| Paul
= Saul (q.v.) was born about the same time as our Lord. His
circumcision-name was Saul, and probably the name Paul was also given to
him in infancy "for use in the Gentile world," as
"Saul" would be his Hebrew home-name.
He was a native of Tarsus, the capital of Cilicia, a Roman province in
the south-east of Asia Minor. That city stood on the banks of the river
Cydnus, which was navigable thus far; hence it became a centre of
extensive commercial traffic with many countries along the shores of the
Mediterranean, as well as with the countries of central Asia Minor. It
thus became a city distinguished for the wealth of its
inhabitants. Tarsus was also the seat of a famous university,
higher in reputation even than the universities of Athens and
Alexandria, the only others that then existed. Here Saul was born, and
here he spent his youth, doubtless enjoying the best education his
native city could afford.
His father was of the straitest sect of the Jews, a Pharisee, of the
tribe of Benjamin, of pure and unmixed Jewish blood #Ac
23:6 Php 3:5 We learn nothing regarding his mother; but there is
reason to conclude that she was a pious woman, and that, like-minded
with her husband, she exercised all a mother influence in moulding the
character of her son, so that he could afterwards speak of himself as
being, from his youth up, "touching the righteousness which is in
the law, blameless" #Php 3:6 We read
of his sister and his sister’s son #Ac 23:16
and of other relatives #Ro 16:7,11,12
Though a Jew, his father was a Roman citizen. How he obtained this
privilege we are not informed. "It might be bought, or won by
distinguished service to the state, or acquired in several other ways;
at all events, his son was freeborn. It was a valuable privilege, and
one that was to prove of great use to Paul, although not in the way in
which his father might have been expected to desire him to make use of
it." Perhaps the most natural career for the youth to follow was
that of a merchant. "But it was decided that...he should go to
college and become a rabbi, that is, a minister, a teacher, and a lawyer
all in one."
According to Jewish custom, however, he learned a trade before entering
on the more direct preparation for the sacred profession. The trade he
acquired was the making of tents from goats’ hair cloth, a trade which
was one of the commonest in Tarsus. His preliminary
education having been completed, Saul was sent, when about thirteen
years of age probably, to the great Jewish school of sacred learning at
Jerusalem as a student of the law. Here he became a pupil of the
celebrated rabbi Gamaliel, and here he spent many years in an elaborate
study of the Scriptures and of the many questions concerning them with
which the rabbis exercised themselves.
During these years of diligent study he lived "in all good
conscience," unstained by the vices of that great city. After the
period of his student-life expired, he probably left Jerusalem for
Tarsus, where he may have been engaged in connection with some synagogue
for some years. But we find him back again at Jerusalem very soon after
the death of our Lord. Here he now learned the particulars regarding the
crucifixion, and the rise of the new sect of the "Nazarenes."
For some two years after Pentecost, Christianity was quietly spreading
its influence in Jerusalem. At length Stephen, one of the seven deacons,
gave forth more public and aggressive testimony that Jesus was the
Messiah, and this led to much excitement among the Jews and much
disputation in their synagogues. Persecution arose against Stephen and
the followers of Christ generally, in which Saul of Tarsus took a
prominent part. He was at this time probably a member of the great
Sanhedrin, and became the active leader in the furious persecution by
which the rulers then sought to exterminate Christianity. But the object
of this persecution also failed. "They that were scattered abroad
went everywhere preaching the word." The anger of the persecutor
was thereby kindled into a fiercer flame.
Hearing that fugitives had taken refuge in Damascus, he obtained from
the chief priest letters authorizing him to proceed thither on his
persecuting career. This was a long journey of about 130 miles, which
would occupy perhaps six days, during which, with his few attendants, he
steadily went onward, "breathing out threatenings and
slaughter." But the crisis of his life was at hand. He had reached
the last stage of his journey, and was within sight of Damascus. As he
and his companions rode on, suddenly at mid-day a brilliant light shone
round them, and Saul was laid prostrate in terror on the ground, a voice
sounding in his ears, "Saul, Saul, why persecutest thou me?"
The risen Saviour was there, clothed in the vesture of his glorified
humanity. In answer to the anxious inquiry of the stricken persecutor,
"Who art thou, Lord?" he said, "I am Jesus whom thou
persecutest" #Ac 9:5 22:8 26:15 This
was the moment of his conversion, the most solemn in all his life.
Blinded by the dazzling light #Ac 9:8 his
companions led him into the city, where, absorbed in deep thought for
three days, he neither ate nor drank #Ac 9:11
Ananias, a disciple living in Damascus, was informed by a vision of the
change that had happened to Saul, and was sent to him to open his eyes
and admit him by baptism into the Christian church #Ac
9:11-16
The whole purpose of his life was now permanently changed. Immediately
after his conversion he retired into the solitudes of Arabia #Ga
1:17 perhaps of "Sinai in Arabia," for the purpose,
probably, of devout study and meditation on the marvellous revelation
that had been made to him. "A veil of thick darkness hangs over
this visit to Arabia. Of the scenes among which he moved, of the
thoughts and occupations which engaged him while there, of all the
circumstances of a crisis which must have shaped the whole tenor of his
after-life, absolutely nothing is known. ‘Immediately,’ says St.
Paul, ‘I went away into Arabia.’ The historian passes
over the incident [comp. #Ac 9:23 1Ki 11:38,39
It is a mysterious pause, a moment of suspense, in the apostle’s
history, a breathless calm, which ushers in the tumultuous storm of his
active missionary life."
Coming back, after three years, to Damascus, he began to preach the
gospel "boldly in the name of Jesus" #Ac
9:27 but was soon obliged to flee #Ac 9:25
2Co 11:33 from the Jews and betake himself to Jerusalem. Here he
tarried for three weeks, but was again forced to flee #Ac
9:28,29 from persecution. He now returned to his
native Tarsus #Ga 1:21 where, for probably
about three years, we lose sight of him. The time had not yet come
for his entering on his great life-work of preaching the gospel to the
Gentiles.
At length the city of Antioch, the capital of Syria, became the scene of
great Christian activity. There the gospel gained a firm footing, and
the cause of Christ prospered. Barnabas (q.v.), who had been sent from
Jerusalem to superintend the work at Antioch, found it too much for him,
and remembering Saul, he set out to Tarsus to seek for him. He readily
responded to the call thus addressed to him, and came down to Antioch,
which for "a whole year" became the scene of his labours,
which were crowned with great success.
The disciples now, for the first time, were called
"Christians" #Ac 11:26 The church
at Antioch now proposed to send out missionaries to the Gentiles, and
Saul and Barnabas, with John Mark as their attendant, were chosen for
this work. This was a great epoch in the history of the church. Now the
disciples began to give effect to the Master’s command: "Go ye
into all the world, and preach the gospel to every creature."
The three missionaries went forth on the first missionary tour. They
sailed from Seleucia, the seaport of Antioch, across to Cyprus, some 80
miles to the south-west. Here at Paphos, Sergius Paulus, the Roman
proconsul, was converted, and now Saul took the lead, and was ever
afterwards called Paul.
The missionaries now crossed to the mainland, and then proceeded 6 or 7
miles up the river Cestrus to Perga #Ac 13:13
where John Mark deserted the work and returned to Jerusalem. The two
then proceeded about 100 miles inland, passing through Pamphylia,
Pisidia, and Lycaonia. The towns mentioned in this tour are the Pisidian
Antioch, where Paul delivered his first address of which we have any
record #Ac 13:16-51 comp. #Ac
10:30-43 Iconium, Lystra, and Derbe.
They returned by the same route to see and encourage the converts they
had made, and ordain elders in every city to watch over the churches
which had been gathered. From Perga they sailed direct for Antioch, from
which they had set out. After remaining "a long time,"
probably till A.D. 50 or 51 in Antioch, a great controversy broke out in
the church there regarding the relation of the Gentiles to the Mosaic
law.
For the purpose of obtaining a settlement of this question, Paul and
Barnabas were sent as deputies to consult the church at Jerusalem. The
council or synod which was there held #Ac 15:1ff.
decided against the Judaizing party; and the deputies, accompanied by
Judas and Silas, returned to Antioch, bringing with them the decree of
the council.
After a short rest at Antioch, Paul said to Barnabas: "Let us go
again and visit our brethren in every city where we have preached the
word of the Lord, and see how they do." Mark proposed again to
accompany them; but Paul refused to allow him to go. Barnabas was
resolved to take Mark, and thus he and Paul had a sharp contention. They
separated, and never again met. Paul, however, afterwards speaks with
honour of Barnabas, and sends for Mark to come to him at Rome #Col
4:10 2Ti 4:11
Paul took with him Silas, instead of Barnabas, and began his second
missionary journey about A.D. 51 This time he went by land, revisiting
the churches he had already founded in Asia. But he longed to enter into
"regions beyond," and still went forward through Phrygia and
Galatia #Ac 16:6 Contrary to his intention,
he was constrained to linger in Galatia (q.v.), on account of some
bodily affliction #Ga 4:13,14 Bithynia, a
populous province on the shore of the Black Sea, lay now before him, and
he wished to enter it; but the way was shut, the Spirit in some manner
guiding him in another direction, till he came down to the shores of the
Ægean and arrived at Troas, on the north-western coast of Asia Minor #Ac
16:8 Of this long journey from Antioch to Troas we have no
account except some references to it in his Epistle to the Galatians #Ga
4:13
As he waited at Troas for indications of the will of God as to his
future movements, he saw, in the vision of the night, a man from the
opposite shores of Macedonia standing before him, and heard him cry,
"Come over, and help us" #Ac 16:9
Paul recognized in this vision a message from the Lord, and the very
next day set sail across the Hellespont, which separated him from
Europe, and carried the tidings of the gospel into the Western world. In
Macedonia, churches were planted in Philippi, Thessalonica, and Berea.
Leaving this province, Paul passed into Achaia, "the paradise of
genius and renown." He reached Athens, but quitted it after,
probably, a brief sojourn #Ac 17:17-31 The
Athenians had received him with cold disdain, and he never visited that
city again. He passed over to Corinth, the seat of the Roman government
of Achaia, and remained there a year and a half, labouring with much
success. While at Corinth, he wrote his two epistles to the church of
Thessalonica, his earliest apostolic letters, and then sailed for Syria,
that he might be in time to keep the feast of Pentecost at Jerusalem.
He was accompanied by Aquila and Priscilla, whom he left at Ephesus, at
which he touched, after a voyage of thirteen or fifteen days. He landed
at Caesarea, and went up to Jerusalem, and having "saluted the
church" there, and kept the feast, he left for Antioch, where he
abode "some time" #Ac 18:20-23
He then began his third missionary tour. He journeyed by land in the
"upper coasts" (the more eastern parts) of Asia Minor, and at
length made his way to Ephesus, where he tarried for no less than three
years, engaged in ceaseless Christian labour. "This city was at the
time the Liverpool of the Mediterranean. It possessed a splendid harbour,
in which was concentrated the traffic of the sea which was then the
highway of the nations; and as Liverpool has behind her the great towns
of Lancashire, so had Ephesus behind and around her such cities as those
mentioned along with her in the epistles to the churches in the book of
Revelation, Smyrna, Pergamos, Thyatira, Sardis, Philadelphia, and
Laodicea. It was a city of vast wealth, and it was given over to every
kind of pleasure, the fame of its theatres and race-course being
world-wide" (Stalker’s Life of St. Paul). Here a "great door
and effectual" was opened to the apostle. His fellow-labourers
aided him in his work, carrying the gospel to Colosse and Laodicea and
other places which they could reach.
Very shortly before his departure from Ephesus, the apostle wrote his First
Epistle to the Corinthians (q.v.). The silversmiths, whose
traffic in the little images which they made was in danger organized a
riot against Paul, and he left the city, and proceeded to Troas #2Co
2:12 whence after some time he went to meet Titus in Macedonia.
Here, in consequence of the report Titus brought from Corinth, he wrote
his second epistle to that church.
Having spent probably most of the summer and autumn in Macedonia,
visiting the churches there, specially the churches of Philippi,
Thessalonica, and Berea, probably penetrating into the interior, to the
shores of the Adriatic #Ro 15:19 he then
came into Greece, where he abode three month, spending probably the
greater part of this time in Corinth #Ac 20:2
During his stay in this city he wrote his Epistle
to the Galatians, and also the great
Epistle to the Romans.
At the end of the three months he left Achaia for Macedonia, thence
crossed into Asia Minor, and touching at Miletus, there addressed the
Ephesian presbyters, whom he had sent for to meet him #Ac
20:17 and then sailed for Tyre, finally reaching Jerusalem,
probably in the spring of A.D. 58 While at Jerusalem, at the feast of
Pentecost, he was almost murdered by a Jewish mob in the temple.
Rescued from their violence by the Roman commandant, he was conveyed as
a prisoner to Caesarea, where, from various causes, he was detained a
prisoner for two years in Herod’s praetorium #Ac
23:35 "Paul was not kept in close confinement; he had at
least the range of the barracks in which he was detained. There we can
imagine him pacing the ramparts on the edge of the Mediterranean, and
gazing wistfully across the blue waters in the direction of Macedonia,
Achaia, and Ephesus, where his spiritual children were pining for him,
or perhaps encountering dangers in which they sorely needed his
presence. It was a mysterious providence which thus arrested his
energies and condemned the ardent worker to inactivity; yet we can now
see the reason for it. Paul was needing rest.
After twenty years of incessant evangelization, he required leisure to
garner the harvest of experience...During these two years he wrote
nothing; it was a time of internal mental activity and silent
progress" (Stalker’s Life of St. Paul). At the end of these two
years Felix (q.v.) was succeeded in the governorship of Palestine by
Porcius Festus, before whom the apostle was again heard. But judging it
right at this crisis to claim the privilege of a Roman citizen, he
appealed to the emperor #Ac 25:11 Such an
appeal could not be disregarded, and Paul was at once sent on to Rome
under the charge of one Julius, a centurion of the "Augustan
cohort."
After a long and perilous voyage, he at length reached the imperial city
in the early spring, probably, of A.D. 61 Here he was permitted to
occupy his own hired house, under constant military custody. This
privilege was accorded to him, no doubt, because he was a Roman citizen,
and as such could not be put into prison without a trial. The soldiers
who kept guard over Paul were of course changed at frequent intervals,
and thus he had the opportunity of preaching the gospel to many of them
during these "two whole years," and with the blessed result of
spreading among the imperial guards, and even in Caesar’s household,
an interest in the truth #Php 1:13 His
rooms were resorted to by many anxious inquirers, both Jews and Gentiles
#Ac 28:23,30,31 and thus his imprisonment
"turned rather to the furtherance of the gospel," and his
"hired house" became the centre of a gracious influence which
spread over the whole city.
According to a Jewish tradition, it was situated on the borders of the
modern Ghetto, which has been the Jewish quarters in Rome from the time
of Pompey to the present day. During this period the apostle wrote his epistles
to the Colossians, Ephesians, Philippians, and to Philemon, and probably
also to the Hebrews.
This first imprisonment came at length to a close, Paul having been
acquitted, probably because no witnesses appeared against him. Once more
he set out on his missionary labors, probably visiting western and
eastern Europe and Asia Minor. During this period of freedom he wrote
his First Epistle to Timothy and his Epistle to
Titus. The year of his release was signalized by the burning of
Rome, which Nero saw fit to attribute to the Christians.
A fierce persecution now broke out against the Christians. Paul was
sized, and once more conveyed to Rome a prisoner. During this
imprisonment he probably wrote the Second Epistle
to Timothy, the last he ever wrote. "There can be little
doubt that he appeared again at Nero’s bar, and this time the charge
did not break down. In all history there is not a more startling
illustration of the irony of human life than this scene of Paul at the
bar of Nero. On the judgment-seat, clad in the imperial purple, sat a
man who, in a bad world, had attained the eminence of being the very
worst and meanest being in it, a man stained with every crime, a man
whose whole being was so steeped in every nameable and un nameable vice,
that body and soul of him were, as some one said at the time, nothing
but a compound of mud and blood; and in the prisoner’s dock stood the
best man the world possessed, his hair whitened with labors for the good
of men and the glory of God.
The trial ended: Paul was condemned, and delivered over to the
executioner. He was led out of the city, with a crowd of the lowest
rabble at his heels. The fatal spot was reached; he knelt beside the
block; the headsman’s axe gleamed in the sun and fell; and the head of
the apostle of the world rolled down in the dust" (probably A.D.
66) four years before the fall of Jerusalem.
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