CHAPTER II.
THE ORIGIN OF ST. PAUL
1. PAUL’S NATIONALITY. In the growth of Christianity we observe that all the threads of development which had been formed in the life of the great races of older history are gathered together into one complex whole. Hence we have just the same assurance of the truth of Christianity that we have of the trustworthiness of earlier history: the earlier works into the later, the later grows out of the earlier, in such a way that all must be taken together. The correspondence is in itself a guarantee of truth. Each exists for the other: each derives its full comprehensibility from the other. We must accept the general outline of early history as a whole, or we must reject it as a whole on the plea of insufficient evidence. There is not a fact of early history, whether Christian or pre-Christian, which is not susceptible of being disputed with a fair show of rational and logical argument: the evidence is nowhere such as would convince a man whose mind is made up against the trustworthiness of ancient history. Let any one test the evidence for any point in regard to the battles of Salamis or of Marathon; and he will find that everywhere he is reduced to a balance of evidence, and frequently to a balance so delicate that no one can feel any assured confidence on the point. Yet
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our confidence in the general facts regarding each battle and its results is not, as a rule, affected by our uncertainty as to the details. Doubtless there will always be some who argue that the trustworthiness of the whole must be proportionate to the trustworthiness of the parts, and conclude that, where all details are so uncertain, the whole is unworthy of study; and those who cannot see—or rather feel—for themselves the fallacy of the argument will not be convinced by any reasoning that can be adduced. But for those who do not adopt the extreme agnostic position, there is no other logical position except that of accepting the. general scheme of ancient history, in which Christianity is the crowning factor that gives unity and rational plan to the whole.
The life of Paul partakes of the uncertainty that envelopes all ancient history. As regards every detail we shall find ourselves in the position of balancing evidence; as to almost every detail we shall find ourselves amid a bewildering variety of opposite opinion and assertion among modern scholars of every school and shade; and, strangest of all, in regard to two or three points where there exists the nearest approach to a general agreement between all the various schools, we shall find ourselves unable to agree. Owing to the peculiar character of the evidence, we shall find it best to begin in the middle of Paul’s life and study the events of the years 44 to 61, and thereafter to sketch in outline the first half of his life.
At present, however, we must emphasise the complex influences amid which Paul grew up. According to the law of his country, he was first of all a Roman citizen. That character superseded all others before the law and
SEC 1. Paul's Nationality
in the general opinion of society; and placed him amid the aristocracy of any provincial town. In the first century, when the citizenship was still jealously guarded, the civitas may be taken as a proof that his family was one of distinction and at least moderate wealth. It also implies that there was in the surroundings amid which he grew up, a certain attitude of friendliness to the Imperial government (for the new citizens in general, and the Jewish citizens in particular, were warm partisans of their protector, the new Imperial regime), and also of pride in a possession that ensured distinction and rank and general respect in Tarsus. As a Roman, Paul had a nomen and prænomen, probably taken from the Roman officer who gave his family civitas; but Luke, a Greek, had no interest in Roman names. Paulus, his cognomen, was not determined by his nomen: there is no reason to think he was an Æmilius (as some suggest).
Paul was, in the second place, a “Tarsian, a citizen of a distinguished city” (XXI 39, IX 11). He was not merely a person born in Tarsus, owing to the accident of his family being there: he had a citizen’s rights in Tarsus. We may confidently assume that Paul was careful to keep within demonstrable law and custom, when he claimed to be a Tarsian citizen in describing himself to the Tribune. According to the strict interpretation of the Roman law, the civitas superseded all other citizenship, but this theoretical exclusiveness was opposed to the Imperial spirit; and it is clear that Roman cives in a provincial city commonly filled the position of high-class citizens, and even had magistracies pressed upon them by general consent. Now, if Paul’s family had merely emigrated to Tarsus from Judæa some years
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before his birth, neither he nor his father would have been “Tarsians,” but merely “residents” (incolæ). It is probable, but not certain, that the family had been planted in Tarsus with full rights as part of a colony settled there by one of the Seleucid kings in order to strengthen their hold on the city. Such a re-foundation took place at Tarsus, for the name Antiocheia was given it under Antiochus IV (175–164 B.C.). The Seleucid kings seem to have had a preference for Jewish colonists in their foundations in Asia Minor. Citizenship in Tarsus might also have been presented to Paul’s father or grandfather for distinguished services to the State; but that is much less probable.
In the third place, Paul was “a Hebrew sprung from Hebrews “. The expression is a remarkable one. It is used not to a Jewish audience, but to a Greek Church (Phil. III 5), and it is similar to a familiar expression among the Greeks: “a priest sprung from priests” is a term commonly applied to members of the great sacerdotal families which play so important a part in the society of Asian cities. He was a Jew at least as much as he was a Tarsian and a Roman, as regards his early surroundings; and it is obvious that the Jewish side of his nature and education proved infinitely the most important, as his character developed. But it is a too common error to ignore the other sides. Many interpreters seem to think only of his words, XXII 3, “I am a Jew born in Tarsus,” and to forget that he said a few moments before, “I am a Jew, a Tarsian, a citizen of no mean city”. To the Hebrews he emphasises his Jewish character, and his birth in Tarsus is added as an accident: but to Claudius Lysias, a
SEC 1. Paul's Nationality
Greek-Roman, he emphasises his Tarsian citizenship (after having old of his Roman citizenship). Now, there is no inconsistency between these descriptions of himself. Most of us have no difficulty in understanding that a Jew at the present day may be a thoroughly patriotic English citizen, and yet equally proud of his ancient and honourable origin. In the extraordinarily mixed society of the Eastern provinces, it was the usual rule in educated society that each man had at least two nationalities and two sides to his character. If we would clearly understand the society in which Paul worked, and the mission of Rome to make the idea of cosmopolitanism and universal citizenship a practical reality—an idea that had been first conceived by the Stoic philosophy in its attempt to fuse Greek and oriental thought into a unified system—we must constantly bear in mind that double or even triple character, which was so common.
To the Hebrew of that period it was specially easy to preserve the Hebraic side of his life along with his Greek citizenship; for the Jewish colony in a Seleucid city preserved as a body its double character. It was not merely a part of the city,