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them how the Spirit had been poured upon Cornelius and his friends (to which the six brethren from Joppa could testify), then all agreed with him that it was impossible to mistake the hand of God in this, and that it would be impious to resist it. So they made no further difficulties, but praised God for having called the heathen also to repent and attain to the supreme blessedness.

This story, which is given with extreme detail because of its great importance, is meant to show that God himself had unconditionally sanctioned the conversion of the heathen. And therefore our author places it before the beginning of Paul's work among the gentiles, and even before the preaching of the Grecian Jews at Antioch. Every thing is dictated from above, and nothing is the result of any human impulse. Nay, Peter is expressly represented as entertaining a very exaggerated horror of the gentiles, which he overcomes with difficulty; while the indignation of the men of Jerusalem shows that nothing short of an unmistakable divine revelation would have reconciled them to the measure. It is the angel's visit, the voice from heaven, and the pouring out of the Spirit that decide the whole matter. Thus it appears that Jew and gentile are alike in the sight of God; that the latter has the same claims to the gospel as the former; that circumcision and observance of the Law are no conditions of salvation. The repeated use of the expression "the heathen "1 shows that there is no intention of treating this as an isolated case, and that it is regarded as involving the whole principle of the conversion of the heathen. In the end the primitive community not only acquiesces in the accession of the uncircumcised, but glorifies God for it.

Whether there are any facts at all at the bottom of this story it is difficult to say. In any case its enumeration of the cities Lydda, Joppa, and Cæsarea constitutes our sole remaining account of Peter's wide-spread and successful labors as the missionary Apostle of the Jews. As it now stands, it need hardly be said that the narrative is in direct contradiction with history. To convince ourselves of this we have only to think of the orthodox believers who forced themselves into Paul's communities, of the danger which consequently threatened his work among the heathen, of his painful journey to Jerusalem, of the emphatic indication of Peter as the Apostle of the Jews in contradistinction to the two messengers to the heathen, of Peter's conduct at Antioch, of the attitude 1 Acts x. 45, xi. 1, 18; compare x. 28, 35, xi. 3, 17.

adopted by James, and of all that yet remains to be told of the community at Jerusalem. In a word, this story makes out that the question of the conversion of the heathen was supernaturally settled, once for all, to everybody's satisfaction; whereas we know from Paul what bitter proof of the contrary he had, and in the book of Acts itself, a few chapters further on, we find the question still regarded as unsettled. Quite apart from the miracles and visions, then, the story is a palpable fiction. As to the miraculous machinery, we may note the analogies between the restoration of Dorcas to life and that of Jairus's daughter, between the person of the Cæsarean officer and that of his brother in arms at Capernaum, and above all between the experiences of Peter and the honor which he gains and all that we are elsewhere told of Paul. And again the visions of Peter and Cornelius remind us of those of Ananias and Saul. Finally, it was no accident, but a definite attempt to obscure the events at Antioch, which dictated the emphatic assertion that Peter had eaten with the uncircumcised, had been reproached for doing so by the orthodox believers, had defended himself manfully, and had freed himself from all blame even in their eyes.

The whole story is a pure invention, and any thing but a purposeless one. Long after the breach had been made in the old community, our author, or his authority, attempted to heal it for ever by throwing a veil over the events that had given rise to it, or rather by disguising them past the possibility of recognition. He would have accomplished his purpose to perfection, had not a few of Paul's letters been preserved! After the short-lived peace of Jerusalem the decisive outbreak at Antioch established the breach between the two parties. The difference of principle between them must end in open warfare. Personal jealousies embittered the contest. Paul's public rebuke of Peter could never be forgiven. A century afterwards the extreme orthodox section reproached him with having told their Apostle that he was condemned for his equivocal dealings.

This conflict was to follow Paul, like a curse, wherever he went, and fall like a blight upon all his work. He seems to have thought it best to leave Antioch at once. In spite of his uncompromising attitude, or perhaps in consequence of it, he was deserted, or at least suspected, by many of the breth

1 Acts xv. 1, 5, 6, et seq.

2 Compare Mark v. 23, 35, 40-42 with Acts ix. 37-41; Luke vii. 2-5 with Acts x. 1, 2, 4 22; and see p. 539 and chap. x. p. 000.

ren.

He permanently removed to other regions the scene of his labors as a preacher. Let us follow him upon these missionary journeys and stay with him, as he takes up his abode for longer or shorter periods in various centres of the ancient civilization!

CHAPTER VII.

THE GOSPEL IN EUROPE.

ACTS XVI-XVIII. 18; MARK V. 1-20.1

In the book of Acte Periods.

divided into three periods. Each journey is begun from Antioch and concluded or followed by a visit to Jerusalem; and in each case that portion of the narrative on which the chief stress falls is illustrated by a discourse. At the beginning of the first journey there is an address to the Jews, in the middle of the second a discourse to the heathen, and at the end of the third a farewell speech to the Christians. But we cannot preserve this division, for the visit to the primitive community in the City of the Temple which divides the socalled second and third missionary journeys was never made at all, and the two therefore fall into one.2 After the events at Antioch (51 or 52 A.D.) begins a period of not less than six and not more than eight years, during which we find Paul working in a fresh field in the central and western portions of Asia Minor, in Macedonia, and in Greece, travelling about from place to place but settling for some time, first at Corinth and afterwards at Ephesus, where he found convenient centres from which to start and to which to return.

Among the written sources of information used by the author of Acts was a record made by an unknown friend of the Apostle, who accompanied him upon some at least of his journeys. It has been conjectured that this friend was Titus, whose name is never mentioned in the book of Acts; and, though we cannot be certain in the matter, there seem to be no valid objections to this idea. A more common opinion is that it was a certain Greek physician of the name of Luke,* and that the tradition which ascribes the whole book to him

1 Matthew viii. 28-34; Luke viii. 26-39. 8 Colossians iv. 14.

2 Acts xviii. 21,

22.

rests upon the fact that it contains these fragments from his hand.1 But whoever he was we only possess a few fragments of his itinerary, embracing the passage to Philippi and the opening of the Apostle's labors at that place, the last journey from Europe to Asia Minor, the journey to Jerusalem, and finally that to Rome. We recognize these fragments at once from the author's use of the first person plural, which the writer of Acts preserved, perhaps with a feeling that this "we" would give a greater air of fidelity to the whole book. In other respects he probably was not equally scrupulous in giving the fragments just as he found them.

It is not an accident that we first meet with this eye-witness on occasion of the introduction and initial establishment of the gospel in Europe; for the preaching of the gospel in our own quarter of the globe has almost as special an interest for our author as it has for ourselves. In fact he lays down his pen as soon as he has recorded the establishment of Christianity in Rome, the heart of the Græco-Roman world, the great capital of the West. And so too here he passes with extreme rapidity over all that precedes the passage to Europe; namely, the journey through Syria and Cilicia, by Derbe and Lystra (where Paul found Timothy and took him with him), and through Phrygia and Galatia. He further informs us that the Apostle was prevented by divine interposition from preaching in the northwest of Asia Minor, and that at Troas God summoned him to preach the gospel in Europe by sending him a vision of a Macedonian who implored him to come over to his land with the message of salvation.

There is only one portion of this very meagre account which we are in a position to amplify. It is the journey through Galatia. In a letter that he afterwards wrote to the congregations scattered through this district, Paul reminds them that an illness had compelled him to remain some time among them,* — probably not in any of the great cities, such as Pessinus, Tavium, or Ancyra, but in the country. This was the beginning of his labors in this district, which were crowned with remarkable success. Here he met with men of a very different character from any he had yet known. They were not Asiatics, but were Gallic or Celtic colonists who had been settled in the district for three hundred years. Although he was ill, and his sickness seems to have had an offensive

1 Compare p. 29.

2 Acts xvi. 10-17, xx. 5-15, xxi. 1-18, xxvii. 1-xxviii. 16.

3 See pp. 555, 556.

4 Galatians iv. 13.

character, perhaps consisting in whole or in part in an eruption or inflammation of the eyes, yet he met with an eminently favorable reception. Had he been an angel from heaven, or the Christ in person, he could hardly have been welcomed more. The Galatians would have torn out their very eyes to give him. These were fair days in the stormy life of Paul. There were no Jews to listen with amazement and suspicion to his words, or to offer direct resistance. He had only to do with heathen, whom he found as simple and open-minded as they were earnest for salvation. So he preached the death of Jesus on the cross to them as the only means of salvation, and preached so clearly and powerfully that he seemed to set it before their very eyes; and they joyfully accepted the faith that was to justify them in the sight of God. Signs that their spiritual nature was thoroughly roused soon followed. Spiritual blessings were multiplied upon them; they glowed with zeal for the truth, and strove to live pure lives in order that when the Christ returned he might receive them into the kingdom of God.2 Before Paul left Galatia he had founded a number of communities of heathen converts, small but rich in promise, won heart and soul for his gospel, and deeply attached to him personally.

The journey from the heart of Asia Minor to the northwest coast appears to have furnished little or nothing noteworthy. At Troas Paul took ship, accompanied by Timothy, Silas, and the unknown companion who wrote the diary. Passing the island of Samothrace, they came in two days to Neapolis, on the coast of Thrace, whence they proceeded to Philippi in Macedonia. This city, which Augustus had made a Roman colony, was the scene of the first preaching of the gospel in Europe. On the Sabbath day after their arrival the missionaries went through the city gate to the Jewish house of prayer, which was situated as usual near the river, for the convenience of the worshippers, who were thus enabled to perform the prescribed ablutions before offering their prayers. Here they found certain women to whom they spoke about the object of their visit, and among them was a proselyte known as Lydia, or "the Lydian woman," because she came from Thyatira, in Lydia. She was a seller of purple dye. Now this woman listened to Paul's preaching with extreme interest, and before long she was converted and baptized, with all her household, and begged the missionaries to take up their abode with her. 1 Galatians iv. 14, 15.

2 Galatians iii. 1 ff., iv. 18, v. 7, vi. 9. 10.

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