MCMXCIX

iv

THE BAMPTON
LECTURES

FOR
1913

v

THE CHURCH IN ROME

IN THE FIRST CENTURY

LECTURE
IV

Acts
28:15—Whom when Paul saw, he thanked God and took courage.

The
hope expressed by St. Paul in his Epistle to the Romans that he might,
after accomplishing his mission of alms-bearing to Jerusalem, be able
shortly to pay a passing visit to the Roman Christians on his way to
Spain,[1]

was
not to be realised in the way that he proposed. The journey to Jerusalem
was overshadowed from the first by dark forebodings,[2]

and
it proved disastrous for a lengthened period to all his plans of active
missionary work. It lies outside the scope of these lectures to relate in
detail all that happened to St. Paul between his arrival at Jerusalem
to keep the Pentecost feast of 57 A.D.
and the early spring of 60 A.D.[3]

when
at length he entered Rome as a prisoner. It is, however, necessary for a
right understanding of the character of St. Paul’s captivity in the
Imperial Capital to consider with some care what St. Luke has to tell us
about his treatment by the Roman authorities during his earlier
captivity in Caesarea. There are few passages in ancient historical
literatures more clearly the work not merely of a contemporary writer
but of an observant eye-witness than is the narrative contained in the
last seven chapters of the Acts. These chapters abound in first-hand
material for the history of the time, and incidentally are valuable for
the side-lights 88that
they throw upon many features of the Roman provincial administration
and legal procedure, and upon the state of Judaea in the years 57 to 59
A.D.

St.
Paul here appears in an historical setting, the truthfulness of which we
can estimate by a comparison with the narrative of the period of Felix and
Festus contained in Josephus’ writings, and in the less detailed but more
pungent references of Tacitus. It was the period when the great revolt was
preparing. Probably there was no provincial post that was more difficult
and less desirable than that of Procurator of Judaea. The celebrated
character-sketch of Felix given by Tacitus,[4]

‘in
the practice of all kinds of lust and cruelty he exercised the power of a
king with the temper of a slave,’ no less than the fierce accusations
brought against this Procurator by Josephus of cruelty, rapacity, and
treachery,[5]

are
tinted with prejudice and exaggeration. The judgment of Mr. Henderson, the
historian of Nero’s Principate, is very different.[6]

‘Alike
in Jerusalem and in the country generally Felix found a widespread turmoil
and insecurity alikeof person and of property. Bands of robbers were
roaming up and down, sweeping in adherents from every class of malcontent
debtor and malefactor. The sect of the Zealots, founded years before by
one Judas of Galilee, were hardly distinguishable from the Sicarii,
those robbers and murderers whose evil deeds load the page of
Josephus, and both plagued the unhappy land, as they disturbed the
unfortunate Governor’s peace. Felix acted vigorously. Robber bands were
dispersed yet always reappeared. Daily assassinations in Jerusalem defied
the Roman garrison. The mob was always the credulous prey of any fanatic.
One Jew from Egypt gathered thousands together on the Mount of Olives
promising them that the walls of the city shall fall at his bidding as
those of Jericho before Joshua’s trumpets, and his adherents’ excited
belief, stimulated by their lust and 89hope
of rapine and of plunder, was only chilled by Felix’ appearance at the
head of Roman troops. The mob was scattered, but the leader escaped.
. . . Wherever Felix appears in the history of these troubled
years, we find him struggling with disorder, and crushing, so far as he
could with the small force at his disposal, both brigandage in the country
and rioting in the city. Difficult cases he duly refers to Nero. Pending
decision he will keep the peace firmly. There is no good evidence to
warrant the accusations of cruelty and lust so lightly brought
against him.’ How accurately the Lukan narrative pictures this state of
things.’[7]

The
strong Roman garrison in Fort Antonia keeping watch and ward over the
faction-torn city at the time of the Feast. The swoop of the tribune
Lysias to rescue Paul from the hands of the raging and howling crowd in
the Temple Courts. His mistake in thinking that his prisoner was ‘the
Egyptian.’ The scene on the stairs and within the fort. The growing
respect of the officer as he notes that the man whom he had taken to be a
leader of banditti can speak Greek, then that he is, though a Jew by race,
not merely an inhabitant but a citizen of a famous Greek university city,
and lastly, most important of all, that he inherits from his father the
privileges of Roman citizenship. His own naive remark ‘with a great sum
obtained I this citizenship’ only enhancing the superior position of the
man who can reply ‘but I was Roman born.’[8]

The
scene in the Sanhedrin is quite explicable when we read in Josephus,
‘about this time King Agrippa gave the High-Priesthood to Ishmael, the son
of Fabi. And now arose discussions between the high priests and the
leading men of the multitude of Jerusalem . . . and when they
met together, they cast reproachful words and threw 90stones
at one another.’[9]

If
Ananias were High Priest de facto, while Ishmael was High Priest
de jure, the exclamation of Paul, ‘I wist not that he was High
Priest,’ was not unjustifiable.[10]

Again
the request of the chief priest to Lysias that Paul should again appear
before the Council, and the plot that was made whereby forty assassins
were bound together by an oath to waylay and murder him, is quite in
accordance with the evidence of Josephus, when he tells us that precisely
at this period ‘robbers went up with the greatest security to the
festivals and having their weapons concealed [under their garments] and
mingling themselves with the multitude, they slew both their own enemies
and those whom other men wanted them to kill for money.’[11]
The reticences of St. Luke upon many points on which we should like to
have fuller information are quite as remarkable as his accuracy. We would
gladly know more about the causes which secured for St. Paul such favoured
and even indulgent treatment for four or five years at the hands of the
succession of Roman officials with whom he was brought in
contact.[12]

How
was it, one asks, that he was able during the whole of this time to find
sufficient means to meet the heavy expenses that must have been thrown
upon him? Had Paul been a mere penniless Jewish preacher of a new
superstition, an ordinary commonplace enthusiast of no position or
resources, it is practically certain that he would not have received so
much attention from Procurators like Felix and Festus, or such courtesy as
was shown by the tribune Claudius Lysias and the Centurion Julius. At Fort
Antonia he was allowed to receive visitors and to bid a centurion
conduct his nephew to the presence of his superior officer. Does this
visit of his nephew signify that some change had taken place in Paul’s
relations with his family, that that family was 91one
of distinction and wealth, and that money had come to Paul possibly on the
death of his father? We do not know. We can only conjecture, but the fact
remains that in dealing with him the Roman authorities treated him as if
he were a person of some consequence.

The
first mark of this was exhibited in the extraordinary precautions taken to
ensure Paul’s safe convoy to Caesarea. Four hundred and seventy
troops—legionaries, horsemen, and light-armed auxiliaries—were sent to
make a swift night march to Antipatris, and then the horsemen continued
the journey apparently without a halt to Caesarea. The next was when
Felix, after declining to condemn Paul, when the High Priest in person
with a deputation of the Sanhedrin brought their threefold accusation
against the Apostle by the mouth of a trained advocate, not only deferred
the trial indefinitely on the pretext that he must wait until Claudius
Lysias also could appear and give evidence, but he ordered that Paul,
while kept in charge, should be treated with indulgence, and leave was
given to any of his friends to minister unto him.[13]

The
reason given by St. Luke why Felix thus deferred the trial and treated
Paul well was ‘that he had more accurate knowledge concerning the
Way,’[14]

i.e.
the Christian religion, implying more accurate knowledge than to be
deceived by the prejudiced ex parte statements of the Jewish
accusers. The explanation lies in the verse which follows: ‘and after
certain days Felix came with Drusilla his wife, who was a Jewess, and
heard him [Paul] concerning the faith in Christ.’ And during the long
interval of two years that he kept him in captivity, ‘hoping,’ says St.
Luke, ‘that money would be given him 92of
Paul, he sent for him the oftener and had communion with him.’[15]

Now
these statements point to two things: first, that Felix knew about Paul
and Christianity from Drusilla, and, secondly, that from what Drusilla
told him he was sufficiently interested in the man and his teaching to
have repeated private interviews with him, and further that he believed
him to be possessed of sufficient means to offer him a bribe to secure his
release. No Roman governor, more especially a man of the type of Felix,
would have such consideration as all this implies for a commonplace
prisoner. At this time of political unrest and ferment in Judaea the
Procurator’s relations with the Jewish leaders were sufficiently strained
without his extending his protection to a man against whom they displayed
such fierce animosity. It would not have been difficult for him to condemn
Paul as a disturber of the peace, and it was his interest to do so. At the
same time he clearly was afraid to release him, lest he should provoke one
of those outbursts of Jewish fanaticism which actually took place in
Caesarea itself after St. Paul had been confined in the barracks attached
to Herod’s palace for two years. The stern way in which in this year 59
A.D.
the Governor dealt with the Jewish rioters led to a deputation of the
principal Jewish inhabitants of Caesarea going to Rome to accuse him for
his misdeeds and harshness before Nero himself, and finally to Felix’
recall to Rome to answer the charges brought against him.[16]

It
is perhaps no wonder that in such a crisis of his life the accused man,
who only narrowly escaped condemnation by the powerful influence of
friends at court, should have ‘desired,’ as St. Luke tells us, ‘to gain
favour with the Jews by leaving Paul bound.’[17]

There
is a curious Western reading here, 93which
possibly records an ancient authentic tradition that Felix left Paul in
confinement ‘because of Drusilla.’[18]

As
Drusilla was the sister of Agrippa II, who had an official residence in
Jerusalem and in whose hands was the appointment of the High Priest,
she may well have counselled her husband, for her brother’s sake even more
than for his own, not to irritate Jewish fanaticism by any act that might
fan it in its present state of fever heat to yet further deeds of
violence.

Festus
on his arrival was confronted by a difficult and critical situation. But
he was a firm and just magistrate and was determined that the prisoner
should despite the clamours of the Jews have a fair trial in his presence.
The principal charge brought against Paul was the crime of majestas—the
inciting of the Jewish communities through the world to treason against
Caesar. The other accusations—the being a ringleader of the sect of the
Nazarenes and a profaner of the Temple—on the other hand were, in the
scornful words of the Procurator to King Agrippa, only 94‘certain
questions of their own superstition.’[19]

These
charges, St. Luke tells us, they failed to prove, and the Apostle no doubt
hoped that the Governor would pronounce judgment in his favour. But
Festus, aware of the excited state of Jewish feeling, was naturally
anxious not at the very outset of his official term to get himself into
disfavour with these embittered representatives of the dominant faction at
Jerusalem, and he asked Paul whether he would be willing to go up to that
city, there to be judged by him. But the Apostle was determined not thus
to place himself in the midst of enemies thirsting for his life and
utterly unscrupulous about the means employed; he was sick, too, of delay,
and he no longer hesitated. ‘To the Jews I have done no wrong, as thou
well knowest,’ he replied to the Governor (I am somewhat paraphrasing the
actual words as recorded), and ‘if I have committed any offence against
Caesar, I, as a Roman citizen, should be tried not at Jerusalem but before
Caesar’s judgment seat. As you do not acquit me of treason, I claim my
right of appeal—ad
Caesarem appello.’[20]

On
this the Procurator, after a conference with his assessors[21]

(consiliarii)
on the legal aspects of the case, quashed all further proceedings in
Judaea, ‘Thou hast appealed to Caesar, to Caesar shalt thou
go.’

I
have dwelt at some length on the circumstances which brought about Paul’s
visit to Rome, in order to make it clear that the charge against him was
political, not religious, the offence one of majestas,
not of preaching new doctrines subversive of the Jewish law. And it is
noteworthy that even in regard to the political charge both Festus and
95King
Agrippa were agreed that Paul had done nothing worthy of death or of
bonds. He had however appealed to Caesar, and so he obtained, not indeed
his liberty, but an escape from an irksome confinement in the midst of his
deadly foes, and a prospect of at length making acquaintance with that
Church in Rome which he had so many years been longing to visit. Whatever
the risks, he would gladly face them, for his deep faith assured him that
he was going to Rome as God’s appointed instrument to do good work in
Christ’s Name amidst the thronging population of that great world-centre
of Imperial rule. Those words that came to him, as on that first night of
his incarceration in Fort Antonia he beheld in mystic vision the Lord
Jesus standing at his side—‘Be of good cheer, for as thou hast testified
concerning me at Jerusalem, so must thou bear witness even at
Rome’[22]

—had,
we may well believe, been his comfort and stay during the whole of those
two weary years spent to all appearance so uselessly in the guard-rooms of
Herod’s palace at Caesarea. Now, at last, the opportunity had come of
bearing witness in the presence of Caesar him-self: an opportunity
embraced with his whole heart and soul, even though the witness should be
that witness which is crowned with the martyr’s death.

The
Apostle left Caesarea some time during the month of August, 59
A.D.,
only after many hardships and life-and-death perils to be shipwrecked
in November on the coast of Malta. Compelled with his companions in
misfortune to winter on the island, it was not until the end of February
60 A.D.
that Paul landed at Puteoli, a centre of the corn traffic with Alexandria
and the chief commercial sea-port of Italy and Rome.[23]

In
this busy and prosperous place 96thronged
with seamen and traders of many nations the Apostle found a body of
Christians who gave a right brotherly welcome to him and his companions,
Luke and Aristarchus, and entertained them seven days. Of the origin of
this Christian community the Acts tells us nothing, but its presence here
will occasion no surprise to those who have followed the arguments of the
previous lectures. It is but one proof more of the early evangelisation of
Rome and other towns in Italy.

From
Puteoli the company of prisoners with their military guard journeyed along
the Appian Way to Rome. But the news of the approach of the Apostle had
already reached the Christians of the capital, and two separate
deputations came to greet him, one as far as Appii Forum, one of the
regular halting places on this route, the other to Tres Tabernae still
nearer Rome.[24]

Probably
among these delegates were a number of those whose names are so
affectionately mentioned in the Epistle to the Romans, Ampliatus,
Urbanus, Stachys and the rest, and surely Aquila and Prisca, his old and
tried friends. St. Luke mentions no names, but his one brief statement of
the effect of this meeting upon the way-worn and much burdened Apostle is
worth a whole volume. In the midst of a strange and foreign land, a
prisoner in bonds, Paul was feeling perhaps, as was natural, somewhat
lonely and depressed, but at the sight of his friends his spirit revived.
How expressive are the words ‘whom when Paul saw, he thanked God and took
courage.’[25]

97

The
Apostle after his entrance into Rome was conducted by the centurion Julius
to an officer who bore the title of the Stratopedarch.[26]

This
centurion, in whose charge St. Paul with his fellow-prisoners had been for
the seven months since they left Caesarea, is described in the Acts as
being of the Augustan band (σπεῖρα
Σεβαστή)
or as it probably should be more correctly translated, of the Imperial
Service Corps. That great authority, Dr. Mommsen, has been able to
give an explanation of the meaning of these unusual terms, which affords
one more example of the marked accuracy of St. Luke in his references to
Roman or local officials. Professor Ramsay has thus summarised Mommsen’s
conclusions.[27]

‘Augustus
had reduced to a regular system the maintenance of communications between
the centre of control in Rome and the armies stationed in the great
frontier provinces. Legionary centurions, called commonly frumentarii,
went to and fro between Rome and the armies and were employed for numerous
purposes between the Emperor and his armies and provinces. They acted not
only for commissariat purposes (whence the name) but as couriers and for
police purposes, and for conducting prisoners. They all belonged to
legions stationed in the provinces, and were considered to be on detached
duty when they went to Rome; and hence in Rome they were “soldiers from
abroad”—peregrini.
While in Rome they resided in a camp on the Coelian Hill called
Castra
Peregrinorum.
In this camp there were always a number of them present, changing from day
to day, as some came and others went away. This camp was under the command
of the Princeps
Peregrinorum, and
it is clear that the Stratopedarch in Acts is the Greek name for that
officer.’

Julius
in any case had now fulfilled his duty and handed over his prisoners to
his chief. But the exceptionally favoured treatment now accorded to Paul
by the Roman 98authorities
in the capital itself was even more remarkable than that which had been
shown to him in Judaea, and it may be added throughout his voyage. I have
already spoken of the behaviour of Felix to him as a proof that the
Apostle was regarded as a man of some distinction, and that at this period
of his life he was in no lack of means. This impression is deepened as the
narrative of the captivity proceeds. Festus and his assessors would not
have been likely to have troubled themselves to send to Caesar’s judgment
seat a poor and obscure man. The courtesy of Julius to him and the
privileged position he occupied during the voyage must have been due in
the first instance to instructions given by the Governor. It can only have
been by express permission that Luke and Aristarchus were allowed to
accompany the Apostle in the vessel, a most unusual thing.[28]

And
it was the same upon his arrival at Rome. From the very first the prisoner
‘was suffered to abide by himself with the soldier that guarded him,’ and
to call together the chief of the Jews to meet him twice in the friend’s
house[29]

in
which for a short time he remained, and then for the whole of the next two
years of his light captivity he lived in his own hired house, receiving
freely and without hindrance all who came in to him. Where this friend’s
house or this hired dwelling was situated we have no hint, but it must
have been in the immediate neighbourhood of, perhaps even within, the
extensive barracks of the Praetorian Guard outside the Collin Gate, for
this would be necessary for the convenience of the change of the guards to
whom he was chained. The custodia
militaris
at its best was most 99irksome,
and as we learn from his epistles was felt to be so by the Apostle, but he
had at least the opportunity, which was so near to his heart, of being
able to have unrestricted intercourse with his Roman friends, and to
preach the Gospel to all who wished to hear him. This liberty, which, as
we have seen, was conceded at once after his arrival, can only have been
due to the contents of the official report—the literae
dimissoriae
and relatio—sent
by Festus concerning the prisoner, which would be handed by Julius to the
Stratopedarch and by him in his turn to Burrhus, who was in 60
A.D.
still sole Praetorian Prefect.[30]
Three days only had passed before St. Paul saw the leading men of the
Jewish synagogues gathered round him in the room where he was confined. So
eager was he to be at work again in his Master’s business that he must
have sent out the invitations to the heads of the six or seven independent
Jewish congregations in Rome immediately after his arrival. Apostle of the
Gentiles as he was, he always adhered to his unbroken rule—to the Jew
first. His words at the opening of his Epistle to the Romans acquire added
force in the new situation in which he now found himself—‘as much as in me
lies I am ready to preach the Gospel to you also in Rome. For I am not
ashamed of the Gospel; for it is the power of God unto salvation to
100every
one that believeth, to the Jew first and also to the Greek.’[31]

These
words were indeed addressed to the Christians of Rome, but he knew well
how small a number out of the great Jewish population in that city had
been converted to the Gospel, and even at a distance the thought saddened
him, and his heart yearned towards them, the more so because he felt
keenly the prejudice which his preaching to the Gentiles had aroused
against him in the minds of his countrymen further east. There are few
more touching passages in the writings of St. Paul, none which reveal the
innermost depth of his soul more fully than portions of the ninth and
tenth chapters of the Epistle to the Romans. No estimate of St. Paul is
complete which does not take account of these impassioned utterances: ‘I
say the truth in Christ, I lie not, my conscience bearing witness with me
in the Holy Ghost, that I have great sorrow and unceasing pain in my
heart. For I could wish that I myself were anathema from Christ for my
brethren’s sake, my kinsmen according to the flesh. . . .
Brethren, my heart’s desire and my supplication to God is for them that
they may be saved.’[32]

And
now, as the chiefs of the Roman synagogues stand around him, he
endeavoured to persuade them that it was not for anything that he had done
against the Jewish people or contrary to the customs of the fathers that
he had been put upon his trial and compelled to appeal to Caesar. On the
contrary, he wished to make it clear to them that all the proceedings
against him were due to a misunderstanding, because—and in these words
lies the whole force of his apology—‘for the hope of Israel I am bound
with this chain.’ The reply was a purely non-committal one. The Jews
declared that they had received from Judaea no letters concerning Paul,
nor had any of the brethren that came to Rome spoken harm of him. They
were therefore quite ready to hear what he had to say and appointed a day
for a conference. But they added, with a cold hostility which must have
chilled any hopes he may have had of the issue of his appeal, ‘as
concerning this sect 101it
is known to us that it is everywhere spoken against.’[33]

This
declaration was no doubt strictly correct, and is of great importance. It
shows that already those charges of ‘atheism,’ immorality, and of
abominable practices at their feasts, which were shortly to be so freely
brought against them, were being widely accepted, and that the Jews
them-selves were taking pains to dissociate Judaism from any connexion
with the new sectaries, whom they disowned. The period during which the
Christians were to find shelter beneath the privileges accorded by the
Imperial Government to the Jewish people and religion was well-nigh over.
The essential note of the Christianity preached by Paul was universalist,
that of the Judaism protected by Roman law was national and particularist:
between the two there could be no reconciliation. No wonder that when a
body of Jewish delegates more numerous apparently than the first gathered
in the Apostle’s room, they remained unconvinced by his arguments. These
chiefs of the Synagogues were not of the stuff of which converts are
easily made, and though St. Luke says they reasoned among themselves and
had clearly some difference of opinion, yet of their generally unbending
attitude the scathing words with which the Apostle closed the interview
are a proof that he regarded all his efforts as thrown away and futile.[34]

It
was a repetition of what had happened at Antioch in Pisidia and elsewhere,
and there his previous experiences cannot have given him much
encouragement that now, as a prisoner accused by the Jews of Jerusalem, he
would meet with more success. In any case his breach with official Judaism
in Rome seems to have been final. At this point the actual narrative of
the Acts ceases. The next two verses, which state that ‘he (Paul) abode
two whole years in his own hired dwelling, and received all that went in
to him, preaching the Kingdom 102of
God the things concerning the Lord Jesus Christ with all boldness, none
forbidding him,’[35]
are a kind of appendix. The brief summary of events which it contains
forms—as did the last verses of the Gospel with the opening passage of the
Acts—a bridge of connexion with another narrative, in which the author
intended to take up the story at the point where it is left, i.e. the
departure of the Jewish delegates, and continue it in a third treatise in
fuller detail.

This
abrupt breaking off of the Lukan history at a most interesting point is
much to be regretted. We are not however left without information about
St. Paul’s personal condition, his missionary activity, and his relations
with the outside world during the two years he spent in his hired house.
Four epistles were written by the Apostle during this period, containing a
number of references to his life and to the friends who were with him or
helping him. Of these a group of three, the Epistles to the Colossians and
Philemon and the circular epistle (commonly called) to the Ephesians, were
clearly dictated in rapid succession and were dispatched together,
somewhere about the middle of the imprisonment. The fourth epistle, to the
Philippians, is later; internal evidence points to a date not long before
the final trial and release.

The
tone of the group of three is on the whole cheerful and full of
confidence. The Apostle is surrounded by a number of his most trusted
disciples and fellow-workers. In each of these epistles he refers to his
bonds, but in every case not to complain, nay, rather to give added weight
to his advice or his pleading. To the Colossians he writes: ‘Pray for us
that God may open unto us a door for the Word, to speak the mystery of
Christ, for which I am also 103in
bonds, that I may make it manifest as I ought to speak,’ while in a
corresponding passage of the circular epistle lie asks for the prayers and
supplications of his readers, ‘on my behalf that utterance may be given to
me in opening my mouth, to make known with boldness the mystery of the
Gospel for which I am an ambassador in chains; that in it I may speak
boldly, as I ought to speak’—passages which testify that his whole
thoughts at this time were directed to the opportunity—the door—which his
position gave him for preaching the Gospel in the very heart of the
world’s capital.[36]

Notice
on the other hand the force of the appeal with which the Epistle to the
Colossians closes—‘the salutation of me Paul with mine own hand. Remember
my bonds,’[37]

or
in that most delightful passage from the beautiful epistle to Philemon, in
which he so tenderly and affectionately pleads with the master at Colossae
to receive back the slave Onesimus, who had run away from him and robbed
him, but had now been converted by Paul at Rome and so become Philemon’s
brother in the faith. ‘Wherefore, though I have all boldness in Christ to
enjoin thee that which is befitting, yet for love’s sake I rather beseech,
being such an one as Paul the aged, and now also a prisoner of Christ
Jesus: I beseech thee for my child, Onesimus, whom I have begotten in my
bonds, Onesimus, who was aforetime unprofitable to thee, but now is
profitable to thee and to me; whom I have sent back to thee in his own
person, that is my very heart; whom I would fain have kept with me, that
in thy behalf he might minister to me in my bonds of the Gospel.’ A few
verses further on the declaration ‘if he have wronged thee at all or oweth
thee ought, put that to my account: I Paul write it with mine own hand, I
will repay it’ affords one more testimony to those already given that the
Apostle at this time did not lack means. One reason for St. Paul’s
cheerfulness was, no doubt, that his release was approaching and not far
distant, otherwise he would not have concluded his letter 104to
Philemon with the words ‘Withal prepare for me a lodging: for I hope that
through your prayers I shall be granted unto you.’ The other reason was
that he had at his side at this time a body of faithful friends,[38]
who were a comfort to him. Aristarchus and Luke, who accompanied the
Apostle on his voyage probably in the capacity of slave-attendants, still
continued their willing service. Aristarchus is mentioned as ‘my
fellow-prisoner,’ Luke as ‘the beloved physician.’ Epaphras, a native of
Colossae, one of those who had originally carried the Gospel to that town,
had arrived in Rome bringing news of the state of the Church of which he
was so prominent a member. He also is styled by the Apostle ‘his
fellow-prisoner,’ and possibly all these three lived with him in his hired
house. Then, too, Tychicus of Ephesus had joined him in company with
Paul’s specially loved disciple Timothy, whom we now find acting as his
amanuensis. In addition to these were Jesus surnamed Justus, one of the
few among the circumcision who had been a fellow-worker and a comfort to
him, and Demas, of whom we know nothing, except that he some years later
deserted him.

One
name remains which deserves a longer notice.  ‘Mark, the cousin of
Barnabas, saluteth you, touching whom ye received injunctions, if he come
unto you receive him,’ the very phraseology of this salutation sent by St.
Paul to the Colossians suggests that more lies behind the words than they
actually express. Since Barnabas and Paul parted in anger at Antioch in 50
A.D.
because of Mark, and Paul chose Silas to be his fellow missionary, while
Barnabas took Mark and sailed to Cyprus, no mention is made of the latter
in the Acts at all nor in the pre-captivity epistles of Paul. What was he
doing during the interval, and how are we to account for this greeting
being sent by Paul from Rome in Mark’s name in 61 A.D.
to the Church at Colossae?

105

In
studying the history of the Apostolic age it should always be remembered
that the character of our extant authorities only too often has caused a
one-sided and very warped view of the expansion of Christianity (during
the period of which we are treating) to be taken. The happy fact that St.
Paul found a sympathetic biographer in his disciple and companion St.
Luke, and still more the fact that, owing to his exceptional power and
weight as a writer, a very considerable collection of his letters have
survived the general destruction of early Christian literature, has led to
a quite false estimate being formed of the widespread and successful
activity of other leading missionaries and preachers of the Gospel. The
influence they exerted and the large area covered by their work have been
too much overlooked and ignored. The late Professor Bigg was one of the
few who have shown a really comprehensive grasp of what actually took
place. In his admirable ‘Introduction to the First Epistle of St. Peter’
he has pointed out how small a portion of Asia Minor was ever visited by
St. Paul. He also suggests not only that many of the Churches in that part
of the Empire were planted at an early date but that the reason why St.
Paul deliberately refrained from entering Asia, Mysia and Bithynia on his
second missionary journey was that those provinces were already being
evangelised by others.[39]

To
say this is no disparagement to St. Paul, he would be the last to wish to
take credit for other men’s labours, and he himself expressly states in
his Epistle to the Colossians that neither the Christians of that city nor
those of Laodicea had seen his face in the flesh![40]

Now
the emphatic mention by St. Paul in this epistle of Mark as Barnabas’
cousin (with the enigmatic parenthesis that follows) appears to me to be
one of those seemingly incidental notices, which, when placed in its right
setting, is then seen to be the central link in a chain of circumstantial
evidence drawn from a variety of sources. Once more I ask, therefore, What
had been the history of Mark since in 10650
A.D.
he sailed with Barnabas for Cyprus? According to one of the best
authenticated traditions of these early times he went to Alexandria and
spent some years in organising the Church in that great city and in
evangelising the neighbouring districts of Egypt.[41]

Another
tradition of a less trustworthy character, but reasonably probable,
relates that Barnabas himself went in the first instance with Mark to
Alexandria.[42]

It
is quite likely that this choice by Barnabas of Egypt as the scene of
Mark’s missionary labours may have been dictated by the fact that it lay
outside the Pauline sphere of activity. Now Eusebius tells us—and he had
exceptional opportunities of obtaining accurate information about the
Alexandrian Church—that in the eighth year of Nero’s reign Annianus
succeeded Mark the Evangelist in the administration of the Church in
Alexandria.[43]

The
date of Mark’s leaving Egypt thus corresponds with the date at which we
find him in Paul’s company at Rome, i.e. 61 A.D.
When he is introduced to us it is as one about to journey to Colossae with
the Apostle’s commendation. But the question again naturally arises, why
should he from Alexandria have gone out of his way to Rome in order to
visit Colossae, what was his object? Those words of St. Paul—‘Mark, the
cousin of Barnabas, about whom ye received injunctions’—gives, I think,
the answer. If Mark is thus described to the Colossian Christians as ‘the
cousin of Barnabas,’ it follows that Barnabas was well known in Colossae,
and that the injunctions referred to were Barnabas’ injunctions, and, if
so, that Barnabas himself had been with Paul and had been one of those who
had furnished him with information about the state of the Asian Churches.
The course of events, that the passage 107suggests
to me, is this. One of the objects of the Epistles to the Colossians and
Ephesians was to give comfort to the hearts of these Asian Christians, who
were afflicted by hearing of St. Paul’s imprisonment at Rome. Barnabas, at
Colossae, on receiving the news had resolved to go to his old friend in
this crisis of his fate and at the same time revisit the scenes of his
previous labours in Rome and in Italy. He travelled by Alexandria to see
Mark, and finding that the work of organisation there was satisfactorily
advanced, it was agreed between them that Mark should seek a new field for
his energies in Asia Minor and that Barnabas should write to prepare the
minds of the Colossians for his cousin’s coming among them. Meanwhile, as
Pauline influence was still strong in the Asian cities—he first took Mark
with him to Rome to effect a reconciliation between him and Paul and
secure a few words of commendation from the Apostle, as a further
credential to the former deserter. It has been pointed out above that the
traditional date of Mark’s departure from Egypt synchronises with the date
at which we find him at Rome with St. Paul making ready shortly to depart
for Colossae. The presence of Barnabas at Rome at this time is vouched for
by the Gnostic Acts of Peter [Actus Petri Vercellenses], which
state that Barnabas accompanied Timothy, when the latter was sent a little
later by Paul to Macedonia as the bearer of the Epistle to the
Philippians.[44]

The
same argument holds good here as in the case of the mention of Barnabas in
the opening of the ‘Clementine Recognitions’; his name would never have
been introduced in documents written expressly to exalt the position of
St. Peter, unless he had actually visited Italy and worked there. There
are strong grounds for believing that Timothy after carrying out his
mission 108to
Philippi went on to Ephesus and made that town the centre of his
ministerial activity for some years. The Pastoral Epistles represent
Timothy and Mark as together a few years later in this same district. In a
future lecture I shall bring forward reasons of considerable weight for
holding that the Epistle to the Hebrews was written by Barnabas and sent
by him to Rome from some place not far from Ephesus, where he had been in
touch with Timothy.[45]

There
is much that is disputable in all this, but all critics who approach the
subject with an open mind must at least admit that a cumulative
presumption has been established in favour of the conclusion that Barnabas
and Mark were together in Italy and Rome in 61 A.D.
and afterwards in Colossae.

At
the time when the Epistle to the Philippians was written the circumstances
and surroundings of St. Paul had undergone a complete change. He had no
longer around him a group of trusted friends and companions. Only Timothy
(whom in the opening salutation we find as sharing with Paul the
responsibility of joint authorship of the epistle) is left of those
mentioned in the earlier epistles, the rest being probably dispersed on
various missions. The situation is in fact precisely similar to that
described in the Second Epistle to Timothy, and curiously it was at the
time of his trial in each case that the Apostle has to complain of being
thus left alone.[46]

As
on the occasion of his second trial he sorrowfully writes ‘only Luke is
with me,’ so now of his intimate disciples there is only Timothy.
Epaphroditus, the bearer of a gift from the Church of Philippi to the
Apostle, was indeed still in Rome, having been detained by a sickness that
had been well-nigh unto death, but he was about to return as the bearer of
the epistle, and such was the unselfishness of St. Paul, moved as he was
by the tenderest feelings of gratitude and affection towards these
Philippians, who had always from the very first been the most liberal and
helpful of all the Churches that he founded, 109that
he was ready to spare even Timothy from his side to go with Epaphroditus
to testify to the Apostle’s deep sense that once again they had borne his
needs in kindly remembrance. He has ‘no one like-minded’ with Timothy
to fulfill this office, and he promises that ‘as soon as I shall see how
it will go with me’ he will send this beloved disciple, of whom he
touchingly says ‘ye know the proof of him, that as a child serveth
a father, so he served with me in the furtherance of the Gospel.’[47]
Those words, ‘as soon as I shall see how it will go with me,’ tell their
own tale. St. Paul was no longer ‘in his own hired house’ but in the
Pretorian camp, where he was in closer confinement while his case was
being brought at last before the Imperial Appeal Court. This alone can be
the meaning of the passage, ‘now I would have you know, brethren, that the
things that are happening to me have rather turned out unto the progress
of the Gospel, so that my bonds became manifest in Christ in the whole
Praetorium and to all the rest; and that most of the brethren in the Lord,
being confident through my bonds, are more abundantly bold to speak the
Gospel without fear.’[48]

The
publicity of the trial, in fact, and the opportunity that it gave the
Apostle in the course of his defence against the charges brought against
him to set forth the true nature of the faith that he preached had caused
the message of the Gospel to be known throughout the Imperial Court, the
Praetorian Guards, and generally in Rome. The whole tone of the epistle
shows that so far all had gone well, that the brethren were filled with
confidence that the issue would be favourable, and that Paul himself,
although not free from serious anxiety and quite prepared for death should
it come, is full of hope that he will speedily be released and be able
once more to revisit his beloved Philippians.[49]

This
Epistle differs widely in character and contents 110from
those to the Colossians and Ephesians. In the latter St. Paul was
combating certain subtle forms of heretical belief of a gnostic character
which had been creeping in and making headway among the mixed Greek and
Oriental populations of a group of Asian Churches, to whom he him-self,
though well known by name and repute was, except at Ephesus itself,
personally a stranger. To Philippi he writes, as a Roman citizen to Roman
citizens, as a friend to dear friends, as an Apostle to a body of personal
disciples who had above all others shown him unceasing sympathy and
kindness. His Epistle is primarily a letter of thanks called forth by the
gift of money that had been sent to him by the hands of Epaphroditus.[50]

Such
a letter was bound to be rich in personal references and allusions. I have
already referred to those which relate to the hopes and fears aroused by
his pending trial. He had however other troubles that worried him. Despite
all he had endured and was enduring for the Gospel’s sake, it is clear
that there was a Judaising faction among the Roman Christians, who even
now could not abate their opposition and spite against the Apostle of the
Gentiles. ‘Most of the brethren in the Lord,’ he writes, ‘being confident
through my bonds, are more abundantly bold to speak the word of God
without fear. Some indeed preach Christ of envy and strife; some also of
good will; the one do it of love, knowing I am set for the defence of the
Gospel; but the other proclaim Christ of faction, not sincerely, thinking
to raise up affliction for me in my bonds. What then? Let but in every
way, whether in pretence or in truth, Christ be proclaimed; and therein I
rejoice, yea, and will rejoice.’ Who they were of 111whom
he is here speaking is revealed in the later warning: ‘Beware of the dogs,
beware of the evil workers, beware of the concision; for we are the
circumcision, who worship by the spirit of God and glory in Jesus Christ
and have no confidence in the flesh.’[51]

Among
the Philippian Christians there had been discords, the opening of the
fourth chapter pointing to the existence of acute dissensions between two
women, named Euodia and Syntyche, possibly deaconesses, and probably each
of them with a following. ‘I exhort Euodia and I exhort Syntyche,'’ writes
the Apostle, the word exhort being repeated, as being addressed to each
separately, ‘to be of one mind in the Lord.’ He then proceeds, ‘Yea, I
beseech thee also, true yokefellow, help them [to be reconciled]; seeing
that they laboured with me in the Gospel together with Clement also and my
other fellow-workers, whose names are in the book of life.’ These words
have caused much difficulty to commentators, and have been interpreted in
many different ways. To myself their meaning does not seem doubtful. The
passage is a sudden parenthesis and is addressed by St. Paul to Timothy,
the man whose name is coupled with his own at the beginning of the
Epistle, and who was sitting at his side as his amanuensis. He was his
yoke-fellow, since he was sharing with him the duty and the burden at that
very moment of a common task. He commends him to the Philippians in the
words ‘I have no man like-minded, who will truly care for your state.’ The
word here descriptive of the character of that care which Timothy alone
could be trusted to give, be it noted, is the same word which is used as
the epithet qualifying the ‘yoke-fellow’ of chapter
4:3, a word which in the original Greek signifies ‘genuine.’ This identity
of epithet is of some evidential significance in support of the
identification of the yoke-fellow with Timothy, and it is
strengthened when we find that the Apostle again uses this same epithet in
the opening salutation of the First Epistle to Timothy, 112where
he addresses that disciple as ‘my true [or genuine] child in the
faith.’[52]
The appeal of St. Paul ‘to his true yoke-fellow’ to strive to heal the
dissensions between the two women Euodia and Syntyche is accompanied by
the suggestion that he should secure the help of ‘Clement and the rest of
my fellow-workers’ in the task of conciliation. Who this Clement was, we
do not know. Origen, Eusebius and others regard this passage as a
reference to the well-known Clement, who wrote in the name of the Roman
Church an Epistle to the Corinthians, but it is extremely doubtful whether
they had any sound historical authority for their statement. The name of
Clement was not uncommon, and this Clement may have been one of the
leading Christians in Philippi. Nevertheless it is not at all impossible
that he may have been the Roman Clement. The title
‘fellow-worker’—σύνεργος—is
frequently used by St. Paul of those like Timothy, Titus, and others, sent
out by him on some mission as his delegates. Clement may have been thus
sent to Philippi by Paul. It will be observed that he alone is named, and
this implies that he stood apart from the rest as a person of some
authority. The final salutation is of some interest. ‘The brethren who are
with me salute you’—the brethren here being those of his companions, not
inhabitants of Rome, who were still at his side. ‘All the saints’—i.e. the
body of Roman Christians—‘salute you, but especially those of Caesar’s
household.’ Why especially? Surely because Paul was now during his trial
confined in the barracks close to the palace, and he had therefore special
opportunities of intercourse at this time with those members of the Roman
Church who belonged to the vast Imperial household—numbering many
thousands of freedmen and slaves. This phrase and the earlier one, ‘my
bonds have become manifest in Christ in the whole Praetorium,’ supplement
and partly explain one another. The spread of the Gospel among Caesar’s
household was no 113new
thing. Already in his Epistle to the Romans St. Paul had sent his
salutations to those who were of the households of Aristobulus and of
Narcissus. These households had almost certainly even in 57 A.D.
been incorporated in the household of the Emperor.[53]

Over
the further progress and issue of the trial a veil falls. It was during
the early months of this year 62 A.D.
that Burrhus died, and a little later Seneca retired from public life.
Burrhus had been sole Praetorian Prefect, but Nero now reverted to the
usual custom of appointing two. One of these, Sofonius Tigellinus, has
left an infamous name as a man who encouraged the cruel propensities of
Nero and pandered to all his vicious excesses. It is probable therefore
that the trial of Paul took place while Burrhus was still prefect, and
that it may have been furthered by the friendly offices of Seneca.[54]

That
he was acquitted at the beginning of 62 A.D.
there can be no reasonable doubt. Clement of Rome, a contemporary, affirms
that Paul after-wards travelled to the far West, and the fragment of the
Muratorian Canon, about 200 A.D.,
states that he carried out his intention of visiting Spain. The Pastoral
Epistles also refer to extensive journeyings of the Apostle later still
114in
Asia Minor. What probably occurred was that when Paul was brought before
the Court the charges preferred against him in the literae
dimissoriae
of Festus would be read and considered, and then an interval of time would
be given for the appearance of witnesses. Then, as no witnesses came, and
the relatio
of Festus was found to be favourable, a dismissal followed.[55]
115

[1] Rom. 15:24.

[2]
Acts 19:22-24; 21:4, 11-14; Rom. 15:30, 31

[3] These
dates can, now that the discovery of an inscription at Delphi makes it
practically certain that Gallio was proconsul in Achaia in 52 A.D., be
regarded as ascertained results.

[4] Tac.
Hist. v. 9: ‘ Antonius Felix per omnem saevitiam et libidinem ius regium
servili ingenio exercuit ’; Ann. xii. 54: ‘ Cuncta malefacta sibi impune
ratus tanta potentia subnixo. ’

[5] Josephus,
Ant. xx. 8; Bell. Jud. ii. 13.

[6] Henderson,
Life and Principate of the Emperor Nero, pp. 364–5.

[7] ‘The
witness to Felix’ or Festus’ endeavours of the other contemporary
writer, St. Luke, is far more trustworthy. His Christianity secured to him
a greater neutrality in his attitude alike to Jew and to Roman, and his
simple tale of proceedings in which both were concerned is of the highest
historical merit, striking with at least one shaft of clear light into the
enwrapping mist of prejudice and hatred.’—Henderson, p.
363.

[8] Acts 21:37-40; 22:22-30.
Tarsus was an urbs libera .

[9] Josephus,
Ant. xx. 8. 8. See also Milman, Hist. of the Jews , ii.
171–2.

[10] Acts 23:5.

[11] Acts
23:12-22. Josephus,
Ant. xx.
8. 5; Bell. Jud. ii. 13. 3.

[12] See
Ramsay, St.
Paul the Traveller, pp. 310–313; also pp. 30–37.

[13] The
confinement of Paul both at Caesarea and Rome was not the
severe confinement of a prison, custodia publica, , but the lighter one,
custodia militaris , where the prisoner was bound by a chain to an
attendant guard. There were however degrees of the custodia militaris and
the word here used for indulgence— ἄνεσις —is the
same as is used by Josephus ( Ant. xviii. 6–10), where
he describes how Caligula on his accession did not liberate Agrippa (Herod
Agrippa I) from custody (he had been put in chains by Tiberius) yet gave
him indulgence or relaxation— τήρησις
μετὰ ἀνέσεως.

[14] Acts 24:22:
ἀκριβέστερον
εἰδὼσ
τὰ
περὶ
τῆς
ὁδοῦ.

[15] Acts 24:26:
ἐλπίζων
ὅτι
χρήματα
δοθήσεται
ὑπὸ
τοῦ
Παύλου·
διὸ
καὶ
πυκνότερον
αὐτὸν
μεταπεμπόμενος
ὡμίλει
αὐτῷ.

[16] Josephus,
Ant. xx. 8—9: Πορκίου
δὲ
Φήστου
διαδόχου
Φήλικι
πεμφθέντος
ὑπὸ
Νέρωνος,
οἱ
πρωτεύοντες
τῶν
κατὰ
τὴν
Καισάρειαν
κατοικούντων
Ἰουδαίων
εἰς
τὴν
Ῥώμην
ἀναβαίνουσι
Φήλικος
κατηγοροῦ_τες·
καὶ
πάντως
ἂν
ἐδεδώκει
τιμωρίαν
τῶν
εἰς
Ἰουδαίους
ἀδικημάτων,
εἰ
μὴ
πολλὰ
αὐτὸν
ὁ
Νέρων
τῷ
ἀδελφῷ
Πάλλαντι
παρακαλέσαντι
συνεχώρησε,
μάλιστα
δὴ
τότε
διὰ
τιμῆς
ἔχων
ἐκεῖνοι

[17] The
reading of Cod. 137 is τὸν
δὲ
Παῦλον
εἴασεν
ἐν
τηρήσει
διὰ
Δρυσίλλαν
.

[18] There
occurs in Josephus, Ant. xx. 7. 2, a passage in which he says: ‘When Felix
was Governor of Judaea, he saw this Drusilla and fell in love with her,
for she did indeed exceed all other women in beauty, and he sent to her a
person whose name was Simon, one of his friends, a Jew, born in Cyprus,
who pretended to be a magician and endeavoured to persuade her to leave
her present husband and marry Felix.’ As Drusilla had required her first
husband to become a Jewish proselyte and submit to circumcision, so it was
thought that her subsequent desertion of him for the Gentile, Felix, could
only have been brought about by magic arts. She was, however, at the time
of her marriage with Felix still a girl in her teens, and this Magian may
have been the instrument employed by the unscrupulous Felix to cajole her
into an act which as an Herodian princess must have been repugnant to her.
But who was this Simon, a Jew of Cyprus, who pretended to be a magician?
Professor Rendel Harris in the Expositor , v. pp. 190–4 (1902), identifies
him with Elymas the Sorcerer of Acts xiii. 8. Now Codex Bezae for
Ἐλυμας
reads Ἐτοιμας
, and this reading is confirmed by several other Western authorities who
read either ετοιμος or its equivalent ‘ paratus .’ Ramsay adopts Ετοιμος
as the correct name in St. Paul the Traveller (p. 74). And there is the
same uncertainty in the text of Josephus. The Ambrosian MS. A has Ατομον
for Σίμονα
, also the Epitome of Josephus at Vienna. Ετοικος and Ατομος are, it may
reasonably be assumed, different forms of this man’s name. Was he then one
source of Felix’ ‘more accurate knowledge’ of Paul and The
Way?

[19] Acts 25:19:
ζητήματά τινα
περὶ
τῆς
ἰδίας
δεισιδαιμονίας. The
profanation of the
Temple was also an offence against Roman Law—Judaism being a religio
licita .

[20] It
is more than probable that St. Paul was acquainted with the Latin
language. The employment of Tertullus before Felix shows that the pleading
was in Latin.

[21] Acts 25:12:
συλλαλήσας
μετὰ
τοῦ
συμβουλίου
. This
body was composed of consiliarii or assessores , in Greek
πάρεδροι
. Suet. Tib. 33; Galba , 19; Josephus, Bell. Jud. ii. 16.
1.

[22] Acts 23:11.
See Ramsay’s article in the Expositor, March 1913: ‘Suggestions on the
History and Letters of St. Paul,’ pp. 269–76.

[23] Puteoli shared with Ostia the trade
between Rome and the provinces, more especially the corn supply. It was
originally named Dicaearchia. Three years after St. Paul, the historian
Josephus (as he himself tells us) on his way to Rome had experiences
extraordinarily similar to those of the apostle. He writes: ‘I reached
Rome after an extremely perilous voyage; for our ship, having foundered
mid-way in the Adriatic, we, to the number of about six hundred, had
recourse to swimming and had already remained the entire night in the
water, when, at daybreak, a vessel from Cyrene providentially hove in
sight, and received on board myself and others, eighty in all—more
fortunate than our companions. Thus rescued from destruction, I landed at
Dicaearchia, called by the Italians Puteoli.’ This passage is interesting,
for here as in Acts xxvii. 27 we find the term
‘Adriatic’ applied to the sea between Greece and Cyrenaica. Comp.
Strabo, ii. 123: Ἰόνιον
πέλαγος,
ὁ
νῦν
Ἀδρίας. Also the
number
on board St. Paul’s ship, 276, is seen not to be excessive as compared
with the 600 with whom Josephus voyaged.

[24] Appii
Forum was 41, Tres Tabernae 23 miles from Rome. ‘ Ab Appii Foro hora
quarta: dederam aliam paullo ante Tribus Tabernis. ’—Cicero, ad Atticum ,
ii. 10.

[25] Acts 28:15:
οὓς
ἰδὼν
ὁ
Παῦλος
εὐχαριστήσας
τῷ
θεῷ
ἔλαβεν
θάρσος·

[26] It
is generally admitted that the words ὁ ἑκατόνταρχος
παρέδοκε
τοὺς
δεσμίους
τῷ
στρατοπεδάρχῃ, though
wanting
in A B, formed part of the original text.

[27] Berlin.
Akad. Sitzungsberichte, 1895, pp. 501 ff; Ramsay, St. Paul the Traveller,
pp. 315 and 347–8.

[28] Ramsay
quotes Pliny, Ep. iii. 16, as relating that when Paetus was brought a
prisoner from Illyricum to Rome his wife Arria, despite her entreaties,
was not allowed to accompany him, but he was permitted to take certain
slaves to wait on him, and he raises the question whether Luke and
Aristarchus may not have voluntarily accompanied Paul in the capacity of
slaves.

[29] St.
Luke (Acts 28:23) speaks of the place where St. Paul received the Jewish
leaders as ἡ
ξενία
, and appears to distinguish it from τὸ
μίσθωμα
, the hired lodging in which he spent the next two
years (Acts 28:30). ξενία
suggests a room in a friend’s house. Comp. Philem.
22 and Acts 21:16.

[30] The
literae dimissoriae or apostoli stated the simple fact of the claim made
by the appellant. When the appeal was made to the Emperor, the letter was
called relatio . The report thus sent included all the depositions
necessary for the elucidation of the case. Buss, Roman Law and the Hist.
of the N.T. p. 399. Usually there were two Praetorian Prefects, but since
52 A.D. Sextus Afranius Burrhus had held the sole command. His appointment
was due to Agrippina, who wished to have a man she could trust at the head
of the Praetorian Guard on the death of Claudius. He was a worthy,
straightforward man, who with Seneca exercised a great influence for good
upon Nero during the first five years of his reign, the quinquennium
Neronis , which the Emperor Trajan is reported to have praised above any
other period in the reigns of his predecessors. Burrus was shortly after
his to fall into disfavour. He
died in 62 A.D.
Some said he was poisoned by the Emperor, and his death was followed by
Seneca’s retirement. After Burrhus’ death two Praetorian Prefects were
appointed, one of them the notorious Sofonius Tigellinus, a cruel, venal,
and vicious man, who pandered to all Nero’s lusts and extravagances.

[31] Romans 1:15, 16.

[32] Rom. 9:1-3; 10:1.

[33] Acts 28:17-21.

[34] The
passage quoted Isa. 6:9, 10 is remarkable as having been spoken at least
twice by our Lord in regard to the Jewish reception of His message, St. Matt. 13:14, St. Mark 4:12, St. Luke 8:10 and
St. John 12:40. St. Paul used it of Israel’s
rejection of the Gospel in his Epistle to the Romans (Rom. 11:8) as
here.

[35] Acts 28:30, 31.
Comp. St. Luke 24:50-53, Acts cc. 1 and 2. Ramsay holds that, in the expression
τὸν
πρῶτον
λόγον
trans. R.V. ‘the former treatise’ with ‘the first’ in the margin; St. Luke
did not use πρῶτον
as an equivalent for πρότερον
If this were the case, ‘the first’ may be regarded as implying, in
addition to a second treatise, also a third. Ramsay, St. Paul the
Traveller , pp. 27–28. See also his Article in Expositor, March 1913, pp.
268–70, 281–4.

[36] Col. 4:3;
Eph. 6:19,
20.

[37] Col. 4:18; Philem. 8-13,
22.

[38] Aristarchus,
Col. 4:10, Philem. 23. Luke, Col. 4:14, Philem. 23. Epaphras, Col. 1:7, 4:12,
Philem. 23. Timothy,  Col. 1:1, Philem, 1.
Tychicus, Col. 4:7, 8, Eph. 6:21, 22. Onesimus, Col. 4:9, Philem. 10. Mark, Col. 4:10, Philem. 23.

[39] Bigg,
Internat. Commentary, Epistles of St. Peter and St. Jude , pp.
73–4.

[40] Col. 2:1.

[41] Eus.
Hist. Eccl. ii. 16. 24. Also in the Hieronymian version of Eusebius’
Chronicle ; Schöne, ii. 155; Lipsius, Die Apokryphen Apostelgeschichten
und Apostellegenden , ii. 2nd half, p. 322 ff.

[42] Περίοδοι
Βαρνάβα
, c. 26 (Tischendorf, p. 73). Mark is supposed to be the narrator.
ἐλθόντες
δὲ
ἐπὶ
τὸν
αἰγιαλὸν
[of the village Limnes in Cyprus] εὕρομεν
πλοῖον
Αἰγύπτιον
καὶ
ἀνελθόντες
εἰς
αὐτὸ
κατήχθημεν
ἐν
Ἀλεξανδρείᾳ
κὰκεῖ
ἔμεινα
ἐγὼ
διδάσκων
τοὺς
ἐχομένους
ἀδελφούς
. . . . .

[43] Eus.
Hist. Eccl. ii. 24.

[44] The
Actus Petri Vercellenses are portions of the Περίοδοι
Πέτρου
which formed the basis of the Clementine Recognitions and Homilies , found
in the Latin Cod. Vercellensis. See Lipsius, vol. ii. 1st half, pp. 174
ff; also vol. ii. 2nd half, p. 272. Speaking of the departure of Paul into
Spain the passage runs ‘ praeterea quod non esset Romae Paulus neque
Timotheus neque Barnabas, quoniam in Macedoniam missi erant a Paulo.
’

[45] Tim.
i. 19, 20; vi. 12-14; II Tim. 2:11; comp. Heb. 13:23.

[46] Phil. 2:11;
comp. II Tim. 4:9-11.

[47] Phil. 2:19-30.

[48] Phil. 1:12-15.
See Lightfoot, Epist. to Philippians, pp. 97–102; Ramsay, St. Paul the
Traveller, pp. 356–360; Expositor, March 1913, pp.
277–80.

[49] Phil. 1:19-25;
also 2:17 and 24.

[50] The
supposition that Paul at this time was in no lack of financial resources
is fully borne out by the language of the passage in which be expresses
his gratitude to the Philippians for their kindly thought in providing for
his necessities. His words are quite plain on this point: ‘Not that I
speak in respect of want,’ and again: ‘Not that I seek for the gift, but I
seek for the fruit that increaseth to your account. But I have all things
and abound: I am filled, having received from Epaphroditus the things that
came from you. . . .’ The whole passage is worth careful study.
Phil. 4:10-20.

[51] Phil. 1:14-18; 3:2, 3.

[52] Phil. 4:3:
γνήσιε
σύνζυγε
; 2:20:
οὐδένα
γὰρ
ἔχω
ἰσόψυχον,
ὅστις
γνησίως
τὰ
περὶ
ὑμῶν
μεριμνήσει
;
1 Tim. 1: Τιμοθέῳ
γνησίῳ
τέκνῳ
ἐν
πίστει.

[53] Supra
, p. 26.

[54] The
very remarkable coincidence in thought and phrase between the writings of
Seneca and Paul led to a tradition arising of actual intercourse between
them, and even of Seneca having secretly become a Christian. Ithas been
shown conclusively by Lightfoot (in his Commentary on the Epistle to the
Philippians ) and others that there are no grounds for such a supposition.
It is however possible that he may have heard of St. Paul from Burrhus,
from his brother Gallio, or others, and have been interested in a man
whose language and moral sentiments were in certain respects so closely
akin to his own. As Seneca was Consul suffectus during Paul’s imprisonment
he must have had some acquaintance with the case. That a member of the
Annaean gens in the next century was a Christian seems to be proved by an
inscription discovered at Ostia in January 1887. D. M. M. ANNIO PAVLO
PETRO M. ANNEVS PAVLVS FILIO CARISSIMO See Lanciant, Pagan and Christian
Rome, p. 17.

[55] Clement,
1 Ep. to Car. c. v.: ἐπὶ
τὸ
τέρμα
τῆς
δύσεως.
Murat. Canon, lines 37, 38: ‘ Sed profectione Pauli ab urbe ad Spaniam
proficiscentis. ’ There was a law of Claudius, which permitted the
discharge of a prisoner if the prosecutors did not put in an appearance
after a certain time. Dion Cassius, lx. 28.