The Expositor's Bible: The Acts of the Apostles Volume Ii Part 17

[248] There is no necessity to adopt forced and unnatural explanations when an easy one lies ready to our hand, and we all have daily experience how hard it is for even a keen-sighted man to distinguish among a crowd the person who utters a brief exclamation; a fact which the debates in the House of Commons often ill.u.s.trate. I can myself quite appreciate St. Paul's difficulty. I am extremely short-sighted, and am never able to discern--say in a meeting of one of our synods--who it is that interrupts or contradicts me.

Again, the readiness and quickness of St. Paul in seizing upon every opportunity of escape have important teaching for us. Upon four different occasions at this crisis he displayed this characteristic.

Let us note them for our guidance. When he was rescued by the chief captain and was carried into the castle, the captain ordered him to be examined by scourging to elicit the true cause of the riot, St. Paul then availed himself of his privilege as a Roman citizen to escape that torture. When he stood before the council he perceived the old division between the Pharisees and the Sadducees to be still in existence, which he had known long ago when he was himself connected with it. He skilfully availed himself of that circ.u.mstance to raise dissension among his opponents. He grasped the essential principle which lay at the basis of his teaching, and that was the doctrine of the Resurrection and the a.s.sertion of the reality of the spiritual world. Without that doctrine Christianity and Christian teaching was utterly meaningless, and in that doctrine Pharisees and Christians were united. Dropping the line of defence he was about to offer, which probably would have proceeded to show how true to conscience and to Divine light had been his course of life, he cried out, "I am a Pharisee, a son of Pharisees: touching the hope and resurrection of the dead I am called in question." Grotius, an old and learned commentator, dealing with ch. xxiii. 6, has well summed up the principles on which St. Paul acted on this occasion in the following words: "St. Paul was not lacking in human prudence, making use of which for the service of the gospel, he intermingled the wisdom of the serpent with the gentleness of the dove, and thus utilised the dissensions of his enemies." Yet once more we see the same tact in operation. After the meeting of the Sanhedrin and his rescue from out of its very midst, a plot was formed to a.s.sa.s.sinate him, of which he was informed by his nephew. Then again St. Paul did not let things slide, trusting in the Divine care alone. He knew right well that G.o.d demanded of men of faith that they should be fellow-workers with G.o.d and lend Him their co-operation. He knew too the horror which the Roman authorities had of riot and of all illegal measures; he despatched his nephew therefore to the chief captain, and by his readiness of resource saved himself from imminent danger. Lastly, we find the same characteristic trait coming out at Caesarea. His experience of Roman rule taught him the anxiety of new governors to please the people among whom they came. He knew that Festus would be anxious to gratify the Jewish authorities in any way he possibly could. They were very desirous to have the Apostle transferred from Caesarea to Jerusalem, sure that in some way or another they could there dispose of him. Knowing therefore the dangerous position in which he stood, St. Paul's readiness and tact again came to his help.

He knew Roman law thoroughly well. He knew that as a Roman citizen he had one resource left by which in one brief sentence he could transfer himself out of the jurisdiction of Sanhedrin and Procurator alike, and of this he availed himself at the critical moment, p.r.o.nouncing the magic words _Caesarem Appello_ ("I appeal unto Caesar"). St. Paul left in all these cases a healthy example which the Church urgently required in subsequent years. He had no morbid craving after suffering or death. No man ever lived in a closer communion with his G.o.d, or in a more steadfast readiness to depart and be with Christ. But he knew that it was his duty to remain at his post till the Captain of his salvation gave a clear note of withdrawal, and that clear note was only given when every avenue of escape was cut off. St. Paul therefore used his knowledge and his tact in order to ascertain the Master's will and discover whether it was His wish that His faithful servant should depart or tarry yet awhile for the discharge of his earthly duties. I have said that this was an example necessary for the Church in subsequent ages. The question of flight in persecution became a very practical one as soon as the Roman Empire a.s.sumed an att.i.tude definitely hostile to the Church. The more extreme and fanatical party not only refused to take any measures to secure their safety or escape death, but rather rushed headlong upon it, and upbraided those as traitors and renegades who tried in any way to avoid suffering.[249]

From the earliest times, from the days of Ignatius of Antioch himself, we see this morbid tendency displaying itself; while the Church in the person of several of its greatest leaders--men like Polycarp and Cyprian, who themselves retired from impending danger till the Roman authorities discovered them--showed that St. Paul's wiser teaching and example were not thrown away.[250] Quietism was a view which two centuries ago made a great stir both in England and France, and seems embodied to some extent in certain modern forms of thought. It taught that believers should lie quite pa.s.sive in G.o.d's hands and make no effort for themselves. Quietism would never have found a follower in the vigorous mind of St. Paul, who proved himself through all those trials and vicissitudes of more than two years ever ready with some new device wherewith to meet the hatred of his foes.[251]

[249] Any reader who wishes to see how this question was discussed about the year 200 A. D. should turn to Tertullian's treatise _De Fuga in Persecutione_, c. 6., in his works translated in Clark's Ante-Nicene Library, vol. i., p. 364, where Tertullian admits that the apostles fled in time of persecution, but argues that the permission to do so was merely temporary and personal to the apostles. The study of Church history is specially useful in showing us how exactly the same tendencies emerge in ancient and modern schisms and sects. Tertullian would have been a Quietist had he lived in the seventeenth century; see note 2, p. 446.

[250] St. Ignatius of Antioch was very desirous of martyrdom. St.

Polycarp fifty years avoided it till he was arrested. St. Clement of Alexandria, in his _Stromata_, iv. 16, 17, condemns the suicidal pa.s.sion for martyrdom. St. Cyprian, enthusiastic as he was, retired like Polycarp till escape was impossible. These holy men all acted like St. Paul. They waited till G.o.d had intimated His will by shutting up all way of escape. The story of Polycarp has an interesting warning against presumptuous rus.h.i.+ng upon trials. Quintus, one of St. Polycarp's flock, gave himself up to death. His courage failed him at the last, and he became an apostate: see on this subject Lightfoot's _Ignatius and Polycarp_, vol. i., pp. 38, 393, 603.

[251] Quietism, Jansenism, and Quakerism were all manifestations of the same spirit, and arose about the same time. Molinos was the founder of Quietism in Spain. A concise account of the movement will be found in Schaffs _Theological Encyclopaedia_ in connexion with the names of Molinos and Guyon.

III. We notice lastly in the narrative of St. Paul's imprisonment his interviews with and his testimony before the members of the house of Herod. St. Peter had experience of the father of Herod Agrippa, and now St. Paul comes into contact with the children, Agrippa, Drusilla and Bernice. And thus it came about. Felix the procurator, as we have already explained, was a very bad man, and had enticed Drusilla from her husband. He doubtless told her of the Jewish prisoner who lay a captive in the city where she was living. The Herods were a clever race, and they knew all about Jewish hopes and Messianic expectations, and they ever seem to have been haunted by a certain curiosity concerning the new sect of the Nazarenes. One Herod desired for a long time to see Jesus Christ, and was delighted when Pilate gratified his longing. Drusilla, doubtless, was equally curious, and easily persuaded her husband to gratify her desire. We therefore read in ch.

xxiv. 24, "But after certain days, Felix came with Drusilla, his wife, which was a Jewess, and sent for Paul, and heard him concerning the faith in Christ Jesus."

Neither of them calculated on the kind of man they had to do with. St.

Paul knew all the circ.u.mstances of the case. He adapted his speech thereto. He made a powerful appeal to the conscience of the guilty pair. He reasoned of righteousness, temperance, and the judgment to come, and beneath his weighty words Felix trembled. His convictions were roused. He experienced a transient season of penitence, such as touched another guilty member of the Herodian house who feared John and did many things gladly to win his approval. But habits of sin had grasped Felix too firmly. He temporised with his conscience. He put off the day of salvation when it was dawning on him, and his words, "Go thy way for this time, and when I have a convenient season I will call thee unto me," became the typical language of all those souls for whom procrastination, want of decision, trifling with spiritual feelings, have been the omens and the causes of eternal ruin.

But Felix and Drusilla were not the only members of the Herodian house with whom Paul came in contact. Felix and Drusilla left Palestine when two years of St. Paul's imprisonment had elapsed.

Festus, another procurator, followed, and began his course, as all the Roman rulers of Palestine began theirs. The Jews, when Felix visited Jerusalem, besought him to deliver the prisoner lying bound at Caesarea to the judgment of their Sanhedrin. Festus, all powerful as a Roman governor usually was, dared not treat a Roman citizen thus without his own consent, and when that consent was asked Paul at once refused, knowing right well the intentions of the Jews, and appealed unto Caesar. A Roman governor, however, would not send a prisoner to the judgment of the Emperor without stating the crime imputed to him. Just at that moment Herod Agrippa, king of Chalcis and of the district of Ituraea, together with his sister Bernice, appeared on the scene. He was a Jew, and was well acquainted therefore with the accusations brought against the Apostle, and could inform the procurator what report he should send to the Emperor. Festus therefore brought Paul before them, and gave him another opportunity of expounding the faith of Jesus Christ and the law of love and purity which that faith involved to a family who ever treated that law with profound contempt.

St. Paul availed himself of that opportunity. He addressed his whole discourse to the king, and that discourse was typical of those he addressed to Jewish audiences. It was like the sermon delivered to the Jews in the synagogue of Antioch in Pisidia in one important aspect.

Both discourses gathered round the resurrection of Jesus Christ as their central idea. St. Paul began his address before Agrippa with that doctrine, and he ended with the same. The hope of Israel, towards which their continuous wors.h.i.+p tended, was the resurrection of the dead. That was St. Paul's opening idea. The same note lay beneath the narrative of his own conversion, and then he returned back to his original statement that the Risen Christ was the hope of Israel and of the world taught by Moses and proclaimed by prophets. But it was all in vain as regards Agrippa and Bernice. The Herods were magnificent, clever, beautiful. But they were of the earth, earthy.

Agrippa said indeed to Paul, "With but little persuasion thou wouldest fain make me a Christian." But it was not souls like his for whom the gospel message was intended. The Herods knew nothing of the burden of sin or the keen longing of souls desirous of holiness and of G.o.d. They were satisfied with the present transient scene, and enjoyed it thoroughly. Agrippa's father when he lay a-dying at Caesarea consoled himself with the reflection that though his career was prematurely cut short, yet at any rate he had lived a splendid life. And such as the parent had been, such were the children. King Agrippa and his sister Bernice were true types of the stony-ground hearers, with whom "the care of the world and the deceitfulness of riches choke the word." And they choked the word so effectually in his case, even when taught by St. Paul, that the only result upon Agrippa, as St. Luke reports it, was this: "Agrippa said unto Festus, This man might have been set at liberty, if he had not appealed unto Caesar."

CHAPTER XVIII.

_IN PERILS ON THE SEA._

"And when it was determined that we should sail for Italy, they delivered Paul and certain other prisoners to a centurion named Julius, of the Augustan band. And embarking in a s.h.i.+p of Adramyttium, which was about to sail unto the places on the coast of Asia, we put to sea, Aristarchus, a Macedonian of Thessalonica, being with us. And the next day we touched at Sidon: and Julius treated Paul kindly, and gave him leave to go unto his friends and refresh himself."--ACTS xxvii. 1-3.

"And when we entered into Rome, Paul was suffered to abide by himself with the soldier that guarded him."--ACTS xxviii. 16.

This chapter terminates our survey of the Acts of the Apostles, and leads us at the same time to contemplate the Apostle of the Gentiles in a new light as a traveller and as a prisoner, in both which aspects he has much to teach us. When St. Paul was despatched to the judgment-seat of Caesar from the port of Caesarea, he had arrived at the middle of his long captivity. Broadly speaking he was five years a prisoner from the day of his arrest at Jerusalem till his release by the decision of Nero. He was a prisoner for more than two years when Festus sent him to Rome, and then at Rome he spent two more years in captivity, while his voyage occupied fully six months. Let us now first of all look at that captivity, and strive to discover those purposes of good therein which G.o.d hides amidst all his dispensations and chastis.e.m.e.nts.

We do not always realise what a length of time was consumed in the imprisonments of St. Paul. He must have spent from the middle of 58 to the beginning of 63 as a prisoner cut off from many of those various activities in which he had previously laboured so profitably for G.o.d's cause. That must have seemed to himself and to many others a terrible loss to the gospel; and yet now, as we look back from our vantage-point, we can see many reasons why the guidance of his heavenly Father may have led directly to this imprisonment, which proved exceedingly useful for himself and his own soul's health, for the past guidance and for the perpetual edification of the Church of Christ. There is a text in Ephesians iv. 1 which throws some light on this incident. In that Epistle, written when St. Paul was a captive at Rome, he describes himself thus, "I therefore the prisoner _in_ the Lord," or "the prisoner _of_ the Lord," as the Authorised Version puts it. These words occur as the beginning of the Epistle for the Seventeenth Sunday after Trinity. Now there is often a marvellous amount of spiritual wisdom and instruction to be gained from a comparison between the epistles and gospels and the collects for each Sunday. All my readers may not agree in the whole theological system which underlies the Prayer Book, but every one will acknowledge that its services and their construction are the result of rich and varied spiritual experiences extending over a period of more than a thousand years. The mere contrast of an epistle and of a collect will often suggest thoughts deep and searching. So it is with this text, "I therefore the prisoner in the Lord." It is preceded by the brief pithy prayer, "Lord, we pray Thee that Thy grace may always prevent and follow us, and make us continually to be given to all good works, through Jesus Christ our Lord." The words of St. Paul to the Ephesians speaking of himself as the prisoner of G.o.d and in G.o.d suggested immediately the idea of G.o.d's grace surrounding, shaping, constraining to His service every external circ.u.mstance; and thus led to the formation of the collect which in fact prays that we may realise ourselves as so completely G.o.d's as, like the Apostle, continually to be given to all good works. St. Paul realised himself as so prevented, using that word in its ancient sense, preceded and followed by G.o.d's grace, guarded before and behind by it, that he looked beyond the things seen, and discarding all secondary agents and all lower instruments, he viewed his imprisonment as G.o.d's own immediate work.

I. Let us then see in what way we may regard St. Paul's imprisonment as an arrangement and outcome of Divine love. Take, for instance, St.

Paul in his own personal life. This period of imprisonment, of enforced rest and retirement, may have been absolutely necessary for him. St. Paul had spent many a long and busy year building up the spiritual life of others, founding churches, teaching converts, preaching, debating, struggling, suffering. His life had been one of intense spiritual, intellectual, bodily activity on behalf of others.

But no one can be engaged in intense activity without wasting some of the spiritual life and force necessary for himself. Religious work, the most direct spiritual activity, visiting the sick, or preaching the gospel, or celebrating the sacraments, make a tremendous call upon our devotional powers and directly tend to lower our spiritual vitality, unless we seek abundant and frequent renewal thereof at the source of all spiritual vitality and life. Now G.o.d by this long imprisonment took St. Paul aside once again, as He had taken him aside twenty years before, amid the rocks of Sinai. G.o.d laid hold of him in his career of external business, as He laid hold of Moses in the court of Pharaoh, leading him into the wilderness of Midian for forty long years. G.o.d made St. Paul His prisoner that, having laboured for others, and having tended diligently their spiritual vineyard, he might now watch over and tend his own for a time. And the wondrous manner in which he profited by his imprisonment is manifest from this very Epistle to the Ephesians, in which he describes himself as G.o.d's prisoner--not, be it observed, the prisoner of the Jews, or of the Romans, or of Caesar, but as the prisoner of G.o.d--dealing in the profoundest manner, as that Epistle does, with the greatest mysteries of the Christian faith. St. Paul had an opportunity during those four or five years, such as he never had before, of realising; digesting, and a.s.similating in all their fulness the doctrines he had so long proclaimed to others, and was thus enabled out of the depth of his own personal experience to preach what he felt and knew to be true, the only kind of teaching which will ever be worth anything.

Again, St. Paul designates himself the prisoner of the Lord because of the benefits his imprisonment conferred upon the Church of Christ in various ways. Take his imprisonment at Caesarea alone. We are not expressly told anything about his labours during that time. But knowing St. Paul's intense energy we may be sure that the whole local Christian community established in that important centre whence the gospel could diffuse itself as far as the extremest west on the one side and the extremest east on the other, was permeated by his teaching and vitalised by his example. He was allowed great freedom, as the Acts declares. Felix "gave orders to the centurion that he should be kept in charge, and should have indulgence; and not to forbid any of his friends to minister unto him." If we take the various centurions to whom he was intrusted, we may be sure that St.

Paul must have omitted no opportunity of leading them to Christ. St.

Paul seems to have known how to make his way to the hearts of Roman soldiers, as his subsequent treatment by Julius the centurion shows, and that permission of the governor would be liberally interpreted when deputies from distant churches sought his presence. Messengers from the various missions he had founded must have had recourse to Caesarea during those two years spent there, and thence too was doubtless despatched many a missive of advice and exhortation. At Caesarea, too, may then have been written the Gospel of St. Luke. Lewin (vol. i., p. 221), indeed, places its composition at Philippi, where St. Luke laboured for several years prior to St. Paul's visit in 57 A.D. after leaving Ephesus; and he gives as his reason for this conclusion that St. Paul called St. Luke in 2 Cor. viii. 18, written about that time, "the brother whose praise is in the Gospel,"

referring to his Gospel then lately published.[252] I think the suggestion much more likely that St. Luke took advantage of this pause in St. Paul's activity to write his Gospel at Caesarea when he had not merely the a.s.sistance of the Apostle himself, but of Philip the deacon, and was within easy reach of St. James and the Jerusalem Church. St. Luke's Gospel bears evident traces of St. Paul's ideas and doctrine, was declared by Irenaeus (_Haer._, iii. 1) to have been composed under his direction,[253] and may with much probability be regarded as one of the blessed results flowing forth from St. Paul's detention as Christ's prisoner given by Him in charge to the Roman governor.

[252] This involves, however, the supposition that St. Luke's narrative had then obtained its more modern name of "the Gospel,"

which is in my opinion an anachronism. In the earliest writings which refer to apostolic narratives they are simply called the writings or memoirs or commentaries of the apostles, as in Aristides, c. xvi., and Justin Martyr, _Apol._, i. 67. In Aristides there is one pa.s.sage in ch. ii. where the word gospel is used, but not in the sense of a special t.i.tle for a book: "This is taught from that Gospel which a little while ago was spoken among them as being preached; wherein if ye also will read, ye will comprehend the power that is upon it." Irenaeus, III. xi. 7, 8, is the earliest I can now recall who uses the word gospel in this technical sense. He speaks there of the Gospel of St. Matthew, etc. But this was in the last quarter of the second century. In the year 57, when Second Corinthians was written, the word gospel was applied to the whole body of revealed truth held by the Church, and not to a book.

[253] Iren., iii. 1: "Luke, also the companion of Paul, recorded in a book the gospel preached by him." With respect to the relation between St. Paul and St. Luke, see also Iren., iii., xiv., xv.

The Apostle's Roman imprisonment again was most profitable to the Church of the imperial capital. The Church of Rome had been founded by the efforts of individuals. Private Christians did the work, not apostles or eminent evangelists. St. Paul came to it first of all as a prisoner, and found it a flouris.h.i.+ng church. And yet he benefited and blessed it greatly. He could not, indeed, preach to crowded audiences in synagogues or porticoes as he had done elsewhere. But he blessed the Church of Rome most chiefly by his individual efforts. This man came to him into his own hired house, and that man followed him attracted by the magnetic influence he seemed to bear about. The soldiers appointed as his keepers were told the story of the Cross and the glad tidings of the resurrection life, and these individual efforts were fruitful in vast results, so that even into the household and palace of the Caesars did this patient, quiet, evangelistic work extend its influence.[254] Nowhere else, in fact, not even in Corinth, where St. Paul spent two whole years openly teaching without any serious interruption; not even in Ephesus, where he laboured so long that all who dwelt in Asia heard the word; nowhere else, was the Apostle's ministry so effective as here in Rome, where the prisoner of the Lord was confined to individual effort and completely laid aside from more public and enlarged activity. It was with St. Paul as it is with G.o.d's messengers still. It is not eloquent or excited public efforts, or platform addresses, or public debates, or clever books that are most fruitful in spiritual results. Nay, it is often the quiet individual efforts of private Christians, the testimony of a patient sufferer perhaps, the witness all-powerful with men, of a life transformed through and through by Christian principle, and lived in the perpetual suns.h.i.+ne of G.o.d's reconciled countenance. These are the testimonies that speak most effectually for G.o.d, most directly to souls.

[254] The subject of Christianity and the household of Caesarea would form an interesting subject of inquiry did only s.p.a.ce permit. I have, however, the less hesitation in pa.s.sing it over because it has been exhaustively discussed by Bishop Lightfoot in the following places, to which I must refer my readers: _Philippians_, Introduction pp. 1-28, and in dissertations on, pp.

97-102 and 169-76. This is also the subject of an elaborate monograph by Professor Harnack in the _Princeton Review_ for July 1878, ent.i.tled "Christians and Rome," with which should be compared Schurer's _Geschichte des Judischen Volkes_, ii. 506-512, and a treatise published by him _Die Gemeindeverfa.s.sung der Juden in Rom._, Leipzig 1879.

Lastly, St. Paul's imprisonment blessed the Church of every age, and through it blessed mankind at large far more than his liberty and his external activity could have done in one other direction. Is it not a contradiction in terms to say that the imprisonment of this courageous leader, this eloquent preacher, this keen, subtle debater should have been more profitable to the Church than the exercise of his external freedom and liberty, when all these dormant powers would have found ample scope for their complete manifestation? And yet if Christ had not laid His arresting hand upon the active, external labour in which St. Paul had been absorbed, if Christ had not cast the busy Apostle into the Roman prison-house, the Church of all future time would have been deprived of those masterly expositions of Christian truth which she now enjoys in the various Epistles of the Captivity, and specially in those addressed to the churches of Ephesus, Philippi, and Colossae.

We have now noted some of the blessings resulting from St. Paul's five years' captivity, and indicated a line of thought which may be applied to the whole narrative contained in the two chapters with which we are dealing. St. Paul was a captive, and that captivity gave him access at Caesarea to various cla.s.ses of society, to the soldiers, and to all that immense crowd of officials connected with the seat of government, quaestors, tribunes, a.s.sessors, apparitors, scribes, advocates. His captivity then led him on board s.h.i.+p, and brought him into contact with the sailors and with a number of pa.s.sengers drawn from diverse lands. A storm came on, and then the Apostle's self-possession, his calm Christian courage, when every one else was panic-stricken, gave him influence over the motley crowd. The waves flung the s.h.i.+p of Alexandria in which he was travelling upon Malta, and his stay there during the tempestuous winter months became the basis of the conversion of its inhabitants. Everywhere in St. Paul's life and course at this season we can trace the outcome of Divine love, the power of Divine providence shaping G.o.d's servant for His own purposes, restraining man's wrath when it waxed too fierce, and causing the remainder of that wrath to praise Him by its blessed results.

II. Let us now gather up into a brief narrative the story contained in these two chapters, so that we may gain a bird's eye view over the whole. Festus entered upon his provincial rule about June A.D. 60.

According to Roman law the outgoing governor, of whatever kind he was, had to await his successor's arrival and hand over the reins of government--a very natural and proper rule which all civilised governments observe. We have no idea how vast the apparatus of provincial, or, as we should say, colonial government among the Romans was, and how minute their regulations were, till we take up one of those helps which German scholars have furnished towards the knowledge of antiquity, as, for instance, Mommsen's _Roman Provinces_, which can be read in English, or Marquardt's _Romische Staatsverwaltung_, vol.

i., which can be studied either in German or French.[255] The very city where first the new governor was to appear and the method of fulfilling his duties as the Judge of a.s.size were minutely laid down and duly followed a well-established routine. We find these things indicated in the case of Festus. He arrived at Caesarea. He waited three days till his predecessor had left for Rome, and then he ascended to Jerusalem to make the acquaintance of that very troublesome and very influential city. Felix then returned to Caesarea after ten days spent in gaining an intimate knowledge of the various points of a city which often before had been the centre of rebellion, and where he might at any moment be called upon to act with sternness and decision. He at once heard St. Paul's cause as the Jews had demanded, brought him a second time before Agrippa, and then in virtue of his appeal to Caesar despatched him to Rome in care of a centurion and a small band of soldiers, a large guard not being necessary, as the prisoners were not ordinary criminals, but for the most part men of some position, Roman citizens, doubtless, who had, like the Apostle, appealed unto the judgment of Caesar.[256] St. Paul embarked, accompanied by Luke and Aristarchus, as the s.h.i.+p, being an ordinary trading vessel, contained not only prisoners, but also pa.s.sengers as well. We do not intend to enter upon the details of St. Paul's voyage, because that lies beyond our range, and also because it has been thoroughly done in the various _Lives_ of the Apostle, and above all in the exhaustive work of Mr. James Smith of Jordanhills. He has devoted a volume to this one topic, has explored every source of knowledge, has entered into discussions touching the build and rigging of ancient s.h.i.+ps and the direction of Mediterranean winds, has minutely investigated the scenery and history of such places as Malta where the Apostle was wrecked, and has ill.u.s.trated the whole with beautiful plates and carefully drawn maps. That work has gone through four editions at least, and deserves a place in every man's library who wishes to understand the life and labours of St. Paul or study the Acts of the Apostles. We may, however, without trenching on Mr.

Smith's field, indicate the outline of the route followed by the holy travellers. They embarked at Caesarea under the care of a centurion of the Augustan cohort, or regiment, as we should say, whose name was Julius.[257] They took their pa.s.sage at first in a s.h.i.+p of Adramyttium, which was probably sailing from Caesarea to lie up for the winter. Adramyttium was a seaport situated up in the north-west of Asia Minor near Troas, and the Sea of Marmora, or, to put it in modern language, near Constantinople. The s.h.i.+p was, in fact, about to travel over exactly the same ground as St. Paul himself had traversed more than two years before when he proceeded from Troas to Jerusalem.

Surely, some one may say, this was not the direct route to Rome! But then we must throw ourselves back into the circ.u.mstances of the period. There was then no regular transport service. People, even the most exalted, had to avail themselves of whatever means of communication chance offered. Cicero, when chief governor of Asia, had, as we have already noted, to travel part of the way from Rome in undecked vessels, while ten years later than St. Paul's voyage the Emperor Vespasian himself, the greatest potentate in the world, had no trireme or wars.h.i.+p waiting upon him, but when he wished to proceed from Palestine to Rome at the time of the great siege of Jerusalem was obliged to take a pa.s.sage in an ordinary merchant vessel or corn s.h.i.+p.[258] It is no wonder, then, that the prisoners were put on board a coasting vessel of Asia, the centurion knowing right well that in sailing along by the various ports which studded the sh.o.r.e of that province they would find some other vessel into which they could be transferred. And this expectation was realised. The centurion and his prisoners sailed first of all to Sidon, where St. Paul found a Christian Church. This circ.u.mstance ill.u.s.trates again the quiet and steady growth of the gospel kingdom, and also gave Julius an opportunity of exhibiting his kindly feelings towards the Apostle by permitting him to go and visit the brethren. In fact, we would conclude from this circ.u.mstance that St. Paul had already begun to establish an influence over the mind of Julius which must have culminated in his conversion. Here, at Sidon, he permits him to visit his Christian friends; a short time after his regard for Paul leads him to restrain his troops from executing the merciless purposes their Roman discipline had taught them and slaying all the prisoners lest they should escape; and yet once again when the prisoners land on Italian soil and stand beside the charming scenery of the Bay of Naples he permits the Apostle to spend a week with the Christians of Puteoli. After this brief visit to the Sidonian Church, the vessel bearing the Apostle pursues its way by Cyprus to the port of Myra at the south-western corner of Asia Minor, a neighbourhood which St.

Paul knew right well and had often visited. It was there at Patara close at hand that he had embarked on board the vessel which carried him two years before to Palestine, and it was there too at Perga of Pamphylia that he had first landed on the sh.o.r.es of the Asiatic province seeking to gather its teeming millions into the fold of Jesus Christ. Here at Myra the centurion realised his expectations, and finding an Alexandrian transport sailing to Italy he put the prisoners on board. From Myra they seem to have sailed at once, and from the day they left it their misfortunes began. The wind was contrary, blowing from the west, and to make any way they had to sail to the island Cnidus, which lay north-west of Myra. After a time, when the wind became favourable, they sailed south-west till they reached the island of Crete, which lay half-way between Greece and Asia Minor. They then proceeded along the southern coast of this island till they were struck by a sudden wind coming from the north-east, which drove them first to the neighbouring island of Clauda, and then, after a fortnight's drifting through a tempestuous sea, hurled the s.h.i.+p upon the sh.o.r.es of Malta. The wreck took place towards the close of October or early in November, and the whole party were obliged to remain in Malta till the spring season permitted the opening of navigation.

During his stay in Malta St. Paul performed several miracles. With his intensely practical and helpful nature the Apostle flung himself into the work of common life, as soon as the s.h.i.+pwrecked party had got safe to land. He always did so. He never despised, like some religious fanatics, the duties of this world. On board the s.h.i.+p he had been the most useful adviser to the whole party. He had exhorted the captain of the s.h.i.+p not to leave a good haven; he had stirred up the soldiers to prevent the sailors' escape; he had urged them all alike, crew and pa.s.sengers and soldiers, to take food, foreseeing the terrible struggle they would have to make when the s.h.i.+p broke up. He was the most practical adviser his companions could possibly have had, and he was their wisest and most religious adviser too. His words on board s.h.i.+p teem with lessons for ourselves, as well as for his fellow-pa.s.sengers. He trusted in G.o.d, and received special revelations from heaven, but he did not therefore neglect every necessary human precaution. The will of G.o.d was revealed to him that he had been given all the souls that sailed with him, and the angel of G.o.d cheered and comforted him in that storm-driven vessel in Adria, as often before when howling mobs thirsted like evening wolves for his blood. But the knowledge of G.o.d's purposes did not cause his exertions to relax. He knew that G.o.d's promises are conditional upon man's exertions, and therefore he urged his companions to be fellow-workers with G.o.d in the matter of their own salvation from impending death. And as it was on board the s.h.i.+p, so was it on the sh.o.r.e. The rain was descending in torrents, and the drenched pa.s.sengers were s.h.i.+vering in the cold. St.

Paul shows the example, so contagious in a crowd, of a man who had his wits about him, knew what to do, and would do it. He gathered therefore a bundle of sticks, and helped to raise a larger fire in the house which had received him. A man is marvellously helpful among a cowering and panic-stricken crowd which has just escaped death who will rouse them to some practical efforts for themselves, and will lead the way as the Apostle did on this occasion. And his action brought its own reward. He had gained influence over the pa.s.sengers, soldiers, and crew by his practical helpfulness. He was now to gain influence over the barbarian islanders in exactly the same way. A viper issued from the fire and fastened on his hand. The natives expected to see him fall down dead; but after looking awhile and perceiving no change, they concluded him to be a G.o.d who had come to visit them. This report soon spread. The chief man therefore of the island sought out St. Paul and entertained him. His father was sick of dysentery and the Apostle healed him, using prayer and the imposition of hands as the outward symbols and means of the cure, which spread his fame still farther and led to other miraculous cures. Three months thus pa.s.sed away. No distinct missionary work is indeed recorded by St. Luke, but this is his usual custom in writing his narrative. He supposes that Theophilus, his friend and correspondent, will understand that the Apostle ever kept the great end of his life in view, never omitting to teach Christ and Him crucified to the peris.h.i.+ng mult.i.tudes where his lot was cast. But St. Luke was not one of those who are always attempting to chronicle spiritual successes or to tabulate the number of souls led to Christ. He left that to another day and to a better and more infallible judge. In three months' time, when February's days grew longer and milder winds began to blow, the rescued travellers joined a corn s.h.i.+p of Alexandria which had wintered in the island, and all set forward towards Rome. They touched at Syracuse in Sicily, sailed thence to Rhegium, pa.s.sing through the Straits of Messina, whence, a favourable south wind springing up, and the vessel running before it at the rate of seven knots an hour, the usual speed for ancient vessels under such circ.u.mstances, they arrived at Puteoli, one hundred and eighty-two miles distant from Rhegium, in the course of some thirty hours. At Puteoli the sea voyage ended. It may at first seem strange to us with our modern notions that St. Paul was allowed to tarry at Puteoli with the local Christian Church for seven days. But then we must remember that St. Paul and the centurion did not live in the days of telegraphs and railway trains. There was doubtless a guard-room, barrack or prison in which the prisoners could be accommodated. The centurion and guard were weary after a long and dangerous journey, and they would be glad of a brief period of repose before they set out again towards the capital. This hypothesis alone would be quite sufficient to account for the indulgence granted to St.

Paul, even supposing that his Christian teaching had made no impression on the centurion. The Church existing then at Puteoli is another instance of that quiet diffusion of the gospel which was going on all over the world without any noise or boasting. We have frequently called attention to this, as at Tyre, Ptolemais, Sidon, and here again we find a little company of saintly men and women gathered out of the world and living the ideal life of purity and faith beside the waters of the Bay of Naples. And yet it is quite natural that we should find them at Puteoli, because it was one of the great ports which received the corn s.h.i.+ps of Alexandria and the merchantmen of Caesarea and Antioch into her harbour, and in these s.h.i.+ps many a Christian came bringing the seed of eternal life which he diligently sowed as he travelled along the journey of life. In fact, seeing that the Church of Rome had sprung up and flourished so abundantly, taking its origin not from any apostle's teaching, but simply from such sporadic effects, we cannot wonder that Puteoli, which lay right on the road from the East to Rome, should also have gained a blessing.[259] A circ.u.mstance, however, has come to light within the last thirty years which does surprise us concerning this same neighbourhood, showing how extensively the gospel had permeated and honeycombed the country parts of Italy within the lifetime of the first apostles and disciples of Jesus Christ. Puteoli was a trading town, and Jews congregated in such places, and trade lends an element of seriousness to life which prepares a ground fitted for the good seed of the kingdom. But pleasure pure and unmitigated and a life devoted to its pursuit does not prepare such a soil. Puteoli was a trading city, but Pompeii was a pleasure-loving city thinking of nothing else, and where sin and iniquity consequently abounded. Yet Christianity had made its way into Pompeii in the lifetime of the apostles. How then do we know this? This is one of the results of modern archaeological investigations and of epigraphical research, two great sources of new light upon early Christian history which have been only of late years duly appreciated. Pompeii, as every person of moderate education knows, was totally overthrown by the first great eruption of Mount Vesuvius in the year 79 A.D. It is a curious circ.u.mstance that contemporaneous authors make but the very slightest and most dubious references to that destruction, though one would have thought that the literature of the time would have rung with it; proving conclusively, if proof be needed, how little the argument from silence is worth, when the great writers who tell minutely about the intrigues and vices of emperors and statesmen of Rome do not bestow a single chapter upon the catastrophe which overtook two whole cities of Italy.[260] These cities remained for seventeen hundred years concealed from human sight or knowledge till revealed in the year 1755 by excavations systematically pursued. All the inscriptions found therein were undoubtedly and necessarily the work of persons who lived before A.D. 79 and then perished. Now at the time that Pompeii was destroyed there was a munic.i.p.al election going on, and there were found on the walls numerous inscriptions formed with charcoal which were the subst.i.tutes then used for the literature and placards with which every election decorates our walls. Among these inscriptions of mere pa.s.sing and transitory interest, there was one found which ill.u.s.trates the point at which we have been labouring, for there, amid the election notices of 79 A.D., there appeared scribbled by some idle hand the brief words, "Igni gaude, Christiane" ("O Christian, rejoice in the fire"), proving clearly that Christians existed in Pompeii at that time, that they were known as Christians and not under any other appellation, that persecution and death had reached them, and that they possessed and displayed the same undaunted spirit as their great leader and teacher St. Paul, being enabled like him to rejoice even amid the sevenfold-heated fires, and in view of the resurrection life to lift the victorious paean, "Thanks be to G.o.d, which giveth us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ."[261]

[255] The governors brought with them regular bodies of a.s.sessors, who a.s.sisted them like a privy council. There is a reference to this council in Acts xxv. 12 and xxvi. 30. These councils served as training schools in law and statesmans.h.i.+p for the young Roman n.o.bility. See Marquardt, _l.c._, p. 391.

[256] Roman citizens had the right of appeal no matter where they were born or of what race they came or how humble their lot in life. Mere provincials devoid of citizens.h.i.+p, no matter how distinguished their position, had not that right.

[257] Julius is one of those unknown characters of Scripture about whom we would desire more information. He is described as a centurion of the Augustan band, which was the imperial guard, and was always stationed at Rome. Julius may possibly have been an officer of this guard sent out with Festus and now returning back to his duties.

[258] See Josephus, _Wars_, VII. ii. 1. It was exactly the same with t.i.tus, Vespasian's son, after the war ended. He travelled from Alexandria to Italy in a trading vessel. Suet., _t.i.t._, c. 5.

[259] The accuracy of the Acts in representing Puteoli as the seat of an early church has been amply ill.u.s.trated by modern investigations. Judaism was flouris.h.i.+ng there from the earliest times. In the year 4 B.C. a colony of wealthy Jews was established at Puteoli (Josephus, _Wars_, II. vii. 1). An inscription has been found there commemorating a Jewish merchant of Ascalon named Herod (Schurer's _Judisch. Volk._, I. 234).

[260] This point is elaborated by Mr. Cazenove in an article on the Theban Legion contained in the _Dictionary of Christian Biography_, iii. 642.

[261] This interesting inscription will be found in Mommsen, _Corpus of Latin Inscriptions_, vol. iv., No. 679. I described it in the _Contemporary Review_ for January 1881, p. 97, in an article on Latin Christian Inscriptions. This inscription fully bears out Lord Lytton in the picture he gives of the introduction of Christianity into the neighbourhood of Vesuvius and Naples in his _Last Days of Pompeii_.

After the week's rest at Puteoli the centurion marched towards Rome.

The Roman congregation had received notice of St. Paul's arrival by this time, and so the brethren despatched a deputation to meet an apostle with whom they were already well acquainted through the epistle he had sent them, as well as through the reports of various private Christians like Phbe, the deaconness of Cenchreae.[262] Two deputations from the Roman Church met him, one at Appii Forum, about thirty miles, another at the Three Taverns, about twenty miles, from the city. How wonderfully the heart of the Apostle must have been cheered by these kindly Christian attentions! We have before noticed in the cases of his Athenian sojourn and elsewhere how keenly alive he was to the offices of Christian friends.h.i.+p, how cheered and strengthened he was by Christian companions.h.i.+p. It was now the same once again as it was then. Support and sympathy were now more needed than ever before, for St. Paul was going up to Rome not knowing what should happen to him there or what should be his sentence at the hands of that emperor whose cruel character was now famous. And as it was at Athens and at Corinth and elsewhere, so was it here on the Appian Way and amid the depressing surroundings and unhealthy atmosphere of those Pomptine Marshes through which he was pa.s.sing; "when Paul saw the brethren, he thanked G.o.d, and took courage." And now the whole company of primitive Christians proceeded together to Rome, allowed doubtless by the courtesy and thoughtfulness of Julius ample opportunities of private conversation. Having arrived at the imperial city, the centurion hastened to present himself and his charge to the captain of the praetorian guard, whose duty it was to receive prisoners consigned to the judgment of the Emperor. Upon the favourable report of Julius, St. Paul was not detained in custody, but suffered to dwell in his own hired lodgings, where he established a mission station whence he laboured most effectively both amongst Jews and Gentiles during two whole years. St. Paul began his work at Rome exactly as he did everywhere else. He called together the chief of the Jews, and through them strove to gain a lodgment in the synagogue. He began work at once. After three days, as soon as he had recovered from the fatigue of the rapid march along the Appian Way, he sent for the chiefs of the Roman Synagogues which were very numerous.[263] How, it may be thought, could an unknown Jew entering Rome venture to summon the heads of the Jewish community, many of them men of wealth and position? But, then, we must remember that St. Paul was no ordinary Jew from the point of view taken by Roman society. He had arrived in Rome a state prisoner, and he was a Roman citizen of Jewish birth, and this at once gave him position ent.i.tling him to a certain amount of consideration. St. Paul told his story to these chief men of the Jews, the local Sanhedrin perhaps, recounted the bad treatment he had received at the hands of the Jews of Jerusalem, and indicated the character of his teaching which he wished to expound to them. "For this cause therefore did I entreat you to see and speak with me: for because of the hope of Israel I am bound with this chain," emphasizing the Hope of Israel, or their Messianic expectation, as the cause of his imprisonment, exactly as he had done some months before when pleading before King Agrippa (ch. xxvi. 6, 7, 22, 23). Having thus briefly indicated his desires, the Jewish council intimated that no communication had been made to them from Jerusalem about St. Paul. It may have been that his lengthened imprisonment at Caesarea had caused the Sanhedrin to relax their vigilance, though we see that their hostility still continued as bitter as ever when Festus arrived in Jerusalem and afterwards led to St. Paul's appeal; or perhaps they had not had time to forward a communication from the Jerusalem Sanhedrin to the Jewish authorities at Rome; or perhaps, which is the most likely of all, they thought it useless to prosecute their suit before Nero, who would scoff at the real charges which dealt merely with questions of Jewish customs, and which imperial lawyers therefore would regard as utterly unworthy the imprisonment or death of a Roman citizen. At any rate the Jewish council gave him a hearing, when St.

Paul followed exactly the same lines as in the synagogue at Antioch of Pisidia and in his speech before Agrippa. He pointed out the gradual development of G.o.d's purposes in the law and the prophets, showing how they had been all fulfilled in Jesus Christ. It was with the Jews at Rome as with the Jews elsewhere. Some believed and some believed not as Paul preached unto them. The meeting was much more one for discussion than for addresses. From morning till evening the disputation continued, till at last the Apostle dismissed them with the stern words of the Prophet Isaiah, taken from the sixth chapter of his prophecy, where he depicts the hopeless state of those who obstinately close their ears to the voice of conviction. But the Jews of Rome do not seem to have been like those of Thessalonica, Ephesus, Corinth, and Jerusalem in one respect. They did not actively oppose St. Paul or attempt to silence him by violent means, for the last glimpse we get of the Apostle in St. Luke's narrative is this: "He abode two whole years in his own hired dwelling, and received all that went in unto him, preaching the kingdom of G.o.d, and teaching the things concerning the Lord Jesus Christ with all boldness, none forbidding him."[264]

[262] Romans xvi. is a sufficient witness of the intimate knowledge of the Roman Church and its members.h.i.+p possessed by St.

Paul. We may be sure that many mentioned in that catalogue written three or four years before found a place in the two deputations who went to meet St. Paul.

[263] See for proof of this Harnack's article in the _Princeton Review_, quoted above.

[264] The various biographies of the Apostle, and specially that of Conybeare & Howson, follow the Apostle's history in great detail during these two years; but the story of that period more properly falls under the consideration of the writers upon the Epistles of the Captivity than of one dealing with the Acts of the Apostles. If I were to discuss St. Paul's life at Rome I should have simply to borrow all my details from these Epistles. The abruptness of St. Luke's termination of his narrative is very noteworthy, and the best proof of the early date of the Acts. I do not think I need add anything to Dr. Salmon's argument on this point contained in the following words, which I take from chap.

xviii. of his _Introduction_: "To my mind the simplest explanation why St. Luke has told us no more is, that he knew no more; and that he knew no more, because at the time nothing more had happened--in other words, that the book of the Acts was written a little more than two years after Paul's arrival in Rome."