The History of Christianity - John S. C. Abbott (bookstand for reading .txt) 📗

Luke adds, “And, when he had thus spoken, he kneeled down, and prayed with them all. And they all wept sore, and fell on Paul’s neck, and kissed him; sorrowing most of all for the words which he spake, that they should see his face no more. And they accompanied him unto the ship.”153

Sailing by the Islands of Coos and Rhodes, without stopping, they landed at Patara, a small seaport in the province of Lycia, on the southern coast of Asia Minor. Here Paul took another vessel, and leaving the island on the left, after a voyage of about three hundred and forty miles, landed at Tyre, in Syria. There was a church in Tyre; and Paul remained with the Christians there a week while the ship was discharging its cargo. The brethren, conscious of the danger he would encounter in Jerusalem, urged him not to go there; but Paul was fixed in his purpose. When the time came for the ship to sail again, the brethren, with their wives and children, accompanied him to the shore. There, upon the sandy beach, they knelt down, and commended the heroic and beloved apostle to the protection of God. From Tyre the ship sailed along the coast of Syria to Ptolemais, the celebrated Jean d’Acre of modern history. The distance between the two places was about thirty miles. Here Paul was again refreshed by the society of the disciples whom he found there, and with whom he remained but one day.

Paul left the ship at Ptolemais, and continuing the journey by land, a distance of thirty or forty miles, reached Cæsarea. Philip the evangelist—one of the seven deacons chosen by the church in Jerusalem, to whom we have been before introduced as teaching and baptizing the eunuch on the road by Gaza, towards Egypt—resided in Cæsarea. His family consisted of four daughters, who were very earnest Christians, and who were endowed with the prophetic spirit. Paul remained for several days the guest of that Christian family.

While residing there, a certain prophet, by the name of Agabus,—the same who had previously predicted “that there should be a great dearth throughout all the world,”154—came to Cæsarea. Agabus, using the imagery of action so common with the prophets, took Paul’s girdle, bound it around his own hands and feet, and said,—

“Thus saith the Holy Ghost: So shall the Jews at Jerusalem bind the man to whom this girdle belongs, and they shall deliver him into the hands of the Gentiles.”155

The Christian friends of Paul at Cæsarea, when they heard this prophetic announcement, entreated him with the most earnest supplication, and even with tears, not to go up to Jerusalem, and thus place himself at the mercy of these cruel and inveterate foes. But Paul replied,—

“What mean ye to weep and to break mine heart? for I am ready not to be bound only, but also to die at Jerusalem for the name of the Lord Jesus.”

Luke, who still accompanied Paul, adds, “And, when he would not be persuaded, we ceased, saying, The will of the Lord be done.”

Paul, with the companions who had attended him from Macedonia, and accompanied by several Christians from Cæsarea, went up to Jerusalem, and took up his residence at the house of Mnason, one of the early converts to Christianity.

Thus we have accompanied Paul on his last recorded journey to Jerusalem. It was a journey full of incident; and it is related more minutely than any other portion of his travels. We know all the places by which he passed, or at which he staid; and we are able to connect them all with familiar recollections of history. We know, too, all the aspects of the scenery. He sailed along those coasts of Western Asia, and among those famous islands, the beauty of which is proverbial. The very time of the year is known to us: it was when the advancing season was clothing every low shore and the edge of every broken cliff with a beautiful and refreshing verdure; when the winter storms had ceased to be dangerous, and the small vessels could ply safely in shade and sunshine between the neighboring ports. Even the state of the weather and the direction of the wind are known.

We can point to the places on the map where the vessel anchored for the night, and trace across the chart the track that was followed when the moon was full. Yet more than this: we are made fully aware of the state of the apostle’s mind, and of the burdened feeling under which this journey was accomplished. The expression of this feeling strikes us the more from its contrast with all the outward circumstances of the voyage. He sailed in the finest season, by the brightest coasts, and in the fairest weather; and yet his mind was occupied with forebodings of evil from first to last, so that a peculiar shade of sadness is thrown over the whole narration.156

Paul, like his divine Master, was “a man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief.” The sins and sufferings of humanity oppressed his soul. Throughout all his epistles, we see indications of the pensive spirit with which he regarded the sublime and awful tragedy of time and sin.

Upon the arrival of the apostle in Jerusalem, he was very cordially received by the brethren. Knowing that he had many enemies even among the Christians there, who demanded that the Gentile converts should be brought into subjection to all the rites of Judaism, his dejected spirit must have been much cheered by this affectionate greeting. The disciples in Jerusalem, consisting of converted Jews and converted Gentiles, now counted their numbers by thousands. They were necessarily divided into many local churches. There was an immediate gathering of the pastors of these churches to hear Paul’s report of the success of his extended missionary tour. James, who had presided at the general council held in Jerusalem several years before, seems also to have presided at this meeting. Paul “declared particularly what things God had wrought among the Gentiles by his ministry.” The majority were very favorably impressed by his address, and “glorified the Lord.” They, however, said to him,—

“Thou seest, brother, how many thousands of Jews there are which believe; and they are all zealous of the law: and they are informed of thee, that thou teachest all the Jews which are among the Gentiles to forsake Moses, saying that they ought not to circumcise their children, neither to walk after the customs.”

They therefore urged, that as it was impossible but that his arrival should be known, and that it would call the Christians together to hear from him, he should do something to refute these calumnies, and disarm hostility. They therefore suggested that he should take charge of four Jewish Christians who were under a vow, accompany them to the temple, and pay for them the necessary charges. This would prove that Paul, so far as the Jews were concerned, still respected the law of Moses. As to the Gentile converts, they reiterated the advice given by the council. Paul, who had laid it down as his principle, that to the Jew he would become a Jew, and to the Gentile a Gentile, that he might win all to Christ, accepted this suggestion. He was ready to accept or reject mere outward observances as expediency might dictate. In his view, circumcision was nothing, and uncircumcision nothing, but faith that worketh by love.

The next day was the great feast of Pentecost. Jerusalem was crowded with Jews from all parts of Syria, and even from remoter lands. Those who had already persecuted Paul on his missionary tour were there, ready to renew their violence. When Paul entered the temple with the men who had taken the vow, they sprang upon him, seized him, and cried out,—

“Men of Israel, help! This is the man that teacheth all men everywhere against the people, and the law, and this place; and, further, brought Greeks also into the temple, and hath polluted this holy place.”157

A terrible mob was at once excited among the fanatic Jews. They seized Paul, dragged him out of the temple, and were about to kill him in the streets, when the chief captain in command of the Roman garrison heard of the uproar. Placing himself at the head of a band of soldiers, he assailed the mob, rescued Paul, chained him by each wrist to a soldier, and then inquired what he had done that they were thus beating him. The tumult and uproar were such, “some crying one thing, and some another,” that no definite charge could be heard.

The captain, Claudius Lysias, supposing Paul to be a renowned Egyptian rebel and a guilty disturber of the peace, ordered his prisoner to be led to the barracks within the fortress. The crowd followed, shouting, “Away with him!” The pressure of the throng was so great, that, when they reached the great staircase leading up into the castled fortress, Paul was borne by the soldiers up the steps. When the prisoner reached the top of the stairs, whence he had a clear view of the angry, surging mob below, he turned to Lysias, and, addressing him in Greek, inquired, “May I speak unto thee?” Lysias was astonished to hear him speak in Greek, and said,—

“Art thou not that Egyptian which before these days madest an uproar, and leddest out into the wilderness four thousand men that were murderers?”

Paul replied, “I am a man which am a Jew of Tarsus, a city in Cilicia, a citizen of no mean city; and, I beseech thee, suffer me to speak unto the people.”

Obtaining permission, he waved his hand to obtain silence, and then, addressing the Jewish multitude in the Hebrew language, gave them quite a minute account of his past history, his persecution of the Christians, and his miraculous conversion to that faith which he once endeavored to destroy. But, when he announced that the Lord Jesus had said to him, “Depart, for I will send thee far hence unto the Gentiles,” the rage of the fanatic Jews was roused to the highest pitch. With united voice they cried out,—

“Away with such a fellow from the earth! it is not fit that he should live.”

As they were shouting and gesticulating with the most violent expressions of ferocity, Lysias ordered him to be led into the fortress, and, in accordance with the infamous practice of the times, to be examined by scourging, to see what confession bodily agony would thus extort from him. As they were binding him to the whipping-post, Paul said to the centurion who was superintending the operation,—

“Is it lawful for you to scourge a man that is a Roman, and uncondemned?”

The remark was immediately reported to Lysias. He, upon questioning Paul, ordered him to be unbound; and the heroic prisoner passed the night in one of the cells of the fortress. The next day, Lysias summoned a council of the chief priests, and brought Paul before them, that he might learn of him of what crimes he was accused. He was put upon his defence without any charge being brought against him. Ananias, the high priest, a brutal wretch, presided. As Paul, commencing his defence, modestly said, “Men and brethren, I have lived in all good conscience before God until this day,” the infamous judge was so enraged, that he ordered those standing near to smite him on the mouth.

Saint as Paul was, this brutal outrage roused his indignation; and he exclaimed, “God shall smite thee, thou whited wall; for sittest thou to judge me after the law, and commandest me to be smitten contrary to the law?”

Some one who stood by said, “Revilest thou the high priest?”

Paul,