expression really means what at first sight it appears to mean, and then
to inquire further whether we can identify this description with any exist
ing harbor. This might indeed be considered a question of mere curiosity,
— since the vessel never reached Phoenix, — and since the description of
the place is evidently not that of St. Luke, but of the sailors, whose con
versation he heard.2 But every thing has a deep interest for us which
tends to elucidate this voyage. And, first, we think there cannot be a
doubt, both from the notices in ancient writers and the continuance of
ancient names upon the spot, that Phoenix is to be identified with the
modern Lutro.3 This is a harbor which is sheltered from the winds above

change of scenery, the little basin, its shipping
and the town, presented themselves. . . .
Excepting Lutro, all the roadsteads looking to
the southward are perfectly exposed to the
south or east." For a view of Lutro, see
Pashley's Travels in Crete.
[The earlier part of this note remains as it
was in the first edition. It is confirmed in
every particular by Mr. Brown's letter. In
the first place, when they were in search of
Lutro, they ran past it, partly because of an
error in the chart, and partly because " the
port in question makes no appearance from the
sea." Next, on reaching the place, and inquir
ing from an old Greek what was its ancient
name, " he replied, without hesitation, Phamiki,
but that the old city exists no longer." A
Latin inscription relating to the Emperor
Nerva (who was of Cretan extraction) is
mentioned as being found on the point which
defends the harbor on the south. The harbor
itself is described thus : " We found the shores
steep and perfectly clean. There are fifteen
fathoms in the middle of the harbor, diminish
ing gradually to two close to the village. As
the beach is extremely narrow, and the hills
immediately behind steep and rocky, the har
bor cannot have altered its form materially
since the days of the Apostle." The health-
officer said, that " though the harbor is open
to the East, yet the easterly gales never blow
home, being lifted by the high land behind;
and that even in storms the sea rolls in gently
(piano, piano) . . it is the only secure harbor,
in nil winds, on the south coast of Crete ; and,

during the wars between the Venetians and
the Turks, as many as twenty and twenty-five
war-galleys have found shelter in its waters.
Further interest is given to this narrative by
the. circumstance that this yachting party was
caught by the Euroclydon (see below, p. 700),
so that some of them who landed were unable
to rejoin the vessel, and detained a night on
shore. The sailors said that it was " no won
der that St. Paul was blown off the coast in
such weather" (see pp. 700, 701), and they
added that " no boat could have boarded them
in such a sea " (see p. 701 ).
It is a curious fact that this same part/, on
returning from Alexandria, were again caught
in a gale on this coast, on February 1 9th, 1 856,
and obliged to run with three-reefed mainsail
and fore-staysail into the harbor of Lutro,
where, the writer says, " we spent as quiet a
night as if we were in a mill-pond. It is a
small place," he continues, " and it was queer,
in looking up the after-companion, to see olive-
trees and high rocks overhanging the taffrail."]
1 This is the literal meaning of the origi
nal, which is inadequately translated in the
English version.
2 Observe the parenthetic way in which the
description of Phoenix is introduced, v. 12.
8 The details are given in the larger edi
tions. Moreover Strabo says that Phoenix is
in the narrowest part of Crete, which is pre
cisely true of Lutro ; and the longitudes of
Ptolemy harmonize with the same result. See
Smith, p. 51.
The chart on the opposite page is taken

35* M.IAr,

OF

S. COAST OF CRETE.
CEOCRAPHHM/. (m NAUTICAL ) MILES

chap. xxm. THB STORM. 699
mentioned : and, without entering fully into the discussions which have
arisen upon this subject, we give it as our opinion that the difficulty is to
be explained, simply by remembering that sailors speak' of every thing
from their own point of view, and that such a harbor does " look " —
from the water towards the land which encloses it — in the direction of
" south-west and north-west." 1
With a sudden change of weather, the north-westerly wind ceasing, and
a light air springing up from the south, the sanguine sailors " thought
thai their purpose was already accomplished " (v. 13). They weighed
anchor : and the vessel bore round Cape Matala. The distance to this
point from Fair Havens is four or five miles : the bearing is W. by S.
With a gentle southerly wind she would be able to weather the cape : and
then the wind was fair to Phoenix, which was thirty-five miles distant
from the cape, and bore from thence about W.N.W. The sailors already
saw the high land above Lutro, and were proceeding in high spirits, —
perhaps with fair-weather sails set,2 — certainly with the boat towing
astern,3 — forgetful of past difficulties, and blind to impending dangers.
The change in the fortunes of these mariners came without a moment's
warning.4 Soon after weathering Cape Matala, and while they were
pursuing their course in full confidence, close by the coast of Crete 5 (v.
13), a violent wind came down 6 from the mountains, and struck the ship
from Mr. Smith's work, with some modifica- 8 This is certain, from v. 16.
tions. The part near Lutro is corrected from 4 Their experience, however, might have
the tracing mentioned above. The spot taught them that there was some cause for
marked " Spring and Church of St. Paul " is fear. Capt. J. Stewart, R. N. (as quoted by
from the English Admiralty survey. The Mr. Smith, p. 60), observes, in his remarks
cape marked " C. St. Paul " is so named on the on the Archipelago : " It is always safe to an-
authority of Lapie's map and last French gov- chor under the lee of an island with a north-
ernment chart of the eastern part of the Med- erly wind, as it dies away gradually ; but it
iterranean. The physical features are after would be extremely dangerous with southerly
Lapie and Pashley. For a notice of St. winds, as they almost invariably shift to a violent
Paul's fountain, see Pashley, ii. 259. northerly wind." [During the revision of these
1 It seems strange that this view should not pages for the press (March 4, 1856), the fol-
have occurred to the commentators. For dis- lowing communication from Capt Spratt was
cussion regarding the Greek preposition nsed received in a letter from Mr. Smith : " We left
here, we must refer to the larger editions. Fair Havens with a light southerly wind and
Such a harbor would have been very " com- clear sky — every thing indicative of a fine day,
modious to winter in ; " and it agrees perfectly until we rounded the cape to haul up for the
with Lutro, as delineated in the recent survey. head of the bay. Then we saw Mount Ida
To have recommended a harbor because the covered with a dense cloud, and met a strong
south-west and north-west winds blew into it northerly breeze (one of the summer gales, in
would have been folly. But, whether the com- fact, so frequent in the Levant, but which in
mentators felt this or not, they have generally general are accomplished by terrific gusts
assumed that the harbor was open to these and squalls from those high mountains), the
wm(js_ wind blowing direct from Mount Ida."]
2 See what is said below in reference to 6 The verb is in the imperfect.
lowering the gear, v. 17. 6 The Greek here denotes that the wind

700 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. . chap. xxu.
(seizing her, according to the Greek expression, and whirling her round),
so that it was impossible for the helmsman to make her keep her course.1
The character of the wind is described in terms expressive of the utmost
violence. It came with all the appearance of a hurricane : 2 and the
name " Euroclydon," which was given to it by the sailors, indicates the
commotion in the sea which presently resulted.3 The consequence
was, that, in the first instance, they were compelled to scud before the
gale.4 If we wish to understand the events which followed, it is of the utmost
consequence that we should ascertain, in the first place, the direction of
this gale. Though there is a great weight of opinion in favor of the
reading Euroaquih, in place of Euroclydon? — a view which would deter
mine, on critical grounds, that the wind was E.N.B., — we need not con
sider ourselves compelled to yield absolutely to this authority : and the
mere context of the narrative enables us to determine the question with
great exactitude. The wind came down from the island and drove the
vessel off the island : whence it is evident that it could not have been
southerly.6 If we consider further that the wind struck the vessel when
she was not far1 from Cape Matala (v. 14), — that it drove her towards
Clauda 8 (v. 16), which is an island about twenty miles to the S.W. of
that point, — and that the sailors " feared " lest it should drive them into
came " down from it," i. e. Crete, not " against show that it was a name popularly given by
it," i. e. the ship. [Sir C. Penrose, without the sailors to the wind ; and nothing is more
reference to the Greek, speaks of the wind as natural than that St. Luke should use the
" descending from the lofty hills in heavy squalls word which he heard the seamen employ on
and eddies, and driving the now almost help- the occasion. Besides it is the more difficult
less ship far from the shore, with which her reading.
pilots vainly attempted to close."] 6 Falconer supposes that the wind came
1 Literally, " to look at the wind." See from the southward, and clumsily attempts to
above, p. 704. We see the additional empha- explain why (on this supposition) the vessel
sis in the expression, if we remember that an was not driven on the Cretan coast.
eye was painted on each side of the bow, as 7 The use of the imperfect shows that they
we have mentioned above. Even now the were sailing near the shore when the gale
" eyes " of a ship is a phrase used by English seized the vessel. Thus we do not agree with
sailors for the bow. Mr. Smith in referring "not long after" to
2 " A typhonic wind." [See above, p. 699, the time when they were passing round Cape
n. 4.] Matala, but to the time of leaving Fair Ha-
8 Whatever we may determine as to the vens. The general result, however, is the
etymology of the word Euroclydon, it seems same. [It appears from Capt. Spratt's infor-
clear that the term implies a violent agitation mation that a ship can stand quite close to
of the water. Cape Matala.]
* " We let her drive." 8 There is no difficulty in identifying
6 Mr. Smith argues in favor of another Clauda. It is the Claudos of Ptolemy and
reading which denotes a N. E. wind. But we the Synecdemus, and the Gaudus of Pompo-
have a strong impression that Euroclydon is nius Mela. Hence the modern Greek GW
the correct reading. The addition of the donesi, and the Italian corruption into Gozo.
words " which was called " seems to us to

chap. xxm.

THE STORM.

701

the Syrtis l on the African coast (v. 17), — all which facts are mentioned
in rapid succession, — an inspection of the chart will suffice to show us
that the point from which the storm came must have been N.E., or rather
to the East of N.E., — and thus we may safely speak of it as coming from
the E.N.E.2
We proceed now to inquire what was done with the vessel under these
perilous circumstances. She was compelled at first (as we have seen) to
scud before the gale. But three things are mentioned in close connection
with her coming near to Clauda, and running under the lee of it? Here
they would have the advantage of a temporary lull and of comparatively
smooth water for a few miles : 4 and the most urgent necessity was attend
ed to first. The boat was hoisted on board : but after towing so long, it
must have been nearly filled with water : and under any circumstances
the hoisting of a boat on board in a gale of wind is a work accomplished
" with difficulty." So it was in this instance, as St. Luke informs us. To
effect it at all, it would be necessary for the vessel to be rounded to, with
her head brought towards the wind ; 5 a circumstance which, for other
reasons (as we shall see presently) , it is important to bear in mind. The
next precaution that was adopted betrays an apprehension lest the vessel

1 We may observe here, once for all, that
the Authorized Version, " the quicksands,"
does not convey the accurate meaning. The
word denotes the notoriously dangerous bay
between Tunis and the eastern part of Tripoli.
2 These arguments are exhibited with the
utmost clearness by Mr. Smith. Adopting
the reading EvpaiivTwv, he has three independ
ent arguments in proof that the wind was E. N.
E. ^ N. ; (1) the etymological meaning of the
word ; (2) the fact that the vessel was driven
to Clauda, from a. point a little west of C.
Matala; (3) the fear of the sailors lest they
might be driven into the Syrtis.
The view of Admiral Penrose is slightly
different. He supposes that the wind began
from some of the northern points, and drew
gradually to the eastward, as the ship gained
an offing; and continued nearly at East,
varying occasionally a point or two to the
North or South. He adds that a Levanter,
when it blows with peculiar violence some
points to the North of East, is called a Grega-
lia [compare "which is "ailed Euroclydon"],
and that he had seen many such.
8 See w. 16, 17.
4 " The ship, still with her boat towing at
ber stern, was, however, enabled to run under
die lee of Clauda, a small island about twenty

miles from the south coast of Crete, and with
some rocks adjacent, affording the advantage
of smooth water for about twelve or fifteen
miles, while the ship continued under tlieir
lee. Advantage was taken of this compara
tive smooth water, with some difficulty to hoist
the boat into the ship, and also to take the
further precaution of undergirding her by
passing cables or other large ropes under the
keel and over the gunwales, and then drawing
them tight by means of pulleys and levers." —
Penrose, MS. It is interesting to observe the
coincidence of this passage with what is said
by Mr. Smith.
Sir C. Penrose proceeds to mention another
reason for the vessel being undergirded. " This
wise precaution was taken, not only because
the ship, less strongly built than those in mod
ern days, might strain her planks and tim
bers, and become leaky, but from the fears,
that if the gale continued from the north-east,
as it probably began, they might be driven
into the deep bight on the coast of Africa,
where were situated the greater and l:sser
Syrtis, so much dreaded by the ancients, and
by these means of security be enabled to keep
together longer, should they be involved iii
the quicksands."
5 Smith, p. 64.

702

THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OP ST. PAUL.

chap, xxin,

should spring a leak, and so be in danger of foundering at sea.1 They
used the tackling, which we have described above, and which provided
" helps " in such an emergency. They " undergirded " the ship with
ropes passed round her frame and tightly secured on deck.2 And after
this, or rather simultaneously (for, as there were many hands on board,
these operations might all be proceeding together), they " lowered the
gear." This is the most literal translation of the Greek expression.3 In
itself it is indeterminate : but it doubtless implies careful preparation for
weathering out the storm. What precise change was made we are not
able to determine, in our ignorance of the exact state of the ship's gear
at the moment. It might mean that the mainsail was reefed and set ;

1 Frapping would be of little use in stop
ping a leak. It was rather a precaution to
prevent the working of the planks and tim
bers : and thus, since the extensive application
of iron in modern ship-building, this contriv
ance has rarely been resorted to. Besides the
modern instances adduced by Mr. Smith, the
writer has heard of the following: (1) A Ca
nadian timber vessel in the year 1846 came
trapped to Aberdeen. (2) In 1809 or 1810,
a frigate (the Venus?) came home from India
with hawsers round her. (3) The same hap
pened to a merchant vessel which came from
India, apparently in the same convoy. (4)
Lord Exmouth (then Captain Pellew) brought
home the Arethusa in this state from New
foundland. (5) At the battle of Navarin, the
Albion man-of-war received so much damage
during the action, that it became necessary
to have recourse to frapping, and the vessel had
chain cables passed round her under the keel,
which were tightened by others passed hori
zontally along the sides interlacing them ; and
she was brought home in this state to Ports
mouth. See the next note.
[Since the publication of the first edition,
two other instances have come to the writer's
knowledge. One is that of the bark Highbury,
which is stated in the Royal Cornwall Gazette
of May 26, 1854, to have just arrived in this
state, i. e. " with a chain cable round the ship's
bottom," off the Lizard Point, after a voyage
of five months, from Port Adelaide, with a
cargo of copper ore, wool, and gold. The other
case is described by the captain of the ship, as
follows : " I sailed from St. Stephen, New
Brunswick, on the 12th of December, 1837, in
the schooner St. Croix, 53 tons, bound for
King ston, Jamaica, with cargo of boards in the

hold and shingles on deck, with a few spars.
On the 20th of same month encountered a severe
gale from S.W., and lay to for seven days [see
below, p. 703]. On the 26th shipped a heavy
sea, which took away about one-third of deck-
load; found the balance shifting from side to
side, top of vessel spreading, that the seams ir
water-ways were open from 1 and a half to 3
inches, much water running down the seams
Found it necessary, for the preservation oi
crew and vessel, and balance of deck-load, U
secure top of ship ; took a coil of four-inch
Manilla rope, commenced forward, passing it
round and round the vessel, after which cut up
some spars, made heavers, and hove the warp
as tight as possible. Fearing the warp would
chafe off and part, took one of the chains,
passed it round and before with tackles and
heavers, and secured the top of the vessel, so
that the leak in the water-ways was partially
stopped. In this state I reached Port Royal,
when I took off the warp and chain, and ar
rived at Kingston on the 12th January, 1838.
Had I not taken the means I did, I am of
opinion the vesssel could not have been got
into port."]
2 Among classical instances we may select
Thucyd. i. 29, where Dr. Arnold says, in his
note, that " the Russian ships taken in the
Tagus in 1 808 were kept together in this man
ner, in consequence of their age and unsound
condition." 8 The same verb is nsed below (v. 30) in
reference to lowering the boat into the water.
1 This suggestion is partly due to a criti
cism in the English Review (June, 1850. Notio
of Mr. Smith's work), based on Isaiah xxxiii
23 (LXX.). In reference to which passage, we
may remark that the verb is equally applicable

chap. xxm. SEAMANSHIP DURING THE GALE. 703
or that the great yard ! was lowered upon deck and st small storm-sail
hoisted. It is certain that what English seamen call the top-hamper 2 would
be sent down on deck. As to those fair-weather sails themselves, which
may have been too hastily used on leaving Fair Havens, if not taken in
at the beginning of the gale, they must have been already blown to
pieces. But the mention of one particular apprehension, as the motive of this
last precaution, informs us of something further. It was because they
feared lest they " should be driven into the Syrtis," that they " lowered the
gear." Now, to avoid this danger, the head of the vessel must necessarily
have been turned away from the African coast, in the direction (more or
less) from which the wind came. To have scudded before the gale under
bare poles, or under storm-sails, would infallibly have stranded them in
the Syrtis, — not to mention the danger of pooping, or being swamped
by the sea breaking over her stern. To have anchored was evidently im
possible. Only one other course remained : and this was what is techni
cally called by sailors lying to. To effect this arrangement, the head of
the vessel is brought as near to the wind as possible : a small amount of
canvas is set, and so adjusted as to prevent the vessel from falling
off into the trough of the sea.3 This plan (as is well known to all who
have made long voyages) is constantly resorted to when the object is not
so much to make progress as to weather out a gale.
to the spreading of a sail which is lowered had a thought about drifting on a lee shore.
from a yard, and to the lowering of a yard Presuming the main-sail and yard to be down,
with whatever belongs te it. The reviewer and the vessel snug under a storm-sail, the
lays stress on the circumstance that St. Paul's heavy onevri, or ropes, being no longer of use
ship had probably no sail set when she reached aloft, would naturally be unrove or lowered, to
Clauda; and, as he justly remarks, the Alex- prevent drift, as a final resource, when the
andrian origin of the Septuagint version should sailors saw that the gale was likely to be strong
be recojlected. and lasting."
1 Such is Mr. Smith's view. 8 i. e. the hull of the vessel is in a direction
2 i. e. the gear connected with the fair- oblique to the length of the wave. The fol-
weather sails. See Smith, p. 69. We are lowing extract from Falconer's Marine Diction-
here allowed to quote from a letter addressed ary, under the article Trying (an equivalent
to Mr. Smith by Capt. Spratt, R.N. After term), may be useful to those who are not
saying that the translation of the word into familiar with sea-phrases : — " The intent of
" gear " is borne out by its application among spreading a sail at this time is to keep the ship
the modern Greek sailors to the ropes, &c, he more steady ; and, by pressing her side down
proceeds : " Ships so rigged as those of the in the water, to prevent her from rolling vio-
ancients, with only one large square sail, would lently ; and also to turn her bow towards the
require very heavy masthead gear ; i. e. very direction of the wind, so that the shock of the
laro-e ropes rove there, to support the yard and waves may fall more obliquely on her flank
sail • so that, even when the latter was lowered, than when she lies along the trough of the sea.
considerable top-weight would remain, to pro- ... In this position she advances very lit-
duce much uneasiness of motion as well as tie according to the line of her length, but is
resistance to the wind. Two such combined driven considerably to leeward."
evils would not be overlooked by sailors, who

704 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap.xxhj
We are here brought to the critical point of the whole nautical diffi
culty in the narrative of St. Paul's voyage and shipwreck, and it is
desirable to notice very carefully both the ship's position in reference to
the wind and its consequent motion through the water. Assuming that
the vessel was laid to, the questions to be answered in reference to its
position are these : How near the wind did she lie ? and which side did
she present to the wind ? The first question is answered in some degree
by a reference to what was said in the early part of this chapter.1 If an
ancient merchantman could go ahead in moderate weather, when within
seven points of the wind, we may assume that she would make about the
same angle with it when lying to in a gale.2 The second question would
be practically determined by the circumstances of the case and the judg
ment of the sailors. It will be seen very clearly by what follows, that, if
the ship had been laid to with her left or port side to the wind, she must
have drifted far out of her course, and also in the direction of another
part of the African coast. In order to make sure of sea-room, and at
the same time to drift to the westward, she must have been laid to with
her right side to the wind, or on the starboard tack, — the position which
she was probably made to assume at the moment of taking the boat on
board.3 We have hitherto considered only the ship's position in reference to
the wind. We must now consider its motion. When a vessel is laid to,
she does not remain stationary, but drifts ; and our inquiries of course
have reference to the rate and direction of the drift. The rate of drift
may vary, within certain limits, according to the build of the vessel and
the intensity of the gale ; but all seamen would agree, that, under the
circumstances before us, a mile and a half in the hour, or thirty-six miles
in twenty-four hours, may be taken as a fair average.4 The direction in
which she drifts is not that in which she appears to sail, or t( wards which
1 See p. 682. . . . The storm came on hei starboard side,
2 It is not to be understood, however, that and in this manner, with her head to the West-
the same absolute position in reference to the ward, she drifted, first to the Soutia West under
wind is continually maintained. When a ship Clauda, and as the wind drew more to the
is laid to in a gale, a. kind of vibralion takes Eastward her head pointed more towards the
place. To use the technical expression, she North, the proper tack to keep farther from
comes up and falls off — oscillating perhaps be- the quicksands, whether adopted from necessity
tween five points and nine points. or from choice." — Penrose MS.
3 See Smith, pp. 64, 68, and compare the 4 See the two naval authorities quoted by
following : " I ought to assign the reason why Mr. Smith, p. 84. The same estimate is given
I consider the ship to have drifted with her in the MS. of Admiral Penrose. " Allowing
starboard side toward the wind, or on the star- the degree of strength of the gale to vary a
board tack, as a sailor expresses it. When the little occasionally, I consider that a ship would
south wind blew softly, the ship was slowly drift at the rate of about a mile and a half per
sailing along the coast of Crete, with her star- hour."
board side towards the land, or to the North.

chap. xxm. SEAMANSHIP DURING THE GALE. 705
her bows are turned : but she falls off to leeward : and to the angle
formed by the line of the ship's keel and the line in which the wind blows
we must add another, to include what the sailors call lee^way : l and this
may be estimated on an average at six points (67°). Thus we come to
the conclusion that the direction of drift would make an angle of thirteen
points (147°) with the direction of the wind. If the wind was E.N.E.,
the course of the vessel would be W. by N.2
We have been minute in describing the circumstances of the ship at
this moment ; for it is the point upon which all our subsequent conclu
sions must turn.3 Assuming now that the vessel was, as we have said,
laid to on the larboard tack, with the boat on board and the hull under-
girded, drifting from Clauda in a direction W. by N. at the rate of thirty-
six miles in twenty-four hours, we pursue the narrative of the voyage,
without anticipating the results to which we shall be brought. The more
marked incidents of the second and third days of the gale are related to
us (vv. 18, 19). The violence of the storm continued without any inter
mission.4 On " the day after " they left Clauda, " they proceeded to
lighten5 the ship" by throwing overboard whatever could be most easily
spared. From this we should infer that the precaution of undergirding
had been only partially successful, and that the vessel had already sprung
a leak. This is made still more probable by what occurred on the " third

1 A reference to the compass on p. 619, with the mean direction of the drift of such a ship,
the following extracts from Falconer's Marine lying to, as before described, would be between
Dictionary, will make the meaning clear. " Lee- W.N. W. and W. by N. ; and such is nearly
Wat is the lateral movement of a ship to lee- the bearing of the North coast of Malta from
ward of her course, or the angle which the line the South side of Clauda." — Penrose MS.
of her way makes with the keel, when she is Compare Smith.
close-hauled. This movement is produced by 8 It is at this point especially that we feel
the mutual effort of the wind and sea upon her the importance of having St. Paul's voyage
side, forcing her to leeward of the line on which examined in the light of practical seamanship.
she appears to sail." " Close-hauled (au The two investigators, who have so examined
plus pres, Fr.). The general arrangement of a it, have now enabled us to understand it clearly,
ship's sails, when she endeavors to make a though all previous commentators were at
progress in the nearest direction possible fault, and while the ordinary charts are still
towards that point of the compass from which full of error and confusion. The sinuosities
the wind bloweth. ... In this manner of in this part of the voyage, as exhibited in the
sailing, the keel commonly makes an angle common maps of St. Paul's Travels, are only
of six points with the line of the wind. The an indication of the perplexity of the cora-
angle of lee-way, however, enlarges in propor- pilers. The course from Clauda, to Malta did
tion to the increase of the wind and sea." not deviate far from a straight line.
2 Again, our two authorities are in substan- 4 " We being exceedingly tossed with the
tial agreement. " Supposing the Levanter (as tempest."
is most probable, it being most usual) after the 5 We should observe that the tense is im-
heavy Gregalia, which first drove the ship off perfect here, as contrasted with the aorist in
the coast of Crete, and under the lee of Clauda, the next verse. It denotes " they began to
took upon the average the direction of East, — lighten ; " or perhaps, " they kept lightening."
45

706 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap.xxui.
day." Both sailors and passengers united1 in throwing out all the
" spare gear " into the sea.2 Then followed " several days " of continued
hardship and anxiety.3 No one who has never been in a leaking ship in
a continued gale 4 can know what is suffered under, such circumstances.
The strain both of mind and body — the incessant demand for the labor
of all the crew — the terror of the passengers — the hopeless working at
the pumps — the laboring of the ship's frame and cordage — the driving
of the storm — the benumbing effect of the cold and wet — make up a
scene of no ordinary confusion, anxiety, and fatigue. But in the present
case these evils were much aggravated by the continued overclouding of
the sky (a circumstance not unusual during a Levanter), which pre
vented the navigators from taking the necessary observations of the
heavenly bodies. In a modern ship, however dark the weather might be,
there would always be a light in the binnacle, and the ship's course would
always be known ; but in an ancient vessel, " when neither sun nor stars
were seen for many days," the case would be far more hopeless. It was
impossible to know how near they might be to the most dangerous coast.
And yet the worst danger was that which arose from the leaky state of
the vessel., This was so bad, that at length they gave up all hope of
being saved, thinking that nothing could prevent her foundering.5 To
this despair was added a further suffering from want of food,6 in con-
1 " We cast out with our own hands." this enabled her to sail on. . . . In the even-
Observe the change from the third person to ing it was found necessary to dispose of the
the first. St. Luke's hands, and probably St. forecastle and aftermost quarter-deck guns, to-
Paul's, aided in this work. gether with some of the shot and other articles
2 We cannot determine precisely what is of very great weight ; and the frame of the ship
meant here by the " tackle " or " gear " of the having opened during the night, the admiral was
ship. Mr. Smith thinks the mainyard is next morning prevailed upon, by the renewed
meant, " an immense spar, probably as long as and pressing remonstrances of his officers, to
the ship, and which would require the united allow ten guns more to be thrown overboard.
efforts of passengers and crew to launch over- The ship still continuing to open very much,
board," — adding that "the relief which a the admiral ordered tarred canvas and hides to
ship would experience by this, would be of the be nailed fore and aft, from under the sills of
same kind as in a modern ship when the guns the ports on the main deck and on the lower
are thrown overboard." But would sailors in deck. Her increasing damage requiring still
danger of foundering willingly lose sight of more to be done, the admiral directed all the
such a spar as this, which would be capable of guns on the upper deck, the shot, both on that
supporting thirty or forty men in the water ? and the lower deck, with various heavy stores, to
8 The narrative of the loss of the " Ramil- be thrown overboard."
lies " supplies a very good illustration of the 4 " No small tempest lay on us."
state of things on board St. Paul's vessel dur- 6 " All hope that we should be saved was
mg these two days. " At this time she had then taken away."
six feet of water in the hold, and the pumps 6 Mr. Smith illustrates this by several ex-
would not free her, the water having worked amples. We may quote an instance from a
out all the oakum. The admiral therefore very ordinary modern voyage between Alexan-
gave orders for all the buckets to be remanned, dria and Malta, which presents some points of
and every officer to help towards freeing the ship : close resemblance in a very mitigated form : —

CHAP. XXIII.

ST. PAUL'S VISION.

707

sequence of the injury done to the provisions, and the impossibility of
preparing any regular meal. Hence we see the force of the phrase 1
which alludes to what a casual reader might suppose an unimportant
part of the suffering, the fact that there was " much abstinence." It
was in this time of utter weariness and despair that to the Apostle there
rose up " light in the darkness: " and that light was made the means of
encouraging and saving the rest. While the Heathen sailors were vainly
struggling to subdue the leak, Paul was praying ; and God granted to
him the lives of all who sailed with him. A vision was vouchsafed to
him in the night, as formerly, when he was on the eve of conveying the
Gospel from Asia to Europe, and more recently in the midst of those
harassing events, which resulted in his voyage from Jerusalem to Rome.
When the cheerless day came, he gathered the sailors round him 2 on the
deck of the laboring vessel, and, raising his voice above the storm,
said, — Acts
xxvii.
Sirs, ye should have hearkened to my counsel, and not have set sail 21
from Crete : thus would you have been spared 3 this harm 4 and loss.

" The commander came down, saying the
night was pitch dark and rainy, with symptoms
of * regular gale of wind. This prediction
was very speedily verified. A violent shower
of hail was the precursor, followed by loud
peals of thunder, with vivid flashes of forked
lightning, which played up and down the iron
rigging with fearful rapidity. . . . She pres
ently was struck by a sea which came over the
paddle-boxes, soon followed by another, which,
coming over the forecastle, effected an entrance
through the skylights, and left four feet of
water in the officers' cabin. The vessel seemed
disabled by this stunning blow ; the bowsprit and
fore part of the ship were for some.moments
under water, and the officer stationed at that
part of the ship described her as appearing
during that time to be evidently sinking, and
declared that for many seconds he saw only
sea. The natural buoyancy of the ship at last
allowed her to right^ herself, and during the
short lull (of three minutes) her head was
turned, to avoid the danger of running too near
the coast of Lybia, which to the more experienced
was the principal cause of alarm ; for had the
wheels given way, which was not improbable
from the strain they had undergone, nothing
could have saved us, though we had been
spared all other causes for apprehension. . . .
With daylight the fearful part of the hurricane
cnve way and we were now in the direction

of Candia, no longer indeed contending against
the wind, but the sea still surging and impetu
ous, and no lull taking place during twelve
hours, to afford the opportunity of regaining
our tack, from which we had deviated about
150 miles. The sea had so completely deluged
the lower part of the ship, that it was with diffi
culty that sufficient fire could be made to afford us
even coffee for breakfast. Dinner was not to be
thought of" — Mrs. Darner's Diary in the Holy
Land, vol. ii.
1 " After long abstinence." See below, the
narrative of the meal at daybreak, vv. 33, 44.
The commentators have done little to elucidate
?his, which is in fact no difficulty to those
who are acquainted with sea-voyages. The
strangest comment is in a book, which devo-
tionally is very useful, — Lectures on St. Paul,
by the late Rev. H. Blunt, of Chelsea, — who
supposes that a religious fast was observed by
the crew during the storm.
2 " Paul stood forth in the midst of them."
8 The verb means " to be spared," not " to
gain." (A. V.) We should observe that St.
Paul's object in alluding to the correctness of
his former advice is not to taunt those who
had rejected it, but to induce them to give
credit to his present assertions.
4 The harm was to their persons, the loss to
their property.

708 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap, xxm
xxvii. 22 And now I exhort you to be of good cheer : for there shall be no loss
23 of any man's life among you, but only of the ship. For there stood by
me this night an angel of God, whose I am, and whom I serve,1 saying,
24 "Fear not, Paul ; thou must stand before Ccesar : and, lo ! Cod hath given
25 thee all who sail with thee." Wherefore, sirs, be of good cheer : for I
believe God, that what hath been declared unto me shall come to pass.
26 Nevertheless, we must be cast upon a certain island.
We are not told how this address was received. But sailors, however
reckless they may be in the absence of danger, are peculiarly open to
religious impressions : and we cannot doubt that they gathered anxiously
round the Apostle, and heard his words as an admonition and encourage
ment from the other world ; that they were nerved for the toil and
difficulty which was immediately before them, and prepared thencefor
ward to listen to the Jewish prisoner as to a teacher sent with a divine
commission. The gale still continued without abatement. Day and night succeeded,
and the danger seemed only to increase : till fourteen days had elapsed,
during which they had been "drifting through the sea of Adria"2
(v. 27). A gale of such duration, though not very frequent, is by no
means unprecedented in that part of the Mediterranean, especially
towards winter.3 At the close of the fourteenth day, about the middle
1 Compare Rom. i. 9, and note. call it, a Levanter) in full force. I think we
2 By this is meant, as we shall see presently, were four days without being able to sit down
that division of the Mediterranean which lies at table to a meal ; during which time we saw
between Sicily and Malta on the west, and ' neither sun nor stars.' Happily she was a
Greece with Crete on the east. See above, p. powerful vessel, and we forced her through it,
680, n. 1 ; and p. 682, n. 7. being charged with despatches, though with
3 The writer has heard of easterly and much injury to the vessel. Had we been a
north-easterly gales lasting for a still longer mere log on the water, like St. Paul's ship, we
period, both in the neighborhood of Gibraltar, should have drifted many days."
and to the eastward of Malta. A captain in [We extract the following from the Chris-
the merchant-service mentions a fruit-vessel tian Observer for May, 1853, pp. 324, 325 :
near Smyrna hindered for a fortnight from "Late in the autumn of 1848 we were return-
loading by a gale from the N.E. She was ing from Alexandria to Malta, and met the
two days in beating up a little bay a mile deep, wild Euroclydon. The sea was crested with
He adds, that such gales are prevalent there foam over all the wide waste of waters, and a
towards winter. Another case is that of a dull impervious canopy of misty cloud was
vessel bound for Odessa, which was kept three drawn over the sky. A vessel which preceded
weeks at Milo with an easterly gale. This, us had been fifty-six days from Alexandria to
also, was late in the year (October). A naval Malta; and just in the same way St. Paul's
officer writes thus: — "About the same time vessel was reduced to lie to in the gale, and
of the year, in 1839, I left Malta for the drifted for fourteen days across the sea which
Levant in the ' Hydra,' a powerful steam fri- separates Crete from Malta. . . . Under th«
gate, and encountered Euroclydon (o», as we modern name of a Levanter, the same Fn

chap- xxm. MODE OP ANCHORING. • 709
of the night, the sailors suspected that they were nearing land.1 There ia
little doubt as to what were the indications of land. The roar of breakers
is a peculiar sound, which can be detected by a practised ear,2 though
not distinguishable from the other sounds of a storm by those who have
not " their senses exercised " by experience of the sea. When it was
reported that this sound was heard by some of the crew, orders were
immediately given to heave the lead, and they found that the depth of
the water was " twenty fathoms." After a short interval, they sounded
again, and found " fifteen fathoms." Though the vicinity of land could
not but inspire some hope, as holding out the prospect of running the
ship ashore 3 and so being saved, yet the alarm of the sailors was great
when they perceived how rapidly they were shoaling the water. It seems
also that they now heard breakers ahead.4 However this might be, there
was the utmost danger lest the vessel should strike and go to pieces. No
time was to be lost. Orders were immediately given to clear the anchors.
But, if they had anchored by the bow, there was good ground for appre
hending that the vessel would have swung round and gone upon the
rocks. They therefore let go " four anchors by the stem." For a time,
the vessel's way was arrested : but there was too much reason to fear
that she might part from her anchors and go ashore, if indeed she did
not founder in the night : and " they waited anxiously for the day."
The reasons are obvious why she anchored by the stern rather than
in the usual mode. Besides what has been said above, her way would
be more easily arrested, and she would be in a better position for being
run ashore 5 next day. But since this mode of anchoring has raised some

roclydon, which dashed down from the gulleys for a sinking ship, and run her ashore ; but to
of the Cretan Ida in the autumn of 60 a. d., do so before it was day would have been to
swept the sea in the autumn of 1848, . . . have rushed on certain destruction : they must
just in the same way veering round from bring the ship, if it be possible, to anchor,
north to easterly. . . . Just in the same and hold on till daybreak," &c. — Smith,
way, likewise, did our Euroclydon exhaust p. 88.
itself in a violent fall of rain."] 4 Mr. Smith (p. 91) seems to infer this
i This might be translated literally : " The from the words " fearing lest we should have
sailors thought they were about to fetch some fallen upon rocks." But the words would
land." Mr. Smith (p. 78) truly remarks, that rather imply that the fear was a general one.
this is an instance of " the graphic language s We must carefully observe that, in
of seamen, to whom the ship is the principal anchoring, — besides the proximate cause, viz.,
object." tne fear °f falling on rocks to leeward, —
2 It is hardly likely that they saw the " they had also an ulterior object in view,
breakers. To suppose that they became aware which was to run the ship ashore as soon as
of the land by the smell of fragrant gardens daylight enabled them to select a spot where
Ian error found in a recent work) is absurd ; it could be done with a prospect of safety :
for the wind blew from the ship towards the for this purpose the very best position in which
land, the ship could be was to be anchored by the
» " They can now adopt the last resource stern." — Smith, p. 92.

710 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap. xxm.
questions, it may be desirable, in passing, to make a remark on the sub
ject. That a vessel can anchor by the stern is sufficiently proved (if
proof were needed) by the history of some of our own naval engagements.
So it was at the battle of the Nile. And when ships are about to attack
batteries, it is customary for them to go into action prepared to anchor
in this way. This was the case at Algiers. There is still greater interest
in quoting the instance of Copenhagen, not only from the accounts we
have of the precision with which each ship let go her anchors astern as
she arrived nearly opposite her appointed station,1 but because it is said
that Nelson stated after the battle, that he had that morning been read
ing the twenty-seventh chapter of the Acts of the Apostles.2 But,
though it will be granted that this manoeuvre is possible with due prepara
tion, it may be doubted whether it could be accomplished in a gale of
wind on a lee shore, without any previous notice. The question in fact
is, whether ancient ships in the Mediterranean were always prepared to
anchor in this way. Some answer to this doubt is supplied by the present
practice of the Levantine caiques, which preserve in great measure the
traditionary build and rig of ancient merchantmen. These modern
Greek vessels may still be seen anchoring by the stern in the Golden
Horn at Constantinople, or on the coast of Patmos.3 But the best illus
tration is afforded by one of the paintings of Herculaneum, which repre
sents " a ship so strictly contemporaneous with that of St. Paul, that
there is nothing impossible in the supposition, that the artist had taken
his subject from that very ship, on loosing from the pier at Puteoli." *
There is this additional advantage to be obtained from an inspection of
this rude drawing, that we see very clearly how the rudders would be
in danger of interfering with this mode of anchoring, — a subject to
which our attention will presently be required.5 Our supposed objector,
if he had a keen sense of practical difficulties, might still insist that to
have anchored in this way (or indeed in the ordinary way) would have
been of little avail in St. Paul's ship : since it could not be supposed
that the anchors would have held in such a gale of wind. To this we
can only reply, that this course was adopted to meet a dangerous emer
gency. The sailors could not have been certain of the result. They
1 See Southey's Life of Nelson : " All the 8 The first of these instances is supplied by
line-of-battle ships were to anchor by the stern, a naval officer ; the second by a captain who
abreast of the different vessels composing the has spent a long life in the merchant-service.
enemy's line ; and for this purpose they had 4 A drawing of this is given by Mr. Smith
already prepared themselves with cables out of (p. 94), and from him in our larger editions.
their stern ports." 6 See v. 40.
2 This anecdote is from a private source,
and does not appear in any of the printed
narratives of the battle

chap, xxiii. The PLACE OP SHIPWRECK. 711
might indeed have had confidence in their cables : but they could not be
sure of their holding ground.
This is one of the circumstances which must be taken into account,
when we sum up the evidence in proof that the place of shipwreck was
Malta. At present we make no such assumption. We will not anticipate
the conclusion till we have proceeded somewhat farther with the narra
tive. We may, however, ask the reader to pause for a moment, and
reconsider what was said of the circumstances of the vessel when we
described what was done under the lee of Clauda. We then saw that
the direction in which she was drifting was W. by N. Now an inspec
tion of the chart will show us that this is exactly the bearing of the
northern part of Malta from the south of Clauda. We saw, moreover,
that she was drifting at the rate of about a mile and a half in every
hour, or thirty-six miles in the twenty-four hours. Since that time,
thirteen days had elapsed : for the first of the " fourteen days " would
be taken up on the way from Fair Havens to Clauda.1 The ship there
fore had passed over a distance of about 468^ miles. The distance be
tween Clauda and Malta is rather less than 480 miles. The coincidence 2
is so remarkable, that it seems hardly possible to believe that the land, to
which the sailors on the fourteenth night " deemed that they drew nigh,"
— the " certain island " on which it was prophesied that they should be
cast, — could be any other place than Malta. The probability is over
whelming. But we must not yet assume the fact as certain : for we
shall find, as we proceed, that the conditions are very numerous which
the true place of shipwreck will be required to satisfy.
We return, then, to the ship, which we left laboring at her four anchors.
The coast was invisible, but the breakers were heard in every pause of the
storm. The rain was falling in torrents ; 3 and all hands were weakened

1 All that happened after leaving Fair which, at the end of fourteen complete days,
Havens before the ship was undergirded and would amount to 504 miles ; but it does not
laid to must evidently have occupied a great appear that the calculation is to be made for
part of a day. fourteen entire days : it was on the fourteenth
2 In the general calculation, Mr. Smith night the anchors were cast off the shores of
and Sir C. Penrose agree with one another; Melita. The distance from the S. of Clauda
and the argument derives great force from the to the N. of Malta, measured on the best chart
slight difference between them. Mr. Smith I have, is about 490 miles ; and is it possible
(pp. 83-89) makes the distance 476.6 miles, for coincident calculations, of such » nature.
aud the time occupied thirteen days, one to be more exact ? In fact, on one chart, after
hour, and twenty-one minutes. With this I had calculated the supposed drift, as a sea-
compare the following : " Now, with respect man, to be 504 miles, I measured the distance
to the distance, allowing the degree of to be 503."
strength of the gale to vary 8 little occa- 8 See xxviii. 2, "because of the present
sionally. I consider that a ship would drift at rain."
the ra.e of about one mile and a half per bour

712 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap. xxm.
by want of food. But the greatest danger was lest the vessel should
founder before daybreak. The leak was rapidly gaining, and it was
expected that each moment might be the last. Under these circum
stances we find the sailors making a selfish attempt to save themselves,
and leave the ship and the pasengers to their fate. Under the pretence of
carrying out some anchors from the bow, they lowered the boat over the
ship's side (v. 30). The excuse was very plausible, for there is no doubt
that the vessel would have been more steady if this had been done ; and,
in order to effect it, it would be necessary to take out anchors in the boat.
But their real intention was to save their own lives and leave the passen
gers.1 St. Paul penetrated their design, and either from some divine
intimation of the instruments which were to be providentially employed
for the safety of all on board, — or from an intuitive judgment, which
showed him that those who would be thus left behind, the passengers and
soldiers, would not be able to work the ship in any emergency that might
arise, — he saw that, if the sailors accomplished their purpose, all hope of
being saved would be gone.2 With his usual tact, he addressed not a
word to the sailors, but spoke to the soldiers and his friend the centurion ; 3
and they, with military promptitude, held no discussion on the subject,
but decided the question by immediate action. With that short sword.
with which the Roman legions cleft their way through every obstacle to
universal victory, they " cut the ropes ; " and the boat fell off,4 and, if not
instantly swamped, drifted off to leeward into the darkness, and was
dashed to pieces on the rocks.
Thus the prudent counsel of the Apostle, seconded by the prompt
action of the soldiers, had been the means of saving all on board. Each
successive incident tended to raise him, more and more, into a position uf
overpowering influence.6 Not the captain or the ship's crew, but the pas
senger and the prisoner, is looked to now as the source of wisdom and
safety. We find him using this influence for the renewal of tlieir bodily
strength, while at the same time he turned their thoughts to the provi-
1 " About to (seeking to) flee out of the usually see only the instrumentality em-
ship." ployed.
2 " Unless these remain in the ship, ye can- 8 " To the centurion and to the soldiers."
not be saved." We observe that in the "ye" 4 "Let her fall off." In the words above
the soldiers are judiciously appealed to on the (" when they had lowered the boat into the
source of their own safety. Much has been sea") it is clear that the boat, which was
very unnecessarily written on the mode in hoisted on deck at the beginning of the gale,
which this verse is to be harmonized with the had been half lowered from the davits.
unconditional assurance of safety in ver. 22- 5 The commanding attitude of St. Paul in
24. The same difficulty is connected with this and other scenes of the narrative is forci-
every action of our lives. The only difference bly pointed out by the reviewer of Mr. Smith's
is, that, in the narrative before us, the Divine work in the North British Review for May,
purpose is mo»e clearly indicated, whereas we 1849.

CHAP-xxln- THE SHIPWRECK. 713
dential care of God. By this time the dawn of day was approaching.1
A faint light showed more of the terrors of the storm, and the objects on
board the ship began to be more distinctly visible. Still, towards the
land, all was darkness, and their eyes followed the spray in vain as it drifted
off to leeward. A slight' effort of imagination suffices to bring before us an
impressive spectacle, as we think of the dim light just showing the hag
gard faces of the 276 persons,2 clustered on the deck, and holding on bv
the bulwarks of the sinking vessel. In this hour of anxiety the -Aposti-
stands forward to give them courage. He reminds them that they hac
" eaten nothing " for fourteen days ; and exhorts them now to partake of
a hearty meal, pointing out to them that this was indeed essential to their
safety,3 and encouraging them by the assurance that " not a hair4 of their
head " should perish. So speaking, he set the example of the cheerful
use of God's gifts, and grateful acknowledgment of the Giver; by taking
bread, " giving thanks to God before all," and beginning to eat. Thus
encouraged by his calm and religious example, they felt their spirits
revive,5 and " they also partook of food," and made themselves ready for
the labor which awaited them.6
Instead of abandoning themselves to despair, they proceeded actively
to adopt the last means for relieving the still sinking vessel. The cargo
of wheat was now of no use. It was probably spoilt by the salt water.
And however this might be, it was not worth a thought ; since it was well
known that the vessel would be lost. Their hope now was to run her on
shore, and so escape to land. Besides this, it is probable that, the ship
having been so long in one position, the wheat had shifted over to the
port side, and prevented the vessel from keeping that upright position,
which would be most advantageous when they came to steer her towards
the shore.1 The hatchways were therefore opened, and they proceeded to
1 " While the day was coming on," v. 39. meal, in order to refresh them after having so
2 It is at this point of the narrative that long taken their precarious repasts, probably
the total number of souls on board is men- without fire or any kind of cooking. He
tioned. begins by example, but first by giving God
8 " This is for your safety." thanks for their preservation hitherto, and
* Our Lord uses the same proverbial expres- hopes of speedy relief. Having thus refreshed
sion Luke xxi. 18. themselves, they cast out as much of the
6 " Then were they all of good cheer." remaining part of the cargo (wheat) as they
6 " All hands now, crew and passengers, could, to enable them by a lighter draught of
bond or free, are assembled on the deck, anx- water either to run into any small harbor, or
lously wishing for day, when Paul, taking at least closer in with dry land, should they be
advantage of a smaller degree of motion obliged to run the ship on the rocks or beach."
[would this necessarily be the case ?] in the — Penrose, MS.
ship than when drifting with her side to the 7 The following extract from Sir C. Pen-
waves, recommends to them to make use of rose's papers supplies an addition to Mr.
this time, before the dawn would require fresh Smith's remarks : " With respect to throwing
exertions, in making a regular and comfortable the wheat into the sea after anchoring, it may

714

THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL.

chap. xxm.

throw the grain into the sea. This work would occupy some time ; and
when it was accomplished, the day had dawned, and the land was visible.1
The sailors looked hard at the shore, but they could not recognize it.5
Though ignorant, however, of the name of the coast off which they were
anchored, they saw one feature in it which gave them a hope that they
might accomplish their purpose of running the ship aground. They per
ceived a small bay or indentation, with a sandy or pebbly beach : 3 and
their object was, " if possible," so to steer the vessel that she might take
the ground at that point. To effect this, every necessary step was care
fully taken. While cutting the anchors adrift, they unloosed the lash
ings with which the rudders had been secured,4 and hoisted the foresail.5
These three things would be done simultaneously,6 as indeed is implied
by St. Luke ; and there were a sufficient number of hands on board for
the purpose. The free use of the rudders would be absolutely necessary;
nor would this be sufficient without the employment of some sail.1 It
does not appear quite certain whether they exactly hit the point at which
they aimed.8 We are told that they fell into " a place between two seas"
(a feature of the coast, which will require our consideration presently),
and there stranded the ship. The bow stuck fast in the shore, and re-

be remarked that it was not likely that, while
drifting, the hatchways could have been opened
for that purpose ; and, when anchored by the
stern, I doubt not that it was found, that, from
the ship having been so long pressed down on
one side, the cargo had shifted, {. e. the wheat
had pressed over towards the larboard side, so
that the ship, instead of being upright, heeled
to the larboard, and made it useful to throw
out as much of the wheat as time allowed, not
only to make her specifically lighter, but to
bring her upright, and enable her to be more
accurately steered aud navigated towards the
land at daybreak."
1 " When it was day."
2 The tense is imperfect (v. 39). "They
tried to recognize it, but could not." The
aorist is used below in xxviii. 1, from which it
appears that the island was recognized imme
diately on landing.
8 It is important to observe that the word
for "shore " here has this meaning, as opposed
to a rocky coast. We may refer in illustration
to Matt. xiii. 2 ; Acts xxi. 5.
4 When they anchored, no doubt the paddle
rudders had been hoisted up and lashed, lest
they should foul the anchors.
B For the proof that aprmuv is the foresail.

we must refer to the able and thorough inves
tigation in Mr. Smith's Dissertation on An
cient Ships, pp. 153-162. The word does not
occur in any other Greek writer, but it is found
in the old nautical phraseology of the Vene
tians and Genoese, and it is used by Dante
and Ariosto. The French still employ the
word, but with them it has become the mizzen-
sail, while the mizzen has become the foresail.
[See the woodcut on the titlepage.]
8 The word which implies this in the origi
nal is omitted in A. V.
7 The mainsail [foresail] being hoisted
showed good judgment, though the distance
was so small, as it would not only enable them
to steer more correctly than without it, but
would press the ship farther on upon the land,
and thus enable them the more easily to get to
the shore." — Penrose, MS. [See the follow
ing passage in a naval officer's letter, dated
" H.M.S.  , off the Katcha, Nov. 15," in the
Times of Dec. 5, 1855. "The Lord Raglan
(merchant-ship) is on shore, but taken there
in » most sailor-like manner. Directly her
captain found he could not save her, he cut
away his mainmast and mizzen, and, setting a
topsail on her foremast, ran her ashore stem on."]
8 See below.

E. COAST of MALTA

mmti(QH nasmpmcAL) miles
i  i  i 

chap. xxm. PKOOF THAT THE PLACE WAS MALTA. 715
mained unmoved ; but the stern began immediately to go to pieces •
under the action of the sea.
And now another characteristic incident is related. The soldiers, who
were answerable with their lives for the detention of their prisoners, were
afraid lest some of them should swim out and escape : and therefore, in
the spiiit of true Roman cruelty, they proposed to kill them at once.
Now again the influence of St. Paul over the centurion's mind2 was made
the means of saving both his own life and that of his fellow-prisoners.
For the rest he might care but little ; but he was determined to secure
Paul's safety.3 He therefore prevented the soldiers from accomplishing
their heartless intention, and directed4 those who could swim to "cast
themselves into the sea " first, while the rest made use of spars and
broken pieces of the wreck. Thus it came to pass that all escaped safely 5
through the breakers to the shore.
When the land was safely reached, it was ascertained that the island
on which they were wrecked was Melita. The mere word does not abso
lutely establish the identity of the place ; for two islands were anciently
called alike by this name. This, therefore, is the proper place for sum
ming up the evidence which has been gradually accumulating in proof
that it was the modern Malta. We have already seen (p. 711) the al
most irresistible inference which follows from the consideration of the
direction and rate of drift since the vessel was laid to under the lee of
Clauda. But we shall find that every succeeding indication not only tends
to bring us to the shore of this island, but to the very bay (the Cala
di San Paolo) which has always been the traditionary scene of the
wreck. In the first place we are told that they became aware of land by the
presence of breakers, and yet without striking. Now an inspection of the
chart will show us that a ship drifting W. by N. might approach Koura
Point, the eastern boundary of St. Paul's Bay, without having fallen in
previously with any other part of the coast ; for, towards the neighbor
hood of Valetta, the shore trends rapidly to the southward.6 Again, the
character of this point, as described in the Sailing Directions, is such that
there must infallibly have been violent breakers upon it that night.1 Yet
a vessel drifting W. by N. might pass it, within a quarter of a mile,
i imperfect. 6 The same strong verb is used in xxvii
2 gee y. 43. 44, xxviii. 1, 4, as in xxvii. 43.
8 " To save Paul to the end," literally. 6 See the Chart opposite this page.
4 The military officer gives the order. The 7 Smith, pp. 79, 89. " With north-easterly
ship's company are not mentioned. Are we to gales, the sea breaks upon this point with such
infer that they fell into .he background, in violence, that Capt. Smyth, in his view of the
consequence of their cowardly attempt to save headland, has made the breakers its distinctive
themselves ? character."

716 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. OE»p.ixm
without striking on the rocks. But what are the soundings at this point ?
They are now twenty fathoms. If we proceed a little farther, we find
fifteen fathoms. It may be said that this, in itself, is nothing remarkable.
But if we add, that the fifteen-fathom depth is in the direction of the vessel's
drift (W. by N.) from the twenty-fathom depth, the coincidence is star
tling.1 But at this point we observe, on looking at the chart, that now
there would be breakers ahead, — and yet at such a distance ahead, that
there would be time for the vessel to anchor before actually striking on the
rocks.2 All these conditions must necessarily be fulfilled ; and we see
that they are fulfilled without any attempt at ingenious explanation. But
we may proceed farther. The character of the coast on the farther side
of. the bay is such, that, though the greater part of it is fronted with
mural precipices, there are one or two indentations,3 which exhibit the
appearance of " a creek with a [sandy or pebbly\ shore." And again we
observe that the island of Salmonetta is so placed, that the sailors, looking
from the deck when the vessel was at anchor, could not possibly be aware
that it was not a continuous part of the mainland ; whereas, while they
were running her aground, they could not help observing the opening of
the channel, which would thus appear (like the Bosphorus) * " a place
between two seas," and would be more likely to attract their attention if
some current resulting from this juxtaposition of the island and the coast
interfered with the accuracy of their steering.5 And finally, to revert to
the fact of the anchors holding through the night (a result which could
not confidently be predicted), we find it stated, in our English Sailing
Directions,6 that the ground in St. Paul's Bay is so good, that, " whilethe
cables hold, there is no danger, as the anchors will never start."
Malta was not then the densely-crowded island which it has become
during the last half-century.1 Though it was well known to the Romans
1 Smith, p. 91. two opposite currents, are meant, yet it is very
2 Smith, p. 91. possible that there might be a current between
3 One place at the opening of the Mestara Salmonetta and the coast, and that this affect-
Valley (see Chart) has still this character. ed the steering of the vessel.
At another place there has been a beach, 6 Purdy, p. 180. In reference to what hap-
though it is now obliterated. See the remarks pened to the ship when she came aground
of Mr. Smith, who has carefully examined the (ver. 4), Mi. Smith lays stress upon the char-
bay, and whose authority in any question acter of the deposits on the Maltese coast
relating to the geology of coasts is of great The ship " would strike a bottom of mud,
weight. graduating into tenacious clay, into which the
4 This illustration is from Strabo, who fore-part would fix itself, and be held fast,
uses the very word of the Bosphorus. It whilst the stern was exposed to the force of
would, of course, be equally applicable to » the waves." — p. 104.
neck of land between two seas, like the Isth- 7 The density of the Maltese population,
mus of Corinth. at the present day, is extraordinary ; but this
0 Though we are not to suppose that by state of things is quite recent. In Boisgelin
'two seas" two moving bodies of water, or (Ancient and Modern Malta, 1805) we find it

chap. xxm. ST. PAUL WORKS MIRACLES. 717
as a dependency of the province of Sicily,1 and though the harbor now
called Valetta must have been familiar to the Greek mariners who traded
between the East and the West,2 — much of tho island was doubtless un
cultivated and overrun with wood. Its population was of Phoenician
origin, — speaking a language which, as regards social intercourse, had
the same relation to Latin and Greek which modern Maltese has to Eng
lish and Italian.3 The inhabitants, however, though in this sense4
" barbarians," were favorably contrasted with many Christian wreckers
in their reception of those who had been cast on their coast. They
showed them no " ordinary kindness ; " for they lighted a fire and wel
comed them all to the warmth, drenched and shivering as they were in
the rain and the cold. The whole scene is brought very vividly before us
in the sacred narrative. One incident has become a picture in St. Paul's
life, with which every Christian child is familiar. The Apostle had gathered
with his own hand a heap of sticks, and placed them on the fire, when a
viper came " out of the heat " and fastened on his hand. The poor super
stitious people, when they saw this, said to one another, " This man must
be a murderer : he has escaped from the sea : but still vengeance suffers
him not to live." But Paul threw off the animal into the fire and suf
fered no harm. Then they watched him, expecting that his body would
become swollen, or that he would suddenly fall down dead. At length,
after they had watched for a long time in vain, and saw nothing happen
to him, their feelings changed as violently as those of the Lystrians had
done in an opposite direction ; 5 and they said that he was a god. We
are not told of the results to which this occurrence led, but we cannot
doubt that while Paul repudiated, as formerly at Lystra,6 all the homage
which idolatry would pay to him, he would make use of the influence
acquired by thl? miracle, for making the Saviour known to his uncivilized
'wnefactors. St. Paul wai.- tuaUed to work many miracles during his stay in Malta.
The first which is reotvded is the healing of the father of Publius, the
stated that in 1530 the island ail not contain and of its handsome buildings, such as those
•im'te 15,000 inhabitants, and th.it iney were which are now characteristic of tne place.
reduced to 10,000 at the raising oi ihe siege We might also refer to Ovid and Cicero.
m the grand-mastership of La Valetta. Not- 8 See the Essay on Mr. Smith's work in
¦withstanding the subsequent wars, and the the North British Review (p. 208) for some
jiagues of 1592 and 1676, the numbers in remarks on the Maltese language, especially
« 798 were 90,000. (Vol. i. pp. S07, ivi>8.1 on the Arabic name of what is still called the
Similar statements are in Miege, Histoire de Apostle's fountain (Ayn-tat-Ruzzul).
Malte. * It *s sufficient to refer to Rom. i. 14,
1 The mention of it in Cicero's V«i,n*t 1 Cor. xiv. 11, Col. iii. 11, fo- the meaning
orations is well known. of the word in the N. T.
2 Diodorus Siculus speaks of the manufao- 6 P. 173.
tures of Malta, of the wealth of its inhabitants, 8 P. 171.

718 THE LIPE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap. xxm.
governor of the island,1 who had some possessions2 near the place where
the vessel was lost, and who had given a hospitable reception to the
shipwrecked strangers, and supplied their wants for three days. The
disease under which the father of Publius was suffering was dysentery
in an aggravated form.3 St. Paul went in to him and prayed, and laid
his hands on him ; and he recovered. This being noised through the
island, other sufferers came to the Apostle, and were healed. Thus he
was empowered to repay the kindness of these islanders by temporal
services intended to lead their minds to blessings of a still higher kind.
And they were not wanting in gratitude to those whose unexpected visit
had brought so much good among them. They loaded them with every
honor in their power, and, when they put to sea again, supplied them
with every thing that was needful for their wants (ver. 10).
Before we pursue the concluding part of the voyage, which was so
prosperous that hardly any incident in the course of it is recorded, it
may be useful to complete the argument by which Malta is proved to be
the scene of St. Paul's shipwreck, by briefly noticing some objections
which have been brought against this view. It is true that the positive
evidence already adduced is the strongest refutation of mere objections ;
but it is desirable not to leave unnoticed any of the arguments which
appear to have weight on the other side. Some of them have been
carelessly brought together by a great writer, to whom, on many sub
jects, we might be glad to yield our assent.4 Thus it is argued, that,
because the vessel is said to have been drifting in the Adriatic, the place
of shipwreck must have been, not Malta to the south of Sicily, but
Meleda in the Gulf of Venice. It is no wonder that the Benedictine of

1 We observe that the name is Roman. In conclusive facts : — The narrative speaks of
the phrase used here there is every appearance the ' barbarous people,' and ' barbarians,' of
of an official title, more especially as the father the island. Now, our Malta was at that time
of the person called " first of the island " was fully peopled and highly civilized, as we may
alive. And inscriptions containing this exact surely infer from Cicero and other writers. A
title are said to have been found in the island. viper comes out from the sticks upon the fire
2 Acts xxviii. 7. These possessions must being lighted: the men are not surprised at
therefore have been very near the present the appearance of the snake, but imagine first
country residence of the English Governor, a murderer, and then a god from the harmless
near Citta Vecchia. attack. Now, in our Malta, there are, I may
3 xxviii. 8. say, no snakes at all ; which, to be sure, the
4 " The belief that Malta is the island on Maltese attribute to St. Paul's having cursed
which St. Paul was wrecked is so rooted in the them away. Melita in the Adriatic was a
common Maltese, and is cherished with such perfectly barbarous island as to its native
a superstitious nationality, that the government population, and was, and is now, infested with
would run the chance of exciting a tumult if serpents. Besides, the context shows that the
it, or its representatives, unwarily ridiculed it. scene is in the Adriatic" — Coleridge's Table
The supposition itself is quite absurd. Not to Talk, p. 185.
argue the matter at length, consider these few

chap. xxm. OBJECTIONS CONSIDERED. 719
Ragusa J should have been jealous of the honor of his order, which had
a convent on that small island. But it is more surprising that the view
should have been maintained by other writers since.2 For not only do
the classical poets 3 use the name " Adria " for all that natural division
of the Mediterranean which lies between Sicily and Greece, but the same
phraseology is found in historians and geographers. Thus Ptolemy dis
tinguishes clearly between the Adriatic Sea and the Adriatic Gulf.
Pausanias says that the Straits of Messina unite the Tyrrhene Sea with
the Adriatic Sea ; and Procopius 4 considers Malta as lying on the
boundary of the latter. Nor are the other objections more successful.
It is argued that Alexandrian sailors could not possibly have been igno
rant of an island so well known as Malta was then. But surely they
might have been very familiar with the harbor of Valetta, without being
able to recognize that part of the coast on which they came during the
storm. A modern sailor who had made many passages between New
York and Liverpool might yet be perplexed if he found himself in hazy
weather on some part of the coast of Wales.5 Besides, we are told that
the seamen did recognize the island as soon as they were ashore.6 It is
contended also that the people of Malta would not have been called
barbarians. But, if the sailors were Greeks (as they probably were),
they would have employed this term, as a matter of course, of those who
spoke a different language from their own.1 Again it is argued that
there are no vipers — that there is hardly any wood — in Malta. But
who does not recognize here the natural changes which result from the
increase of inhabitants 8 and cultivation ? Within a very few years there
was wood close to St. Paul's Bay ; 9 and it is well known how the Fauna
1 Padre Georgi, however, was not the first the two shipwrecks ; but it is difficult to har-
who suggested that the Apostle was wrecked monize the narratives.
on Melida in the Adriatic. We find this mis- 6 Even with charts he might have a diffi-
taken theory in a Byzantine writer of the tenth culty in recognizing a part of the coast which
century. [Very recently the same view has he had never seen before. And we must recol-
been advocated, but quite inconclusively, in lect that the ancient mariner had no charts.
Mr. Neale's Ecclesiological notes on Dalmatia, 6 xxviii. 1.
j g6i.] 7 See above, p. 717, u. 4.
2 Mr. Smith has effectually disposed of all 8 See above, note on the population of
Bryant's arguments, if such they can be called. Malta. Sir C. Penrose adds a circumstance
See especially his Dissertation on the island which it is important to take into account in
Melita. Among those who have adopted considering this question, viz. that, in the time
Bryant's view, we have referred by name only of the Knights, the bulk of the papulation
to Falconer. was at tne east end of the island, and that the
8 Ovid for instance, and Horace. neighborhood of St. Paul's Bay was separated
4 Thucydides speaks of the Adriatic Sea in off by a line of fortification built for fear of
the same way. We should also bear in mind descents from Barbary cruisers.
the shipwreck of Josephus, which took place 9 This statement rests on the authority of
in " Adria." Some (r. g., Mr. Sharpe, the an English resident on the island.
author of the History of Egypt) have identified

720

THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL.

chap. lira,

of any country varies with the vegetation.1 An argument has even been
built on the supposed fact that the disease of Publius is unknown in the
island. To this it is sufficient to reply by a simple denial.2 Nor can we
close this rapid survey of objections without noticing the insuperable
difficulties which lie against the hypothesis of the Venetian Meleda, from
the impossibility of reaching it, except by a miracle, under the above-
related circumstances of weather,3 — from the disagreement of its sound
ings with what is required by the narrative of the shipwreck,4 — and
from the inconsistency of its position with what is related of the sub
sequent voyage.5
To this part of the voyage we must now proceed. After three months
they sailed again for Italy in a ship called the Castor and Pollux.6 Syra
cuse was in their track, and the ship put into that famous harbor, and staid
there three days. Thus St. Paul was in a great historic city of the
West, after spending much time in those of greatest note in the East.
We are able to associate the Apostle of the Gentiles and the thoughts of
Christianity with the scenes of that disastrous expedition which closed the
progress of the Athenians towards our part of Europe, — and with those
Punic Wars, which ended in bringing Africa under the yoke of Rome.

1 Some instances are given by Mr. Smith.
2 It happens that the writer once spent an
anxious night in Malta with a fellow-travel
ler, who was suffering precisely in the same
way. 8 " If Euroclydon blew in such a direction
as to make the pilots afraid of being driven on
the quicksands (and there were no such dan
gers but to the south-west of them), how could
it be supposed that they could be driven north
towards the Adriatic 1 In truth, it is very
difficult for a well-appointed ship of modern
days to get from Crete into and up the Adri
atic at the season named in the narrative, the
north winds being then prevalent and strong.
We find the ship certainly driven from the
south coast of Crete, from the Fair Havens
towards Clauda (now Gozzi), on the south
west; and during the fourteen-days' continu
ance of the gale, we are never told that Euroc
lydon ceased to blow; and with either a
Gregalia or Levanter blowing hard, St. Paul's
ship could not possibly have proceeded up the
Adriatic." — Penrose, MS. He says again:
"How is it possible that a ship at that time,
and so circumstanced, could have got up the
difficult navigation of the Adriatic t To have
drifted up the Adriatic to the island of Melita

or Melida, in the requisite curve, and to have
passed so many islands and other dangers in
the route, would, humanly speaking, have been
impossible. The distance from Clauda to this
Melita is not less than 780 geographical miles,
and the wind must have long been from the
south to make this voyage in fourteen days.
Now, from Clauda to Malta, there is not any
one danger in a direct line, and we see that
the distance and direction of drift will both
agree." 4 This is clearly shown on the Austrian
chart of that part of the Adriatic.
6 From the Adriatic Melida it would have
been more natural to have gone to Brundusium
or Ancona, and thence by land to Rome ; and,
even in going by sea, Syracuse would have
been out of the course, whereas it is in the
direct track from Malta.
6 It is natural to assume that such was its
name, if such was its " sign," i. e. the sculp
tured or painted figures at the prow. It was
natural to dedicate ships to the Dioscuri, who
were the hero-patrons of sailors. They were
supposed to appear in those lights which are
called by modern sailors the fires of St. Elmo;
and in art they are represented as stars. See
below on the coins of Rhegium.

chap. xxm. PUTEOLI. 721
We are not told whether St. Paul was permitted to go on shore at Syra
cuse ; but from the courtesy shown him by Julius, it is probable that this
permission was not refused. If he landed, he would doubtless find Jews
and Jewish proselytes in abundance, in so great a mercantile emporium ;
and would announce to them the Glad Tidings which he was commis
sioned to proclaim " to the Jew first, and also to the Gentile." Hence
we may without difficulty give credit to the local tradition, which regards
St. Paul as the first founder of the Sicilian church.
Sailing out of that beautiful land-locked basin, and past Ortygia, once
an island,1 but then united in one continuous town with the buildings
under the ridge of Epipolae, — the ship which carried St. Paul to Rome
shaped her course northwards towards the straits of Messina. The
weather was not favorable at first : they were compelled to take an indi
rect course,2 and they put into Rhegium, a city whose patron divinities
were, by a curious coincidence, the same hero-protectors of seafaring
men, " the Great Twin Brethren," to whom the ship itself was dedicated.3
Here they remained one day (ver. 13), evidently waiting for a fair
wind to take them through the Faro ; for the springing-up of a wind
from the south is expressly mentioned in the following words. This wind
would be favorable, not only for carrying the ship through the straits, but
for all the remainder of the voyage. If the vessel was single-masted,4
with one large square-sail, this wind was the best that could blow : for to
such a vessel the most advantageous point of sailing is to run right
before the wind ; 5 and Puteoli lies nearly due north from Rhegium.
The distance is about 182 miles. If, then, we assume, in accordance with
what has been stated above (p. 683), that she sailed at the rate of seven
knots an hour,6 the passage would be accomplished in about twenty-six
hours, which agrees perfectly with the account of St. Luke, who says
that, after leaving Rhegium, they came, " the next day," to Puteoli.
1 The city has now shrunk to its old limit. 8 Macaulay's Lays of Rome (Battle of Lake
2 Mr. Smith's view that the word here Regillus). One of these coins, exhibiting the
(rendered in A. V. " fetching a compass," i. e. heads of the twin-divinities with the stars, is
" going round ") means simply " beating" is given at the end of the chapter.
more likely to be correct than that of Mr. 4 We cannot assume this to have been the
Lewin, who supposes that " as the wind was case, but it is highly probable. See above.
westerly, and they were under shelter of the We may refer here to the representation of the
hio-h mountainous range of JEtna on their left, harbor of Ostia on the coin of Nero, given
they were obliged to stand out to sea in order below, p. 743. It will be observed that all the
to fill their sails, and so come to Rhegium by ships in the harbor are single-masted.
a circuitous sweep." He adds in a note, that 6 Smith, p. 180.
he " was informed by a friend that when he 6 We cannot agree with the N. Brit. Re
made the voyage from Syracuse to Rhegium, viewer in doubting the correctness of Mr
the vessel in which he sailed took a similar Smith's conclusion on this point
circuit for a similar reason." 46

722 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap, xxm
Before the close of the first day they would see on the left the volcanic
cone and smoke of Stromboli, the nearest of the Liparian islands. In
the course of the night they would have neared that projecting part of
the mainland, which forms the southern limit of the bay of Salerno.1
Sailing across the wide opening of this gulf, they would, in a few hours,
enter that other bay, the bay of Naples, in the northern part of which
Puteoli was situated. No long description need be given of that bay,
which has been made familiar, by every kind of illustration, even to those
who have never seen it. Its south-eastern limit is the promontory of
Minerva, with the island of Caprese opposite, which is so associated with
the memory of Tiberius, that its cliffs still seem to rise from the blue
waters as a monument of hideous vice in the midst of the fairest scenes
of nature. The opposite boundary was the promontory of Misenum,
where one of the imperial fleets 2 lay at anchor under the shelter of the
islands of Ischia and Procida. In the intermediate space the Campanian
coast curves round in the loveliest forms, with Vesuvius as the prominent
feature of the view. But here one difference must be marked between
St. Paul's day and our own. The angry neighbor of Naples was not
then an unsleeping volcano, but a green and sunny background to the
bay, with its westward slope covered with vines.3 No one could have
suspected that the time was so near, when the admiral of the fleet at
Misenum would be lost in its fiery eruption ; 4 and little did the Apostle
dream, when he looked from the vessel's deck across the bay to the right,
that a ruin, like that of Sodom and Gomorrah, hung over the fair cities
at the base of the mountain, and that the Jewish princess, who had so
lately conversed with him in his prison at Caesarea, would find her tomb
in that ruin, with the child she had borne to Felix.5
By this time the vessel was well within the island of Capreae and the
promontory of Minerva, and the idlers of Puteoli were already crowding
to the pier to watch the arrival of the Alexandrian corn-ship ; so we may
safely infer from a vivid and descriptive letter preserved among the corre
spondence of the philosopher Seneca. He say that all ships, on rounding
into the bay within the above-mentioned island and promontory, were
obliged to strike their topsails, with the exception of the Alexandrian
corn-vessels, which were thus easily recognized as soon as they hove in
1 See the Sailing Directions, 129-133, with Strabo describes the mountain as very fertile at
the Admiralty charts, for the appearance of its base, though its summit was barren, and
the coast between Cape Spartivento (Pr. Pali- full of apertures, which showed the traces of
nurura ) and Cape Campanella (Pr. Minervas). earlier volcanic action.
2 The fleet of the " Upper Sea " was sta- 4 See the younger Pliny's description of his
tioned at Ravenna, of the " Lower " at Mise- uncle's death, Ep. vi. 16.
num. 8 Josephus. See above, p. 652.
8 So it is described by Martial and others.

chap. xxm. PUTEOLI. 723
sight ; and then he proceeds to moralize on the gathering and crowding
of the people of Puteoli to watch these vessels coming in. Thus we are
furnished with new circumstances to aid our efforts to realize the arrival
of the Castor and Pollux, on the coast of Italy, with St. Paul on board.
And if we wish still further to associate this event with the history and
the feeling of the times, we may turn to an anecdote of the Emperor
Augustus which is preserved to us by Suetonius. The Emperor had been
seized with a feverish attack, — it was the beginning of his last illness, —
and was cruising about the bay for the benefit of his health, when an
Alexandrian corn-ship was coming to her moorings, and passed close by.
The sailors recognized the old man, whom the civilized world obeyed as
master, and was learning to worship as God ; and they brought out gar
lands and incense, that they might pay him divine honors, saying that it
was by his providence that their voyages were made safe and that their
trade was prosperous. Augustus was so gratified by this worship, that he
immediately distributed an immense sum of gold among his suite, exact
ing from them the promise that they would expend it all in the pur
chase of Alexandrian goods. Such was the interest connected in the
first century with the trade between Alexandria and Puteoli. Such was
the idolatrous homage paid to the Roman Emperor. The only difference,
when the Apostle of Christ came, was that the vice and corruption of the
Empire had increased with the growth of its trade, and that the Emperor
now was not Augustus, but Nero.
In this wide and sunny expanse of blue waters, no part was calmer or
more beautiful than the recess in the northern part of the bay between
Baiae and Puteoli. It was naturally sheltered by the surrounding coasts,
and seemed of itself to invite both the gratification of luxurious ease,
and the formation of a mercantile harbor. Baiae was devoted to the for
mer purpose ; it was to the invalids and fashionable idlers of Rome like a
combination of Brighton and Cheltenham. Puteoli, on the opposite side
of this inner bay, was the Liverpool of Italy. Between them was that
enclosed reach of water called the Lucrine Lake, which contained the
oyster-beds for the luxurious tables of Rome, and on the surface of which
the small yachts of fashionable visitors displayed their colored sails.
Still farther inland was that other calm basin, the Lacus Avernus, which
an artificial passage connected with the former, and thus converted into
a harbor. Not far beyond was Cumae, once a flourishing Greek city, but,
when the Apostle visited this coast, a decayed country town, famous only
for the recollections of the Sibyl.1
We must return to Puteoli. We have seen above (p. 684) how it
divided with Ostia the chief commerce by sea between Rome and the
1 See Juv. Sat. iii. 1 .

724 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap, xxm
provinces. Its early name, when the Campanian shore was Greek rather
than Italian, was Dicaearchia. Under its new appellation (which seems
to have had reference to the mineral springs of the neighborhood) 1 it
first began to have an important connection with Rome in the second
Punic war. It was the place of embarkation for armies proceeding to
Spain, and the landing-place of ambassadors from Carthage. Ever after
wards it was an Italian town of the first rank. In the time of Vespasian
it became the Flavian Colony, like the city in Palestine from which St.
Paul had sailed ; 2 but even from an earlier period it had colonial privi
leges, and these had just been renewed under Nero. It was intimately
associated both with this Emperor and with two others who preceded
him in power and in crime. Close by Baiae, across the bay, was Bauli,
where the plot was laid for the murder of Agrippina.3 Across these
waters Caligula built his fantastic bridge ; and the remains of it were
probably visible when St. Paul landed.4 Tiberius had a. more honorable
monument in a statue (of which a fragment is still seen by English
travellers at Pozzuoli) erected during St. Paul's life to commemorate
the restitution of the Asiatic cities overthrown by an earthquake.5 But the
ruins which are the most interesting to us are the seventeen piers of the
ancient mole on which the lighthouse stood, and within which the mer
chant-men were moored. Such is the proverbial tenacity of the concrete
which was used in this structure,6 that it is the most perfect ruin exist
ing of any ancient Roman harbor. In the earlier part of this chapter, we
spoke of the close mercantile relationship which subsisted between Egypt
and this city. And this remains on our minds as the prominent and sig
nificant fact of its history, — whether we look upon the ruins of the mole,
and think of such voyages as those of Titus and Vespasian,1 or wander
among the broken columns of the Temple of Serapis,8 or read the accounl
which Philo gives of the singular interview of the Emperor Caligula with
the Jewish ambassadors from Alexandria.9
Puteoli, from its trade with Alexandria and the East, must necessarily
have contained a colony of Jews, and they must have had a close con
nection with the Jews of Rome. What was true of the Jews would
probably find its parallel in the Christians. St. Paul met with disciples
1 It was named either from the springs gorical representations of the towns, is still
(a puteis), or from their stench (o putendo). extant.
2 See above on Cassarea, p. 658. 6 The well-known Pozzolana, which is men-
8 Nero had murdered his mother about two tioned by Pliny.
years before St. Paul's coming. ' See p. 685.
4 Some travellers have mistaken the remains 8 This is one of the most remarkable ruins
of the mole for those of Caligula's bridge. at Pozzuoli. It is described in the guide-books.
But that was only a wooden structure. 9 Philo Leg. ad Caium.
6 The pedestal of this statue, with the alle-

chap. xxm.

COIN OF RHEGIUM.

725

here ; 1 and, as soon as he was among them, they were in prompt commu
nication on the subject with their brethren in Rome.2 The Italian Chris
tians had long been looking for a visit from the famous Apostle, though
they had not expected to see him arrive thus, a prisoner in chains, hardly
saved from shipwreck. But these sufferings would only draw their hearts
more closely towards him. They earnestly besought him to stay some
days with them, and Julius was able to allow this request to be complied
with. Even when the voyage began, we saw that he was courteous and
kind towards his prisoner ; and, after all the varied and impressive inci
dents which have been recounted in this chapter, we should indeed be
surprised if we found him unwilling to contribute to the comfort of one
by whom his own life had been preserved.

Coin of Rhegium.4

1 Acts xxviii. 14. a See ver. 15.
8 It is not clearly stated who urged this stay.
Possibly it was Julius himself. It is at all
events evident from ver. 15 that they did stay;
otherwise there would not have been time for

the intelligence of St. Paul's landing to reach
Rome so long before his own arrival there.
4 From the British Museum. The head*
and stars are those of Castor and Pollux. See
p. 720, n. 6 ; and 721, n. 3.

CHAPTEE XXIV.
The Appian Way. — Appii Forum and the Three Taverns. — Entrance into Rome. — The
Praatorian Prefect. — Description of the City. — Its Population. — The Jews in Rome. — The
Roman Church. — St. Paul's Interview with the Jews. — His Residence in Rome.
THE last chapter began with a description of the facilities possessed
by the ancients for travelling by sea : this must begin with a refer
ence to their best opportunities of travelling by land. We have before
spoken of some of the most important roads through the provinces of the
Empire : now we are about to trace the Apostle's footsteps along that
road, which was at once the oldest and most frequented in Italy,1 and
which was called, in comparison with all others, the " Queen of Roads."
We are no longer following the narrow line of compact pavement across
Macedonian plains and mountains,2 or through the varied scenery in the
interior of Asia Minor : 3 but we are on the most crowded approach to
the metropolis of the world, in the midst of praetors and proconsuls,
embassies, legions, and turms of horse, " to their provinces hasting or
on return," which Milton4 — in his description of the City enriched with
the spoils of nations — has called us to behold "in various habits on
the Appian road."
Leaving, then, all consideration of Puteoli, as it was related to the sea
and to the various places on the coast, we proceed to consider its com
munications by land with the towns of Campania and Latium. The
great line of communication between Rome and the southern part of the
peninsula was the Way constructed by Appius Claudius, which passed
through Capua,6 and thence to Brundusium on the shore of the Adri-
1 "Appia longarum teritur Regina viarum." brated of Roman roads, was constructed as far
— Stat. Silv. ii. 2. See below. as Capua, a. tr. c. 442, by the censor Appius
2 For the Via Egnatia, see pp. 274, 275. Claudius. Eight hundred years afterwards,
3 In making our last allusion to Asia Minor, Procopius was astonished at its appearance.
we may refer to the description which Basil He describes it as broad enough for two car-
gives of the scenery round his residence, a little riages to pass each other, and as made of stones
to the east of the inland region thrice traversed brought from some distant quarry, and so fit-
by St. Paul. See Humboldt's Kosmos, vol. ii. ted to each other, that they seemed to be thus
p. 26. (Sabine's Eng. Trans.) formed by nature rather than cemented by art.
4 Paradise Regained, book iv. He adds that, notwithstanding the traffic of sc
6 The Via Appia, the oldest and most cele- many ages, the stones were not displaced, nor
726

chap. xxrv. CAPUA. 727
atic.1 Puteoli and its neighborhood lay some miles to the westward of this
main road, but communicated with it easily by well-travelled cross-roads.
One of them followed the coast from Puteoli northwards, till it joined the
Appian Way at Sinuessa, on the borders of Latium and Campania.2 It
appears, however, that this road was not constructed till the reign of
Domitian.3 Our attention, therefore, is called to the other cross-road
which led directly to Capua. One branch of it left the coast at Cumas,
another at Puteoli. It was called the " Campanian Way," and also the
" Consular Way." It seems to have been constructed during the Repub
lic, and was doubtless the road which is mentioned, in an animated
passage of Horace's Epistles, as communicating with the baths and villas
of Baiae.4
The first part, then, of the route which Julius took with his prisoners
was probably from Puteoli to Capua. All the region near the coast, how
ever transformed in the course of ages by the volcanic forces which are
still at work, is recognized as the scene of the earliest Italian mythology,
and must ever be impressive from the poetic images, partly of this world,
and partly of the next, with which Virgil has filled it. From Cumae to
Capua, the road traverses a more prosaic district : 5 the " Phlegraean
fields " are left behind, and we pass from the scene of Italy's dim my
thology to the theatre of the most exciting passages of her history. The
whole line of the road can be traced at intervals, not only in the close
neighborhood of Puteoli and Capua, but through the intermediate vil
lages, by fragments of pavement, tombs, and ancient milestones.6
Capua, after a time of disgrace had expiated its friendship with Han
nibal, was raised by Julius Caesar to the rank of a colony: in the reign
of Augustus it had resumed all its former splendor ; and about the very
time of which we are writing, it received accessions of dignity from the
Emperor Nero. It was the most important city on the whole line of the
had they lost their original smoothness. There distances are slightly different. A direct road
is great doubt as to the date of the continuation from Capua to Neapolis, by Atella, is men-
by Beneventum to Brundusium, nor is the tioned in the Tab. Pent.
course of it absolutely ascertained. 8 This is the road which is the subject of
1 Here it came to the customary ferry be- the pompous yet very interesting poem of
tween the Greek aud Italian peninsulas, and Statins, Silv. iv.
was succeeded on the other side by the Via 4 See the vivid passage in the beginning of
Egnatia. Strabo, v. 3; vi. 3. Compare p. 274. Ep. i. xv., where we see that the road was well
2 The stages of this road from Sinuessa travelled at that period, and where its turning
appear as follows in the Peutingerian Table : — out of the Via Appia is clearly indicated.
Savonem Fl. III. ; Vulturnum, VII. ; Liter- 6 On the left was a district of pine-woods,
num VII.; Cumas, VI.; Lacum Avernum, notorious for banditti (Gallinaria pinus), Juv.
H. • Puteolos, HI. Thence it proceeds by iii. 305 ; now Pineta di Castel Volturno.
Naples to Herculaneum, Pompeii, Stabiae, and 6 The road seems to have left Puteoli by
Surrentum. ' In the Antonine Itinerary it is en- the Solfatara, where Romanelli says that the
titled " Iter a Terracina Neapolim," and the old pavement is visible.

728 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OP ST. PAUL. chap, xxrv
Appian Way, between Rome and Brundusium. That part of the line
with which we are concerned is the northerly and most ancient portion.
The distance is about 125 miles : and it may be naturally divided into
two equal parts. The division is appropriate, whether in regard to the
physical configuration of the country, or the modern political boundaries.
The point of division is where Terracina is built at the base of those
cliffs,1 on which the city of Anxur was of old proudly situated, and where
a narrow pass, between the mountain and the sea, unites (or united re
cently) the Papal States to the kingdom of Naples.
The distance from Capua to Terracina2 is about seventy Roman miles.
At the third mile the road crossed the river Vulturnus at Casilinum, a
town then falling into decay.3 Fifteen miles farther it crossed the river
Savo, by what was then called the Campanian Bridge.4 Thence, after
three miles, it came to Sinuessa on the sea,5 which in St. Paul's day was
reckoned the first town in Latium. But the old rich Campania extended
farther to the northward, including the vine-clad hills of the famous
Falernian district through which we pass, after crossing the Savo.6 The
last of these hills (where the vines . may be seen trained on elms, as of
old) is the range of Massicus, which stretches from the coast towards the
Apennines, and finally shuts out from the traveller, as he descends on
the farther side, all the prospect of Vesuvius and the coast near Puteoli.1
At that season, both vines and elms would have a winterly appearance.
But the traces of spring would be visible in the willows ; 8 among which
the Liris flows in many silent windings — from the birthplace of Marius
in the mountains 9 — to the city and the swamps by the sea, which the
ferocity of his mature life has rendered illustrious. After leaving Min-
turnae, the Appian Way passes on to another place, which has different
1 The modern Terracina is by the sea at 6 Pliny extends Campania to the Liris or
the base of the cliffs, and the present road Garigliano. It is difficult to fix the limits of
passes that way. The ancient road ascended the Falernus ager, which extended from the
to Anxur, which was on the summit. Massic Hills towards the Volturnus.
2 The stages are as follows (reckoning 7 The ancient road, however, seems to have
from Terracina) in the Antonine Itinerary : followed the coast.
fundis. xvi. Formis. xiii. mintuenis. ix. 8 "March 22. We crossed the Liris by a
sinuessa. ix. capua. xxvi. The distances suspension-bridge. It is a large stream —
are rather smaller in the Jerusalem Itinerary, truly a taciturnus amnis — winding like the
where a mutatio Ponte Campano and a mutatio Trent among willow - trees, which showed
ad octavum are here inserted between Sinuessa nearly the first symptoms of spring we had
and Capua. Casilinum is mentioned only in seen." (Extract from a private journal.)
the Peutingerian Table. We have already seen that St. Paul's journey
8 The operations on the Volturno in Gari- through Campania and Latium was very early
baldi's recent campaign are very fresh in our in the spring.
recollection. 9 The Garigliano rises near Arpinum, which
4 Campano Ponti. Hor. Sat. i. v, 45. was also the birthplace of Cicero.
6 " Plotius et Variup Sinuesaae, Virgiliusque
Occurrunt." Ib. 40.

chap. xxrv. AJSTXUR TO APPII FORUM. 729
associations with the later years of the Republic. We speak of Formias,1
with its long street by the shore of its beautiful bay, and with its villas
on the seaside, and above it ; among which was one of Cicero's favorite
retreats from the turmoil of the political world, and where at last he fell
by the hand of assassins.2 Many a lectica? or palanquin, such as that in
which he was reclining when overtaken by his murderers, may have been
met by St. Paul in his progress, — with other carriages, with which the
road would become more and more crowded, — the cisium? or light cab
riolet, of some gay reveller, on his way to Baiae, — or the four-wheeled
rheda,5 full of the family of some wealthy senator quitting the town for
the country. At no great distance from Formiae the road left the sea
again, and passed, where the substructions of it still remain, through the
defiles 6 of the Caecuban hills, with their stony but productive vineyards.
Thence the traveller looked down upon the plain of Fundi, which retreats
like a bay into the mountains, with the low lake of Amyclas between
the town and the sea. Through the capricious care, with which time
has preserved in one place what is lost in another, the pavement of
the ancient way is still the street of this, the most northerly town of
the Neapolitan kingdom in this direction. We have now in front of us the
mountain line, which is both the frontier of the Papal States,1 and the
natural division of the Apostle's journey from Capua to Rome. Where
it reaches the coast, in bold limestone precipices, there Anxur was situated,
with its houses and temples high above the sea.8
After leaving Anxur,9 the traveller observes the high land retreating
again from the coast, and presently finds himself in a wide and remark
able plain, enclosed towards the .interior by the sweep of the blue
Volscian mountains, and separated by a belt of forest from the sea.
Here are the Pomptine marshes, — " the only marshes ever dignified by
1 This is Mola di Gaeta, jusc opposite the 6 Itri is in one of these defiles. The sub-
fortress which has been so notorious in recent structions of the ancient way show that it
passages of Italian history. nearly followed the line of the modern road
2 See Plutarch's description of his death. between Rome and Naples.
8 The lecticce, or couches carried by bear- 1 Or of what were till lately the Papal
ers, were in constant use both for men and States.
women ; and a traveller could hardly go from 8 See Hor. Sat. I. v. 25, 26, and many
Puteoli to Rome without seeing many of them. other passages in Roman poets. There are
4 Seneca says you could write in the cisium, here still the substructions of large temples,
whence we must infer that such carriages [if one of them probably that of Jupiter, to whom
they had springs] were often as comfortable as the town was dedicated.
those of modern times. 9 The stages during the latter half of the
6 " Tota domus rheda componitur una." journey, reckoning from Rcme, appear thus
(Juv. iii. 10.) The remark just made on the in the Antonine Itinerary: ariciam. xvi.
cisium is equally applicable to the larger car- thes tabebnas. xvii. appi foko. x. takra-
riage. Cicero 3jys in one of his Cilician let- cina. xviii. The other Itineraries give some
ters that he dictated it while seated in his rheda. intermediate details.

730 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap. xxrv.
classic celebrity." The descriptive lines of the Roman satirist have
wonderfully concurred with the continued unhealthiness of the half-
drained morass, in preserving a living commentary on that fifteenth verse
in the last chapter of the Acts, which exhibits to us one of the most
touching passages in the Apostle's life. A few miles beyond Terracina,
where a fountain, grateful to travellers, welled up near the sanctuary of
Feronia,1 was the termination of a canal, which was formed by Augustus
for the purpose of draining the marshes, and which continued for twenty
miles by the side of the road.2 Over this distance, travellers had their
choice, whether to proceed by barges dragged by mules, or on the pave
ment of the way itself.3 It is impossible to know which plan was adopted
by Julius and his prisoners. If we suppose the former to have been
chosen, we have the aid of Horace's Satire to enable us to imagine the
incidents and the company, in the midst of which the Apostle came,
unknown and unfriended, to the corrupt metropolis of the world. And
yet he was not so unfriended as he may possibly have thought himself
that day, in his progress from Anxur across the watery, unhealthy plain.
On the arrival of the party at Appii Forum, which was a town where the
mules were unfastened, at the other end of the canal, and is described
by the satirist as full of low tavern-keepers and bargemen,4 — at that
meeting-place where travellers from all parts of the Empire had often
crossed one another's path, — on that day, in the motley and vulgar
crowd, some of the few Christians who were then in the world suddenly
recognized one another, and emotions of holy joy and thanksgiving
sanctified the place of coarse vice and vulgar traffic. The disciples at
Rome had heard of the Apostle's arrival at Puteoli, and hastened to meet
him on the way ; and the prisoner was startled to recognize some of
those among whom he had labored, and whom he had loved, in the
distant cities of the East. Whether Aquila and Priscilla were there it is
needless to speculate. Whoever might be the persons, they were brethren
in Christ, and their presence would be an instantaneous source of com
fort and strength. We have already seen, on other occasions of his life,5
how the Apostle's heart was lightened by the presence of his friends.
About ten miles farther he received a second welcome from a similar
group of Christian brethren. Two independent companies had gone to
meet him ; or the zeal and strength of one party had outstripped the
1 Hor. Sat. I. 24. 4 This place is also mentioned by Cicero
2 " Qua Pomptinas via dividit uda palu- Aft. ii. 10. Its situation was near the present
des." (Lucan, iii. 85.) The length of the Treponti.
canal was nineteen miles. 5 See especially p. 313.
8 With Horace's account of his night-
journey on the canal we may compare Strabo.

ohap. xxrv. APPROACH TO ROME. 731
other. At a place called the Three Taverns,1 where a cross-road from
the coast at Antium came in from the left, this second party of Chris
tians was waiting to welcome and to honor " the ambassador in bonds."
With a lighter heart and a more cheerful countenance, he travelled the
remaining seventeen miles, which brought him along the base of the
Alban hills, in the midst of places well known and famous in early
Roman legends, to the town of Aricia. The Great Apostle had the
sympathies of human nature ; he was dejected and encouraged by the
same causes which act on our spirits ; he too saw all outward objects in
" hues borrowed from the heart." The diminution of fatigue — the
more hopeful prospect of the future — the renewed elasticity of religious
trust — the sense of a brighter light on all the scenery round him — on
the foliage which overshadowed the road — on the wide expanse of the
plain to the left — on the high summit of the Alban Mount, — all this,
and more than this, is involved in St. Luke's sentence, — " When Paul
saw the brethren, he thanked God, and took courage."
The mention of the Alban Mount reminds us that we are approaching
the end of our journey. The isolated group of hills which is called by
this collective name stands between the plain which has just been trav
ersed and that other plain which is the Campagna of Rome. All the
bases of the mountain were then (as indeed they are partially now)
clustered round with the villas and gardens of wealthy citizens. The
Appian Way climbs and then descends along its southern slope. After
passing Lanuvium,2 it crossed a crater-like valley on immense substruc
tions, which still remain.3 Here is Aricia, an easy stage from Rome.4
The town was above the road ; and on the hill-side swarms of beggars
beset travellers as they passed.5 On the summit of the next rise, Paul
of Tarsus would obtain his first view of Rome. There is no doubt that
the prospect was, in many respects, very different from the view which
1 This place is mentioned by Cicero when See Sir W. Gell's Campagna, under Aricia
on a journey from Antium to Rome. Att. ii. and Laricia : see also an article entitled "Ex-
12. From the distances in the Itineraries it cursions from Rome in 1843," in the first vol-
seems to have been not very far from the mod- ume of the Classical Museum, p. 322. The
ern Cisterna. magnificent causeway or viaduct, mentioned
2 Sub Lanuvio is one of the stations in the in the text, is 700 feet long, and in some
Tab. Pent. (See above.) The ancient Lanu- places 70 feet high. It is built of enormous
vium was on a hill on the left, near where squared blocks of peperino, with arches for the
the Via Appia (which can be traced here, by water of the torrents to pass through.
means of the tombs, as it ascends from the 4 It was Horace's first halting-place. The
plain) strikes the modern road by Velletri. distance from Rome was sixteen miles.
8 The present road is carried through the 6 The clivus Aricinus is repeatedly men-
modern town of Laricia, which occupies the tioned by the Eoman satirists as swarming
site of the citadel of ancient Aricia. The with beggars.
Appian Way went across the valley below.

13'2 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap, xxrv
is now obtained from the same spot. It is true that the natural features
of the scene are unaltered. The long wall of blue Sabine mountains,
with Soracte in the distance, closed in the Campagna, which stretched
far across to the sea and round the base of the Alban hills. But ancient
Rome was not, like modern Rome, impressive from its solitude, standing
alone, with its one conspicuous cupola, in the midst of a desolate thougli
beautiful waste. St. Paul would see a vast city, covering the Campagna,
and almost continuously connected by its suburbs with the villas on the
hill where he stood, and with the bright towns which clustered on the
sides of the mountains opposite. Over all the intermediate space were
the houses and gardens, through which aqueducts and roads might be
traced in converging lines towards the confused mass of edifices which
formed the city of Rome. Here no conspicuous building, elevated above
the rest, attracted the eye or the imagination. Ancient Rome had neither
cupola J nor campanile. Still less had it any of those spires, which give
life to all the landscapes of Northern Christendom. It was a widespread
aggregate of buildings, which, though separated by narrow streets and
open squares, appeared, when seen from near Aricia, blended into one
indiscriminate mass : for distance concealed the contrasts 2 which divided
the crowded habitations of the poor, and the dark haunts of filth and
misery, — from the theatres and colonnades, the baths, the temples and
palaces with gilded roofs, flashing back the sun.
The road descended into the plain at Bovillae, six miles from Aricia,'
and thence it proceeded in a straight line,4 with the sepulchres of illus
trious families on either hand.5 One of these was the burial-place of the
Julian gens,6 with which the centurion who had charge of the prisoners
was in some way connected.1 As they proceeded over the old pavement,
among gardens and modern houses,8 and approached nearer the busy
metropolis, the " conflux issuing forth or entering in " 9 on various
1 The Pantheon was indeed bnilt ; but the Cecilia Metella is familiar to all travellers.
world had not seen any instance of an elevat- Pompey's tomb was also on the Appian Way,
ed dome, like that of St. Sophia, St. Peter's, but nearer to Aricia.
or St. Paul's. 8 Sir W. Gell, on what appears to be a me-
2 See below, p. 735, and the reference to mortal of the burying-place of the Gens Julia,
1 Cor. near Bovillae. See Tac. Ann. ii. 41, xv. 33.
8 Bovillae (not far from Fratocchie) is mem- ' He might be a free-born Italian (like Cor-
orable as the place where Clodius was killed. nelius, see p. 108), or he might be a freedman,
4 The modern road deviates slightly from or the descendant of a freedman, manumitted
the Via Appia ; but by aid of the tombs by some members of the Julian house.
the eye can easily trace the course of the 8 Much building must have been continu-
ancient way. Recent excavations have brought ally going on. Juvenal mentions the carrying
the whole line of the Via Appia more clearly of building materials as one of the annoy mcep
into view than formerly. of Rome.
° There is a well-known sentence in Cicero 9 Paradise Regained, iv. 62.
having reference to these sepulchres. That of

chap. xxrv. ENTRANCE INTO ROME. 733
errands and in various costumes — vehicles, horsemen, and foot-passen
gers, soldiers and laborers, Romans and foreigners — became more
crowded and confusing. The houses grew closer. They were already in
Rome. It was impossible to define the commencement of the city. Its
populous portions extended far beyond the limits marked out by Servius.
The ancient wall, with its once sacred pomoerium, was rather an object
for antiquarian interest, like the walls of York or Chester, than any pro
tection against the enemies, who were kept far aloof by the legions on the
frontier. Yet the Porta Capena is a spot which we can hardly leave without
lingering for a moment. Under this arch — which was perpetually drip
ping x with the water of the aqueduct that went over it 2 — had passed all
those who, since a remote period of the Republic, had travelled by the
Appian Way, — victorious generals with their legions returning from
foreign service, — emperors and courtiers, vagrant representatives of every
form of Heathenism, Greeks and Asiatics, Jews and Christians.3 From
this point entering within the city, Julius and his prisoners moved on,
with the Aventine on their left, close round the base of the Coelian, and
through the hollow ground which lay between this hill and the Palatine;
thence over the low ridge called Velia,4 where afterwards was built the
arch of Titus to commemorate the destruction of Jerusalem ; and then
descending,5 by the Sacra Via, into that space which was the centre of
imperial power and imperial magnificence, and associated alsb with the
most glorious recollections of the Republic. The Forum was to Rome
what the Acropolis 6 was to Athens, the heart of all the characteristic
interest of the place. Here was the Milliarium Aureum, to which the
roads of all the provinces converged. All around were the stately build
ings, which were raised in the closing years of the Republic, and by the
1 Mart. iii. 47. Hence called the moist 4 " The ridge on which the arch of Titus
gate by Juvenal, iii. 10. Compare Mart. iv. stands was much more considerable than the
1 8. It was doubtless called Capena, as being modern traveller would suppose : the pave-
the gate of Capua. Its position is fully ascer- ment, which has been excavated at this point, is
tained to have been at the point of union of fifty-three feet above the level of the pavement in
the valleys dividing the Aventine, Coelian, and the Forum. This ridge ran from the Palatine to
Palatine. Both the Via Latina and Via Appia the Esquiline, dividing the basin in which the
issued from this gate. The first milestone on Colosseum stands from that which contained
the latter was found in the first vineyard be- the Forum : it was called Velia. Publicola
vond the Porta S. Sebastiano (see Map). excited popular suspicion and alarm by build-
2 This was a branch of the Marcian aque- ing his house on the elevated part of this
, . ridge." — Companion Volume to Mr. Cookes-
8 We must not forget that close by this ley's Map of Rome, p. 30.
gate was the old sanctuary of Egeria, which 6 This slope, from the arch of Titus down
in Juvenal's time was occupied by Jewish beg- to the Forum, was called the Sacer Clivus.
gars. See Sat. iii. 13, vi. 542, already referred 6 See p. 308.
to in p. 133.

734 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OP ST. PAUL. chap. xxrv.
earlier Emperors. In front was the Capitoline Hill, illustrious long before
the invasion of the Gauls. Close on the left, covering that hill, whose
name is associated in every modern European language with the notion of
imperial splendor, were the vast ranges of the palace — the " house of
Cassar" (Phil. iv. 22). Here were the household troops quartered in a
prcetorium 1 attached to the palace. And here (unless, indeed, it was in
the great Prcetorian camp 2 outside the city wall) Julius gave up his
prisoner to Burrus, the Proztorian Prafect? whose official duty it was to
keep in custody all accused persons who were to be tried before the
Emperor.4 This doubt, which of two places, somewhat distant from each other, was
the scene of St. Paul's meeting with the commander-in-chief of the
Prastorian guards, gives us the occasion for entering on a general descrip
tion of the different parts of the city of Rome. It would be nugatory to
lay much stress, as is too often done, on its " seven hills : " for a great
city at length obliterates the original features of the ground, especially
where those features were naturally not very strongly marked. The
description, which is easy in reference to Athens or Edinburgh, is hard
in the instance of modern London or anqjent Rome. Nor is it easy, in
the case of one of the larger cities of the world, to draw any marked
lines of distinction among the different clases of buildings. It is true,
the contrasts are really great ; but details are lost in a distant view of so
vast an aggregate. The two scourges to which ancient Rome was most
exposed revealed very palpably the contrast, both of the natural ground
and the human structures, which by the general observer might be unno
ticed or forgotten. When the Tiber was flooded, and the muddy waters
converted all the streets and open places of the lower part of the city
into lakes and canals,5 it would be seen very clearly how much lower
were the Forum and the Campus Martius than those three detached hills
(the Capitoline, the Palatine, and the Aventine) which rose near the
' We think that Wieseler has proved that peror, though he had not yet acquired all that
the Tvpairapiov in Phil. i. 13 denotes the quar- extensive jurisdiction which was subsequently
ters of the household troops attached to the conferred upon him. At this time (a.d. 61)
Emperor's residence on the Palatine. See the Burrus, one of the best of Nero's advisers, was
beginning of Ch. XXVI. Prastorian Praefect.
2 The establishment of this camp was the * Trajan says (Plin. Ep. x. 65) of such a
work of Tiberius. Its place is still clearly prisoner, " vinctus mitti ad Praefectos Prajtorii
visible in the great rectangular projection in mei debet." Compare also Joseph. An*, xviii. 6,
the walls, on the north of the city. In St. quoted by Wieseler, p. 393.
Paul's time it was strictly outside the city. The 6 The writer has known visits paid in the
inner wall was pulled down by Constantine. Ripetta (in the Campus Martius) by means of
8 This is the accurate translation of Acts boats brought to the windows of the first
xxviii. 16. The Prcefectus Prcetorio was al- story. Dio Cassius makes three distinct refer-
ready the most important subject of the Em- ences to a similar state of things.

chap. xxiv. DESCRIPTION OF ROME. 735
river, and those four ridges (the Coelian, the Esquiline, the Viminal, and
the Quirinal) which ascended and united together in the higher ground
on which the Praetorian camp was situated. And when fires swept
rapidly from roof to roof,1 and vast ranges of buildings were in the ruins
of one night, that contrast between the dwellings of the poor and the
palaces of the rich, which has supplied the Apostle with one of his most
forcible images, would be clearly revealed, — the difference between struc
tures of " sumptuous marbles with silver and gold," which abide after
the fire, and the hovels of " wood, hay, stubble," which are burnt (1
Cor. iii. 10-15).
If we look at a map of modern Rome, with a desire of realizing to
ourselves the appearance of the city of Augustus and Nero, we must in
the first place obliterate from our view that circuit of walls, which is due,
in various proportions, to Aurelian, Belisarius, and Pope Leo IV.2 The
wall through which the Porta Capena gave admission was the old
Servian enclosure, which embraced a much smaller area ; though we
must bear in mind, as we have remarked above, that the city had extend
ed itself beyond this limit, and spread through various suburbs, far into
the country. In the next place, we must observe that the hilly part of
Rome, which is now half occupied by gardens, was then the most popu
lous, while the Campus Martius, now covered with crowded streets, was
comparatively open. It was only about the close of the Republic that
many buildings were raised on the Campus Martius, and these were
chiefly of a public or decorative character. One of these, the Pantheon,
still remains, as a monument of the reign of Augustus. This, indeed, is
the period from which we must trace the beginning of all the grandeur
of Roman buildings. Till the civil war between Pompey and Caesar, the
private houses of the citizens had been mean, and the only public struc
tures of note were the cloacae and the aqueducts. But in proportion as
the ancient fabric of the constitution broke down, and while successful
generals brought home wealth from provinces conquered and plundered
on every shore of the Mediterranean, the city began to assume the ap
pearance of a new and imperial magnificence. To leave out of view the
luxurious and splendid residences which wealthy citizens raised for their
own uses,3 Pompey erected the first theatre of stone,4 and Julius Caesar
1 Suetonius mentions floods and fires to- word burgh, used by Anglo-Saxon pilgrims)
gether, Aug. 29, 30. The fire-police of Augus- where St. Peter's and the Vatican are situated.
tus seems to have been organized with great 8 Till the reign of Augustus, the houses of
care. The care of the river, as we learn from private citizens had been for the most part
inscriptions, was committed to a Curator alvei of sun-dried bricks, on a basement of stone.
Tiberis. The houses of Crassus and Lepidus were
2 The wall of Leo IV. is that which en- among the earlier exceptions.
••loses the Borgo (said to be so called from the 4 This theatre was one of the principal or-

736 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. "pap. xxrv.
surrounded the great Circus with a portico. From this time tho change
went on rapidly and incessantly. The increase of public business led to
the erection of enormous Basilicas.1 The Forum was embellished on all
sides.2 The Temple of Apollo on the Palatine, and those other temples
the remains of which are still conspicuous at the base of the Capitoline,3
were only a small part of similar buildings raised by Augustus. The
triumphal arch erected by Tiberius near the same place 4 was only one of
many structures, which rose in rapid succession to decorate that busy
neighborhood. And if we wish to take a wider view, we have only to
think of the aqueducts, which were built, one by one, between the pri
vate enterprises of Agrippa in the reign of Augustus, and the recent
structures of the Emperor Claudius, just before the arrival of the Apostle
Paul. We may not go farther in the order of chronology. We must
remember that the Colosseum, the Basilica of Constantine, and the baths
of other emperors, and many other buildings which are now regarded as
the conspicuous features of ancient Rome, did not then exist. We are
describing a period which is anterior to the time of Nero's fire. Even
after the opportunity which that calamity afforded for reconstructing the
city, Juvenal complains of the narrowness of the streets. Were we to
attempt to extend our description to any of these streets, — whether the
old Vicus Tuscus, with its cheating shopkeepers, which led round the
base of the Palatine, from the Forum to the Circus, — or the aristocratic
Carinae along the slope of the Esquiline, — or the noisy Suburra, in the
hollow between the Viminal and Quirinal, which had sunk into disrepute,
though once the residence of Julius Caesar, — we should only wander
into endless perplexity. And we should be equally lost if we were to
attempt to discriminate the mixed multitude, which were crowded on
the various landings of those insulae? or piles of lodging-houses, which
are, perhaps, best described by comparing them to the houses in the old
town of Edinburgh.
If it is difficult to describe the outward appearance of the city, it is
naments of the Campus Martius. Some parts are popularly called the remains of the Tem-
of it still remain. pie of Jupiter Stator : perhaps they are part
1 The Roman Basilica is peculiarly interests of the Temple of Castor and Pollux.
ing to us, since it contains the germ of the Chris- 8 The larger ruin, on the lower side of the
tian cathedral. Originally these Basilicas were Clivus Capitolinus, is believed to be the Tem-
rather open colonnades than enclosed halls ; pie of Vespasian, and was not built till after
but, before the reign of Nero, they had assumed St. Paul's death. The Temples of Concord
their ultimate form of a nave with aisles. We and of Saturn were of earlier date.
shall refer again to them in our account of 4 It was built in commemoration of the re-
St. Paul's last trial. See p. 778. covery of the standards of Varus.
2 Three well-known Corinthian columns, 5 A decree was issued by Augustus, defin-
of the best period of art under the Emperors, ing the height to which these insuloz might be
remain near the base of the Palatine. They raised.

chap, xxrv. POPULATION OF ROME. 737
still more difficult to trace the distinctive .features of all the parts of that
colossal population which filled it. Within a circuit of little more than
twelve miles J more than two millions 2 of inhabitants were crowded. It
is evident that this fact is only explicable by the narrowness of the streets,
with that peculiarity of the houses which has been alluded to above. In
this prodigious collection of human beings, there were of course all the
contrasts which are seen in a modern city, — all the painful lines of
separation between luxury and squalor, wealth and want. But in Rome
all these differences were on an exaggerated scale, and the institution of
slavery modified further all social relations. The free citizens were more
than a million : of these, the senators were so few in number as to be
hardly appreciable : 3 the knights, who filled a great proportion of the
public offices, were not more than 10,000 : the troops quartered in the
city may be reckoned at 15,000 : the rest were the Plebs urbana. That
a vast number of these would be poor is an obvious result of the most
ordinary causes. But, in ancient Rome, the luxury of the wealthier
classes did not produce a general diffusion of trade, as it does in a
modern city. The handicraft employments, and many of what we should
call professions,4 were in the hands of slaves ; and the consequence was,
that a vast proportion of the Plebs urbana lived on public or private
charity. Yet were these pauper citizens proud of their citizenship,
though many of them had no better sleeping-place for the night than the
public porticoes or the vestibules of temples. They cared for nothing
beyond bread for the day, the games of the Circus,5 and the savage
delight of gladiatorial shows. Manufactures and trade they regarded as
the business of the slave and the foreigner. The number of the slaves
was perhaps about a million. The number of the strangers or peregrini
was much smaller ; but it is impossible to describe their varieties. Every
kind of nationality and religion found its representative in Rome. But
it is needless to pursue these details. The most obvious comparison is
better than an elaborate description. Rome was like London with all its
miseries, vices, and follies exaggerated, and without Christianity.
One part of Rome still remains to be described, the " Trastevere " or
district beyond the river.6 This portion of the city has been known in
1 This is of course a much wider circuit 8 Before Augustus there were 1,000 sena-
than that of the Servian wall. The present tors ; he reduced them to about 700.
wall as we have said above, did not thru exist. 4 Some were physicians, others were en-
2 See Milman's note on Gibbon "» tnirty-first gaged in education, &c.
chapter. The estimate of 2,000,000 agrees 6 " Panem et Circenses ; " such is the Sati-
with that of the writer of the article " Rome " rist's account of the only two things for which
in Smith's Diet, of Geog. vol. ii. p. 748. Mr. the Roman populace was really anxious.
Merivale thinks it far too high. Hist, of Rom. 6 Whether the wall of Servius included any
under Emp. vol. iv. pp. 515-528. portion of the opposite side of the river, or not
47

738 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap, xxrv
modern times for the energetic and intractable character of its popula
tion. In earlier times it was equally notorious, though not quite for the
same reason. It was the residence of a low rabble, and the place of the
meanest merchandise.1 There is, however, one reason why our attention
is particularly called to it. It was the ordinary residence of the Jews,
the " Ghetto " of ancient Rome : 2 and great part of it was doubtless
squalid and miserable, like the Ghetto of modern Rome,3 though the
Jews were often less oppressed under the Caesars than under the Popes.
Here, then, on the level ground, between the windings of the muddy
river, and the base of that hill 4 from the brow of which Porsena looked
down on early Rome, and where the French within these few years have
planted their cannon — we must place the home of those Israelitish
families among whom the Gospel bore its first-fruits in the metropolis of
the world : and it was on these bridges 5 — which formed an immediate
communication from the district beyond the Tiber to the Emperor's
household and the guards on the Palatine — that those despised Jewish
beggars took their stand, to whom in the place of their exile had come
the hopes of a better citizenship than that which they had lost.
The Jewish community thus established in Rome had its first begin
nings in the captives brought by Pompey after his Eastern campaign.6
Many of them were manumitted ; and thus a great proportion of the
Jews in Rome were freedmen.7 Frequent accessions to their numbers
were made as years went on — chiefly from the mercantile relations
which subsisted between Rome and the East. Many of them were
wealthy, and large sums were sent annually for religious purposes from
Italy to the mother-country.8 Even the proselytes contributed to these
sacred funds.9 It is difficult to estimate the amount of the religious in
fluence exerted by the Roman Jews upon the various Heathens around
them ; but all our sources of information lead us to conclude that it was
very considerable.10 So long as this influence was purely religious, we
(a question which is disputed among thetopog- K Mart. x. 5. See Juv. iv. 116 ; v. 8; xiv.
raphers of the Italian and German schools), 134.
a suburb existed there nnder the imperial 6 See p. 17. The first introduction of the
regime. Jews to Rome was probably the embassy of
1 Juv. xiv. 202 ; Mart. i. 42, 109 ; vi. 93. the Maccabees.
2 We learn this from Philo. 7 This we have on the authority of Philo.
8 The modern Ghetto is in the filthy quar- 8 Here again Cicero confirms what we learn
ter between the Capitoline Hill and the old from Philo.
Fabrician Bridge, which leads to the island, and 9 Tac. Hist. v. 6.
thence to the Trastevere. It is surrounded by 10 The very passages (and they are numer-
walls, and the gates are closed every night by ous) which express hatred of the Jews imply
the police. The number of Jews is about a sense of their influence. Again, many Jews
8,000, in a total population of 150,000. were Roman citizens, like Josephus and St.
4 The Janiculum. Paul : and there were numerous proselytes at

chap. xxrv. THE ROMAN CHURCH. 739
have no reason to suppose that any persecution from the civil power
resulted. It was when commotions took place in consequence of expecta
tions of a temporal Messiah, or when vague suspicions of this mysterious
people were more than usually excited, that the Jews of Rome were
cruelly treated, or peremptorily banished. Yet from all these cruel
ties they recovered with elastic force, and from all these exiles they
returned ; and in the early years of Nero, which were distinguished for
a mild and lenient government of the Empire,1 the Jews in Rome seem
to have enjoyed complete toleration, and to have been a numerous,
wealthy, and influential community.
The Christians doubtless shared the protection which was extended to
the Jews. They were hardly yet sufficiently distinguished as a self-
existent community to provoke any independent hostility. It is even
possible that the Christians, so far as they were known as separate, were
more tolerated than the Jews ; for, not having the same expectation of
an earthly hero to deliver them, they had no political ends in view, and
would not be in the same danger of exciting the suspicion of the govern
ment. Yet we should fall into a serious error if we were to suppose
that all the Christians in Rome, or the majority of them, had formerly
been Jews or Proselytes ; though this was doubtless true of its earliest
members, who may have been of the number that were dispersed after
the first Pentecost, or, possibly, disciples of our Lord Himself. It is
impossible to arrive at any certain conclusion concerning the first origin
and early growth of the Church in Rome ;2 though, from the manifold
links between the city and the provinces, it is easy to account for the
formation of a large and flourishing community. Its history before the
year 61 might be divided into three periods, separated from each other
by the banishment of the Jews from Rome in the reign of Claudius,3
and the writing of St, Paul's letter from Corinth.4 Even in the first of
these periods there might be points of connection between the Roman
Church and St. Paul ; for some of those whom he salutes (Rom. xvi.
7, 11) as " kinsmen " are also said to have been " Christians before him."
In the second period it cannot well be doubted that a very close connec
tion began between St. Paul and some of the conspicuous members and
principal teachers of the Roman Church. The expulsion of the Jews in
Rome, especially among the women (see, for first quinquennium — had not yet expired. The
instance, Joseph. Ant. xviii. 3, 5). As in the full toleration of the Jews in Rome is implied
case of Greece, the conquest of Judaea brought in the narration of St. Paul's meeting with the
Rome under the influence of her captive. elders, as well as in a passage which might be
Hence Seneca's remark, in reference to the quoted from the satirist Persius
Jews : " The conquered gave laws to their 2 See above, pp. 543, 544.
conquerors." P- 335.
1 The good period of Nero's reign — the 4 P. 542.

740 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OP ST. PAUL. chap. xxrv.
consequence of the edict of Claudius brought them in large numbers to
the chief towns of the Levant ; and there St. Paul met them in the
synagogues. We have seen what results followed from his meeting with
Aquila and Priscilla at Corinth. They returned to Rome with all the
stores of spiritual instruction which he had given them ; and in the
Epistle to the Romans we find him, as is natural, saluting them thus : —
" Greet Priscilla and Aquila, my helpers in Christ Jesus : who have for
my sake laid down their own necks : unto whom not only I give thanks,
but also all the Churches of the Gentiles. Likewise greet the Church
that is in their house." All this reveals to us a great amount of devoted
exertion on behalf of one large congregation in Rome ; and all of it dis
tinctly connected with St. Paul. And this is perhaps only a specimen
of other cases of the like kind. Thus he sends a greeting to Epaenetus,
whom he names " the first-fruits of Asia" l (ver. 5), and who may have
had the same close relation to him during his long ministration at
Ephesus (Acts xix.) which Aquila and Priscilla had at Corinth. Nor
must we forget those women whom he singles out for special mention,
— " Mary, who bestowed much labor on him" (ver. 6) ; " the beloved
Persis, who labored much in the Lord " (ver. 12) ; with Tryphaena and
Tryphosa, and the unknown mother of Rufus (ver. 13). We cannot
doubt, that, though the Church of Rome may have received its growth
and instruction through various channels, many of them were connected,
directly or indirectly, with St. Paul ; and accordingly he writes, in the
whole of the letter, as one already in intimate relation with a Church
which he has never seen. And whatever bonds subsisted between this
Apostle and the Roman Christians must have been drawn still closer
when the letter had been received ; for from that time they were looking
forward to a personal visit from him, in his projected journey to the
West. Thenceforward they must have taken the deepest interest in all
his movements, and received with eager anxiety the news of his impris
onment at Caesarea, and waited (as we have already seen) for his arrival
in Italy. It is indeed but too true that there were parties among the
Christians in Rome, and that some had a hostile feeling against St. Paul
himself;2 yet it is probable that the animosity of the Judaizers was less
developed than it was in those regions which he had personally visited
and to which they had actually followed him. As to the unconverted
Jews, the name of St. Paul was doubtless known to them ; yet were
they comparatively little interested in his movements. Their proud con
tempt of the Christian heresy would make them indifferent. The leaven
of the Gospel was working around them to an extent of which they were
hardly aware. The very magnitude of the population of Rome had a
1 For the reading here, see p. 581, n. 3. 2 See Phil. i. 15.

chap. xxrv. THE ROMAN CHURCH. 741
tendency to neutralize the currents of party feeling. For these reasons,
the hostility of the Jews was probably less violentvthan in any other part
of the Empire.
Yet St. Paul could not possibly be aware of the exact extent of their
enmity against himself. Independently, therefore, of his general prin
ciple of preaching, first to the Jew, and then to the Gentile, he had an
additional reason for losing no time in addressing himself to his country
men. Thus, after the mention of St. Paul's being delivered up to Burrus,
and allowed by him to be separate from the other prisoners,1 the next
scene to which the sacred historian introduces us is among the Jews.
After three days 2 he sent for the principal men among them to his
lodging,3 and endeavored to conciliate their feelings towards himself and
the Gospel.
It is highly probable that the prejudices of these Roman Jews were
already roused against the Apostle of the Gentiles ; or if they had not
yet conceived an unfavorable opinion of him, there was a danger that
they would now look upon him as a traitor to his country, from the mere
fact that he had appealed to the Roman power. He might even have
been represented to them in the odious light of one who had come to Rome
as an accuser of the Sanhedrin before the Emperor. St. Paul, therefore,
addressed his auditors on this point at once, and showed that his enemies
were guilty of this very appeal to the foreign power, of which he had
himself been suspected. He had committed no offence against the holy
nation, or the customs of their fathers ; yet his enemies at Jerusalem
had delivered him — one of their brethren — of the seed of Abraham —
of the tribe of Benjamin — a Hebrew of the Hebrews — into the hands
of the Romans. So unfounded was the accusation, that even the Roman
governor had been ready to liberate the prisoner ; but his Jewish enemies
opposed his liberation. They strove to keep a child of Israel in Roman
chains. So that he was compelled, as his only hope of safety, to appeal
unto Caesar. He brought no accusation against his countrymen before
the tribunal of the stranger : that was the deed of his antagonists. In
fact, his only crime had been his firm faith in God's deliverance of his
i " By himself," v. 16 ; an indulgence prob- manent residence; and the mention of the
ably due to the influence of Julius. money he received from the Philippians (Phil.
2 V. 17. This need not mean three com- iv.) serves to show that he would not need the
pletedays. means of hiring a lodging. The former
8 "Paul called the chief of the Jews to- phrase implies the temporary residence of a
gether," v. 17. With regard to the " lodging," guest with friends, as in Philemon 22. Noth
v. 23, we are convinced, with Wieseler, that it ing is more likely than that Aquila and Pris-
is to be distinguished from "his own hired cilia were his hosts at Rome, as formerly at
house " v. 30, mentioned below. The latter Corinth.
was a hired lodging, which he took for his per-

742 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. cha*. xxrv.
people through the Messiah promised by the Prophets. "For the hope of
Israel," he concluded, "I am bound with this chain." 1
Their answer to this address was re-assuring. They said that they had
received no written communication from Judaea concerning St. Paul, and
that none of " the brethren" who had arrived from the East had spoken
any evil of him. They further expressed a wish to hear from himself a
statement of his religious sentiments, adding that the Christian sect was
everywhere spoken against.2 There was perhaps something hardly
honest in this answer ; for it seems to imply a greater ignorance with
regard to Christianity than we can suppose to have prevailed among the
Roman Jews. But with regard to Paul himself, it might well be true
that they had little information concerning him. Though he had been
imprisoned long at Caesarea, his appeal had been made only a short time
before winter. After that time (to use the popular expression), the sea
was shut ; and the winter had been a stormy one ; so that it was natural
enough that his case should be first made known to the Jews by himself.
All these circumstances gave a favorable opening for the preaching of
the Gospel, and Paul hastened to take advantage of it. A day was
fixed for a meeting at his own private lodging.3
They came in great numbers4 at the appointed time. Then followed
an impressive scene, like that at Troas (Acts xxi.), — the Apostle plead
ing long and earnestly, — bearing testimony concerning the kingdom of
God, — and endeavoring to persuade them by arguments drawn from
their own Scriptures, — " from morning till evening."5 The result was
a division among the auditors,6 — " not peace, but a sword," — the divis
ion which has resulted ever since when the truth of God has encoun
tered, side by side, earnest conviction with worldly indifference, honest
investigation with bigoted prejudice, trustful faith with the pride of
scepticism. After a long and stormy discussion, the unbelieving portion
departed ; but not until St. Paul had warned them, in one last address,
that they were bringing upon themselves that awful doom of judicial
blindness, which was denounced in their own Scriptures against obstinate
unbelievers ; that the salvation which they rejected would be withdrawn
from them, and the inheritance they renounced would be given to the
Gentiles.7 The sentence with which he gave emphasis to this warning
was that passage in Isaiah, which is more often quoted in the New
Testament than any other words from the Old,8 — which, recurring thus
with solemn force at the very close of the Apostolic history, seems to
bring very strikingly together the Old Dispensation and the New, and to
1 Ver. 17-20. 2 Ver. 21, 22. 6 "Some believed the things which were
8 " When they had appointed him a day." spoken, and some believed not. And when
1 " Then came many." they agreed not among themselves," &c.
6 Ver 23 t Ver. 28. 8 Ver, 24-28.

CHAP. xxiv.

COIN OF NERO.

743

connect the ministry of our Lord with that of his Apostles : — " (&0 Mttitf
thiss people mA wj, Rearing p mil UmxmA shall wot xmAtxmnA, and geeittfl
p shall m mA shall not perceive : f^ the tact of this people te wutA gws,
ami their ears are dull of heating, ami theft eyes hawe they ehwtl ; tot thejj
Should see with theft eges, atut hea* with their rats, and vmAtx&tmtA with theft
heart, mA slmuM he eoavettett, mA I should heal them." 1
A formal separation was now made between the Apostle of the Gentiles
and the Jews of Rome. They withdrew to dispute concerning the
"sect" which was making such inroads on their prejudices (ver. 29).
He remained in his own hired house2 — where the indulgence of Burrus
permitted him to reside, instead of confining him within the walls of the
Praetorian barrack. We must not forget, however, that he was still a
prisoner under military custody, — chained by the arm,3 both day and
night, to one of the imperial body-guard, — and thus subjected to the
rudeness and caprice of an insolent soldiery. This severity, however,
was indispensable, according to the Roman law ; and he received every
indulgence which it was in the power of the Prefect to grant. He was
allowed to receive all who came to him (ver. 30), and was permitted,
without hinderance, to preach boldly the kingdom of God, and teach the
things of the Lord Jesus Christ (ver. 31).
Thus was fulfilled his long-cherished desire " to proclaim the Gospel
to them that were in Rome also " (Rom. i. 15). Thus ends the Apos
tolic History, so far as it has been directly revealed. Here the thread of
sacred narrative, which we have followed so long, is suddenly broken.
Our knowledge of the incidents of his residence in Rome, and of his
subsequent history, must be gathered almost exclusively from the letters
of the Apostle himself.

Coin of Nero (with the Harbor of Ostia).*

i Isa. vi. 9, 10 (LXX.). Quoted also by
our Lord (Matt. xiii. 15), and referred to by
St. John (John xii. 40). '2 See above.
8 " With the soldier that kept him," Acts
xxviii. 16. See above, pp. 665, 666, and com
pare Eph. vi. 20 (" an ambassador in bonds "),
Col. iv. 18, Phil. i. 13. Possibly two soldiers
guarded him by night according to the sen

tence of the Roman law — "nox custodian]
geminat," — quoted by Wieseler.
* From the British Museum- This is ono
of the large brass coins of Nero's reign, which
exhibit admirable portraits of the emperor.
We notice here that peculiar rig of ancient
ships which was mentioned above, pp. 679
and 721.

CHAPTER XXV.
Delay of St. Paul's Trial. — His Occupations and Companions during his Imprisonment. — He
writes the Epistle to Philemon, the Epistle to the Colossians, and the Epistle to the Ephesians (so
called).
TX7E have seen that St. Paul's accusers had not yet arrived from
' " Palestine, and that their coming was not even expected by the
Roman Jews. This proves that they had not left Syria before the pre
ceding winter, and consequently that they could not have set out on
their journey till the following spring, when the navigation of the Medi
terranean was again open. Thus they would not reach Rome till the
summer or autumn of the year 61 a.d.1 Meanwhile, the progress of the
trial was necessarily suspended, for the Roman courts required 2 the per
sonal presence of the prosecutor. It would seem that, at this time,3 an
accused person might be thus kept in prison for an indefinite period,
merely by the delay of the prosecutor to proceed with his accusation ;
nor need this surprise us, if we consider how harshly the law has dealt
with supposed offenders, and with what indifference it has treated the
rights of the accused, even in periods whose civilization was not only
more advanced than that of the Roman Empire, but also imbued with the
merciful spirit of Christianity. And even when the prosecutors were
present, and no ground alleged for the delay of the trial, a corrupt judge
might postpone it, as Pelix did, for months and years, to gratify the ene-
1 About this period (as we learn from Jose- was not the State (as with us the Crown), but
phus) there were two embassies sent from Jeru- any private individual who chose to bring an
salem to Rome ; viz., that which was charged accusation.
to conduct the impeachment of Felix, and that 8 At a later period, the suspension on the
which was sent to intercede with Nero on the part of the prosecutor of the proceedings dur-
subject of Agrippa's palace, which overlooked ing a year was made equivalent to an aban-
the Temple. The former seems to have ar- donment of it, and amounted to an abolitio of
rived in Rome in a. d. 60, the latter in A. d. the process. In the time of Nero, the prosecu-
61. (See note on the Chronological Table in tors on a public charge were liable to punish-
Appendix HI.) It is not impossible that the ment if they abandoned it from corrupt mo-
latter embassy, in which was included Ishmael fives, by the Senatus Consultum Turpilianum.
the high priest, may have been intrusted with See Tacitus, Ann. xiv. 41. This law was
the prosecution of St. Paul, in addition to their passed a. d. 61, and was afterwards interpreted
other business. by the jurisconsults as forbidding an accuser to
2 It should be observed that the prosecutor withdraw his accusation.
on a criminal charge, under the Roman law,
744

chap. xxv. DELAY OF ST. PAUL'S TRIAL. 745
mies of the prisoner. And if a provincial Governor, though responsible
for such abuse of power to his master, might venture to act in this arbi
trary manner, much more might the Emperor himself, who was respon
sible to no man. Thus we find that Tiberius was in the habit of delaying
the hearing of causes, and retaining the accused in prison unheard, merely
out of procrastination.1 So that, even after St. Paul's prosecutors had
arrived, and though we were to suppose them anxious for the progress
of the trial, it might still have been long delayed by the Emperor's
caprice. But there is no reason to think that, when they came, they
would, have wished to press on the cause. Prom what had already
occurred, they had every reason to expect the failure of the prosecution.
In fact it had already broken down at its first stage, and Festus had
strongly pronounced his opinion of the innocence 2 of the accused. Their
hope of success at Rome must have been grounded either on influencing
the Emperor's judgment by private intrigue, or on producing further
evidence in support of their accusation. For both these objects, delay
would be necessary. Moreover, it was quite in accordance with the regular
course of Roman jurisprudence, that the Court should grant along suspen
sion of the cause, on the petition of the prosecutor, that he might be al
lowed time to procure the attendance of witnesses 3 from a distance. The
length of time thus granted would depend upon the remoteness of the
place where the alleged crimes had been committed. We read of an
interval of twelve months permitted during Nero's reign, in the case
of an accusation against Suilius,4 for misdemeanors committed during
his government of Proconsular Asia. The accusers of St. Paul might
fairly demand a longer suspension ; for they accused him of offences
committed not only in Palestine (which was far more remote than
Proconsular Asia from Rome), but also over the whole 6 Empire. Their
witnesses must be summoned from Judasa, from Syria, from Cilicia, from
Pisidia, from Macedonia. In all cities, from Damascus to Corinth, in all
countries, " from Jerusalem round about unto Illyricum," must testimony
be sought to prove the seditious turbulence of the ringleader of the
Nazarenes. The interval granted them for such a purpose could not be
less than a year, and might well be more.6 Supposing it to be the
i Joseph. Ant. xviii. 6, 5. 6 Another cause of delay, even if the prose-
2 Acts xxv. 25, and xxvi. 32. cutors did not make the demand for suspension,
8 A good instance is given in Tacitus, Ann. would have been the loss of the official notice
xiii. 52. This was in a case where the accused of the case forwarded by Festus. No appeal
had been proconsul in Africa. We may observe (as we have before observed) could be tried
that the attendance of the witnesses for the without u rescript (called Apostoli or literal
prosecution could be legally enforced. dimissorice) from the inferior to the superior
4 Tac. Ann. xiii. 43. judge, stating full particulars of the case.
6 " A mover of sedition among the Jews Such documents might well have been lost in
throughout the world," Acts xxiv. 5. the wreck at Malta.

746 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap, xxv,
shortest possible, and assuming that the prosecutors reached Rome in
August a.d. 61, the first stage of the trial would be appointed to commence
not before August a.d. 62. And when this period arrived, the prosecu
tors and the accused, with their witnesses, must have been heard on each
of the charges separately (according to Nero's regulations),1 and sentence
pronounced on the first charge before the second was entered into. Now,
the charges against St. Paul were divided (as we have seen) into three 2
separate heads of accusation. Consequently the proceedings, which
would of course be adjourned from time to time to suit the Emperor's
convenience, may well have lasted till the beginning of 63, at which
time St. Luke's narrative would lead us to fix their termination.3
During the long delay of his trial, St. Paul was not reduced, as he had
been at Caesarea, to a forced inactivity. On the contrary, he was per
mitted the freest intercourse with his friends, and was allowed to reside
in a house of sufficient size to accommodate the congregation which
flocked together to listen to his teaching. The freest scope was given to
his labors, consistent with the military custody under which he was
placed. We are told, in language peculiarly emphatic, that this preach
ing was subjected to no restraint whatever.4 And that which seemed at
first to impede must really have deepened the impression of his eloquence ;
for who could see without emotion that venerable form subjected by iron
links to the coarse control of the soldier who stood beside him ? How
often must the tears of the assembly have been called forth by the uprais
ing of that fettered hand, and the clanking of the chain which checked
its energetic action !
We shall see hereafter that these labors of the imprisoned Confessor
were not fruitless ; in his own words he begot many children in his
chains.5 Meanwhile, he had a wider sphere of action than even the
metropolis of the world. Not only " the crowd which pressed upon him
daily," 6 but also " the care of all the churches," demanded his constant
vigilance and exertion. Though himself tied down to a single spot, he
kept up a constant intercourse, by his delegates, with his converts
throughout the Empire ; and not only with his own converts, but with the
other Gentile Churches, who, as yet, had not seen his face in the flesh.
To enable him to maintain this superintendence, he manifestly needed
many faithful messengers ; men who (as he says of one of them) ren-
1 It was Nero's practice, as Suetonius tells only lasted five days. It has already been re
us (Nero, 15), " to take the heads of accusa- futed by Neander and Wieseler.
tion singly." 4 Acts xxviii. 31 : " teaching . . . with aU
2 See above, p. 660. confidence, no man forbidding him."
" We need not notice the hypothesis of 6 Philem. 10.
Bottger, that St. Paul's imprisonment at Rome 6 2 Cor. xi. 28.

chap. axv. HIS COMPANIONS DURING IMPRISONMENT. 747
dered him profitable service ; J and by some of whom he seems to have
been constantly accompanied, wheresoever he went.2 Accordingly, we
find him, during this Roman imprisonment, surrounded by many of
his oldest and most valued attendants. Luke,3 his fellow-traveller,
remained with him during his bondage ; Timotheus,4 his beloved son in
the faith, ministered to him at Rome, as he had done in Asia, in Macedo
nia, and in Achaia. Tychicus,5 who had formerly borne him company
from Corinth to Ephesus, is now at hand to carry his letters to the shores
which they had visited together. But there are two names amongst his
Roman companions which excite a peculiar interest, though from oppo
site reasons, — the names of Demas and of Mark. The latter, when last
we heard of him, was the unhappy cause of the separation of Barnabas
and Paul. He was rejected by Paul as unworthy to attend him, because
he had previously abandoned the work of the Gospel out of timidity or
indolence.6 It is delightful to find him now ministering obediently to
the very Apostle who had then repudiated his services ; still more, to
know that he persevered in this fidelity even to the end,7 and was sent
for by St. Paul to cheer his dying hours. Demas, on the other hand, is
now a faithful " fellow-laborer" 8 of the Apostle ; but in a few years we
shall find that he had "forsaken" him, "having loved this present
world." Perhaps we may be allowed to hope, that, as the fault of Demas
was the same with that of Mark, so the repentance of Mark may have
been paralleled by that of Demas.
Amongst the rest of St. Paul's companions at this time, there were two
whom he distinguishes by the honorable title of his " fellow-prisoners."
One of these is Aristarchus,9 the other Epaphras.10 With regard to the
former, we know that he was a Macedonian of Thessalonica, one of
" Paul's companions in travel," whose life was endangered by the mob at
Ephesus, and who embarked with St. Paul at Caesarea when he set sail
for Rome. The other, Epaphras, was a Colossian, who must not be iden
tified with the Philippian Epaphroditus, another of St. Paul's fellow-
laborers during this time. It is not easy to say what was the exact sense
in which these two disciples were peculiarly fellow-prisoners u of St. Paul.
1 2 Tim. iv. 11. 6 Pp- 145 and 216.
2 Comp. Acts xix. 22 : " two of them that 7 2 Tim. iv. 11 : " Take Mark, and bring
ministered to him." him with thee ; for his services are profitable
8 Col. iv. 14 ; Philem. 24. Luke seems, to me."
however to have been absent from Rome when 8 Philem. 24 ; cf. Col. iv. 14.
the Epistle to the Philippians was written. 9 Col. iv. 10; cf. Acts xix. 29, and Acts
* Philem. 1 ; Col. i. 1 ; Philip, i. 1. xxvii. 2, and Philem. 24.
8 Col. iv. 7 ; Eph. vi. 21 ; cf. Acts xx. 4, 10 Col. i. 7 ; Philem. 23.
and Tit. iii. 12. [St. Paul himself was not u The same expression s ised of Androni-
actually at Ephesus. It is very possible that eus and Junius (Rom. xvi. 7) but of no others
Tychicus went thither from Miletus. See Acts except these four.
xx. 16, 38. — H. |

748 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap. xxv.
Perhaps it only implies that they dwelt in his house, which was also his
prison. But of all the disciples now ministering to St. Paul at Rome, none has
for us a greater interest than the fugitive Asiatic slave Onesimus. He
belonged to a Christian named Philemon, a member of the Colossian1
Church. But he had robbed 2 his master, and fled from Colossae, and at
last found his way to Rome. It is difficult to imagine any portion of
mankind more utterly depraved than the associates among whom a run
away pagan slave must have found himself in the capital. Profligate
and unprincipled as we know even the highest and most educated society
to have then been, what must have been its dregs and offal ? Yet from
this lowest depth Onesimus was dragged forth by the hand of Christian
love. Perhaps some Asiatic Christian, who had seen him formerly at his
master's house, recognized him in the streets of Rome destitute and starv
ing, and had compassion on him ; and thus he might have been brought
to hear the preaching of the illustrious prisoner. Or it is not impossible
that he may have already known St. Paul at Ephesus, where his master
Philemon had formerly been himself converted 3 by the Apostle. How
ever this may be, it is certain that Onesimus was led by the providence
of God to listen to that preaching now which he had formerly despised.
He was converted to the faith of Christ, and therefore to the morality
of Christ. He confessed to St. Paul his sins against his master. The
Apostle seems to have been peculiarly attracted by the character of
Onesimus ; and he perceived in him the indications of gifts which fitted
him for a more important post than any which he could hold as the slave
of Philemon. He wished 4 to keep him at Rome, and employ him in the
service of the Gospel. Yet he would not transgress the law, nor violate
the rights of Philemon, by acting in this matter without his consent. He
therefore decided that Onesimus must immediately return to his master ;
and, to make this duty less painful, he undertook himself to discharge
the sum of which Philemon had been defrauded. An opportunity now
offered itself for Onesimus to return in good company ; for St. Paul was
sending Tychicus to Asia Minor, charged, amongst other commissions,
with an epistle to Colossae, the home of Philemon. Under his care,
therefore, he placed the penitent slave, who was now willing to surrender
himself to his offended master. Nevertheless, he did not give up the
hope of placing his new convert in a position wherein he might minister
no longer to a private individual, but to the Church at large. He inti
mated his wishes on the subject to Philemon himself, with characteristic
1 For the proof of this, see Paley's Horce 8 Philem. 10 appears to state this. (Se«
Paulince on Philemon (10-12). p. 413.)
2 Philem. 18. * Philem. 13.

chap. xxv. EPISTLE TO PHILEMON. 749
delicacy, in a letter which he charged Onesimus to deliver on his arrival
at Colossae. This letter is not only a beautiful illustration of the charac
ter of St. Paul, but also a practical commentary upon the precepts con
cerning the mutual relations of slaves 1 and masters given in his contem
porary Epistles. We see here one of the earliest examples of the mode
in which Christianity operated upon these relations ; not by any violent
disruption of the organization of society, such as could only have pro
duced another Servile War, but by gradually leavening and inter-penetrat
ing society with the spirit of a religion which recognized the equality of
all men in the sight of God. The letter was as follows : —

THE EPISTLE TO PHILEMON.2
salutation. PAUL, a prisoner of Christ Jesus, and Timotheus the bro- 1
ther, To Philemon our beloved friend and fellow-laborer, and to 2
Appia3 our beloved sister,4 and to Archippus6 our fellow-soldier,
and to the Church at thy house.
Grace be to you and peace, from God our Father and our Lord Jesus S
Christ.
inisnaiidlT" ^ ^an^ my God, making mention of thee always in my 4
Phuemon?' prayers, because I hear of thy love and faith towards the Lord 5
Jesus, and towards all the saints ; praying 6 that thy faith may communi- 6
1 See Col. iii. 22, and Eph. vi. 5. St. Paul's 23, 24 compared with Col. iv. 12-14), prove
attention seems to have been especially drawn that it was sent to Asia Minor, together with
to this subject at the present time ; and he the Epistle to the Colossians, the date of which
might well feel the need there was for a fun- is discussed in a note on the beginning of that
damental change in this part of the social sys- epistle.
tem of antiquity, such as the spirit of Christ 8 We are told by Chrysostom that she was
alone could give. In the very year of his the wife of Philemon, which seems probable
arrival at Rome, a most frightful example was from the juxtaposition of their names.
given of the atrocity of the laws which regu- 4 " Sister " is added in many of the best
lated the relations of slave to master. The MSS.
prefect of the city (Pedanius Secundus) was 6 Archippus was apparently a. presbyter
killed by one of his slaves ; and in accordance of the church at Colossa?, or perhaps an evan-
with ,the ancient law, the whole body of slaves gelist resident there on a special mission (corn-
belonging to Pedanius at Rome, amounting to pare Col. iv. 17) ; from the present passage, he
a vast multitude, and including many women seems to have lived in the house of Philemon.
and children, were executed together, although 6 " That " is to be joined with verse 4, as
confessedly innocent of all participation in the stating the object of the prayer there men-
crime. Tac. Ann. xiv. 42-45. tioned, while verse 5 gives the subject of the
2 With respect to the date of this epistle, thanksgiving. This is Chrysostom's view,
the fact that it was conveyed by Onesimus against which Meyer's objections appearincon-
(compare Col. iv. 9), and the persons men- elusive. The literal English of verse 6 is as
tioned as with St. Paul at the time (Philem. follows, that the communication of thy faith may

750 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OP ST. PAUL. chap. xxv.
cate itself to others, and may become workful, in causing true knowledge
7 of all the good which is in us, for Christ's service. For I have great joy
and consolation in thy love, because the hearts of the saints have been
comforted by thee, brother.
8 Wherefore, although in the authority of Christ I might bold- gX£rabie
9 ly enjoin upon thee that which is befitting, yet for love's sake onesimus.
I rather beseech thee as Paul the aged, and now also prisoner of Jesus
10 Christ. I beseech thee for my son, whom I have begotten in my chains,
11 Onesimus ; who formerly was to thee unprofitable,1 but now is profitable
12 both to thee and me. Whom I have sent back to thee ; 2 but do thou
13 receive him as my own * flesh and blood. For I would gladly4 retain him
with myself, that he might render service to me in thy stead, while I am
14 a prisoner for declaring the Glad-tidings ; but I am unwilling to do any
thing without thy decision, that thy kindness may not be constrained, but
15 voluntary. For perhaps to this very end he was parted from thee for a
16 time, that thou mightest possess him forever ; no longer as a bondsman,
but above a bondsman, a brother beloved ; very dear to me, but how
17 much more to thee, being thine both in the flesh and in the Lord ! If,
18 then, thou count me in fellowship with thee, receive him as myself. But
19 whatsoever he has wronged thee of, or owes thee, reckon it to my account
20 (I) Paul, write5 this with my own hand) ; I will repay it; for I would
not say to thee that thou owest me even thine own self besides. Yea,
brother, let me have joy of thee in the Lord ; comfort my heart in
Christ.6
21 I write to thee with full confidence in thy obedience, know- Announce
ment of a visit
22 ing that thou wilt do even more than I say. But, moreover, from Paul to
become workful, in true knowledge of all good The omission of the imperative makes no dif-
which is in us, for Christ. The latter words are ference in the sense ; bat it is characteristic of
very obscure, but the rendering adopted in the St. Paul's abrupt and rapid dictation. [If,
text appears to make the best sense. The best with the best MSS., we omit the imperative, we
MSS. are divided between Christ and Christ find it in v. 17 : and the intermediate matter is
Jesus ; but agree in reading " in us," not " in practically parenthetic. — h.J
you." 8 Children were called the oidayxva of their
1 Most modern commentators suppose a parents.
play on the name Onesimus, which means use- i The imperfect here, and aorist in the pre-
Jul ; but there seems scarcely sufficient ground ceding and following verse, are used, accord-
for this, and it was never remarked by the ing to classical idiom, from the position <if the
ancient Greek commentators, whose judgment reader of the letter.
on such a point would be entitled to most def- 5 See the preceding note.
erence. 8 " Christ " is the reading of the best MSS
* Many of the best MSS. add " to thee."

CHAP. XXV.

ST. PAUL WRITES TO THE COLOSSIANS.

751

Asia Minor on prepare to receive me as thy guest ; for I trust that through
m* acquittal. r r J ° '
your l prayers I shall be given to you.

Salutationsfrom Rome.

laborers.
Concluding benediction.

There salute thee Epaphras my fellow-prisoner 2 in Christ 23
Jesus, Marcus, Aristarchus, Demas, and Luke, my fellow- 24
The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with your spirits.8 25

While Onesimus, on the arrival of the two companions at Colossae,4
hurried to the house of his master with the letter which we have just
read, Tychicus proceeded to discharge his commission likewise by deliver
ing to the Presbyters the Epistle with which he was charged, that it
might be read to the whole Colossian Church at their next meeting. The
letter to the Colossians itself gives us distinct information as to the cause
which induced St. Paul to write it. Epaphras, the probable founder of
that Church (Col. i. 7), was now at Rome, and he had communicated
to the Apostle the unwelcome tidings, that the faith of the Colossians
was in danger of being perverted by false teaching. It has been ques
tioned whether several different systems of error had been introduced
among them, or whether the several errors combated in the Epistle were
parts of one system, and taught by the same teachers. On the one side
we find that, in the Epistle, St. Paul warns the Colossians separately
against the following different errors: — First, A combination of angel-
worship and asceticism ; Secondly, A self-styled philosophy or gnosis
which depreciated Christ ; Thirdly, A rigid observance of Jewish festivals
and Sabbaths. On the other side, 'First, the Epistle seems distinctly

1 Observe the change from singular to plural
here, and in verse 25.
2 "Fellow-soldier," as we have before re
marked, perhaps means only that Epaphras had
voluntarily shared Paul's imprisonment at
Rome by taking up his residence with him, in
the lodging where he was guarded by the
" soldier that kept him."
8 The Amen as usual is interpolated.
4 Though we have come to the conclusion
that St. Paul had not himself (at this time)
visited Colossse, yet it is hardly possible to
read these Epistles without feeling an interest
in the scenery and topography of its vicinity.
The upper part of the valley of the Mseander,
where this city, with its neighbor cities Hie
rapolis and Loadicea (Col. ii. l,iv. 13; Rev. iii.
14), was situated, has been described by many
travellers ; and the illustrated works on Asia

Minor contain several views, especially of the
vast and singular petrifactions of Hierapolis
(Pambouk-Kalessi). Colossa? was older than
either Laodicea or Hierapolis, and it fell into
comparative insignificance as they rose into
importance. In the Middle Ages it became a
place of some consequence, and was the birth
place of the Byzantine writer Nicetas Chonia-
tes, who tells us that Chonse and Colossse
were the same place. A village called Chonas
still remains, the proximity of which to the
ancient Colossa? is proved by the correspond
ence of the observed phenomena with what
Herodotus says of the river Lycus. The
neighborhood was explored by Mr. Arundel
(Seven Churches, p. 158; Asia Minor, U. 160) ;
but Mr. Hamilton was the first to determine
the actual site of the ancient city. (Researches,
I. 508.)

752 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap, axv
(though with an indirectness caused by obvious motives) to point to a
single source, and even a single individual, as the origin of the errors
introduced ; and, Secondly, we know that at any rate the two first of
these errors, and apparently the third also, were combined by some of
the early Gnostics. The most probable view, therefore, seems to be,
that some Alexandrian Jew had appeared at Colossae, professing a belief
in Christianity, and imbued with the Greek " philosophy" of the school
of Philo, but combining with it the Eabbinical theosophy and angelolo-
gy, which afterwards was embodied in the Cabala, and an extravagant
asceticism, which also afterwards distinguished several sects of the
Gnostics.1 In short, one of the first heresiarchs of the incipient Gnos
ticism had begun to pervert the Colossians from the simplicity of their
faith. We have seen in a former chapter 2 how great was the danger to
be apprehended from this source, at the stage which the Church had now
reached ; especially in a church which consisted, as that at Colossae did,
principally of Gentiles (Col. i. 25-27, Col. ii. 11) ; and that, too, in
Phrygia,3 where the national character was so prone to a mystic fanati
cism. We need not wonder, therefore, that St. Paul, acting under the
inspiration of the Holy Spirit, should have thought it needful to use
every effort to counteract the growing evil. This- he does, both by con
tradicting the doctrinal errors of the new system, and by inculcating, as
essential to Christianity, that pure morality which these early heretics
despised. Such appears to have been the main purpose of the following
Epistle : — THE EPISTLE TO THE COLOSSIANS.4
i. 1 PAUL, an apostle of Jesus Christ by the will of God, and Salutation.
2 Timotheus the brother, To the holy and faithful brethren in Christ
WHO ARE AT COLOSSI,5
Grace be to you, and peace from God our Father.6
1 See pp. 34 and 396. (b) Because he could not have expected
3 Ch. XUI. at Caesarea to be soon coming to
8 See p. 235; and also the account of Phrygia (Acts xxiii. 11, xix. 21;
the early Phrygian Gnostics in the lately- Rom. i. 13; Acts xx. 25), whereas
discovered " Refutation of Heresies," Book v. while writing this he expected soon
* The following are the grounds for the to visit Phrygia (Philem. 22).
date assigned to this Epistle : — (3.) The indications above mentioned all
(1.) It was written in prison at the same correspond with Rome. Moreover, Timotheus
time as that to Philemon, and sent by the was with him, as we know he was at Rome,
same messenger (iv. 7-9). from Phil. i. 1.
(2.) It was not written in Caesarea, — 5 Many of the best MSS. have Colassae;
(a) Because while writing St. Paul was and this form is found in some of the later
laboring for the Gospel (iv. 3, 4), Greek writers.
which he did not at Caesarea (Acts 6 The words " And our Lord Jesus Christ,"
xxviii. 31). with which St. Paul in all other cases con-

chap. xxv. EPISTLE TO THE COLOSSIANS. 753 i.
Thanksgiving I1 give continual thanks to God2 the Father of our Lord 3
for their con
version. Jesus Christ, in my prayers for you (since I heard of your 4
faith in Christ Jesus, and your love to all the saints), because3 of the 5
hope laid up for you in the heavens, whereof you heard the promise 4 in
the truthful Word of the Glad-tidings ; which is come to you, as it is 6
through all the world ; and everywhere it bears fruit and ' grows, as it
does also among you, since the day when first you heard it, and learned to
know truly the grace of God. And thus you were taught by Epaphras my 1
beloved fellow-bondsman,6 who is a faithful servant of Christ on your behalf.
And it is he who has declared to me your love for me 7 in the Spirit. 8
Prayers for Wherefore I also, since the day when first I heard it, cease 9
their perfec- ' J 7
tiDn- not to pray for you, and to ask of God that you may fully
attain to the knowledge of His will ; that 8 in all wisdom and spiritual 10
understanding you may walk worthy of the Lord, to please Him in all
things ; that you may bear fruit in all good works, and grow continually
in the knowledge of God ; that you may be strengthened to the utter- n
most in the strength of His glorious power, to bear all sufferings with
steadfastness and with joy, giving thanks 9 to the Father who has fitted 12
us to share the portion of the saints in the light.
Awnement For He has delivered us from the dominion of darkness, 13
and eove- '
ohnstT °f and transplanted us into the kingdom of his beloved Son,
in whom we have our redemption,10 the forgiveness- of our sins. Who is 14,11

eludes this formula of benediction, are omitted 7 This interpretation (which is Chrysos-
here in the best MSS. Chrysostom remarks tom's) seems the most natural. Their love
on the omission. for St. Paul was in the Spirit, because they had
1 See note on 1 Thess. i. 2. never seen him in i

2 " And " is omitted by the best MSS. 8 The punctuation here adopted connects
8 It seems more natural to take the prepo- " in all wisdom," &c, with the following
sition thus, as in verse 9, than to connect it verb.
with the preceding verse. 9 The " giving thanks " here seems parallel
4 " Before." The information regarding to the preceding participles, and consequently
the hope had been reeeived by them here before the " us " is used, not with reference to the
its fufilment. Olshausen. writer, but generally as including both writer
6 The MSS. add this to the T. R. and readers ; and the particular case of the
6 Epaphras is the same name with Epaph- readers (as formerly Heathens) referred to in
roditus; but this can scarcely be the same per- verse 21 (" and you ").
son with that Epaphroditus who brought the *> "Through His blood "has been introduced
contribution from Philippi to Rome about here by mistake from Eph. i. 7, and is not
this time. This was a native of Colossa? (see fonnd in the best MSS.
iv. 12) : the other was settled at Philippi, and
held office in the Philippian Church.
48

754

THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL.

CHAP. XXV.

16 a visible J image of the invisible God, the first-born of all creation ; for
in2 Him were all things created, both in the heavens and on the earth,
both visible and invisible, whether they be Thrones, or Dominations, or
17 Principalities, or Powers ; 3 by Him and for Him4 were all created. And
18 He is before all things, and in Him all things subsist.5 And He is the
head of the body, the Church ; whereof He is the beginning, as first
born from the dead ; that in all things His place might be the first.
19 For He willed 6 that in Himself all the Fulness of the universe 7 should
20 dwell ; and by Himself He willed to reconcile all things to Himself,
having made peace by the blood of His cross ; by Himself (I say) to
reconcile all things, whether on the earth, or in the heavens.8
21 And you, likewise, who once were estranged from Him, and The Colos
sians had been
with your mind at war with Him, when you lived in wicked- called from

1 It is important to observe here that St.
Paul says not merely that our Lord was when
on earth the visible image of God, but that he
is so still. In Him only God manifests him
self to man, and He is still visible to the eye
of faith.
2 " In " here must not be confounded with
" through " or " by." The existence of Christ,
the Adyof, is the condition of all creation ; in
Him the Godhead is manifested.
8 St. Paul here appears to allude to the doc
trines of the Colossian heretics, who taught a.
system of angel-worship based upon a. syste
matic classification of the angelic hierarchy
(probably similar to that found in the Cab
ala), and who seem to have represented our
Lord as only one (and perhaps not the highest)
of this hierarchy. Other allusions to a hierar
chy of angels) which was taught in the Rab
binical theology) may be found Rom. viii. 38,
Eph. i. 21, iii. 10, 1 Pet. iii. 22, joined with
the assertion of their subjection to Christ.
* Compare Rom. xi. 36, where exactly the
same thing is said concerning God; from
which the inference is plain. It appears evi
dent that St. Paul insists here thus strongly
on the creation by Jesus Christ, in opposition
to some erroneous system which ascribed the
creation to some other source ; and this was
the case with the early Gnosticism, which
ascribed the creation of the world to a Demi
urge, who was distinct from the man Jesus.
6 i. e. the life of the universe is conditioned
by His existence. See the last note but two.

6 " He willed." Most commentators sup
pose an ellipsis of " God," but the instances
adduced by De Wette and others to justify
this seem insufficient ; and there seems no rea
son to seek a new subject for the verb when
there is one already expressed in the preceding
verse. 7 The word Pleroma is here used by St
Paul in a technical sense, with a manifest allu
sion to the errors against which he is writing
The early Gnostics used the same word tc
represent the assemblage of emanations (con
ceived as angelic powers) proceeding from the
Deity. St. Paul therefore appears to say, that
the true Fulness of the universe (or, as he calls
it, chap. ii. 9, Fulness of the Godhead) is to be
found, not in any angelic hierarchy (see the
remarks introductory to this epistle, p. 751),
but in Christ alone.
6 This statement of the infinite extent of
the results of Christ's redemption (which may
well fill us with reverential awe) has been a
sore stumbling-block to many commentators,
who have devised various (and some very in
genious) modes of explaining it away. Into
these this is not the place to enter. It is suffi
cient to observe that St. Paul is still led to set
forth the true greatness ot Christ in opposi
tion to the angelolatry of the Colossian here
tics ; intimating that, far from Christ being one
only of the angelic hierarchy, tlie heavenly
hosts themselves stood in need of His atone
ment. Compare Heb. ix. 23.

chap. xxv. EPISTLE TO THE COLOSSIANS. 755 i.
indrecSed ness> yet now He has reconciled in the body of His flesh1 22
Christ. y through death, that He might bring you to His presence in
holiness, without blemish and without reproach ; if, indeed, you be stead- 23
fast in your faith, with your foundation firmly grounded and immovably
fixed, and not suffering yourselves to be shifted away from the hope of
the Glad-tidings which you heard, which has been published throughout
all the earth,2 whereof I, Paul, was made a ministering servant.
st. Paul's -^-u<i even now I rejoice in the afflictions which I bear for 24
reveal the your 3 sake, and I fill up what yet is lacking of the sufferings 4
uSveSrrs:ai0sai- °^ Christ in my flesh, on behalf of His body, which is the
Church; whereof I was made a servant, to minister in the 25
stewardship which God gave me for you [Gentiles] , that I might fulfil it 26
by declaring the Word of God, the mystery which has been hid for ages
and generations,5 but has now been shown openly to His saints ; to whom 27
God willed to manifest how rich, among the Gentiles, is the glory of this
mystery, which 6 is Christ in you the hope op glory.
Him, therefore, I proclaim, warning every man, and teaching every 28
man, in all wisdom ; that I may bring every man into His presence full
grown in Christ.1 And to this end I labor in earnest conflict, according 29
to His working which works in me with mighty power.
For I would have you know how great 8 a conflict I sustain for ii. 1
He prays that J °
g^ow^n true vou> an<^ ror those at Laodicea, and for all 9 who have not seen
my face in the flesh ; that their hearts may be comforted, and 2
1 Here again is perhaps a reference to the words when he called his sufferings " the suf-
Gnostic element in the Colossian theosophy. ferings of Christ in his flesh."
It was Christ himself who suffered death in 5 Literally, from (i. e. since) the ages and the
the oody of his flesh ; He was perfect man, generations, meaning, from the remotest times,
and not (as the Docetse taught) an angelic with special reference to the times of the
emanation, who withdrew from the man Jesus Mosaic Dispensation. Compare Rom. xvi. 25,
before he suffered. and Titus i. 2.
2 Literally, throughout all the creation under 6 The best MSS. are here divided so as to
the sky, which is exactly equivalent to throughout leave it doubtful whether the relative belongs
all the earth. St. Paul of course speaks here to mystery or riches ; in either case the sense is
hyperbolically, meaning the teaching which you the same, the riches are the rich abundance con-
heardfrom Epaphras is the same which has been tained in the mystery.
published universally by the Apostles. 7 Jesus is omitted here in the best MSS.
a St. Paul's sufferings were caused by his Perfect denotes grown to tlie ripeness of ma-
ksl\ on behalf of the Gentile converts. turity.
4 Compare 2 Cor. i. 5. " The sufferings 8 Alluding to what has just preceded.
of Christ have come upon me above measure ; " 9 Viz. all Christians. By the plain natural
and also Acts ix. 4, " Why persecutest thou sense of this passage, the Colossians are classed
me?" St. Paul doubtless recollected those among those personally unknown to St. Paul.

756

THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL.

CHAP. XXV

that they may be knit together in love, and may gain in all its richness
the full assurance of understanding ; 1 truly to know the mystery of
3 God,2 wherein are all the treasures of wisdom and of knowledge 3 hidden.
4 I say this, lest any man should mislead you with enticing aDd warnB
T them agamst
5 words. For though I am absent from you in the flesh, yet 1 those who
° * would mis-
am present with you in the spirit, rejoicing when I behold leadthem
6 your good order, and the firmness of your faith in Christ. As, therefore,
7 you first received Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk in Him ; having in
Him your root, and in Him the foundation whereon you are continu
ally 4 built up ; persevering steadfastly in your faith, as you were taught ;
and abounding 5 in thanksgiving.
8 Beware 6 lest there be any man who leads you captive ' by his ^isan|^m of
philosophy, which is a vain deceit, following the tradition of SX'ch"^

men,8 the outward lessons9 of childhood, not the teaching of ci

preciates

For the " they " of verse 2 comprehends and
binds together the Colossians, and the Laodi-
ceans, with the " all who," &c. This view is
confirmed by i. 4 (where Paul had heard of,
not witnessed, their faith), by i. 7 (where
Epaphras is described as their founder), and by
i. 8 (where their love for Paul has been declared
to him by Epaphras, not personally known by
himself). i Compare " spiritual understanding " (i. 9).
2 The reading of the MSS. here is very
doubtful. The reading we have adopted is
that of Tischendorf's 2d edition.
3 St. Paul here alludes, as we see from the
next verse, to those who (like the Colossian
false teachers) professed to be in possession of
a higher Gnosis. In opposition to them, he
asserts that the depths of Gnosis are to be
found only in the " Mystery of God," viz. the
Gospel, or (as he defines it above) " Christ in
you." 4 Observe the present tense, and compare
1 Cor. iii. 10.
6 " Therein " is omitted here, as in Tischen
dorf s text.
6 The following paraphrase of this part of
the Epistle is given by Neander : — " How cam
you still fear evil spirits, when the Father him
self has delivered you from the kingdom of
darkness, and transplanted you into the king
dom of his dear Son, who has victoriously
ascended to heaven to share the divine might

of his Father, with whom he now works in
man; when, moreover, he by his sufferings
has united you with the Father, and freed yon
from the dominion of all the powers of dark
ness, whom he exhibits (as it were) as captives
in his triumphal pomp, and shows theii impo
tence to harm his kingdom established among
men 1 How can you still let the doubts and
fears of your conscience bring you into slavery
to superstition, when Christ has nailed to his
cross and blotted out the record of guilt whicn
testified againsS you in your conscience, ana
has assured to you the forgiveness of all your
sins 1 Again, how can you fear to be polluted
by outward things, how can you suffer your
selves to be in captivity to outward ordinances,
when you have died with Christ to all earthly
things, and are risen with Christ, and live
(according to your true, inward life) with
Christ in heaven ? Your faith must be fixed
on things above, where Christ is, at the right
hand of God. Your life is hid with Christ in
God, and belongs no more to earth."
7 Literally, who drags you away as his spoil.
The peculiar form of expression employed
(similar to " there are some that trouble you,"
Gal. i. 7 ) shows that St. Paul alludes to some
particular individual at Colossas, who professed
to teach a " Philosophy."
8 " The tradition of man " is applied to the
Rabbinical theology (Mark vii. 8).
9 " Elements of the world " (cf. Gal. iv. 31

chap. xxv. EPISTLE TO THE COLOSSIANS. 757, ii.
Christ. For in Him dwells all the Fulness x of the Godhead in bodily 9
form, and in Him 2 you have your fulness ; for He is the head of all the 10
Principalities and Powers. In Him, also, you were circumcised with a 11
circumcision not made by hands, even the offcasting of the 3 whole body of
the flesh, the circumcision of Christ. ; for with Him you were buried in your 12
baptism, wherein also you were made partakers of His resurrection,
through the faith wrought in you by God, who raised Him from tho
dead ; and you also, when you were dead in the transgressions and un- 13
circumcision of your flesh, God raised to share His life. For He forgave 14
us 4 all our transgressions, and blotted out the Writing against us which
opposed us with its decrees,5 having taken it out of our way, and nailed
it to the cross. And He disarmed the Principalities and the Powers6 15
[which fought against Him] , and put them to open shame, leading them
captive in the triumph of Christ.7
and unites Therefore, suffer not any man to condemn you for what you 16
Jewish observ- i • i a •
auceswith eat or drink, nor in respect of feast-days, or new moons,9 or
angel-worship
andascetism. saDbaths ; for these are a shadow of things to come, but the 17
body is Christ's. Let no man succeed in his wish 10 to defraud you of 18
your prize, persuading you to self-humiliation,11 and worship of the angels,12
referring to the Jewish ordinances, as "a joined together, 1 Chron. xxiii. 31. Compare
shadow of things to come " (v. 17). also Gal. iv. 10.
1 See note on i. 19. 10 Let no man, though hewishes it; this seems
2 i. e. by union with Him alone, you can the most natural explanation of this difficult
partake of the Pleroma of the Godhead, and expression ; it is that adopted by Theodoret
not (as the Gnostics taught) by initiation into and Theophylact. We observe again the ref-
an esoteric system of theosophy, whereby men erence to some individual false teacher.
might attain to closer connection with some u From the combination of this with
of the "Principalities and Powers" of the " chastening of the body," in verse 23, it seems
angelic hierarchy. to mean an exaggerated self-humiliation, like
8 The casting-off, not (as in outward cir- that which has often been joined with ascetic
cumcision) of a part, but of the whole body practices, and has shown itself by the devotee
of the flesh, the whole carnal nature. Of the wearing rags, exposing himself to insult,
tins in the T. R. is an interpolation. living by beggary, &c.
4 " Us " is the reading of the best MSS. 12 Mr. Hartley mentions a fact in the later
6 The parallel passage (Eph. ii. 15) is more Christian history of Colossse which is. at least
explicit, " the law of enacted ordinances." curious when considered in connection with
6 Cf. Eph. vi. 12 ; and see Neander's St. Paul's warning concerning angels, and the
paraphrase quoted above. statement of Herodotus regarding the river
i " In Him," i. e. " Christ," the subject Lycus. The modern Greeks have a legend to
being " God." For the metaphor, compare this effect : — " An overwhelming inundation
2 Cor. ii. 14. threatened to destroy the Christian population
8 Compare Rom. xiv. 1-17. of that city. They were fleeing before it in
9 The same three Mosaic observances are the utmost consternation, and imploring supe-

758

THE LIFE AJSTD EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL.

n.

intruding * rashly into things which he has not seen, puffed up by his
19 fleshly mind, and not holding fast the Head, from whom2 the whole body,
by the joints which bind it, draws full supplies 3 for all its needs, and is
knit together, and increases in godly growth.
20 If, then,4 when you died with Christ, you put away the childish lessons
of outward things, why, as though you still lived in outward things, do
21 you submit yourselves to decrees ( " hold 5 not, taste not, touch not " —
22 forbidding the use of things which are all made to be consumed in the
23 using) 6 founded on the precepts and doctrines of men ? For these pre
cepts, though they have a show of wisdom, in a self-chosen worship, and
in humiliation, and chastening of the body, are of no value to check 7 the
indulgence of fleshly passions.
iii. 1 If, then,8 you were made partakers of Christ's resurrection, Exhortation to
' ' "* A heavenward.
seek those things which are above, where Christ abides,9 seated affectlODB-
2 on the right hand of God. Set your heart on things above, not on things
3, 4 earthly ; for ye are dead,10 and your life is hid with Christ in God. When
Christ, who is our life, shall be made manifest, then shall ye also be made
manifest u with Him in glory.

rior succor for their deliverance. At this criti
cal moment, the Archangel Michael descended
from heaven, opened the chasm in the earth to
which they still point, and at this opening the
waters of the inundation were swallowed up
and the multitude was saved." (Res. in Greece,
p. 52.) A church in honor of the archangel
was built at the entrance of the chasm. A
council held at the neighboring town of Lao
dicea, in the 4th century, condemned this
Angel worship ; and Theodoret speaks of it
as existing in the same region.
1 We join vainly (rashly) with what pre
cedes. 2 From whom, not from which, as in A. V.
8 Literally, furnished with all things necessary
to its support.
4 The reference is to verse 1 2. The literal
translation is, if you died with Christ, putting
away, Sec.
6 Hold is distinguished from touch, the for
mer conveying (according to its original sense)
the notion of close contact and retention, the
latter of only momentary contact ; compare
1 Cor. vii. 1, and also John xx. 17, where the
words should probably be translated " hold
me not," or " cling not to me."

6 This appears to be the best view of this
very difficult passage, on a comparison with
1 Cor. vi. 13, and with St. Paul's general use
of this verb.
•' Literally this is, in reference to the indul
gence of the flesh. The difBculty of this verse
is well known. The interpretation, which
leaves the verse a mere statement of the favor
able side of this Colossian asceticism, unbal
anced by any contrary conclusion, and with
nothing to answer to " having a show," &c,
appears very untenable. We consider " in no
honor " here to be used as " of no value."
See Acts xx. 24, Rev. xvii. 4. Since the first
edition of this word was published, we have
ascertained that the view above taken of this
verse was proposed by Archbishop Sumner
(Practical Expos, in loco), who interprets it,
" These things are of little honor or value
against the fulness of the flesh, the motions of
sin in the members ; " and quotes the LXX.
in illustration. 8 The reference is to ii, 12.
9 Stronger than " is seated."
10 Literally, you have died; for the aorisf
must here be used for a perfect, since it is
coupled with a perfect following.
11 Bo also in Rom. viii. 19 the coming of

CHAP. XXV,

EPISTLE TO THE COLOSSIANS.

759

Against Heathen im
purity and
other vices.

character in
all its various Ol your mOUth
perfections,

m.
Give, therefore, unto death your earthly members ; fornica- 5
tion, uncleanness,1 shameful appetites, unnatural desires, and
the lust of concupiscence,2 which is idolatry. For these things 6
bring the wrath of God upon the children of disobedience ; among whom 7
you also walked in former times, when you lived therein ; but now, with
Exhortation us'3 ^ou likewise must renounce them all. Anger, passion, and 8
cirristian11116 malice must be cast away, evil-speaking and reviling put out
Lie not one to another, but 4 put off the old 9
man with his deeds, and put on the new5 man, who grows 10
continually to a more perfect knowledge and likeness of his Creator.6
Wherein there is not " Greek and Jew," " circumcision and uncircum- 11
cision," " barbarian," " Scythian," " bondsman," " freeman ; " but Christ
is all, and in all. Therefore, as God's chosen people, holy and beloved, put 12
on tenderness of heart, kindness, self-humiliation,1 gentleness, long-suffer
ing ; forbearing one another, and forgiving one another, if any thinks him- 13
self aggrieved by his neighbor ; even as Christ forgave you, so also do ye.
•And over all the rest put on the robe 8 of love, which binds together and 14
completes the whole.9 Let the peace of Christ10 rule in your hearts, to 15
which also you were called in one body : and be thankful one u to another.

Christ in glory is identified with the manifesta
tion of the sons of God. St. Paul declares,
that the real nature and glory of Christ's
people (which is now hidden) will be mani
fested to all mankind when Christ shall come
again, and force the world to recognize Him,
by an open display of His majesty. The
Authorized Version, though so beautiful in
this passage that it is impossible to deviate
from it without regret, yet does not adequate
ly represent the original.
i Viz. of word as well as deed.
2 Lust of concupiscence, whence the before-
named special sins spring, as branches from
the root. For the meaning of the original
word, see note on 1 Cor. v. 11. Lust is called
idolatry, either because impurity was so closely
connected with the Heathen idol-worship, or
because it alienates the heart from God.
8 You also, — you as well as other Christians.
There should be a comma after v. 7, and a full
stop in the middle of v. 8. Then the exhorta
tion beginning anger, &c, follows abruptly, a

repetition of renounce being understood from
the sense.
4 "Vutoff." The participle is equivalent
to the imperative. Compare "put on," v. 12.
6 For this use of new compare Heb. xii. 24.
6 Literally, who is continually renewed [pres
ent participle] to the attainment of a true knowl
edge according to the likeness of his Creator.
7 It is remarkable that the very same quali
ty which is condemned in the false teachers is
here enjoined ; showing that it was not their
self-humiliation which was condemned, but
their exaggerated way of showing it, and the
false system on which it was ingrafted.
8 Above all in the sense of over all. See
Eph. vi. 16.
9 Literally, which is the bond of completeness.
10 The great majority of MSS. read Christ.
u This is most naturally understood of
gratitude towards one another, especially as the
context treats of their love towards their
brethren ; for ingratitude destroys mutual
love.

760 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap, xxv
iii. 16 Let the Word of Christ dwell in you richly. Teach and admonish- one
another in all wisdom.1
Let your singing be of psalms, and hymns, and spiritual Festive meet-
i n iu&8» bow to
songs,2 sung in thanksgiving, with your heart, unto " God. be celebrated.
17 And whatsoever you do, in word or deed, do all in the name of the Lord
Jesus, giving thanks to God our Father through Him.
18 Wives, submit yourselves to your husbands, as it is fit in Exhortationtothefulfil-
the Lord. rnent of the
duties of do-
19 Husbands, love your wives, and deal not harshly with them. me8tioUfe-
20 Children, obey your parents in all things ; for this is acceptable in the
Lord.4
21 Fathers, vex not your children, lest their spirit should be broken.
22 Bondsmen, obey in all things your earthly masters; not in Blavesand
eye-service, as men pleasers, but in singleness of heart, fear- maBter8-
23 ing the Lord.5 And whatsoever you do, do it heartily, as for the Lord,
24 and not for men ; knowing that from the Lord you will receive the re
ward of the inheritance ; for you are the bondsmen of Christ, our Lord.
25 and Master.6 But he who wrongs another will be requited for the wrong
which he has done, and [in that judgment] there is no respect of
persons.7
iY. i Masters, deal rightly and justly with your bondsmen, knowing that you
also have a Master in heaven.
2 Persevere in prayer, and join thanksgiving with your watch- He aBk8 fo
3 fulness therein; and pray for me likewise, that God would their prayer8,
open to me a door of entrance8 for His Word, that I may declare the
1 The punctuation here adopted connects man merry % Let him sing psalms." For tha
" in all wisdom " with what follows. The " Thanksgiving " see 1 Cor. x. 30, where the
participles are used imperatively, as in Rom. same word is used.
xii. 9-16. 8 God is the reading of the best MSS.
2 The reading adopted is Tischendorf s, a 4 " Acceptable in the Lord " is the reading
stop being put after the preceding. St. Paul of the MSS.
appears to intend (as in Eph. v. 18, 19, which 6 " The Lord " is the reading of the MSS.
throws light on the present passage) to con- ° The correlative meanings of Lord (Mas-
trast the songs which the Christians were to ter) and Servant (Slave) give a force to, this m
employ at their meetings with those impure Greek, which cannot be fully expressed in
or bacchanalian strains which they formerly English.
sang at their heathen revels. It should be 7 i. e. slaves and masters are equal at
remembered that singing always formed a part Christ's judgment-seat.
of the entertainment at the banquets of the 8 Compare 2 Cor. ii. 12.
Greeks. Compare also James v. 13, " Is any

chap. xxv. EPISTLE TO THE COLOSSIANS. 761 iv.
mystery of Christ,1 which is the very cause of my imprisonment : pray 4
for me that I may declare it openly, as I ought to speak.
conduct Conduct yourselves with wisdom towards those without the 5
towards un
believers. Church,2 and forestall opportunity.3 Let your speech be always 6
gracious, with a seasoning of salt,4 understanding how to give to every
man a fitting answer.
Mission of All that concerns me will be made known to you by Tychi- 7
Tychicus and
onesimus. Cus, my beloved brother and faithful servant and fellow-bonds
man in the Lord, whom I have sent to you for this very end, that he 8
might learn your state, and comfort your hearts ; with Onesimus, the 9
faithful and beloved brother, your fellow-countryman ; they will tell you
all which has happened here.
Greetings Aristarchus, my fellow-prisoner, salutes you, and Marcus, 10
from Chris
tians in Eome. the cousin 5 of Baruabas, concerning whom you received in
structions (if he come to you, receive him), and Jesus surnamed Justus. 11
Of the circumcision 6 these only are my fellow-laborers for the kingdom
of God, who have been a comfort to me.
Epaphras your fellow-countryman salutes you ; a bonsdman of Christ,- 12
who is ever contending on your behalf in his prayers, that in ripeness of
understanding, and full assurance of belief,7 you may abide steadfast in all
the will of God ; for I bear him witness that he is filled with zeal8 for 13
you, and for those in Laodicea and Hierapolis.
Luke, the beloved physician, and Demas, salute you. 14
Salute the brethren in Laodicea, and Nymphas, with the 15
Messages to j rr r
So°dic1eanand Church at his house. And when this letter has been read 16
among you, provide that it be read also in the Church of the
Laodiceans, and that you also read the letter from Laodicea. And say to 17
Archippus, " Take heed to the ministration which thou hast received in
the Lord's service, that thou fulfil it."
1 See above, i. 27. 6 We adopt the punctuation of Lachmann
2 Compare 1 Thess. iv. 12 and 1 Cor. v. 12. and Meyer. Literally, these, who are of the cir-
8 This is the literal translation. Like the cumcision, are alone fellow-workers ; i. e. alone
Englisr forestall, the verb means to buy up an among those of the circumcision ; for other
article o.. '. of the market, in order to make the fellow-workers are mentioned below.
largest possible profit from it. ~> We adopt Lachmann and Tischendorf s
4 i. e. free from insipidity. It would be well reading. For the meaning of the word, see
if religious speakers and writers had always Rom. iv. 21.
kept this precept in mind. 8 If, with some MSS., we read toil here; it
6 The original word has the meaning of will not materially alter the sense.
cousin (not nephew) both in classical and Helle
nistic Greek.

762 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OP ST. PAUL. ctiap.xxv
IV. 18 The salutation of me, Paul, with my own hand. Remember AutographBalutation aud
my chains. Grace be with you. benediction.
We have seen that the above Epistle to the Colossians, and that to
Philemon, were conveyed by Tychicus and Onesimus, who travelled
together from Rome to Asia Minor. But these two were not the only
letters with which Tychicus was charged. We know that he carried a
third letter also ; but it is not equally certain to whom it was addressed.
This third letter was that which is now entitled the Epistle to the Ephe
sians ; 3 concerning the destination of which (disputed as it is) perhaps
the least disputable fact is, that it was not addressed to the Church of
Ephesus.4 This point is established by strong evidence, both internal and exter
nal. To begin with the former, we remark, First, that it would be inex
plicable that St. Paul, when he wrote to the Ephesians, amongst whom
he had spent so long a time, and to whom he was bound by ties of such
close affection (Acts xx. 17, &c), should not have a single message of
personal greeting to send. Yet none such are found in this Epistle.
Secondly, He could not have described the Ephesians as a Church whose
conversion he knew only by report (i. 15). Thirdly, He could not speak
to them, as only knowing himself (the founder of their Church) to be an
Apostle by hearsay (iii. 2), so as to need credentials to accredit him with
them (iii. 4). Fourthly, He could not describe the Ephesians as so ex
clusively Gentiles (ii. 11, iv. 17), and so recently converted (v. 8, i. 13,
ii. 13).
This internal evidence is confirmed by the following external evidence
also. (1.) St. Basil distinctly asserts, that the early writers whom he had
consulted declared that the manuscripts of this Epistle in their time did
not contain the name of Ephesus, but left out altogether the name of the
Church to which the Epistle was addressed. He adds, that the most
ancient manuscripts which he had himself seen gave the same testimony.
This assertion of Basil's is confirmed by Jerome, Epiphanius, and Ter
tullian.5 1 We have before remarked that the right recently-discovered Sinaitic MS. is a, strong
hand, with which he wrote these words, was confirmation of the view here expressed. — h.]
fastened by a chain to the left hand of the 6 Tertullian accuses Marcion of adding the
soldier who was on guard over him. title " To the Laodiceans," but not of altering
2 The Amen (as usual) was added by the the salutation; whence it is clear that the
copyists, and is absent from the best MSS. MSS. used by Tertullian did not contain the
8 See Eph. vi. 21, 22. words "in Ephesus." It is scarcely necessary
4 [This statement has been blamed, as ex- here to notice the apocryphal Epistola ad Lao-
treme; and perhaps it is too strong: but the dicenses, which only exists in Latin MSS. It
omission of the words " in Ephesus " from the is a mere cento compiled from the Epistles to

chap. xxv. EPISTLE a'O THE EPHESIANS (SO CALLED). 763
(2.) The most ancient manuscript now known to exist, namely, that of
the Vatican Library, fully bears out Basil's words ; for in its text it does
not contain the words " in Ephesus " at all ; and they are only added in
its margin by a much later hand.1
(3.) We know, from the testimony of Marcion, that this Epistle was
entitled in his collection " the Epistle to the Laodiceans." And his
authority on this point is entitled to greater weight from the fact that he
was himself a native of the district where we should expect the earlier
copies of the Epistle to exist.2
The above arguments have convinced the ablest modern critics that
this Epistle was not addressed to the Ephesians. But there has not been
by any means the same approach to unanimity on the question who
were its intended readers. In the most ancient manuscripts of it (as we
have said) no Church is mentioned by name, except in those consulted
by Marcion, according to which it was addressed to the Laodiceans.
Now the internal evidence above mentioned proves that the Epistle was
addressed to some particular church or churches, who were to receive
intelligence of St. Paul through Tychicus, and that it was not a treatise
addressed to the whole Christian world; and the form of the salutation
shows that the name of some place 3 must originally have been inserted in
it. Again : the very passages in the Epistle which have been above
referred to, as proving that it could not have been directed to the Ephe
sians, agree perfectly with the hypothesis that it was addressed to the
Laodiceans. Lastly, we know from the Epistle to the Colossians, that
St. Paul did write a letter to Laodicea (Col. iv. 16) about the same time
with that to Colossse.4 On these grounds, then, it appears the safest
the Galatians and Philippians ; and was evi- translated " to God's people who are also
dently a forgery of a very late date, originat- faithful in Christ Jesus ; " but this would
ing from the wish to represent the epistle, men- make the Epistle addressed (like the 2d of
tioned Col. iv. 16, as not lost. Peter) to the whole Christian world; which
1 [See remark, p. 762, n. 4, on the Sinaitic is inconsistent with its contents, as above re-
MS. — H.] marked.
2 Many critics object to receive Marcion's 4 De Wette argues that the letter to Lao-
evidence, on the ground that he often made dicea, mentioned Col. iv. 16, must have been
arbitrary alterations in the text of the New written some time before that to Colossae,
Testament. But this he did on doctrinal and not sent by the same messenger, because
grounds, which could not induce him to alter St. Paul in the Colossian Epistle sends greet-
the title of an epistle. ings to Laodicea (Col. iv. 15), which he would
3 Compare the salutations at Rom. i. 7 ; have sent directly if he had written to Laodi-
2 Cor. i. 1 ' Phil. i. 1 ; the analogy of which cea at the same time. But there is not much
tenders it impossible to suppose " those who' weight in this objection, for it was agreeable
are " used emphatically (" those who are really to St. Paul's manner to charge one part of
Saints"), as some commentators mentioned the church to salute the other; see Rom. xvi.
by Jerome took it. It is true that this (the 3, where he says " salute ye," not " I salute."
oldest known form of the text) might be Moreover it seems most probable that Col. iv.

764 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OP ST. PAUL. chap, xxv
course to assume (with Paley, in the Horce Paulince) that the testimony
of Marcion (uncontradicted by any other positive evidence) is correct,
and that Laodicea was one at least of the Churches to which this Epistle
was addressed. And, consequently, as we know not the name of any
other Church to which it was written, that of Laodicea should be in
serted in the place which the most ancient manuscripts leave vacant.
Still, it must be obvious, that this does not remove all the difficulties of
the question. For, first, it will be asked, how came the name of Laodicea
(if originally inserted) to have slipped out. of these ancient manuscripts?
and again, how came it that the majority of more recent manuscripts
inserted the name of Ephesus ? These perplexing questions are in some
measure answered by the hypothesis originated by Archbishop Usher,
that this Epistle was a circular letter addressed not to one only, but to
several Churches, in the same way as the Epistle to the Galatians was
addressed to all the Churches in Galatia, and those to Corinth were
addressed to the Christians " in the whole province of Achaia." 1 On this
view, Tychicus would have carried several copies of it, differently super
scribed, one for Laodicea, another, perhaps, for Hierapolis, another for
Philadelphia, and so on. Hence the early copyists, perplexed by this
diversity in their copies, might many of them be led to omit the words in
which the variation consisted ; and thus the state of the earliest known
text 2 of the Epistle would be explained. Afterwards, however, as copies
of the Epistle became spread over the world, all imported from Ephesus
(the commercial capital of the district where the Epistle was originally
circulated), it would be called (in default of any other name) the Epistle
from Ephesus, and the manuscripts of it would be so entitled ; and thence
the next step, of inserting the name of Ephesus into the text, in a place
where some local designation was plainly wanted, would be a very easy
one. And this designation of the Epistle would the more readily prevail,
from the natural feeling that St. Paul must have written 3 some Epistle
to so great a Church of his own founding as Ephesus.

16-18 was a, postscript, added to the Epistle lossian, and was sent to Colossae on this very
after the Epistle to Laodicea was written. It occasion. See also Horce Paulince (in loco).
is difficult to imagine that the "letter from 1 See 2 Cor. i. 1, and p. 485.
Laodicea" (Col. iv. 16) could have been re- 2 That of the Codex Vaticanus, above
ceived much before that to the Colossians, described as agreeing with the most ancient
from the manner in which it is mentioned, and MSS. seen by Basil.
the frequent intercourse which must have oc- 8 We cannot doubt that St. Paul did write
curred between such neighboring churches. many epistles which are now lost. He him-
The hypothesis of Wieseler, that the Laodi- self mentions one such to the Corinthians (see
cean Epistle was that to Philemon, is quite page 421 ) ; and it is a mysterious dispensation
arbitrary, and appears irreconcilable with the of Providence that his Epistles to the two
fact that Onesimus is expressly called a Co- great metropolitan churches of Antioch and

chap. xxv. EPISTLE TO THE EPHESIANS (SO CALLED). 765
Thus the most plausible account of the origin of this Epistle seems to
be as follows. Tychicus was about to take his departure from Rome for
Asia Minor. St. Paul had already written1 his Epistle to the Colossians
at the request of Epaphras, who had informed him of their danger. But
Tychicus was about to visit other places, which, though not requiring the
same warning with Colossae, yet abounded in Christian converts. Most
of these had been Heathens, and their hearts might be cheered and
strengthened by words addressed directly to themselves from the great
Apostle of the Gentiles, whose facr chey had never seen, but whose name
they had learned to reverence, and whose sufferings had endeared him
to their love. These scattered Churches (one of which was Laodicea) 2
had very much in common, and would all be benefited by the same
instruction and exhortation. Since it was not necessary to meet the
individual case of any one of them, as distinct from the rest, St. Paul
wrote the same letter to them all, but sent to each a separate copy au
thenticated by the precious stamp of his own autograph benediction.
And the contents of this circular epistle naturally bore a strong resem
blance to those of the letter which he had just concluded to the Colos
sians, because the thoughts which filled his heart at the time would ne
cessarily find utterance in similar language, and because the circum
stances of these Churches were in themselves very similar to those of the
Colossian Church, except that they were not infected with the peculiar
errors which had crept in at Colossse.3 The Epistle which he thus wrote
consists of two parts : first, a doctrinal, and, secondly, a hortatory portion.
The first part contains a summary, very indirectly conveyed (chiefly in
the form of thanksgiving) , of the Christian doctrines taught by St. Paul,
and is especially remarkable for the great prominence given to the aboli
tion of the Mosaic Law. The hortatory part, which has been so dear to
Christians of every age and country, enjoins unity (especially between
Ephesus, with which he was himself so pecu- added as a postscript ; unless we suppose that
liarly connected, should not have been pre- St. Paul there refers to " the letter from Laodi-
served to us. cea " before it was actually written (as intend-
1 It is here assumed that the Epistle to the ing to write it, and send it by the same mes-
Colossians was written before that (so called) senger), which he might very well have done.
to the Ephesians. This appears probable 2 It has been objected to the circular hy-
from a close examination of the parallel pas- pothesis, that the Epistle, if meant as a circular,
sages in the two Epistles ; the passages in would have been addressed " to those who are
Ephesians bear marks of being expanded from in Asia." But to this it may be replied, that
those in Colossians ; and the passages in Co- on our hypothesis the Epistle was not addressed
lossians could not be so well explained on the to all the churches in Proconsular Asia, and
converse hypothesis, that they were a conden- that it was addressed to some churches not in
sation of those in Ephesians. We have re- that province.
marked, however, in a previous note, that we s On this part of the subject, see Appen-
must assume the reference in Colossians to dix H.
the other epistle (Col. iv. 16) to have been

766

THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL.

CHAP. XXV

Jewish and Gentile Christians), the renunciation of Heathen vices, and
the practice of Christian purity. It lays down rules (the same as those
in the Epistle to Colossa?, only in an expanded form) for the performance
of the duties of domestic life, and urges these new converts, in the midst
of the perils which surrounded them, to continue steadfast in watchfulness
and prayer. Such is the substance, and such was most probably the his
tory, of the following Epistle : —

THE EPISTLE TO THE EPHESIANS (SO CALLED).1
L 1 PAUL, an Apostle of Jesus Christ, by the will of God, To salutation.
the saints 2 who are [in laodicea] ,3 and who have faith in christ
Jesus.
2 Grace be to you and peace, from God our Father, and from our Lord
Jesus Christ.
3 Blessed be God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who Thanksgivingfor redemp-
has given us4 in Christ all spiritual blessings in the heavens.5 SSwiedge of

1 In the above introductory remarks it is
assumed that this Epistle was contemporary
with that to the Colossians, which is stated in
the Epistle itself (vi. 21 ; compare Col. iv.
7). Its date, therefore, is fixed by the argu
ments in p. 752. We may here shortly notice
the arguments which have been advanced by
some German critics for rejecting the Epistle
altogether as a forgery. Their objections
against its authenticity are principally the fol
lowing. First, the difficulties respecting its
destination, which have been already noticed.
Secondly, The want of originality in its matter,
the substance of its contents being found also
in the Colossians, or others of St. Paul's Epis
tles. This phenomenon has been accounted
for above (p. 765), and is well explained by
Paley (Horce Paulinos). Thirdly, Certain
portions of the doctrinal contents are thought
to indicate a later origin, e. g. the Demonology
(ii. 2, and vi. 12). Fourthly, Some portions
of the style are considered un-Pauline. Fifth
ly, Several words are used in a sense different
from that which they bear in St. Paul's other
writings. These three last classes of difficul
ties we cannot pretend fully to explain, nor is
this the place for their discussion ; but as a
general answer to them we may remark:
First, That if we had a fuller knowledge of
the persons to whom, and especially of the

amanuensis by whom, the letter was written,
they would probably vanish. Secondly, That
no objector has yet suggested a satisfactory
explanation of the origin of the Epistle, if it
were a forgery ; no motive for forgery can be
detected in it ; it contains no attack on post-
apostolic forms of heresy, no indication of a
later development of church government.
The very want of originality alleged against
it would not leave any motive for its forgery.
Thirdly, It was unanimously received as St.
Paul's Epistle by the early church, and is
quoted by Polycarp and Irenseus ; and, as ap
pears by the lately discovered work of Hippoly
tus against heresies (which has appeared since
this was first published), it is also quoted
most distinctly by Valentinus (about 120
a.d.), who cites Eph. iii. 14, 16, 17, and 18,
verbatim. 2 For the translation here, see note on
1 Cor. i. 2.
8 See the preceding remarks, p. 763.
4 " Us " (here) includes both the writer and
(apparently) the other Apostles; while "you
likewise" (v. 13) addresses the readers as dis
tinguished from the writer.
5 Literally, in the heavenly places. This ex
pression is peculiar to the present Epistle, in
which it occurs five times.

"hap. xxv. EPISTLE TO THE EPHESIANS (SO CALLED). 767 i.
rr^s?e™8g1ven Even as He cnose us m Him, before the foundation of the 4
ties. e pos world, that we should be holy and spotless in His sight. For 5
in His love x He predestined us to be adopted among His children through
Jesus Christ, according to the good pleasure of His will, that we might 6
praise and glorify His grace, wherewith He favored2 us in His beloved.
For in Him we have our redemption through His blood, even the forgive
ness of our sins, in the richness of His grace,3 which He bestowed upon
us above measure ; and He made known 4 to us, in the fulness of wisdom 8
and understanding, the mystery of His will, according to His good pleas- 9
ure, which He had purposed in Himself to fulfil, that it should be 10
dispensed 5 in the fulness of time ; 6 to make all things one 7 in Christ as
head, yea, both things in heaven and things on earth in Him ; in whom 11
'we also receive the portion of our lot,8 having been predestined thereto
according to His purpose, whose working makes all fulfil the counsel of
His own will ; that unto His praise and glory 9 we might live, who have 12
hoped in Christ before 10 you.
Thanks for And you, likewise, have hoped in Him, since you heard the 13
their conver- J ' ' r ' J
pr°ay'ernfor message of the truth, the Glad-tidings of your salvation ; and
ennfent. 8 you believed in Him, and received His seal, the holy Spirit
of promise ; who is an n earnest of our inheritance, given to 12 redeem that 14
which He hath purchased,13 to the praise of His glory. .
1 We join " in love " with v. 5. 8 Literally, for a dispensation [of it] which
2 The verbal connection would be more belongs to the fulness of time.
literally given thus : His favor wherewith He 7 Literally, to unite all things under one head,
favored us. in union with Christ : so Chrysostom explains
8 Comma at the end of verse 7, colon in it. For the doctrine compare 1 Cor. xv. 24.
the middle of v. 8, and no stop at the end of * Literally, were portioned with our lot.
v. 8, taking the verb transitively. 9 The original may be considered as a
4 This is referred to in iii. 3. Compare Hebraism ; literally, that we should be for the
" made known to us the mystery, &c.," with glory-praise of Him ,- compare verse 6.
" made known to me the mystery," which 10 This might mean, as some take it, to look
proves "us" here to correspond with "me" forward with hope: but the other meaning
there. appears most obvious, and best suits the con-
5 Dispensation. According to most inter- text. Compare " went before to ship," Acts
preters this expression is used in this Epistle xx. 13.
ia the sense of adjustment, or preparation ; but u Compare Rom. viii. 23; and note on
as the meaning it bears elsewhere in St. Paul's 1 Cor. i. 22.
writings (viz. the office of a steward in dispens- u Not until (A. V.).
ine his master's goods: see 1 Cor. ix. 17, and 1S Used in the same sense here as "the
cf. Col. i. 25) gives a very intelligible sense to church which He purchased" (Acts xx. 28).
the passages in this Epistle.it seems needless The metaphor is, that the gift of the Holy
to depart from it. The meaning of the pres- Spirit was an earnest (that is, apart payment in
ent passage is best illustrated by iii. 2, 3 advance) of the price required for the furl de-

768 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap. xxv.
15 Wherefore I, also, since I heard of your faith in our Lord Jesus, and
16 your love to all the saints, give thanks for you without ceasing, and make
17 mention of you in my prayers, beseeching the God of our Lord Jesus
Christ, the Father of glory, to give you a spirit of wisdom and of in-
18 sight, in the knowledge of Himself; the eyes of your understanding1
being filled with light, that you may know what is the hope of His call-
19 ing, and how rich is the glory of His inheritance among the saints, and
how surpassing is the power which He has shown toward us who believe ;
20 Tfor He has dealt with us] in the strength of that might where- office and
L J dignity of
with He wrought in Christ, when He raised Him from the Christ.
21 dead ; and set Him on His own right hand in the heavens, far above
every 2 Principality and Power, and Might, and Domination, and every
name which is named, not only in this world, but also in that which is
22 to come. And " P* frill all fyiviQS ttriiSZX ||is fad," 3 and gave Him
23 to be sovereign head of the Church, which is His body ; the 4 Fulness of
ii. 1 Him who fills all things everywhere with Himself. And you, They had
° J * heen awa-
likewise, He raised from death 5 to life, when you were dead in HeTto?™
2 transgressions and sins ; wherein once you walked according grace,
to the course of this8 world, and obeyed the Ruler of the Powers of the
Air,1 even the Spirit who is now working in the children of disobedience ;
3 amongst whom we also, in times past, lived, all of us, in fleshy lusts,
fulfilling the desires of our flesh and of our imagination, and were by
4 nature children of wrath, no less than others.8 But God, who is rich in
5 mercy, because of the great love wherewith He loved us, even when
we were dead in sin, called us to share the life of Christ (by grace you
liverance of those who had been slaves of sin, of Christ, that is, the full manifestation of His
but now were purchased for the service of being, because penetrated by His life, and
God. living only in Him. It should be observed
1 The majority of MSS. read "heart," that the Church is here spoken of so far forth
which would give the less usual sense, the eyes as it corresponds to its ideal.
of your heart. 5 The sentence (in the original) is left uu-
2 See Col. i. 16, and note. finished in the rapidity of dictation; but the
3 Ps. viii. 6 (LXX.), quoted in the same verb is easily supplied for the context.
Messianic sense, 1 Cor. xv. 27, and Heb. ii. 8. 6 Compare 2 Cor. iv. 4, 1 Cor. i. 20, &c.
Compare also Ps. ex. 1. 7 In the Rabbinical theology evil spirits
4 We see here again the same allusion to were designated as the " Powers of the Air."
the technical use of the word Pleroma by false St. Paul is here again probably alluding to
teachers as in Col. ii. 9, 10. St. Paul there the language of those teachers against whom
asserts, that not the angelic hierarchy, but he wrote to the Colossians.
Christ himself, is the true fulness of the God- 8 Literally, the rest of mankind, i. e. unbeliev
head ; and here that the Church is the fulness ers. Compare 1 Thess. iv. 13.

chap. xxv. EPISTLE TO THE EPHESIANS (SO CALLED). 769 ii
are saved) ; and in : Christ Jesus He raised us up with Him from the 6
dead, and seated us with Him in the heavens ; that, in the ages which 7
are coming,2 He might manifest the surpassing riches of His grace, show
ing kindness toward us in Christ Jesus. For by grace you are saved, 8
through faith ; and that not of yourselves, it is the gift of God ; not 9
won by works, lest any man should boast. For we are His workman- 10
ship, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God has prepared ?
that we should walk therein.
andincorpo- Wherefore remember that you, who once were reckoned 11
rated into
God's Israel, among carnal Gentiles, who are called the Uncircumcision
by that which calls itself the Circumcision (a circumcision of the flesh,4
made by the hands of man) — that in those times you were shut out from 12
Christ, aliens from the commonwealth of Israel, and strangers from the
covenants5 of the promise, having no hope, and without God in the
world. But now, in Christ Jesus, ye, who were once far off, have been 13
The Law brought near through the blood of Christ. For He is our 14
jews from peace, who has made both one,6 and has broken down the7
Gentiles r
abolished. wan which parted us; for, in His8 flesh, He destroyed the 15
ground of our enmity, the law of enacted ordinances ; that so, making 16
peace between us, out of both He might create9 in himself one new man ;
and that, by His cross, He might reconcile both, in one body, unto God, 17
having slain their enmity thereby. And when He came, He published
the Glad-tidings of peace to you that were far off, and to them that were
near. For through Him we both have power to approach the Father in the 18
fellowship 10 of one Spirit. Now, therefore, you are no more strangers and 19
1 The meaning is, that Christians share in 7 The allusion is evidently to that " balus-
their Lord's glorification, and dwell with Him trade of stone " described by Josephus, which
in heaven, in so far as they are united with separated the Court of the Gentile3 from the
Him. holier portion of the Temple, and which it
2 Viz. the time of Christ's perfect triumph was death for a Gentile to pass. See Ch.
over evil, always contemplated in the New XXI. p. 630.
Testament as near at hand. 8 i. e. by His death, as explained by the
8 i. e. God, by the laws of His Providence, parallel passage, Col. i. 22.
has prepared opportunities of doing good for 9 Christians are createdin Christ (see above,
every Christian. v. 10), i. e. their union with Christ is the es-
4 Meaning a circumcision of the flesh, not of sential condition of their Christian existence.
the spirit, — made by man's hands, not by God's. 10 "In one spirit." It is sometimes im-
6 Covenants of the promise. Compare Gal. possible to translate such expressions accu-
iii. 16, and Eom. ix. 4. rately, except by a periphrasis.
6 Both, viz. Jews and Gentiles.
49

770 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap. xxv.
S. sojourners, but fellow-citizens of the saints, and members of They are bunt
into the tem-
20 God's household. You are built upon the foundation of the Ple of God-
Apostles and Prophets, Jesus Christ himself being the chief corner-stone ;
21 in whom all the building, fitly framed together, grows into a temple
22 hallowed by the : indwelling of the Lord. And in Him, not others only,2
but you also, are built up together, to make a house wherein God may
... dwell by the 3 presence of His Spirit.
1 Wherefore I, Paul, who, for maintaining the cause of you The mystery
° J of universal
2 Gentiles, am the prisoner of Jesus Christ 4 — for 5 1 suppose oittaedby10"
that you have heard of the stewardship of God's grace, which oner'for1!"8
3 was given me for you ; and how, by revelation, was 6 made known to me
4 the mystery (as I have already shortly 7 written to you ; so that, when
you read, you may perceive my understanding in the mystery of Christ),
5 which, in the generations of old, was not made known to the sons of men,
as it has now been revealed by the indwelling8 of the Spirit, to His holy
6 Apostles and Prophets ; to wit, that the Gentiles are heirs of the same
inheritance, and members of the same body, and partakers of the 9 same
promise in Christ, by means of the Glad-tidings.
7 And of this Glad-tidings I was made a ministering servant, according
to the gift of the grace of God, which was given me in the full measure
8 of His mighty working ; to me, I say, who am less than the least of all the
saints, this grace was given, to bear among the Gentiles the Glad-tidings
9 of the unsearchable riches of Christ, and to bring light to all, that they
might behold what is the stewardship 10 of the mystery which, from the
10 ages of old, has been hid in God, the maker of all things ; u that now,
11 by the Church,12 the manifold wisdom of God might be made known to
1 " Holy in the Lord." See the preceding 6 In the MSS. the verb is passive.
note. ' The reference is to chap. i. 9, lo.
2 You as well as others. 8 See notes on verses 18 and 21 above.
8 Compare 1 Cor. iii. 16 ; and see note 1. 9 " His " is omitted by the best MSS.
"In the spirit" might, however, be taken •"> The best MSS. have stewardship, not fel-
(with Olshausen and others) merely as an lowship. See note on i. 10. St. Paul displayed
antithesis to "in the flesh." the nature of his " stewardship " by the man-
4 The sentence is abruptly broken off here, ner in which he discharged its duties. Com-
but carried on again at v. 13. The whole pas- pare 1 Cor. ix. 17, and 2 Cor. iv. and v.
sage bears evident marks of the rapidity of n "By Jesus Christ" is not in the best
dictation. MSS.
6 Literally, if, as I suppose you have heard of u i. e. by the union of all mankind in the
the office of dispensing (see note on i. 10) the Church. That which calls forth the expres-
grace of God which was given me for you. sions of rapturous admiration here, and in the

chap. xxv. EPISTLE TO THE EPHESIANS (SO CALLED). 771 iii.
the Principalities and Powers in the heavens, according to His eternal
purpose, which He wrought in Christ Jesus our Lord ; in whom we can 12
approach without fear to God, in trustful confidence, through faith in
Him.
He prays for Wherefore I pray that I may not faint under my sufferings 13
himself and , . , T
them, that for you, which are your glory. For this cause I bend my 14
strengthened knees before tne Father,1 whose children2 all are called in 15
heaven and in earth, beseeching Him, that, in the richness of His glory, 16
enlightened. He would grant you strength by the entrance of His Spirit into
your inner man, that Christ may dwell in your hearts by faith ; that having 17
your root and your foundation in love, you may be enabled, with all the 18
saints, to comprehend the breadth and length, and depth and height
thereof; and to know the love of Christ, which passeth knowledge,' that 19
you may be filled therewith, even to the measure of4 the fulness of God.
Doxoiogy. Now unto Him who is able to do exceeding abundantly, above 20
all that we ask or think, in the power of his might which works within
us, — unto Him, in Christ Jesus, be glory in the Church, even to all the 21
generations of the age of ages. Amen.
Exhortation I> therefore, the Lord's prisoner, exhort you to walk worthy 1
Different gifts of the calling where with you were called ; with all lowli- 2
and offices
mustMmMne nesS)5 an(j gentleness, and long-suffering, forbearing one
the church. another in love, striving to maintain the unity of the Spirit, 3
bound together with the bond of peace. You are one body and one 4
spirit, even as you were called to share one common hope ; you have 5
one Lord, you have one faith, you have one baptism ; you have one God 6
and Father of all, who is over all, and works through all, and dwells in
all.6 But each one of us received the gift of grace which he possesses 7
according to the measure ' wherein it was given by Christ. Wherefore
similar passage in Romans (xi. 33), is the might be literally rendered from whom every
divine plan of including all mankind in a fatherhood in heaven and earth is named; i. e.
universal redemption. the very name ot fatherhood refers us back to
1 The words, "of our Lord Jesus Christ," God as the father of all. The A. V. is incor-
are not in the best MSS. rect, and would require the definite article.
2 The sense depends on a paronomasia, the 8 Again we observe an apparent allusion to
word for " family " (A. V.) meaning a race de- the technical employment of the words Gnosis
tcendedfrom a common ancestor. Compare Luke and Pleroma. * Unto, net with (A. V.).
ii. 4. If fatherhood had this meaning in 6 See note on Col. iii. 12.
English (as it might have had, according to 8 You omitted in best MSS.
the analogy of "a brotherhood"), the verse 7 This verse is parallel to Rom. xii. 6,

772 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap, xxv
iv. 8 it is1 written : " WfytXX |I« ixrcrti tt"J? 0tt §ifjjl, ]§£ Ids OVgiWltv tKlg-
9 lib*, mxb pbe gifts xrnta men." Now that word "||e fowl ttp," what
10 saith it, but that He first came down to the earth below ? Yea, He who
came down is the same who is gone up, far above all the heavens, that He
11 might fill all things.2 And He gave some to be apostles,3 and some prophets,
12 and some evangelists, and some pastors and teachers ; for the perfecting
of the saints, to labor4 in their appointed service, to build up the body
13 of Christ ; till we all attain the same 5 faith and knowledge of the Son of
God, and reach the stature of manhood,6 and be of ripe age to receive
14 the fulness of Christ ; 7 that we should no longer be children, tossed to
and fro, and blown round by every shifting current of teaching, tricked
by the sleight of men, and led astray into the snares 8 of the cunning ;
15 but that we should live in truth and love, and should grow up in every
16 part 9 to the measure of His 10 growth, who is our head, even Christ. From
whom u the whole body (being knit together, and compacted by all its
joints) derives its continued growth in the working of His bounty, which
supplies its needs, according to the measure of each several part, that it
may build itself up in love.
17 This I say, therefore, and adjure you in the Lord, to live no Exhortationto the rejec-
longer like other Gentiles, whose minds are filled with folly, Heathen vice
18 whose understanding is darkened, who are estranged from the renewa™0™1
life of God because of the ignorance which is in them, through the
19 blindness of their hearts ; who, being past feeling, have given themselves
" having gifts differing according to the grace B Literally, a man of mature age.
which God has given us." The whole context 7 See again note on iii. 19.
of the two passages also throws light on both. 8 Literally, cunningly toward the snares of
1 Literally, it says, i. e. the Scripture says. misleading error.
The quotation is from Ps. Ixviii. 18, but slight- 9 " In every part." See following verse.
ly altered, so as to correspond neither with the 10 To grow into Him is to grow to the standard
Hebrew nor with the Septuagint. Our two of His growth.
authorized versions of the Psalms have here de- u Literally rendered, this is from whom all
parted from the original, in order to follow the the body (being knit together and compacted by
present passage; probably on the supposition every joint), according to the working of his boon-
that St. Paul quoted from some older reading. teous providing in the measure of each several part,
2 Again we remark an allusion to the doc- continues the growth of the body. Compare the
trine of the Pleroma. Compare i. 23. parallel passage, Col. ii. 19, from whom the
8 On this classification of church offices, whole body, by the joints which bind it, draws full
see p. 381. supplies for its needs, and is knit together and
4 The word does not mean " the ministry " increases in godly growth. A child derives its
(-*-• v-'- life from its father, and grows up to the stand-
5 Literally, the oneness of the faith and of the ard of its father's growth.
knowledge.

chap. xxv. EPISTLE TO THE EPHESIANS (SO CALLED). 773 iv.
over to lasciviousness, to work all uncleanness in lust.1 But you have 20
not so learned Christ; if, indeed, you have heard His voice, and been 21
taught in Him, as the truth is in Jesus ; to forsake your former life, and 22
put off the old man, whose way is2 destruction, following the desires
which deceive ; and to be renewed in the spirit of your mind, and to put 23
on the new man, created after God's likeness, in the righteousness and 24
Against holiness of the Truth. Wherefore, putting away lying, speak 25
flfevcrjii sped*
aed vices. every man truth with his neighbor ; for we are members one
of another. " ^ gt anjjrg, RXIQ UVX not." ' Let not the sun go down 26,27
upon your wrath, nor give away to the Devil. Let the robber 4 rob no 28
more, but rather let him labor, working to good purpose with his hands,
that he may have somewhat to share with the needy. From your mouth 29
let no filthy words come forth, but such as may build up 5 the Church
according to its need, and give a blessing to the hearers. And grieve 30
not the Holy Spirit of God, who was given to seal you 6 for the day of
redemption. Let all bitterness, and passion, and anger, and clamor, and 31
•evil-speaking, be put away from you, with all malice ; and be 7 kind one 32
S^chriswike *° another, tender-hearted, forgiving one another, even as God
»n"?ioveeBB in Christ has forgiven you. Therefore be followers of God's v. 1
example, as the children of His love. And walk in love, as Christ also 2
loved us, and gave Himself for us, an offering and a sacrifice unto God,
for " an aoax at sfatetiwss."8
A«atast to- BujJ) as befits the saints, let not fornication or any kind of 3
1 For this see note on 1 Cor. v. 11 ; and church" or something equivalent), <hat it may
compare chap. v. 3. give a blessing to the hearers.
2 Not " corrupt " (A. V.), bnt going on in 6 The tense is mistranslated in A. V.
the way of ruin. Literally, in whom you were sealed. The mean-
8 Ps. iv. 4 (LXX.). ing is rendered evident by i. 13, 14. It is the
* Him that steals (present). The A. V. constant doctrine of St. Paul that the gift of
would require the aorist. It should be remem- the Holy Spirit is a seal or mark of Christ's
bered that the stealers (klephts) of the N. T. redeemed, which was given them at their
were not what we should now call thieves (as conversion and reception into the Church, as a
the word is generally rendered in A. V.), but foretaste of their full redemption. Compare
bandits ; and there is nothing strange in find- Rom. viii. 23.
ing such persons numerous in the provincial 7 Literally, " become ye." This word is
towns among the mountains of Asia Minor. sometimes used as simply equivalent to " be
Seep. 145. ye." Compare v. 17.
6 Literally such as is good for needful build- 8 Gen. viii. 21 (LXX.) : see Phil. iv. 18,
ma up ("building" always implies "the where it is also quoted.

T74

THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL.

CHAP, xxv

4 uncleanness or lust 1 be so much as named among you ; nor other sins of
Heathen dark-
filthiness, nor buffoonery, nor ribald jesting, for such speech ness;
5 beseems you not, but rather thanksgiving. Yea, this you know ; for you
have learned that no fornicator, or impure or lustful man, who is nothing
better than an 2 idolater, has any inheritance in the kingdom of Christ
6 and God. Let no man mislead you by empty3 words ; for these are the
deeds 4 which bring the wrath of God upon the children of disobedience.
7, 8 Be not ye, therefore, partakers with them ; for you once were darkness,
9 but now are light in the Lord. Walk as children of light ; for the fruits
10 of light5 are in all goodness, and righteousness, and truth. Examine well
11 what is acceptable to the Lord, and have no fellowship with
the unfruitful works of darkness, yea, rather expose their foul- rehukedj>ythe example
12 ness.6 For, concerning the secret deeds of the Heathen,7 it is ness^fchrS."
13 shameful even to speak ; yet all these things, when exposed, ans'
14 are made manifest by the shining of the light ; for whatsoever is made
manifest becomes light.8 Wherefore it is written,9 " l^toake, tyfm tljut
zhiytut, mb arise from % btna, una <&{rrisi sjjall sBn* upon

•10

1 It has been before remarked that this
passage is conclusive as to the use of this par
ticular Greek word by St. Paul ; for what
intelligible sense is there in saying that " cow-
etousness" must not be so much as named?
See note on 1 Cor. v. 11. It was there
remarked that the use of concupiscence in
English is an analogous case ,- it might be
added that the word lust itself is likewise used
in both senses ; e. g. " the lust of gold."
[Since our First Edition, we are glad to see
that this old view of the Pauline usage of
the word has been adopted by Prof. Jowett
and Prof. Stanley, in their notes on Rom. i.
29, and 1 Cor. v. 11, respectively, and by Dean
Trench in his Synonymes.]
2 See note on Col. iii. 5.
8 Namely, reasonings to prove the sins of
impurity innocent. See 1 Cor. vi. 12-20, and
the note.
4 Viz., the sins of impurity. Compare
Rom. i. 24-27.
6 Light, not Spirit, is the reading of the
best MSS.

8 The verb means to lay bare the real charac
ter of a thing by exposing it to open scrutiny.
7 " What is done by them," i.e. the Heathen.
8 Such appears to be the meaning of this
difficult verse, viz., that, when the light falls
on any object, the object itself reflects the
rays ; implying that moral evil will be recog
nized as evil by the conscience, if it is shown
in its true colors by being brought into con
trast with the laws of pure morality. The
preceding " is made manifest " does not allow
us to translate the same foim immediately
following as active (as A. V.).
9 See note on iv. 8.
10 There is no verse exactly corresponding
with this in the O. T. But Isaiah lx. 1 is
perhaps referred to. "We must remember,
however, that there is no proof that St. Paul
intends (either here or 1 Cor. ii. 9) to quote
the Old Testament. Some have supposed that
he is quoting a Christian hymn ; others, a
saying of our Lord (as at Acts xx. 35.)

chap. xxv. EPISTLE TO THE EPHESIANS (SO CALLED). 775 V.
See, then, that you walk1 without stumbling, not in folly, but in If,
wisdom, forestalling 2 opportunity, because the times are evil. Therefore, 16,17
be not without understanding, but learn to know what the will of the
Lord is.
Festive meet- Be not drunk with wine, like those 3 who live riotously ; but 18
ings, how to *
be celebrated, be filled with the indwelling of the Spirit, when you speak one
to another.4 Let your singing be of psalms and hymns and spiritual 19
songs ; and make melody with the music of your hearts, to the Lord.5
And at all times, for all things which befall you, give thanks to our God 20
and Father, in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ.
Duties of Submit yourselves one to another in the fear of Christ.6 21
wives and .^.
husbands. Wives, submit yourselves to your husbands, as unto the Lord ; 22
for the husband is head of the wife, even as Christ is head of the Church,1 23
His body, which He saves.8 But,9 as the Church submits itself to Christ, 24
so let the wives submit themselves to their husbands in all things.
Husbands, love your wives, as Christ also loved the Church, and 25
gave Himself for it, that, having purified it by the water wherein it is 26
washed,10 He might hallow it by the indwelling of the word of God ; that 27
1 Dean Ellicott's translation, " See then by the best MSS. ; an omission to which
how ye walk with exactness," is literally accu- Jerome testifies. The transition of participial
rate, tuough scarcely intelligible to an English into imperative 'clauses is according to the
reader. analogy of the similar hortatory passage,
2 See Col. iv. 5, and note. Rom. xii. 8 to 19.
8 Literally, in doing which is riotous living. 7 This statement occurs 1 Cor. ii. 3 almost
4 We put a full stop after to one another verbatim.
(here), as Col. iii. 16. 8 The literal English is,he is the delivererof
6 Throughout the whole passage there is a his body ; and an analogy is implied to the con-
contrast implied between the Heathen and the jugal relation, in which the husband maintains
Christian practice, q. d. When you meet, let and cherishes the wife.
your enjoyment consist, not in fulness of wine, but 9 The conjunction cannot be translated
fulness of the Spirit ; let your songs be, not the "therefore" (A. V.).
drinking-songs of heathen feasts, but psalms and 10 "The water" (not simply "water");
hymns; and their accompaniment, not the music literally, by the laver of the water, equivalent to
of the lyre, but the melody of the heart ; while you laver of regeneration (Titus iii. 5). The folio w-
sing them to the praise, not of Bacchus or Venus, ing in the word is exceedingly difficult. Chrys-
but of the Lord Jesus Christ. For the construe- ostom and the patristic commentators general-
tion and punctuation, see Col. iii. 16. ly explain it of the formula of baptism; De
6 Christ is the reading of the best MSS. Wette takes the same view. But see St. Paul's
That this comprehends all the special relations use of the same expression elsewhere, Rom. x.
of subjection which follow (and should be 8, x. 17, also Eph. vi. 17; and moreover, as
joined with what follows) is shown by the Winer and Meyer have remarked, the junction
omission oi submit yourselves (in the next verse) of " in the word " with the verb letter suits

776 THE LIPE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap. xxv.
T.
28 He might Himself1 present unto Himself2 the Church in stainless glory,
not having spot or wrinkle, or any such thing ; but that it should be holy
and unblemished. In like manner, husbands ought to love their wives as
they love their own bodies ; for he that loves his wife does but love him-
29 self: and a man never hated his own flesh, but nourishes and cherishes
80,31 it, as Christ3 also the Church ; for we are members of His body.4 ' $nt
ifris tnmit sfrall a man leak fris falfrer ma fris maifrer, una sfrall
32 dtubt mta fris mile, antr tfreg thro sfrall bt ant flusfr."5 This
33 mystery is great, but 1 6 speak of Christ and of the Church. Neverthe
less, let every one of you individually T so love his wife even as himself,
and let the wife see that she reverence her husband.
vi. 1 Children, obey your parents in the Lord; for this is right. Duties of chu-
2 " Honor tfrg fa%r anir tfrg mcr%r," 8 which is the first pareX
3 commandment with9 promise : " Cfral it mag bt hxell faritfr %*, anb
tfrou sfrall lib* long tqpxm % sartfr." 10
4 And ye, fathers, vex not your children ; but bring them up in such
training and correction as befits the servants of the Lord.11
5 Bondsmen, obey your earthly masters with anxiety and self- Duties of
slaves and
6 distrust,12 in singleness of heart, as unto Christ ; not with eye- masters.
service, as men-pleasers, but as bondsmen of Christ, doing the will of
7 God from the soul. With good will fulfilling your service, as to the Lord
8 our master,13 and not to men. For you know that whatever good any man
does, the same shall he receive from the Lord, whether he be bond or free.

the Greek. On this view, the meaning is that 6 The pronoun is emphatic : but I, while 1
the Church, having been purified by the waters quote these words out of the Scriptures, use them
of baptism, is hallowed by the revelation of in a higher sense.
the mind of God imparted to it, whether 7 In your individual capacity, contrasted
mediately or immediately. Compare Heb. with the previous collective view of the mem-
iv. 12. 13. bers of the Church as the bride of Christ.
1 The best MSS. read thus. 8 Ex. xx. 12, and Deut. v. 16 (LXX.).
2 The Church is compared to a bride, as 9 Literally, in a promise. The command
2 Cor. xi. 2. being (as it were) set in a promise.
3 The best MSS. read Christ. 10 Ex. xx. 12, and Deut. v. 16 (LXX. not
4 The words "of his flesh and of his bones" exactly verbatim).
are not found in the MSS. of highest authority u The word lord implies the idea of ser-
(A. and B.). They may have easily been vants.
introduced from the Septuagint, where they u " With fear and trembling " has this
occur immediately before the following quota- meaning in St. Paul's language. Compare
tion, viz. at Gen. ii. 23. 1 Cor. ii. 3.
6 Gen. ii. 24 (LXX.). 18 See note on Col. iii. 25.

chap. xxv. EPISTLE TO THE EPHESIANS (SO CALLED). 777
And ye, masters, do in like manner by them, and abstain from threats ; 9
knowing that your own 1 Master is in heaven, and that with Him is no
respect of persons.
Exhortation Finally, my brethren, let your hearts be strengthened in the 10
christian e Lord,2 and in the conquering power of His might. Put on the 11
armor. a
whole armor of God, that you may be able to stand firm
against the wiles of the Devil. For the adversaries with whom we wrestle 12
are not flesh and blood, but they are 3 the Principalities, the Powers, and
the Sovereigns of this4 present darkness, the spirits of evil in the
heavens. Wherefore, take up with you to the battle 5 the whole armor 13
of God, that you may be able to withstand them in the evil day, and,
having 6 overthrown them all, to stand unshaken. Stand, therefore, girt 14
with the belt of truth, and wearing the breastplate of righteousness, and 15
shod as ready messengers of the Glad-tidings of peace : and take up to 16
cover you 7 the shield of faith, wherewith you shall be able to quench all
the fiery darts of the Evil One. Take, likewise, the helmet of salvation,8 17
and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God.9
To pray for Continue to pray at every season with all earnestness of sup- 18
Paul. plication in the Spirit ; and to this end be watchful with all
perseverance in prayer for all the saints ; and for me, that utterance may 19
be given me, to open my mouth and make known with boldness the 20
mystery of the Glad-tidings, for which I am an ambassador in fetters.18
Pray that I may declare it boldly, as I ought to speak.
But that you, as well as u others, may be informed of my 21
messenger. concerns, and how I fare, Tychicus, my 12 beloved brother, and
1 Some of the best MSS. read " both their against hostile weapons by his knowledge of
and your," which brings out still more forcibly the salvation won for him by Christ.
the equality of slaves and masters in the sight 9 For the meaning of " word of God," see
of Christ. note on chap. v. 26. It is here represented as
2 This is the literal meaning. the only offensive weapon of Christian warfare.
8 Compare Col. ii. 15, and the note; also The Roman pilum (Joh. xix. 34) is not men
John xii. 31. tioned. For a commentary on this military
4 " This world " is omitted in the best MSS. imagery, and the circumstances which natural-
5 " Take up," literally, ly suggested it, see the beginning of the next
8 Not "done" (A. V.), but "overthrown." chapter.
t To cover all. If it meant in addition to all 10 See Paley's observations (Horce Paulinos,
(Ellicott), it would suielyhave come last in in loco), and our preceding remarks on Custo-

the list.

dia Militaris. u " You also."

8 The head of the Christian is defended 12 See the parallel passage, Col. iv. 7.

778

TTTE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL.

CHAP, xxv

VI.
22 faithful servant in the Lord, will make all known to you. And I have
sent him to you for this very end, that you may learn what concerns me,
and that he may comfort your hearts.
23 Peace be to the brethren, and love with faith, from God our Con(!ludillg
Father, and our Lord Jesus Christ.
24 Grace be with all who love our Lord Jesus Christ in ! sincerity.2

benediction.

1 The difficulty of the concluding words is
well known : the phrase might also be trans
lated in immortality, with the meaning whose
love endures immortally. Olshausen supposes
the expression elliptical, for " that they may

have life in immortality ; " but this can scarce
ly be justified.
2 "Amen," as usual, is omitted in the best
MSS.

T— *f-< 1111

tsr.

Ground-Plan of the Basilica of Pompeii.
(From Gell's Pompeii.)

CHAPTER XXVL
The Praetorium and the Palatine. — Arrival of Epaphroditus. — Political Events at Rome. —
Octavia and Poppaea. — St. Paul writes the Epistle to the Philippians. — He makes Converts
in the Imperial Household.
THE close of the Epistle to which our attention has just been turned
contains a remarkable example of the forcible imagery of St. Paul.1
Considered simply in itself, this description of the Christian's armor
is one of the most striking passages in the Sacred Volume. But if we
view it in connection with the circumstances with which the Apostle was
surrounded, we find a new and living emphasis in his enumeration of all
the parts of the heavenly panoply,2 — the belt of sincerity and truth, with
which the loins 3 are girded for the spiritual war, — the breastplate of
that righteousness,4 the inseparable links whereof are faith and love,5 —
the strong sandals,6 with which the feet of Christ's soldiers are made
ready,7 not for such errands of death and despair as those on which the
Praetorian soldiers were daily sent, but for the universal message of
the Gospel of peace, — the large shield 8 of confident trust,9 wherewith the
whole man is protected,10 and whereon the fiery arrows u of the Wicked
1 Eph. vi. 14-17. context, but strong and heavy sandals. See
2 " The whole armor of God." For au- the anecdote of the death of the centurion
thentic information regarding the actual Julian in the Temple at Jerusalem. Joseph.
Roman armor of the time, we may refer to War, vi. 1, 8.
Piranesi's fine illustrations of the columns of 7 " Shod as ready messengers," &c.
Trajan and Marcus Aurelius. There are also 8 The " shield " here is the large oblong or
many useful engravings in Dr. Smith's Die- oval Roman shield — the scutum, not the clipeus
tionary of Antiquities. — specimens of which may be seen in Piraneii.
8 "Your loins girt about with truth." The See especially the pedestal of Trajan's column.
belt or zona passed round the lower part of the 9 " The shield of faith."
body, below the " breastplate," and is to be 10 Observe " over all," which is not clearly
distinguished from the balteus, which went over translated in the Authorized Version.
the shoulder. n Part of the artillery in an ancient siega
4 " Wearing the breastplate of righteous- consisted of darts and heavier missiles, in the
ness." The " breastplate " was a cuirass or heads of which were inflammable materials.
corselet, reaching nearly to the loins. Diodorus Siculus, in his account of one of the
6 In the parallel passage (1 Thess. v. 8), the sieges of Rhodes, uses the very expression
breastplate is described as " the breastplate of here employed by the Apostle. The Latin
faith and love." names for these missiles were falarica and
6 The Roman caligos were not greaves, malleoli. Liv. xxi. 8 ; Cic. Cat. i. 13.
which in fact would not harmonize with the 779

780 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap. xxvi.
One fall harmless and dead, — the close-fitting helmet,1 with which the
hope of salvation 2 invests the head of the believer, — and finally the
sword of the Spirit, the Word of God,3 which, when wielded by the Great
Captain of our Salvation, turned the Tempter in the wilderness to flight,
while in the hands of His chosen Apostle (with whose memory the sword
seems inseparably associated)4 it became the means of establishing Chris
tianity on the earth.
All this imagery becomes doubly forcible if we remember that when
St. Paul wrote the words he was chained to a soldier, and in the close
neighborhood of military sights and sounds. The appearance of the
Praetorian guards was daily familiar to him ; — as his " chains " on the
other hand (so he tells us in the succeeding Epistle) became " well
known throughout the whole Prcetorium." (Phil. i. 13.) A difference
of opinion has existed as to the precise meaning of the word in this pas
sage. Some have identified it, as in the Authorized Version, with the
" house of Caesar" on the Palatine:5 more commonly it has been sup
posed to mean that permanent camp of the Praetorian guards, which
Tiberius established on the north of the city, outside the walls.6 As
regards the former opinion, it is true ;that the word came to be used,
almost as we use the word " palace," for royal residences generally, or
for any residences of a princely splendor,7 and that thus we read, in other
parts of the New Testament, of the Praetorium of Pilate at Jerusalem8
and the Praetorium of Herod at Caesarea.9 Yet we never find the word
employed for the Imperial house at Rome : and we believe the truer view
to be that which has been recently advocated,10 namely, that it denotes
here, not the palace itself, but the quarters of that part of the Imperial
guards which was in immediate attendance upon the Emperor. Such a
military establishment is mentioned in the fullest account which we pos
sess of the first residence of Augustus on the Palatine : n and it is in har-
1 One of these compact Roman helmets, Paul, and that a statue of the Apostle, bear-
preserved in England, at Goodrich Court, is ing the sword, is on the summit.
engraved in Dr. Smith's Dictionary. (See under 6 With Phil. i. 13 we should compare iv.
Galea). 22 in the Authorized Version.
2 With " helmet of salvation " (Eph. vi. 6 See above, in the description of Rome,
17) we should compare " as a helmet the hope and compare the map.
of salvation" (1 Thess. v. 8). 7 We find the word used in Suetonius for
8 See note on the passage. the Imperial castles out of Rome. Elsewhere
4 It is the emblem of his martyrdom: and it is applied to the palaces of foreign princes,
we can hardly help associating it also with this and even private persons.
passage. The small short sword of the Ro- 8 See above, p. 634.
mans was worn like a dagger on the right side. 9 See above, p. 659, n. 4.
Specimens may be seen in Piranesi. Those 10 In Wieseler's note, p. 403.
readers who have been in Rome will remember n " The Imperial residence is called Palo-
that Pope Sixtus V. dedicated the column of Hum . . . because the Emperor dwelt on
Aurelius (ab omni impietate purgatam) to St. Mount Palatine, and there he had his military

chap. xxvi. THE PALATINE. 781
mony with the general ideas on which the monarchy was founded. The
Emperor was praetor 1 or commander-in-chief of the troops, and it was
natural that his immediate guard should be in a prmtorium near him.
It might, indeed, be argued that this military establishment on the Pala
tine would cease to be necessary when the Praetorian camp was estab
lished : but the purpose of that establishment was to concentrate near the
city those cohorts which had previously been dispersed in other parts of
Italy : a local body-guard near the palace would not cease to be neces
sary : and Josephus, in his account of the imprisonment of Agrippa,*
speaks of a " camp " in connection with the " royal house. ?uch we
conceive to have been the barrack immediately alluded to by St. ± aul :
though the connection of these smaller quarters with the general camp
was such that he would naturally become known to" all the rest" 3 of
the guards, as well as those who might for the time be connected with
the Imperial household.
What has just been said of the word " praetorium " applied still more
extensively to the word " palatium." Originally denoting the hill on
which the twin-brothers were left by the retreating river, it grew to be,
and it still remains, the symbol of Imperial power. Augustus was born
on the Palatine ; 4 and he fixed his official residence there when the Civil
Wars w:re terminated. Thus it may be truly said, that, " after the
Capitol and the Forum, no locality in the ancient city claims so much of
our interest as the Palatine hill, — at once the birthplace of the infant
city, and the abode of her rulers during the days of her greatest
splendor, — where the red-thatched cottage of Romulus was still pre
served in the midst of the gorgeous structures of Caligula and Nero." 5
About the close of the Republic, this hill was the residence of many
distinguished citizens, such as Crassus, Cicero, Catiline, Clodius, and
Antony. Augustus himself simply bought the house of Hortensius, and
lived there in modest state.6 But the new era was begun for the
Palatine, when the first Emperor, soon after the battle of Actium, raised
the temple of Apollo, with its celebrated Greek and Latin libraries,1 on
the side near the Forum. Tiberius erected a new palace, or an addition
force (Prostorium) . . . hence it comes that 4 Suet. Aug. 5.
wherever the Emperor is living it is called 6 Bunbury in the Classical Museum, vol. v.
Palatium." Dio Cass. liii. 16. p. 229. We learn from Plutarch and Diony-
i See what has been said (pp. 129, 130) in sius that this " wooden hut thatched with
refereKie to the term propraetor in the prov- reeds, which was preserved as a memorial of
mces the simple habitation of the Shepherd-king,"
2 Joseph. Ant. xviii. 6. He uses orpaTomdov was on the side of the hill tc wards the Circus,
for the prcetorium, and ^aa'Oeiov for the pala- p. 232.
Hum. Compare what is said of Drusus, Suet. 6 Suet. Aug. 72.
Tii 54 s Ibid. ' Hor. Ep. i. iii. 17. Suet. Aug. 29

82 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap. xxvi.
to the old one, on the opposite side of the hill, immediately above the
Circus Maximus.1 It remained for subsequent Emperors to cover the
whole area of the hill with structures connected with the palace.
Caligula extended the Imperial buildings by a bridge (as fantastic as that
at Baiae),2 which joined the Palatine with the Capitol. Nero made a
similar extension in the direction of the Esquiline : and this is the point
at which we must arrest our series of historical notices ; for the burning
of Rome and the erection of the Golden House intervened between the
first and second imprisonments of the Apostle Paul. The fire, more
over, which is so closely associated with the first sufferings of the Church,
has made it impossible to identify any of the existing ruins on the
Palatine with buildings that were standing when the Apostle was among
the Praetorian guards. Nor indeed is it possible to assign the ruins to
their proper epochs. All is now confusion on the hill of Romulus and
Augustus. Palace after palace succeeded, till the Empire was lost in the
mist of the Middle Ages. As we explore the subterraneous chambers,
where classical paintings are still visible on the plaster, or look out
through broken arches over the Campagna and its aqueducts, the mind
is filled with blending recollections, not merely of a long line of Roman
Caesars, but of Ravenna and Constantinople, Charlemagne and Rienzi.
This royal part of the Western Babylon has almost shared the fate of the
city of the Euphrates. The Palatine contains gardens and vineyards,3
and half-cultivated spaces of ground, where the acanthus-weed grows in
wild luxuriance : but its population has shrunk to one small convent ; 4
and the unhealthy air seems to brood like a curse over the scene of
Nero's tyranny and crime.
St. Paul was at Rome precisely at that time when the Palatine was
the most conspicuous spot on the earth, not merely for crime, but for
splendor and power. This was the centre of all the movements of the
Empire.5 Here were heard the causes of all Roman citizens who had
appealed to Caesar.6 Hence were issued the orders to the governors of
provinces, and to the legions on the frontier. From the " Golden Mile
stone " (Milliarium Aureum) 7 below the palace, the roads radiated in
all directions to the remotest verge of civilization. The official messages
of the Emperor were communicated along them by means of posts
1 The position of the "Domus Tiberiana " 4 The Franciscan convent of St. Bonaven-
B determined by the notices of it in the account tura, facing the Forum. 6 Tac. Hist. iii. 70.
Df the murder of Galba. 6 See the account of St. Paul's trial in the
2 See above p. 724. next chapter.
3 The Faniese Gardens and the Villa Mills » The Milliarium Aureum (afterwards called
formerly Villa Spada) are well known to the Umbilicus Romce) is believed to have been
S-avellers. Some of the finest arches are in discovered at the base of the Capitol, near the
lie Vigna del Collegio Inglese. Temples of Saturn and Concord.

chap. axvi. EPAPHRODITUS, 783
established by the government : * but these roads afforded also the means
of transmitting the letters of private citizens, whether sent by means of
tabellarii,2 or by the voluntary aid of accidental travellers. To such
communications between the metropolis and the provinces others were
now added of a kind hitherto unknown in the world, — not different
indeed in outward appearance 3 from common letters, — but containing
commands more powerful in their effects than the despatches of Nero, —
touching more closely the private relations of life than all the correspond
ence of Seneca 4 or Pliny, — and proclaiming, in the very form of their
salutations, the perpetual union of the Jew, the Greek, and the Roman.5
It seems probable that the three letters which we have last read were
despatched from Rome when St. Paul had been resident there about a
year,6 that is, in the spring of the year 62 a.d. After the departure of
Tychicus and Onesimus, the Apostle's prison was cheered by the arrival
of Epaphroditus, who bore a contribution from the Christians of Philippi.
We have before seen instances7 of the noble liberality of that Church,
and now once more we find them ministering to the necessities of their
beloved teacher. Epaphroditus, apparently a leading presbyter among
the Philippians, had brought on himself, by the fatigues or perils of his
journey, a dangerous illness. St. Paul speaks of him with touching
affection. He calls him his " brother, and companion in labor, and fel-
1 So far as related to government de- without some allusion to the so-called corre-
spatches, Augustus established posts similar to spondence between him and St. Paul : but a
those of King Ahasuerus. Compare Suet. mere allusion is not enough for so vapid and
Aug. 49 with Esther viii. 13, 14. meaningless a forgery. These Epistles (with
2 See Becker's Gallus, p. 250 (Eng. Trans.). that which is called the Ep. to the Laodiceans,
3 In p. 357, a general reference was made described p. 762, note 5) will be found in Jones
to the interest connected even with the writing on the Canon (vol. ii.).
materials employed by St. Paul. There is lit- 6 We allude to the combination of the Ori-
tle doubt that these were reed-pens, Egyptian ental "peace" with the Greek "grace" or
paper, and black ink. All these are mentioned "joy " in the opening salutations of all St.
by St. John (paper and ink, 2 Joh. 12; ink and Paul's Epistles. We may compare Horace's
pen, 3 Joh. 13) ; and St. Paul himself, in a " Celso gaudere," &c., Ep. i. viii., with the
passage where there is a blended allusion to opening of the letter of Lysias to Felix, Acts
inscriptions on stone and to letter-writing (2 xxiii. 26.
Cor. iii. 3), speaks of ink. Representations of 6 The state of things described in the 4th
ancient inkstands found at Pompeii, with reed- chapter of Colossians, the conversion of
pens, may be seen in Dr. Smith's Dictionary, Onesimus and his usefulness to St. Paul
under Atramentum. Allusion has been made (Philem. 11-13), imply the continuance of St.
in a previous page to the paper-trade of Egypt. Paul's ministry at Rome during a period
Parchment (2 Tim. iv. 13) was of course used which can hardly have been less than a year.
for the secondary MSS. in which the Epistles Nor would St. Paul, at the beginning of his
were preserved Letters were written in the imprisonment, have written as he does (Philem.
large or uncial character, though of course the 22) of his captivity as verging towards its ter-
handwriting of different persons would vary. mination.
See Gal. vi. 11. 7 See 'he account of the Macedonian col-
* We must not pass by the name of Seneca lection, p. 480.

784 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap, xxvt
low-soldier " (ii. 25) ; declares that " his labor in the cause of Christ
had brought him near to death " (ii. 30), and that he had " hazarded his
life " in order to st pply the means of communication between the
Philippians and himself. And, when speaking of his recovery, he says,
" God had compassion on him, and not on him only, but on me also, that
I might not have sorrow upon sorrow." (ii. 27.) We must suppose,
from these expressions, that Epaphroditus had exposed himself to some
unusual risk in his journey. Perhaps his health was already feeble when
he set out, so that he showed self-devotion in encountering fatigues which
were certain to injure him.
Meanwhile St. Paul continued to preach, and his converts to multiply.
We shall find that when he wrote to the Philippians, either towards
the close of this year, or at the beginning of the next, great effects had
already been produced ; and that the Church of Rome was not only
enlarged, but encouraged to act with greater boldness upon the surround
ing masses of Heathenism,1 by the successful energy of the apostolic
prisoner. Yet the political occurrences of the year might well have
alarmed him for his safety, and counselled a more timid course. We
have seen that prisoners in St. Paul's position were under the charge of
the Praetorian Prefect ; and in this year occurred the death of the virtu
ous Burrus,2 under whose authority his imprisonment had been so
unusually mild. Upon this event the prefecture was put into com
mission, and bestowed on Fenius Rufus and Sofonius Tigellinus. The
former was respectable,3 but wanting in force of character, and quite
unable to cope with his colleague, who was already notorious for that
energetic wickedness which has since made his name proverbial. St.
Paul's Christian friends in Rome must have trembled to think of him as
subject to the caprice of this most detestable of Nero's satellites. It does
not seem, however, that his situation was altered for the worse ; possibly
he was never brought under the special notice of Tigellinus, who was too
intent on court intrigues, at this period, to attend to so trifling a matter
as the concerns of a Jewish prisoner.
Another circumstance occurred about the same time, which seemed to
threaten still graver mischief to the cause of Paul. This was the mar
riage of Nero to his adulterous mistress Poppaea, who had become a
proselyte to Judaism. This infamous woman, not content with inducing
1 Phil. i. 12-14. riod Nero's public administration became grad-
2 Tac. Ann. xiv. 51. The death of Burrus ually worse and worse, till at length his infa-
was an important epoch in Nero's reign. my rivalled that of his private life.
Tacitus tells us in the following chapter that 3 Fenius Rufus was afterwards executed for
it broke the power of Seneca and established his share in Piso's conspiracy (Tac. Ann. xv. 66,
the influence of Tigellinus ; and from this pe- 68), in which he showed lamentable imbecility.

chap. xxvi. ST. PAUL'S RELEASE DOUBTFUL. 785
her paramour to divorce his young wife Octavia, had demanded and
obtained the death of her rival ; and had gloated over the head of the
murdered victim,1 which was forwarded from Pandataria to Rome for her
inspection. Her power seemed now to have reached its zenith, but rose
still higher at the beginning of the following year, upon the birth of a
daughter, when temples were erected to her and her infant,2 and divine
honors paid them. We know from Josephus 3 that she exerted her influ
ence over Nero in favor of the Jews, and that she patronized their emis
saries at Rome ; and assuredly no scruples of humanity would prevent
her from seconding their demand for the punishment of their most
detested antagonist.
These changed circumstances fully account for the anticipations of
an unfavorable issue to his trial, which we shall find St. Paul now ex
pressing ; 4 and which contrast remarkably with the confident expectation
of release entertained by him when he wrote the letter5 to Philemon.
When we come to discuss the trial of St. Paul, we shall see reason to
believe that the providence of God did in fact avert this danger ; but at
present all things seemed to wear a most threatening aspect. Perhaps
the death of Pallas 6 (which also happened this year) may be considered,
on the other hand, as removing an unfavorable influence ; for, as the
brother of Felix, he would have been willing to soften the Jewish accusers
of that profligate governor, by co-operating with their designs against
St. Paul. But his power had ceased to be formidable, either for good or
evil, some time before his death.
Meanwhile Epaphroditus was fully recovered from his sickness, and
able once more to travel ; and he willingly prepared to comply with St.
Paul's request that he would return to Philippi. We are told that he
was " filled with longing " to see his friends again, and the more so when
he heard that great anxiety had been caused among them by the news of
his sickness.7 Probably he occupied an influential post in the Philippian
Church, and St. Paul was unwilling to detain him any longer from his
duties there. He took the occasion of his return to send a letter of
grateful acknowledgment to his Philippian converts.
It has been often remarked that this Epistle contains less of censure
aud more of praise than any other of St. Paul's extant letters. It gives
1 Tac. Ann. xiv. 64. Temple. They sent ambassadors to Rome, who
2 Tac. Ann. xv. 23. The temples to Pop- succeeded by Poppsea's intercession in carrying
peea are mentioned in a fragment of Dio. their point. * Phil. ii. 17, and iii. 11.
3 Josephus, Antiq. xx. 8, 11, speaks of 5 Philem. 22,23.
Nero as " granting favors to the Jews, to 6 Pallas was put to dealt by poison soon
please Poppesa, who was a religious woman. " after the marriage of Poppaea, and in the same
This was on the occasion of the wall which the year. Tac. Ann. xiv. 65.
Jews built to intercept Agrippa's view of the 7 Phil.- ii. 26.
<i0

786 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. «hap. xxvi.
us a very high idea of the Christian state of the Philippians, as shown by
the firmness of their faith under persecution,1 their constant obedience
and attachment to St. Paul,2 and the liberality which distinguished them
above all other Churches.3 They were also free from doctrinal errors,
and no schism had as yet been created among them by the Judaizing party.
They are warned, however, against these active propagandists, who were
probably busy in their neighborhood, or (at least) might at any time
appear among them. The only blemish recorded as existing in the
Church of Philippi is, that certain of its members were deficient in lowli
ness of mind, and were thus led into disputes and altercations with their
brethren. Two women of consideration amongst the converts, Euodia
and Syntyche by name, had been especially guilty of this fault ; and
their variance was the more to be regretted because they had both
labored earnestly for the propagation of the faith. St. Paul exhorts the
Church, with great solemnity and earnestness,4 to let these disgraceful
bickerings cease, and to be all " of one soul and one mind." He also
gives them very full particulars about his own condition, and the spread
of the Gospel at Rome. He writes in a tone of most affectionate remem
brance, and, while anticipating the speedily-approaching crisis of his fate,
he expresses his faith, hope, and joy with peculiar fervency.
THE EPISTLE TO THE PHILIPPIANS.5
L 1 PAUL and Timotheus, bondsmen of Jesus Christ, To all salutation.
THE SAINTS 6 IN CHRIST JESUS WHO ARE AT PHILIPPI, WITH THE BISHOPS 7
AND DEACONS.8
1 Phil. i. 28, 29. (3.) It was written towards the conclusion of
2 Phil. ii. 12. 3 Phil. iv. 15. this first imprisonment, because (a) he expects
* Phil. ii. 1, 2, and iv. 2. the immediate decision of his cause; (b)
6 The following are the grounds of the Enough time had elapsed for the Philippians
date assigned to this Epistle : — to hear of his imprisonment, send Epaphrodi-
(1.) It was written during an imprisonment tus to him, hear of Epaphroditus's arrival and
at Rome, because (a) the Prostorium (i. 13) sickness, and send back word to Rome of theii
was at Rome ; (b) So was the Emperor's distress (ii. 26).
household (iv. 22) ; (c) He expects the imme- (4.) It was written after Colossians and
diate decision of his cause (i. 19, ii. 24), which Philemon; both for the preceding reason, and
could only have been given at Rome. because Luke was no longer at Rome, as he
(2.) It was written during the first imprison- was when those were written; otherwise he
ment at Rome, because (a) the mention of the would have saluted a Churcn in which he had
Pratorium agrees with the fact, that, during labored, and would have " cared in earnest for
his first imprisonment, he was in the custody their concerns " (see ii. 20).
of the Praetorian Prefect; (b) His situation " For Saints, see note on 1 Cor. i. 2.
described (i. 12-14) agrees with his situation 7 Bishops. This term was at this early
in the first two years of his imprisonment period applied to all the presbyters : see p. 378.
(Acts xxviii. 30, 31 ). 8 Deacons : see p. 379. It is singular that

«hat. xxvi. EPISTLE TO THE PHILIPPIANS. 787 i.
Grace be to you, and peiace, from God our Father, and from our Lord 2
Jesus Christ.
Thanksgiv- * * tnank m7 God upon every remembrance of you (contin- 3
prlyersdfor ually in all my prayers making my supplication for you all 2 4
them. with joy) , for your fellowship in forwarding 3 the Glad-tidings, 5
from the first day until now. And I am confident accordingly,4 that He 6
who has begun a good work in you will perfect it, even until the day of
Jesus Christ. And it is just that I should be thus mindful 5 of you all, 7
because you have me in your hearts, and, both in my imprisonment and
in my defence and confirmation 6 of the Glad-tidings, you all share in the
grace 7 bestowed upon me. God is my witness how I long after you all, 8
in the tender affection of Christ Jesus.
And this I pray, that your love may abound yet more and more, in true 9
knowledge, and in all understanding, teaching you to distinguish good 8
from evil ; that you may be pure, and may walk without 9 stumbling until 10
the day of Christ ; being filled with the fruits of righteousness which are 11
by Jesus Christ, unto the glory and praise of God.
intelligence I would have you know, brethren, that the things which 12
*f his condi
tion at Rome, have befallen me have tended rather to the furtherance than
hinderance of the Glad-tidings. So that my chains have become well 13
known in the name of Christ, throughout the whole Praetorium,10 and to
all the rest.11 And thus most 12 of the brethren in the Lord, rendered con- 14
the presbyters and deacons should be men- and also on the Philippians, was the power of
tioned separately in the address of this Epis- confirming the Gospel by their sufferings : the
tie only. It has been suggested that they corresponding verb is used in v. 29.
had collected and forwarded the contribution 8 Compare Rom. ii. 18.
sent by Epaphroditus. 9 " Without offence " seems used here in-
1 Observe " Paul and Timotheus " fol- transitively ; at 1 Cor. x. 32, the same word is
lowed immediately by "I," in confirmation of active.
the remarks in the note on 1 Thess. i. 2. 10 Presternum. For the explanation of this,
2 The constant repetition of " all " in con- see above, p. 780. We have seen that St.
nection with " you " in this Epistle is remarka- Paul was committed to the custody of the
ble. It seems as if St. Paul implied that he Prwfectus Prcetorio, and guarded by different
(at least) would not recognize any divisions Praetorian soldiers, who relieved one another.
among them. See above. Hence his condition would be soon known
8 Not " in the Gospel " (A. V.). throughout the Praetorian quarters.
4 Accordingly : compare 2 Cor. ii. 3, and n This expression is very obscure ; it may
Gal. ii. 10. mean either to the Prcetorian soldiers who guard
6 Mindful, Src. This refers to the preced- me, and to all the rest of those who visit me ; or
ing mention of his prayers for them. to all the rest of the Prcetorian Guardt. The
6 St. Paul defended his doctrine by his latter view gives the best sense.
werds, and confirmed it by his life. 12 " Most," not " many " (A. V.).
7 The grace or aift bestowed on St. Paul,

788 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap. xxvi.
i. fident by my chains, are very much emboldened to speak the Word fear-
15 lessly. Some, indeed, proclaim Christ 1 even out of envy and contention ; 2
16 but some, also, out3 of good will.' These do it from love,4 knowing that I
17 am appointed to defend the Glad-tidings ; but those announce Christ from
a spirit of intrigue,5 not sincerely, thinking to stir6 up persecution against
18 me in my imprisonment. What then ? nevertheless, every way, whether
in pretence or in truth, Christ is announced ; and herein I rejoice now,
19 yea, and I shall rejoice hereafter. For I know that ' tyjt&t tjjiirgg 7
gjjall fall ant ta mg mlbntlan," 8 through your prayers, and through
20 the supply of all my needs 9 by the Spirit of Jesus Christ ; according to
my earnest expectation and hope, that I shall in no wise be put to
shame,10 but that with all boldness, as at all other times, so now also,
Christ will be magnified in my body, whether by my life or by my death.
21,22 For to me life is Christ, and death is gain. But whether this life11 in the
flesh shall be the fruit of my labor, and what I should choose, I know
23 not. But 12 between the two I am in perplexity ; having the desire to
24 depart and be with Christ, which is far better ; yet to remain in the flesh
25 is more needful, for your sake. And in this confidence I know that I
1 " Christ " has the article, which perhaps 9 The words literally applied would mean
may indicate that they were Jews, who pro- the supplying of all needs [of the chorus] by the
claimed Jesus as the Messiah. The verb in Choregus. So the words here mean the supply-
v. 15 denotes to proclaim (as a herald) ; that in ing of all needs [of the Christian] by tlie Spirit.
v. 17, to declare tidings of (as a messenger). Compare Eph. iv. 16, and Col. ii. 19.
2 These were probably Judaizers. 10 St. Paul was confident that his faith and
8 We can by no means assent to Professor hope would not fail him in the day of trial.
Jowett's proposal to translate the preposition Compare Rom. v. 5, " our hope cannot shame
here " amid." See his note on Gal. iv. 13. us." He was looking forward to his final
4 The order of verses 16 and 17 (as given hearing, as we have already seen, page 785.
in the best MSS.) is transposed in the Re- u We punctuate this very difficult verse so
ceived Text. that the meaning is literally, but whether this
6 See note on Rom. ii. 8. life in the flesh (compare this mortal, 1 Cor. xv.
6 Such is the reading of the best MSS. 54, and my present life in the flesh, Gal. ii. 20)
The Judaizers probably, by professing to be my labor's fruit, and what I shall choose, I
teach the true version of Christianity, and know not. The A. V. assumes an ellipsis, and
accusing Paul of teaching a false and anti- gives no intelligible meaning to fruit of my
national doctrine, excited odium against him labor. On the other hand, De Wette's trans-
among the Christians of Jewish birth at lation, if life in the flesh, — if this be my labor's
R°me- fruit, what I shall choose I know not, causei
7 These things, viz. the sufferings resulting a redundancy, and is otherwise objectionable.
from the conduct of these Judaizers. Beza's translation, " an vero vivere in earn*
6 The words are quoted verbatim from mihi opera? pretium sit, et quid eligam ignoro,"
Job xiii. 16 (LXX.). Yet perhaps St. Paul comes nearest to that which we adopt.
did not so much deliberately quote them, as 12 The MSS. read "but." and not "for,"
use an expression which floated in his memory. here.

chap. xxvi. EPISTLE TO THE PHILIPPIANS. 789 i.
shall remain,1 and shall continue with you all, to your furtherance and
joy in faith ; that you may have more abundant cause for your boasting 2 26
in Christ Jesus on my account, by my presence again among you.
Exhortations Only live 3 worthy of the Glad-tidings of Christ, that 27
to steadfast °
TOUTOrdCand wheTjher I come and see you, or be absent, I may hear con-
lowiincss. cerning you, that you stand firmly in one spirit, contending 28
together with one mind for the faith of the Glad-tidings, and *nowise
terrified by its enemies ; 4 for their enmity is to them an evidence of per
dition, but to you of salvation, and that from God. For to you it has 29
been given, on behalf of Christ, not only to believe on Him, but also to
suffer for His sake ; having the same conflict which once you saw* in me, 30
and which now you hear that I endure.
If, then, you can be entreated 6 in Christ, if you can be persuaded, by 1
love, if you have any fellowship in the Spirit, if you have any tenderness
or compassion, I pray you make my joy full,7 be of one accord, filled with 2
the same love, of one soul, of one mind. Do nothing in a spirit of in- 3
trigue 8 or vanity, but in lowliness of mind let each account others above
himself. Seek not your private ends alone, but let every man seek like- 4
wise his neighbor's good.
Let this mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus ; who, being 5, 6
in the form of God, thought it not robbery 9 to be equal with God, but i
stripped 10 Himself [of His glory] and took upon Him the form of a
1 Shall remain, i. e. alive. sion ; from which, therefore, we have not
2 " Whose boasting is in Christ." Com- thought it right to deviate. The majority of
pare iii. 3. modern interpreters, however, take it as mean-
3 See note on iii. 20. ing to reckon a thing as a booty, to look on a thing
* Compare " many adversaries," — I Cor. as a robber would look on spoil. It is a con-
xvi. 9. siderable (though not a fatal) objection to this
6 They had seen him sent to prison, Acts view, that it makes a word denoting the act of
xvi. 23. seizing identical with one denoting the thing
6 The first word means to entreat, see Matt. seized. The Authorized Version is free from
xviii. 32 ; the second, to urge by persuasion or this objection ; but it is liable to the charge of
entreaty, see 1 Thess. ii. 11. rendering the connection with the following
• The extreme earnestness of this exhorta- verse less natural than the other interpretation.
tion to unity shows that the Philippians were If the latter be correct, the translation would
guilty of dissension ; perhaps Euodia and be, He thought not equality with God a thing to
Syntyche, whose opposition to each other is be seized upon ; i. e. though, essentially, even while
mentioned iv. 2, had partisans who shared on earth, He was in the form of God, yet He did
their quarrel. »ot think fit to claim equality with God intil H*
8 See above, i. 17. had accomplished His mission.
9 This very difficult expression admits of 10 Literally, emptied Himself
the translation adopted in the Authorized Ver- f

790

THE LIFE AJ5D EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL.

CHAP. XXVI

8 slave,1 being changed 2 into the likeness of man. And having appeared
in the guise of men, He abased Himself and showed obedience,3 even
9 unto death, yea, death upon the cross. Wherefore God also exalted Him
above measure, and gave Him the4 name which is above every name:
10 that in the name of Jesus " tbtXg ktltt s|j0ul0 00*0," 8 of all who dwell
11 in heaven, in earth, or under the earth, and every tongue should confess
that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.
12 Wherefore, my beloved, as you have always obeyed me, not as in my
presence only, but now much more in my absence, work out your own
13 salvation with fear and trembling ; 6 for it is God who works in you both
14 will and deed. Do all things for the sake of good will,7 without murmur-
15 ings and disputings, that you may be blameless and guileless, the sons of
God without rebuke, in the midst of " a tzaafob Klia QtxbtXBt genera
tion " 8 among whom ye shine like stars 9 in the world ; holding fast the
16 Word of Life ; that you may give me ground of boasting^ even to the day
of Christ, that I have not run in vain, nor labored in vain.

1 The likeness of man was the form of a
slave to Him, contrasted with the form of God
which essentially belonged to Him.
2 Literally, having become in the likeness,
which in English is expressed by being changed
into the likeness.
* He " showed obedience " to the laws of
human society, to His parents, and to the civil
magistrate; and carried that self-humiliating
obedience even to the point of submitting to
death, when He might have summoned
" twelve legions of angels " to His rescue.
4 The best MSS. have "the name."
6 Isaiah xiv. 23 (LXX.), quoted Rom. xiv.
11. It is strange that this verse should often
have been quoted as commanding the practice
of bowing the head at the name of Jesus ; a
practice most proper in itself, but not here
referred to : what it really prescribes is kneeling
in adoration of Him.
6 We have already remarked that with
anxiety and self-distrust is a nearer representa
tion of this Pauline phrase than the literal
English, as appears by the use of the same
phrase 1 Cor. ii. 3 ; 2 Cor. vii. 15 ; Eph. vi. 5.
The " fear " is a fear of failure, the " trem
bling " an eager anxiety.
7 This phrase has perplexed the interpreters,

because they have all joined it with the preced
ing words. We put a stop after the preceding
verb, and take the noun in the same sense as
at i. 15 above, and Luke ii. 14. It is strange
that so clear and simple a construction, in
volving no alteration in the text, should not
have been before suggested.
Since the above was first published, it has
been objected that the position of the Greek
article negatives the above rendering ; because
the insertion of the article (where it is gener
ally omitted) between a preposition and an
abstract noun, gives to the latter a reflective
sense; so that the phrase would mean "your
good will," not good will in the abstract.
This grammatical statement is not universally
true ; but even if the objection were valid, it
would not negative the construction proposed (
nor materially alter the meaning. The trans
lation would then stand : — "Do all things for
the sake of maintaining your mutual good will."
[It seems very doubtful whether this view ii
tenable : and the ordinary rendering gives *
very forcible sense. — h.]
8 Deut. xxxii. 5 (LXX.). The preceding
"without rebuke" calls up a corresponding
word in the Greek context of the LXX.
9 Compare Gen. i. 14 (LXX.).

chap. xxvi. EPISTLE TO THE PHILIPPIANS. 791 ii
st. Paul's ex- But 1 though my biood 2 be poured forth upon the ministra- 17
pecta tions and
intentions. tion of the sacrifice of your faith, I rejoice for myself, and re
joice with you all ; and do ye likewise rejoice, both for yourselves and 18
with me. But I hope in the Lord Jesus to send Timotheus to you 3 19
shortly, that I also may be cheered, by learning your state ; for I have no 20
other like-minded with me, who would care in earnest for your concerns ;
for all seek their own, not the things of Jesus Christ. But you know 4 the 2i,2i
trials which have proved his worth, and that, as a son with a father, he
has shared my servitude, to proclaim the Glad-tidings. Him, then, I 23
hope to send without delay, as soon as I see how it will go with me ; but 24
I trust in the Lord that I also myself shall come shortly.
Return of Epaphroditus, who is my brother and companion in labor and 25
ap ro us. feuow.soi^jer) an(j y0ur messenger to minister 5 to my wants, I
have thought it needful to send to you. For he was filled with long- 2€
ing for you all, aud with sadness, because you had heard that he was
6ick. And, indeed, he had a sickness which brought him almost to death, 27
but God had compassion on him ; and not on him only, but on me, that,
I might not have sorrow upon sorrow. Tlierefore I have been 6 the more 28
anxious to send him, that you may have the joy of seeing him again, and
that I may have one sorrow the less. Receive him, therefore, in the 29
Lord, with all gladness, and hold such men in honor ; because his labor 30
in the cause of Christ brought him near to death ; for he hazarded 7 his
life that he might supply all which you could not do,8 in ministering to me. ...
Finally, my brethren, rejoice in the Lord. 1
warning To repeat the same 9 warnings is not wearisome to me, and
against Juda- .
fcers, and it is safe for you. Beware of the Dogs,10 beware of the Evil 2
1 This but seems to connect what follows 7 This is the meaning of the reading of the
with i. 25, 26. best MSS.
2 Literally, I be poured forth. The meta- 8 The same expression is used of the roes-
phor is probably from the Jewish drink-offer- sengers of the Corinthian Church. 1 Cor.-
ings (Numb, xxviii. 7) rather than from the xvi. 17. The ^nghsli reader must not under-
Heathen libations. The Heathen converts stand the A. V. " lack of service " to convey a
are spoken of as a sacrifice offered up by St. reproach. From this verse we learn that the
Paul as the ministering priest, in Bom. xv. 16. illness of Epaphroditus was caused by some
8 The Greek construction is the same as in casualty of his journey, or perhaps by over-
I Csr. iv. 17. fatigue.
4 Timotheus had labored among them at 9 Literally, to write the same things to yott.
the first. See Acts xvi. St. Paul must here refer either to some previ-
6 Minister. We have the corresponding ous Epistle to the Philippians (now lost), or
abstract noun in v. 30. to his former conversations with them.
6 The aorist used from the position of the 10 The Judaizers are here described by three
reader, according to classical usage. epithets : " the dogs," because of their un-

792 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL chap. xxvi.
hi. 3 Workmen, beware of the Concision. For we are the Circum- exhortation to
perseverance
cision, who worship God 1 with the spirit, whose boasting 2 is tia^ac?*18'
1 in Christ Jesus, and whose confidence is not in the flesh. Although I'
might have confidence in the flesh also. If any other man thinks that
5 he has ground of confidence in the flesh, I have more. Circumcised
the eighth day, of the stock of Israel, of the tribe of Benjamin, a Hebrew
6 of the Hebrews ; as to the Law, a Pharisee ; as to zeal, a persecutor of
7 the Church ; as to the righteousness of the Law, unblamable. But what
8 once was gain to me, that I have counted loss for Christ. Yea, doubtless,
and I count all things but loss, because all are nothing-worth in com
parison ' with the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord ; for whom I have
suffered the loss of all things, and count them but as dung that I may
9 gain Christ, and be found in Him ; not having my own righteousness of
the Law, but the righteousness of faith in Christ, the righteousness which
10 God bestows on Faith;4 that I may know Him, and the power of His
resurrection, and the fellowship of His sufferings, sharing the likeness of
11 His death ; if by any means I might attain to the resurrection from the
dead.
12 Not that I have already won,8 or am already perfect ; but I press
onward, if indeed I, might lay hold on that for which Christ also laid
13 hold on me.6 Brethren, I count not myself to have laid hold thereon ;
but this one thing I do — forgetting that which is behind, and reaching7
14 forth to that which is before, I press onward towards the mark, for the
prize of God's heavenly calling in Christ Jesus.
cleanness (of which that animal was the type ; the knowledge of Christ, i. e. because the knowl-
compare 2 Pet. ii. 22) ; " the evil workmen " edge of Christ surpasses all things else
(not equivalent to " evil workers "), for the 4 Of God (i. e. which He bestows) on condi-
same reason that they are called " deceitful tion of faith. Compare Acts iii. 16.
workmen " in 2 Cor. xi. 13 ; and " the concis- 6 " Won," i. e. " the prize " (v. 14). Com-
ion," to distinguish them from the true cir- pare 1 Cor. ix. 24, " So run that ye may
cumcision, the spiritual Israel. win." It is unfortunate that in A. V. this is
1 We retain " God " here, with the Textus translated by the same verb attain, which is
Receptus, and a minority of MSS., because used for another verb in the preceding verse,
of the analogy of Rom. i. 9 (see note there). so as to make it seem to refer to that.
The true Christians are here described by con- 6 0ur Lord had " laid hold on " Paul, in
trast with the Judaizers, whose worship was the order to bring him to the attainment of "the
carnal worship of the Temple, whose boasting prize of God's heavenly calling." "Jesus " is
was in the law, and whose confidence was in omitted by the best MSS.
the circumcision of their flesh. 7 The image is that of the runner m a foot-
2 Apparently alluding to Jer. ix. 24, " He race, whose body is bent forwards in the direc-
that boasteth let him boast in the Lord," which is tion towards which he runs. See beginning
quoted 1 Cor. i. 31 and 2 Cor. x. 7. of Ch. XX.
* Literally, because of the supereminence oj

chap. xxvi. EPISTLE TO THE PHILIPPIANS. 793 iii.
Let us all, then, who are ripe 1 in understanding, be thus minded ; and 15
if in any thing you are otherwise minded, that also shall be revealed to
you by God [in due time]. Nevertheless, let us walk according to that 16 •
which we have attained.2
Brethren, be imitators of me with one consent, and mark those who 17
walk according to my example. For many walk, of whom I told you 18
often in times 3 past, and now tell you even weeping, that they are the
enemies 4 of the cross of Christ ; whose end is destruction, whose God is 19
their belly,5 and whose glory is in their shame ; whose mind is set on
earthly things. For my 6 life 7 abides in heaven ; from whence also I look 20,2
for a Saviour, the Lord Jesus Christ ; who shall change my vile 8 body 22
into the likeness of His glorious body ; according to the working whereby
He is able even to subdue all things unto Himself. Therefore, my iv. 1
brethren, dearly beloved and longed for, my joy and crown, so stand fast
in the Lord, my dearly beloved.
I exhort Euodia, and I exhort Syntyche,9 to be of one mind 2
Euodiaand ' J J
ounstbe6 *n tne Lord. Yea, and I beseech thee also, my true yoke- 3
teconciied. feuOW)io t0 nejp them [to be reconciled] ; for they strove ear-
1 The translation in A. V. (here and in v. the most fervent sympathy, and which they
12) by the same word makes St. Paul seem to have most undoubtingly appropriated, are
contradict himself. " Perfect " is the antithesis those very passages where St. Paul uses the
of " babe." Compare 1 Cor. xiv. 20. " singular : " as, for example, " for me," Gal.
2 The precept is the same given Rom. xiv. ii. 20.
5. The words " think the same thing " are 7 This noun must not be translated citizen-
omitted in the best MSS. ship (as has been proposed), which would be a
* Literally, / used to tell you. different word (cf. Acts xxii. 28). The corre-
" For the construction, compare 1 John ii. sponding verb means to perform the functions
25. The persons meant were men who led of civil life, and is used simply for to live; see
licentious lives (like the Corinthian freethink- Acts xxiii. 1, and Phil. i. 27. Hence the noun
ers), and they are called "enemies of the cross" means the tenor of hfe. It should be also
because the cross was the symbol of mortifica- observed that the verb here means more than
tjon simply " is," though it is difficult here to ex-
6 Cf. Rom. xvi. 18. press the shade of difference in English.
6 On St. Paul's use of " we " see note on 8 Literally, the body of my humiliation.
I Thess. i. 3. An objection has been made to 9 These were two women (the pronoun is
translating it in the singular in this passage, feminine in v. 3, which is mistranslated in
on the ground that this seems to limit St. A. V.) who were at variance.
Paul's expression of Christian hope and faith 10 We have no means of knowing who was
to himself; but a very little consideration will the person thus addressed. Apparently some
suffice to show the futility of such an objection. eminent Christian at Philippi, to whom the
Where St. Paul speaks of his hopes and faith Epistle was to be presented in the first instance.
as a Christian, his words are necessarily appii- The old hypothesis (mentioned by Chrysos-
cable to other Christians as well as to himself. torn), that the word is a proper name, is not
And in fact, some of the passages to which without plausibility ; " who art Syzygus in
Christians in general have ever turned with name and in fact," as a commentator says.

794 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap. xxvi.
iv. nestly in the work of the Glad-tidings with me, together with Clemens '
and my other fellow-laborers, whose names are in the Book2 of Life.
4 Rejoice in the Lord at all times. Again will3 1 say, rejoice. Exhortation to
rejoice in trib-
5 Let your forbearance be known to all men. The 4 Lord is at ^ °°^.to
6 hand. Let no care trouble you, but in all things, by prayer low s°°dness-
and supplication with thanksgiving, let your requests be made known to
7 God. And the peace of God, which passeth all understanding, shall
8 keep 5 your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus. Finally, brethren, what
soever is true, whatsoever is venerable, whatsoever is just, whatsoever is
pure, whatsoever is endearing, whatsoever is of good report, — if there
be any virtue, and if there be any praise, — be such your treasures.8
9 That which you were taught and learned, and which you heard and saw
in me, — be that your practice. So shall the God of peace be with you.
10 I rejoiced in the Lord greatly when I found that now, after Liberality of
the Philippian
so long a time, your care for me had borne fruit again ; 7 church.
11 though your care indeed never failed, but you lacked opportunity. Not
that I speak as if I were in want ; for 1 8 have learned, in whatsoever
12 state I am, to be content. I can bear either abasement or abundance.
In all things, and amongst all men, I have been taught the secret,9 to be
13 full or to be hungry, to want or to abound. I can do all things in Him 16
14 who strengthens me. Nevertheless, you have done well, in contributing
15 to the help of my affliction. And you know yourselves, Philippians, that,
in the beginning of the Glad-tidings, after I had left Macedonia,11 no
Church communicated with me on account of giving and receiving, but
16 you alone. For even while I was [still] in Thessalonica,12 you sent once

1 We learn from Origen (Comm. on John i. 8 The verb is future. He refers to iii. 1.
29) that this Clemens (commonly called Clem- 4 They are exhorted to be joyful under
ent) was the same who was afterwards Bishop persecution, and show gentleness to their
of Rome, and who wrote the Epistles to the persecutors, because the Lord's coming would
Corinthians which we have before referred to soon deliver them from all their afflictions.
(p. 541). Eusebius quotes the following state- Compare note on 1 Cor. xvi. 22.
ment concerning him from Irenaeus : " In the 6 Literally, garrison.
third place after the Apostles the episcopal 6 Literally, reckon these things in account.
ofiice was held by Clemens, who also saw the Compare 1 Cor. xiii. 5.
blessed Apostles, and lived with them."— Hist. 7 The literal meaning is to put forth fresh
Eccl. v. 6. It appears from the present pas- shoots. 8 This " I " is emphatic
sage that he had formerly labored successfully 9 Literally, " I have been initiated."
at Philippi. io "Christ" is omitted in the best MSS
2 Compare " Book of the living," Ps. lxix. For " strengthen," cf. Rom. iv. 20
28 (LXX), and also Luke x. 20, and Heb. u Compare 2 Oor. xi. 9, and p. 338
xii. 23, i2 See n 284.

criAp. xxvi. CONVERTS IN THF IMPERIAL HOUSEHOLD. 795 iv
and again to relieve my need. Not that I seek your gifts, but I seek 17
the fruit which accrues therefrom to your account. But I have all which 18
I require, and more than I require. I am fully supplied, having received
from Epaphroditus your gifts, " an aaav at shmtttCSS," x an acceptable
sacrifice well pleasing to God. And your own needs2 shall be all 19
supplied by my God, in the fulness of His glorious riches in Christ
Jesus. Now to our God and Father be glory unto the ages of ages. 20
Amen.
salutations. Salute every saint in Christ Jesus. The brethren who are 21
with me 3 salute you,
All the saints here salute you, especially those who belong to the 22
house of Caesar.4
ben^IctSn. Tne grace °f our Lord Jesus Christ be with your spirits.8 23
The above Epistle gives us an unusual amount of information concern
ing the personal situation of its writer, which we have already endeav
ored to incorporate into our narrative. But nothing in it is more
suggestive than St. Paul's allusion to the Praetorian guards, and to the
sonverts he had gained in the household of Nero. He tells us (as we
have just read) that throughout the Praetorian quarters he was well
known as a prisoner for the cause of Christ,6 and he sends special saluta
tions to the Philippian Church from the Christians in the Imperial house
hold.7 These notices bring before us very vividly the moral contrasts by
which the Apostle was surrounded. The soldier to whom he was chained
to-day might have been in Nero's body-guard yesterday; his comrade
who next relieved guard upon the prisoner might have been one of the
executioners of Octavia, and might have carried her head to Poppaea a
few weeks before. Such were the ordinary employments of the fierce
and blood-stained veterans who were daily present, like wolves in the
midst of sheep, at the meetings of the Christian brotherhood. If there
i Gen. viii. 21 (LXX.). Compare also is used by Josephus (Ant. xviii. 5, 8). If St.
Levit. i. 9, and Eph. v. 2. Paul was at this time confined in the neigh-
2 The your is emphatic. borhood of the Praetorian quarters attached to
8 This brethren with me, distinguished from the palace, we can more readily account for the
all the saints in the next verse, seems to denote conversion of some of those who lived in the
St Paul's special attendants, such as Aristar- buildings immediately contiguous.
chus, Epaphras, Demas, Timotheus, &c. Cf. 6 The majority of uncial MSS. read " spir-
QaL j. 2. it," and omit the " amen."
4 These members of the Imperial household 6 Phil. i. 1 .
were probably slaves ; so the same expression 7 Phil. iv. 22

796 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap. xxvi.
were any of these soldiers not utterly hardened by a life of cruelty, their
hearts must surely have been touched by the character of their prisoner,
brought as they were into so close a contact with him. They must have
been at least astonished to see a man, under such circumstances, so
utterly careless of selfish interests, and devoting himself with an energy
so unaccountable to the teaching of others. Strange indeed to their
ears, fresh from the brutality of a Roman barrack, must have been the
sound of Christian exhortation, of prayers, and of hymns; stranger still,
perhaps, the tender love which bound the converts to their teacher and to
one another, and showed itself in every look and tone.
But if the agents of Nero's tyranny seem out of place in such a scene,
still more repugnant to the assembled worshippers must have been the
instruments of his pleasures, the ministers of his lust. Yet some even
among these, the depraved servants of the palace, were redeemed from
their degradation by the Spirit of Christ, which spoke to them in the
words of Paul. How deep their degradation was we know from
authentic records. We are not left to conjecture the services required
from the attendants of Nero. The ancient historians have polluted their
pages 1 with details of infamy which no writer in the languages of Chris
tendom may dare to repeat. Thus the very immensity of moral amelio
ration wrought operates to disguise its own extent, and hides from
inexperienced eyes the gulf which separates Heathenism from Chris
tianity. Suffice it to say that the courtiers of Nero were the spectators,
and the members of his household the instruments, of vices so monstrous
and so unnatural, that they shocked even the men of that generation,
steeped as it was in every species of obscenity. But we must remember
that many of those who took part in such abominations were involuntary
agents, forced by the compulsion of slavery to do their master's bidding.
And the very depth of vileness in which they were plunged must have
excited in some of them an indignant disgust and revulsion against vice.
Under such feelings, if curiosity led them to visit the Apostle's prison,
they were well qualified to appreciate the purity of its moral atmosphere.
And there it was that some of these unhappy bondsmen first tasted of
spiritual freedom, and were prepared to brave with patient heroism the
tortures under which they soon 2 were destined to expire in the gardens
of the Vatican.
History has few stranger contrasts than when it shows us Paul preach-
1 See Tac. Ann. xv. 37, Dio. lxiii. 13, and in the summer of 64 A. D. ; that is, within less
especially Suetonius, Nero, 28, 29. than two years of the time when the Epistle
2 The Neronian persecution, in which such to Philippi was written. See the next chap-
vast multitudes of Christians perished, occurred ter.

chap. xxvi. MODERN INFIDELITY. 797
ing Chrisf under the walls of Nero's palace. Thenceforward, there were
but two religions in the Roman world ; the worship of the Emperor, and
the worship of the Saviour. The old superstitions had been long worn
out ; they had lost all hold on educated minds. There remained to
civilized Heathens no other worship possible but the worship of power ;
and the incarnation of power which they chose was, very naturally, the
Sovereign of the world. This, then, was the ultimate result of the noble
intuitions of Plato, the methodical reasonings of Aristotle, the pure
morality of Socrates. All had failed for want of external sanction and
authority. The residuum they left was the philosophy of Epicurus, and
the religion of Nerolatry. But a new doctrine was already taught in the
Forum, and believed even on the Palatine. Over against the altars of
Nero and Poppaea, the voice of a prisoner was daily heard, and daily
woke in grovelling souls the consciousness of their divine destiny. Men
listened, and knew that self-sacrifice was better than ease, humiliation
more exalted than pride, to suffer nobler than to reign. They felt that
the only religion which satisfied the needs of man was the religion of
sorrow, the religion of self-devotion, the religion of the cross.
There are some amongst us now who think that the doctrine which
Paul preached was a retrograde movement in the course of humanity;
there are others, who, with greater plausibility, acknowledge that it was
useful in its season, but tell us that it is now worn out and obsolete.
The former are far more consistent than the latter ; for both schools of
infidelity agree in virtually advising us to return to that effete philosophy
which had been already tried and found wanting when Christianity was
winning the first triumphs of its immortal youth. This might well sur
prise us, did we not know that the progress of human reason in the
paths of ethical discovery is merely the progress of a man in a tread
mill, doomed forever to retrace his own steps. Had it been otherwise, we
might have hoped that mankind could not again be duped by an old and
useless remedy, which was compounded ancj re-compounded in every
possible shape and combination two thousand years ago, and at last
utterly rejected by a nauseated world. Yet for this antiquated anodyne,
disguised under a new label, many are once more bartering the only true
medicine that can heal the diseases of the soul.
For such mistakes there is, indeed, no real cure, except prayer to Him
who giveth sight to the blind ; but a partial antidote may be supplied by
the history of the Imperial Commonwealth. The true wants of the
Apostolic age can best be learned from the Annals of Tacitus. There
men may still see the picture of that Rome to which Paul preached ; and
thence they may comprehend the results of civilization without Christi-

798

THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL.

CHAP. XXVI.

anity, and the impotence of a moral philosophy destitute of supernatural
attestation.1

Coin of Philippi J

1 Had Arnold lived to complete his task,
how nobly would his history of the Empire
have worked out this great argument! His
indignant abhorrence of wickedness, and his

enthusiastic love of moral beauty, made him
worthy of snch a theme.
2 From the British Museum.

CHAPTER XXVH.
Authorities for St. Paul's Subsequent History - His Appeal is heard. — His Acquittal. — He
goes from Rome to Asia Minor. — Ther.ce to Spain, where he resides Two Years. — He
returns to Asia Minor and Macedonia. — Writes tlie First Epistle to Timotheus. — Visits Crete.
— Writes the Epistle to Titus. — He winters at Nicopolis. — He is again imprisoned at Rome.
— Progress ofhis Trial. — He writes the Second Epistle to Timotheus. — His Condemnation
and Death.
WE have already remarked that the light concentrated upon that por
tion of St. Paul's life which is related in the latter chapters of the
Acts makes darker by contrast the obscurity which rests upon the re
mainder of his course. The progress of the historian who attempts to
trace the footsteps of the Apostles beyond the limits of the Scriptural nar
rative, must, at best, be hesitating and uncertain. It has been compared1
to the descent of one who passes from the clear sunshine which rests upon
a mountain's top into the mist which wraps its side. But this is an
inadequate comparison ; for such a wayfarer loses the daylight gradually,
and experiences no abrupt transition, from the bright prospect and the
distinctness of the onward path, into darkness and bewilderment. Our
case should rather be compared with that of the traveller on the Chinese
frontier, who has just reached a turn in the valley along which his course
has led him, and has come to a point whence he expected to enjoy the
view of a new and brilliant landscape ; when he suddenly finds all
farther prospect cut off by an enormous wall, filling up all the space
between precipices on either hand, and opposing a blank and insuperable
barrier to his onward progress. And if a chink here and there should
allow some glimpses of the rich territory beyond, they are only enough
to tantalize without gratifying his curiosity.
Doubtless, however, it was a Providential design which has thus limited
our knowledge. The wall of separation, which forever cuts off the
Apostolic age from that which followed it, was built by the hand of God
That age of miracles was not to be revealed to us as passing by any
gradual transition into the common life of the Church : it was intention
ally isolated from all succeeding time, that we might learn to appreciate
1 The comparison occurs somewhere in Arnold's works. 798

800 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OP ST. PAUL. chap, xxvn,
more fully its extraordinary character, and see, by the sharpness of the
abruptest contrast, the difference between the human and the divine.
A few faint rays of light, however, have been permitted to penetrate
beyond the dividing barrier, and of these we must make the best use we
can ; for it is now our task to trace the history of St. Paul beyond the
period where the narrative of his fellow-traveller so suddenly terminates.1
The only contemporary materials for this purpose are his own letters to
Titus and Timotheus, and a single sentence of his disciple, Clement of
Rome ; and during the three centuries which followed we can gather but
a few scattered and unsatisfactory notices from the writers who have
handed down to us the traditions of the Church.
The great question which we have to answer concerns the termination
of that long imprisonment whose history has occupied the preceding chap
ters. St. Luke tells us that Paul remained under military custody in
Rome for " two whole years " (Acts xxviii. 16 and 30) ; but he does
not say what followed at the close of that period. Was it ended, we are
left to ask, by the Apostle's condemnation and death, or by his acquittal
and liberation ? Although the answer to this question has been a subject
of dispute in modern times, uo doubt was entertained about it by the
ancient Church.2 It was universally believed that St. Paul's appeal to
Caesar terminated successfully ; that he was acquitted of the charges laid
against him ; and that he spent some years in freedom before he was
again imprisoned and condemned. The evidence on this subject, though
(as we have said) not copious, is yet conclusive so far as it goes, and it is
all one way.3
1 Numerous explanations have been at- 2 If the Epistle to the Hebrews was written
tempted of the sudden and abrupt termination by St. Paul, it proves conclusively that he was
of the Acts, which breaks off the narrative of liberated from his Roman imprisonment ; for
St. Paul's appeal to Caesar (up to that point so its writer is in Italy and at liberty. (Heb. xiii.
minutely detailed) just as we are expecting its 23, 24.) But we are precluded from using this
conclusion. The most plausible explanations as an argument, in consequence of the doubts
are — ( 1 ) That Theophilus already knew of the concerning the authorship of that Epistle.
conclusion of the Roman imprisonment ; wheth- See the next chapter.
er it was ended by St. Paul's death or by his 3 Since the above was published, the same
liberation. (2) That St. Luke wrote before the opinion has been expressed yet more strongly
conclusion of the imprisonment, and carried his by Chevalier Bunsen, whose judgment on such
narrative up to the point at which he wrote. a point is entitled to the greatest weight. He
But neither of these theories is fully satisfacto- says, " Some German critics have a peculiar
ry. We may take this opportunity to remark idiosyncrasy which leads them to disbelieve the
that the "dwelt" and "received" (Acts xxviii. second captivity of Paul. Yet it appears to
30) by no means imply (as Wieseler asserts) me very arbitrary to deny a fact for which we
that a changed state of things had succeeded to have the explicit evidence of Paul's disciple and
that there described. In writing historically, companion Clemens." — Bunsen's Hippolytus,
the historical tenses would be used by au an- Second Ed., vol. 1. p. 27.
cient writer, even though (when he wrote) the
events described by him were still going on.

°*AP-xxvn. ST. PAUL'S LIBERATION. 801
The most important portion of it is supplied by Clement, the disciple of
St. Paul, mentioned Phil. iv. 3,1 who was afterwards Bishop of Rome.
This author, writing from Rome to Corinth, expressly asserts that Paul
had preached the Gospel " in the east and in the west ; " that " he
')ad instructed the whole world [i. e. the Roman Empire, which was com
monly so called] in righteousness ; " and that he " had gone to the
extremity OP the west " before his martyrdom.2
Now, in a Roman author, the extremity of the West could mean nothing
short of Spain, and the expression is often used by Roman writers to
denote Spain. Here, then, we have the express testimony of St. Paul's
own disciple that he fulfilled his original intention (mentioned Rom. xv.
24-28) of visiting the Spanish peninsula ; and consequently that he was
liberated from his first imprisonment at Rome.
The next piece of evidence which we possess on the subject is contained
in the canon of the New Testament, compiled by an unknown Christian
about the year a/b. 170, which is commonly called "Muratori's Canon."
In this document it is said, in the account of the Acts of the Apostles,
that " Luke relates to Theophilus events of which he was an eye-witness, as
also, in a separate place (remote) [viz. Luke xxii. 31-33], he evidently
declares the martyrdom of Peter, but [omits'] the journey op Paul prom
Rome to Spain." 3
In the next place, Eusebius tells us, " after defending himself successfully,
it is currently reported that the Apostle again went forth to proclaim the
Gospel, and afterwards came to Rome a second time, and was martyred
under Nero." 4
Next we have the statement of Chrysostom, who mentions it as an
undoubted historical fact, that " St. Paul, after his residence in Rome,
departed to Spain." s
About the same time St. Jerome bears the same testimony, saying that
" Paul was dismissed by Nero, that he might preach Christ's Q-ospel in the
West."6 Against this unanimous testimony of the primitive Church there is no
1 For the identity of St. Paul's disciple der translates one phrase " having been mar-
Clemens with Clemens Romanus, see the note tyred there," and then argues that the extremity
on Phil. iv. 3. We may add, that even those of the PFesf cannot mean Spain, because St. Paul
who doubt this identity acknowledge that was not martyred in Spain ; but his " there " is
Clemens Romanus wrote in the first century. a mere interpolation of his own.
2 Clem. Rom. i. chap. v. We need scarcely 8 For an account of this fragment see
remark upon Wieseler's proposal to translate Routh's Reliquiae Sacrce, vol. iv. p. 1-12.
the words for the extremity of the West (rd r'eppa 4 Hist. Eccl. ii. 22.
rr)c ivaeug), the Sovereign of Rome! That inge- 6 He adds, " whether he went to the East-
nious writer has been here evidently misled by ern part of the Empire, we know not." Thu
his desire to wrest the passage (quocunque does not imply a doubt of his return to Rome.
modo) into conformity with his theory. Schra- 6 Hieron. Catal. Script.
51

8^2 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. CHAP.xxva.
external evidence 1 whatever to oppose. Those who doubt the liberation
of St. Paul from his imprisonment are obliged to resort to a gratuitous
hypothesis, or to inconclusive arguments from probability. Thus they
try to account for the tradition of the Spanish journey by the arbitrary
supposition that it arose from a wish to represent St. Paul as having ful
filled his expressed intentions (Rom. xv. 19) of visiting Spain. Or they
say that it is improbable Nero would have liberated St. Paul after he had
fallen under the influence of Poppaea, the Jewish proselyte. Or, lastly,
they urge, that, if St. Paul had really been liberated, we must have had
some account of his subsequent labors. The first argument needs no
answer, being a mere hypothesis. The second, as to the probability of
the matter, may be met by the remark, that we know far too little of the
circumstances, and of the motives which weighed with Nero, to judge
how he would have been likely to act in the case. To the third argu
ment we may oppose the fact, that we have no account whatever of St.
Paul's labors, toils, and sufferings, during several of 'the most active
years of his life, and only learn their existence by a casual allusion in a
letter to the Corinthians (2 Cor. xi. 24, 25). Moreover, if this argument
be worth any thing, it would prove that none of the Apostles except
St. Paul took any part whatever in the propagation of the Gospel after
the first few years ; since we have no testimony to their subsequent
labors at all more definite than that which we have above quoted concern
ing the work of St. Paul after his liberation.
But farther, unless we are prepared to dispute the genuineness of the
Pastoral Epistles,2 we must admit not only that St. Paul was liberated
from his Roman imprisonment, but also that he continued his Apostolic
labors for at least some years afterwards. For it is now admitted by
nearly all those who are competent to decide on such a question,3 first,
1 It has indeed been urged that Origen known history of the Gallican Church, and
knew nothing of the journey to Spain, be- made by a writer of the fifth century. It has
cause Eusebius tells us that he speaks of Paul been also argued by Wieseler that Eusebius
" preaching from Jerusalem to Illyricum," — and Chrysostom were led to the hypothesis of
a manifest allusion to Rom. xv. 19. It is a second imprisonment by their mistaken view
strange that those who use this argument of 2 Tim. iv. 20. But it is equally probable
should not have perceived that they might, that they were led to that view of the passage
with equal justice, infer that Origen was igno- by their previous belief in the tradition of the
rant of St. Paul's preaching at Malta. Still second imprisonment. Nor is their view of
more extraordinary is it to find Wieseler rely- that passage untenable, though we think it
ing on the testimony of Pope Innocent I., who mistaken.
asserts (in the true spirit of the Papacy) 2 On the question of the date of the Pasto-
that " all the churches in Italy, Gaul, Spain, ral Epistles, see Appendix II.
Africa, Sicily, and the interjacent islands, 3 Dr. Davidson is an exception, and has
were founded by emissaries of St. Peter or summed up all that can be said on the oppo-
his successors ; " an assertion manifestly con- site side of the question with his usual ability
tradicting the Acts of the Apostles, and the and fairness. With regard to Wieseler, see

hap Axvn. HIS PERSONAL HISTORY AFTER LIBERATION. 803
that the historical facts mentioned in the Epistles to Timotheus and Titus
cannot be placed in any portion of St. Paul's life before or during his first
imprisonment in Rome ; and, secondly, that the style in which those
Epistles are written, and the condition of the Church described in them,
forbid the supposition of such a date. Consequently, we must acknowl
edge (unless we deny the authenticity of the Pastoral Epistles) that after
St. Paul's Roman imprisonment he was travelling at liberty in Ephesus,1
Crete,2 Macedonia,3 Miletus,4 and Nicopolis,5 and that he was afterwards a
second time in prison at Rome.6
But, when we have said this, we have told nearly all that we know of
the Apostle's personal history, from his liberation to his death. We can
not fix with certainty the length of the time which intervened, nor the
order in which he visited the different places where he is recorded to have
labored. The following data, however, we have. In the first place, his
martrydom is universally said to have occurred 7 in the reign of Nero.
Secondly, Timotheus was still a young man (i. e. young for the charge
committed to him)8 at the time of Paul's second imprisonment at
Rome. Thirdly, the three Pastoral Epistles were written within a few
months of one another.9 Fourthly, their style differs so much from the
style of the earlier Epistles, that we must suppose as long an interval
between their date and that of the Epistle to Philippi as is consistent with
the preceding conditions.
These reasons concur in leading us to fix the last year of Nero as that
of St, Paul's martrydom. And this is the very year assigned to it by
Jerome, and the next to that assigned by Eusebius, the two earliest
writers who mention the date of St. Paul's death at all. We have already
seen that St. Paul first arrived in Rome in the spring of A. D. 61 : we
therefore have, on our hypothesis, an interval of five years between the
period with which St. Luke concludes (a. d. 63) and the Apostle's mar
trydom.10 And the grounds above mentioned lead us to the conclusion
that this interval was occupied in the following manner.
the note in the Appendix, above referred to. 1 1 Tim. i. 3.
fin an able and candid review of this work, 2 Titus i. 5.
which appeared in Kitto's Journal of Sacred 8 1 Tim. i. 3.
Literature, the reviewer has misunderstood our 4 2 Tim. iv. 20.
assertion in the text, on which this is a note. 6 Titus iii. 12.
He states that we have there asserted that 6 2 Tim. i. 16,17.
competent judges are nearly unanimous in ' See the references to Tertullian, Eusebius,
agreeing with our view of the second imprison- Jerome, &c, given below, p. 847, note 1 .
ment. But any one who reads carefully what 8 1 Tim. iii. 2, 2 Tim. ii. 22.
we have written above will perceive that this 9 See remarks on the date of the Pastoral
is not what we have said We have only as- Epistles, in Appendix H.
serted that most competent judges are agreed 10 The above data show us the necessity of
in thinking that the Pastoral Episdes cannot be supposing as long an interval as possible
placed before the first captivity.] between St. Paul's liberation and his second

804 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap, xxvtj.
In the first place, after the long delay, which we have before endeav
ored to explain, St. Paul's appeal came on for hearing before the
Emperor. The appeals from the provinces in civil causes were heard,
not by the Emperor himself, but by his delegates, who were persons of
consular rank : Augustus had appointed one such delegate to hear
appeals from each province respectively.1 But criminal appeals appear
generally to have been heard by the Emperor in person,2 assisted by his
council of Assessors. Tiberius and Claudius had usually sat for this
purpose in the Forum ; 3 but Nero, after the example of Augustus,
heard these causes in the Imperial Palace,4 whose ruins still crown
the Palatine. Here, at one end of a splendid hall,5 lined with the
precious marbles 6 of Egypt and of Lybia, we must imagine the Caesar
seated, in the midst of his Assessors. These councillors, twenty in num
ber, were men of the highest rank and greatest influence. Among them
were the two consuls,1 and selected representatives of each of the other
great magistracies of Rome.8 The remainder consisted of Senators
chosen by lot. Over this distinguished bench of judges presided the
representative of the most powerful monarchy which has ever existed, —
the absolute ruler of the whole civilized world. But the reverential
awe which his position naturally suggested was changed into contempt
and loathing by the character of the Sovereign who now presided over
that supreme tribunal. For Nero was a man whom even the awful attri
bute of " power equal to the gods " 9 could not render august, except in
title. The fear and horror excited by his omnipotence and his cruelty
were blended with contempt for his ignoble lust of praise, and his shame-
imprisonment. Therefore we must assume 6 Those who are acquainted with Rome
that his appeal was finally decided at the end will remember how the interior of many of
of the " two years " mentioned in Acts xxviii. ' the ruined buildings is lined with a coating of
30, — that is, in the spring of A.D. 63. these precious marbles.
1 Sueton. Oct. 33 ; but Geib thinks this 7 Memmius Regulus and Virginins Rufru
arrangement was not of long duration. were the consuls of the year a.d. 63 (a.tj.'o
2 " Other matters he himself examined and 816). Under some of the Emperors, the con-
decided with his assessors, sitting on the tribu- suis were often changed several times during
nal in the Palatium." (Dio, lv. 27.) This is the year; but Nero allowed them to hold of-
said of Augustus. fice for six months. So that these consuls
8 As to Tiberius, see Dio, lvii. 7 ; and as would still be in office till July.
to Claudius, Dio, lx. 4. 8 Such, at least, was the constitution of
4 Tiberius built a tribunal on the Palatine the council of assessors, according to the ordi-
(Dio, lvii. 7). nance of Augustus, which appears to have
5 Dio mentions that the ceilings of the remained unaltered. See Dio, liii. 21. Also
Halls of Justice in the Palatine were painted see Sueton. Tiber. 55, and the passages of Dio
by Severus to represent the starry sky. The referred to in the notes above.
old Roman practice was for the magistrate to 9 " Diis aequa potestas " was the attribute
sit under the open sky, which probably sug- of the Emperors. (Juv. iv.)
gested this kind of ceiling. Even the Basili
cas were not roofed over (as to their central
nave) till a late period.

«HAP.xxvn. THE TRIAL. 805
less licentiousness. He had not as yet plunged into that extravagance of
tyranny, which, at a later period, exhausted the patience of his subjects,
and brought him to destruction. Hitherto his public measures had been
guided by sage advisers, and his cruelty had injured his own family
rather than the State. But already, at the age of twenty-five, he had
murdered his innocent wife and his adopted brother, and had dyed his
hands in the blood of his mother. Yet even these enormities seem to
have disgusted the Romans less than his prostitution of the Imperial pur
ple, by publicly performing as a musician on the stage and a charioteer
in the circus. His degrading want of dignity, and insatiable appetite for
vulgar applause, drew tears from the councillors and servants of his
house, who could see him slaughter his nearest relatives without remon
strance. Before the tribunal of this blood-stained adulterer, Paul the Apostle
was now brought in fetters, under the custody of his military guard. We
may be sure that he who had so often stood undaunted before the dele
gates of the Imperial throne did not quail when he was at last confronted
with their master. His life was not in the hands of Nero : he knew that
while his Lord had work for him on earth, He would shield him from the
tyrant's sword ; and, if his work was over, how gladly would he " depart
and be with Christ, which was far better." l To him all the majesty of
Roman despotism was nothing more than an empty pageant ; the Impe
rial demigod himself was but one of " the princes of this world, that
come to nought." 2 Thus he stood, calm and collected, ready to answer
the charges of his accusers, and knowing that in the hour of his need it
should be given him what to speak.
The prosecutors and their witnesses were now called forward to sup
port their accusation : 3 for although the subject-matter for decision was
contained in the written depositions forwarded from Judaea by Festus,
yet the Roman law required the personal presence of the accusers and
the witnesses, whenever it could be obtained.4 We already know the
charges 5 brought against the Apostle. He was accused of disturbing
the Jews in the exercise of their worship, which was secured to them by
1 See his anticipations of his trial. Phil. 4 As to the accusers, see above, p. 688,
i. 20-25, and Phil. ii. 17. 2 1 Cor. ii. 6. note 8. Written depositions were received at
8 The order of the proceedings was (1) this period by the Roman Courts, but not
Speech of the prosecutor; (2) Examination where the personal presence of the witnesses
and cross-examination of witnesses for the could be obtained. See also Acts xxiv. 19,
prosecution; (3) Speech of the prisoner; (4) " who ought to have been here present before
Examination and cioss-examination of the thee."
witnesses for the defence. The introduction 6 See Acts xxiv. 5, 6, and xxv. 7, 8, and
of cross-examination was an innovation upon pages 660, 661, and 668.
the old Republican procedure.

806 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap, xxvii.
law; of desecrating their Temple; and, above all, of violating the public
peace of the Empire by perpetual agitation, as the ringleader of a new
and factious sect. This charge 1 was the most serious in the view of a
Roman statesman ; for the crime alleged amounted to majestas, or
treason against the Commonwealth, and was punishable with death.
These accusations were supported by the emissaries of the Sanhedrin,
and probably by the testimony of witnesses from Judaea, Ephesus, Cor
inth, and the other scenes of Paul's activity. The foreign accusers,
however, did not rely on the support of their own unaided eloquence.
They doubtless hired the rhetoric of some accomplished Roman pleader
(as they had done even before the provincial tribunal of Felix) to set off
their cause to the best advantage, and paint the dangerous character of
their antagonist in the darkest colors. Nor would it have been difficult
to represent the missionary labors of Paul as dangerous to the security
of the Roman state, when we remember how ill informed the Roman
magistrates, who listened, must have been concerning the questions
really at issue between Paul and his opponents ; and when we consider
how easily the Jews were excited against the government by any fanati
cal leader who appealed to their nationality, and how readily the king
dom of the Messiah, which Paul proclaimed, might be misrepresented as
a temporal monarchy, set up in opposition to the foreign domination of
Rome. We cannot suppose that St. Paul had secured the services of any
professional advocate to repel such false accusations,2 and put the truth
clearly before his Roman judges. We know that he resorted to no such
method on former occasions of a similar kind. And it seems more con
sistent with his character, and his unwavering reliance on his Master's
promised aid, to suppose that he answered3 the elaborate harangue of
the hostile pleader by a plain and simple statement of facts, like that
which he addressed to Felix, Festus, and Agrippa. He could easily
prove the falsehood of the charge of sacrilege by the testimony of those
1 It must be remembered that the old Re- cert& lege sortitur ; Principum autem et Sena-
publican system of criminal procedure had tus cognitionibus frequens est." (Quintil.
undergone a great change before the time of Inst. Oral. iii. 10.)
Nero. Under the old law (the system of 2 It was most usual, at this period, that
Qucestiones Perpetuae), different charges were both parties should be represented by advo-
tried in distinct courts, and by different magis- cates; but the parties were allowed to conduct
trates. In modern language, a criminal indict- their cause themselves, if they preferred doing
ment could then only contain one count. But so.
thi_ -fas altered under the Emperors; " ut si 8 Probably all St. Paul's judges, on this
quis Sh,crilegii simul et homicidii accusetur ; occasion, were familiar with Greek and there-
quod nunc in publicis judiciis [i. e. those of fore he might address them in his own native
the Qucestiones Perpetuce, which were still not tongue, without the need of an interpreter.
entirely obsolete] non accidit, quoniam Prsetor

chap, xxvii. THE TRIAL. 807
who were present in the Temple ; and perhaps the refutation of this
more definite accusation might incline his judges more readily to attrib
ute the vaguer charges to the malice of his opponents. He would then
proceed to show, that, far from disturbing the exercise of the religio licita
of Judaism, he himself adhered to that religion, rightly understood. He
would show, that, far from being a seditious agitator against the state, he
taught his converts everywhere to honor the Imperial Government, and
submit to the ordinances l of the magistrate for conscience' sake. And,
though he would admit the charge of belonging to the sect of the Naza
renes, yet he would remind his opponents that they themselves acknowl
edged the division of their nation into various sects, which were equally
entitled to the protection of the law ; and that the sect of the Nazarenes
had a right to the same toleration which was extended to those of the
Pharisees and the Sadducees.
We know not whether he entered on this occasion into the peculiar
doctrines of that " sect " to which he belonged ; basing them, as he ever
did, on the resurrection of the dead ; 2 and reasoning of righteousness,
temperance, and judgment to come. If so, he had one auditor at least
who had more need to tremble than even Felix. But doubtless a seared
conscience, and a universal frivolity of character, rendered Nero proof
against emotions which for a moment shook the nerves of a less auda
cious criminal.
When the parties on both sides had been heard,3 and the witnesses all
examined and cross-examined (a process which perhaps occupied several
days) ,4 the judgment of the court was taken. Each of the assessors gave
his opinion in writing to the Emperor, who never discussed the judgment
with his assessors, as had been the practice of better emperors, but, after
reading their opinions, gave sentence according to his own pleasure,5
without reference to the judgment of the majority. On this occasion, it

1 Compare Rom. xiii.' 1-7. 4 Plin. Epist. ii. 11. " The giving of the
2 Compare the prominence given to the proofs continued till the third day ; " and again,
Resurrection in the statement before the San- Ep. iv. 9, " On the following day, Titius, Ho-
hedrin (Acts xxiii. 6), before Felix (Acts xxiv. mullus, and Fronto pleaded admirably for
15), before Festus (Acts xxv. 19), and before Bassus : the proofs occupied four days/'
Agrippa (Acts xxvi. 8). 6 Suet. Nero, 15. This judgment was not
8 We are told by Suetonius, as we have pronounced by Nero till the next day. The
mentioned before, that Nero heard both parties sentence of a magistrate was always given in
on each of the counts of the indictment sepa- writing at this period, and generally delivered
rately, and gave his decision on one count by the magistrate himself. But in the case of
before he proceeded to the next. (Sueton. the Emperor, he did not read his own sentence,
Nero, 15. The proceedings, therefore, which but caused it to be read in his presence by his
we have described in the text, must have been Quaestor.
repeated as many times as there were separate
charges against St. Paul.

808 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap, xxvn
might have been expected that he would have pronounced the condem
nation of the accused ; for the influence of Poppaea had now l reached
its culminating point, and she was, as we have said, a Jewish proselyte.
We can scarcely doubt that the emissaries from Palestine would have
sought access to so powerful a protectress, and demanded her aid2 for
the destruction of a traitor to the Jewish faith ; nor would any scruples
have prevented her from listening to their request, backed as it probably
was, according to the Roman usage, by a bribe. If such influence was
exerted upon Nero, it might have been expected easily to prevail. But we
know not all the complicated intrigues of the Imperial Court. Perhaps
some Christian freedman of Narcissus 3 may have counteracted, through
the interest of that powerful favorite, the devices of St. Paul's antago
nists ; or possibly Nero may have been capriciously inclined to act upon
his own independent view of the law and justice of the case, or to show
his contempt for what he regarded as the petty squabbles of a super
stitious people, by " driving the accusers from his judgment-seat" with
the same feelings which Gallio had shown on a similar occasion.
However this may be, the trial resulted in the acquittal of St. Paul.
He was pronounced guiltless of the charges brought against him, his
fetters were struck off, and he was liberated from his lengthened captivi
ty. And now at last he was free to realize his long-cherished purpose
of evangelizing the West. But the immediate execution of this design
was for the present postponed, in order that he might first revisit some
of his earlier converts, who again needed his presence.
Immediately on his liberation it may reasonably be supposed that he
fulfilled the intention which he had lately expressed (Philem. 22, and
Phil. ii. 24), of travelling eastward through Macedonia, and seeking the
churches of Asia Minor, some of which, as yet, had not seen his face in
the flesh. We have already learnt, from the Epistle to the Colossians,
how much his influence and authority were required among those Asiatic
Churches. We must suppose him, therefore, to have gone from Rome
by the usual route, crossing the Adriatic from Brundusium to Apollonia,
or Dyrrhachium, and proceeding by the great Egnatian road through
Macedonia ; and we can imagine the joy wherewith he was welcomed by
his beloved children at Philippi, when he thus gratified the expectation
which he had encouraged them to form. There is no reason to suppose,
however, that he lingered in Macedonia. It is more likely that he
1 Poppssa's influence was at its height from 8 This Narcissus must not be confounded
the birth to the death of her daughter Claudia, with the more celebrated favorite of Claudius
who was born at the beginning of 63, and lived See Dio, lxiv. 3. The Narcissus here men-
four months. tioned had Christian converts in his establish-
2 See last chapter, p. 785, note 3. ment; see Rom. xvi 11, and note.

chap, xxvii. HE PROCEEDS TO ASIA AND SPAIN. 809
hastened on to Ephesus, and made that city once more his centre of
operations. If he effected his purpose,1 he now for the first time visited
Colossae, Laodicea, and other churches in that region.
Having accomplished the objects of his visit to Asia Minor, he was at
length enabled (perhaps in the year following that of his liberation) to un
dertake his long-meditated journey to Spain. By what route he went, we
know not ; he may either have travelled by way of Rome, which had been
his original intention, or more probably, avoiding the dangers which at
this period (in the height of the Neronian persecution) would have beset
him there, he may have gone by sea. There was constant commercial
intercourse between the East and Massilia (the modern Marseilles) ; and
Massilia was in daily communication with the Peninsula. We may sup
pose him to have reached Spain in the year 64, and to have remained
there about two years ; which would allow him time to establish the
germs of Christian Churches among the Jewish proselytes who were to
be found in all the great cities, from Tarraco to Gades, along the Spanish
coast.2 From Spain St. Paul seems to have returned, in a.d. 66,3 to Ephesus ;
and here he found that the predictions which he had long ago uttered to
the Ephesian presbyters were already receiving their fulfilment. Hereti
cal teachers had arisen in the very bosom of the Church, and were lead
ing away the believers after themselves. Hymenaeus and Philetus were
sowing, in a congenial soil, the seed which was destined in another
century to bear so ripe a crop of error. The East and West were infus
ing their several elements of poison into the pure cup of Gospel truth.
In Asia Minor, as at Alexandria, Hellenic philosophism did not refuse to
blend with Oriental theosophy ; the Jewish superstitions of the Cabala,
and the wild speculations of the Persian magi, were combined with the
Greek craving for an enlightened and esoteric religion. The outward
forms of superstition were ready for the vulgar multitude ; the interpre
tation was confined to the aristocracy of knowledge, the self-styled
Gnostics (1 Tim. vi. 20) ; and we see the tendencies at work among the
latter, when we learn that, like their prototypes at Corinth, they denied
the future resurrection of the dead, and taught that the only true resur
rection was that which took place when the soul awoke from the death of
ignorance to the life of knowledge.4 We recognize already the germ of
those heresies which convulsed the Church in the succeeding century ;
and we may imagine the grief and indignation aroused in the breast of
1 See Philem. 22. Epistles. See remarks in Appendix H. on their
2 Seep. 17. date, an(^ tne Chronological Table given in
8 This hypothesis best explains the subse- Appendix HI.
qnent transactions recorded in the Pastoral 4 See p. 394.

810 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap, xxvii.
St. Paul, when he found the extent of the evil, and the number of Chris
tian converts already infected by the spreading plague.
Nevertheless, it is evident from the Epistles to Timotheus and Titus,
written about this time, that he was prevented by other duties from stay
ing in this Oriental region so long as his presence was required. He left
his disciples to do that, which, had circumstances permitted, he would
have done himself. He was plainly hurried from one point to another.
Perhaps also he had lost some of his former energy. This might well be
the case if we consider all he had endured during thirty years of labor.
The physical hardships which he had undergone were of themselves
sufficient to wear out the most robust constitution ; and we know that his
health was already broken many years before.1 But in addition to these
bodily trials, the moral conflicts which he continually encountered could
not fail to tire down the elasticity of his spirit. The hatred manifested
by so large and powerful a section even of the Christian Church ; the
destruction of so many early friendships ; the faithless desertion of fol
lowers ; the crowd of anxieties which pressed upon him daily, and " the
care of all the Churches," must needs have preyed upon the mental
energy of any man, but especially of one whose temperament was so
ardent and impetuous. When approaching the age of seventy,2 he might
well be worn out both in body and mind. And this will account for the
comparative want of vigor and energy which has been attributed to the
Pastoral Epistles, if there be any such deficiency ; and may perhaps also
be in part the cause of his opposing those errors by deputy, which we
might rather have expected him to uproot by his own personal exertions.
However this may be, he seems not to have remained for any long time
together at Ephesus, but to have been called away from thence, first to
Macedonia,3 and afterwards to Crete ; 4 and immediately on his return
from thence, he appears finally to have left Ephesus for Rome, by way of
Corinth.5 But here we are anticipating our narrative : we must return
to the first of these hurried journeys, when he departed from Ephesus
to Macedonia, leaving the care of the Ephesian Church to Timotheus, and
charging him especially with the duty of counteracting the efforts of
those heretical teachers whose dangerous character we have described.
When he arrived in Macedonia, he found that his absence might pos
sibly be prolonged beyond what he had expected ; and he probably
felt that Timotheus might need some more explicit credential from
himself than a mere verbal commission, to enable him for a longer period
to exercise that Apostolic authority over the Ephesian Church wherewith
1 See Gal. iv. 13, 14, and 2 Cor. xii. 7-9. 8 Tim. i. 3.
2 See p. 59, and compare Philem. 9 and the 4 Titus i. 5.
Chronological Table in Appendix III. 6 2 Tim. iv. 20

«hap. xxvn. FIRST EPISTLE TO TIMOTHEUS. 811
he had invested him. It would also be desirable that Timotheus should
be able, in his struggle with the heretical teachers, to exhibit document
ary proof of St. Paul's agreement with himself, and condemnation of the
opposing doctrines. Such seem to have been the principal motives which
led St. Paul to despatch from Macedonia that which is known as " the
First Epistle to Timothy ; " in which are contained various rules for the
government of the Ephesian Church, such as would be received with sub
mission when thus seen to proceed directly from its Apostolic founder,
while they would perhaps have been less readily obeyed if seeming to be
the spontaneous injunctions of the youthful Timotheus. In the same
manner it abounds with impressive denunciations against the false teach
ers at Ephesus, which might command the assent of some who turned a
deaf ear to the remonstrances of the Apostolic deputy. There are also
exhortations to Timotheus himself, some of which perhaps were rather
meant to bear an indirect application to others, at the time, as they have
ever since furnished a treasury of practical precepts for the Christian
Church. THE FIRST EPISTLE TO TIMOTHEUS.1 L
salutation. PAUL, an Apostle of Jesus Christ, by command of God our 1
Saviour and Christ Jesus 2 our hope, To Timotheus my true son in 3 2
FAITH. Grace, mercy, and peace, from God our Father, and Christ Jesus our
Lord. As I desired thee to remain in Ephesus,4 when I was setting 3
Timotheus is r "
th^commiB- out for Macedonia, that thou mightest command certain per-
mm foTppose SOns not to teach 5 falsely, nor to regard fables and endless 6
the false J
teachers. genealogies, which furnish ground for disputation rather than 4
for the exercising of the stewardship 7 of God in faith.
Now the end of the commandment is love, proceeding from a pure 5
heart, and good conscience, and undissembled faith. Which some have 6
l For the date of this Epistle, see Appen- 6 This Greek word occurs nowhere but in
dix jj this Epistle.
2 " Lord " is omitted in the best MSS. 6 See p. 396, and Titus iii. 9.
8 Not "the faith" (A. V.), which would ' "Stewardship" (not " edifying" ) is the
require the definite article. reading of the MSS. Compare 1 Cor. ix. 17.
4 This sentence is left incomplete. Prob- It would seem from this expression that the
ably St. Paul meant to complete it by " so I false teachers in Ephesus were among the num-
still desire thee," or something to that effect ; ber of the presbyters, which would agree with
but forgot to express this, as he continued to the anticipation expressed in Acts xx. 30.
dictate the subjects of his charge to Timo
theus.

812 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. ohap.xxvh,
I. missed, and have turned aside to vain babbling, desiring to be teachers
7 of the Law,1 understanding neither what they say nor whereof they
8 affirm. But we know that the Law is good if a man use it lawfully;
9 knowing this, that the 2 Law is not made for a 3 righteous man, but for
the lawless and disobedient, for the impious and sinful, for the unholy
10 and profane, for parricides 4 and murderers, for fornicators, sodomites,
slave-dealers,5 liars, perjurers, and whatsoever else is contrary to sound
11 doctrine. Such is the glorious Glad-tidings of the blessed God, which
was committed to my trust.
12 And I thank Him who has given me strength, Christ Jesus The commis
sion aud cali-
our Lord, that He accounted me faithful, and appointed me to ing of Paul.
13 minister unto His service, who was before a blasphemer and persecutor,
and doer of outrage ; but I received mercy because I acted ignorantly,
14 in unbelief. And the grace of our Lord abounded beyond 6 measure,
15 with faith and love which is in Christ Jesus. Faithful is the saying,1 and
worthy of all acceptation, " Christ Jesus came into the world to save sin-
16 ners ; " of whom I am first. But for this cause I received mercy, that in
me first Jesus Christ might show forth all His long-suffering, for a pattern
17 of those who should hereafter believe on Him unto life everlasting. Now
to the King eternal,8 immortal, invisible, the only 9 God, be honor and
glory unto the ages of ages. Amen.
18 This charge I commit unto thee, son Timotheus, accord-
19 ing to the former prophecies 10 concerning thee; that in the enjoined to
r r ° fuifli his com-
strength thereof thou mayest fight the good fight, holding faith mSaBlon-
1 We must observe that this expression 4 This word in English includes parricides
may be taken in two ways ; either to denote and matricides, both of which are expressed in
Judaizers, who insisted on the permanent obli- the original.
gation of the Mosaic Law (which seems to suit 6 This is the literal translation.
the context best), or to denote Platonizing ex- 6 Compare Rom. v. 20, " the gift of grace
pounders of the Law, like Philo, who pro- overflowed beyond."
fessed to teach the true and deep view of the 7 See note on iii. 16.
Law. To suppose (with Baur) that a Gnostic 8 This seems the best interpretation of
like Marcion, who rejected the Law altogether, " king of the ages; " compare Apoc. xi. 15.
could be called " a teacher of the Law," is (to 9 " Wise " is omitted in the best MSS.
say the least of it) a very unnatural hy- i» These prophecies were probably made at
pothesis. the time when Timotheus was first called to
2 The noun in the original is without the the service of Christ. Compare Acts xiii 1,
article here, as often when thus used. Com- 2, when the will of God for the mission of
pare Rom. ii. 12, iii. 31, iv. 13, &c. Paul and Barnabas was indicated by the
3 Compare Gal. v. 18, " If ye are led by Prophets of the Church of Antioch.
the Spirit, ye are not under the Law," and the
note on that passage.

CHAP. XXVII.

FIRST EPISTLE TO TIMOTHEUS.

813

and a good conscience, which some have cas*- away, and made shipwreck
concerning the faith. Among whom are Hyinenaeus l and Alexander, 20
#hom I delivered over unto Satan 2 that they might be taught by 3 pun
ishment not to blaspheme.
Directions for I exhort, therefore, that, first of all,4 supplications, prayers, 1
public wor- . .
ship, and the intercessions, and thanksgivings be made for all men; for 2
behavior of o o
women"1 kings 5 and all that are in authority, that we may lead a quiet
and peaceable life in all godliness 6 and gravity. For this is 3
good and acceptable in the sight of God our Saviour, who wills that all 4
men should be saved, and should come to the knowledge 7 of the truth.
For [over all] there is but 8 one God, and one mediator between God and 5
men, the man9 Christ Jesus, who gave Himself a ransom for all men, to 6
be testified in due time. And of this testimony I was appointed herald 7
and apostle (I speak the truth in Christ, I lie not), a teacher of the Gen
tiles, in faith and truth. I desire, then, that in every place 10 the men u 8
should offer up prayers, lifting up their hands 12 in holiness, putting away

1 These are probably the same mentioned
in the second Epistle (2 Tim. ii. 17, and iv.
14). Baur and De Wette argue that this pas-
gage is inconsistent with the hypothesis that
2 Tim. was written after 1 Tim. ; because Hy
menaeus (who in this place is described as
excommunicated and cut off from the Church)
appears in 2 Tim. as a false teacher still
active in the Church. But there is nothing at
all inconsistent in this ; for example, the inces
tuous man at Corinth, who had the very same
sentence passed on him (1 Cor. v. 5), was
restored to the Church in a few months, on
his repentance. De Wette also says, that, in
2 Tim. n. 17, Hymenseus appears to be men
tioned to Timotheus for the first time; but this
(we think) will not be the opinion of any one
who takes an unprejudiced view of that pas
sage. 2 On this expression, see the note on 1 Cor.
v. 5. 8 The Greek verb has this meaning. Cf.
Luke xxiii. 16, and 2 Cor. vi. 9.
4 " First of all," namely, before the other
prayers. This explanation, which is Chrysos-
tom's, seems preferable to that adopted by De
Wette, Huther, and others, who take it to
mean "above all things." It is clear from

what follows (v. 8) that St. Paul is speaking
of public prayer, which he here directs to be
commenced by intercessory prayer.
6 Here we see a precept directed against the
seditious temper which prevailed (as we have
already seen, p. 399) among some of the early
heretics. Compare Jude 8, and 2 Pet. ii. 9,
and Rom. xiii. 1.
6 This term for Christian piety is not used
by St. Paul, except in the Pastoral Epistles.
We must refer here to the Appendix in the
larger editions. See note on Tit. i. 9. It is
used by St. Peter (2 Pet. i. 6) and by Clemens
Romanus in the same sense.
7 For the meaning of this, compare 2 Tim.
iii. 7, and Rom. x. 2, and 1 Cor. xiii. 12.
8 This is the same sentiment as Rom. iii.
29, 30.
9 The manhood of our Lord is here insisted
on, because thereon rests His mediation. Com
pare Heb. ii. 14, and iv. 15.
10 Chrysostom thinks that there is a contrast
between Christian worship, which could be
offered in every place, and the Jewish sacrifices,
which could only be offered in the Temple.
11 The men, not the women, were to officiate.
12 This was the Jewish attitude in prayer
Cf. Ps. lxiii. 4.

S14

THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL.

CHAP. XXVIi

1 •
9 anger and disputation. Likewise, also, that the women should come in
seemly apparel, and adorn themselves with modesty and self-restraint ; 2
10 not in braided hair, or gold, or pearls, or costly garments, but (as befits
11 women professing godliness) with the ornament of good works. Let
12 women learn in silence, with entire submission. But I permit not a wo
man to teach, nor to claim authority over the man, but to keep silence.
13,14 (For Adam was first formed, then Eve. And Adam was not deceived ;
15 but the woman was deceived, and became a transgressor.) But women
will be saved 3 by the bearing of children ; if they continue in faith and
... love and holiness, with self-restraint.
m- 1 Faithful is the saying, "If a man seeks the office of a Bishop,4 .
2 he desires a good work." A Bishop,5 then, must be free from mlnt^Pres-
reproach, the husband6 of one wife, sober, self-restrained, y
3 orderly, hospitable,7 skilled in teaching ; not given to wine or brawls,'
4 but gentle, peaceable, and liberal ; ruling his own household well, keep-
5 ing his children in subjection with all gravity — (but if a man knows not
how to rule his own household, how can he take charge of the Church of

1 After women we must supply pray (as
Chrysostom does), or something equivalent
(to take part in the worship, &c), from the pre
ceding context.
2 It is a peculiarity of the Pastoral Epistles
to dwell very frequently on this virtue of self-
restraint. A list of such peculiarities is given
in the Appendix in the larger editions.
5 The Greek here cannot mean " in child-
bearing" (A. V.). The Apostle's meaning
is, that women are to be kept in the path of
safety, not by taking upon themselves the
office of the man (by taking a public part in
the assemblies of the Church, &c), but by the
performance of the peculiar functions which
God has assigned to their sex.
4 It should not be forgotten that the word
litionmoc is used in the Pastoral Epistles as
synonymous with irpeapiirepoc. See p. 378,
and Tit. i. 5, compared with i. 7.
6 Rightly translated in A. V. "a bishop,"
not " the bishop," in spite of the article. See
note on Tit. i. 7.
6 " Husband of one wife." Compare iii.
12, v. 9, and Tit. i. 6. Many different inter
pretations have been given to this precept. It
has been supposed ( 1 ) to prescribe marriaee,

(2) to forbid polygamy, (3) to forbid second
marriages. The true interpretation seems to
be as follows : — In the corrupt facility of
divorce allowed both by the Greek and Roman
law, it was very common for man and wife to
separate, and marry other parties, during the
life of one another. Thus a man might have
three or four living wives ; or, rather, women
who had all successively been his wives. An
example of the operation of a similar code is
unhappily to be found in our own colony of
Mauritius : there the French Revolutionary
law of divorce has been suffered by the Eng
lish government to remain unrepealed ; and
it is not uncommon to meet in society three or
four women who have all been the wives of the
same man, and three or four men who have all
been the husbands of the same woman. We
believe it is this kind of successive polygamy,
rather than simultaneous polygamy, which is
here spoken of as disqualifying for the Presby-
terate. So Beza.
7 " Hospitable." Compare Heb. xiii. 2, and
v. 10. 8 The allusion to " filthy lucre " is omitted
in th( best MSS.

^hat- xxvii. FIRST EPISTLE TO TIMOTHEUS. 815 iii.
God?) — not a novice, lest he be blinded with pride, and fall into the 6
condemnation of the Devil. Moreover, he ought to have a good reputa- 7
tion among those who are without the Church ; lest he fall into reproach,
and into a snare of the Devil.1
Directions for Likewise, the Deacons must be men of gravity, not double- 8
ment^ifea- tongued, not given to much wine, not greedy of gain, holding
cons. the mystery of the faith in a pure conscience. And let these 9
also be first tried, and after trial be made Deacons, if they are found 10
irreproachable. Their wives,2 likewise, must be women of gravity, not 11
slanderers, sober and faithful in all things. Let the Deacons be hus- 12
bands of one wife, fitly ruling their children and their own households.
For those who have well performed the office of a Deacon gain for them- 13
selves a good position,3 and great boldness in the faith of Christ Jesus. '¦
These things I write to thee, although I hope to come to 14
Reason for ° or
direeu^nsto6 tnee shortly ; but in order that (if I should be delayed) thou 15
mayst know how to conduct thyself in the house of God (for
such is the Church of the living God) 4 as a pillar and main-stay of the
truth. And, without contradiction, great is the mystery of godliness — 16
iiQ-odi was manifested in the flesh, justified6 in the Spirit; beheld by angels,
1 See note on 2 Tim. ii. 26. their principles, which was of great advantage
2 We agree with Huther in thinking the to them afterwards, and to the Church of
Authorized Version correct here, notwithstand- which they were subsequently to become
ing the great authority of Chrysostom in an- Presbyters.
cient, and De Wette and others in modern 4 In this much-disputed passage, we adopt
times, who interpret " women " here to mean the interpretation given by Gregory of Nyssa.
"deaconesses." On that view, the verse is most So the passage was understood (as Canon
unnaturally interpolated in the midst of the Stanley observes) by the Church of Lyons
discussion concerning the Deacons. [This is (a.d. 177) ; for in their Epistle the same ex-
hardly so, if we view the Primitive Diaconate pression is applied to Attalus the Martyr. So,
as consisting of two co-ordinate branches, », also, St. Paul speaks of the chief Apostles at
diaconate of men and a diaconate of women. Jerusalem as "pillars" (Gal. ii. 9); and so,
We observe, too, that nothing is said above of in Apoc. iii. 12, we find the Christian who is
the duties of the wives of the Bishops. Our undaunted by persecution described as " a pil-
three chief modern commentators in England, lar in the Temple of God." The grammatical
Alfjrd, Ellicott, and Wordsworth, interpret objection to Gregory's view is untenable ; and
' the verse before us as it was interpreted by a Greek writer of the 4th century may be at
Chrysostom and Jerome. — H.] least as good » judge on this point as his
8 This verse is introduced by " for " as modern opponents.
giving a reason for the previous directions, viz. 6 We retain the Received Text here, con-
the great importance of having good deacons J sidering, that, when the testimony of the MSS.
such men, by the fit performance of the office, is so divided, we are justified in retaining the
sained a high position in the community, and text most familiar to English readers.
acquired (by constant intercourse with different 6 i. e. justified against gainsayers, as being
¦classes of men) a boldness in maintaining what He claimed to be.

816 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap. xxvn.
iv
preached among the Gentiles; believed on in the world, received up in
glory." 1
1 Now the Spirit declares expressly, that in after-times some False teachera
to be ex-
will depart from the faith, giving heed to seducing spirits, and peiied; their
2 teachings of demons, speaking 2 lies in hypocrisy, having their ^aeot ™-
3 conscience seared ; hindering marriage,8 enjoining abstinence
from meats, which God created to be received with thanksgiving by those
4 who believe and have 4 knowledge of the truth. For all things created
by God are good, and nothing is to be rejected, if it be received with
5 thanksgiving. For it is sanctified by the Word of God 5 and prayer.
6 In thus instructing the brethren, thou wilt be a good servant of Jesus
Christ, nourishing thyself with the words of the faith and good doctrine
7 which thou hast followed. Reject the fables of profane and doting teach-
8 ers, but train thyself 6 for the contests of godliness. For the training of
the body is profitable for a little ; but godliness is profitable for all
9 things, having promise of the present life, and of the life to come. Faith-
10 ful is the saying, and worthy of all acceptation, — "Porto this end we
endure labor and reproach, because we have set our hope on the living God,
who is the saviour of ali'' mankind, specially of the faithful."
1 There can be little doubt that this is a 6 We have a specimen of what is meant by
quotation from some Christian hymn or creed. this verse in the following beautiful " Grace
Such quotations in the Pastoral Epistles (of before Meat," which was used in the primitive
which there are five introduced by the same Church : " Blessed art Thou, O Lord, who
expression, "faithful is the saying") corre- feedest me from my youth, who givest food
spond with the hypothesis that these Epistles unto all flesh. Fill our hearts with joy and
were among the last written by St. Paul. gladness, that always having all sufficiency we
2 " Speaking lies " is most naturally taken may abound unto every good work, in Christ
with " demons ; " but St. Paul, while gram- Jesus our Lord, through whom be glory, hon-
matically speaking of the demons, is really or, and might unto Thee for ever. Amen."
speaking of the false teachers who acted under ¦ (Apostolical Constitutions, vii. 49.) The expres-
their impulse. sion " Word of God " probably implies that
8 With regard to the nature of the heresies the thanksgiving was commonly made in some
here spoken of, see pp. 394-397. We observe Scriptural words, taken, for example, out of
a strong admixture of the Jewish element the Psalms, as are several expressions in the
(exactly like that which prevailed, as we have above Grace.
seen, in the Colossian heresies) in the prohibi- 6 It seems, from a comparison of this with
tion of particular kinds of food ; compare verse the following verse, that the false teachers laid
4, and Col. ii. 16, and Col. ii. 21, 22. This great stress on a training of the body by ascet-
shows the very early date of this Epistle, and ic practices. For the metaphorical language,
contradicts tne hypothesis of Baur as to its borrowed from the contests of the Palaestra,
origin At the same iiuie there is also an compare 1 Cor. ix. 27, and p. 585.
Anti-Judaical element, as we have remarked 7 The prominence given to this truth of
above, p. 397, note 2. the universality of salvation in this Epistle
4 See note on 1 Tim. ii. 4. (compare ii. 4) seems to imply that it was

chap. xxvn. FIRST EPISTLE TO TIMOTHEUS. 817
• lv-
Dutios of These things enjoin and teach ; let no man despise thy 11
youth,1 but make thyself a pattern of the faithful, in word, jn 12
life, in love,2 in faith, in purity. Until I come, apply thyself to pub- 13
lie 3 reading, exhortation, and teaching. Neglect not the gift that is in 14
thee, which was given thee by prophecy * with the laying-on of the hands
of the Presbytery. Let these things be thy care ; give thyself wholly to 15
them ; that thy improvement may be manifest to all men. Give heed to 16
thyself and to thy teaching ; continue steadfast therein.5 For in so doing
thou shalt save both thyself and thy hearers. v.
Rebuke not an aged 6 man, but exhort him as thou wouldst a father ; 1
treat young men as brothers ; the aged women as mothers ; the young as 2
sisters, in all purity.
widows are Pay due regard 7 to the widows who are friendless in their 3
to be support
ed- widowhood. But if any widow has children or grandchildren, 4
let them learn to show their godliness first 8 towards their own household,
and to requite their parents ; for this is acceptable 9 in the sight of God.
The widow who is friendless and desolate in her widowhood sets her hope 5
on God, and continues in supplications and prayers night and day ; but g
she who lives in wantonness is dead while she lives ; and hereof do thou 7
admonish them, that they may be irreproachable. But if any man pro- g
vide not for his own,10 and especially for his kindred, he has denied the
faith, and is worse than an unbeliever.
Qualifications A widow, to be placed upon the u list, must be not less 9
of widows on
the list. fljan sixty years of age, having been the wife of one hus-
denied by the Ephesian false teachers. So the may most naturally be referred to the preced-
Gnostics considered salvation as belonging ing these things.
only to the enlightened few, who, in their 6 Chrysostom has remarked that we must
system, constituted a kind of spiritual anstoc- not take "elder" here in its official sense;
racy. See p. 395. compare the following " elder women."
1 Compare 2 Tim. ii. 22, and the remarks 7 The widows were from the first supported
in Appendix H. out of the funds of the Church. See Acts vi. 1.
2 The words " in spirit" are omitted in the 8 First: i. e. before they pretend to make
best MSS professions of godliness in other matters, let
8 This does not mean reading in the sense them show its fruits towards their own kindred.
of study, but reading aloud to others ; the books * The best MSS. omit " good and."
so read were (at this period) probably those of 10 His own would include his slaves and de-
the Old Testament, and perhaps the earlier pendants. So Cyprian requires the Christian
masters to tend their sick slaves in i pesti-

4 Compare with this passage 1 Tim. i. 18, lence.
d the note U *' 's a disPuted point what list is referred
6 This in them is very perplexing; but it to in this word; whether (1) it means the list
52

818

THE LIFE AND EPISTLES QP ST. PAUL.

chap. xxvn.

10 band ; J she must be well reported of for good deeds, as one who has
brought up children, received strangers with hospitality, washed the feet of
the saints, relieved the distressed, and diligently followed every good work.
11 But younger widows reject ; for when they have become wanton against
12 Christ, they desire to marry ; and thereby incur condemnation, because
13 they have broken their former 2 promise. Moreover, they learn 3 to be
idle, wandering about from house to house ; and not only idle, but
tattlers also and busy-bodies, speaking things which ought not to be
14 spoken. I wish therefore that younger widows should marry, bear chil
dren, rule their households, and give no occasion to the adversary for
15 reproach. For already some of them have gone astray after Satan.
16 If there are widows dependent on any believer (whether man or
woman), let those on whom they depend relieve them, and let not the
Church be burdened with them ; that it may relieve the widows who are
destitute.
17 Let the Presbyters who perform their offices well be counted Government
of the Presby-
worthy of a twofold honor,4 especially those5 who labor in ters.

of widows to be supported out of the charitable
fund, or (2) the list of deaconesses (for which
office the age of sixty seems too old), or (3)
the body of church-widows mentioned by Tertul
lian and by other writers, as a kind of female
Presbyters, having a distinct ecclesiastical posi
tion and duties. The point is discussed by De
Wette, Hither, and Wiesinger. We are dis
posed to take a middle course between the first
and third hypotheses ; by supposing, viz., that
the list here mentioned was that of all the
widows who were officially recognized as sup
ported by the Church ; but was not confined to
such persons, but included also richer widows,
who were willing to devote themselves to the
offices assigned to the pauper widows. It has
been argued that we cannot suppose that needy
widows who did not satisfy the conditions of
verse 9 would be excluded from the benefit of
the fund ; nor need we suppose this ; but since
all could scarcely be supported, certain condi
tions were prescribed, which must be satisfied
before any one could be considered as officially
entitled to a place on the list. From the class
of widows thus formed, the subsequent " body
of widows " would naturally result. There is
not the slightest ground for supposing that wid-
oios here means virgins, as Baur has imagined

His opinion is well refuted by Wiesinger and
De Wette.
1 For the meaning of this, see note on iii. 2.
2 The phrase means to break a promise, and
is so explained by Chrysostom, and by Augus
tine. Hence we see that, when a widow was
received into the number of church-widows, a
promise was required from her (or virtually
understood) that she would devote herself for
life to the employments which these widows
undertook ; viz. the education of orphans, and
superintendence of the younger women. There
is no trace here of the subsequent ascetic disap
probation of second marriages, as is evident from
verse 14, where the younger widows are ex
pressly desired to marry again. This also con
firms our view of the " wife of one husband."
See note on iii. 2.
8 The construction is peculiar, but not un
exampled in classical Greek.
4 Honor here seems (from the next verse)
to imply the notion of reward. Compare the
verb honor in verse 3 above. Upon a misinter
pretation of this verse was founded the dis
gusting practice, which prevailed in the third
century, of setting a double portion of meat
before the Presbyters, in the feasts of love.
s In pp. 378, 379. we observed that the

chap. xxvn. FIRST EPISTLE TO TIMOTHEUS. 819 v.
speaking and teaching. For the Scripture saith, " Cbuu S&alt Xiot 18
mnult % 02 ijjal txtUatfy ant % COXIX ; " x and, " The laborer is worthy
of his hire." 2
Against a Presbyter receive no accusation except on the testimony 3 of 19
two or three witnesses. Rebuke the offenders in the presence of all, 20
that others also may fear. I adjure thee, before God and4 Christ Jesus 21
and the chosen 5 angels, that thou observe these things without prejudice
against any man, and do nothing out of partiality.
ordinaUon. Lay hands hastily on no man, nor make thyself6 a partaker 22
in the sins committed by another. Keep thyself pure.
Particular Drink no longer water only, but use a little wine for the 23
and general
cautions. sajje 0f ^y stomach, and thy frequent maladies.
[In thy decisions remember that] the sins of some men are manifest 24
beforehand, and lead the way to their condemnation ; but the sins of
others are not seen till afterwards. Likewise, also, the good deeds of 25
some men are conspicuous ; and those which thev conceal cannot be
kept hidden.
Saves8 of ^et those who are under the yoke as bondsmen esteem their vi. 1
masters worthy of all honor, lest reproach be brought upon the name of
God and His doctrine. And let those whose masters are believers not 2
despise them because they are brethren, but serve them with the more
subjection, because they who claim1 the benefit are believing and
beloved. Thus teach thou, and exhort.
rebukedtt-°ber8 ^ any man *eac'1 faisely>8 ana< consent not to the sound 3
offices of presbyter and teacher were united, at prudence, Deut. xix. 5, and appealed to by St.
the date of the Pastoral Epistles, in the same Paul, 2 Cor. xiii. 1.
persons ; which is shown by apt to teach being 4 Lord is omitted by the best MSS.
a qualification required in a Presbyter, 1 Tim. s By the chosen angels are probably meant
iii. 2. But though this union must in all cases those especially selected by God as His mes-
have been desirable, we find, from this passage, sengers to the human race, such as Gabriel.
that there were still some presbyters who were 6 The meaning of the latter part of this
not teachers, i. e. who did not perform the office verse is, that Timotheus, if he ordained unfit
of public instruction in the congregation, persons (e. g. friends or relations) out of par-
This is another strong proof of the early date tiality, would thereby make himself » partici-
of the Epistle. Pator in their sins-
i This quotation (Deut. xxv. 4) is applied 7 The A. V. is inconsistent with the pres
to the same purpose, 1 Cor. ix. 9 (where the ence of the Greek definite article. The verb
words are quoted in a reverse order). The here used has the sense of claim in classical
LXX. agrees with 1 Cor. ix. 9. Greek, though not elsewhere in the N. T.
2 T ke x 7 8 '^ne section from verses 9 to 10 is a gen
ii This rule is founded on the Mosaic juris- era! warning against the false teachers, as it

820 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap. xxvu.
vi. 4 words of our Lord Jesus Christ, and to the godly doctrine, he ^ 00vet0,1B
is blinded with pride, and understands nothing, but is filled with a
sickly1 appetite for disputations and contentions about words, whence
5 arise envy, strife, reproaches, evil suspicions, violent collisions 2 of men
whose mind is corrupted, and who are destitute of the truth ; who
6 think that godliness 3 is a gainful trade.4 But godliness with content-
7 ment is truly gainful ; for we brought nothing into the world, and it is
8 certain we can carry nothing out ; but having food and shelter, let us be
9 therewith content. They who seek for riches fall into temptations and
snares and many foolish and hurtful desires, which drown men in ruin
10 and destruction. For the love of money is the root of all evils ; and
some, coveting it, have been led astray from the faith, and pierced them
selves through with many sorrows.
11 But thou, 0 man of God, flee these things; and follow to:^0aieus.
after righteousness, godliness, faith, love, steadfastness,5 meekness.
12 Fight the good fight 6 of faith, lay hold on eternal life, to which thou T
wast called, and didst confess the good 8 confession before many wit-
13 nesses. I charge thee in the presence of God who gives life to all things,
and Christ Jesus who bore testimony under Pontius Pilate 9 to the good
14 confession, that thou keep that which thou art commanded, spotlessly
evident from the whole context. It is a mis- 8 The A. V. here reverses the true order,
take to refer the " false teaching " to some and violates the law of the article.
(imaginary) teachers who are supposed by some 4 The words " From such withdraw thy-
to have preached the abolition of slavery. self " are not found here in the best MSS.
There is no evidence or probability whatever 5 xhe meaning is, steadfast endurance under
that such teachers existed; although it was persecution.
natural that some of the Christian slaves 6 Here we have another of those metaphors
themselves should have been tempted to " de- from the Greek games, so frequent with St
spise " their believing masters, with whom they Paul. See 2 Tim. iv. 7.
were now united by so holy a bond of brother- 7 "Also " is omitted by the best MSS.
hood; a bond which contained in itself the 8 "The (not a) good confession" means
seeds of liberty for the slave, destined to ripen the confession of faith in Jesus as the Christ.
in due time. It would scarcely have been ne- (Compare Rom. x. 10.) Timotheus had prob-
cessary to say this, but that a teacher of divinity bably been a confessor of Christ in persecu-
has lately published a statement that " St. tion, either at Rome or elsewhere ; or it is pos-
Paul's epistles condemn attempts to abolish sible that the allusion here may be to his bap-
slavery, as the work of men 'proud, knowing tism.
nothing' (1 Tim. vi. 2-4)." See Rational God- 9 For this use of "witness" or "testify"
liness .- by R. Williams, D.D., p. 303. with the accusative, compare John iii. 32,
1 Sickly is the antithesis to sound above. " What he hath seen, that he testifieth." Our
Similar phraseology is found in Plato. Lord testified before Pontius Pilate that He
2 The original meaning of the nncom- was the Messiah.
pounded word (taking the reading of the best
MSS.) is friction.

chap-xxvu. ST. PAUL VISITS CRETE. 821 vi.
and irreproachably, until the appearing of our Lord Jesus Christ ; wiiich 15
shall in due time be made manifest by the blessed and only l Potentate,
the King of kings, and Lord of lords ; who only hath immortality, dwell- 16
ing in light unapproachable ; whom no man hath seen, nor can see ; to
whom be honor and power everlasting. Amen.
rich68 °f the Charge those who are rich in this present world, not to be 17
high-minded, nor to trust in uncertain riches, but in 2 God, who provides
all things richly for our use. Charge them to practise benevolence, to 18
be rich in good works, to be bountiful and generous, storing up for them- 19
selves a good foundation for the time to come, that they may lay hold on
eternal 8 life.
Snre6-'18 0 Timotheus, guard 4 the treasure which is committed to 20
co^u^8°on.hli, thy trust, and avoid the profane babblings and antitheses * of
the falsely-named " Knowledge ; " 8 which some professing, have erred 21
concerning the faith.
%2*%3L Grace be Tri*1* thee-7
The expectations which St. Paul expressed in the above letter, of a
more prolonged absence from Ephesus, could scarcely have been ful
filled ; for soon after 8 we find that he had been in Crete (which seems
to imply that, on his way thither, he had passed through Ephesus), and
was now again on his way westwards. We must suppose, then, that he
1 Only. This seems to allude to the same " babblings '' and the " contentions about
polytheistic notions of incipient Gnosticism words " ascribed to the heretics above, vi. 4)
which are opposed in Col. i. 16. is to suppose that St. Paul here speaks, not of
2 " Living " is omitted by the best MSS. the doctrines, but of the dialectical and rhetori-
8 The majority of MSS. read tlie true life, cal arts of the false teachers.
which is equivalent to the Received Text. 6 From this passage we see that the here
4 The treasure here mentioned is probably tics here opposed by St. Paul laid claim to a
the pastoral office of superintending the peculiar philosophy, or " Gnosis." Thus they
Church of Ephesus, which was committed by were Gnostics, at all events in name; how far
St. Paul to Timotheus. Cf. 2 Tim. i. 14. their doctrines agreed with those of later Gnos-
« " Antitheses." There is not the slight- tics is a further question. We have before
est ground (as even De Wette allows) for sup- seen that there were those at Corinth (1 Cor.
posing, with Baur, that this expression is to viii. 1, 10, 11) who were blamed by St. Paul
be understood of the contrarice oppositiones (or for claiming a high degree of " Gnosis ; " and
contrasts between Law and Gospel) of Mar- we have seen him condemn the "philosophy"
aon. If there be an allusion to any Gnostic of the heretics at Colossse (Col. ii. 8), who
toctrines at all, it is more probable that it is to appear to bear the closest resemblance to those
iU dualistic opposition between the principles condemned in the Pastoral Epistles. See pp.
,*f good and evil in the world, which was an 393-101.
Oriental element in the philosophy of some of ' " Amen " is not found in the best MSS.
<he early Gnostics. But the most natural in- 8 See remarks on the date of the Pastoral
toprention (considering the junction with Epistles, Appendix II.

822 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap, xxvii.
returned shortly from Macedonia to Ephesus, as he hoped, though doubt
fully, to be able to do when he wrote to Timotheus. From Ephesus, as
we have just said, he soon afterwards made an expedition to Crete. It
can scarcely be supposed that the Christian Churches of Crete were first
founded duriug this visit of St. Paul ; on the contrary, many indications
in the Epistle to Titus show that they had already lasted for a consider
able time. But they were troubled by false teachers, and probably had
never yet been properly organized, having originated, perhaps, in the
private efforts of individual Christians, who would have been supplied
with a centre of operations and nucleus of Churches by the numerous
colonies of Jews established in the island.1 St. Paul now visited them in
company with Titus,2 whom he left in Crete as his representative on his
departure. He himself was unable to remain long enough to do what
was needful, either in silencing error, or in selecting fit persons as
presbyters of the numerous scattered Churches, which would manifestly
be a work of time. Probably he confined his efforts to a few of the
principal places, and empowered Titus to do the rest. Thus, Titus was
left at Crete in the same position which Timotheus had occupied at
Ephesus during St. Paul's recent absence ; and there would, consequent
ly, be the same advantage in his receiving written directions from St.
Paul concerning the government and organization of the Church, which
we have before mentioned in the case of Timotheus. Accordingly,
shortly after leaving Crete, St. Paul sent a letter to Titus, the outline of
which would equally serve for that of the preceding Epistle. But
St. Paul's letter to Titus seems to have been still further called for, to
meet some strong opposition which that disciple had encountered while
attempting to carry out his master's directions. This may be inferred
from the very severe remarks against the Cretans which occur in the
Epistle, and from the statement, at its commencement, that the very
object which its writer had in view, in leaving Titus in Crete, was that
he might appoint Presbyters in the Cretan Churches ; an indication that
1 Philo mentions Crete as one of the seats word of the Cretans, when they fought against
of the Jewish dispersion; see p. 17. [For the the Venetians, who came under the standard
introduction of Christianity into the island in of St. Mark. The Venetians themselves,
connection with St. Paul, see the art. " Crete " when here, " seem to have transferred to him
in the Diet, of the Bible. — h.] part of that respect, which, elsewhere, would
2 For the earlier mention of Titus, see probably have been manifested for Mark alone.
above, pp. 512, 513. There is some interest in During the celebration of several great fesn
mentioning the traditionary recollections of vals of the Church, the response of the Latin
him which remain in the island of Crete. One clergy of Crete, after the prayer for the Doge
Greek legend says that he was the nephew of of Venice, was Sancte Marce, tu nos adjuva ;
a proconsul of Crete, another that he was de- but, after that for the Duke of Candia, Sancte
scended from Minos. The cathedral of Me- Tite, tu nos adjuva." Pashley's Travels in Crete,
galo-Castron on the north of the island was vol. i. pp. 6 and 175.
dedicated to him. His name was the watch-

CHAP, xxvn,

EPISTLE TO TITUS.

823

his claim to exercise this authority had been disputed. This Epistle
seems to have been despatched from Ephesus at the moment when
St. Paul was on the eve of departure on a westward journey, which was
to take him as far as Nicopolis x (in Epirus) before the winter. The fol
lowing is a translation of this Epistle : —

THE EPISTLE TO TITUS.2
salutation. . PAUL, a bondsman of God. and an Apostle of Jesus Christ, i. 1
— sent forth3 to bring God's chosen to faith, and to the4 knowledge of
the truth which is according to godliness,5 with hope of eternal life, 2
which God, who cannot lie, promised before eternal times6 (but He 3
made known His word in due season, in the message1 committed to my
trust by the command of God our Saviour), — To Trrus, mt true son in 4
OUR COMMON FAITH.
Grace and peace 8 from God our Father, and the Lord Jesus Christ
our Saviour. This was the [very] cause 9 why I left thee in Crete, that 5
thou mightest further 10 correct what is deficient, and appoint
Presbyters in every city, as I gave thee commission. No man 6
must be appointed a Presbyter, but he who is without re-
6i presbyters. proaca5 ^he husband of one wife,11 having believing children
who are not accused of riotous living, nor disobedient ; for a 12 Bishop 7

Commissionof Titus to
regulate the
Cretan Churches.

Qualifications

1 See below, p. 827, note 3.
2 For the date of this Epistle, see Ap
pendix II.
8 The original here is perplexing, but
seems to admit of no other sense than this, an
apostle sent forth on an errand of faith. Com
pare 2 Tim. i. 1, "an apostle sent forth to
proclaim the promise of life." The involved
and parenthetical style of this salutation re
minds us of that to the Romans, and is a
strong evidence of the genuineness of this
Epistle. 4 See note on 1 Tim. ii. 4.
s Godliness. See note on 1 Tim. ii. 2.
6 Before eternal times ; meaning, probably,
in the old dispensation : cf. Rom. xvi. 25, and
note on 2 Tim. i. 9.
7 Literally, proclamation.
B The best MSS. omit mercy here.
9 This commencement seems to indicate (as
we have above remarked) that, in exercising

the commission given to him by St. Paul for
reforming the Cretan Church, Titus had been
resisted. 10 Not simply " set in order " (as in A. V.),
but " set in order farther."
11 This part of the Presbyter's qualifications
has been very variously interpreted. See note
on 1 Tim. iii. 2.
12 Rightly translated in A. V. " a " (not
the) " bishop," because the article is only used
generically. So, in English, "the reformer
must be patient : " equivalent to " a reformer,"
Sec. We see here a proof of the early date of
this Epistle in the synonymous use of emoitorToc
and npeopvrepo; ; the latter word designating
the rank, the former the duties, of the Presby
ter. The best translation here would be the
term overseer, which is employed in the A. V.
as a translation of imoitcmoc, Acts xx. 28 ; but.
unfortunately, the term has associations in
modern English which do not permit of its

824: THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap, xxvii.
must be free from reproach, as being a steward of God ; not self-willed,
not easily provoked, not a lover of wine, not given to brawls, not greedy
,. 8 of gain ; but hospitable to x strangers, a lover of good men, self-restrained,5
9 just, holy, continent ; holding fast the words which are faithful to our
teaching, that he may be able both to exhort others in the sound 2 doc
trine, and to rebuke the gainsayers.
10 For there are many disobedient babblers and deceivers, thus must
oppose the
specially they of the Circumcision, whose mouths need3 bit false teachers.
11 and bridle ; for they subvert whole houses, by teaching evil, for the love
12 of shameful gain. It was said by one of themselves, a prophet4 of their
own, — " Always liars and beasts are the Cretans, and inwardly sluggish."
13 This testimony is true. Wherefore rebuke8 them sharply, that they
14 may be sound in faith, and may no more give heed to Jewish fables,6 and
15 precepts7 of men who turn away from the truth. To the pure all
things are pure ; 8 but to the polluted and unbelieving nothing is pure,
16 but both their understanding and their conscience is polluted. They
profess to know God, but by their works they deny Him, being abomi
nable and disobedient, aud worthless 9 for any good work.
being thus nsed here. Compare with this pas- " Jewish " element appears distinctly in the
sage 1 Tim. iii. 2. Colossian heretics (" Sabbaths," Col. ii. 16),
1 Cf. 3 John 5, 6. In the early Church, although it is not seen in the Epistles to Timo-
Christians travelling from one place to another thy. Comp. iii. 9, and see p. 397.
were received and forwarded on their journey 8 It would seem from this that the heretics
by their brethren ; this is the " hospitality " attacked taught their followers to abstain from
so often commended in the N. T. certain acts, or certain kinds of food, as being
2 The Appendix in the larger editions con- impure. We must not, however, conclude from
tains a list of words peculiarly used in the this that they were Ascetics. Superstitions
Pastoral Epistles. Among them are these abstinence from certain material acts is quite
words. compatible with gross impurity of teaching and
8 The word literally denotes to put a bit and of practice, as we see in the case of Hindoo
bridle upon a horse. devotees, and in those impure votaries of Cybele
* Epimenides of Crete, a poet who lived in and of Isis mentioned so often in Juvenal and
the 6th century b. c, is the author quoted. other writers of the same date. The early
His verseB were reckoned oracular, whence the Gnostics, here attacked, belonged apparently
title " prophet." So by Plato he is called " a to that class who borrowed their theosophy
divinely-inspired man," and by Plutarch "a from Jewish sources ; and the precepts ofabsti
man dear to the gods." nence which they imposed may probably have
6 Rebuke : this seems to refer to the same been derived from the Mosaic law. Their im-
word in v. 9. morality is plainly indicated by the following
6 Fables. See note on 1 Tim. iv. 7. words.
7 These precepts were probably those men- 9 Literally, unable to stand the test ; i. e. when
tioned 1 Tim. iv. 3, and Col. ii. 16-22. The tested by the call of duty, they fail.

•chap. xxvn. EPISTLE TO TITUS. 825 ii.
Directions to But do thou speak conformably to the sound doctrine. 1
Titus how he r J
aoBe'ofeS? Exhort the aged men to be sober, grave, self-restrained, sound 2
andsexes? in faith, in love, in steadfastness. Exhort the aged women, 3
likewise, to let their deportment testify of holiness, not to be slanderers,
not to be enslaved by drunkenness, but to give good instruction ; that 4
they may teach discretion to the younger women, leading them to be
loving wives and loving mothers, self-restrained, chaste, keepers at home, 5
amiable and obedient to their husbands, lest reproach be brought upon
the Word of God. In like manner, do thou exhort the young men to 6
Hiso con- self-restraint. And show thyself in all things a pattern of 7
duot' good works; manifesting in thy teaching uncorruptness,
gravity,1 soundness of doctrine not to be condemned, that our adversa- 8
Duties of ' r*es may ^e shamed, having no evil to say against us.2 Exhort 9
' " ' bondsmen to obey their masters, and to strive to please them
in all things, without gainsaying ; not purloining, but showing all good 10
fidelity, that they may adorn the doctrine of God our Saviour in all
General mo- things. For the grace of God has been made manifest, bring- 11
tives of
Christianity, fog salvation to all s mankind ; teaching us to deny ungodli- 12
ness and earthly lusts, and to live temperately, justly, and godly in this
present world ; looking for that blessed hope,4 the appearing of the glory 13
of the great God, and our5 Saviour Jesus Christ', who gave Himself for 14
us, that He might redeem us from all iniquity, and purify us unto Him
self, as a " jrmiliar pople," 6 zealous of good works. These things 15
speak, and exhort and rebuke with all authority. Let no man despise thee.
Duty towards Remind 7 them to render submission to magistrates and iii. 1
andVtowards authorities, to obey the Government, to be ready for every
unbelievers
generally. g00(j work? to speak evil of no man, to avoid strife, to act 2
1 The best MSS. omit the word translated withstanding the omission of the article before
" sincerity " in A. V. " Saviour." We must not be guided entirely
2 Us (not you) is the reading of the best by the rules of classical Greek in this matter.
jyjsS. Comp. 2 Thess. i. 12.
8 This statement seems intended to contra- 6 This expression is borrowed from the Old
diet the Gnostic notion that salvation was Testament, Deut. vii. 6, Deut. xiv. 2, and
given to the enlightened alone. It should be other places. (LXX.)
observed that the definite article of T. R. is ' St. Paul himself had no doubt insisted on
omitted by some of the best MSS. the duty of obedience to the civil magistrate
4 Compare the same expeotation expressed when he was in Crete. The Jews throughout
Rom viii. 18-25. the Empire were much disposed to insubordi-
6 The A. V. here is probably correct, not- nation at this period.

826 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap. xxvn.
3 with forbearance, and to show all meekness to all men. For we our
selves also were formerly without understanding, disobedient and led
astray, enslaved to all kinds of lusts and pleasures, living in malice and
4 in envy, hateful and hating one another. But when God our Saviour
5 made manifest His kindness and love of men, He saved us, not through
the works of righteousness which we had done, but according to His own
mercy, by the laver1 of regeneration, and the renewing of the Holy
6 Spirit, which He richly poured forth upon us, by Jesus Christ our
7 Saviour; that, being justified by His grace, we might become heirs,
8 through2 hope, of life eternal. Faithful is the saying,3 and Titusmusten-
force good
these things I desire thee to affirm, "Let them that have be- J^]^^
9 lieved in God be careful to practise good works." These things teachers-
are good and profitable to men : but avoid foolish disputations,4 and
genealogies,5 and strifes and contentions concerning the 6 Law, for they
10 are profitless and vain. A sectarian,' after two admonitions, reject,
11 knowing that such a man is perverted, and by his sins is self-con
demned.
12 When I send Artemas or Tychicus 8 to thee, endeavor to Special direc.
come to me to Nicopolis ; 9 for there I have determined to Titus's jour-
neytoNicopo
13 winter. Forward Zenas the lawyer and Apollos on their us-
14 journey zealously, that they may want for nothing. And let our people
also 10 learn to practise good works, ministering to the necessities of
others, that they may not be unfruitful.
1 The word does not mean " washing " from which our term " heresy " comes is used
(A. V.), but laver ; i. e. a vessel in which wash- by St. Paul, in his earlier writings, simply for
ing takes place. a religious sect, sometimes (as Acts xxvi. 5)
2 Through hope is explained by Rom. viii. without disapprobation, sometimes (as 1 Cor.
24, 25. xi. 19) tn a bad sense; here we find its deriva-
8 The " saying '' referred to is supposed by tive (which occurs here and nowhere else in
some interpreters to be the statement which the N. T.) already assuming a bad sense, akin
precedes (from 3 to 7). These writers main- to that which it afterwards bore. It should
tain that it is ungrammatical to refer " Faith- be also observed that these early heretics
ful is the saying " to the following, as is done united moral depravity with erroneous teach-
in A. V. But this objection is avoided by ing ; their works bore witness against their
taking " that " as a part of the quotation. The doctrine ; and this explains the subsequent
usage is similar in Eph. v. 33. " by his sins he is self-condemned." See pp.
* Disputations: see 1 Tim. vi. 4, and 2 Tim. 397-399.
ii. 23. 8 Cf. Col. iv. 7.
6 See 1 Tim. i. 4. 9 See p. 827, note 3.
6 Compare precepts (i. 14), and teachers of 10 i. e. the Cretan Christians were to aid in
the Law. 1 Tim. i. 7. furnishing Zenas and Apollos with all that
7 Sectarian. We have seen that the word they needed.

chap, xxvii. WINTER AT NICOPOLIS. 827 iii.
salutations. All that are with me salute thee. Salute those who love us 15
in faith.
be°nne°Sl. Grace be with you all.1
We see from the above letter that Titus was desired to join St. Paul at
Nicopolis, where the Apostle designed to winter. We learn, from an in
cidental notice elsewhere,2 that the route he pursued was from Ephesus to
Miletus, where his old companion Trophimus remained behind from sick
ness, and thence to Corinth, where he left Erastus, the former treasurer
of that city, whom, perhaps, he had expected, or wished, to accompany
him in his farther progress. The position of Nicopolis 3 would render it
a good centre for operating upon the surrounding province ; and thence
St. Paul might make excursions to those Churches of Illyricum which he
perhaps 4 founded himself at an earlier period. The city which was thus
chosen as the last scene of the Apostle's labors, before his final imprison
ment, is more celebrated for its origin than for its subsequent history. It
was founded by Augustus, as a permanent memorial of the victory of
Actium, and stood upon the site of the camp occupied by his land-forces
before that battle. We learn, from the accounts of modern ' travellers,
that the remains upon the spot still attest the extent and importance of
the " City of Victory." " A long lofty wall spans a desolate plain ; to
the north of it rises, on a distant hill, the shattered scena of a theatre ;
and, to the west, the extended though broken line of an aqueduct con
nects the distant mountains, from which it tends, with the main subject
of the picture, the city itself." 5 To people this city, Augustus uprooted
the neighboring mountaineers from their native homes, dragging them by
his arbitrary compulsion " from their healthy hills to this low and swampy
plain." It is satisfactory to think (with the accomplished traveller from
whom the above description is borrowed) that, " in lieu of the blessings
of which they were deprived, the Greek colonists of Nicopolis were con
soled with one greater than all, when they saw, heard, and talked with
the Apostle who was debtor to the Greeks."
It seems most probable, however, that St. Paul was not permitted to
spend the whole of this winter in security at Nicopolis. The Christians
1 The "Amen" is omitted in the best 5 See Wordsworth's Greece, pp. 229-232,
jjgg where a map of Nicopolis will be found, and
2 g Tim iv. 20. an interesting description of the ruins. See
8 It is here assumed that the Nicopolis, also Leake's Northern Greece, vol. i. p. 178,
ipoken of Titus iii. 12, was the city of that and vol. iii. p. 491 ; and Merivale's Rome, vol.
name in Epirus. There were other places of iii. pp. 327, 328. In Bowen's Mount Athos
the same name ; but they were comparatively and Epirus (p. 211), there is also a notice of
insignificant. its P"1861" de8olate MPect-
4 See above, pp. 515 and 579.

828 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap.hvj
were now far more obnoxious to the Roman authorities than formerly.
They were already distinguished from the Jews, and could no longei
shelter themselves under the toleration extended to the Mosaic religion.
So eminent a leader of the proscribed sect was sure to find enemies every
where, especially among his fellow-countrymen ; aud there is nothing
improbable in supposing that, upon the testimony of some informer, he
was arrested J by the magistrates of Nicopolis, and forwarded to Rome 2 for
trial. The indications which we gather from the Second Epistle to Timo
theus render it probable that this arrest took place not later than 3 mid
winter, and the authorities may have thought to gratify the Emperor by
forwarding so important a criminal immediately to Rome. It is true that
the navigation of the Mediterranean was in those times suspended during
the winter ; but this rule would apply only to longer voyages, and not to
the short passage 4 from Apollonia to Brundusium. Hence, it is not un
likely that St. Paul may have arrived at Rome some time before spring.
In this melancholy journey he had but few friends to cheer him. Titus
had reached Nicopolis, in obedience to his summons ; and there were
others also, it would seem, in attendance on him ; but they were scattered
by the terror of his arrest. Demas forsook him, " for love of this present
world," 6 and departed to Thessalonica ; Crescens6 went to Galatia on the
same occasion. We are unwilling to suppose that Titus could have
yielded to such unworthy fears, and may be allowed to hope that his
journey to the neighboring Dalmatia 7 was undertaken by the desire of
St. Paul. Luke,8 at any rate, remained faithful, accompanied his master
once more over the wintry sea, and shared the dangers of his imprison
ment at Rome.
This imprisonment was evidently more severe than it had been five
years before. Then, though necessarily fettered to his military guard, he
had been allowed to live in his own lodgings, and had been suffered to

1 It may be asked, why was he not arrested 8 The reason for supposing this is, that it
sooner, in Spain or Asia Minor t The expla- leaves more time for the events which inter-
nation probably is, that he had not before vened between St. Paul's arrest and his death,
ventured so near Italy as Nicopolis. which took place (if in Nero's reign) not
2 The law required that a prisoner should later than June. If he had not been arrested
be tried by the magistrates within whose juris- till the spring, we must crowd the occurrences
diction the offence was alleged to have been mentioned in the Second Epistle to Timothy
committed ; therefore, a prisoner accused of into a very short space.
conspiring to set fire to Rome must be tried at 4 Even an army was transported across
Rome. There can be no doubt that this the Adriatic by Caesar, during the season of
charge must have formed one part of any the " Mare Clausum," before the battle of
accusation brought against St. Paul, after 64 Philippi. See also p. 274.
a.d. Another part (as we have suggested 6 2 Tim. iv. 10. • Ibid.
below) may have been the charge of introdu- 7 Ibid. See above, p. 515
cing a religio novaet illicita. 8 2 Tim. iv. 11.

ihap. xxvn. SECOND ROMAN IMPRISONMENT. 829
preach the Gospel to a numerous company who came to hear him. Now
he is not only chained, but treated " as a malefactor." ' His friends,
indeed, are still suffered to visit him in his confinement ; but we hear
nothing of his preaching. It is dangerous and difficult2 to seek his
prison ; so perilous to show any public sympathy with him, that no Chris
tian ventures to stand by him in the court of justice.3 And, as the final
stage of his trial approaches, he looks forward to death as his certain
sentence.4 This alteration in the treatment of St. Paul exactly corresponds with
that which the history of the times would have led us to expect. We
have concluded that his liberation took place early in a. d. 63 : he was
therefore far distant from Rome when the first imperial persecution of
Christianity broke out, in consequence of the great fire in the summer
of the following year. Then first, as it appears, Christians were recog
nized as a distinct body, separate both from Jews and heathens ; and their
number must have been already very great at Rome to account for the
public notice attracted towards a sect whose members were, most of them,
individually so obscure in social position.5 When the alarm and indig
nation of the people were excited by the tremendous ruin of a conflagra
tion, which burnt down almost half the city, it answered the purpose of
Nero (who was accused of causing the fire) to avert the rage of tho
populace from himself to the already hated votaries of a new religion.
Tacitus 6 describes the success of this expedient, and relates the suffer-
1 2 Tim. ii. 9. According to the legends the liberal donations of the prince, could efface
of the Mediaeval Church, St. Paul was im- from the minds of men the prevailing opinion
prisoned in the Mamertine Prison, together that Rome was set on fire by his own orders.
with St. Peter ; see the Martyrology of Baro- The infamy of that horrible transaction still
nius, under March 14. But there is no early adhered to him. In order, if possible, to re-
authority for this story, which seems irrecon- move the imputation, he determined to trans-
cilable with the fact that Onesiphorus, Clau- fer the guilt to others. For this purpose he
dia, Linus, Pudens, &c., had free access to St. punished, with exquisite torture, a race of men
Paul during his imprisonment. It seems more detested for their evil practices, by vulgar ap-
likely [see 2 Tim. i. 16] that he was again pellation commonly called Christians. The
under military custody, though of a severer name was derived from Christ, who, in the
nature than that of his former imprisonment. reign of Tiberius, suffered under Pontius
We have given a view of the Tullianum, or Pilate, the procurator of Judasa. By that
dungeon of the Mamertine Prison, in p. 297. event, the sect, of which he was tho founder,
Very full details will be found in Sir. W. received a blow which for a time checked the
Gell's work on Rome and its neighborhood. growth of a dangerous superstition ; but it re-
2 2 Tim. i. 1 6. vived soon after, and spread with recruited
s 2 Tim. iv. ]S. vigor, not only in Judaea, the soil that gave it
* 2 Tim. iv. 6-8. birth, but even in the city of Rome, the com-
s j Qor- j, 26. mon smk into which every thing infamous and
6 Tac. Ann. xv. 44. We give the well- abominable flows like a torrent from all quar-
known passage from a popular translation : — ters of the world. Nero proceeded with his
" But neither these religious ceremonies, nor usual artifice. He found a set of profligate

830

THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OP ST. PAUL.

CHAP. XXVU

inga of the Christian martyrs, who were put to death with circumstances
of the most aggravated cruelty. Some were crucified ; some disguised
in the skins of beasts, and hunted to death with dogs ; some were
wrapped in robes impregnated with inflammable materials, and set on
fire at night, that they might serve to illuminate the circus of the Vatican
and the gardens of Nero, where this diabolical monster • exhibited the
agonies of his victims to the public, and gloated over them himself,
mixing among the spectators in the costume of a charioteer. Brutalized
as the Romans were by the perpetual spectacle of human combats in the
amphitheatre, and hardened by popular prejudice against the " atheisti
cal " sect, yet the tortures of the victims excited even their compassion.
" A very great multitude," as Tacitus informs us, perished in this man
ner ; and it appears from his statement that the mere fact of professing
Christianity was accounted sufficient l to justify their execution ; the
whole body of Christians being considered as involved in the crime of
firing the city. This, however, was in the first excitement which followed
the fire ; and even then, probably but few among those who perished were
Roman citizens.2 Since that time, some years had passed, and now a

and abandoned wretches, who were induced to
confess themselves guilty ; and, on the evidence
of such men, a number of Christians were
convicted, not, indeed, upon clear evidence of
their having set the city on fire, but rather on
account of their sullen hatred of the whole
Roman race. They were put to death with
exquisite cruelty, and to their sufferings Nero
added mockery and derision. Some were cov
ered with the skins of wild beasts, and left to
be devoured by dogs ; others were nailed to
the cross ; numbers were burnt alive ; and
many, covered over with inflammable matter,
were lighted up, when the day declined, to
serve as torches during the night. For the
convenience of seeing this tragic spectacle,
the emperor lent his own gardens. He added
the sports of the circus, and assisted in person,
sometimes driving a curricle, and occasionally
mixing with the rabble in his coachman's dress.
At length the cruelty of these proceedings
filled every breast with compassion. Human
ity relented in favor of the Christians. The
manners of that people were, no doubt, of a
pernicious tendency, and their crimes called for
the hand of justice; but it was evident that
they fell a sacrifice, not for the public good, but
to glut the rage and cruelty of one man only."
1 It was criminal, according to the Roman
'aw, to introduce into Rome any religio nova et

itticita. Yet, practically, this law was seldom
enforced, as we see by the multitude of foreign
superstitions continually introduced into Rome,
and the occasional and feeble efforts of the
Senate or the Emperor to enforce the law.
Moreover, the punishment of those who of
fended against it seems only to have been ex
pulsion from the city, unless their offence had
been accompanied by aggravating circumstan
ces. It was not, therefore, under this law
that the Christians were executed ; and, when
Suetonius tells us that they were punished as
professors of a superstitio nova et malefica, we
must interpret his assertion in accordance
with the more detailed and accurate statement
of Tacitus, who expressly says that the vic
tims of the Neronian persecution were con
demned on the charge of arson. Hence the
extreme cruelty of their punishment, and espe
cially the setting them on fire.
2 No doubt most of the victims who per
ished in the Neronian persecution were for
eigners, slaves, or freedmen ; we have already
seen how large a portion of the Roman Church
was of Jewish extraction (see p. 543, n. 3).
It was illegal to subject a Roman citizen to the
ignominious punishments mentioned by Taci
tus; but probably Nero would not have re
garded this privilege in the case of freedmen,
although by their emancipation they hui. be-

chap.xxvti. HIS FINAL TRIAL. 831
decent respect would be paid to the forms of law, ih dealing with one
who, like St. Paul, possessed the privilege of citizenship. Yet we can
quite understand that a leader of so abhorred a sect would be subjected
to a severe imprisonment.
We have no means of knowing the precise charge now made against
the Apostle. He might certainly be regarded as an offender against the
law which prohibited the propagation of a new and illicit religion (religio
nova et illicita) among the citizens of Rome. But, at this period, one
article of accusation against him must have been the more serious charge
oe having instigated the Roman Christians to their supposed act of
incendiarism, before his last departure from the capital. It appears that
" Alexander the brass-founder" (2 Tim. iv. 14) was either one of his
accusers, or, at least, a witness against him. If this was the same with
the Jewish1 Alexander of Ephesus (Acts xix. 33), it would be probable
that his testimony related to the former charge. But there is no proof
that these two Alexanders were identical. We may add, that the em
ployment of Informer (delator) was now become quite a profession at
Rome, and that there would be no lack of accusations against an unpopu
lar prisoner as soon as his arrest became known.
Probably no long time elapsed, after St. Paul's arrival, before his cause
came on for hearing. The accusers, with their witnesses, would be
already on the spot ; and on this occasion he was not to be tried by the
Emperor in person,2 so that another cause of delay,3 which was often
interposed by the carelessness or indolence of the Emperor, would be
removed. The charge now alleged against him probably fell under the
cognizance of the city Prefect (Praefectus Urbi), whose jurisdiction daily
encroached, at this period, on that of the ancient magistracies.4 For we
must remember, that, since the time of Augustus, a great though silent
change had taken place in the Roman system of criminal procedure.
The ancient method, though still the regular and legal system, was
rapidly becoming obsolete in practice. Under the Republic, a Roman
citizen could theoretically be tried on a criminal charge only by the
Sovereign People ; but the judicial power of the people was delegated,
by special laws, to certain bodies of Judges, superintended by the
come Roman citizens. And we know that the 2 Clemens Romanus says that Paul, on
Jewish population of Rome had, for the most this occasion, was tried " before the presiding
part, a Servile origin ; see pp. 335, 739. magistrates." Had the Emperor presided, he
1 An Alexander is also mentioned, 1 Tim. would probably have said " before Caesar."
i. 20, as a heretic, who had been excommuni- 8 See above, p. 746.
cated by St. Paul. This is, probably, the * The authority for this, and for all the
same person with the Alexander of 2 Tim. iv. points of Roman Law referred to in this chap-
14 • and if so, motives of personal malice ter, is given in our larger editions.
would account for his conduct.

832 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap.xxvii,
several Praetors. Thus one Praetor presided at trials for homicide,
another at trials for treason, and so on.1 But the presiding magistrate
did not give the sentence : his function was merely to secure the legal
formality of the proceedings. The judgment was pronounced by the
Judices, a large body of judges (or rather jurors) chosen (generally by
lot) from amongst the senators or knights, who gave their vote, by ballot,
for acquittal or condemnation. But under the Empire this ancient
system, though not formally abolished, was gradually superseded. The
Emperors from the first claimed supreme2 judicial authority, both civil
and criminal. And this jurisdiction was exercised not only by them
selves, but by the delegates whom they appointed. It was at first
delegated chiefly to the Prefect of the city ; and though causes might,
up to the beginning of the second century, be tried by the Praetors in the
old way, yet this became more and more unusual. In the reign of Nero,
it was even dangerous for an accuser to prosecute an offender in the
Praetor's instead of the Prefect's court.3 Thus the trial of criminal
charges was transferred from a jury of independent Judices to a single
magistrate appointed by a despot, and controlled only by a Council of
Assessors, to whom he was not bound to attend.
Such was the court before which St. Paul was now cited. We have
an account of the first hearing of the cause from his own pen. He
writes thus to Timotheus immediately after : — " When I was first heard
in my defence, no man stood by me, but all forsook me, — I pray that it
be not laid to their charge. Nevertheless the Lord Jesus stood by me,
and strengthened my heart ; that by me the proclamation of the Glad-
tidings might be accomplished in full measure, and that all the Gentiles
might hear ; and I was delivered out of the lion's mouth." We see from
this statement, that it was dangerous even to appear in public as the
friend or adviser of the Apostle. No advocate would venture to plead
his cause, no procurator* to aid him in arranging the evidence, no
patronus (such as he might have found, perhaps, in the powerful
1 This was the system of Qucestiones Per- again refer it to the Tribunitian power con-
petuce. ferred upon the Emperor, which was extended
2 The origin of this jurisdiction is not (as we have seen) so as to give him a supreme
so clear as that of their appellate jurisdiction, appellate jurisdiction, and by virtue of which
which we have explained above Some writers he might perhaps bring before his tribunal any
hold that the Emperor assumed the supreme cause in the first instance which would ulti-
judicial power as an incident of his quasi-dic- mately come under his judgment by appeal.
tutorial authority. Others think that it was 8 Tacitus relates that Valerius Ponticus
theoretically based upon a revival of that sum- was banished under Nero, because he had
mary jurisdiction which was formerly (in the brought some accused persons before the Prae-
earliest ages of the Commonwealth) exercised tor instead of the Prefect. Ann. xiv. 41.
by the great magistrates whose functions were 4 The procurator performed the functions
now concentrated in the Emperor. Others of our attorney.

CHAPX3C™- HIS FINAL TRIAL. 833
¦iEmilian l house) to appear as his supporter, and to deprecate,2 accord
ing to ancient usage, the severity of the sentence. But he had a more
powerful intercessor, and a wiser advocate, who could never leave him
nor forsake him. The Lord Jesus was always near him, but now was
felt almost visibly present in the hour of his need.
From the above description we can realize in some measure the
external features of his last trial. He evidently intimates that he spoke
before a crowded audience, so that " all the Gentiles might hear ; " and
this corresponds with the supposition, which historically we should be led
to make, that he was tried in one of those great basilicas which stood in
the Forum. Two of the most celebrated of these edifices were called
the Pauline Basilicas, from the well-known Lucius iEmilius Paulus, who
had built one of them, and restored the other. It is not improbable that
the greatest man who ever bore the Pauline name was tried in one of
these. From specimens which still exist, as well as from the descriptions
of Vitruvius, we have an accurate knowledge of the character of these
halls of justice. They were rectangular buildings, consisting of a central
nave and two aisles, separated from the nave by rows of columns. At
one end of the nave was the tribune,3 in the centre of which was placed
the magistrate's curule chair of ivory, elevated on a platform called the
tribunal. Here also sat the Council of Assessors, who advised the
Prefect upon the law, though they had no voice in the judgment. On
the sides of the tribune were seats for distinguished persons, as well as
for parties engaged in the proceedings. Fronting the presiding magis
trate stood the prisoner, with his accusers and his advocates. The public
was admitted into the remainder of the nave and aisles (which was railed
off from the portion devoted to the judicial proceedings) ; and there were
also galleries along the whole length of the aisles, one for men, the other
for women.4 The aisles were roofed over ; as was the tribune. The
nave was originally left open to the sky. The basilicas were buildings
of great size, so that a vast multitude of spectators was always present
at any trial which excited public interest.
1 We have already (p. 138) suggested the XXV. Here the tribune is rectangular; in
possibility of a connection of clientship between others it was semicircular.
Paul's family and this noble Roman house. 4 Pliny gives a lively description of the
2 It was the custom, both in the Greek and scene presented by a basilica at an interesting
Roman courts of justice, to allow the friends trial : " A dense ring, many circles deep, sur-
of the accused to intercede for him, and to rounded the scene of trial. They crowded
endeavor by their prayers and tears to move close to the judgment-seat itself, and even in
the feelings of his judges. This practice was the upper part of the basilica botn men and
gradually limited under the Imperial regime. women pressed close in the eager desire to see
8 The features of the basilica will be best (which was easy) and to hear (which was diffi-
understood by the ground-plan of that of cult)." Plin. Ep. vi. 83.
Pompeii, which is given at the end of Ch.
63

834 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chai.xxvij.
Before such an audience it was that Paul was now called to speak in
his defence. His earthly friends had deserted him, but his Eeavenly
Friend stood by him. He was strengthened by the power of Christ's
Spirit, and pleaded the cause not of himself only, but of the Gospel.
He spoke of Jesus, of His death and His resurrection, so that all the
Heathen multitude might hear. At the same time, he successfully de
fended himself from the first1 of the charges brought against him, which
perhaps accused him of conspiring with the incendiaries of Rome. He
was delivered from the immediate peril, and saved from the ignominious
and painful death 2 which might have been his doom had he been con
victed on such a charge.
He was now remanded to prison to wait for the second stage of his
trial. It seems that he himself expected this not to come on so soon as
it really did ; or, at any rate, he did not think the final decision would
be given till the following 3 winter, whereas it actually took place about
midsummer. Perhaps he judged from the long delay of his former trial ;
or he may have expected (from the issue of his first hearing) to be again
acquitted on a second charge, and to be convicted on a third. He cer
tainly did not expect a final acquittal, but felt no doubt that the cause
would ultimately result in his condemnation. We are not left to con
jecture the feelings with which he awaited this consummation ; for he
has himself expressed them in that sublime strain of triumphant hope
which is familiar to the memory of every Christian, and which has
nerved the hearts of a thousand martyrs. " I am now ready to be
offered, and the time of my departure is at hand. I have fought the good
fight, I have finished my course, I have kept the faith. Henceforth is
laid up for me the crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous
Judge, shall give me in that day." He saw before him, at a little dis
tance, the doom of an unrighteous magistrate, and the sword of a blood
stained executioner ; but he appealed' to the sentence of a juster Judge,
who would soon change the fetters of the criminal into the wreath of the
1 The hypothesis of an .acquittal on the that under the Imperial system the practice of
first charge agrees best with the being delivered Ampliatio was discontinued. So also was the
from the mouth of the lion (2 Tim. iv. 17). We Comperendinatio abolished, by which certain
have seen that it was Nero's practice (and trials were formerly divided into a prima actio
therefore, we may suppose, the practice of the and secunda actio. We cannot therefore agree
Prefects under Nero) to hear and decide each with Wieseler in supposing this " first defence "
branch of the accusation separately ( Suet Ner. to indicate an Ampliatio or Comperendinatio.
15, before cited). Had the trial taken place 2 See the account given by Tacitus (above
under the ancient system, we might have sup- quoted) of the punishment of the supposed
posed an Ampliatio, which took place when the incendiaries. In the case of such a crime,
judices held the evidence insufficient, and gave probably, even a Roman citizen would not
tbe verdict Non liquet, in which case the trial have been exempted from such punishments.
was commenced de novo ; but Geib has shown 8 2 Tim. iv. 21 .

eaAP.xxvn. HE IS REMANDED TO PRISON. 835
conqueror ; he looked beyond the transitory present ; the tribunal of
Nero faded from his sight ; and the vista was closed by thi judgment-
seat of Christ.
Sustained by such a blessed and glorious hope — knowing, as he did,
that nothing in heaven or in earth could separate him from the love of
Christ — it mattered to him but little if he was destitute of earthly
sympathy. Yet still, even in these last hours, he clung to the friendships
of early years ; still the faithful companionship of Luke consoled him in
the weary hours of constrained inactivity, which, to a temper like his,
must have made the most painful part of imprisonment. Luke was the
only one x of his habitual attendants who now remained to minister to
him : his other companions had left him, probably before his arrival at
Rome. But one friend from Asia, Onesiphorus,2 had diligently sought
him out, and visited him in his prison, undeterred by the fear of danger
or of shame. And there were others, some of them high in station, who
came to receive from the chained malefactor blessings infinitely greater
than all the favors of the Emperor of the world. Among these were
Linus, afterwards a bishop of the Roman Church ; Pudens, the son of a
senator ; and Claudia, his bride, perhaps the daughter of a British king.3
But however he may have valued these more recent friends, their society
could not console him for the absence of one far dearer to him : he
longed with a paternal longing to see once more the face of Timotheus,
his beloved son. The disciple who had so long ministered to him with
filial affection might still (he hoped) arrive in time to receive his parting
words, and be with him in his dying hour. But Timotheus was far dis
tant, in Asia Minor, exercising apparently the same function with which
he had before been temporarily invested. Thither, then, he wrote to him,
desiring him to come with all speed to Rome, yet feeling how uncertain
it was whether he might not arrive too late. He was haunted also by
another fear, far more distressing! Either from his experience of the
desertion of other friends, or from some signs of timidity which Timo
theus 4 himself had shown, he doubted whether he might not shrink from
i 2 Tim. iv. 11. If we suppose Tychicus British Church. See especially pp. 21-54,
the bearer of the Second Epistle to Timothy 77-83, and 108-120.
(2 Tim. iv. 12), he also would have been with 4 We cannot say with certainty where
St. Paul at Rome till he was despatched to Timotheus was at this time ; as there is no
v »,..„_ 2 2 Tim. i. 16. direct mention of his locality in the Second
ii.pnesus. t
8 For the evidence of these assertions, see Epistle. It would seem, at first sight, proba-
note on 2 Tim. iv. 21. We may take this ble that he was still at Ephesus, from the salu-
opportunity of saying that the tradition of tation to Priscilla and Aquila, who appear
St. Paul's visit to Britain rests on no sufficient to have principally resided there. Still this is
authority. Probably all that can be said in not decisive, since we know that they were
its favor will be found in the Tracts of the late occasional residents both at Rome and Corinth,
Bishop Burgess on the origin of the ancient and Aquila was himself a native of Pontus,

836 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OP ST. PAUL. chap. xxvn.
the perils which would surround him in the city of Nero. He therefore
urges on him very emphatically the duty of boldness in Christ's cause,
of steadfastness under persecution, and of taking his share in the suffer
ings of the Saints. And, lest he should be prevented from giving him
his last instructions face to face, he impresses on him, with the earnest
ness of a dying man, the various duties of his Ecclesiastical office, and
especially that of opposing the heresies which now threatened to destroy
the very essence of Christianity. But no summary of its contents can
give any notion of the pathetic tenderness and deep solemnity of this
Epistle. SECOND EPISTLE TO TIMOTHEUS.1
i. v
1 PAUL, an Apostle of Jesus Christ by the will of God, — salutation.
sent forth2 to proclaim the promise of the life which is in Christ Jesus, —
2 To Timotheus mt beloved son.
Grace, mercy, and peace from God our Father, and Christ Jesus our
Lord.
3 I thank God (whom I worship, as 3 did my forefathers, with Timotheus i»
v r' » reminded of
a pure conscience) whenever4 I make mention of thee, as I Mstor^and
4 do continually, in my prayers night and day. And I long perseverance
where he and Timotheus may perhaps have 1 For the date of this Epistle, see Appen
been. Again, it is difficult, on the hypothesis dix II.
of Timotheus being at Ephesus, to account for 2 " An Apostle according to the promise
2 Tim. iv. 12, " Tychicus I sent to Ephesus," of life." See note on Tit. i. 1.
which Timotheus need not have been told if 8 Some interpreters have found a difficulty
himself at Ephesus. Also, it appears strange here, as though it were inconsistent with St.
that St. Paul should have told Timotheus that Paul's bitter repentance for the sins he had
he had left Trophimus sick at Miletus, if Timo- committed in the time of his Judaism. (Cf.
theus was himself at Ephesus, within thirty miles 1 Tim. i. 13.) But there is no inconsistency.
of Miletus. Yet both these objections may be All that is said here is, that the worship of God
explained away, as we have shown in the notes was handed down to St. Paul from his fore-
on 2 Tim. iv. 12, and 2 Tim. iv. 20. The fathers, or, in other words, that his religion
message abont bringing the articles from Troas was hereditary. This is exactly the view
shows only that Timotheus was in a place taken of the religion of all converted Jews in
whence the road to Rome lay through Troas ; Rom. xi. 23, 24, 28. Compare also " the God
and this would agree either with Ephesus, or of my fathers " (Acts xxiv. 14), and " I have
Pontus, or any other place in the north or always lived a conscientious life " (Acts xxiii.
north-west of Asia Minor. It is most probable 1). These latter passages remind us that the
that Timotheus was not fixed to any one spot, topic was one on which St. Paul had proba-
but employed in the general superintendence bly insisted, in his recent defence ; and this
of the Pauline Churches throughout Asia accounts for its parenthetical introduction
Minor. This hypothesis agrees best with his here.
designation as an Evangelist (2 Tim. iv. 5), a 4 Literally, as the mention which I make of
term equivalent to itinerant missionary. thee in my prayers is continual.

CHAP.xxvn. SECOND EPISTLE TO TIMOTHEUS. 837 i.
w'tn^'hope to 8ee *nee» remembering thy [parting] tears, that I may be
taiit^!1101" filled with joy. For I have been J reminded of thv undis- b
sembled faith, which dwelt first in thy grandmother Lois, and thy
mother Eunice, and (I am persuaded) dwells in thee also. Wherefore I 6
call thee to remembrance, that thou mayest stir up the gift of God,
which is in thee by the laying-on of my 2 hands. For God gave us not a 7
spirit of cowardice, but a spirit of power and love and self-restraint.'
Be not therefore ashamed of the testimony of our Lord, nor of me His 8
prisoner ; but share the affliction 4 of them who publish the Glad-tidings,
according to the power of God. For He saved us, and called us with a 9
holy calling, not dealing with us according to our own works, but accord
ing to His own purpose and grace, which was bestowed upon us in Christ
Jesus before eternal times,5 but is now made manifest by the appearing 10
of our Saviour Jesus Christ, who has put an end to death, and brought
life and immortality from darkness into light ; by the Glad-tidings, 11
whereunto I was appointed herald and apostle, and teacher of the Gen
tiles. Which also is the cause of these sufferings that I now endure : 12
nevertheless I am not ashamed ; for I know in whom I have trusted, and
I am persuaded that He is able to guard the treasure 8 which I have com
mitted to Him, even unto that day.
1 " Have been reminded." Such is the * Literally, share affliction for the Glad-fid-
reading of the best MSS. Perhaps a message ings. The dative nsed as in Phil. i. 27.
or other incident had reminded St. Paul of 6 "Before eternal times" (which phrase
some proof which Timotheus had given of the also occurs in Titus i. 2) appears to mean the
sincerity of his faith (as Bengel thinks) ; or, period of the Jewish (including the Patriar-
«till more probably, he was reminded of the chalj dispensation. The grace of Christ was
faith of Timotheus by its contrast with the virtually bestowed on mankind in the Patri-
cowardice of Demas and others. He mentions archal covenant, though only made manifest in
it here obviously as a motive to encourage him the Gospel.
to persevere in courageous steadfastness. * " That which I have committed unto
2 The grace of God required for any par- Him." It is strange that so acute an inter-
ticular office in the early Church was conferred preter as De Wette should maintain that this
after prayer and the laying-on of hands. This expression must necessarily mean the same
imposition of hands was repeated whenever thing as " that which is committed unto thee"
any one was appointed to a new office or com- in verse 14. Supposing St. Paul to have said,
mission. The reference here may, therefore, " God will keep the trust committed to Him ;
be to the original " ordination " of Timotheus, do thou keep the trust committed to thee," it
or to his appointment to the superintendence would not follow that the same trust was meant
of the Ephesian Church. See p. 382, and in each case. Paul had committed himself, ,
compare Acts viii. 18, and 1 Tim. iv. 14 ; also his soul and body, his true life, to God's keep-
D 232 n. 5. mS > tn*s was tne treasure which he trusted
8 Self-restraint wonld control the passion to God's care. On the other hand, the treas-
of fear. ure committe<l to the charge of Timotheus

838 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chaf.xxvu
i.
13 Hold fast the pattern of sound l words which thou hast Exhortation
r to fulfil his
heard from me, in the faith and love which is in Christ Jesus. S^uy!™
14 That goodly treasure which is committed to thy charge, guard by the
Holy Spirit who dwelleth in us.
15 Thou already knowest that I was abandoned2 by all the conductorcertain
16 Asiatics, among whom are Phygellus and Hermogenes. The Asiatic Chris
Lord give mercy to the house of Onesiphorus ; 3 for he often Rome-
17 refreshed me, and was not ashamed of my chain,4 but, when he was in
18 Rome, sought me out very diligently and found me. The Lord grant
unto him that he may find mercy from the Lord in that day. And all
his services 5 at Ephesus thou knowest better 6 than I.
ii 1 Thou therefore, my son, strengthen thy heart7 with the Seu3s<inTlmo'
2 grace that is in Christ Jesus. And those things which thou government.
hast heard from me attested 8 by many witnesses deliver into the keep
ing of faithful men, who shall be able to teach others in their turn.9
3 Take thy 10 share in suffering, as a good soldier of Jesus He is ex-
J o> & hortednotto
4 Christ. The soldier when u on service abstains from entangling Buffering01*
5 himself in the business of life, that he may please his commander. And
again, the wrestler does not win the crown unless he wrestles lawfully.12
was the ecclesiastical office intrusted to him. 6 " Unto me" is omitted by the best MSS.
(Compare 1 Tim. vi. 20.) 6 Better, because Timotheus had been more
1 Sound words. The want of the article constantly resident at Ephesus than St. Paul.
Bhows that this expression had become almost ' Compare Rom. iv. 20, and Eph. vi. 10.
a technical expression at the date of the Pas- 8 We agree with De Wette, Huther, and
toral Epistles. Wiesinger as to the construction here, but
2 This appears to refer to the conduct of cannot agree with them in referring this pas-
certain Christians belonging to the province sage to Timothy's ordination or baptism.
of Asia, who deserted St. Paul at Rome when The literal English must be, those things which
he needed their assistance. " They in Asia" thou hast heard from me by the intervention of
is used instead of "they of Asia," because many witnesses, which is surely equivalent to
these persons had probably now returned " by the attestation of many witnesses." In a
home, similar way, St. Paul appeals to the attestation
8 An undesigned coincidence should be of other witnesses in 1 Cor. xv. 3-7.
observed here, which is not noticed by Paley. » The " also " seems to have this meaning
Blessings are invoked on the house of Onesiph- here.
orus, not on himself; and in verse 18 a hope w « Take thy share in suffering." This is
is expressed that he may find mercy at the last according to the reading of the best MSS.
day. This seems to show that Onesiphorus u This is the force of the present participle.
was dead ; and so, in iv. 19, greetings are ad- Cf. Luke iii. 14.
dressed, not to himself, but to his house. i2 " Lawfully." See p. 586. The verb
4 "My chain." Hence we see that St. here used is not confined to wrestling, but
Paul was, in this second imprisonment, as in includes the other exercises of the athletic
the first, under Custodia Militaris, and there- contests also ; but there is no English verb
fore bound to the soldier who guarded him, by co-extensive with it. With this passage (w.
a chain. See above, p. 666. 3-6) compare 1 Cor. ix. 7.

shap.xxvii. SECOND EPISTLE TO TIMOTHEUS. 839
The husbandman who toils must share the fruits of the ground before1 6
the idler. Consider what I say; for the Lord will2 give thee under- 7
standing :'n all things. Remember that Jesus Christ, of the seed 3 of 8
David, ia 4 raised from the dead, according to the Glad-tidings which I
proclaim. Wherein I suffer even unto chains, as a malefactor ; neverthe- 9
less the Word of God is bound by no chains. Wherefore I endure all 10
for the sake of the chosen, that they also may obtain the salvation which
is in Christ Jesus, with glory everlasting. Faithful is the saying, "For5 11
if we have died with Him,6 we shall also live with Sim ; if we suffer, we 12
shall also reign with Him; if we deny Him, He also will deny us ; if we
be faithless, yet He abideth faithful; He cannot deny Himself." 13
He must Call men to remembrance of these things, and adiure them 14
oppose the ° ' J
an'rtrfeif6™ before the Lord not to contend7 about words, with no profita-
and'carefuiiy ble end, but for the subversion of their hearers. Be diligent 15
preserve his
own purity, to present thyself unto God as one proved trustworthy 8 by
trial, a workman not to be ashamed, declaring the word of truth without
distortion.9 But avoid the discussions of profane babblers ; for they willi6,l?
go farther and farther in ungodliness, and their word will eat like a
cancer. Among whom are HymenaBus and Philetus ; who concerning is
the truth have erred, for they say that the resurrection is past10 already,
and overthrow the faith of some.
1 This is the sense of "first." The Au- • Rom. vi. 8, "If we died with Christ, we
thorized Version, and not its margin, is here believe that we shall also live with Him."
correct. 7 Compare 1 Tim. vi. 4.
2 The future, not the optative, is the read- 8 The meaning is, tested and proved worthy
ing of the best MSS. De Wette and others by trial. Cf. 2 Cor. xiii. 7.
object to this verse, that it is impossible to • The verb used here (not found elsewhere
suppose that St. Paul would imagine Timo- in the New Testament) means to cut straight.
theus so dull of apprehension as not to com- So in the LXX. " righteousness cuts straight
prehend such obvious metaphors. But they paths" (Prov. xi. 5). The metaphor here,
have missed the sense of the verse, which is being connected with the previous " work-
not meant to enlighten the understanding of man," appears to be taken from the work of a
Timotheus as to the meaning of the metaphors, carpenter.
but as to the personal application of them. 10 See p. 39o. In tne larger editions a pas-
8 i e. though a man in flesh and blood ; sage is there quoted from Tertullian, which
therefore His resurrection is an encourage- shows that the Gnostics taught that the Resur-
mont to His followers to be fearless. rection was to be understood of the rising of
4 Perfect not aorist. the soul from the death of ignorance to the
6 This is another of those quotations so light of knowledge. There is • nothing here
characteristic of the Pastoral Epistles. It to render doubtful the date of this Epistle, for
appears to be taken from a Christian hymn. we have already seen that even so early as tbe
The Greek may be easily sung to the music First Epistle to Corinth, there were heretics
ot one of the ancient ecclesiastical chants. who denied the resurrection of the dead.

840

THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL.

CHAP. XXVD

U.
19 Nevertheless the firm : foundation of God stands unshaken, having this
seal, " %\t %atb kntbj fytm fyut bsttt J|is," 2 and "Let every one that
20 nameth the name of the Lord depart from iniquity." 3 But in a great house
there are not 4 only vessels of gold and silver, but also of wood and clay ;
21 and some for honor, others for dishonor. If a man therefore purify him
self from these, he shall be a vessel for honor, sanctified, and fitted for
the Master's use, being prepared for every good work.
22 Flee the lusts of youth ; 5 and follow righteousness, faith, love, and
23 peace with those who call on the Lord out of a pure heart ; but shun the
disputations of the foolish and ignorant, knowing that they breed strife ;
24 and the bondsman of the Lord 6 ought not to strive, but to be gentle
25 towards all, skilful in teaching, patient of wrong, instructing opponents
with meekness ; if God perchance may give them repentance, that they
26 may attain the knowledge of the truth, and may escape, restored7 to
soberness, out of the snare of the Devil,8 by whom 8 they have been taken
captive to do his will.
iH. l Know this, that, in the last 10 days, evil times shall come. Dangerous

Baur's view — that the Pastoral Epistles were
written against Marcion — is inconsistent with
the present passage ; for Marcion did not deny
the resurrection of the dead, but only the res
urrection of the flesh. ( See Tertull. adv. Mar
cion. v. 10.)
1 The Authorized Version here violates the
law of the article.
2 Numbers xvi. 5 (LXX. with Lord for
God). We must not translate the verb "know
eth," as in A. V. The context of the passage,
according to LXX. (which differs from the
present Hebrew text), is, " Moses spake unto
Core, saying, . . . The Lord knew them that were
His, and that were holy, and brought them near
unto Himself; and whom He chose unto Him
self, He brought near unto Himself."
8 This quotation is not from the Old Tes
tament ; Isaiah Iii. 1 1 is near it in sentiment,
but can scarcely be referred to, because it is
quoted exactly at 2 Cor. vi. 17. The MSS.
read Lord instead of the Christ of T. R.
4 The thought here is the same as that ex
pressed in the- parable of the fishes and of the
tares, — viz. that the visible church will never
be perfect. We are reminded of Rom. ix. 21,
by the " vessels for dishonor."
6 Compare 1 Tim. iii. 2, and the remarks

upon the age of Timotheus in the Essay in
Appendix II. on the date of these Epistles.
6 Lord, viz. the Lord Jesus. Compare
" bondsman of Christ," 1 Cor. vii. 22.
7 Restored to soberness." See 1 Cor. xv.
34. 8 This expression appears to be used here,
and in Eph. iv. 27, and Eph. vi. 11, for the
Devil, who is elsewhere called " Satan " by St.
Paul. In the Gospels and Acts the two ex
pressions are used with nearly equal frequency.
9 The interpretation of this last clause is
disputable. The construction is awkward, and
there is a difficulty in referring the two pro
nouns to the same subject ; but De Wette
shows that this is admissible by a citation
from Plato.
10 This phrase (used without the article, as
having become a familiar expression) generally
denotes the termination of the Mosaic dispen
sation : see Acts ii. 1 7 ; 1 Pet. i. 5, 20 ; Heb.
i. 2. Thus the expression generally denotes
(in the Apostolic age) the time present; but
here it points to a future immediately at hand,
which is, however, blended with the present (see
verses 6, 8), and was, in fact, the end of the
Apostolic age. Compare 1 John ii. 18, "it is
the last hour." The long duration of this las'

coap. xxvn. SECOND EPISTLE TO TIMOTHEUS. 841
^faslaa^" For men shall be selfish, covetous, false boasters,1 haughty, 2
blasphemous, disobedient to parents, ungrateful, unholy, without natural 3
affection, ruthless, calumnious, incontinent, merciless, haters of the good,
treacherous, headlong with passion, blinded with pride, lovers of pleas- 4
ure rather than lovers of God ; having an outward form of godliness, but 5
renouncing its power. From such turn away. Of these are they who 6
creep into houses, and lead captive silly women, laden with sins, led 7
away by lusts of all kinds, perpetually learning, yet never able to attain
the knowledge2 of the truth. And as Iannes and Iambres3 resisted 8
Moses, so do these men resist the truth, being corrupt in mind, and
worthless * in all that concerns the faith. But they 5 shall not advance 9
farther, for their folly shall be made openly manifest to all, as was that
of Iannes and Iambres.
Exhortation ^ut ^ou kast ^°em *^e fou°wer6 °f mv teaching and be- 10
fcst in'paui's havior,1 my resolution,8 faith, patience, love, and steadfast
ness ; my persecutions and sufferings, such as befell me at 11
Antioch, Iconium, and Lystra.' [Thou hast seen] what persecutions I
endured ; and out of them all the Lord delivered me. Yea, and all who 12
determine to live a godly life in Christ Jesus will suffer persecution.
But wicked men and impostors will advance from bad to worse, deceiv- 13
ing and being deceived. But do thou continue in that which was taught 14
thee, and whereof thou wast persuaded ; knowing who were 10 thy teach
ers, and remembering that from a child thou hast known the Holy Scrip
tures, which are able to make thee wise unto salvation, by the faith 15
which is in Christ Jesus. All Scripture is inspired by God, and may 16
period of the world's development was not ungodliness : " but there is no contradiction ;
revealed to the Apostles ; they expected that for the present passage speaks of outward sue-
their Lord's return would end it, in their own cess, the former of inward deterioration. Im-
generation ; and thus His words were fulfilled, posters will usually go on from bad to worse
that none should foresee the time of His com- (as it is just said below, verse 13), and yet
ing. (Matt. xxiv. 36.) their success in deceiving others is generally
1 Several of the classes of sinners here soon ended by detection.
mentioned occur also Rom. i. 30. 6 This verb cannot be accurately translated
2 For the meaning of this word (cf. above, " hast fully known " (Authorized Version) ; but
ii. 25), see Rom. x. 2, and 1 Cor. xiii. 12. its meaning is not very different. Chrysostom
8 These, as we find in the Targum of explains it, " of these things thou art the wit-
Jonathan, were the traditional names of the ness."
Egyptian sorcerers who opposed Moses. 7 In this meaning the word is found in
4 Worthless: see Tit. i. 16, and note. LXX. 8 Compare Acts xi. 23.
6 It has been thought that this " they shall 9 It has been before remarked how appro-
not advance farther " contradicts the assertion priate this reference is. See p. 174.
in ii. 16, " they will go farther and farther in 10 This is plural in the best MSS.

842 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap, xxvii
iii. profitably be used for teaching,1 for confutation,2 for correction,3 and for
17 righteous discipline;4 that the man of God may be fully prepared, and
thoroughly furnished for every good work.
iv. 1 1 5 adjure thee before God and Jesus Christ, who is about to f^ge^o per.
judge the living and the dead — I adjure thee by His appear- rXorf faith"
fully, in ex-
2 ing and His kingdom — proclaim the tidings, be urgent in l^^aot
season and out of season, convince, rebuke, exhort, with all death.
3 forbearance and perseverance in teaching. For a time will come when
they will not endure the sound doctrine, but according to their own
inclinations they will heap up for themselves teachers upon teachers to
4 please their itching ears. And they will turn away their ears from the
truth, and turn aside to fables.
5 But thou in all things be sober,6 endure affliction, do the work of an
6 evangelist,7 accomplish thy ministration in full measure. For I am now
7 ready 8 to be offered, and the time of my departure is at hand. I have
fought9 the good fight, I have finished my10 course, I have kept the faith.
8 Henceforth is laid up for me the crown of righteousness, which the Lord,
the righteous " Judge, shall give me in that day ; and not to me only, but
to all who love His appearing.
9 Do thy utmost to come to me speedily ; for Demas has for-
J r J > Timotheus is
saken me for love of this present world, and has departed to clme'^Eome
] 0 Thessalonica ; 12 Crescens is gone to Galatia, Titus to Dalma- Bpee y'
1 St. Paul frequently uses the Old Testa- 8 Literally, I am already in the very act of
ment for teaching, i. e. to enforce or illustrate being poured out as a sacrificial offering. Com-
his doctrine; e. g. Rom. i. 17. pare Phil. ii. 17.
2 The numerous quotations from the Old 9 It is impossible to translate this fully in
Testament, in the Romans and Galatians, are English. It is not strictly correct to render
mostly examples of its use for confutation. it " I have fought the fight," and seems to
8 The word means the setting right of that introduce a new metaphor. The noun means
which is wrong. The Old Testament is applied a contest for a prize, and the metaphor is taken
for this purpose by St. Paul in 1 Cor. xiv. 21, from the Greek foot-races. / have run the good
1 Cor. x. 1-10. and, generally, wherever he race would be perhaps more exact. The literal
applies it to enforce precepts of morality. English is, / have completed the glorious contest.
4 " Chastisement that is in righteousness." See pp. 585-587 above, and 1 Tim. vi. 12.
The word used here has the meaning of chas- 10 Strictly, the course marked out for the race.
tisement or discipline; compare Heb. xii. 7. This expression occurs only in two other
Thus the Old Testament is applied in 1 Cor. places in the New Testament, both being ir
v. 13. speeches of St. Paul.
6 The best MSS. omit therefore and. Lord, n "The righteous Judge" contrasted with
and read " and " instead of " at " in this the unrighteous judge, by whose sentence he
verse. 6 Not " watch," as in A. V. was soon to be condemned.
7 Compare Eph. iv. 11. And see p. 381. M Demas is mentioned as a "fellow-labor-

CHAP. XXVII.

SECOND EPISTLE TO TIMOTHEUS.

843

tia; Luke alone is with me. Take Mark1 and bring him with thee, for 11,12
his services 2 are profitable to me ; .but Tychicus 3 1 have sent to Ephesus.
When thou comest, bring with thee the case 4 which I left at Troas 13
with Carpus, and the books, but especially the parchments.
, t „. , Alexander the brass-founder5 charged 6 me with much evil 14
Intelligence of °
Sr in nls declaration ; the Lord shall 7 reward him according to
his works. Be thou also on thy guard against him, for he 15
has been a great opponent of my arguments.8 When I was first heard 16
in my defence9 no man stood by me, but all forsook me (I pray that it
be not laid to their charge). Nevertheless the Lord Jesus 10 stood by me, 17
and strengthened my heart,11 that by me the proclamation of the 12 Glad-
tidings might be accomplished in full measure, and that all the Gentiles
might hear; and I was delivered out of the lion's mouth.13 And the 18

er " at Rome with St. Paul, Philem. 24 ; and
joined with Lnke, Col. iv. 14. Nothing fur
ther is known of him. Crescens is not men
tioned elsewhere. In saying here that he was
deserted by all but Luke, St. Paul speaks of
his own companions and attendants : he had
still friends among, the Roman Christians who
visited him (iv. 21), though they were afraid
te stand by him at his trial.
- Mark was in Rome during a part of the
former imprisonment, Col. iv. 10 ; Philem. 24.
2 Not (as in A. V.) " the ministry."
a If we suppose (see above, p. 835, note 4)
that Timotheus was at Ephesus, we must con
clude that Tychicus was the bearer of this
Epistle, and the aorist, " I send herewith," used
according to the idiom of classical letter-
writers. 4 This word means either a travelling-case
(for carrying clothes, books, &c), or a travel
ling-cloak. The former seems the more proba
ble meaning here, from the mention of the books.
6 Brass-founder. Whether this Alexander
is the same mentioned as put forward by the
Jews at Ephesus in the theatre (Acts xix. 33),
and as excommunicated by St. Paul (1 Tim.
i. 20), we do not know. If these names all
belong to the same person, he was probably
of the Judaizing faction. See above, p. 474.
8 " Charged me with," not "did" (A. V.).
This verb, though of frequent occurrence in
the New Testament (in tne sense of exhibit,
display, manifest), does not elsewhere occur in
the sami construction as here, with an accusa

tive of the thing, and a dative of the person.
The active form of the verb in classical Greek
has a forensic sense, — viz. to make a declaration
against; and as the verb is here used in an
active sense (the active form of it not occurring
in the New Testament), we may not unnatu
rally suppose that it is so used here. At any
rate, the literal English is, " Alexander mani
fested many evil things against me."
* The MSS. are divided here between the
optative and the future ; the latter is adopted
by Lachmann, and has rather the greatest
weight of MS. authority in its favor. We
have, therefore, adopted it in the translation
in the present edition. Tet it must be ac
knowledged that there are obvious reasons why
the optative (if it was the original reading)
should have been altered into the future.
8 The " arguments " here mentioned are
probably those used by St. Paul in his defence.
9 On this first defence, see above, p. 834.
The ancient interpreters, Eusebius, Jerome,
and others, understood St. Paul here to refer
to his acquittal at the end of his first imprison
ment at Rome, and his subsequent preaching
in Spain; but while we must acknowledge
that the strength of the expressions accom
plished in full measure and all the Gentiles are in
favor of this view, we think that on the whole
tlie context renders it unnatural.
10 The Lord, viz. Jesus.
u Cf. Rom. iv. 20, Eph. vi. 10.
12 The proclamation, i.e. of the Glad-tidings.
18 By the lion's mouth may be only meant the

844

THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL.

chap. xxvn.

IV. 192021 22

Lord shall deliver me from every evil, and shall preserve me unto His
heavenly kingdom. To Him be glory unto the ages of ages. Amen.
Salute Prisca and Aquila, and the household of Onesipho- salutationsand personal
j-US. intelligence.
Erastus x remained at Corinth ; but Trophimus I left sick at Miletus.
Do thy utmost to come before winter.
There salute thee Eubulus, and Pudens, and Linus,2 and Claudia,3 and
all the brethren.
The Lord Jesus Christ be with thy spirit.
you4 all.

Grace be with concludingbenedictions.

imminence of the immediate peril ; but it may mean
that St. Paul, at his first hearing, established
his right, as a Roman citizen, to be exempted
from the punishment of exposure to wild
beasts, which was inflicted during the Neronian
persecution on so many Christians. On the
historical inferences drawn from this verse,
see the preceding remarks.
1 This verse is an insuperable difBculty to
those who suppose this Epistle written in the
first imprisonment at Rome; since it implies
a recent journey, in which St. Paul had passed
through Miletus and Corinth. It has been
also thought inexplicable that Paul should
mention to Timotheus (who was at Ephesus,
so near Miletus) the fact that Trophimus was
left there. But many suppositions might be
made to account for this. For instance,
Trophimus may have only staid a short time
at Miletus, and come on by the first ship after
his recovery. This was probably the first
communication from St. Paul to Timotheus
since they parted ; and there would be nothing
unnatural even if it mentioned a circumstance
which Timotheus knew already. For example,
A. at Calcutta writes to B. in London, " / left
C. dangerously ill at Southampton," although
he may be sure that B. has heard of C.'s ill
ness long before he can receive the letter.
2 Linus is probably the same person who
was afterwards bishop of Rome, and is men
tioned by Irenseus and Eusebius.
8 Pudens and Claudia. The following facts
relating to these names are taken from an in
genious essay on the subject, entitled "Claudia
and Pudens, by J. Williams, m. A. (London,
1848)." There are two epigrams of Martial, the

former of which describes the marriage of a
distinguished Roman named Pudens to a for
eign lady named Claudia, and the latter of
which tells us that this Claudia was a Briton,
and gives her the cognomen of Rufina. When
the latter epigram was written, she had grown
up sons and daughters, but herself still re
tained the charms of youth. Both these epi
grams were written during Martial's residence
at Rome ; and, therefore, their date must be
between a.d. 66 and a.d. 100. The former of
the two epigrams was not published till the
reign of Domitian, but it may very probably
have been written many years earlier. Thus
the Claudia and Pudens of Martial may be
the same with the Claudia and Pudens who
are here seen as friends of St. Paul in
a.d. 68.
But, further, Tacitus mentions (Agric. 14)
that certain territories in the south-east of
Britain were given to a British king Cogidu-
nus as a reward for his fidelity to Rome : this
occurred about a.d. 52, while Tiberius Clau
dius Nero, commonly called Claudius, was em
peror. Again, in 1723, a marble was dug up at
Chichester, with an inscription making men
tion of a British king bearing the title of Ti
berius Claudius Cogidubnus. His daughter
would, according to Roman usage, have been
called Claudia. And in the same inscription
we find the name Pudens. Other details are
given in our larger editions. See the Quarter
ly Review for July, 1858.
4 You (not thee) is the reading of the
best MSS., which also omit "amen." In
English we are compelled to insert all here, ir
order to show that you is plural.

chap, xxvii. CONDEMNATION OP ST. PAUL. 845
We know not whether Timotheus was able to fulfil these last requests
of the dying Apostle ; it is doubtful whether he reached \Rome in time to
receive his parting commands, and cheer his latest earthly sufferings.
The only intimation which seems to throw any light on the question is
the statement in the Epistle to the Hebrews, that Timotheus had been
liberated from imprisonment in Italy. If, as appears not improbable,1
that Epistle was written shortly after St. Paul's death, it would be
proved not only that the disciple fearlessly obeyed his master's summons,
but that he actually shared his chains, though he escaped his fate. This,
also, would lead us to think that he must have arrived before the execu
tion of St. i'aul, for otherwise there would be no reason to account for
his being himself arrested in Rome ; since, had he come too late, he
would naturally have returned to Asia at once, without attracting the
notice of the authorities.
We may, therefore, hope that Paul's last earthly wish was fulfilled.
Yet if Timotheus did indeed arrive before the closing scene, there could
have been but a very brief interval between his coming and his master's
death. For the letter which summoned him2 could not have been de
spatched from Rome till the end of winter, and St. Paul's martyrdom
took place in the middle of summer.8 We have seen that this was
sooner than he had expected ; but we have no record of the final stage
of his trial, and cannot tell the cause of its speedy conclusion. We only
know that it resulted in a sentence of capital punishment.
The privileges of Roman citizenship exempted St. Paul from the
ignominious death of lingering torture, which had been lately inflicted
on so many of his brethren. He was to die by decapitation ; 4 and he
was led out to execution beyond the city walls, upon the road to Ostia,
1 See the next chapter. If our Chronology in page 847. The constitutional mole of in-
be right, Timothy's escape would be accounted flicting capital punishment on a Roman citizen
for by the death of Nero, which immediately was by the lictor's axe. The criminal was tied
followed that of St. Paul. to a stake; cruelly scourged with the rods,
2 Supposing the letter to have been de- and then beheaded. See Livy, ii. 6. " Missi
spatched to Timotheus on the 1st of March, he lictores ad sumendum supplicium, nudatos virgis
could scarcely have arrived at Rome from cozdunt, securique feriunt." Compare Juv. 8,
Asia Minor before the end of May. "legum prima securis." But the military
3 Nero's death occurred in June, A. D. 68. mode of execution — decapitation by the
Accepting therefore, as we do, the universal sword— was more usual under Nero. Many
tradition that St. Paul was executed in the examples may be found in Tacitus ; for fo
reign of Nero, his execution must have taken stance, the execution of Subrius Flavius (Tac.
place not later than the beginning of June. Ann. xv. 67). The executioner was generally
We have endeavored to show (in the article one of the speculatores, or imperial body-guards,
on the Pastoral Epistles in Appendix II.) that under the command of a centurion, who was
this date satisfies all the necessary condi- responsible for the execution of the sentence.
See the interesting story in Seneca de Ira, lib
4 Such is the universal tradition ; see note 1 i. cap. ie.

846 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap. xxvu.
the port of Rome. As he issued forth from the gate, his eyes must have
rested for a moment on that sepulchral pyramid which stood beside the
road, and still stands unshattered, amid the wreck of so many centuries,
upon the same spot. That spot was then only the burial-place of a single
Roman ; it is now the burial-place of many Britons. The mausoleum
of Caius Cestius 1 rises conspicuously amongst humbler graves, and marks
the site where Papal Rome suffers her Protestant sojourners to bury their
dead. In England and in Germany, in Scandinavia and in America,
there are hearts which turn to that lofty cenotaph as the sacred point of
their whole horizon ; even as the English villager turns to the gray
church-tower which overlooks the gravestones of his kindred. Among
the works of man, that pyramid is the only surviving witness of the
martyrdom of St. Paul ; and we may thus regard it with yet deeper
interest, as a monument unconsciously erected by a pagan to the memory
of a martyr. Nor let us think that they who lie beneath its shadow are
indeed resting (as degenerate Italians fancy) in unconsecrated ground.
Rather let us say, that a spot where the disciples of Paul's faith now
sleep in Christ, so near the soil once watered by his blood, is doubly
hallowed ; and that their resting-place is most fitly identified with the
last earthly journey and the dying glance of their own Patron Saint, the
Apostle of the Gentiles.
As the martyr and his executioners passed on, their way was crowded
with a motley multitude of goers and comers between the metropolis
and its harbor — merchants hastening to superintend the unloading of
their cargoes — sailors eager to squander the profits of their last voyage
in the dissipations of the capital — officials of the government, charged
with the administration of the Provinces, or the command of the legions
on the Euphrates or the Rhine — Chaldean astrologers — Phrygian
eunuchs — dancing-girls from Syria with their painted turbans — mendi
cant priests from Egypt howling for Osiris — Greek adventurers, eager
to coin their national cunning into Roman gold — representatives of the
avarice and ambition, the fraud and lust, the superstition and intelligence,
of the Imperial world. Through the dust and tumult of that busy
throng, the small troop of soldiers threaded their way silently, under the
bright sky of an Italian midsummer. They were marching, though they
knew it not, in a procession more truly triumphal than any they had ever
followed, in the train of General or Emperor, along the Sacred Way.
Their prisoner, now at last and forever delivered from his captivity,
rejoiced to follow his Lord " without the gate." 2 The place of execu-
1 The pyramid of Caius Cestius, which now in the time of Nero, though within the present
marks the site of the Protestant burying- Aurelianic walls.
ground, was erected in, or just before, the 2 Heb. xiii. 12, " He suffered without the
reign of Augustus. It was outside the walls gate."

CHAP, xxvii.

DEATH OP ST. PAUL.

847

tion was not far distant ; and there the sword of the headsman1 ended
his long course of sufferings, and released that heroic soul from that
feeble body. Weeping friends took up his corpse, and carried it for
burial to those subterranean labyrinths,2 where, through many ages of
oppression, the persecuted Church found refuge for the living, and
sepulchres for the dead.
Thus died the Apostle, the Prophet, and the Martyr ; bequeathing to
the Church, in her government and her discipline, the legacy of his
Apostolic labors ; leaving his Prophetic words to be her living oracles ;
pouring forth his blood to be the seed of a thousand Martyrdoms.
Thenceforth, among the glorious company of the Apostles, among the
goodly fellowship of the Prophets, among the noble army of Martyrs, his
name has stood pre-eminent. And wheresoever the Holy Church
throughout all the world doth acknowledge God, there Paul of Tarsus is
revered, as the great teacher of a universal redemption and a catholic
religion — the herald of Glad-tidings to all mankind.

1 The death of St. Paul is recorded by his
contemporary Clement, in a passage already
quoted; also by the Roman presbyter Caius
(about 200 A. D.) (who alludes to the Ostian
Road as the site of St. Paul's martyrdom), by
Tertullian, Eusebius (in the passage above
¦cited), Jerome, and many subsequent writers.
The statement of Caius is quoted by Eusebius.
That of Jerome is the most explicit.
The statement that Paul was beheaded
on the Ostian Road agrees with the usage of
the period, and with the tradition that his de
capitation was by the sword, not the axe.
We have this tradition in Orosius and Lactan-
tius. It was not uncommon to send prisoners,
whose death might attract too much notice in
Rome, to some distance from the city, under a
military escort, for execution. Wieseler com
pares the execution of Calpurnius Galerianus,
as recorded by Tacitus, " who was sent under
a military escort some distance along the Ap

pian Road." (Tac. Hist. iv. 11.) This hap
pened a. d. 70.
The great Basilica of St. Paul now stands
outside the walls of Rome, on the road to Ostia,
in commemoration of his martyrdom, and the
Porta Ostiensis (in the present Aurelianic wall)
is called the gate of St. Paul. The tradition
al spot of the martyrdom is the tre fontane not
far from the basilica. The basilica itself ( S.
Paolo fuori le mura) was first built by Con
stantine. Till the Reformation it was under
the protection of the Kings of England, and
the emblem of the Order of the Garter is still
to be seen among its decorations.
2 Eusebius (ii. 25) says that the original
burial-places of Peter and Paul, in the Cata
combs, were still shown in his time. This
shows the tradition on the subject. Jerome,
however, in the passage above cited, seems to
make the place of burial and execution the
same.

Coin of Antioch in Pisidia.

CHAPTER XXVIII.
The Epistle to the Hebrews. — Its Inspiration not affected by the Doubts concerning its Author
ship. — Its Original Readers. — Conflicting Testimony of the Primitive Church concerning
its Arthor. — His Object in writing it. — Translation of the Epistle.
THE origin and history of the Epistle to the Hebrews was a subject of
controversy even in the second century. There is no portion of the
New Testament whose authorship is so disputed, nor any of which the
inspiration is more indisputable. The early Church could not determine
whether it was written by Barnabas, by Luke, by Clement, or by Paul.
Since the Reformation, still greater diversity of opinion has prevailed.
Luther assigned it to Apollos, Calvin to a disciple of the Apostles. The
Church of Rome now maintains by its infallibility the Pauline authorship
of the Epistle, which in the second, third, and fourth centuries, the same
Church, with the same infallibility, denied. But notwithstanding these
doubts concerning the origin of this canonical book, its inspired authority
is beyond all doubt. It is certain, from internal evidence, that it was
written by a contemporary of the Apostles, and before the destruction of
Jerusalem ; l that its writer was the friend of Timotheus ; 2 and that he
was the teacher3 of one of the Apostolic Churches. Moreover, the Epistle
was received by the Oriental Church as canonical from the first.4 Every
sound reasoner must agree with St. Jerome, that it matters nothing
whether it were written by Luke, by Barnabas, or by Paul, since it is
allowed to be the production of the Apostolic age, and has been read in
the public service of the Church from the earliest times. Those, there
fore, who conclude with Calvin, that it was not written by St. Paul, must
also join with him in thinking the question of its authorship a question
of little moment, and in " embracing it without controversy as one of
the Apostolical Epistles."
But when we call it an Epistle, we must observe that it is distinguished
1 See Heb. vii. 25, xiii. 11-13, and other 4 For this we can refer to Clemens Alex-
passages which speak of the Temple services andrinus and Origen, also to passages of Je-
as going on. rome. Our larger editions give at length in the
2 See xiii. 23. notes the passages from the Fathers referred',
8 See xiii. 19. Restored to you. to in the introductory part of this chapter.
848

chap, xxviii. EEADERS OF THE EPISTLE TO THE HEBREWS. 849
by one remarkable peculiarity from other compositions which bear that
name. In ancient no less than in modern times, it was an essential fea
ture of an epistle, that it should be distinctly addressed, by the writer, to
some definite individual, or body of individuals ; and a composition which
bore on its surface neither the name of its writer,. nor an address to any
particular readers, would then, as now, have been called rather a treatise
than a letter. It was this peculiarity x in the portion of Scripture now
before us which led to some of the doubts and perplexities concerning
it which existed in the earliest times. Yet, on the other hand, we cannot
consider it merely as a treatise or discourse ; because we find certain
indications of an epistolary nature, which show that it was originally
addressed not to the world in general, nor to all Christians, nor even to
all Jewish Christians, but to certain individual readers closely and per
sonally connected with the writer.
Let us first examine these indications, and consider how far they tend
to ascertain the readers for whom this Epistle was originally designed.
In the first place, it may be held as certain that the Epistle was
addressed to Hebrew Christians. Throughout its pages there is not a
single reference to any other class of converts. Its readers are assumed
to be familiar with the Levitical worship, the Temple services, and all
the institutions of the Mosaic ritual. They are in danger of apostasy
to Judaism, yet are not warned (like the Galatians and others) against
circumcision ; plainly because they were already circumcised. They are
called to view in Christianity the completion and perfect consummation of
Judaism. They are called to behold in Christ the fulfilment of the Law,
in His person the antitype of the priesthood, in His offices the eternal
realization of the sacrificial and mediatorial functions of the Jewish
hierarchy. Yet, as we have said above, this work is not a treatise addressed to all
Jewish Christians throughout the world, but to one particular Church,
concerning which we learn the following facts : — First, its members had
steadfastly endured persecution and the loss of property ; secondly, they
had shown sympathy to their imprisoned brethren and to Christians gen
erally (x. 32-34, and vi. 10) ; thirdly, they were now in danger of
apostasy, and had not yet resisted unto blood (xii. 3-4 ; see also v. 11,
&c. vi. 9, &c.) ; fourthly, their Church had existed for a considerable
length of time (v. 12), and some of its chief pastors were dead (xiii. 7) ;
fifthly their prayers are demanded for the restoration to them of the writer
l We need scarcely remark that the inscrip- of later origin ; and the title by which this
tion which the Epistle at present bears was not was first known was merely " to the Hebrews,"
a part of the original document. It is well and not "of Paul to the Hebrews."
known that the titles of all the Epistles were
54

850 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap, xxv m.
of the Epistle, who was therefore personally connected with them (xiii.
19) ; sixthly, they were acquainted with Timotheus, who was about to
visit them (xiii. 23) ; seventhly, the arguments addressed to them pre
suppose a power on their part of appreciating that spiritualizing and
allegorical interpretation of the Old Testament which distinguished the
Alexandrian 1 School of Jewish Theology ; eighthly, they must have been
familiar with the Scriptures in the Septuagint version, because every one
of the numerous quotations is taken from that version, even where it differs
materially from the Hebrew; ninthly, the language in which they are
addressed is Hellenistic Greek, and not Aramaic.2
It has been concluded by the majority, both of ancient and modern
. critics, that the church addressed was that of Jerusalem, or at least was
situate in Palestine. In favor of this view it is urged, first, that no church
out of Palestine could have consisted so exclusively of Jewish converts.
To this it may be replied, that the Epistle, though addressed only to
Jewish converts, and contemplating their position and their dangers
exclusively, might still have been sent to a church which contained Gentile
converts also. In fact, even in the church of Jerusalem itself, there must
have been some converts from among the Gentile sojourners who lived in
that city ; so that the argument proves too much. Moreover, it is not
necessary that every discourse addressed to a mixed congregation should
discuss the position of every individual member. If an overwhelming
majority belong to a particular class, the minority is often passed over in
addresses directed to the whole body. Again, the Epistle may have been
intended for the Hebrew members only of some particular church, Which
contained also Gentile members ; and this would perhaps explain the
absence of the usual address and salutation at the commencement.
Secondly, it is urged that none but Palestinian Jews would have felt the,
attachment to the Levitical ritual implied in the readers of this Epistle.
1 The resemblance between the Epistle to was addressed to the Palestinian Church.
the Hebrews and the writings of Philo is most That the present Epistle is not a translation
striking. It extends not only to the general from an Aramaic original is proved, 1st, by
points mentioned in the text, but to particu- the quotation of the Septuagint argumentative-
lar doctrines and expressions : the parallel pas- ly, where it differs from the Hebrew ; for in-
sages are enumerated by Bleek. stance, Heb. x. 38 : 2dly, by the paronomasias
2 It may be considered as an established upon Greek words, which could not be trans-
point, that the Greek Epistle which we now lated into Aramaic, e.g. that on SiaSrinri (ix.
have is the original. Some of the early fa- 16) ; 3dly, by the free use of Greek com.
thers thought that the original had been writ- pounds, &c, which could only be expressed in
ten in Aramaic ; but the origin of this tradi- Aramaic by awkward periphrases ; 4th, by the
tion seems to have been, 1st, the belief that fact that even the earliest Christian writers
the Epistle was written by St. Paul, combined had never seen a copy of the supposed Ara-
with the perception of its dissimilarity in style maic original. Its existence was only hypo-
*o his writings ; and 2dly, the belief that it thetical from the first.

chap, xxvni. READERS OF THE EPISTLE TO THE HEBREWS. 851
But we do not see why the same attachment may not have been felt in
every great community of Hebrews ; nay, we know historically that no
Jews were more devotedly attached to the Temple worship than those of
the dispersion, who were only able to visit the Temple itself at distant
intervals, but who still looked to it as the central point of their religious
unity and of their national existence.1 Thirdly, it is alleged that many
passages seem to imply readers who had the Temple services going on
continually under their eyes. The whole of the ninth and tenth chapters
speak of the Levitical ritual in a manner which naturally suggests this
idea. On the other hand it may be argued, that such passages imply
no more than that amount of familiarity which might be presupposed
in those who were often in the habit of going up to the great feasts at
Jerusalem.2 Thus, then, we cannot see that the Epistle must necessarily have been
addressed to Jews of Palestine, because addressed to Hebrews} And,
moreover, if we examine the preceding nine conditions which must be
satisfied by its readers, we shall find some of them which could scarcely
ajmly to the church of Jerusalem, or any other church in Palestine.
Thus the Palestinian Church was remarkable for its poverty, and was the
recipient of the bounty of other churches ; whereas those addressed here
are themselves the liberal benefactors of others. Again, those here
addressed have not yet resisted unto blood; whereas the Palestinian
Church had produced many martyrs in several persecutions. Moreover,
the Palestinian 4 Jews would hardly be addressed in a style of reasoning
adapted to minds imbued with Alexandrian culture. Finally, a letter to
the church of Palestine would surely have been written in the language
of Palestine ; or, at least, when the Scriptures of Hebraism were appealed
to, they would not have been quoted from the Septuagint version, where
it differs from the Hebrew.
These considerations (above all, the last) seem to negative the
hypothesis, that this Epistle was addressed to a church situate in the
Holy Land ; and the latter portion of them point to another church, for
i They showed this by the large contribu- "Hebrew" was applied as properly to Jews of
tions which they sent to the Temple from all the dispersion as to Jews of Palestine.
countries where they were dispersed ; see * Cultivated individuals at Jerusalem (as,
above n 739 ror mstance> tae pupils of Gamaliel) would
2 We cannot agree with Ebrard, that the have fully entered into such reasoning ; but it
Epistle contains indications that the Chris- would scarcely have been addressed to the
tians addressed had been excluded from the mass of Jewish believers. Bleek (as we have
Tpmnle before observed) has shown many instances of
8 Bleek and De Wette have urged the title parallelism between the Epistle to the Hebrews
" to the Hebrews," to prove the 6ame point. and the writings of Philo, the representative
But Wieseler has conclusively shown that of Alexandrian Judaism.

852 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap, xxvrn
which we may more plausibly conceive it to have been intended, namely,
that of Alexandria.1 Such a supposition would at once account for the
Alexandrian tone of thought and reasoning, and for the quotations from
the Septuagint ; 2 while the wealth of the Alexandrian Jew would ex
plain the liberality here commended ; and the immense Hebrew popula
tion of Alexandria would render it natural that the Epistle should
contemplate the Hebrew Christians alone in that church, wherein there
may perhaps at first have been as few Gentile converts as in Jerusalem
itself. It must be remembered, however, that this is only an hypothesis,'
offered as being embarrassed with fewer difficulties than any other which
has been proposed.
Such, then, being the utmost which we can ascertain concerning the
readers of the Epistle, what can we learn of its writer ? Let us first
examine the testimony of the Primitive Church on this question. It is
well summed up by St. Jerome in the following passage:4 — "That
which is called the Epistle to the Hebrews is thought not to be Paul's,
because of the difference of style and language, but is ascribed either to
Barnabas (according to Tertullian) ; or to Luke the Evangelist (accord
ing to some authorities) ; or to Clement (afterwards Bishop of Rome),
who is said to have arranged and adorned Paul's sentiments in his own
language ; or at least it is thought that Paul abstained from the inscrip
tion of his name at its commencement because it was addressed to the
Hebrews, among whom he was unpopular." Here, then, we find that the
Epistle was ascribed to four different writers, — St. Barnabas, St. Luke,
St. Clement, or St. Paul. With regard to the first, Tertullian expressly
says that copies of the Epistle in his day bore the inscription, " The
Epistle of Barnabas to the Hebrews." The same tradition is mentioned
by Philastrius. The opinion that either Luke or Clement was the writer
is mentioned by Clement of Alexandria, Origen,5 and others ; but they
1 The canon of Muratori mentions an ly suggested by Schmidt) by maintaining thai
epistle ad Alexandrinos (which it rejects), and the constant allusions to the Temple and hie-
takes no notice of any epistle ad Hebrews. rarchy in this Epistle refer to the Egyptian
We cannot prove, however, that this epistle ad temple built by Onias at Leontopolis. This
Alexandrinos was the same with our Epistle to notion is sufficiently refuted by Wieseleris
the Hebrews. own admission, that even Philo the Alexan-
2 Bleek has endeavored to prove (and we drian, when speaking of the Temple, knows
think successfully) that these are not only from but one, viz. the Temple on Mount Zion.
the LXX., but from the Alexandrian MSS. of 4 See p. 848, n. 4.
the LXX. But we do not insist on this argu- 5 After stating that the style is admitted
ment, as it is liable to some doubt. not to be that of St. Paul, Origen adds his
3 Since the above remarks were published, own opinion that the Epistle was written by
this hypothesis has been advocated by Bunsen some disciple of St. Paul, who recorded the
in his " Hippolytus." It is to be regretted that sentiments of the Apostle, and commented like
Wieseler should have encumbered his able ar- u. scholiast upon the teaching of his master.
guments in defence of this hypothesis (original- Then follows the passage which is quoted be-

chap. xxvm. WRITER OF THE EPISTLE TO THE HEBREWS. 853
seem not to have considered Luke or Clement as the independent authors
of the Epistle, but only as editors of the sentiments of Paul. Some held
that Luke had only translated the Pauline original ; others that he or
Clement had systematized the teaching of their master with a com
mentary'- of their own. Fourthly, St. Paul was held to be ih some sense
the author of the Epistle by the Greek ecclesiastical writers generally ;
though no one, so far as we know, maintained that he had written it in
its present form. On the other hand, the Latin Church, till the fourth
century, refused to acknowledge the Epistle 2 as Paul's in any sense.
Thus there were, in fact, only two persons whose claim to the inde
pendent authorship of the Epistle was maintained in the Primitive Church,
viz., St. Barnabas and St. Paul. Those who contend that Barnabas was
the author confirm the testimony of Tertullian by the following argu
ments from internal evidence. First, Barnabas was a Levite, and there
fore would naturally dwell on the Levitical worship which forms so
prominent a topic of this Epistle. Secondly, Barnabas was a native of
Cyprus, and Cyprus was peculiarly connected with Alexandria ; so that a
Cyprian Levite would most probably receive his theological education at
Alexandria. This would agree with the Alexandrian character of the
argumentation of this Epistle. Thirdly, this is further confirmed by the
ancient tradition which connects Barnabas and his kinsman Mark with
the church of Alexandria.8 Fourthly, the writer of the Epistle was a
friend of Timotheus (see above, pp. 845, 850) ; so was Barnabas (cf.
Acts xiii. and xiv. with 2 Tim. iii. 11). Fifthly, the Hebraic appellation
which Barnabas received from the Apostles — " Son of Exhortation " * —
shows that he possessed the gift necessary for writing a composition dis
tinguished for the power of its hortatory admonitions.
The advocates of the Pauline authorship urge, in addition to the
external testimony which we have before mentioned, the following argu
ments from internal evidence. First, that the general plan of the Epistle
is similar to that of Paul's other writings ; secondly, that its doctrinal
sentiments are identical with Paul's ; thirdly, that there are many points
of similarity between its phraseology and diction and those of Paul.8 On
low; after which he mentions the tradition ship could not easily have been forgotusn,"
about Clement and Luke. — Origen in Euseb. and also that " we should not expect in Bar-
Hist. Ecc. vi. 25. nabas so Pauline a turn of mind." On these
1 See the preceding note. grounds he assigns the epistle to Apollos.
2 Even Cyprian rejected it, and Hilary is 4 So the word is translated by some of the
the first writer of the Western Church who best authorities. See p. 109, note 7.
received it as St. Paul's. 6 The ablest English champion of the
8 Bunsen acknowledges the force of the Pauline authorship is Dr. Davidson, who has
arguments in favor of Barnabas, but thinks stated the arguments on both sides with that
ihat if he had been the author " his author- perfect candor which so peculiarly distinguish-

854 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap, xxvin,
the other hand, the opponents of the Pauline origin argue, first, that the
rhetorical character of the composition is altogether unlike Paul's other
writings ; secondly, that there are many points of difference in the
phraseology and diction ; thirdly that the quotations of the Old Testa
ment are not made in the same form as Paul's ; 1 fourthly, that the
writer includes himself among those who had received the Gospel from the
original disciples of the Lord Jesus (ii. 3),2 whereas St. Paul declares
that the Gospel was not taught him by man, but by the revelation of Jesus
Christ (Gal. i. 11, 12) ; fifthly, that St. Paul's Epistles always begin
with his name, and always specify in the salutation the persons to whom
they are addressed.3
Several very able modern critics have agreed with Luther in assigning
the authorship of this Epistle to Apollos, chiefly because we know him to
have been a learned Alexandrian Jew,4 and because he fulfils the other
conditions mentioned above, as required by the internal evidence. But
we need not dwell on this opinion, since it is not based on external testi
mony, and since Barnabas fulfils the requisite conditions almost equally
well. Finally, we may observe, that, notwithstanding the doubts which we
have recorded, we need not scruple to speak of this portion of Scripture
by its canonical designation, as " the Epistle of Paul the Apostle to the
Hebrews." We have seen that Jerome expresses the greatest doubts
concerning its authorship : Origen also says, " The writer is known to
God alone : " the same doubts are expressed by Eusebius and by Augus
tine : yet all these great writers refer to the words of the Epistle as the
words of Paul. In fact, whether written by Barnabas, by Luke, by
es him among theological writers. See David- have been said by Barnabas, because they
son's Introduction, vol. iii. pp. 163-259. Eb- receive the tradition mentioned by Clement of
rard, in his recent work on the Epistle, argnes Alexandria, that Barnabas was one of the
plausibly in favor of the hypothesis mentioned seventy disciples of Christ. But this tradi-
above, that it was written by St. Luke, under tion seems to have arisen from a confusion be-
the direction of St. Paul. He modifies this tween Barnabas and Barsabas (Acts i. 23).
hypothesis by supposing Luke to receive Tertullian speaks of Barnabas as a disciple of
Paul's instructions at Rome, and then to write the Apostles, " qui ab Apostolis didicit." — De
the Epistle in some other part of Italy. We Pudic. c. 20.
think, however, that the argument on which 8 We have not mentioned here the mistakes
he mainly relies (viz. that the writer of xiii. which some suppose the writer to have made
19 could not have been the writer of xiii. 23) concerning the internal arrangements of the
is untenable. Temple and the official duties of the High
1 It should be observed that the three pre- Priest. These difficulties will be discussed in
ceding arguments do not contradict the primi- the notes upon the passages where they occur._
tive opinion that the Epistle contained the em- They are not of a kind which tend to fix the
bodiment of St. Paul's sentiments by the pen authorship of the Epistle upon one more than
of Luke or Clement. upon another of those to whom it has been
2 Some have argued that this could not assigned. 4 Acts xviii. 24

chap, xx vm.

EPISTLE TO THE HEBREWS.

855

Clement, or by Apollos, it represented the views, and was impregnated
by the influence, of the great Apostle, whose disciples even the chief of
these Apostolic men might well be called. By their writings, no less
than by his own, he, being dead, yet spake.
We have seen that the Epistle to the Hebrews was addressed to Jewish
converts who were tempted to apostatize from Christianity, and return
to Judaism. Its primary object was to check this apostasy, by showing
them the true end and meaning of the Mosaic system, and its symbolical
and transitory character. They are taught to look through the shadow
to the substance, through the type to the antitype. But the treatise,
though first called forth to meet the needs of Hebrew converts, was not
designed for their instruction only. The Spirit of God has chosen this
occasion to enlighten the Universal Church concerning the design of the
ancient covenant, and the interpretation of the Jewish Scriptures. Nor
could the memory of St. Paul be enshrined in a nobler monument, nor
his mission on earth be more fitly closed, than by this inspired record of
the true subordination of Judaism to Christianity.
THE EPISTLE TO THE HEBREWS.1

God has re
vealed Him-

GOD,2 who at sundry times and in divers manners spake i. 1
Bemfiinath^t0 °f om *° our Others by the prophets, hath 3 in these last days 4 2
Person ofHre Sp0k.eil unt0 us by 5 gjg g0Ilj wuom He appointed heir of all
things, by whom also He made the universe ; 6 who, being an emanation 7 3

1 We have the following circumstances to
fix the date of this Epistle : —
(1) The Temple of Jerusalem was stand
ing, and the services going on undisturbed (vii.
25, xiii. 11-13). Hence it was written before
the destruction of the Temple in a.d. 70.
(2) Its author was at liberty in Italy; and
Timotheus was just liberated from imprison
ment (xiii. 23, 24). If St. Paul wrote it, this
would fix the date at 63 ; but as we do not
hear that Timotheus was then imprisoned in
Italy (either in Acts, or in the Epistles to
Timothy, where allusions might be expected
to the fact), it would seem more probable that
his imprisonment here mentioned took place
about the time of St. Paul's death, and that
he was liberated after the death of Nero.
This would place the date of the Epistle in
A.D. 68 or 69, if our chronology be correct :
see Chronol. Table in Appendix II.
(3) This date agrees with ii. 3, which
places the readers of the Epistle among those

who had not seen our Lord in the flesh ; for
the " we " there plainly includes the readers as
well as the writer.
8 In order to mark the difference of style
and character between this and the preceding
Epistles, the translator has in this Epistle ad
hered as closely as possible to the language
of the Authorized Version.
8 The Hellenistic peculiarity of using the
aorist for the perfect (which is not uncom
mon in St. Paul's writings, see Rom. xi. 30,
and Phil. iii. 12) is very frequent in this Epis
tle. 4 The best MSS. have the singular. It
should perhaps rather be translated " in the end
af these days," these days being contrasted with
the future period, the world to come.
6 The preposition means more than " by "
(so in preceding verse) ; in the person of His
Son would be more accurate.
6 " The worlds : " so xi. 3.
7 Not " brightness" (A. V ), but emanation,

856 THE LIPE AND EPISTLES OP ST. PAUL. chap, xxvm
L of His glory, and an express l image of His substance,2 and upholding all
things by the word of His power, when He had by Himself made purifi
cation3 for our sins, sat down on the right hand of the Majesty on high ;
4 being made so much greater than the Angels, as He hath by inheritance
obtained a more excellent name than they.
5 For to which of the Angels4 said He at any time, " Cfroil who i« higher
" than the
art mg son, ijjis bag jjabe Jf begotten vqtt " ? 5 And again, Aj^eU-
6 " | brill bt ta §im a fatjjer, anb jje sfrall bt ta mt a son "?6 But
when He bringeth back1 the First-begotten into the world, He saith,
7 " ^nb let all % ^ngels of (&ab toorsfjin frim." 8 And of the angels
He saith, " ISfro maketfr fris angels spirits, anb fris ministers
8 flames of Are."9 But unto the Son He saith, " Cfrg jfrrone, # (Sob,
is for uber anb eber ; a srenire of righteousness is % srejjtre of
tfrg kingbom. Cfron frasi labta rigfrieonsness anb frateb iniqnitg ;
9 therefore (Sob, eben tfrg (&ab, fratfr anointeb tfree briffr tfre oil of
io glabness abobe tfrg fellofos." 10 And " ®fron, $forb, in tfre begin
ning bibst lag tfre founbation of tfre eartfr, anb tfre freabens are tfre
n toorks of limine franb. Cfreg sfrall perisfr, fori fyan remainest;
12 anb tfreg all sfrall foa-e olb as botb a garment, anb as a besinre
as of light from the sun. The word and idea mentioned, His return to jndge the world
occur in Philo. follows.
1 Literally, impression, as of a seal on wax. 8 This quotation forms an exception to
The same expression is used by Philo concern- Bleek's assertion, that the quotations in this
ing " the Eternal Word." Epistle are always from the Alexandrian text
2 Not "person" (A. V.), but substance. of the LXX. It is from Dent, xxxii. 43, ver-
Cf. xi. 1 ; and see note on iii. 14. batim according to the MSS. followed by the
8 The "by Himself" and "our" of T. R. T. R. ; but not according to the Codex Alex.,
are not found in some of the best MSS. which reads " sons," instead of "angels."
4 The Law (according to a Jewish tradi- The LXX. here differs from the Hebrew,
tion frequently confirmed in the New Testa- which entirely omits the words here quoted.
ment) was delivered by angels (Acts vii. 53 ; The passage where the quotation occurs is at
Gal. iii. 19; Heb. ii. 3). Hence the emphasis the conclusion of the final song of Moses,
here laid upon the inferiority of the angels to where he is describing God's vengeance upon
the Messiah, whence follows the inferiority of His enemies. It seems here to be applied in
the Law to the Gospel. This inference is ex- a higher sense to the last judgment.
pressed ii. 3. 9 Ps. civ. 4. Quoted according to LXX.
6 Ps. ii. 7 (LXX.). The Hebrew is, " Who maketh the winds His
6 2 Sam. vii. 14 (LXX.) (originally spoken messengers, and the flames His ministers."
of Solomon, in whom we see a type of Christ. But the thought expressed here is, that God
Cf. Ps. lxxii.). employs His angels in the physical operations
7 This is, literally translated, when He shall of the universe. " Spirits " is equivalent to
have brought back, not again, when He has brought " winds," as at John iii. 8, and Gen. viii. 1
back. The ascension of Christ having been (LXX.). w Ps. xiv. 6, 7 (LXX.)

ohap. xxvm. EPISTLE TO THE HEBREWS. 857
sfralt ifroix folb tfrem no anb tfreg sfrall be rfrangeb ; but fyan art
tfre same, anb tfrg gears sfrall not fail." 1
But to which of the angels hath He said at any time, " Sit Ifron On 13
wg rigfrt franb, until J make ifrine enemies tfrg footstool " ? 2 Are 14
they not all ministering spirits, sent forth to execute [His] service for3
the sake of those who shall inherit salvation ?
Therefore we ought to give the more earnest heed to the things which ii. 1
we have heard, lest at any time we should let them slip.4 For if the 2
word declared by angels 5 was steadfast, and every transgression and dis
obedience received a due requital ; how shall we escape, if we neglect so 3
great salvation ? which was declared at first by the Lord, and was estab
lished 6 unto us 7 on firm foundations by those who heard Him, God also 4
bearing them witness, both with signs and wonders, and divers miracles,
and with gifts of the Holy Spirit, which He distributed 8 according to His
own will.
For not unto angels hath He subjected the world9 to come, whereof 5
we speak. But one in a certain place testified, saying, " Wfrat is man 6
tfrat ifron art minbfnl of frim, or tfre son of man ifrat tfron regarb-
est frim ? Jfor a little fafrile 10 tfron frast mabe frim lofaer tfran % 7
angels ; ifron frast erofaneb frim faitfr glorg anb fronor,11 t\ian frast 8
pi all tfrings in snbjeetion unber fris feet." 12 For in that He ' not
all tfrings in Subjection " under Him, He left nothing that should not
be put under Him.
1 Ps. cii. 26-28. (LXX.) It is most im- the city to come of xiii. 14. The subjection of
portant to observe that this description, applied this to the Messiah (though not yet accom-
in the original to God, is here without hesita- plished, see verse 9) was another proof of His
tion applied to Christ. superiority to the angels.
2 Ps. ex. 1. (LXX.) Applied to the Mes- 10 The phrase may mean in a small degree,
siah by our Lord himself, by St. Peter (Acts or for a short time; the former is the meaning
ii. 35), and by St. Paul (1 Cor. xv. 25). of the Hebrew original, but the latter mean-
8 The A. V., " to minister for them, is in- ing is taken here, as we see from verse 9.
t u The T. R. inserts here what we find in
4 The active signification here given in A. V., and hast set Him over the works of thy
A. V. is defended by Buttmann and Wahl. hands, but this is not found in the best MSS.
'* Vii. the Mosaic Law. Seethe noteon i. 5. 12 Ps. viii. 5-7 (LXX). Quoted also (with
« The verb means, was established on firm a slight variation), as referring to our Lord,

ground.

1 Cor. xv. 27, and Eph. i. 22. The Hebrew

i On the inferences from this verse, see Psalmist speaks of mankind : the New Testa-
_„. ment teaches ns to apply his words in a higher
above, p. 524. , r" 6
• "Distributed." Compare 1 Cor. xii. 11. sense to Christ, the representative of glorified
9 The world to come here corresponds with humanity.

858 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OP ST. PAUL. chap. xxvm.
But now we see not yet all things in subjection under Him. ^oFjeiua
9 But we behold Jesus, who was " for a little fafrile mabe ««*He migu
lofaer than ib angels," crowned through 1 the suffering of 8uffearfndgby
o ° a as High Priest
death with glory and honor ; that by the free gift of God He for man.
10 might taste death for all men. For it became Him, through 2 whom are all
things, and by whom are all things, in bringing 3 many sons unto glory,
to consecrate4 by sufferings the Captain5 of their salvation.
11 For both He that sanctifieth, and they that are 6 sanctified, have all one
Father ; wherefore He is not ashamed to call them brethren, saying,
12 " | toill beelare Cfrg name ia mg bretfrren, in tfre mibst of tfre tan-
13 gregation brill J sing praises nnto ^Dfree." 1 And again, " Jf toill
put mg trust in Jiim; lo, $ anb tfre rfrilbren tofrkfr (Sob fratfr
14 gifaen me." 8 Forasmuch, then, as " tfre rfrilbren " are partakers of flesh
and blood, He also himself likewise took part of the same, that by death
15 He might destroy the lord of death, that is, the Devil ; and might
deliver them who through fear of death were all their lifetime subject to
16 bondage. For truly He giveth His aid,9 not unto angels, but unto the
17 seed of Abraham. Wherefore it behooved Him in all things to be made
like unto His brethren, that He might become a merciful 10 and faithful
High Priest in the things of God, to make expiation for the sins of the
18 people. For whereas He hath himself been tried n by suffering, He is
able to succor them that are in trial.
1 Compare Phil. ii. 8, 9. 7 Ps. xxii. 23 (LXX. with a slight change
2 Compare Rom. xi. 36, and 1 Cor. viii. 6. in the verb for "declare"). Here again the
God is here described as the First Cause (" by Messianic application of this Psalm (which is
whom ") and the Sustainer ( " through whom ") not apparent in the original) is very instructive.
of the Universe. 8 This quotation from Isa. viii. 17, 18
8 Por the grammar here we may refer to (LXX.), appears in English to be broken into
Acts xi. 12. two (which destroys the sense), if the inter-
4 Literally, to bring to the appointed accom- mediate words " and again " (which are not in
plishment, to develop the full idea of the character, the LXX.) be inserted. Indeed.it may well
to consummate. The latter word would be the be suspected that they have here been intro-
best translation, if it were not so unusual as duced into the MSS., by an error of transcrip-
applied to persons ; but the word consecrate is tion, from the line above.
often used in the same sense, and is employed 9 The verb means to assist here. So it is
in the A. V. as a translation of this verb, vii. used in Sirach iv. 12. The A. V. mistraas-
28. lates the present tense as past.
6 Captain. Those who are being saved are 10 Perhaps it would be more correct to trans-
here represented as an army, with Jesus lead- late that He might become merciful, and a faith-
ing them on. Compare xii. 2. ful, &c.
6 Literally, who are in the process of sancti- n Literally, liath suffered when in trial. This
fication. verb does not mean usually to be tempted to sin,

chap. xxvm. EPISTLE TO THE HEBREWS. ' 859

ui.

u*h£ L Wherefore, holy brethren, partakers of a heavenly calling, 1
consider the Apostle1 and High Priest of our Confession,2
Christ 3 Jesus ; who was faithful to Him that appointed Him, as Moses 2
also was " faitfrfnl in all tfre frousefrolb of (Sob." 4 For greater glory 3
is due to Him than unto Moses, inasmuch as the founder of the house
hold is honored above the household. For every household hath some 4
founder ; but He that hath founded all things is God. And Moses indeed 5
was " faitfrfnl in all tfre fronsefrolb of &ab " as " a Serbant "5 ap
pointed to testify the words that should be spoken [unto him] ; but 6
Christ as " a Son " 6 over His own household.
warning And His household are we, if we hold fast our confidence,
againstapostesy; and the rejoicing of our hope, firmly unto the end. Where
fore, as the Holy Spirit saith, "Co-bag, if ge frear ||is boice, frarben 7
not gonr frearis as in tfre nroboraiion, in tfre bag of temptation in 8
tfre toilbemess ; fofren conr fatfrers tempteb me, nrobeb me, anb sato 9
mg toorks fortg gears. Mfrerefore <f faas griebeb faitfr tfral gene- io
ration, anb saib, Cfreg bo altoag err in tfreir frearts, anb tfreg T
frabe not knoton mg toags. So <f stoare in mg toratfr, &freg sfrall n
not enter into mg rest."8 Take heed, brethren, lest there be in any of 12
you an evil heart of unbelief, in departing from the living God. But 13
exhort one another daily while it is called To-day, lest any of you be
hardened through the deceitfulness of sin. For we are made partakers 9 14
of Christ, if we hold our first foundation10 firmly unto the end.
but to be tried by affliction. Cf. 1 Cor. x. 13, metaphor is of a faithful steward presiding
and James i. 2. Hence it is better not to over his master's household.
translate it by temptation, which, in modern 6 " Servant," quoted from the same verse,
English, conveys only the former idea. A Numbers xii. 7 (LXX.). (See above.)
perplexity may perhaps be removed from some 6 See the quotations in i. 5.
English readers by the information that St. 7 They is emphatic.
James's direction to " count it all joy when 8 The above quotation is from Ps. xcv.
we fall into divers temptations," is, in reality, 7-11, mainly according to the Codex Alexan-
an admonition to rejoice in suffering for drinus of the LXX., but not entirely so, the
Christ's sake. fi^H ymrs interpolated in verse 9th being the
i Apostle is here used in its etymological principal, though not the only variation.
eense far one sent forth. The peculiar use of " if " here (and iv. 3) is a
2 For " confession " compare iv. 14 and x. Hebraism.
oo 9 "Partakers." Compare iii. 1, and vi. 4
8 We have not departed here from the ("partakers of the Holy Spirit").
T. R. ; but the best MSS. omit " Christ" 10 Literally, the beginning of our foundation.
•Numbers xii. 7 (LXX.). "My servant The original meaning of the latter word is (Aot
Moses is faithful in all my household." The whereon any thing else stands, or is supported;

860 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OP ST. PAUL. chap. xxvm.
iii.
15 When it is said, " Co-bag, if ge frear Pis fooi.ee, frarben not gonr
16 frearts as in tfre proboration," — who l were they that, though they
had heard, did provoke ? Were they not all2 whom Moses brought forth
17 out of Egypt ? And with whom was He grieved forty years ? Was it
not with them that had sinned, whose carcasses3 fell in the wilderness?
18 And to whom sware He that they should not enter into His rest, but to
19 them that were disobedient ? 4 And 5 we see that they could not enter,
because of unbelief.6
iv. 1 Therefore let us fear, since a promise still7 remaineth of entering into
2 His rest, lest any of you should be found 8 to come short of it. For we
have received glad tidings as well as they ; but the report which they
3 heard did not profit them, because it 9 met no belief in the hearers. For
we that have believed are entering into the [promised] rest. And
thus He hath said, " So Jf stoare in mg toratfr, % freg sfrall %®%
enter into mg rest." 10 Although His works were finished, ever since
4 the foundation of the world ; for He hath spoken in a certain place of the
5 seventh day in this wise, " |^nb <§flb bib %<&%% on tfre sebentfr bag
from all Pis toorks ; " u and in this place again, " Cfreg sfrall |t#C
6 enter into mg rest."12 Since therefore it still remaineth that some
hence it acquired the meaning of substantia, or 6 The allusion is to the refusal of the Israel-
substance (in the metaphysical sense of the ites to believe in the good report of the land
term). Cf. Heb. i. 3, and xi. 1 ; hence, again, of Canaan brought by the spies. (Numbers
that of ground, nearly in the sense of subject- xiii. and xiv. )
matter (2 Cor. ix. 4; 2 Cor. xi. 17). There is 7 " Still remaineth." Compare " remain-
no passage of the New Testament where it eth," verses 6 and 9. The reasoning is ex-
need necessarily be translated " confidence ; " plained by what follows, especially verses 6-8.
although it seems to have the latter meaning 8 Should be seen.
in some passages of the LXX. cited by Bleek ; 9 Literally, it was not mixed with belief. The
and it is also so used by Diodorus Siculus, other reading would mean, " they were not
and by Polybius. united by belief to its hearers," where its hearers
1 We follow the accentuation adopted by must mean the spies, who reported what they had
Chrysostom, Griesbach, &c. heard of the richness of the land. Tischen-
2 The inference is that Christians, though dorf, in his 2d edition, retains the T. R.
delivered by Christ from bondage, would 10 The A. V. here strangely departs from
nevertheless perish if they did not persevere the correct translation which it adopts above
(see verses 6 and 14). The interrogation is (iii. 11).
not observed in A. V. u Gen. ii. 2 (LXX. slightly altered).
8 Literally, limbs ; but the word is used by I2 The meaning of this is, — God's rest
the LXX. for carcasses. Numbers xiv. 32. was a perfect rest, — He declared His inten-
* Not "that believed not" (A. V.). See tion that His people should enjoy His rest, —
. note on Rom. xi. 30. that intention has not yet been fulfilled, -*— its
6 " And," not " So " (A. V.). fulfilment therefore is still to come.

chap. xxvm. EPISTLE TO THE HEBREWS. 861 iv.
must enter theiein, and they who first received the glad tidings thereof
entered not, because of disobedience,1 He again fixeth a certain day, — 7
QDw-£!^||," — declaring in David, after so long a time (as hath been
said), " ®o-bag, if ge frear pis fooke, frarben not gonr frearls."
For if Joshua had given them rest, God would not speak afterwards of 8
another day. Therefore there still remaineth a Sabbath-rest2 for the 9
people of God. For he that is entered into God's rest must 3 himself 10
also rest from his labors, as God did from His. Let us therefore strive 11
to enter into that rest, lest any man fall after the same example of
disobedience.*for God's For the word of God 'liveth and worketh, and is sharper 12
judgment r
evaded*6 than any two-edged sword, piercing even to the dividing
asunder of soul and spirit, yea, to the6 inmost parts thereof, and
judging the thoughts and imaginations of the heart. Neither is there 13
any creature that is not manifest in His sight. But all things are naked
and opened unto the eyes of Him with whom we have to do.
cnriBtisa Seeing, then, that we have a great High Priest, who hath 14
who'can881 passed1 through the heavens, Jesus the Son of God, let us
be touched . ,
witnafeeiing hold fast our confession. For we have not a High Priest 15
of our mtlrmi-
tles' that cannot be touched with a feeling of our infirmities, but
who bore in all things the likeness of our trials,8 yet without sin. Let us 16
therefore come boldly to the throne of grace, that we may obtain mercy,
and find grace to help in time of need. For every High Priest taken v. 1
from among men is ordained to act on behalf of men in the things of
1 Here it is said they entered not because of ites, and the repose of Canaan, were typical
disobedience; in iii. 19, because of unbelief ; but of higher realities; and that this fact had
this does not justify us in translating these been divinely intimated in the words of the
different Greek expressions (as in A. V.) by Psalmist.
the same English word. The rejection of the 6 The word of God is the revelation of the
Israelites was caused both by unbelief and by mind of God, imparted to man. See note on
disobedience; the former being the source of Eph. v. 26. Here it denotes the revelation of
the latter God's judgment to the conscience.
2 Stric'tly, a keeping of Sabbatical rest. 6 The expression is literally, of soul and
» Literally, hath rested, the aorist used for spirit, both joint and marrow; the latter being
perfect. To complete the argument of this a proverbial expression for utterly, even to the
verse, we must supply the minor premise, but inmost parts.
God's people have never yet enjoyed this perfect 7 " Through, not "into (A. V.). The
rest ¦ whence the conclusion follows, therefore allusion is to the high priest passing through
its enjoyment is still future, as before. the ccurts of the Temple to the Holy of Ho
* The reasoning of the above passage rests lies. Compare ix. 11 and 24
upon

the truth that the unbelief of the Israel- 8 See note on ii. IS.

862 THE LIPE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap, xxvm,
V. 2 God, that he may offer gifts and sacrifices for sins ; and is able to bear
with the ' ignorant ! and erring, being himself also encompassed with
3 infirmity. And by reason thereof, he is bound, as for the people,2 so also
4 for himself, to make offering for sins. And no man taketh this honor on
5 himself, but he that is ' called by God, as was Aaron. So also Christ
glorified not Himself, to be made a High Priest ; but He that said unto
6 Him, " fofyau art mg Son, to-bag frabe Jf begotten tfree." 4 As He
saith also in another place, " Cfron art a f)riesi fbrefoer after tfre orber
7 of |£telcfrisebe.C." "' Who in the days of His flesh offered up prayers
and supplications with strong crying and tears unto Him that could save
8 Him from death, and was heard because He feared God ; 6 and though He
9 was a Son, yet learned He obedience 7 by suffering. And when His con
secration 8 was accomplished, He became the author of eternal salvation
10 to all them that obey Him ; having been named by God a High Priest
" after tfre orber of plekfriseber."
11 Of whom I have many things to say, and hard of interpreta- The readers
are reproach-
12 tion, since ye have grown9 dull in understanding.10 For when aeo^e'in1*
ye ought, after so long a time,11 to be teachers, ye need again derstendmlj
to be taught yourselves what 12 are the first principles of the oracles of
13 God ; and ye have come to need milk, instead of meat.13 For every one
that feeds on milk is ignorant of the doctrine of righteousness, for he is
14 a babe ; but meat is for men full grown, who, through habit, have their
ri. 1 senses exercised to know good from evil. Therefore let me leave 14 the
1 The sin-offerings were mostly for sins of 9 " Have grown," implying that they had
ignorance. See Levit. chap. v. declined from a more advanced state of Chris-
2 See Levit. chap. iv. and chap. ix. tian attainment.
8 If (with the best MSS.) we omit the 10 Literally, " in their hearing." Compare
article, the translation will be, "but when called Acts xvii. 20, and Matt xiii. 15.
by God," which does not alter the sense. u Literally, because ofthetime, viz. the length
4 Ps. ii. 7 (LXX.). of time elapsed since your conversion. See
6 Ps. ex. 4 (LXX.). the preceding introductory remarks, p. 850.
6 "Fear" hear means the fear of God. 12 We accentuate with Grieshach, Tischen-
Compare " God-fearing men," Acts ii. 5. The dorf, &c.
sentiment corresponds remarkably with that 18 The adjective does not mean "strong"
of chap. xii. 5-11. (A. V.), but solid, opposed to liquid. We use
7 There is a junction here of words of meat for solid food in general.
similar sound and parallel meaning, with 14 The 1 st person plural here, as at v. 11
which the readers of iEsehylus and Herodo- vi. 3, vi. 9, vi. 11, is used by the writer ; it is
t us are familiar. See JEsch. Agam. and Herod. translated by the 1st person singular in Eng-
'• 207- lish, according to the principle laid down, p.
* Compare ii. 10, and the note there. 341, note 3.

JHAF.xxvm. EPISTLE TO THE HEBREWS. 863 vi
rudiments of the doctrine of Christ, and go on to its maturity ; not lay
ing again the foundation, — of Repentance from dead works,1 and Faith
towards God; — Baptism,2 Instruction,3 and Laying-on of hands;4 — 2
and Resurrection of the dead, and Judgment everlasting.
warned of the And this I will do 5 if God permit. For it is impossible « 3,
danger of L r
apostasy, again to renew unto repentance those who have been once
enlightened, and have tasted of the heavenly gift, and been made par
takers of the Holy Spirit, and have tasted the goodness of the word of 5
God,7 and the powers of the world to come,8 and afterwards have fallen 6
away ; seeing they 9 crucify to themselves the Son of God afresh, and put
Him to an open shame. For the earth, when it hath drunk in the rain 7
that falleth oft upon it, if it bear herbs profitable to those for whom it is
tilled, partaketh of God's blessing ; but if it bear thorns and thistles, it 8
is counted worthless, and is nigh unto cursing, and its end is to be
of the1ralnded burned. But, beloved, I am persuaded better things of you, 9
perseverance, and things that accompany salvation, though I thus speak.
For God is not unrighteous to forget your labor, and the love 10 which ye 10
have shown to His name, in the services ye have rendered and still ren
der11 to the saints. But I desire earnestly that every one of you might 11
1 Dead works here may mean either sinful in such a case. Of course, no limit is placed
works (cf. Eph. ii. 1, "dead in sins"), or on the Divine power. Even in the passage, x.
legal works ; but the former meaning seems to 26-31 (which is much stronger than the pres-
correspond better with the "repentance" here, ent passage), it is not said that such apostates
and with ix. 14. are never brought to repentance, but only
2 We take the punctuation sanctioned by that it cannot be expected they ever should be.
Chrysostom. Both passages were much appealed to by the
8 This was the Catechetical Instruction, Novatians, and some have thought that this
which, in the Apostolic age, followed baptism, was the cause which so long prevented the
as we have already mentioned, p. 383. Latin Church from receiving this Epistle into
1 This is mentioned as following baptism, the Canon.
Acts viii. 17-19, xix. 6, and other places. 7 i.e. have experienced the fulfilment of
4 Or, let me do, if we read with the best God's promises.
•jog s The powers of the world to come appear to
6 A reason is here given by the writer denote the miraculous operations of the spirit-
why he will not attempt to teach his readers ual gifts. They properly belonged to the
the rudiments of Christianity over again; " world to come."
namely, that it is useless to attempt, by the 9 These apostates to Judaism crucified
repetition of such instruction, to recall those Christ afresh, inasmuch as they virtually gave
who have renounced Christianity to repent- their approbation to His crucifixion by join-
ance. The impossibility which he speaks of ing His crucifiers.
has reference (it should be observed) only to 10 "Labor" is omitted in the best MSS.
human agents; it is only said that all human " Compare x. 32, and the remarks, p. 850.
means of acting on the heart have been exhausted Por " saints," see note on 1 Cor. i. 2.

864 THE LIFE AJSTD EPISTLES OP ST. PAUL. ohap. xxviii.
vi. show the same zeal, to secure the full possession 1 of your hope unto the
12 end ; that ye be not slothful, but follow the example of them who through
13 faith and steadfastness inherit the promises. For God when He made
promise to Abraham, because He could swear by no greater, sware by
14 Himself, saying, " Uerilg, blessing Jf toil! bless tfree, anb mnltiplg-
15 ing $ mill mnltinlg ifree;"2 and so, having steadfastly endured,3 he
16 obtained the promise. For men, indeed, swear by the greater ; and
their oath establisheth 4 their word, so that they cannot gainsay it.
17 Wherefore God, willing more abundantly to show unto the heirs of the
promise the immutability of His counsel, set an oath between himself
18 and them ; 5 that by two immutable things, wherein it is impossible for
God to lie, we that have fled [to Him] for refuge might have a strong
19 encouragement6 to hold fast the hope set before us. Which hope we
have as an anchor of the soul, both sure and steadfast, and entering
20 within the veil ; whither Jesus, our forerunner, is for us entered, being
made " a |pirrfr |)riest foreber after tfre orber of glekfriseber." ''
vii 1 For this Melchisedec,8 " King of Salem," 9 " nriest of tfre The priest-
T • t /rv v » fl hoodofChrkt
most frljjy (§flb, who met Abraham returning from the ^yp^?dby
2 slaughter of the kings and blessed him, to whom also Abra- c^etacMs"
ham gave " a tentfr part of all/' 10 — who is first, by inter- £°£*%V<*.
pretation, King of Righteousness,11 and, secondly, king of eternafdiira-
3 Salem,12 which is King op Peace — without father, without cacy*11
mother, without table of descent 13 — having " neither beginning of days
1 Such appears the meaning of the word Heb. xii. 5, and xiii. 22; also Heb. i>. 14}
here. The English word satisfaction, in its than the A. V.
different uses, bears a close analogy to it. 7 Ps. ex. 4, quoted above, verse 6 and verse
2 Gen. xxii. 17 (LXX., except that " thee" 10, and three times in the next chapter.
is put for " thy seed "). 8 The following passage cannot be rightly
3 Abraham's " steadfast endurance " was understood, unless we bear in mind through-
shown just before he obtained this promise, in out that Melchisedec is here spoken of, not as
the offering up of Isaac. an historical personage, but as a type of Christ.
* Literally, their oath is to them an end of all 9 Gen. xiv. 18 (LXX.).
gainsaying, unto establishment [of their word.] 10 Gen. xiv. 20 (LXX.).
5 The verb means to interpose between two u This is the translation of his Hebrew
parties. Bleek gives instances of its use, both name. 12 Salem in Hebrew means peace.
transitively and intransitively. The literal la " Without table of descent." This ex-
English of the whole phrase is, He interposed plains the two preceding words ; the mean-
with an oath between the two parties. The " two ing is, that the priesthood of Melchisedec was
immutable things " are God's promise and His not, like the Levitical priesthood, dependent
oath, on his descent, through his parents, from a par-
6 This construction of the words seems to ticular family, but was a personal ofiice.
agree better with the ordinary meaning (see 14 Here, as in the previous " without father "

chap. xxvm. EPISTLE TO THE HEBREWS-. 865 vii.
nor end of life, but made like unto the Son of God — remaineth a priest
forever. Now consider how great this man was, to whom even Abraham the 4
patriarch gave a tenth of the choicest x spoil. And truly those among 5
the sons of Levi who receive the office of the priesthood have a com
mandment to take tithes according to the Law from the People, that is,
from their brethren, though they come out of the loins of Abraham.
But he, whose descent is not counted from them, taketh tithes from 6
Abraham, and blesseth2 the possessor of the promises. Now without all 7
contradiction, the less is blessed by the greater.3 And here, tithes are 8
received by men that die ; but there, by him of whom it is testified 4 that 9
he liveth. And Levi also, the receiver of tithes, hath paid tithes (so to
speak) by 5 Abraham ; for he was yet in the loins of his father when Mel- 10
chisedec met him.
Now if all things 6 were perfected by the Levitical priesthood (since 11
under it 7 the people hath received the Law) ,8 what further need was
there that another priest should rise " after tfre orber of Utelcfriseber,"
and not be called " after the order of Aaron " ? For the priesthood 12
being changed, there is made of necessity a change also of the Law.9
For He 10 of whom these things are spoken belongeth to another tribe, of 13
which no man giveth attendance " at the altar ; it being evident that our 14
Lord hath arisen 12 out of Judah, of which tribe Moses spake nothing con
cerning priesthood. And this is far more evident when 13 another priest 15
ariseth after the likeness of Melchisedec ; who is made not under the law 16
of a carnal commandment, but with the power of an imperishable life ;
for it is testified14 of Him, " Cfrou art a priest $®\%®*B€% after 17
and " without mother," the silence of Scripture to bring a thing to the fulness of its designed devd-
is interpreted allegorically. Scripture mentions opment. Compare vii. 19, and note on ii. 10.
neither the father nor mother, neither the birth 7 Under its conditions and ordinances. Com-
nor death, of Melchisedec. Pare ™- 6-
i Such is the sense of the word used here. 8 Such is the tense according to the read-
2 The verbs are present-perfect. ing of the best MSS.
3 The same word as in i. 4. 9 The word used (as often) without the ar-
4 Vis. testified in Ps. ex. 4. " Thou art tide for the law. Cf. note on Rom. iii. 20.
a priest forever." 10 Viz- the Messiah, predicted in Ps. ex. 4.
* " By," not " in " (A. V.). u The verbs are present-perfect.
e The term here used, a word of very fre- 12 Hath arisen. Compare the passage of
quent occurrence and great significance in this Isaiah quoted Matt. iv. 16.
Epistle, is not fully represented by the English 1S If, here meaning if, as is the case.
"perfection." The corresponding verb denotes, 14 The best MSS. have the passive.
55

866 THE LIPE AND EPISTLES OP ST. PAUL. chap, xxvm
Vii. 18 tfre orber of H>kfris£ber." On the one hand,1 an old commandment is
19 annulled, because it was weak and profitless (for the Law perfected2
nothing) ; and on the other hand, a better hope is brought in, whereby
we draw near unto God.
20 And inasmuch as this Priesthood hath the confirmation of an oath —
21 (for those priests are made without an oath, but He with an oath, by
22 Him that said unto Him, " i&fre ITorb sware, anb brill not repent, %\axx
art a priest forefoer ") 3 — insomuch Jesus is4 surety of a better covenant.
23 And they, indeed, are5 many priests [one succeeding to another's
24 office] , because death hindereth their continuance. But He, because He
25 remaineth forever, hath no successor in His priesthood.6 Wherefore also
He is able to save them to the uttermost that come unto God by Him,
seeing He ever liveth to make intercession for them.
26 For such a High Priest became us, who is holy, harmless, undefiled,
27 separate 7 from sinners, and ascended above the heavens. Who needeth
not daily,8 as those High Priests,9 to offer up sacrifice, first for His own
sins, and then for the People's ; for this He did once, when He offered up
28 Himself. For the Law maketh men High Priests, who have infirmity ;
but the word of the oath which was since the Law,10 maketh the Son, who
is consecrated u forevermore.
1 The particles in the Greek express this xxx. 7-10.) We must either suppose (with
contrast. The overlooking of this caused the Tholuck) that it is used for perpetually, i. e.
error in the A. V. year after year ; or we must suppose a ref-
2 Compare note on verse 11. erence to the High Priest as taking part in the
8 In this quotation (again repeated) from occasional sacrifices made by all the Priests,
Ps. ex. 4, the words "after the order of Mel- for sins of ignorance (Levit. iv.) ; or we must
chisedec " are not found here in the best MSS. suppose that the regular acts of the Priesthood
4 Not "was made" (A. V.), but has become are attributed to the High Priests, as represen-
or is. tatives and heads of the whole order ; or, final-
6 Are, or have become, not " were " (A. V.) ; ly, we must take " High Priests," as at Matt.
an important mistranslation, as the present tense ii. 4, Acts v. 24, and other places, for the heads
shows that the Levitical priesthood was still of the twenty-four classes into which the Priests
enduring while this Epistle was written. were divided, who officiated in turn. This lat-
6 Not passing on to another. ter view is perhaps the most natural. The
7 This seems to refer to the separation Priests sacrificed a lamb every morning and
from all contact with the unclean, which was evening, and offered an offering of flour, and
required of the high priest; who (according to wine besides. Philo regards the lambs as of-
the Talmud) abstained from intercourse even fered by the Priests for the people, and the flour
with his own family, for seven days before the for themselves. He also says the High Priest
day of Atonement. offered prayers and sacrifices every day.
8 This " daily " has occasioned much per- 9 Literally, the [ordinary] High Priests.
plexity, for the High Priest only offered the 10 Viz., the oath in Ps. ex. 4, so often referred
sin-offerings here referred to once a year, on to in this Epistle.
tlie day of Atonement. (Levit. xvi. and Exod. u Compare ii. 10.

ciiap. xxvm. EPISTLE TO THE HEBREWS. 867 viii.
rhe Mosaic Now this is' the sum of our words.1 We have such a High 1
Temple, hie- Priest, who hath sat down on the right hand of the throne of
rarchy, and
anTmperfec?8 tne Majesty in the heavens ; a minister of the sanctuary,2 and 2
betterTove- e of the true tabernacle, which the Lord pitched, and not man.
mint, and the
meantnofatone" ¦^or evei7 High Priest is ordained 3 to offer gifts and sacrifices ; 3
abrist' wherefore this High Priest also must have somewhat 4 to offer.
Now5 if He were on earth, He would not be a Priest at all,6 since the 4
Priests are they that make the offerings according to the Law ; 7 who 5
minister to that which is a figure 8 and shadow of heavenly things, as
Moses is admonished 9 by God, when he is about to make the tabernacle ;
for " See," saith He, " tfrat t^an make all tfrings arrorbing ta tfre
pattern sfroforeb tfree in tfre mount."10 But now He hath obtained a 6
higher ministry, by so much as He is the mediator u of a better covenant,
which is enacted 12 under better promises.
For if that first covenant were faultless, no place would be sought 13 for 7
a second ; whereas He findeth fault,14 and saith unto them, " ^efrolb, tfre 8
bags eome, saiifr tbt i^orb, tofren J brill arromplisfr15 for tfre fronse
of Israel anb for tfre frouse of |ubafr a neto robenant. |tot arxorb- 9
ing ta tfre robenant tofrirfr J gafoe 16 nnto tfreir fatfrers, in tfre bag
tofren | took t\itm bg tfre franb to leab tfrem oni of tfre lanb of
t%gpi ; beranse tfreg rontinneb not in mg robenant, anb | also
tnrneb mg fare from tfrem, saiifr tfre f orb. Jfor tfris is tfre robe- io
1 Literally, the things which are being spoken. 18 Here A. V. is not quite correct.
2 Sanctuary. Compare ix. 12, Holy Place, 14 " Pindeth fault " refers to the preceding
where the Greek word is the same. " faultless." The pronoun should be joined
8 The same thing is said v. 1. with " saith."
4 What the sacrifice was is not said here, 16 Here another verb is substituted for that
but had been just before mentioned, vii. 27. found in the LXX. The preposition denotes
* Now (not for) is according to the reading " for," not " with " (A. V.).
of the best MSS 16 ^' must ',e remembered that the Greek
6 "Not tx Priest at all." The translation word does not (like the English covenant)
in A. V. is hardly strong enough. imply reciprocity. It properly means a legal
t Our Lord, being of the tribe of Judah, disposition, and would perhaps be better trans-
could not have been one of the Levitical Priest- lated dispensation here. A covenant between
hood. So it was said before, vii. 14. two parties is expressed by a different term.
8 Viz. the Temple ritual. The new dispensation is a gift from God rath-
9 Compare Acts x. 22, and Heb. xi. 7. er than a covenant between God and man (see
i° Exod. xxv. 40 (LXX.). Gal. iii. 15-20). Hence perhaps the other
n Moses was called by the Jews the Media- alteration of verb here, as well as that men
tor of the law. See Gal. iii. 19, and note. tioned in the preceding note.
i2 Compare vii. 11, not "was established "
(A. V.), but hath been or is

868

THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OP ST. PAUL.

CHAP. XXVIII.

nant tofrirfr J mill make nnio tfre frouse of Israel after tfrose bags,
saiifr tfre ITorb ; | toill gibe1 mg latos nnto tfreir minb, anb forite
tfrem upon tfreir frearis ; anb J toill be ta tfrem a (&aa, anb
n tfreg sfrall be to me a people. %ria tfrea sfrall not tearfr eberg
man fris neigfrbor 2 anb eberg man fris frroifrer, saging, ftnoto tfre
ITorb; for all sfrall knoto me, from tfre least unto tfre greatest.
12 Jfor | toil! be merrifni ta tfreir nnrigfrieousness, anb tfreir sins anb
13 tfreir iniquities toill | remember no more.'" In that He saith
" % neto robenant," He hath made the first old ; and that which is old 4
and stricken in years is ready to vanish away.
Now the first covenant also had ordinances of worship, and its Holy
Place was in this world.5 For a tabernacle was made [in two portions] ; the
first (wherein was the candlestick,6 and the table,7 and the showbread),*
which is called the 9 sanctuary ; and, behind the second veil, the taber
nacle called the Holy of Holies, having the golden altar of incense,10 and
the ark of the covenant overlaid round about with gold,11 wherein 12 was the

ix. 1
2 3
4

i " Give," not "put" (A. V.).
2 The best MSS. read citizen instead of
neighbor, which does not, however, alter the
sense. 3 Jer. xxxi. 31-34 (LXX. with the above-
mentioned variations).
4 The first refers to time (growing out of
date), the second to the weakness of old age.
6 "The sanctuary," not "A sanctuary"
(A. V.); and observe the order of the words,
showing that " in this world " is the predicate.
6 Exod. xxv. 31, and xxxvii. 17.
7 Exod. xxv. 23, and xxxvii. 10.
B Exod. xxv. 30, and Levit. xxiv. 5.
9 See the note on ix. 24.
i° "Altar of incense." This has given
rise to much perplexity. According to Exod.
xxx. 6, the Incense altar was not in the Holy
of Holies, but on the outer side of the veil
which separated the Holy of Holies from the
rest of the Tabernacle. Several methods of
evading the difBculty have been suggested;
amongst others, to translate the word by censer,
and understand it of the censer which the High
Priest brought into the Holy of Holies once a
year; but this was not kept in the Holy of
Holies. Moreover, the term is used for the
Incense-altar by Philo and Josephus. The

best explanation of the discrepancy is to con
sider that the Incense altar, though not with
in the Holy of Holies, was closely connected
therewith, and was sprinkled on the day of
Atonement with the same blood with which the
High Priest made atonement in the Holy of
Holies. See Exod. xxx. 6-10, and Levit. xvi.
11, &c. u Exod. xxv. 11.
12 Here we have another difficulty ; for the
pot of manna and Aaron's rod were not kept
in the Ark in Solomon's time, when it con
tained nothing but the tables of the Law. See
1 Kings viii. 9, 2 Chron. v. 10. It is, however,
probable that these were originally kept in the
Ark. Compare Exod. xvi. 33, and Numbers
xvii. 10, where they are directed to be laid up
" before the Lord," and " before the testimony "
[i. e. the tables of the Law], which indicates, at
least, a close juxtaposition to the Ark. More
generally, we should observe that the intention.
of the present passage is not to give us a mi
nute and accurate description of the furniture of
the Tabernacle, but to allude to it rhetorically :
the only point insisted upon in the application
of the description (see verse 8) is the symboli
cal character of the Holy of Holies. Hence the
extreme anxiety of commentators to explain
away every minute inaccuracy is superfluous.

cuap. xxvm.

EPISTLE TO THE HEBREWS.

869

golden pot x that had the manna, and Aaron's rod 2 that budded, and the
tables 3 of the covenant ; and over it the cherubims 4 of glory shadowing 5
the Mercy-seat.5 Whereof we cannot now speak particularly. Now 6
these things being thus ordered, unto the first tabernacle the priests go6
in continually, accomplishing the offices 7 of their worship. But into the 7
second goeth the High Priest alone, once a year, not without blood, which
he offereth for himself and for the errors 8 of the people. Whereby the 8
Holy Spirit signifieth that the way into the Holy Place is not yet made
fully manifest,9 while still the outer 10 tabernacle standeth. But it is a 9
figure for the present time,11 under 12 which gifts and sacrifices are offered
that cannot perfect the purpose of the worshipper, according to the con
science ; 13 being carnal ordinances, commanding meats and drinks, and 10
diverse washings, imposed until a time of reformation.14

1 Exod. xvi. 32, &c.
2 Num. xvii. 10.
8 Exod. xxv. 16. 4 Exod. xxv. 18.
6 Exod. xxv. 17. This is the word used in
the LXX. for Mercy-seat.
6 The writer of the Epistle here appears to
speak as if the Tabernacle were still standing.
Commentators have here again found or made
a difficulty, because the Temple of Herod was
in many respects different from the Tabernacle,
and especially because its Holy of Holies did
not contain either the Ark, the Tables of the
Law, the Cherubim, or the Mercy-seat (all of
which had been burnt by Nebuchadnezzar with
Solomon's Temple), but was empty. See
above, p. 632. Of course, however, there was
no danger that the original readers of this
Epistle should imagine that its writer spoke of
the Tabernacle as still standing, or that he was
ignorant of the loss of its most precious con
tents. Manifestly he is speaking of the sanc
tuary of the First Covenant (see ix. 1) as origi
nally designed. And he goes on to speak of the
existing Temple-worship as the continuation
of the Tabernacle-worship, which, in all essen
tial points, it was. The translators of the Au
thorized Version (perhaps in consequence of this
difficulty) have mistranslated many verbs in the
following passage, which are in the present tense,
as though they were in the past tense. Thus
we have "went," "offered," "were offered,"
" they offered " (x. 1 ), &c. The English read
er is thus led to suppose that the Epistle was
written after the cessation of the Temple-wor
ship. 7 Plira1. not singular, as in A. V.

8 " Errors." Compare v. 2, and the note.
9 On the mistranslation in A. V. see note 6
on this page. It may be asked, How could it be
said, after Christ's ascension, that the way into
the Holy place was not made fully manifest ? The
explanation is, that while the Temple-worship,
with its exclusion of all but the High Priest
from the Holy of Holies, still existed, the way
of salvation would not be fully manifest to
those who adhered to the outward and typical
observances, instead of being thereby led to
the Antitype.
l° i. e. while the inner is separate rrom the
outer tabernacle. That " first " has this mean
ing here is evident from ix. 2.
Jl The A. V. here interpolates " then " in
order to make this correspond with the mis
translated tenses already referred to.
a According to which figure. This follows
the reading of the best MSS., and adopted by
Griesbach, Lachmann, and Tischendorfs 1st
edition ; it suits the preposition better than
the other reading, to which Tischendorf has
returned in his 2d edition.
18 Perfect the worshipper, according to the con
science. This is explained, x. 2, as equivalent
to " the worshippers, once purified, would have
had no more conscience of sin." The meaning
here is to bring him to tlie accomplishment of the
end of his worship, viz. remission of sins. It is
not adequately represented by to make perfect,
as we have before remarked ; to consummate
would be again the best translation, if it were
less unusual.
M The reading of this verse is very doubtful

870 THE LIPE AND EPISTLES OP ST. PAUT chap, xxvm,
ix. 11 But when Christ appeared, as High Priest of the good things to come,
He passed through the greater and more perfect tabernacle ' not made
12 with hands (that is, not of man's building),2 and entered, not by the
blood of goats and calves, but by His own blood, once for all, into the
13 Holy Place, having obtained an everlasting redemption.3 For if the blood
of bulls and goats, and the ashes of a heifer4 sprinkling the unclean,
14 sanctifieth to the purification of the flesh, how much more shall the
blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit offered Himself without
spot to God, purify our5 conscience from dead works, that we may
worship the living God !
15 And for this cause He is the mediator of a new testament ; that, when
death had 6 made redemption for the transgressions under the first testa
ment,1 they that are called might receive the promise of the eternal
16 inheritance. For where a testament is, the death of the testator must be
17 declared ; 8 because a testament is made valid by death, for it hath no
force at all during the lifetime of the testator.
18 Wherefore9 the first testament also hath its dedication 10 not without
19 blood. For when Moses had spoken to all the people every precept
Tischendorf in his 2d edition returns to the translating testament in this passage. The at-
reading of the T. R., which is also defended tempts which have been made to avoid this
by De Wette. But Griesbach and Lachmann meaning are irreconcilable with any natural
adopi the other reading, which is followed in explanation of testator. The simple and obvi-
our translation. The construction is literally, ous translation should not be departed from
imposed with conditions of meats, Src, until a time in order to avoid a difficulty ; and the diffi-
of reformation. culty vanishes when we consider the rhetorical
i This greater tabernacle is the visible heav- character of the Epistle. The statement in
ens, which are here regarded as the outer this verse is not meant as a logical argument,
Banctuary. but as a rhetorical illustration, which is sug-
2 Literally, this building. This parenthesis gested to the writer by the ambiguity of the
has very much the appearance of having been word for "testament" or "covenant."
originally a marginal gloss upon the preced- 8 Declared is omitted in A. V. The legal
ing phrase. maxim is the same as that of English Law,
8 There is nothing in the Greek correspond- Nemo est hceres viventis.
ing to the words "for us" (A. V.). 9 This "wherefore" does not refer to the
4 The uncleanness contracted by touching preceding illustration concerning the death of
a corpse was purified by sprinkling the un- the testator, but to the reasoning from which
clean person with the water of sprinkling, which that was only a momentary digression. Com-
was made with the ashes of a red heifer. See pare verse 18 with verses 12-14.
Numbers xix. (LXX.) 10 The verb means to dedicate in the sense
5 "Our" (not "your") is the reading of of to inaugurate; cf. Heb. x. 20; so the feast
the best MSS. commemorating the opening or inavauration of
6 Literally, after death had occurred for the the Temple by Judas Maccabaeus (after its
redemption of, &c. The words must be thus pollution by Antiochus Epiphanes) was called
taken together. " the dedication." (John x. 22.)
' The Authorized Version is correct In

ci-tp. xxviii. EPISTLE TO THE HEBREWS. 871
according to the Law, he took 1 the blood of the calves and goats, with
water and scarlet wool and hyssop, and sprinkled both the book itself 2
and all the people, saying, " Cfris is tfre bloob of tfre testament tofrirfr 20
(lob fratfr enjoineb nnto gon." 3 Moreover he sprinkled with blood the 21
tabernacle 4 also, and all the vessels of the ministry, in like manner. And 22
according to the Law, almost all things are purified with blood, and with
out shedding of blood is no remission. It was, therefore, necessary that 23
the patterns of heavenly things should thus be purified, but the heavenly
things themselves with better sacrifices than these. For Christ entered 24
not into the sanctuary 5 made with hands, which is a figure of the true,
but into heaven itself, now to appear in the presence of God for us. Nor 25
yet that He should offer Himself often, as the High Priest entereth the
sanctuary every year with blood of others ; for then must He often have 26
suffered since the foundation of the world : but now once, in the end 6 of
the ages, hath He appeared,7 to do away sin by the sacrifice of Himself.8
And as it is appointed unto men once to die, but after this the judgment, 27
so Christ was once offered " io bear tfre sins of mang," 9 and unto 28
them that look for Him shall He appear a second time, without sin,10
unto salvation.
For the Law, having a shadow of the n good things to come, and not the x, 1
very image of the reality,13 by the unchanging sacrifices which year by 2
year they offer continually 13 can never perfect 14 the purpose of the offer-
i See Exod. xxiv. 3-8. The sacrifice of 6 " The end of the ages " means the termi-
goats (besides the cattle) and the sprinkling ' nation of the period preceding Christ's com-
of the book are not in the Mosaic account. It ing. It is » phrase frequent in St. Matthew,
should be remembered that the Old Testa- with " age," instead of " ages," but not occur-
ment is usually referred to memoriter by the ring elsewhere. The A. V. translates two
writers of the New Testament. Moreover, different terms here by the same word,
the advocates of verbal inspiration would be " world."
justified in maintaining that these circumstan- 7 Literally, He hath been made manifest to the
ces actually occurred, though they are not sight of men.
mentioned in the books of Moses. See, how- 8 The A. V. is retained here, being justi-
ever, p. 199, note 2. fied by offered Himself, verse 14.
2 Itself is omitted in A. V. 9 Isaiah liii. 12 (LXX.), He bare the sins of
8 Exod. xxiv. 8 (LXX., but with a change many.
of verb) 10 Tholuck compares separate from sinners
4 Apparently referring to Levit. viii., verses (vii. 26). The thought is the same as Rom.
19, 24, and 30. vi- la
5 Not " the holy places " (A. V.), but the holy n The definite article is omitted in A. V
place or sanctuary. Compare viii. 2, ix. 2, ix. w The real things.
25 xiii. 11. It is without the article here, as i8 The same is omitted in A. V.
is often the case with words similarly used. 14 Compare ix. 9, and note. The " perfec-

872 THE LIFE AJSD EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap.xxviii.
X. ers.1 For then would they not have ceased to be offered ? because the
worshippers, once purified, would have had no more conscience of sins.
3 But in these sacrifices there is a remembrance of sins made every year.
4 For it is not possible that the blood of bulls and goats should take away
5 sins. Wherefore, when He cometh into the world, He saith, " ^arrifire
anb offering t^an toonlbest not, but a bobjr frast tfron nrenareb me.2
6 Jfn bnrnt-offerings anb sarrifires for sin tfron frast frab na nleas-
7 nre. Cfren saib J, go, J[ rome (in tfre foolnme of tfre book ii is
8 toritten of me) ta bo tfrg toill, # <&ob." s When He had said before,
" Sarrifire anb offering anb bnrnt-offerings anb sarrifires for sin
t^au toonlbest not, neitfrer frabst pleasure tfrerein " (which are offered
9 under the law), " Cfren" (saith4 He), " 'go, $ rome tfl bo % toill,
<® (Bob." He taketh away the first,5 that He may establish the second.
10 And in 6 that " toill " we are sanctified, by the offering of the " bobjX " T
of Jesus Christ, once for all.
11 And every priest 9 standeth daily ministering, and offering oftentimes
12 the same sacrifices which can never take away sins. But HE, after He
had offered one sacrifice for sins, forever sat down on the right hand of
13 God ; from henceforth expecting " till fris enemies bt mabe fris foot-
14 stool." 9 For by one offering He hath perfected 10 forever the purification
15 of them whom He sanctifieth. Whereof the Holy Spirit also is a witness
16 to us. For after He had said before, " Ilfris XS tfre robenant Ifrat Jf
tion " of the worshippers was entire purification 8 In the will of God, Christians are already
from sin .- this they could not attain under the sanctified as well as justified, and even glorified
Law, as was manifest by the perpetual itera- (see Rom. viii. 30) ; i. e. God wills their sanc
tion of the self-same sacrifices required of them. tification, and has done His part to insure it.
1 Literally, those who come to offer. 7 " Body," alluding to the " body hast thou
2 In the Hebrew original the words are, prepared me " of the above quotation.
"thou hast opened [or pierced] my ears." The 8 The MSS. are divided between "priest"
LXX. (which is here quoted) translates this and "high priest; "if the latter reading be
" a Iwdy hast thou prepared me." Perhaps the correct, the same explanation must be given
reading of the Hebrew may formerly have as in the note on vii. 27.
been different from what it now is; or per- 9 Ps. ex. 1 (LXX.), quoted above, i. 13.
haps the body may have been an error for ear, (See note there.)
which is the reading of some MSS. 10 Literally, He hath consummated them that
8 Ps. xl. 6-8 (LXX. with some slight varia- are being sanctified. The verb to perfect does
tions). not, by itself, represent the original word.
4 Not "said He" (A. V.), but He hath See notes on x. 1, ix. 10, and ii. 10. We
said, or saith He. should also observe, that " being sanctified " is
6 Tlie first, viz. the sacrifices ; the second, not equivalent to " having been sanctified."
viz. the will of God.

<HAP. XXVIII.

EPISTLE TO THE HEBREWS.

873

toil! make toitfr tfrem after Ifrose bags, saiifr ifre g orb : $ toill gibe
mg ^atos uo.au tfreir frearts, anb toriie tfrem upon tfreir minbs." 1
He saith also, " Cfreir sins anb tfreir iniquities toil! Jf remember no 17
more. Now, where remission of these is, there is no more offering for 18
sin.wlrnmgd Having therefore, brethren, boldness to enter the holy place 19
agains apos- tnr0Ugjj tne blood of Jesus,3 by a new and living way which 20
He hath opened4 for us, through the veil (that is to say, His flesh),5
and having a High Priest6 over the house of God, let us draw near 21,22
with a true heart, in full assurance of faith ; as our hearts have been
44 Sprinkleb " 7 from the stain of an evil conscience, and our bodies have
been washed with pure water. Let us hold fast the confession of our 23
hope,8 without wavering ; for faithful is He that gave the promise. And 24
let us consider the example 8 one of another, that we may be provoked
unto love and to good works. Let us not forsake the assembling10 of 25
ourselves together, as the custom of some is, but let us exhort one
another ; and so much the more, as ye see The Day approaching.11 For 26
if we sin wilfully,12 after we have received the knowledge 13 of the truth,

1 Jer. xxxi. 34 (LXX.). The part of the
quotation here omitted is given above, viii.
10-12. It appears, from the slight variations
between the present quotation and the quota
tion of the same passage in chap, viii., that
the writer is quoting from memory.
2 Jer. xxxi. 34 (LXX.), being the conclu
sion of the passage quoted before, viii. 12.
The omission of " He saith " with the " and "
which joins the two detached portions of the
quotation, though abrupt, is not unexampled ;
compare 1 Tim. v. 18.
8 Compare ix. 25.
4 See note on ix. 1 8
6 The meaning of this is, that the flesh (or
manhood) of Christ was a veil which hid His
true nature ; this veil He rent when He gave
up His body to death ; and through His incar
nation, thus revealed under its true aspect, we
must pass, if we would enter into the presence
of God. We can have no real knowledge of
God but through His incarnation.
6 Literally, "Great Priest." The same
expression is used for High Priest by Philo
and LXX.
7 " Sprinkled " (alluding to ix. 13 and 21),

viz. with the blood of Christ ; compare " blood
of sprinkling," xii. 24. Observe the force of
the perfect participle in this and " washed ; "
both referring to accomplished facts. See x. 2.
8 " Hope," not "faith." (A. V.)
9 This is Chrysostom's interpretation, which
agrees with the use of the verb, iii. 1 .
i° It was very natural that the more timid
members of the Church should shrink from
frequenting the assembly of the congregation
for worship, in a time of persecution.
11 " The Day " of Christ's coming was seen
approaching at this time by the threatening
prelude of the great Jewish war, wherein He
came to judge that nation.
& " Wilfully." This is opposed to the " if
a man sin not wilfully " (Levit. iv. 2, LXX.),
the involuntary sins for which provision was
made under the Law. The particular sin
here spoken of is that of apostasy from the
Christian faith, to which these Hebrew Chris
tians were particularly tempted. See the
whole of this passage from x. 26 to xii. 29.
18 " Knowledge." Compare Rom. x. 2,
Phil. i. 9, &c.

874 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap, xxvm
X.
27 there remaineth no more sacrifice for sins, but a certain fearful looking-
for of judgment, and " a toratfrfnl fire ifrat sfrall bebonr tfre abber-
28 sarieS." * He that hath despised the Law of Moses dieth2 without
29 mercy, upon the testimony of two or three witnesses. Of how much
sorer punishment, suppose ye, shall he be thought worthy, who hath
trodden under foot the Son of God, and hath counted the blood of the
covenant, wherewith he was sanctified, an unholy thing, and hath done
30 despite unto the Spirit of Grace ? For we know Him that hath said,
"©engeanre is mine, Jf toill remrji, saiifr tfre gaxb; "3 and again,
31 " &fre g orb sfrall jubge fis uton.lt." 4 It is a fearful thing to fall
into the hands of the living God.5
32 But call to remembrance the former days, in which, after and exhorta
tion not to let
ye were illuminated, ye endured6 a great fight of afflictions; f^e^ebcon'
33 for not only were ye made a gazing-stock by reproaches and
tribulations, but ye took part also in the sufferings of others who bore
34 the like. For ye showed compassion to the prisoners,7 and took joyfully
the spoiling of your goods, knowing that ye have 8 in heaven a better and
36 an enduring substance. Cast not away, therefore, your confidence, which
1 Is. xxvi. 11. Quoted generally from a stumbling-block to Luther, that they caused
the LXX. Those who look for this quotation him even to deny the canonical authority of
in A . V. will be disappointed ; for the A. V., the Epistle. Yet neither passage asserts the
the Hebrew, and the LXX., all differ. impossibility of an apostate's repentance. What
2 The present, translated as past in A. V. is said amounts to this — that for the conver-
The reference is to Deut. xvii. 2-7, which pre- sion of a deliberate apostate, God has (accord-
scribes that an idolater should be put to death ing to the ordinary laws of His working) no
on the testimony of two or three witnesses. further means in store than those which have
The writer of the Epistle does not mean that been already tried in vain. It should be remem-
idolatry was actually thus punished at the time bered, also, that the parties addressed are not
he wrote (for though the Sanhedrin was al- those who had already apostatized, but those
lowed to judge charges of a religious nature, who were in danger of so doing, and who
they could not inflict death without permis- needed the most earnest warning.
sion of the Roman Procurator, which would 6 If this Epistle was addressed to the
probably have been refused, except under very Church of Jerusalem, the afflictions referred
peculiar circumstances, to an enforcement of to would be the persecutions of the Sanhedrin
this part of the Law) ; but he speaks of the (when Stephen was killed), of Herod Agrippa
punishment prescribed by the Law. (when James the Greater was put to death),
a Deut. xxxii. 35. This quotation is not and again the more recent outbreak of Ana-
exactly according to LXX. or Hebrew, but is nus, when James the Less was slain. But see
exactly in the words in which it is quoted by the preceding remarks, p. 849.
St. Paul, Rom. xii. 19. 7 " The bondsmen " (not " my bonds ") is
4 Deut. xxxii. 36 (LXX.). the reading of all the best MSS.
6 The preceding passage (from verse 26), 8 Not "knowing in yourselves" (A. V.).
and the similar passage, vi. 4-6, have proved The reading of the best MSS. is, that ye have
perplexing to many readers ; and were such yourselves, or for yourselves, i. e. as your own.

chap, xxviii. EPISTLE TO THE HEBREWS. 875 X.
hath great recompense of reward. For ye have need of steadfastness, 36
that, after ye have done the will of God, ye may receive the promise. For 37
yet a little while and " Jpe ifrai rometfr sfrall be rome, anb sfrall not
tarrg." a Nov " §g faitfr sfrall ifre rigfrieons libe ; "2 and " |f fr*8 38
brato bark ifrrongfr fear, mg soul fratfr no pleasure in frim."4 But 39
we are not men of fear unto perdition, but of faith unto salvation.6
L'akt pri'n-3 Now faith is the SUDstance 6 of things hoped for, the evidence xi. 1
erfibirB mcehn of things not seen. For therein the elders obtained a good re- 2
to prefer -
things invisl- port.'
ble to things
visible. By faith we understand that the universe 8 is framed 9 by 3
the word of God, so that the world which we behold 10 springs not from
things that can be seen.
its operation By faith Abel offered unto God a more excellent sacrifice 4
historicallyexemplified, than Cain, whereby he obtained testimony that he was right
eous, for God testified u unto his gifts ; and by it he being dead yet
speaketh.12 By faith Enoch was translated, that he should not see death, and " bt 5
toas not founb, beranse <§ob iransiaieb frim." 13 For before his trans
lation he had this testimony, that " fre ttleaseb (Hflb ; "14 but without 6
faith it is impossible to please Him ; for whosoever cometh unto God must
have faith 15 that God is, and that He rewardeth them that diligently seek
Him. By faith Noah, being warned by God concerning things not seen as 7
1 Habak. ii. 3 (LXX.). Not fully translat- B " The worlds : " so i. 2.
ed in A. V. 9 Observe that the tenses are perfects, not
2 Habak. ii. 4 (LXX.), quoted also Rom. aorists.
i. 17, and Gal. iii. 11. 10 The best MSS. have the participle in the
8 The " any man " of A. V. is not in the singular. The doctrine negatived is that which
Greek. The Greek verb is exactly the English teaches that each successive condition of the
flinch. universe is generated from a preceding condi-
4 Habak. ii. 4 (LXX.). But this passage tion (as the plant from the seed) by a mere
in the original precedes the last quotation, material development, which had no beginning
which it here follows. in a Creator's will.
" Prorieriy gaining of the soul, and thus equiv- u Gen. iv. 4. The Jewish tradition was,
alent to salvation. tnat ^re fr°m heaven consumed Abel's offering.
6 For the meaning of this word, see note on n This has been supposed (compare xii.
jjj 14_ 24) to refer to Gen. iv. 10, but it may be taken
' " Obtained a good report," cf. Acts vi. 3. more generally.
This verse is explained by the remainder of 13 Gen. v. 24 (LXX.).
the chapter. The faith of the Patriarchs was a M Ibid.
type of Christian faith, because it was fixed 16 Without faith — must have faith. The
upon a future and unseen good. original has this verbal connection.

876 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OP ST. PAUL. chap. xxvm.
xi. yet, through fear of God 1 prepared an ark, to the saving of his house.
Whereby he condemned the world, and became heir of the righteousness
of faith.
8 By faith Abraham, when he was called,2 obeyed the command to g<s
forth into a place 3 which he should afterward receive for an inheritance ;
9 and he went forth, not knowing whither he went. By faith he sojourned
in the land of promise as in a strange country, dwelling in tents, with
10 Isaac and Jacob, the heirs with him of the same promise. For he looked
for the city which hath sure 4 foundations, whose builder and maker is
God.
11 By faith also Sarah herself received power to conceive seed, even
when5 she was past age, because she judged Him faithful who had
12 promised. Therefore sprang there of one, and him as good as dead, " SO
mang as tfre stars of tfre skg in multiinbe," 8 and as the sand which
is by the seashore 1 innumerable.
13 These all died in faith, not having received the promises, but having
seen them afar off, and embraced them,8 and confessed that they were
14 strangers and pilgrims upon earth. For they that say such things declare
15 plainly that they seek a country. And truly, if they speak 9 of that coun
try from whence they came forth, they might have opportunity to return ;
16 but now they desire a better country, that is, a heavenly. Wherefore
God is not ashamed to be called their God ; for He hath prepared for
them a city.
17 By faith Abraham, when he was tried, offered 10 up Isaac, and he that
18 had believed u the promises offered up his only-begotten son, though it

1 Compare Heb. v. 7. 9 Speak. The verb is the same in verse 22.
2 If we follow some of the best MSS., the The meaning is, "If, in calling themselves
translation will be, " He that was called Abra- strangers and pilgrims, they refer to the fact of
ham [instead of Abram]." their having left their native land." In other
3 Some of the best MSS. read "place" words, if Christians regret the world which
without the article. * Cf. xii. 28. they have renounced, there is nothing to pre-
6 Was delivered is not in the best MSS. vent their returning to its enjoyments. Here
B Exod. xxxii. 13 (LXX.). again we trace a reference to those who were
7 The same comparison is found Is. x. 22, tempted to apostatize. Such is the meaning of
quoted Rom. ix. 27. the imperfect.
8 Persuaded is an interpolation not found 10 Literally, hath offered.
in the best MSS. It was originally a margi- n The word means more than " received."
nal gloss on embraced. The latter word cannot (A. V.) His belief in the promises to his pos
be adequately translated in English, so as to terity enhanced the sacrifice which he made
retain the full beauty of the metaphor.

chap, xxvdi. EPISTLE TO THE HEBREWS. 877 xi.
was said unto 1 him, " Jn <f saar sfrall ifrg seeb be ralleb ; " 2 account- 19
ing that God was able to raise him up, even from the dead ; from whence
also (in a figure) he received him.
By faith Isaac blessed Jacob and Esau concerning things to come. 20
By faith Jacob, when he was dying, blessed both the sons of Joseph ; 21
and " ||e toorsfrinneb, leaning upon tfre top of fris staff." 3
By faith Joseph, in the hour op his death, spake 4 of the departing 22
of the sons of Israel ; and gave commandment concerning his bones.
By faith Moses, when he was born, was hid three months by his parents, 23
because " tfreg Sato tfral tfre rfrilb toas gooblg ; "5 and they were not
afraid of the king's commandment.
By faith Moses,-" tofren fre tons rome to gears," 6 refused to be called 24
the son of Pharaoh's daughter, choosing rather to suffer affliction with the 25
people of God, than to enjoy the pleasures of sin for a season ; esteeming 26
the reproach of Christ 7 greater riches than the treasures of Egypt ; for
he looked beyond8 unto the reward.9 By faith he forsook10 Egypt, not 27
fearing the wrath of the king ; for he endured, as seeing Him who is
invisible. By faith he hath established11 the passover, and the sprin- 28
kling of blood, that the destroyer of the first-born might not touch
the children of Israel.12
By faith they passed through the Red Sea as through dry land; which 29
the Egyptians tried to pass, and were swallowed up.
By faith the walls of Jericho fell down, after they were compassed 30
about for seven days.
By faith the harlot Rahab perished not with the disobedient,13 because 31
she had received the spies with peace.
i" Unto "not "of." (A. V.) "Unto 6 Exod. ii. 2 (LXX.). " They seeing that
whom" is equivalent to " though unto him." he was goodly." The Hebrew speaks of his
2 Gen. xxi. 12 (LXX.), quoted also Rom. mother only. 6 Exod. ii. 11 (LXX.).
7 The reproach of Christ's people is here
S » Gen xlvii 31 (LXX.). The present He- called the reproach of Christ. Compare Col.
brew text means, not the top of his staff, but the i- 24 and 2 Cor i. 5; ; also see ICorxi
head of his bed • but the LXX. followed a differ- 8 Literally, he looked away from that which
ent reading The " faith " of Jacob consisted was before his eyes. » Compare verse 6.
in fixing his hopes upon future blessings, and » See Exod. ii 15 " Perfect.
worshipping God, even in the hour of death. 12 Them, i. e. the children of Israel.
* Spake See verse 15. Joseph's " faith " 1S Not " them that believed not." (A. V.)
relied on the promise that the seed of Abraham They had heard the miracles wrought in favor
should return to the promised land. (Gen. xv. of the Israelites (Josh. ii. 10), and yet refused
obedience.
16.)

878

THE LIPE AND EPISTLES OP ST. PAUL.

CHAP. XXVIII.

Xl.
32 And what shall I more say? for the time would fail me to tell of
Gideon, and of Barak, of Samson and of Jephthae, of David, and Samuel,
33 and the prophets ; who through faith subdued kingdoms, wrought right-
34 eousness, obtained promises, stopped the mouths of lions,1 quenched the
violence of fire,2 escaped the edge of the sword, out of weakness3 were
made strong, waxed valiant in fight, turned to flight the armies of the
35 aliens. Women 4 received their dead raised to life again ; and others were
tortured,5 not accepting deliverance, that they might obtain a better6
36 resurrection. Others also had trial of cruel mockings 7 and scourgings,
37 with chains also and imprisonment. They were stoned,8 were sawn9
asunder, were tempted,10 were slain with the sword. They wandered
about in sheep-skins and goat-skins, being destitute, afflicted, tormented.
38 They wandered in deserts, and in mountains, and in dens and caves of the
earth ; of whom u the world was not worthy.
39 And these all, having obtained a good report through faith, received
40 not the promise ; God having provided some better thing for us, that
they, without us, should not be made perfect.12

1 Referring to Daniel. (Dan. vi. 17.)
2 Referring to Dan. iii. 27.
8 This and the two following clauses may
be most naturally referred to the Maccabees.
4 Referring to the widow of Sarepta (1
Kings xvii.) and the Shunamite (2 Kings
iv.). 6 This refers both to Eleazar (2 Mace, vi.),
and to the seven brothers, whose torture is
described, 2 Mace. vii. The verb Irvunavla-
dnoav points especially to Eleazar, who was
bound to the rupizavov, an instrument to which
those who were to be tortured by scourging
were bound. (2 Macci- vi. 19.) The "not
accepting deliverance " refers to the mother
of the seven brothers and her youngest son
(2 Mace. vii.).
6 Better, viz. than that of those who (like
the Shunamite's son) were only raised to
return to this life. This reference is plain in
the Greek, but cannot be rendered equally ob
vious in English, because we cannot translate
the first avaardoeuc in this verse by resurrec
tion. 7 Mockings. Still referring to the seven
brothers, concerning whose torments this word
is used. (2 Mace. vii. 7.)

8 Zechariah, the son of Jehoiadah, was
stoned. (2 Chron. xxiv. 20.) But it is not
necessary (nor indeed possible) to fix each
kind of death here mentioned on some person
in the Old Testament. It is more probable
that the Epistle here speaks of the general
persecution under Antiochus Epiphanes.
9 According to Jewish tradition, this was
the death of Isaiah ; but see the preceding
note. 10 The Received Text is here retained;
but it seems very probable that the reading
should be (as has been conjectured), they were
burned. This was the death of the seven
brothers. 11 Literally, they of whom the world was not
worthy, wandering in deserts and in mountains,
frc; i.e. they, for whom all that the world
could give would have been too little, had not
even a home wherein to lay their head.
12 Made perfect. See notes on ii. 10, vii. 11,
ix. 9 ; literally, attain their consummation, in
cluding the attainment of the full maturity of
their being, and the attainment cf the full accom
plishment of their faith; which are indeed identi
cal. They were not to attain this without us
i. t. not until we came to join them.

cilap. xxvm.

EPISTLE TO THE HEBREWS.

879

Exhortationto imitate
such exam
ples, and to
follow Jesus
in steadfast
endurance of
suffering.

xu
Wherefore, seeing we are compassed about with so great a 1
cloud of witnesses, let us 1 also lay aside every weight, and
the sin which clingeth closely round us,2 and run witb. cour
age 3 the race that is set before us ; looking onward 4 unto 2
Jesus, the forerunner 5 and the finisher of our faith ; who, for the joy that
was set before Him, endured the cross, despising the shame, and is set
down at the right hand of the throne of God. Yea, consider Him that 3
endured such contradiction of sinners against Himself, lest ye be wearied
and faint in your minds. Ye have not yet resisted unto blood,6 in your 4
conflict against sin ; and ye have forgotten the exhortation which reason- 5
eth7 with you as with sons, saying, " gig BOU, bespise not t^OU tfre
rfrastening of tfre gaxb, nor faint tofren tfron art rebnheb of frim.
$ax tofrom tfre gaxb iobeifr Jje rfrasteneifr, anb sronrgeifr eberg son 6
tofrom pe rereibetfr." 8 If ye endure chastisement,9 God dealeth with 7
you as with sons ; for where is the son that is not chastened by his
father ? but if ye be without chastisement, whereof all [God's children] 8
have been 10 partakers, then are ye bastards, and not sons. Moreover, we 9
were chastened u by the fathers of our flesh, and gave them reverence ;
shall we not much rather submit ourselves to the Father of our 12 spirits,

1 Let us, as they did. The Agonistic meta
phor here would be more naturally addressed
to the Church of Alexandria than to that of
Jerusalem. 2 This word occurs nowhere else. Sin
seems here to be described under the metaphor
of a garment fitting closely to the limbs, which
must be cast off if the race is to be won. A
garment would be called by the term in ques
tion, which fitted well all round.
8 The original (as it has been before re
marked) is not accurately represented by "pa
tience ; " it means steadfast endurance, or forti
tude. * "Looking onward." Compare "looked
beyond" (xi. 26).
6 Literally, foremost leader. Compare ii. 10.
Compare also the similar phrase in vi. 20.
B If this Epistle was addressed to the
Christians of Jerusalem,, the writer speaks
here only of the existing generation ; for the
Church of Jerusalem had "resisted unto
blood " formerly, in the persons of Stephen,
James the Greater, and James the Less. But
see introductory remarks, p. 850.

7 This is the meaning of the Greek word.
8 Prov. iii. 11-12. (LXX. nearly verba
tim.) Philo quotes the passage to the same
purpose as this Epistle.
9 Throughout this passage it appears that
the Church addressed was exposed to perse
cution. The intense feeling of Jewish nation
ality called forth by the commencing struggle
with Rome, which produced the triumph
of the zealot party, would amply account
for a persecution of the Christians at Jerusa
lem at this period, as is argued by those who
suppose the Epistle addressed to them. But
the same cause would produce the same effect
in the great Jewish population of Alexandria.
10 Observe the perfect, referring to the ex
amples of God's children mentioned in the
preceding chapter.
11 " We had our fathers to chasten us."
¦ The A. V. does not render the article cor
rectly. 12 " Our " is understood (without repetition)
from the parallel "our flesh."

880 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL. chap. xxvm.
xii. 10 and live ? For they, indeed, for a few days chastened us, after their own
pleasure ; but He for our profit, that we might be partakers of His holi-
11 ness. Now no chastisement for the present seemeth to be joyous, but
grievous ; nevertheless, afterward, unto them that are exercised thereby,
it yieldeth the fruit of righteousness in peace.1
12 Wherefore " g ift uu tfre franbs tofrirfr frang boton, anb tfre feeble
13 knees," 2 and " mahe eben naifrs for gonr feet ; " 3 that the halting
limb be not lamed,4 but rather healed.
14 Follow peace with all men, and holiness, without which no warning
*¦ against seusur
15 man shall see the Lord. And look diligently lest any man *&%¦
fall 5 short of the grace of God ; " lest ang root of bitterness snring-
16 ing UU trouble gon," 6 and thereby many be defiled ; lest there be any
fornicator, or profane person, as Esau, who for a single meal sold his
17 birthright ; for ye know that afterward, when he desired to inherit the
blessing, he was rejected ; finding no room for repentance, though he
sought it7 earnestly with tears.
18 For ye are not come to a mountain that may be touched,8 ^ th^S
and that burneth with fire, nor to " blarkneSS anb barRneSS Go8pe°iover

1 Peaceful fruit of righteousness. God's 6 The most natural construction here is
chastisements lead men to conformity to the similar to that in verse 16.
will of God (which is righteousness); and this 6 Deut. xxix. 18. This quotation is a
effect (fruit) of suffering is (peaceful) full of strong instance in favor of Bleek's view, that
peace. There can be no peace like that which the writer of this Epistle used the Alexan-
follows upon the submission of the soul to drian text of the LXX. For the Codex Alex-
the chastisement of our heavenly Father, if andrinus (which, however, is corrupt here) cor-
we receive it as inflicted by infinite wisdom responds with the Epistle, while the Codex
and perfect love. Vaticanus corresponds more closely with the
2 This quotation is from Is. xxxv. 3, from Hebrew.
LXX. (as appears by two of the Greek 7 Although, with Chrysostom and De
words), but quoted from memory, and not ver- Wette, we refer " it" grammatically to "re-
batim. The quotation here approaches more pentance," yet we think the view of Bleek
nearly than this to the Hebrew original, and substantially correct in referring it to " bless-
might therefore (if not quoted memoriter) be ing." That is, in saying that Esau sought re-
considered an exception to the rule, which pentance with tears, the writer obviously means
otherwise is universal throughout this Epistle, that he sought to reverse the consequences of his
of adhering to the LXX. in preference to the fault, and obtain the blessing. If we refer to
Hebrew. Genesis, we find that it was, in fact, Jacob's
3 Prov. iv. 26 (LXX. nearly verbatim). blessing (the Greek word is the same, Gen.
4 Or be dislocated. The meaning of this' xxvii. 35-38, LXX.) which Esau sought with
exhortation seems to be, that they should tears.
abandon all appearance of Judaizing practices, s The first is the present participle ; the
which might lead the weaker brethren into second the perfect participle (not as A. V.). For
apostasy. the particulars here mentioned, see Exod. xix.

CFIAP. xxvm.

EPISTLE TO THE HEBREWS.

881

01.

MESL anb iemnest,"1 and " sonnb of tempt," 2 and " faoire of 19
of despising ,,„ V '
u- toorbs — the hearers whereof entreated that no more might
be spoken unto them;4 for they could not bear that which was com- 20
manded.5 (" %nb if so mnrfr as a beast tonrfr tfre monniain, it
Sfrall be Stoneb ; " 6 and so terrible was the sight, that Moses said, " Jf 21
esreebingig fear anb quake." 7) But ye are come unto Mount Sion, 22
and to the city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem,8 and to myri
ads 9 of angels in full assembly, and to the congregation of the first-born 10 23
whose names are written in heaven, and to God u the judge of all, and to
the spirits of just men 12 made perfect,13 and to Jesus the mediator of a 24
new covenant, and to the blood of sprinkling,14 which speaketh better
things than that of Abel.15
See that ye reject 16 not Him that speaketh. For if they escaped not 25
who rejected him that spake17 on earth, much more shall not we escape
if we turn away from Him that speaketh from heaven. Whose voice 26
then shook the earth ; but now He hath promised, saying, " |Jei ona

1 Deut. iv. 11, the same Greek words
(LXX.). 2 Exod. xix. 16, again the same Greek
words (LXX.).
- Deut. iv. 12 (LXX.)
* Deut. v. 25 (LXX.), where one of the
Greek words accounts for what we read here.
6 We put a full stop after commanded, be
cause that which the Israelites "could not
bear " was not the order for killing the beasts,
but the utterance of the commandments of
God. See Ex. xx. 19.
6 Quoted from Ex. xix. 12 (LXX., but not
verbatim). The words "or thrust through
with a dart" of the Received Text have been
here interpolated from the Old Testament,
and are not in any of the uncial MSS.
' Deut. ix. 19 (LXX.). This is the pas
sage in the Old Testament, which comes near
est to the present. It was the remembrance of
that terrible sight which caused Moses to say
this ; much more must he have been terrified
by the reality.
8 This is (see Gal. iv. 26) the Church of
God, which has its metropolis in heaven, though
some of its citizens are still pilgrims and
strangers upon earth.
9 We take myriads of angels with full assem
bly The latter phrase properly means a fes-
¦*' 66

tire assembly, which reminds us of " the mar
riage-supper of the Lamb."
w First-born. These appear to be the Chris
tians already dead and entered into their rest ;
" written " means registered or enrolled. Cf.
Luke ii 1, and Phil. iv. 3.
11 The order of the Greek would lead us
more naturally to translate to a judge, who is
God of all; but we have retained the A. V. in
deference to the opinion of Chrysostom.
12 These just men (being distinguished from
the first-born above) are probably the worthies
of the ancient dispensation, commemorated
chap. xi.
18 Literally, who have attained their consum
mation. This they had not done until Christ's
coming. See xi. 40.
14 Contrasted with the water of sprinkling of
Numbers xix. (LXX.) Compare ix. 13-14,
and x. 22.
16 Or, if we read with the best MSS., "bet
ter than Abel." The voice of Abel cried for
vengeance (Gen. iv. 10). Compare xi. 4 ; the
blood of Christ called down forgiveness.
16 It is impossible to translate this verb by
the same English word here and in verse 19th ;
hence the reference of the one passage to the
other is less plain than in the original,
17 Literally, " that spake oracularly."

882 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OP ST. PAUL. chap, xxvin.
xii. more onlg1 foil! Jf sfrake 2 not tfre earifr alone, but also freaben." 3
27 And this " gel onre more Onlg " signifieth the removal of those things
that are shaken, as being perishable,4 that the things unshaken may
28 remain immovable. Wherefore, since we receive a kingdom that can
not be shaken, let us be filled with thankfulness,5 whereby we may offer
29 acceptable worship unto God with reverence and godly fear. For " OUX
(Bob is a ronsnming fire." 8
xiii.l Let brotherly love continue. Be not forgetful to entertain Exhortationto several
2 strangers, for thereby some 7 have entertained angels un- moral duties,
° ' J ° especially to
3 awares. BemembeT the prisoners, as though ye shared their £?ofeKsof
prison ; and the afflicted, as being yourselves also in the body, ohedienc'e to
r ° J the leaders of
4 Let marriage be held honorable8 in all things, and let the the church.
marriage-bed be undefiled ; for 9 whoremongers and adulterers God will
5 judge. Let your conduct be free from covetousness, and be content with
what ye have ; for HE hath said, " Jf toill neber leabe tfree nor forsake
6 tfree." 10 So that we may boldly say, " Cfre gaxb is mg frelner, anb Jf
toill noi fear. SEfrat ran man bo unto me ? " u
7 Remember them that were your leaders,12 who spoke to you the word
of God ; look upon 13 the end of their life, and follow the example of their
faith.
8, 9 Jesus Christ M is the same yesterday and to-day and forever. Be not

1 Once, and once only. Cf. ix. 26 and x. 2. Moses. In Josh. i. 5 (LXX.), we find a direct
2 "Will I shake" is the reading of the promise from God, almost in the same words,
best MSS. addressed to Joshua. The citation here, being
8 Hagg. ii. 6 (LXX., but not verbatim). not verbatim, may be derived from either of
4 Used here as made with hands is (ix. 11, these places. Philo cites the same words as
ix. 24), and as we often use "things created" the text.
as equivalent to thing perishable. n Ps. cxviii. 6 (LXX.).
6 " Filled with thankfulness." Compare 12 Not rulers, but leaders. Compare Acts
Luke xvii. 9. If the meaning were, " Let us xv. 22, where the word is the same. It is
hold fast [the] grace [which we haye received]," here (cf. verses 17 and 24) applied to the
the Greek verb would be different. presbyters or bishops of the Church. See p.
6 Deut. iv. 24 (LXX., nearly verbatim). 379, note 6.
7 Viz. Abraham and Lot. 13 A very graphic word, not to be fully ren-
8 This must be taken imperatively on the dered by any English term The meaning is,
same ground as what immediately follows,' at " contemplate the final scene [perhaps martyrdom]
the beginning of the 5th verse. which closed their life and labors."
9 The MSS. A, D, and some others, read 14 The A. V. here gives an English reader
for here, which is adopted by Lachmann and the very erroneous impression that " Jesus
Bleek. Christ " is in the objective case, and in appost
10 Deut. xxxi. 6 (LXX.). This is said by tion to "the end of their conversation."

chap, xxviii. EPISTLE TO THE HEBREWS. 883 xiii.
carried away l with manifold and strange doctrines. For it is good that
the heart be established by grace ; not by meats,2 which profited not
them that were occupied therein. We have an altar whereof they that 10
minister unto the tabernacle have no right to eat. For3 the bodies of 11
those beasts whose blood the High Priest bringeth 4 into the Holy Place 5
are burned " toitfroni tfre ramn." 8 Wherefore Jesus also, that He 12
might sanctify the People by His own blood, suffered without the gate.
Therefore let us go forth unto Him " faitfront tfre ttXUXU," bearing His 13
reproach. For here we have no continuing city, but we seek one to come.7 14
By Him therefore let us offer unto God continually a sacrifice of 15
praise,8 that is, " tfre fruit of flnr lip," 9 making confession unto His
name. And be not unmindful of benevolence and liberality, for such 16
are the sacrifices which are acceptable unto God.
Render unto them that are your leaders obedience and submission ; for 17
they on their part 10 watch for the good of your souls, as those that must
give account ; that they may keep their watch with joy, and not with
lamentation ; for that would be unprofitable for you.
The writer Pray for me ; for I trust11 that I have a good conscience, 18
Srayers, gives desiring in all my conduct to live rightly. But I the rather 19
iem his own, °
cttes^infornS- beseech you to do this, that I may be restored to you the
tion from ,,
itaiy. sooner."
1 " Carried away," not " carried about," is camp of the Israelites was afterwards represent
ee reading of the best MSS. ed by the Holy City ; so that the bodies of
2 Not by meats. The connection here is very these victims were burnt outside the gates of
difficult. The reference seems to be, in the Jerusalem. See above, p. 636, note 6.
first place, to Judaizing doctrines concerning 7 Literally, the city which is to come. Com
clean and unclean meats; but thence the pare x. 34, and the kingdom that cannot be
thought passes on to the sacrificial meats, on shaken, xii. 28.
which the priests were partly supported. Some 8 The Christian sacrifice is " a sacrifice of
think this verse addressed to those who had praise and thanksgiving," contrasted with the
themselves been priests, which would be an ar- propitiatory sacrifices of the old law, which
gument for supposing the Epistle addressed to were forever consummated by Christ. See x.
the Church at Jerusalem. (Compare Acts vi. 4-14.
7 , 9 Hosea xiv. 2. (LXX.) (The present
8 The connection seems to be, that the vie- Hebrew text is different.)
tims sacrificed on the day of Atonement were w The pronoun is emphatic.
commanded (Levit. xvi. 27) to be wholly burned, n This seems to be addressed to a party
«nd therefore not eaten. amongst these Hebrew Christians who had tak-
4 Viz. on the day of Atonement. Com- en offence at something in the writer's conduct,
pare chaps, ix. and x. 12 We have alreadv observed that this im-
6 The words " for sin " are omitted in the plies that a personal connection existed be-
ho t M^S tween the writer and the readers of this Epistle.
6 Levit. xvi. 27 (LXX. verbatim). The The opinion of Ebrard, that this verse is writ-

884

THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OP ST. PAUL.

chap, xxvm.

20 Now the God of peace, who raised up1 from the dead the great
44 Sfrejffrerb of Ifre sfreen," 2 even our Lord Jesus, through the blood
21 of an everlasting covenant, — make you perfect in every good work to do
His will, working in you that which is well pleasing in His sight, by
Jesus Christ. To whom be glory forever.3 Amen.
22 I beseech you, brethren, to bear with these words of exhortation ; for I
have written shortly.4
23 Know that our brother Timotheus is set at liberty ; and with him, if
he come speedily, I will see you.
24 Salute all them that are your leaders, and all the saints.
25 They of Italy 6 salute you. Grace be with you all. Amen.

BNGAAE EEI

Here lies Faustina. In peace.6

ten by St. Luke in St. Paul's person, and verse
23d in his own person, appears quite untena
ble; no intimation of a change of person is
given (compare Rom. xvi. 22) ; nor is there
any inconsistency in asking prayers for a pros
perous journey, and afterwards expressing a
positive intention of making the journey.
1 This denotes not to bring again (A. V.),
but to bring up from below, to raise up. (Rom.
x. 7.)
2 This is an allusion to a passage in Isaiah
(Is. lxiii. 11, LXX.), where God is described
as " He who brought up from the sea the shepherd
of the sheep " [viz. Moses].
8 " And ever " is probably to be omitted
both here and Rom. xi. 36, and xvi. 27.
4 They are asked to excuse the apparent
harshness of some portions of the letter, on the

ground that the writer had not time for circum
locution. 6 " They ofltslj." We agree with Winer
in thinking that this " of" may be most natu
rally understood as used from the position of the
readers. This was the view of the earlier inter
preters, and is agreeable to Greek analogy. In
fact, if we consider the origin in most lan
guages of the gentilitial prepositions (von, de, of,
&c), we shall see that they conform to the
same analogy. Hence we infer from this pas
sage that the writer was in Italy.
6 A Christian tomb with the three lan
guages, from Maitland's Church in the Cata
combs, p. 77. The name is Latin, the inscrip
tion Greek, and the word Shalom or " peace "
is in Hebrew. See p. 28.

APPENDICES.

APPENDIX I.
ON THE TIME OP THE VISIT TO JERUSALEM MENTIONED D, GALA
TIANS (Chap, ii.).1
TO avoid circumlocution, we shall call the visit mentioned in Galatians ii. 1 the Gala
tian Visit; and we shall designate the visit mentioned in Acts ix. as visit (1), that
in Acts xi. and xii. as visit (2), that in Acts xv. as visit (8), that in Acts xviii. as vis.
(4), that in Acts xxi. as visit (5).
L The Galatian Visit was not the same with visit (1), because it is mentioned as sub
sequent by St. Paul.8
H. "Was the Galatian Visit the same with visit (2) ? * The first impression from read
ing the end of Gal. i. and beginning of Gal. ii. would be that it was ; for St. Paul seems
to imply that there had been no intermediate visit between the one mentioned in Gal i.
18, which was visit (1), and that in Gal. ii. 1, which we have called the Galatian Visit.
On the other side, however, we must observe that St. Paul's object in this passage is not
to enumerate all his visits to Jerusalem. His opponents had told his converts that Paul
was no true Apostle ; that he was only a Christian teacher authorized by the Judsean
Apostles ; that he derived his authority and his knowledge of the Gospel from Peter
James, and the rest of " the twelve." St. Paul's object is to refute this statement. This
he does by declaring, firstly, that his commission was not from men, but from God ; sec
ondly, that he had taught Christianity for three years without seeing any of " the twelve "
at all ; thirdly, that, at the end of that time, he had only spent one fortnight at Jerusalem
with Peter and James, and then had gone to Cilicia and remained personally unknown to
the Judtean Christians ; fourthly, that, fourteen years afterwards, he had undertaken a
journey to Jerusalem, and that he then obtained an acknowledgment of his independent
mission from the chief Apostles. Thus we see that his object is, not to enumerate every
1 This question is one of the most important, both 4 We must certainly acknowledge that St. Paul
chronologically and historically, in the life of St. appears to say this; and some commentators have
Paul. Perhaps its discussion more properly belongs avoided the difficulty by supposing, that although
to the Epistle to the Galatians than to this place; Paul and Barnabas were commissioned to convey
but it has been given here as a justification of the the alms from Antioch to Jerusalem, yet that St.
view taken in Ch. VU. Paul was prevented (by some circumstances nol
* Gal. ii. 1. mentioned) from going the whole way to Jerusalem.
a To support this view, either the conversion For example, it might be too hazardous for him tu
must be placed much earlier than we think probable, appear within the walls of the city at such a time of
or " fourteen," in Gal. ii. 1, must be altered into persecution.
"four." 886

886 THE LIPE AND EPISTLES OP ST. PAUL.
occasion where he might possibly have been instructed by " the twelve," but to assert (an
assertion which he confirms by oath, Gal. i. 20) that his knowledge of Christianity was
not derived from their instruction. A short visit to Jerusalem which produced no im
portant results he might naturally pass over, and especially if he saw none of " the
twelve " at Jerusalem when he visited it. Now, this was probably the case at visit (2),
because it was just at the time of Herod Agrippa's persecution, which would naturally
disperse the Apostles from Jerusalem, as the persecution at Stephen's death did. With
regard to St. Peter, it is expressly said, that, after his miraculous escape from prison, he
quitted Jerusalem.1 This supposition is confirmed by finding that Barnabas and Saul
were sent to the Elders of the church at Jerusalem, and not to the Apostles.
A further objection to supposing the Galatian Visit identical with visit (2) is, that, at
the time of the Galatian Visit, Paul and Barnabas are described as having been already
extensively useful as missionaries to the Heathen ; but this they had not been in the time
of visit (2).
Again : St. Paul could not have been, at so early a period, considered on a footing of
equality with St. Peter ; yet this he was at the time of the Galatian Visit.'
Again : visit (2) could not have been so long as fourteen years8 after visit (1). For
visit (2) was certainly not later than 45 a.d. ; and, if it was the same as the Galatian
Visit, visit (1) must have been not later than from 31 to 33 a.d. (allowing the inclusive
Jewish mode of reckoning to be possibly employed). But Aretas (as we have seen p. 76)
was not in possession of Damascus till about 37.
Again : if visit (2) were fourteen years after visit (1), we must suppose nearly all this
time spent by St. Paul at Tarsus, and yet that all his long residence there is unrecorded
by St. Luke, who merely says that he went to Tarsus, and from thence to Antioch.4
HI- The Galatian Visit not being identical with (1) or (2), was it identical with (3),
(4), or (5) ? We may put (5) at once out of the question, because St. Paul did not re
turn to Antioch after (5), whereas he did return after the Galatian Visit. There remain,
therefore, (3) and (4) to be considered. We shall take (4) first.
IV. Wieseler has lately argued very ingeniously that the Galatian Visit was the same
with (4). His reason^ are, firstly, that, at the Galatian Visit, the Apostles allowed un
limited freedom to the Gentile converts ; i.e., imposed no conditions upon them, such as
those in the decrees of the Council passed at visit (3). This, however, is an inference not
warranted by St. Paul's statement, which speaks of the acknowledgment of his personal
independence, but does not touch the question pf the converts. Secondly, Wieseler urges,
that, till the time of visit (4), St. Paul's position could not have been so far on a level with
St. Peter's as it was at the Galatian Visit. Thirdly, he thinks that the condition of mak
ing a collection for the poor Christians in Jerusalem, which St. Paul says s he had been
forward to fulfil, must have been fulfilled in that great collection which we know that St.
. Paul set on foot immediately after visit (4), because we read of no other collection made
by St. Paul for this purpose.6 Fourthly, Wieseler argues that St. Paul would not have
been likely to take an uncircumcised Gentile, like Titus, with him to Jerusalem at a period
earlier than visit (4). And, moreover, he conceives Titus to be the same with the Corin
thian Justus,7 who is not mentioned as one of St. Paul's companions till Acts xviii. 7 ;
that is, not till after visit (3).
i Acts xii. 17. a See Gal. ii. 9. • The collection carried up to Jerusalem at visit
8 On this fourteen years, see note 2, p. 891, and (2) might, however, be cited as an exception to this
the note B on the Chronological Table in Appendix remark; for (although not expressly Btated) it is
m- most probable that St. Paul was active in forwarding
* Acts ix. 30, and xi. 26. See what Prof. Burton it, since he was selected to carry it to Jerusalem.
says on this interval. i Many of the most ancient MBS. and versions
5 Gal. ii. 10. read Titus Justus in Acts xviii. 7.

APPENDIX ON THE CHRONOLOGY OF GAL. II. 887
It is evident that these arguments are not conclusive in favor of visit (4), even if there
were nothing on the other side ; but there are, moreover, the following objections against
supposing the Galatian Visit identical with (4). Firstly, Barnabas was St. Paul's com
panion in the Galatian Visit: he is not mentioned as being with him at visit (4). Sec
ondly, had so important a conference between St. Paul and the other Apostles taken place
at visit (4), it would not have been altogether passed over by St. Luke, who dwells so fully
upon the council held at the time of visit (3), the decrees of which (on Wieseler's view)
were inferior in importance to the concordat between St. Paul and the other Apostles
which he supposes to have been made at visit (4). Thirdly, the whole tone of the second
chapter of Galatians is against Wieseler's hypothesis : for, in that chapter, St. Paul plainly t
seems to speak of the first conference which he had held, after his success among the
Heathen, with the chief apostles at Jerusalem ; and he had certainly seen and conferred
with them during visit (3).
V. We have seen, therefore, that, if the Galatian Visit be mentioned at all in the Acts,
it must be identical with visit (3), at which the (so-called) Council of Jerusalem took
place. We will now consider the objections against the identity of these two visits nrged
by Paley and others, and then the arguments in favor of the identity.

Objections to the identity of the Galatian
Visit with Visit (3).
1. St. Paul, in Gal. (ii. 1), mentions this
journey as if it had been the next visit to
Jerusalem after the time which he spent
there on his return from Damascus : he
does not say any thing of any intermediate
visit. This looks as if he were speaking of
the journey which he took with Barnabas
to Jerusalem (Acts xi. SO) to convey alms
to the Jewish Christians in the famine.

Answers to the Objections.

1. This objection is answered above, p.

886.

2. In the Galatians, the journey is said
to have taken place " by revelation " (Gal.
ii. 2) ; but in Acts xv. 2-4, 6-12, a public
mission is mentioned.

2. The journey may have taken place
in consequence of a revelation, and yet
may also have been agreed to by a vote
of the church at Antioch. Thus, in St.
Paul's departure from Jerusalem (Acts ix.
29, 30), he is said to have been sent by
the brethren in consequence of danger
feared ; and yet (Acts xxii. 17-21) he says
that he had taken his departure in conse
quence of a vision on the very same occa
sion (see pp. 186, 187).

8. In the Galatians, Barnabas and Titus
are spoken of as St. Paul's companions ; in
the Acts, Barnabas and others (Acts xv.
2) : but Titus is not mentioned.

3. This argument is merely ex sUentio,
and therefore inconclusive. In the Acts,
Paul and Barnabas are naturally men
tioned, as being prominent characters in
the history ; whereas, in the Epistle, Titus
would naturally be mentioned by St. Paul
as a personal friend of his own, and also
because of his refusal to circumcise him.

THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OP ST. PAUL.

4. The object of the visit in Acts xv. is
different from that of the Galatian Visit.
The object in Acts xv. was to seek relief
from the imposition of the Mosaic Law:
that of the Galatian Visit was to obtain the
recognition of St. Paul's independent apos
tleship.

5. In Acts xv., a public assembly of the
Church in Jerusalem is described ; while, in
the Galatians, only private interviews with
the leading Apostles are spoken of.

4. Both these objects are implied in
each narrative. The recognition of St.
Paul's apostleship is implied in Acts xv.
25 ; and the relief from the imposition of
the Mosaic Law is implied, Gal. ii. 7, where
the word " uncircumcision " shows that the
Apostles at the time of St. Paul's visit to
Jerusalem, mentioned in the Epistle, ac
knowledged that the uncircumcised might
partake of " the gospel." The same thing
is shown by the fact that the circumcision
of Titus was not insisted on. We must re
member, also, that the transactions recorded
are looked upon from different points of
view in the Acts and in the Epistle: for
Acts xv. contains a narrative of a great
transaction in the history of the Church ;
while St. Paul, in the Epistle, alludes to
this transaction with the object of prov
ing the recognition of his independent
authority. 5. The private interviews spoken of in
the Epistle do not exclude the supposition
of public meetings having also taken place-
and a communication to the whole Church
(Gal. ii. 2) is expressly mentioned.

6. The narrative in the Epistle says noth
ing of the decision of the Council of Jeru
salem, as it is commonly called, mentioned
Acts xv. Now, this decision was conclu
sive of the very point disputed by the Ju
daizing teachers in Galatia, and surely,
therefore, would not have been omitted by
St. Paul in an argument involving the ques
tion, had he been relating the circumstan
ces which happened at Jerusalem when
that decision was made.

6. The narrative in Galatians gives a
statement intended to prove the recogni
tion of St. Paul's independent authority,
which is sufficient to account for this omis
sion. Moreover, if St. Paul's omission of
reference to the decision of the Council
proved that the journey he speaks of was
prior to the Council, it must equally prove
that the whole Epistle was written before
the Council of Jerusalem ; yet it is gener
ally acknowledged to have been written
long after the Council. The probable rea
son why St. Paul does not refer to the de
cision of the Council is this, — that the
Judaizing teachers did not absolutely dis
pute that decision : they probably did not
declare the absolute necessity of circumcis
ion, but spoke of it as admitting to greater
privileges and a fuller covenant with God.
The Council had only decided that Gentile
Christians need not observe the Law. The
Judaizing party might still contend that

APPENDIX ON THE CHEONOLOGY OP GAL. II.

889

Jewish Christians ought to observe it (as
we know they did observe it till long after
wards). And also the decrees of the Coun
cil left Gentile Christians subject to the
same restrictions with the Proselytes of
the Gate. Therefore the Judaizing party
would naturally argue, that they were still
not more fully within the pale of the Chris
tian Church than the Proselytes of the
Gate were within that of the Jewish
Church. Hence they would urge them to
submit to circumcision, by way of placing
themselves in full membership with the
Church ; just as they would have urged a
Proselyte of the Gate to become a Proselyte
of Righteousness. Also St. Paul might as
sume that the decision of the Council was
well known to the Churches in Galatia;
for Paul and Silas had carried it with them
there.

7. It is inconsistent to suppose, that,
after the decision of the Council of Jeru
salem, St. Peter could have behaved as he
is described doing (Gal. ii. 12) ; for how
could he refuse to eat with the uncircum
cised Christians, after having advocated
in the Council their right of admission to
Christian fellowship?

7. This objection is founded on a mis
understanding of St. Peter's conduct. His
withdrawal from eating at the same table
with the uncircumcised Christians did not
amount to a denial of the decision of the
Council. His conduct showed a weak fear
of offending the Judaizing Christians who
came from Jerusalem; and the practical
effect of such conduct would have been, if
persisted in, to separate the Church into
two divisions. Peter's conduct was still
more inconsistent with the consent which
he had certainly given previously (Gal. ii.
7-9) to the "gospel" of Paul, and with
his previous conduct in the case of Corne
lius (see end of Chap. VH.). We may
add, that whatever difBculty may be felt
in St. Paul's not alluding to the decrees of
the Council in his Epistle to the Galatians
must also be felt in his total silence con
cerning them when he treats of the ques
tion of " things sacrificed to idols " in the
Epistles to Corinth and Borne; for that
question had been explicitly decided by
the Council. The fact is, that the Decrees
of the Council were not designed as of per
manent authority, but only as a temporary
and provisional measure ; and their author
ity was superseded as the Church gradually
advanced towards true Christian freedom.

890

THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL.

8. The Epistle mentions St. Paul as
conferring with James, Peter, and John ;
whereas, in Acts xv., John is not men
tioned at all ; and it seems strange that
so distinguished a person, if present at the
Council, should not have been mentioned.
9. Since, in the Galatians, St. Paul men
tions James, Peter, and John, it seems most
natural to suppose that he speaks of the
well-known apostolic triumvirate so often
classed together in the Gospels. But if so,
the James mentioned must be James the
Greater ; and hence the journey mentioned
in the Galatians must have been before
the death of James the Greater, and there
fore before the Council of Jerusalem.

8. This argument is only ex silentio, and
obviously inconclusive.

9. This objection proceeds on the mere
assumption, that, because James is men
tioned first, he must be James the Greater ;
whereas James the Less became even a
more conspicuous leader of the Church at
Jerusalem than James the Greater had
previously been, as we see from Acts xv. :
hence he might be very well mentioned
with Peter and John. And the fact of
his name riming first in St. Paul's nar
rative agrees better with this supposition;
for James the Greater is never mentioned
the first in the apostolic triumvirate, the
order of which is Peter, James, and John :
but James the Less would naturally be
mentioned first, if the Council at Jerusa
lem was mentioned, since we find from
Acts xv. that he took the part of presi
dent in that Council.

10. St. Paul's refusal to circumcise Titus
(Gal. ii.), and voluntary circumcising of
Timothy (Acts xvi. 3), so soon afterwards.

10. Timothy's mother was a Jewess, and
he had been brought up a Jew ; * whereas
Titus was a Gentile. The circumstances
of Timothy's circumcision were fully dis
cussed in pp. 228-231.

Thus we see that the objections against the identity of the Galatian Visit with visit
(3) are inconclusive ; consequently, we might at once conclude (from the obvious circum
stances of identity between the two visits) that they were actually identical. But this
conclusion is further strengthened by the following arguments : —
1. The Galatian Visit could not have happened before visit (3) ; because, if so, the
Apostles at Jerusalem had already granted to Paul and Barnabas * the liberty which was
sought for the " gospel of the uncircumcision : " therefore there would have been no need
for the Church to send them again to Jerusalem upon the same cause. And again : the
Galatian Visit could not have happened after visit (3) ; because, almost immediately after
that period, Paul and Barnabas ceased to work together as missionaries to the Gentiles ;
whereas, up to the time of the Galatian Visit, they had been working together.3
2. The chronology of St. Paul's life (so far as it can be ascertained) agrees better with
the supposition that the Galatian Visit was visit (3) than with any other supposition.
Beckoning backwards from the ascertained epoch of 60 a.d., when St. Paul was sent

1 See 2 Tim. iii. 15. We may remark that this
difficulty (which is urged by Wieseler) is quite as
great on his own hypothesis; for, according to him,

the refusal happened only about two years after the
consent. * Gal. il. 3-6. » Gal ii.1.9

APPENDIX ON THE CHRONOLOGY OF GAL. II. 891
to Borne, we find that he must have begun his second missionary journey in 51 and that,
therefore, the Council (i.e., visit (3) ) must have been either in 50 or 51. This calculation
is based upon the history in the Acts. Now, turning to the Epistle to the Galatians, we
find the following epochs : —
A. — Conversion.
B. — 3 years' interval (probably Judaically reckoned = 2 years).1
C. — Flight from Damascus, and visit (1).
D. — 14 a years' interval (probably Judaically reckoned = 13 years).1
E. — Galatian Visit.
And since Aretas was supreme at Damascus • at the time of the flight, and his su
premacy there probably began about 37 (see pp. 76 and 93), we could not put the flight
at a more probable date than 38. If we assume this to have been the case, then the Ga
latian Visit was 38 + 13 =51 ; which agrees with the time of the Council (i.e. visit (3) )
as above. VI. Hence we need not further consider the views of those writers who (like Paley
and Schrader) have resorted to the hypothesis, that the Galatian Visit is some supposed
journey not recorded in the Acts at all ; for we have proved that the supposition of its
identity with the third visit there recorded satisfies every necessary condition. Schroder's
notion is, that the Galatian Visit was between visit (4) and visit (5). Paley places it be
tween visit (3) and visit (4). A third view is ably advocated Ln a discussion of the subject
(not published) which has been kindly communicated to us. The principal points in this
hypothesis are, that the Galatians were converted in the^rs^ missionary journey ; that the
Galatian Visit took place between visit (2) and visit (3) ; and that the Epistle to the Ga>
latians was written after the Galatian Visit, and before visit (3). This hypothesis cer
tainly obviates some difficulties,4 and it is quite possible (see p. 212, n. 2) that the Gala
tian churches might have been formed at the time supposed ; but we are strongly of
opinion that a much later date must be assigned to the Epistle.6
> On this Judalcal reckoning, see note B on the not the Conversion : at least, this is the most natural
Chronological Table in Appendix m. way; although the other interpretation might be
» The reading " fourteen » (Gal. ii. 1) is un- Justified, if required by the other circumstances of
doubtedly to he retained. It Is in all the ancient the case.
MSS. which contain the passage. The reading * 2 Cor. xi. 82.
"four "has probably arisen from the words " four ' Especially the difficulties which relate to the
years," which relate to » different subject, in the apparent discrepancies between the Galatiom Visit
sentence below. The preposition " after," denoting and visit (3), and to the circumstance that the
" after an interval of," may be used, according to Apostle does not allude to the Council in his argo-
the Jewish way of reckoning time, inclusively. The ment with the Galatians on the subject of circum-
fourtcen years must be reckoned/rom the epoch last oision.
mentioned, which Is the visit (1) to Jerusalem, and 'Bee note en Epistle to the Galatians.

APPENDIX IL

ON THE DATE OF THE PASTORAL EPISTLES.
BEFORE we can fix the time at which these Epistles were written, we must take the
following data into account : —
1. The three Epistles were nearly contemporaneous with one another. This is proved
by their resembling each other in language, matter, and style of composition, and in the
state of the Christian Church which they describe ; and by their differing in all these three
points from all the other Epistles of St. Paul. Of course, the full force of this argument
cannot be appreciated by those who have not carefully studied these Epistles ; but it is
now almost universally admitted by all1 who have done so, both by the defenders and im-
pugners of the authenticity of the Pastoral Epistles. Hence, if we fix the date of one of
the three, we fix approximately the date of all.
2. They were written after St. Paul became acquainted with Apollos, and therefore after
St. PauVs first visit to Ephesus. (See Acts xviii. 24, and Titus iii. 13.)
3. Hence they could not have been written till after the conclusion of that portion of
his life which is related in the Acts ; because there is no part of his history, between his
first visit to Ephesus and his Roman imprisonment, which satisfies the historical condi
tions implied in the statements of any one of these Epistles. Various attempts have been
made, with different degrees of ingenuity, to place the Epistles to Timothy and Titus at
different points in this interval of time ; but all have failed even to satisfy the conditions
required for placing any single Epistle correctly.2 And no one has ever attempted to
place all three together at any period of St. Paul's life before the end of his first Eoman
imprisonment ; yet this contemporaneousness of the three Epistles is a necessary condition
of the problem.
4. The Pastoral Epistles were written not merely after St. Paul's first Roman impris
onment, but considerably after it. This is evident from the marked difference in their
style from the Epistle to the Philippians, which was the last written during that imprison
ment. So great a change of style (a change not merely in the use of single words, but in
phrases, in modes of thought, and in method of composition) must require an interval of
certainly not less than four or five years to account for it. And even that interval might
seem too short, unless accompanied by circumstances which should further explain the
alteration. Yet five years of exhausting labor, great physical and moral sufferings, and
bitter experience of human nature, might suffice to account for the change.
1 We have noticed Dr. Davidson's contrary opin- alphabetical list of the words and phrases peculiar
ion before; and we should add that Wieseler may be to the Pastoral Epistles.
considered another exception, only that he does not * Wieseler's is the most ingenious theory which
attempt to reply to the grounds stated by other has been suggested forgetting over this difficulty;
critics for the contemporaneousness of the three but it has been shown by Huther that none of the
Epistles, but altogether ignores the question of three Epistles can be placed as Wieseler places them
internal evidence from style and Church organiza- without involving some contradiction of the facts
tion, which is the conclusive evidence here. Sub- mentioned in them respectively.
Joined to this Appendix in the larger editions is an
8S2

DATE OF THE PASTORAL EPISTLES. 893
5. The development of Church organization implied in the Pastoral Epistles leads to
the same conclusion as to the lateness of their date. The detailed rules for the choice of
presbyters and deacons, implying numerous candidates for these offices ; the exclusion
of new converts (neophytes x) from the presbyterate ; the regular catalogue of Church
widows (1 Tim. v. 9), — are all examples of this.
6. The heresies condemned in all three Epistles are likewise of a nature which forbids
the supposition of an early date. They are of the same class as those attacked in the
Epistle to the Colossians, but appear under a more matured form. They are apparently
the same heresies which we find condemned in other portions of Scripture written in the
later part of the apostolic age ; as, for example, the Epistles of Peter and Jude. We trace
distinctly the beginnings of the Gnostic Heresy, which broke out with such destructive
power in the second century, and of which we have already seen the germ in the Epistle
to the Colossians.
7. The preceding conditions might lead us to place the Pastoral Epistles at any point
after a.d. 66 (see condition 4, above) ; i.e., in the last thirty-three years of the first cen
tury. But we have a limit assigned us in this direction by a fact mentioned in the Epistles
to Timothy; viz., that Timotheus was still a young man (1 Tim. iv. 12, 2 Tim. ii. 22)
when they were written. We must, of course, understand this statement relatively to the
circumstances under which it is used. Timotheus was young for the authority intrusted to
him ; he was young to exercise supreme jurisdiction over all the Presbyters (many of them
old men) of the Churches of Asia. According even to modern notions (and much more
according to the feelings of antiquity on the subject), he would still have been very young
for such a position at the age of thirty-five. Now, Timotheus was (as we have seen, pp.
175 and 228) a youth still living with his parents when St. Paul first took him in a.d. 51
(Acts xvi. 1-3) as his companion. From the way in which he is then mentioned (Acts
xvi. 1-3, compare 2 Tim. i. 4), we cannot imagine him to have been more than seventeen
or eighteen at the most. Nor, again, could he be much younger than this, considering the
part he soon afterwards took in the conversion of Macedonia (2 Cor. i. 19). Hence we
may suppose him to have been eighteen years old in a.d. 51. Consequently, in 68 (the
last year of Nero), he would be thirty-five 2 years old.
8. If we are to believe the universal tradition of the early Church, St. Paul's martyr-
lorn occurred in the reign of Nero.8 Hence we have another limit for the date of the
Pastoral Epistles ; viz., that it could not have been later than a.d. 68 : and this agrees
very well with the preceding datum.
It will be observed that all the above conditions are satisfied by the hypothesis adopted
in Chap. XX VH., — that the Pastoral Epistles were written, the two first just before, and
the last during, St. Paul's final imprisonment at Rome.4
'ITim ill 6. « At this point, inthe larger editions, is a detailed
> No objection against the genuineness of the discussion of the arguments of those, who, during
Pastoral Epistles has been more insisted on than the present century, have denied the genuineness of
that furnished by the reference to the youth of these three Epistles. This was written before the
Timotheus in the two passages above mentioned. appearance of Dr. Davidson's third volume. The
How groundless such objections are, we may best reader who is acquainted with that valuable work
realize by considering the parallel case of those will perceive that we differ from Dr. Davidson on
young Colonial bishops who are almost annuallj ooi^e material points; nor, after considering his
leaving our shores. Several of these have been not arguments, do we see reason to change our conclu
more than thirty-four or thirty-five years of age at sions. But this difference does not prevent us from
the time of their appointment; and how naturally appreciating the candor and ability with which he
might they be addressed by an elderly friend in the states the arguments on both sides. We would
very language which St. Paul here addressed to especially refer our readers to his statement of the
Timotheus I difficulties in the way of the hypothesis that these
¦¦ See the authorities for this statement above, Epistles were forged.
p. 846.

894 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL.
We come now to consider the order of the three Epistles among themselves : —
1. 1 Tim. — In this we find that St. Paul had left Ephesus for Macedonia (1 Tim. i. 3).
and had left Timothy at Ephesus to counteract the erroneous teaching of the heretics
(iii. 4) ; and that he hoped soon to return to Ephesus (iii. 14).
2. Titus. — Here we find that St. Paul had lately left Crete (i. 5"), and that he was
now about to proceed (iii. 1 2) to Nicopolis in Epirus, where he meant to spend the ap
proaching winter ; whereas, in 1 Tim., he meant soon to be back at Ephesus ; and he was
afterwards at Miletus and Corinth between 1 Tim. and 2 Tim. (otherwise 2 Tim. iv. 20
would be unintelligible). Hence Titus1 must have been written later than 1 Tim.
3. 2 Tim. — We have seen that this Epistle could not (from the internal evidence of
its style, and close resemblance to the other Pastorals) have been written in the first Ro
man imprisonment. The same conclusion may be drawn also on historical grounds, as
Huther has well shown where he proves that it could neither have been written before the
Epistle to the Colossians, nor after the Epistle to the Colossians during that imprison
ment. The internal evidence from style and matter, however, is so conclusive, that it is
needless to do more than allude to this quasi-external evidence. In this Epistle, we find
St. Paul a prisoner in Rome (i. 17): he has lately been at Corinth (iv. 20) ; and, since he
left Timothy (at Ephesus), he has been at Miletus (iv. 20). Also he has been, not long
before, at Troas (iv. 13).
The facts thus mentioned can be best explained by supposing, (1) that, after writing
1 Tim. from Macedonia, St. Paul did, as he intended, return to Ephesus by way of Troas,
where he left the books, &c, mentioned 2 Tim. iv. 13, with Carpus ; (2) that from Ephe
sus he made a short expedition to Crete and back, and on his return wrote to Titus ; (3)
that, immediately after despatching this letter, he went by Miletus to Corinth, and thence
to Nicopolis ; whence he proceeded to Rome.
1 Had 1 Tim. been written after Titus, St. Paul (on that hypothesis) would be Intending to winter
could not have hoped to he back soon at Epheaui, at the distant Nicopous.
1 Tim. Iii. 14 ; for he had only just left Ephe™, and

APPENDIX TH

CHRONOLOGICAL TABLE.

A.D.

Biography of St. Padl.

CONTEMPORARY EVENTS.

36 37 38

39
4041

42 43

4445 46 47 48 49

(?) St. Paul's conversion [supposing the
3 years of Gal. i. 18 Judaically reck
oned]. See p. 891, and note (B) be
low.
(?) At Damascus.
(?) Flight 'from Damascus [see p. 891]
to Jerusalem, and thence to Tarsus.
During these years, St. Paul preach
es in Syria and Cilicia, making
Taksus his head-quarters; and
probably undergoes most of the
sufferings mentioned at 2 Cor.
xi. 24-26 ; viz., two of the Ro
man and the five Jewish scour-
(?) gings, and three shipwrecks. See
(?) pp. 98 and 109, and note on
2 Cor. xi. 25.
He is brought from Tarsus to Antioch
(Acts xi. 26), and stays there a year
before the famine.
He visits Jerusalem with Barnabas to
relieve the famine.
At Antioch.
At Antioch.
His " First Missionary Journey," from
Antioch to
Cyprus, Antioch in Pisidia, Iconium,
Lystra, Derbe,
and back through the same places to
Antioch.

Death of Tiberius, and accession of
Caligula (March 16).

Death of Caligula, and accession of
Claudius (Jan. 25). Judasa and
Samaria given to Herod Agrippa I.
Invasion of Britain by Aulus Plautius.

Death of Herod Agrippa I. (Acts xii.)
[see note (A) below.]
Cuspius Fadus (as procurator) suc
ceeds to the government of Judasa.

Tiberius Alexander made procurator
of Judasa (about this time).

ia H. (Acts xxv.) made king of
'Chalcis ;
Cumanus made procurator of Judasa
(about this time). 895

896

THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL.

Appendix HI. — continued.

A.D.

Biography of St. Paul.

Contemporary Eventb.

50

51

52

53

54

5556 57

5859 60
61

St. Paul and Barnabas attend the " Coun
cil of Jerusalem."
[See p. 191, &c. ; and note (B) below.]
His " Second Missionary Journey," from
Antioch to
Cilicia, Lycaonia,
Galatia,
Troas,
Philippi, Thessalonica, Beroea,
Athens, and
Corinth. — Writes 1 Thess.
At Corinth. — Writes 2 Thess.

(Spring) — He leaves Corinth, and reaches
(Summer) — Jerusalem at Pentecost, and
thence goes to Antioch.
(Autumn) — His " Third Missionary
Journey." — He goes
To Ephesus.
At Ephesus.
At Ephesus.
(Spring) — He writes 1 Cor.
(Summer) — Leaves Ephesus for Mace
donia,
(Autumn) — Where he writes 2 Cor. ; and
thence
(Winter) — To Corinth, where he writes
Galatians.
(Spring) — He writes Ramans, and leaves
Corinth, going by Philippi and Miletus
(Summer) — To Jerusalem (Pentecost),
where he is arrested, and sent to Caes
area.
At CAESAREA.
(Autumn) — Sent to Borne by Festus
(about August).
(Winter) — Shipwrecked at Malta.
(Spring) — He arrives at Rome.

Caractacus captured by the Romans
in Britain ;
Cogidunus (father of Claudia pi 2 Tim.
iv. 21) assists the Romans in Britain.

Claudius expels the Jews from Rome
(Acts xviii. 2).

The tetrarchy of Trachonitis given to
Agrippa H. ;
Felix made procurator of Judaea. [See
note (C) below.]
Death of Claudius, and accession of
Nero (Oct. 13).

Nero murders Agrippina.
Felix is recalled, and succeeded by
Festus [see note (C) below].

Embassy from Jerusalem to Rome to
petition about the wall [see note (C)
below].

CHRONOLOGICAL TABLE.

897

Appendix HL — continued.

A.D.

626364
65
6667

Biography of St. Pact..

At Rome. f Philemon,
(Spring) — Writes ¦) Colossians,
( Ephesians.
(Autumn) — Writes Philippians.

ring) — He is acquitted, and goes to
lacedonia (Phil. ii. 24) and
Asia Minor (Philem. 22).
(?) He goes to Spain. [For this and
the subsequent statements, see Chap.
XXVH.]
(?) In Spain.

(Summer) — From Spain (?) to Asia
Minor (1 Tim. i. 3).
(Summer) — Writes 1 Tim. from Mace
donia.
(Autumn) — Writes Titus from Ephesus.
(Winter) — At Nicopolis.
(Spring) — In prison at Rome. Writes
2 Tim.
(Summer) — Executed (May or June).

Contemporary Events,

Burrus dies ;
Albinus succeeds Festus as procurator :
Nero marries Poppaea ;
Octavia executed ;
Pallas put to death.
Poppasa's daughter Claudia born.

Great fire at Rome (July 19), followed
by persecution of Roman Christians ;
Gessius Floras made procurator of
Judasa.
Conspiracy of Piso, and death of Seneca.
The Jewish war begins.

Death of Nero in the middle of June.

£7

NOTES ON THE CHRONOLOGICAL TABLES.

Note (A.) — Date of the Famine in Acts xi. 28.
We find in Acts xi. 28 that Agabus prophesied the occurrence of a famine, and that
his prophecy was fulfilled in the reign of Claudius ; also that the Christians of Antioch
resolved to send relief to their poor brethren in Judaea, and that this resolution was car
ried into effect by the hands of Barnabas and Saul. After relating this, St. Luke digress
es from his narrative to describe the then state (" about that time ") of the Church at
Jerusalem, immediately before and after the death of Herod Agrippa (which is fully de
scribed Acts xii. 1-24). He then resumes the narrative which he had interrupted, and
tells us how Barnabas and Saul returned to Antioch after fulfilling their commission to
Jerusalem (Acts xii. 25).
From this it would appear that Barnabas and Saul went up to Jerusalem, to relieve the
sufferers by famine, soon after the death of Herod Agrippa I.
Now, Josephus enables us to fix Agrippa's death very accurately: for he tells us (Ant.
xix. 9, 2), that, at the time of his death, he had reigned three full years over the whole of
Judaea; and also (Ant. xix. 5, 1), that, early in the first year of Claudius (41 a.d.), the
sovereignty of Judasa was conferred on him. Hence his death was in a.d. 44.1
The famine appears to have begun in the year after his death ; for (1) Josephus speaks
of it as having occurred during the government of Cuspius Fadus and Tiberius Alexander
(Ant. xx. 5, 2). Now, Cuspius Fadus was sent as Procurator from Rome on the death of
Agrippa I., and was succeeded by Tiberius Alexander ; and both their Procuratorships
together only lasted from a.d. 45 to a.d. 50, when Cumanus succeeded. (2) We find
from Josephus (Ant. xx. 2, 6, compare xx. 5, 2), that, about the time of the beginning of
Fadus's government, Helena, Queen of Adiabene, a Jewish proselyte, sent corn to the re
lief of the Jews in the famine. (3) At the time of Herod Agrippa's death, it would seem
from Acts xii. 20 that the famine could not have begun ; for the motive of the Phoenicians
in making peace was that their country was supplied with food from Judasa, — a motive
which could not have acted while Judaea itself was perishing of famine.
Hence we conclude that the journey of Barnabas and Saul to Jerusalem with alms took
place in a.d. 45. Note (B.)
In p. 891, we have remarked that the interval of 14 years (Gal. ii. 1) between the
flight from Damascus and the Council of Jerusalem might be supposed to be either 14 full
years, or 13, or even 12 years, Judaically reckoned. It must not be imagined that the
Jews arbitrarily called the same interval of time 14, 13, or 12 years; but the denomination
of the interval depended on the time when it began and ended, as follows : If it began on
Sept, 1, a.d. 88, and ended Oct. 1, a.d. 50, it would be called 14 years, though really
i Additional authorities for this are given by WleteUtr.
8»8

NOTES ON THE CHRONOLOGICAL TABLES. 899
only 12 years and one month, because it began before the 1st of Tisri, and ended after
the 1st of Tisri; and, as the Jewish civil year began on the 1st of Tisri, the interval was
contained in 14 different civil years. On the other hand, if it began Oct. 1, a.d. 38, and
ended Sept. 1, a.d. 50, it would only be called 12 years, although really only two months
less than the former interval which was called 14 years. Hence, as we do not know the
month of the flight from Damascus, nor of the Council of Jerusalem, we are at liberty to
suppose that the interval between them was only a few weeks more than 12 years, and
therefore to suppose the flight in a.d. 38, and the Council in a.d. 50.

Note (C.) — On the Date of the Recall of Felix.
We have seen that St. Paul arrived in Rome in spring, after wintering at Malta ; and
that he sailed from Judasa at the beginning of the preceding autumn, and was at Fair Ha
vens in Crete in October, soon after " the Fast," which was on the 10th of Tisri (Acts
xxvii. 9). He was sent to Rome by Festus, upon his appeal to Caesar ; and his hearing
before Festus had taken place about a fortnight (see Acts xxiv. 27 to xxv. 1) after the
arrival of Festus in the province. Hence the arrival of Festus (and consequently the
departure of Felix) took place in the summer preceding St. Paul's voyage.
This is confirmed by Acts xxiv. 27, which tells us that Paul had been in prison two
complete years at the time of Felix's departure : for he was imprisoned at a Pentecost ;
therefore Felix's departure was just after a Pentecost.
We know, then, the season of Felix's recall ; viz., the summer: and we must determine
the date of the year.
(a) At the beginning of St. Paul's imprisonment at Cassarea (i.e., two years before
Felix's recall), Felix had been already "for many years Procurator ofJudosa " (Acts xxiv.
10). "Many years" could not be less than 5 years : therefore Felix had governed Judasa
at least (5 + 2 =) 7 years at the time of his recall. Now, Felix was appointed Procura
tor in the beginning of the 13th year of Claudius1 (Joseph. Ant. xx. 7, 1, twelfth year com
plete) ; that is, early in the year a.d. 53. Therefore Felix's recall could not have occurred
iefore a.d. (53 + 7 =) 60.
(3) But we can also show that it could not have occurred after a.d. 60, by the follow
ing arguments : —
1. Felix was followed to Rome by Jewish ambassadors, who impeached him of misgov-
ernment. He was saved from punishment by the intercession of his brother Pallas, at a
time when Pallas was* in special favor with Nero (Joseph. Ant. xx. 8, 9). Now, Pallas
was put to death by Nero in the year a.d. 62 ; and it is improbable, that, at any part
of that or the preceding year, he should have had much influence with Nero. Hence
Felix's recall was certainly not after a.d. 62, and probably not after a.d. 60.
2. Burrus was living (Joseph. Ant., quoted by Wieseler) at the time when Felix's Jew
ish accusers were at Rome. Now, Burrus died not later than February, a.d. 62. And
the Jewish ambassadors could not have reached Rome during the season of the Mare
Clausum : therefore they (and consequently Felix) must have come to Rome not after
the autumn of a.d. 61.
3. Paul, on arriving at Rome, was delivered (Acts xxviii. 16) to the prefect (not the pre-
i Tacitus places the appointment of Felix earlier too much on hi* favor, he excited the disgust ef
than thl» ; hut, on such a question, his authority i» Nero at the very beginning of his reign (A. D. 64).
not to be compared with that of Josephus. In A. D. 65 he was accused of treason, but acquitted ;
s Pallas had been mainly instrumental in obtain- and, after this acquittal, he seems to have regained
irui Nero's adoption by Claudius ; but, by presuming hia favor at court.

900 THE LIFE AND EPISTLES OF ST. PAUL.
feels) : ' hence there was a single prefect in command of the praetorians at that time. But
this was not the case after the death of Burrus, when Rufus and Tigellinus were made
joint prefects. Hence (as above) Paul could not have arrived in Rome before a.d. 61,
and therefore Felix's recall (which was in the year before Paul's arrival at Rome) could
not have been after a.d. 60.
Therefore Felix's recall has been proved to be neither after a.d. 60, nor before a.d.
60 : consequently, it was in a.d. 60.
(y) This conclusion is confirmed by the following considerations : —
1. Festus died in Judaea, and was succeeded by Albinus. We are not informed of the
duration of Festus's government ; but we have proved (a) that it did not begin before
A.D. 60 : and we know that Albinus was in office in Judaea in the autumn of A.D. 62 (at
the Feast of Tabernacles), and perhaps considerably before that time. Hence Festus's
arrival (and Felix's recall) must have been either in 60 or 61. Now, if we suppose it in
61, we must crowd into a space of fifteen months the following events : (a) Festus repress
es disturbances. (5) Agrippa H. builds bis palace overlooking the temple, (c) The
Jews build their wall, intercepting his view, (d) They send a deputation to Rome to ob
tain leave to keep their wall, (e) They gain their suit at Rome by the intercession of
Poppaea. (/) They return to Jerusalem, leaving the high priest Ishmael as hostage at
Rome, (g) Agrippa, on their return, nominates a new high priest (Joseph), the length
of whose tenure of office we are not told. (K) Joseph is succeeded in the high priesthood
by Ananus, who holds the office three months, and is displaced just before the arrival of Al
binus. This succession of events could not have occurred between the summer of a.d. 61
and the autumn of a.d. 62 ; because the double voyage of the Jewish embassy, with
their residence in Rome, would alone have occupied twelve months. Hence we conclude
that from the arrival of Festus to that of Albinus was a period of not less than two years
and consequently that Festus arrived a.d. 60.
2. The Procurators of Judaea were generally changed when the Propraetors of Syria
were changed. Now, Quadratus was succeeded by Corbulo in Syria a.d. 60 : hence we
might naturally expect Felix to be recalled in that year.
N 3. Paul was indulgently treated (Acts xxviii. 31) at Rome for two years after his arrival
there. Now, he certainly would not have been treated indulgently after the Roman fire
(in July, 64). Hence his arrival was, at latest, not after (64 — 2=) a.d. 62. Conse
quently, Felix's recall was certainly not after 61.
4. After Nero's accession (Oct. 13, a.d. 54), Josephus9 mentions the following consec
utive events as having occurred in Judaea : (a) Capture of the great bandit Eleazar by
Felix, (b) Rise of the Sicarii. (c) Murder of Jonathan unpunished, (d) Many pre
tenders to Inspiration or Messiahship lead followers into the wilderness, (e) These are
dispersed by the Roman troops. (/) An Egyptian rebel, at the head pf a body of Sicarii,
excites the most dangerous of all these insurrections : his followers are defeated ; but he
himself escapes. This series of events could not well have occupied less than three years ;
and we should therefore fix the insurrection of the Egyptian not before a.d. 57. Now,
when St. Paul was arrested in the Temple, he was at first mistaken for this rebel Egyptian,
who is mentioned as " the Egyptian who before these days made an uproar " (Acts xxi.
38), — an expression which would very naturally be used if the Egyptian's insurrection
had occurred in the preceding year. This would again agree with supposing the date of
St. Paul's arrest to be a.d. 58, and therefore Felix's recall a.d. 60.
> The official phrase was in the plural, when > The referenoes are given by Wlewler.
there was more than one prefect. So Trajan writes,
" Vinctus mitti ad prosfectos prsetoril mei debet." —
Min. Ep. x. 66

NOTES ON THE CHRONOLOGICAL TABLES. 901
5. St. Paul (Acts xviii. 2) finds Aquila and Priscilla just arrived at Corinth from
Rome, whence they were banished by a decree of the Emperor Claudius. We do not
know the date of this decree ; but it could not, at the latest, have been later than A.D. 54,
in which year Claudius died. Now, the Acts gives us distinct information, that between
this first arrival at Corinth, and St. Paul's arrest at Jerusalem, there were the following in
tervals of time : viz., from arriving at Corinth to reaching Antioch, If years ; from reach
ing Ephesus to leaving Ephesus, 2£ years ; from leaving Ephesus to reaching Jerusalem,
1 year. (See Acts xviii., xix., and xx.) These make together 5^ years; but to this
must be added the time spent at Antioch, and between Antioch and Ephesus, which is
not mentioned, but which may reasonably be estimated at \ year. Thus we have 5J
years for the total interval. Therefore the arrest of St. Paul at Jerusalem was probably
not later than (54 -f- 5£ =) a.d. 59, and may have been earlier ; which agrees with the
result independently arrived at, — that it was actually in a.d. 58.
It is impossible for any candid mind to go through such investigations as these with
out seeing how strongly they confirm (by innumerable coincidences) tlie historical accu
racy of the Acts of the Apostles.

¦¦¦¦

s

INDEX

" Abba," remarks on the use of the word,
531 n.
Acamas, promontory of, 142.
Acco, 614.
Achaia, 273 ; harbors of, 360 ; province of,
under the Romans, 362.
Acre, St. Jean d', 614.
Acrocorinthus, the, 359 ; its importance,
ib. ; views from its summit, ib.
Acropolis,, the, 300, 305 ; view of the, re
stored, 326.
Acts of the Apostles, 121.
.Adana, 220 n., 223 n.
Adramyttium, 240, 686.
iEgae, 220 n.
JSgina, Island of, 299.
Agabus the prophet, 117, 615.
Agora, the, of Athens, 306.
Agricola, 14.
Agrippa, Herod, grandson of Herod the
Great, 103 ; his death, 119.
Agrippa H., 652.
'Aicoii, meaning ofj 570 n.
Ak-Sher, 233.
Alban Mount, 731.
Albinus, 667 n.
Alcibiades, character of, 315 ; fortifications
of, at Cos, 605.
Alexander the coppersmith, 472, 474.
Alexander the Great, 6, 7 ; at Pamphylia,
144.
Alexandria, eminence of, 684.
Alexandria Troas, 241 ; harbor ofj 242, 591.
Almalee in Lycia, 149.

Almsgiving amongst the Jews, 61.
« Altar of the Twelve Gods " at Athena,
307 ; to the " Unknown God," 815.
Amphipolis, 275.
Amphitheatres in Asia Minor, 587.
Amplias, 581.
Amyntas, King of Galatia, 21.
Ananias, 87.
Ananias, the Jewish merchant, 117.
Ancyra, description of) 212 n., 234.
Andriace, 608, 691.
Androclus, founder of Ephesus, 462.
Andronicus, " kinsman " of St. PauL 581.
Anemurium, cliffs of, 142.
Annaeus Novatus. — See Gallio.
'AvOtJTTOToc, the word as translated in the
A. V., 131 n.
" Antinomian," the term as applied to the
"all things lawful" party at Corinth,
539 n.
Antinoniianism, Corinthian, 539.
Antinomians, 422.
Antinous, the favorite of -Hadrian, birth
place of, 208 re.
Antioch, 101; Jewish Christians in, 109;
description and history of the city, 112
et seq. ; earthquake and famine in, 1 1 7 ;
a revelation at, 122.
Antioch in Pisidia, 150 ; identified with the
modern town of Jalobatch, 151 ; its
foundation, ib. ; called Caesarea by Au
gustus, 152.
' kvrioxeiac Tixv, statue of the, 116, n. 4.
Antiochus Epiphanes, coins of, 24; his
adoption of Roman fashions, 25.
Antiochus Soter, 211. 903

904

INDEX.

Antigonia Troas. — See Alexandria Troas.
Anti-Taurus, the, 224 n.
Antipas, son of Herod the Great, 26.
Antipater, 26.
Antipatris, 650.
Antonia, the Fortress, 638.
Antonine Itinerary, 274.
Antoninus Pius, 584 n.
Anxur, 728, 730.
Aorist, St. Paul's constant use of the, for
the perfect, 496 n.; 532 n.; 552 n.
Apamea in Asia Minor, 114.
Apelles, 605.
Apollo Patrous, Temple oi, 307.
Apollonia on the Adriatic, description of,
277.
Apollos, 390 ; 406 et seq. ; followers of, 422.
Apostles, Acts of the, 47 ; their office in the
Primitive Church, 376.
Apostles and Elders, letters of the, to the
Christians of Antioch, 197.
Apostolic Church, the, 60.
Appellatio, the Roman right of, 669 n.
Appendices : — I. On the time of the visit
to Jerusalem mentioned in Galatians
(chap, ii.), 885. II. On the date of the
Pastoral Epistles, 892. HL Chronolo
gical Table, 895.
Appian Way, 727.
Appii Forum, 730.
Aquila, 336, 357, 367.
Aquila, the translator of the Old Testa
ment into Greek, 836.
Arabia, the word as used by the ancients,
89.
Aram, 33.
Aramaean Jews, 33.
Aratus, the Greek poet of Cilicia, 328 n.
Araunah, threshing-floor of, 629.
Archelaus, son of Herod, his banishment,
51.
Archelaus, last king of Cappadocia, 214.
Archippus, 413.
Areopagus, 300, 306 ; description of the,
325.
Aretas, the Arab royal title of, 76 n. ; coins
of, 100 n.
Arethusa, Pass of) 277.
Argseus, Mount, 166.
Aricia, town of, 731.

Aristarchus, 687.
Aristobulus, the, mentioned in Rom. xvi. 10,
582.
Aristotle, 310.
Artemio, 128.
Artemisian festival, 471.
Asia, the word as used by the ancients, 205
et seq.
Asia Minor, robbers in, 145; "water-
floods " of, 145 ; caravans in, 148 ; table
lands of, 149; political divisions of,
204 n.
'Aaiapxat, translation o£ 471, n. 2.
Asiarchs, the, 471.
Aspendus, 143.
" Assemblies of the Wise," 55.
Assize-towns of the Romans, 470.
Assos, 240 ; notice of, 594.
Astrology, passion of the Antiochseans for,
115; amongst the Orientals, 138.
Asyncritus, 582.
Athenian religion, notice of the, 314.
Athenodorus, 98.
Athens, scenery around, 301 ; description
of the city of, 801 et seq. ; its " careful
ness in religion," 314 ; paganism of, con
trasted with Christianity, 331 ; compared
with Corinth, 333.
Athos, Mount, 243, 247, 272, 297.
Attaleia, Bay of, 141 ; town o£ 142 ; his
tory and description of, 177.
Attalus Fhiladelphus, 143.
Attalus HI., King of Pergamus, 206.
Attica, description of, 300.
" Augustan Band," the, 26 n.
Augustine, St., on the names of " Saulus"
and " Paulus," 137.
Aulon, Pass of, 276.
Airdc ly£>, meaning of, in Rom. vii. 25,
561 n.
Avernus Lacus, 728.
Axius River, 272.

Baiae, 220 n. ; 724.
Balaamites, or Nicolaitans, 398.
" Barbarian," use of the word in the N. T.,
In.

INDEX.

905

Barjesus the sorcerer, 133.
Barnabas at Antioch, 96, 110; accompanies
St. Paul to Jerusalem with contribution-
money in time of famine, 117 ; becomes
one of the teachers at Antioch, 120;
departs for Cyprus, 123 ; arrives at Se
leucia, 126; at Salamis, 127; and at
Paphos, 128; brought before Sergius
Paulus, 133 ; visits Pamphylia, 141 ;
arrives at Perga, 143 ; and at the table
land of Asia Minor, 149 ; reaches An
tioch in Pisidia, 155 ; accompanies St.
, Paul to the synagogue there, 155 ; ex
pelled from the city, 162 ; journeys
towards Lycaonia, 162 ; reaches Iconi
um, 162 ; flies from a conspiracy of the
Iconians to destroy him, 164 ; reaches
Lystra, 167 ; goes to Derbe, 175 ; turns
back, and revisits Lystra, Iconium, and
Antioch, 1 76 ; reaches Perga, 1 76 ; ac
companies St. Paul to Jerusalem, 187 ;
arrives there, 189 ; his address to the
Christian conference at Jerusalem, 190 ;
returns to Antioch, 196 ; quarrels with
and separates from St. Paul 217, 218;
his subsequent life, 218.
Basil, St., 322.
Basilica, the Roman, 736.
Basilides, the Gnostic, 899 n.
Baptism, infant, 255.
Baris, 633.
Baulos-Dagh, the, 238 n.
Behistoun, rock-inscriptions of, 295 n.
Beilan Pass, the, 220.
Brjua, the, 364 n.; 634.
Benjamin, lot of, 41 ; the youngest and
most honored of the patriarchs, 41.
Berenice, 23, 213, 652, 671.
Beroea, description of, 292.
Bethesda, Pool of, 634.
Bethsaida, city of, 52.
Bin-Bir-Kilisseh, 166 n.
Bishop, office of, in the Primitive Church,
878.
Bithynia, description of, 207.
Bovillae, 732.
Buldur, marble road at, 148; Lake o£
150.
Burning bush, the, 66.
Burrus, the praetorian prefect, 784.

" Cabala,'' meaning of the word, 896 n.
Capua, 727.
Caesar, J., 133.
Caesarea, 25, 107 ; its theatre, 118; descrip
tion of the city, 658.
Caesarea Stratonis, city of, 97 n.
Caius, or Gaius, 349.
Caligula, 76, 102.
Cambunian Hills, the, 272 n.
Cameniata, Joh., history of, 280 n.
Campagna of Rome, 731.
Campanian Way, 726.
Candace, Queen, 18.
Cappadocia, description of, 214.
Caprese, Island cf, 722.
Casilinum, 728.
Casius, Mount, 126.
Catarrhactes River, 142.
Cayster River, 410.
Caystrian Meadows, 461.
"Cemetery," Christian use of the word,
69 n.
Cenchreae, 302 ; notice of, 367 ; its geo
graphical position, 584 n.
Cephas, the name, 426 n.
Cephisus River, 303, 311.
Ceramicus, the, at Athens, 306.
Cercinitus, the Lake, 276.
Ceres, Temple of) at Athens, 305.
Cestrus River, 142.
Charity amongst the early Christiani, ISA.
"Chiefs of Asia," 470.
Chios, 410, 597.
Chittim, 139.
" Chittim, isles of," 189 n.
Chloe, family of, 421.
Chrestus, 835.
Chrysorrhoas River, 81.
Chrysostom, John, 170, 286.
Christianity and Judaism, 29, 80.
Christianity, dissemination of, in Antioch
in Pisidia, 161 ; compared with Greek
philosophy, 319; foundation of, in
Achaia, 409 ; in Rome, founder of, not
known, 543.
"Christians," the name, when first used,
111.
Chrysippus the Stoic, his birthplace, 20 n.

906

INDEX.

Church, the Apostolic, 60; charity of its
members, 61 ; first aspect of the, 62 ;
formation of the first, of united Jews
and Gentiles, 161 ; controversy in the,
179; great conference of the apostles
and elders of the, at Jerusalem, 190 ;
its decree, 192; foundation of the, in
Macedonia, 255 ; constitution of the
i primitive, 376 et seq. ; ordinances of the,
382; festivals of the, 385; divisions in
the, 387 ; heresies in the, 390.
Church of Philippi, 480 ; veneration of, for
St. Paul, 480 ; its liberality to the Apos
tle, 481, 512.
Church of Tyre, 612.
Church, the Roman, 739.
Cibyra, " the Birmingham of Asia Minor,"
149.
Cicero, 13, 14; as governor of Cilicia, 22;
at Athens, 811, 312 re.
Cilician churches, foundation of the, 98.
" Cilician Gates," 176, 220 n. ; 222 n.
Cilicia, 13, 18 ; Rough Cilicia, 19 ; Flat
Cilicia, 20 ; mountain-wall of, 20 ; as a
Roman province, 22 ; under Cicero, 22 ;
description of, 214.
" Cilicium" tents, 45, 150.
Cimon of Athens, statue of, 306 ; his vic
tory over the Persians at Plataea and
Salamis, 143.
Cithaeron, hills of, 300.
Citium, Phoenician colony of, 139 n.
Claudia, 835, 844 /..
Claudius Lysias, 636 ; letter of, to Felix,
650.
Claudius, the Emperor, 104, 105 ; his edict
banishing the Jews from Rome, 835.
Cleanthes the Stoic, hymn of, 5 re.
Cnidus, notice of, 605. 692.
Colonia, observations on the constitution
of a, 252.
Colonna, Cape, 299.
Colossse, 234 n. ; description of, 752 n.
Colossians, Epistle to the, 752.
Colossus at Rhodes, the, 607.
Colony, constitution of a Roman, 252.
Commerce, Roman, 682.
Conference, great, of the apostles and
elders at Jerusalem, 190.
Constantia, 128.

Consular Way, 727.
Contributions for poor Jewish Christians,
509, 542.
" Conventus," use ef the word, 471 n.
Coracesium, cliffs of, 142.
Coressus mountains, 462.
Corinth, 333, 334 ; its early history, 361 ;
under the Romans, 362 ; its destruction
by Mummius, 362; re-establishment of
its importance under Julius Caesar, 362 ;
tumult at, 365.
Corinthian Church, state of, in time of St.
Paul, 541 ; its subsequent character,.
542.
Corinthians, First Epistle to the, 424;
Second, 485.
Corinthians, licentiousness of the, 419.
Cornelius, 99, 106 ; conversion of) 107, 108.
Corn-vessels of Egypt, 685.
Cos, Island of, 604.
Cotyaeum, 238 re.
Council-house of Athens, 807.
Cragus, Mount, 608.
Crassus, 133.
Crescens, 828.
Crispus, " ruler of the synagogue," 850.
Cross, meaning of the expression, "to boast
in the cross," 537 re.
Croesus and the " Ephesian Letters," 413.
Cumas, 723.
Cuspius Fadus, 635.
Cydnus, the River, 20, 45.
Cybistra, 225 re.
Cyprus, 16, 109, 123 ; as a Roman province,
129; history of) 139.
Cyrene, 16. D.
Dalmatia, 515.
Damaris, the female convert at Athens, 330.
Damascus, 76 ; roads from, to Jerusalem,
78 ; history of, 80.
Daphne, 116.
Delos, slave-trade of, 19.
Demas, 747.
Demetrius and the silver-smiths, 472.
Demoniac slave, the, at Philippi, 260.
Demoniacs, the, of :the New Testament.
258.

INDEX.

907

Demosthenes, statue of, 807.
Demus, the, of Thessalonica, 289.
Denarius, silver, 2.
Derbe, city of, 166, 175, 222, 225; site of)
225.
" Devil," and " demon," 259.
Diana, Temple of, at Perga, 143 ; statue of)
by Praxiteles, 308.
Diana of Ephesus, worship of, 413 ; Temple
of Ephesus, 464 ; worship of) 466.
Dicaearchia, 724.
Diogenes, tomb of, 584 re.
Dionysius, the convert at Athens, 830.
Dium, 296.
Drachma, the, 416 n.
Drepanum, promontory of, 142.
Drusilla, wife of Felix, 664.
Dyrrhachium, 278 n.

E.

Earnest-money, 487.
Easter, 385.
Edessa, 292 re.
'Hyeutiv, meaning of the term, 181 n.
Egnatia,. Via, 274.
Egyptian corn-vessels, 685.
" Elder," the name, 378.
Elogium, the document so called, 3 n.
Elymas Barjesus, 133.
Epsenetus, "the first-fruits of Achaia," 581.
Epaphras, 413, 747, 753.
Epaphroditus, 785.
'Enapx'ia, meaning of, 130 n., 214 n.
" Ephesian Letters," 413.
Ephesian magic, 413.
Ephesians, Epistle to the, 766 ; parallelism
between it and the Epistle to the Colos
sians, 765.
Ephesus, its geographical position, 410 ;
description of, 461 ; its natural advan
tages, 462 ; foundation of the city, ib. ;
its present appearance, 463 ; its cele
brated temple, 464 ; political constitu
tion of, 469 ; tumult in the city, 473 ;
speech of the town-clerk, 475.
Ephraim, hills of, 648.
Epictetus, philosophy of, 321.
Epicureans, their philosophy, 319.

Epicurus, garden of, 320 ; notice of him
319 n.
Epimenides of Crete, 824 n.
Epipolae, 721.
'Emo-/co7rof, office of) 378, 602 re.
Epistles of St. Paul : — First Epistle to the
Thessalonians, 340 ; Second Epistle to
the Thessalonians, 352; First Epistle
to the Corinthians, 424 ; Second Epistle
to the Corinthians, 485 ; Epistle to the
Galatians, 523 ; Epistle to the Romans,
544 ; Epistle to Philemon, 749 ; to the
Colossians, 752 ; to the Ephesians,
766; to the Philippians, 786; First
Epistle to Timotheus, 811 ; Second to
Timotheus, 836 ; Epistle to the He
brews, 855.
Epistles, Pastoral, on the date of the, 892 ;
peculiar words and phrases in the,
894.
Epiphanius, Bishop of Salamis, 153, 218.
Eponymi, the, 307.
'Epavnr, the entertainment so called, 446 n.
Erastus, 421, 583.
Erectheium, the, 309.
Eski-Karahissar, 233.
Essenes, the, 32.
Etesian winds, 682.
Euboea, Island of, 299.
Eunice, mother of Timotheus, 175.
" Euroclydon," the, 700 ; etymology of the
word, 700 n.
Eurymedon, River, 142.
Eutychus, restored to life by St Paul,
593.
" Evangelist," the term, 615 n.
Exorcists, Jewish, 415.
Eyerdir, Lake of, 150.

Fair Havens, 694.
Famagousta, 127.
Felix, 651 ; summoned to Rome, 667.
Festivals of the Primitive Church, 885.
Festus, 667.
Formiae, 729.
Fundi, plain of, 729.
Furies, sanctuary of the, 807.

908

INDEX.

G.
Gadarenes, demoniacs of the country of the,
260.
Gaggitas River, 254.
Gaius, or Caius, 521, 588.
Galatae and Keltae, 210.
Galatia, description of) 209 ; foundation of,
211.
Galatian Church, state of the, 521.
Galatians, Epistle to the, 523. .
Galen, 131.
Gallesus, precipices of, 461.
Galli, the, of Galatia, 235.
Gallio, originally called Annaeus Novatus,
proconsul of Achaia, 363.
Gamaliel, 53, 54 ; prayer of, 54 re.
Games of Asia and Ephesus, 471.
Gate of St. Stephen, 68.
Gauls, settlement of the, in Asia, 210.
Gazith, or "the Stone Chamber," 65.
Genealogies, the, mentioned in the Pastoral
Epistles, 394.
Gentiles at the synagogue of Antioch in
Pisidia, 160; addressed by St. Paul
160 ; their reception of the Word of
God, 161 ; religiously and socially sepa
rated from the Jews, 181.
Gibea, 50.
Gilboa, Mount, 50.
Gnosticism, 751.
Gnostics, 399 n.
Gophna, 648.
Gordium, 212 n.
Gospel first preached in Europe, 255.
" Grace before meat," the, as used in the
Primitive Church, 816 re.
Tpauuarevg, the, of Acts xix. 35, 469.
" Grecians," 34.
Greek tongue, 9 ; a theological language, 9 ;
its universal spread among the educated
classes, 15.
Greeks, the, 7 ; social condition of) 10 ; their
science and commerce, 11.
Grego, Cape, 127.
Gregory Nazianzene, St., 322.
Grotius on the names " Saulus " and
" Paulus," 137.
Gymnasium, the, in ancient Greek cities,
586 re.

Haemus, Mount, 610.
Haliacmon River, 293.
Hannibal in the fleet of Antiochus, 143.
Harmodius and Aristogeiton, statues of)
307.
Hebrews, Epistle to the, its authorship,
848, 852 ; its readers, 849 ; its object,
855 ; text of Epistle, 855.
Helena, mother of King Izates, 117.
Hellenist Jews, 33.
Heresies in the Primitive Church, 895 ; in
the later Apostolic Church, 393.
Hermas, 582.
Hermes, 582.
Hermon, Mount, 79.
Hermus River, 239.
Herod Agrippa I., 26, 104.
Herod Agrippa H., 652.
Herod Antipas, 75.
Herodians, the, 32.
Herodion, 582.
Herod, King of Chalcis, 658.
Herod the Great, 24 ; interview with Au
gustas, 25 ; death of) 51.
Herod's theatre and amphitheatre, 118.
Herostratus, 464.
Hierarchy, the Greek, 467.
Hillel, Jewish school of, 53.
Hospitality, Christian, 256, 257.
Hymettus, Mount, 300.

Iconium (now Konieh), 162; its history,
168.
Ida, Gulf of, 240 n.
" Idols, dumb," recent discovery of, at Tar
sus, 221 re.
Uissus River, 303.
Hium, New, 242 re.
Imbros, Island of) 247.
Illyricum, 273 ; Greek, 514 ; Roman, 514.
Informers at Rome, 831.
Isauria, 19.
Isbarta, 146 re.
Isthmian games, 585 ; Stadium, note on the,
585.

INDEX

909

Isthmus, notice of the, 357.
" Italian Band," the, 26.
" Italian Cohort," the, of Cornelius, 108.
Italy, misery of, during Rome's splendor,
12.
Izates, King of Adiabene, 117.

J.
Jacob's Well, 79.
James the Just, 191 ; his address to the
conference of Christians at Jerusalem,
192, 621.
James, St., 118.
Jason, 287, 583.
Jebel-el-Akrab, 126.
Jerusalem, state of) under the Romans, 51 ;
conference at, between the Christians
and the Pharisaic Christians, 190.
Jewish dispersion, the, 15, 17 n.
Jewish exoreists, 415.
Jewish mode of teaching, 54.
Jewish names, history of) 135.
Jewish spiritual pride and exclusive bigot
ry, 160.
Jews, languages spoken by, at the period
of the Apostles, 2 ; religious civilization
of the, 3 ; influence of, on the heathen
world, 6 ; dispersion of, 15 ; colony of,
in Babylonia, 16 ; in Lydia and Phry
gia, 16 ; in Africa, 16 ; in Alexandria,
1 7 ; in Europe, 1 7 ; in Rome, 1 7 ; prose
lytes of) 1 7 ; forcibly incorporated with
aliens, 18 ; Jews in Arabia, 18 ; in the
east of the Mediterranean, 18 ; Jewish
sects, 80; Jews not unfrequently Ro
man citizens, 43 ; state of the Jews
after the death of Herod, 52; mode
of teaching amongst, 54 ; almsgiving
amongst, 61 ; numerous in Salamis, 128 ;
insurrection of, at Salamis, 128 ; syna
gogue of, at Antioch in Pisidia, 155 ;
spiritual pride and exclusive bigotry of,
160; intrigues of Judaizers at Antioch,
162 ; influential position of, at Thessa
lonica, 280 ; colony of, at Beroea, 293 ;
in Athens, 313 ; in gieat numbers in
Athens, 835 ; banished from Rome by
command of the Emperor Claudius, 335 ;
colonies of) in Asia Minor, 336 ; charges

of the, against St. Paul at Corinth, 364 ;
Jews at Ephesus, 368 ; irritation of the,
at the progress of Christianity, 588;
conspiracy of, to take the life of St. Paul
in the Isthmus, 589 ; hatred of, of the
Roman soldiers at Jerusalem, 635 ; in
dignation of, at the appearance of St.
Paul in the Temple, 627 ; slaughter of,
in the streets of Caesarea, 660 ; Jews in
Rome, 738.
John the Baptist, 406 ; disciples of, 411.
John, St., 118 ; his meeting with St. PauL
195.
John, "whose surname was Mark," 119,
124 ; leaves St. Paul and Barnabas, and
returns to Jerusalem, 144, 196, 218.
Jonathan the high priest, 654.
Joses, the Levite of Cyprus, 109.
Judaizers generally, 390.
Judaoa, history of, 652 ; geographical posi
tion of, 6; notices of) 18; political
changes in, 25 ; state of) 51.
Judas, 197.
Julia, 582.
Julius, city of, 52.
Juliopolis, Tarsus so called, 43 re.
Junius, " kinsman '' of St. Paul, 581.
Jus Italicum, remarks on the, 242 n.

K.
Kara-Dagh, or Black Mountain, 166 ;
of, 225.
Keltae and Galatae, 210.
"Keys, The," 129.
Kiutaya. — See Cotyaeum.
Konieh. — See Iconium.

Ladik, 233.
Laodicea Combusta, 284.
Laodicea, Church of) 765.
Lasaea, 696.
Latmus, Mount, 604.
Lebanon, 19.
Lectum, Cape, 594.
Legions, Roman, 655.
Lemnos, 246.

910

INDEX.

Leoni, Port (the Piraeus), 302.
Leontopolis, Temple of Onias at, 85 n.
Libertines, synagogue of the, 62.
Limyra, Greek tablets at, 148.
Linus, 835.
Liris, River, 729.
Lissus, the modern Alessis, 273 re.
Lois, grandmother of Timotheus, 175.
Longinus, Governor of Syria, 635.
" Long Legs " of Athens, the, 303 re.
" Long Walls " of Athens, 303.
Lucius of Cyrene, 121, 122.
Lucrine Lake, oyster-beds of, 723.
Luke, St., his meeting with St. Paul, Silas,
and Timotheus, at Alexandria Troas,
244 ; they sail from Troas, 246 ; arrive
at Samothrace, 247 ; reach Philippi, 250 ;
left behind at Philippi, 269 ; visited by
St. Paul at Philippi, 590 ; they both sail
from Philippi, and arrive at Troas, 591.
Leaves Troas, and arrives at Assos, 595 ;
at Miletus, 599; at Patara, 610; at
Tyre, 611 ; at Caesarea, 615; at Jeru
salem, 619 ; writes his Gospel, 665 ; ac
companies St. Paul from Caesarea to
Rome, 687 ; remains with him till St.
Paul's death, 687, 835.
Lycabettus, 300.
Lycaonia, 165 ; drought of) 225 re.
Lyceum, the, 311.
Lydia, 175; her profession of faith and
baptism, 255.
Lystra, city of) 166 ; visited by St PauL
167. M
Maccabean shekels, 2.
Maccabees, Second Book of) authorship of)
16, 17 re.
Macedonia Prima, 272; Quarta, 278 re.;
Secunda, 273; Tertia, 273 re.
Macedonia, coins of, 245.
Macedonians, liberality of the, 511.
Maeander, Valley of the, 461 ; River, 601 re.
Magicians, Oriental, 132 et seq.
Ma-yog, good and bad senses in which it was
used, 133, re. 9.
Mahometan school, description of) 47 n.
Malea, Cape, 360.

Manaen, foster-brother of Herod Antipas,
121, 122.
Maran-atha, meaning of the word, 459 re.
Marathon, 299.
Marius, 133.
Marriages between the Jews and Greeks,
228.
Mary, 41.
Massicus Hills, 728.
Meals, customs of Greek and Roman, 267 n,;
466 re.
Megabyzi, or priests of Diana, 467.
Melissae, the priestesses so called, 467.
Melita, 715, 719.
Mercurius Propylaeus, 308.
Messogis, 461.
Milestone, the Golden, 307.
Miletus, 410, 598.
Minerva Promachus, 302, 305; statue at,
309.
Minerva Hygieia, statue of, 308.
Minturnae, 728.
Mithridates, King of Pontus, 218.
Mitylene, notice of, 596.
"Mnason of Cyprus," 109, 617.
Mopsuestia, 220 n.
Mummius, 362.
Munychia, height of the, 803 n.
Museum of Athens, the, 300.
Mycale, 598.
Myra, 690.
Mysia, description of) 287 ; remarks on the
history of, 237 n.

N.

Nahlous, or Neapolis, 78.
Narcissus, the, mentioned in Rom. xvi 11,
582.
Navigation of the ancients, 677 et seq.
"Nazarenes," 111.
Nazarites, the, 367; the four, 628; vow of,
625, 626.
Neapolis, or Nablous, 78.
Neapolis of Macedonia, 248.
Nereus, 582.
Nero, his marriage with Poppaea, 784 ; con
verts in the household of, 795 ; his char
acter, 805 ; St. Paul brought before. 805

INDEX.

911

Neptune, statue of, at Athens, 805.
Nestor, tutor of Tiberius, 99.
"Nicholas of Antioch," 18.
Nicholas, St., 691.
Nicolaitans, or Balaamites, 398.
Nicomedes IH., King of Bithynia, 207.
Nicopolis, 516.
Nicopolis in Epirus, 827.
Nicosia, 127.
M/ioc, meaning of) 548, n. 1.

Olives, Mount of, 682.
Olympas, 582.
Olympus, Mount, 272, 296.
Onesimus, the slave. 748 ; meaning of the
name, 750 re.
Onesiphorus, 835.
Orontes, Valley of the, 18 ; the River, 114 ;
description of the, 124.
Ortygia, 721.
Overseer, office of) in the Primitive Church,
378.

P.

Pactyas, Mount 461.
« Painted Porch," the, 817.
Palatine, the, 781.
Pallas, death of, 785.
Pamphylia, 208 ; Sea of) 142 ; description
of, 208.
Pangaeus, Mount, 248.
Paoli, village of, in Pisidia, 146 re.
Paphos, 147 ; New, history of, 140 et seq.;
Old, 140.
Parnes, hills of, 300, 301.
Paroreia in Phrygia, 150.
Participles, accumulation of, in Acts xvi. 6,
7, 237 re.; used substantively, 534 re.
Parthenon, the, at Athens, 309.
" Paschal Lamb is Christ who was slain for
us," remarks on the passage, 433 n.
Patara, harbor of, 608.
Patrobas, 582.
Paul, St., a Pharisee, 31 ; language of his
infancy, 87 ; his childhood at Tarsus, |
39 ; his descent from Benjamin, 40, 41 ; |

Paul, St., cor.tinued: —
his early education, 42 ; period of his
birth, 42 ; his station in life, 46 ; his boy
hood, 48 ; sent to Jerusalem, 49 ; his
study there, 58 ; his early manhood, 59 ;
his taste for Greek literature, 60 ; his
presence at the death of St. Stephen,
69 ; his persecution of the Christians,
72 ; his journey to Damascus, 75 ; im
portance of his conversion, 83 ; vision
of Jesus Christ 84 ; his call, 85 ; his
blindness, 86 ; his recovery of sight, 88 ;
his baptism, 89 ; his journey into Arabia
Petraea, 90 ; his return to Damascus,
93 ; conspiracy to assassinate him, 93 ;
his escape, 94 ; his return to Jerusalem,
94 ; his meeting with the apostles, 96 ;
he withdraws to Syria and Cilicia, 98 ;
travels with Barnabas to Antioch, 110 ;
carries the contribution-money from An
tioch to Jerusalem in time of famine,
117; departs for Cyprus, 123; arrives
at Seleucia, 126; at Salamis, 127; at
Paphos, 129 ; his denunciation of Ely
mas Barjesus, 134; his name changed
to Paul, 135; visits Pamphylia, 141 ;
arrives at Perga, 143 ; journeys to the
table-land of Asia Minor, 149 ; reaches
Antioch in Pisidia, 155 ; his address to
the Jews in the synagogue there, 156
impression made on his hearers, 159
scene on the following sabbath, 160
expelled from the synagogue, 161 ; turns
from the Jews, and preaches to the
Gentiles, 161 ; journeys towards Lyca
onia, 162; arrives at Iconium, 163 ; es
capes from a conspiracy to crush him,
164; reaches Lystra, 167; his miracle
there, 169 ; worship offered to him, 1 70 ;
his address to the Lystrians, 171; stoned
in the city, 173; recovers from appar
ent death, 1 73 ; travels to Derbe, 1 75 ;
revisits Lystra, Iconium, and Antioch,
176; reaches Perga, 176; travels to
Jerusalem, 187 ; his companions on the
journey, 187; his arrival at the Holy
City, 189 ; his address to the confer
ence of Christians in Jerusalem, 191 ;
public recognition of his mission to the
heathen, 194 ; his meeting with St. John,

912

INDEX

Paul, St., continued : —
195 ; returns to Antioch, 196 ; rebukes
St. Peter for his weak conduct 199 ; St.
Paul's personal appearance, 200; St.
Peter's reconciliation with him, 201 ; he
proposes to Barnabas to visit the church
es, 215 ; quarrels with and separates
from Barnabas, 216, 217; takes Silas
with him into Cilicia, 218 ; takes Timo
theus into companionship, 227 ; reaches
Iconium, 231 ; journeys through Phry
gia, 233 ; arrives at Galatia, 235 ; his
sickness, 235 ; his reception there, 236 ;
journeys to the JEgean, 238 ; arrives at
Alexandria Troas, 241 ; is joined by St.
Luke at Troas, 246; they sail from
Troas, 246 ; arrive at Samothrace, 247;
reach Philippi, 250 ; St. Paul preaches
the gospel for the first time in Europe,
255 ; the demoniac slave, 260 ; St. Paul
scourged, and cast into prison, 262 ; his
conversion of the jailer, 267; released
from prison, 269; leaves Philippi, 271 ;
arrives at Thessalonica, 277 ; visits the
synagogue at Thessalonica, 281 ; sub
jects of his preaching, 281 ; his own la
bor for the means of support, 284 ;
leaves Thessalonica for Beroea, 292 ;
arrives there, 293 ; leaves the city, 295 ;
his arrival on the coast of Attica, 300 ;
lands at Athens, 303; his reflections
amidst the idolatry at Athens, 312 ;
"left in Athens alone," 313; addresses
the Athenians in the Agora, 322 ; goes
up to the hill of the Areopagus, 324 ;
his speech to the Athenians, 326 ; de
parts from Athens, 331 ; takes up his
abode at Corinth, 331 ; his address to
the Jews in the synagogue there, 338 ;
rejoined by Silas and Timotheus, 338 n. ;
writes his First Epistle to the Thessa
lonians, 340 ; he turns from the Jews to
the Gentiles, 348 ; his vision, 350 ;
writes the Second Epistle to the Thessa
lonians, 352; continues to reside in
Corinth, 356 ; brought by the Jews be
fore Gallio, proconsul of Achaia, 364 ;
who refuses to hear the charges, 365 ;
departs from Achaia, 366 ; takes his
farewell of the Church of Corinth, 366 ;

Paul, St., continued : —
sails from Cenchreae by Ephesus to
Caesarea, 367; visits the synagogue at
Ephesus, 368 ; reaches Caesarea, 369 ;
leaves Caesarea for Jerusalem, 369 ; visits
Antioch for the last time, 370 ; departs
from Antioch, 403 ; arrives at Ephesus,
411; the magicians of Ephesus, 414;
burning of the mystic books, 416 ; the
Apostle pays a short visit to Corinth,
418 ; returns to Ephesus, 420 ; writes
the First Epistle to the Corinthians,
424 ; his future plans, 459 ; Demetrius
and the silver-smiths, 472; Caius and
Aristarchus seized by the mob, 473;
tumult in Ephesus, 474; St, Paul bids
farewell to the Christians of Ephesus,
476; departs from the city, 476; arrives
at Alexandria Troas, 479 ; preaches the
gospel there, 480 ; sails from Troas to
Macedonia, 480 ; lands at Neapolis, 480 ;
proceeds to Philippi, 480 ; his love for
the Philippian Christians, 480 ; passes
over to Macedonia, 482 ; state of his
bodily health, 482 ; rejoined by Titus,
483 ; writes his Second Epistle to the
Corinthians, 485 ; he collects contribu
tions for the poor Christians in Judaea,
509; he journeys southward, 517; his
feelings on approaching Corinth, 518
state of the Galatian Church, 521
writes his Epistle to the Galacians, 523
convinces the Christians ot his apostle
ship, 540; he punishes the disobedient
by publicly casting them out of the
Church, 540 ; sends a letter by Phoebe
to the Roman Church, 542 ; his Epistle
to the Romans, 544 ; conspiracy of the
Jews to take his life, 589 ; flies from
Corinth to Macedonia, 589 ; visits St.
Luke at Philippi, 589 ; they leave there
together, 591 ; arrive at Troas, 591 ; St.
Paul restores the life of Eutychus, 593 ;
leaves Troas, and arrives at Assos, 595 ;
at Miletus, 599 ; his speech to the Ephe
sian presbyters there, 601 ; he departs
from Miletus, 604; arrives at Patara,
610 ; sails for Phoenicia, 610 ; arrives
at Tyre, 612 ; leaves Tyre, 613 ; arrives
at Caesarea, 614 ; meets with Philip the

INDEX.

913

Paul, St., continued: —
Evangelist 615 ; warned by Agabus of
danger to be apprehended at Jerusalem,
615; sets out for Jerusalem, 617; his
reception by the presbyters, 620 ; advice
of the Christians of Jerusalem to St.
Paul, 623 ; the four Nazarites, 623 ; St.
Paul seized at the festival of Pentecost,
627 ; beaten by the mob, 636 ; rescued
by Claudius Lysias, 637 ; his conversa
tion with Lysias, 637 ; the Apostle ad
dresses the multitude from the stairs,
637 ; their rage, 640 ; sentenced by Ly
sias to " receive the lashes," 640 ; as
serts his rights as a Roman citizen, 641 ;
taken before the Sanhedrin, 642 ; struck
by order of the high priest Ananias,
642 ; tumult in the judgment-hall, 643 ;
the ApoStle taken back to the fortress,
644 ; conspiracy to assassinate him, 645 ;
the plot discovered, 646 ; removed by
Lysias to Caesarea to be judged by
Felix, 647 ; ordered to be kept in
Herod's praetorium, 651 ; summoned be
fore Felix, 660 ; charges brought against
him, 660 ; his speech before Felix, 661 ;
remanded, 663 ; brought up again be.
fore the governor, 664 ; imprisoned
again, 664 ; brought before Festus, 668 ;
his " appeal unto Caesar," 669 ; brought
before Herod Agrippa H., 671 ; his
speech to the king, 672; departs from
Caesarea for Rome, 686 ; puts into Sidon,
687; reaches Myra, 690; Cnidus, 692;
anchors at Fair Havens, 695 ; sails from
Fair Havens, 699 ; the storm, 700 ;
leaky state of the vessel, 706 ; St. Paul's
vision, 707; his address to the sailors,
708 ; they anchor for the night, 709 ;
wrecked on the coast of Melita, 715 ;
his miracles at Malta, 718 ; sails from
Malta, 720 ; puts into Syracuse, 720 ;
visits Rhegium, 721 ; reaches Puteoli,
721 ; journey from Puteoli toward Rome,
726 ; reaches Rome, 733 ; his interview
with the Jews there, 741 ; his occupations
during his imprisonment at Rome, 747 ;
Onesimus, 748 ; the Apostle writes his
Epistle to Philemon, 749 ; writes his
Epistle to the Colossians, 752 ; writes
68

Paul, St, continued: —
his Epistle to the Ephesians, 766 ; visit
ed by Epaphroditus, 783 ; writes his
Epistle to the Philippians, 786; he
makes many converts in Nero's house
hold, 795 ; his trial before Nero, 804 ;
charges brought against him, 806 ; ac
quitted, 808 ; he goes to Asia and Spain,
809 ; writes his First Epistle to Timo
theus, 811 ; writes his Epistle to Titus,
823 ; his second imprisonment at Rome,
828 ; first stage of his final trial, 833 ;
is remanded to prison, 834 ; writes his
Second Epistle to Timotheus, 836 ; his
death, 847.
Pausanius, his visit to and description of
Athens, 305.
Pedalium, the, of Strabo and Ptolemy,
127.
Pediaeus River, 127
Pella, 272.
Pentecost, feast of) at Jerusalem, 625.
Perga, 142.
Pericles, statue of, at Athens, 809.
Peripatetics, the, 311.
Persis, 582.
Pessinus, 235.
Peter, St., 63, 107; in captivity, 118; hia
address to the conference of Christians
at Jerusalem, 190; his weak conduct at
Antioch, 198; openly rebuked by St
Paul, 199 ; St Peter's personal appear
ance, 200; his reconciliation with St
Paul, 201.
Persecution of Nero, 830.
Pessinus, capital of the Tolistaboii, 212 n.
Petra, origin of the Arab city of) 75 re.
Petronius, 104.
Phaleric Wall the, 304.
Pharisaic Christians at Jerusalem, 622.
Pharisees, the, 30 ; in Jerusalem, 189.
Phaselis, promontory of) 148 n. ; battles of)
143.
Philemon, 413 ; Epistle to, 749.
Philip, son of Herod the Great 26.
Philip, Tetrarch of Gaulonitis, 52.
Philip the Asiarch, 474 n.
Philip the Evangelist, the companion of
Stephen, 74, 615; his family, 615.
Philippi, description of) 250

914

INDEX.

Philippians, Epistle to the, 786.
Philologus, 582.
Philomelium, city of) 151 ; identified with
Ak-Sher, 151, 233, 234.
Philosophy, Greek, notice of the older, 316 ;
later schools, 321 ; spread of, 321.
Phlegon, 582.
Phoebe of Cenchreae, 542.
Phoenicians, the, 8.
Phoenix, harbor of, 697.
Physicians among the ancients, 270, 271.
Pieric Valley, the, 275 re.
Piraeus, the, 300, 302.
Pisidia, 145 ; robbers of, 145 ; violence of
its flooded rivers, 146 ; mountain-scenery
of, 147, 149.
Plataea, battle of, 143.
Plato, philosophy of, 316, 317.
Pliny on the Conventus, or assize-town,
470.
Pynx, the, 300, 306 re., 808.
Polemo H., King of Pontus, 22, 23, 213.
Politarchs, the, of Thessalonica, 290.
Polycarp, martyrdom of) 474 re.
Pompeiopolis, 19.
Pompey the Great, 19 ; in Damascus, 24 ;
at Jerusalem, 24.
Pomptine marshes, 729.
Pontus, last king of, 23 re.
Pontus, description of, 213.
" Pontus," origin of the name, 218 re.
Pontus Galaticus, 213 re.
Poppaea, 784, 808.
Posidonium at the Isthmus of Corinth,
588.
Posts established by Augustus, 781.
Praetorian guards, 655.
Praetorium, 780.
Praxiteles, 308.
" Presidents of the Games," 471.
Priam, Palace of, 592.
Prion, Mount, 462, 472.
Priscilla, 336 re., 337, 368, 411, 425 n.
Proconsuls, 129.
Propraetors, 129 et seq.
Proselytes, Jewish, 17.
Proselytes, female, at Damascus, 18, 152 ;
at Antioch in Pisidia, 161.
Proseucha at Lystra, 175 ; the word, 253.
Ptolemais, 613.

Pudens, 835.
Puteoli, 721, 723.
Pydna, 296.
Pythagoras, philosophy of) 816.

Q.
Quadratus, Governor of Syria, 654,
Quartus, 583. R.
« Rabbinism," 55.
Resurrection of the body, 456 re. et seq.
Rhegium, 721.
Rhodes, notice of, 605.
Rhodian fleet at Phaselis, 143.
Rhyndacus River, 239. •
Roman Church, 739 ; name of founder not
known, 740.
Roman amphitheatre, 12 ; army, the, 655 ;
commerce, 683 ; fleet at Phaselis, 143 ;
power in the East H i growth and gov
ernment of, 12.
" Roman," meaning of the word in the New
Testament, 251 re.
Rome, description of) 782.
Rufus, 784.

Sadducees, the, 30, 63.
St. John at Ephesus, 476.
St. Paul's Bay, view of, 716.
Salamis, 124, i27 ; copper-mines at, 128 ;
destroyed, 128 ; sea-fight at 128 ; battle
of, 143, 301.
Salonica, Gulf of, 297.
Samaria, 649.
Samaritans, the, 33, 78.
Samian ship-builders, 861.
Samos, 271 n.
Samothrace, 243, 244, 247.
Sangarius River, 238.
Sanhedrin, the, 52, 64, 65 ; its power over
foreign synagogues, 75.
Saronic Gulf) 299.
Sarus River, 224.
Sav, village of, 146 n.

INDEX.

915

Sav-Sou River, 146 re. v
Saul — See Paul, St, " Saul," and « Paul,"
the words, 43, 44.
Sceva, sons of, the exorcists, 415; rebuked
by the demons, 416.
Schools, Jewish, 56; customs in, 57; St.
Paul an eager student in, 57.
Schammai, Jewish school of) 53.
Schoenus, port of, 360.
Scio, 597.
Secundus of Thessalonica, 290.
Seleucia, foundation of, 112, 125; immense
excavation at, 125 ; its excellent har
bor, 126.
Seleucus Nicator, 114.
Seige, 146.
Seneca the philosopher, 363; brother of
Gallio, 363.
Sergius Paulus, 129, 131.
" Seven Capes," the, 608.
Sharon, Plain of, 649.
Sheba, Queen of, 17.
Ship-builders of Samos, 361.
Ships of the ancients, 677 etseq.; rudders
similar to those of the early Northmen,
679 ; differences between and those of
the moderns, 681.
Side, 143.
Sidon, notice of, 688.
Silas, 196, 198; accompanies St. Paul to
Cilicia, 219; scourged and cast into
prison at Philippi, 262; released from
prison, 269 ; leaves Philippi, 269 ; visits
the synagogue at Thessalonica, 281 ;
accompanies St. Paul to Beroea, 292 ;
left behind with Timotheus at Beroea,
295 ; joins St. Paul at Corinth, 338 ; ac
companies the Apostle to Ephesus,
Caesarea, and Jerusalem, 368-370; re
mains at Jerusalem, 403.
Silversmiths of Ephesus, 472 ; their shrines
of Diana, 472 ; their fury against St.
Paul, 473; pacified by the town-clerk,
475.
Simeon, father of Gamaliel, 53.
Simeon, son of Gamaliel, 54 n.
Simeon, surnamed Niger, 121.
Simon Magus, 415 re.
Sinuessa, 728.
Slave-trade of Delos, 19.

Smyrna, 410.
Socrates, character of, 316.
Soli, town of) 19.
Solomon, Temple of) 628.
Solon, statue of, 307.
Sopater of Beroea, 290.
Sorcery, Jewish, 415.
Sosipater, 583 n., 589.
Sosthenes, chief of the Corinthian Jewish
synagogue, 365; beaten by the Greek
mob, 365.
Stachys, 581.
Stadium, enclosure of the, 463 ; Isthmian,
note on the, 584.
Stadia in Asia Minor, 587 re.
Stagirus, 277 ; the birthplace of Aristotle,
277.
Stephen, St., 61, 63, 64, 66 ; his trial 67;
his martyrdom, 68 ; his prayer, 69 ; his
burial, 72.
Stephen, St., Gate of, 68 re. ; identity of
with the Damascus Gate, 68 re.
Stoa Poecile, the, 311.
Stocks, the, 263.
Stoics, 311 ; their philosophy, 317, 818.
Strato's Tower, 658.
Stromboli, 722.
Strymon Elver, 272.
Students, Jewish, 58.
Sulla at Athens, 304.
" Sultan Tareek" Road, 150.
Sunium, Cape of, 300.
Sychar, city of) 74 re.
" Synagogue of the Libertines," 56 ; the
first, 56 ; number of, in Jerusalem, 56 ;
in Salamis, 128 ; in Antioch in Pisidia,
152; ancient and modern, 153, 160;
the, at Thessalonica, 281 ; at Athens,
314 ; at Corinth, 338.
Synnada, 232.
Syntyche, 786.
Syracuse, 720.
" Syrian Gates," the, 220.
Syrophoenician woman, interview of Christ
with, 74.

Tallith, the, 154.
Talmud, the, 55.
Tarsus, 20 ; coin of) 20 ; named " Metropo-

916

INDEX

lis," 20 ; condition of, under the Romans,
21 ; not a municipium, 42 ; scenery of,
45.
Taurus, Mount, 19, 222.
" Taverns, the Three," 731.
Tavium, capital of the Eastern Galatians,
212 re.
Tectosages, the, 211.
Temple, position of the, 628 ; Temple of
Solomon, 628 ; that of Zerubbabel, 629 ;
that of Herod, 629; the Outer Court,
629; "Porch of Solomon," 630; the
"Beautiful Gate," 630; the sanctuary,
631 ; " Court of the Women," 631 ; the
Treasury, 631 ; the Court of Israel 631 ;
the Court of the Priests, 631 ; the Hall
Gazith, 631 ; the Altar, 632 ; the Vesti
bule, 632; the Holy Place, 632; the
Holy of Holies, 632 ; connection of the
Temple with the Fortress Antonia,
634.
Tertullus, 660.
Tetrapolis, the, 114.
Teucer, kingdom of, 127.
Thais, tomb of, 584 re.
Thales, philosophy of) 316.
Thamna, 649.
Thasos, 248.
Theatre, the, of Athens, 307 ; consecrated
to Bacchus, 307.
Thecla, St., of Iconium, 164 n.
Themistocles, tomb of, 303 ; his fortification
of the Piraeus, 303.
Therapeutae, the, 32.
Thermopylae, 299.
Thessalonian Letters, the, 285.
Thessalonians, First Epistle to the, 840 ;
Second, 352.
Thessalonica, 277 ; description of) 278 ; the
most populous town in Macedonia,
278.
Tiberias, 26 ; city of, 52; sea of, 77.
Tiberius, 103, 133.
Tiberius Alexander, 635 re.
Tigranes, 125.
Timotheus, 174, 175, 226; birthplace of,
227 n.; becomes the companion of St
Paul, 227 ; his circumcision, 230 ; reach
es Iconium, 231 ; accompanies St. Paul
to Galatia and to the iEgean, 236, 239 ;

sails from Troas, 246 ; arrives at Samo
thrace, 247 ; at Philippi, 250 ; left behind
at Philippi, 269 ; again with St. Paul
at Beroea, 293 ; left behind at Beroea,
296 ; joins St. Paul at Corinth, 338 ;
accompanies St. Paul in his subsequent
journeys, 367 et seq. ; despatched by St.
Paul from Ephesus to Macedonia, 421 ;
First Epistle to, 811 ; Second Epistle to,
836.
Titus, 187, 189, 190; visits St. Paul at
Philippi, 483 ; his account of the state
of the Church at Corinth, 483 ; directed
by St. Paul to return to Corinth, 484 ;
his character, 513 ; St. Paul's Epistle
to, 823.
Tongues, gift of, remarks on the, 459 re.
" Town-clerk," the, of the Authorized Ver
sion of the Bible, 469.
Triopium, the modern Cape Crio, promon
tory of, 605.
Troas, description of) 591. — See Alexan
dria Troas.
Trogyllium, 598.
Trophimus, 479, 499 n.
Tryphena, 582.
Tryphosa, 582.
" Tullianum," the, 268.
Tyana, 222.
Tychicus, 479, 748, 762.
Tyrannus, 412.
Tyre, 612, 618.

0.

Unchaste behavior condemned, 485 re.
Unknown gods, altars of the, 315 ; origin
of the, 315 re.
Urbanus, 581.
Urbs libera, constitution of) 288 ; its privi
leges, 288.

Valentinus the Gnostic, 399 n.
Ventidius Cumanus, 635.
Venus, worship of, 139.
Vestments, the sacred, 635.
Via Appia, 726 ; Egnatia, 274.

INDEX.

917

Vitellius, 76.
Vulturnus River, 728.

W.
"Walls, Long," of Athens, 303.
Women, influence of, over the religious
opinions of the ancients, 161 ; their holy
influence in early Christianity, 256.
Writing-materials employed by St Paul,
783 re.

Xanthus, Valley of the, 147.

Zabeans, the, 406 n.
Zealot the term, 525 n.
Zealots, the, 32.
Zeno, school of) 311 ; his philosophy, 817.
Zerubbabel Temple of) 629.

Whole Ntthbeb of Pages, including Pbefack, Introduction, Contents,
Preliminary Dissertation, Maps and full-page Engravings, 1015.