'And it came to pass, that, when I was come again to Jerusalem, even
while I prayed in the Temple, I was in a trance; 18. And saw Him saying
unto me, Make haste, and get thee quickly out of Jerusalem: for they
will not receive thy testimony concerning Me. 19. And I said, Lord,
they know that I imprisoned and beat in every synagogue them that
believed on Thee: 20. And when the blood of Thy martyr Stephen was
shed, I also was standing by, and consenting unto his death, and kept
the raiment of them that slew him. 21. And He said unto me, Depart: for
I will send thee far hence unto the Gentiles. 22. And they gave him
audience unto this word, and then lifted up their voices, and said,
Away with such a fellow from the earth: for it is not fit that he
should live. 23. And as they cried out, and cast off their clothes, and
threw dust into the air, 24. The chief captain commanded him to be
brought into the castle, and bade that he should be examined by
scourging; that he might know wherefore they cried so against him. 25.
And as they bound him with thongs, Paul said unto the centurion that
stood by, Is it lawful for you to scourge a man that is a Roman, and
uncondemned? 26. When the centurion heard that, he went and told the
chief captain, saying, Take heed what thou doest: for this man is a
Roman. 27. Then the chief captain came, and said, Tell me, art thou a
Roman? He said, Yea. 28. And the chief captain answered, With a great
sum obtained I this freedom. And Paul said, But I was free born. 29.
Then straightway they departed from him which should have examined him:
and the chief captain also was afraid, after he knew that he was a
Roman, and because he had bound him. 30. On the morrow, because he
would have known the certainty wherefore he was accused of the Jews, he
loosed him from his bands, and commanded the chief priests and all
their council to appear, and brought Paul down, and set him before
them.'--ACTS xxii. 17-30.
The threatened storm soon burst on Paul in Jerusalem. On the third day
after his arrival he began the ceremonial recommended by the elders to
prove his adherence to the law. Before the seven days during which it
lasted were over the riot broke out, and he was saved from death only
by the military tribune hurrying down to the Temple and dragging him
from the mob.
The tribune's only care was to stamp out a riot, and whether the victim
was 'that Egyptian' or not, to prevent his being murdered. He knew
nothing, and cared as little, about the grounds of the tumult, but he
was not going to let a crowd of turbulent Jews take the law into their
own hands, and flout the majesty of Roman justice. So he lets the
nearly murdered man say his say and keeps the mob off him. It was a
strange scene--below, the howling zealots; above, on the stairs, the
Christian apologists guarded from his countrymen by a detachment of
legionaries; and the assembly presided over by a Roman tribune.
It is very characteristic of Paul that he thought that his own
conversion was the best argument that he could use with his
fellow-Israelites. So he tells his story, and this section strikes into
his speech at the point where he is coming to very thin ice indeed, and
is about to vindicate his work among the Gentiles by declaring that it
was done in obedience to a command from heaven. We need not discuss the
date of the trance, whether it was in his first visit to Jerusalem
after his conversion or, as Ramsay strongly argues, is to be put at the
visit mentioned in Acts xi. 30 and xii. 25.
We note the delicate, conciliatory skill with which he brings out that
his conversion had not made him less a devout worshipper in the Temple,
by specifying it as the scene of the trance, and prayer as his
occupation then. The mention of the Temple also invested the vision
with sanctity.
Very noticeable too is the avoidance of the name of Jesus, which would
have stirred passion in the crowd. We may also observe that the first
words of our Lord, as given by Paul, did not tell him whither he was to
go, but simply bade him leave Jerusalem. The full announcement of the
mission to the Gentiles was delayed both by Jesus to Paul and by Paul
to his brethren. He was to 'get quickly out of Jerusalem'; that was
tragic enough. He was to give up working for his own people, whom he
loved so well. And the reason was their rooted incredulity and their
hatred of him. Other preachers might do something with them, but Paul
could not. 'They will not receive testimony of _thee_.'
But the Apostle's heart clung to his nation, and not even his Lord's
command was accepted without remonstrance. His patriotism led him to
the verge of disobedience, and encouraged him to put in his 'But,
Lord,' with boldness that was all but presumption. He ventures to
suggest a reason why the Jews _would_, as he thinks, receive his
testimony. They knew what he had been, and they must bethink themselves
that there must be something real and mighty in the power which had
turned his whole way of thinking and living right round, and made him
love all that he had hated, and count all that he had prized 'but
dung.' The remonstrance is like Moses', like Jeremiah's, like that of
many a Christian set to work that goes against the grain, and called to
relinquish what he would fain do, and do what he would rather leave
undone.
But Jesus does not take His servants' remonstrances amiss, if only they
will make them frankly to Him, and not keep muttering them under their
breath to themselves. Let us say all that is in our hearts. He will
listen, and clear away hesitations, and show us our path, and make us
willing to walk in it. Jesus did not discuss the matter with Paul, but
reiterated the command, and made it more pointed and clear; and then
Paul stopped objecting and yielded his will, as we should do. 'When he
would not be persuaded, we ceased, saying, The will of the Lord be
done.' The Apostle had kept from the obnoxious word as long as he
could, but it had to come, and he tells the enraged listeners at last,
without circumlocution, that he is the Apostle of the Gentiles, that
Jesus has made him so against his will, and that therefore he must do
the work appointed him, though his heart-strings crack with seeming to
be cold to Israel.
The burst of fury, expressed in gestures which anybody who has ever
seen two Easterns quarrelling can understand, looks fitter for a
madhouse than an audience of men in their senses. They yelled and tore
their garments (and their beards, no doubt), and clutched handfuls of
dust and tossed it in the air, like Shimei cursing David. What a
picture of frenzied hate! And what was it all for? Because Gentiles
were to be allowed to share in Israel's privileges. And what were the
privileges which they thus jealously monopolised? The favour and
protection of the God who, as their own prophets had taught them, was
the God of the whole earth, and revealed Him to Israel that Israel
might reveal Him to the world.
The less they entered into the true possession of their heritage, the
more savagely they resented sharing it with the nations. The more their
prerogative became a mere outward thing, the more they snarled at any
one who proposed to participate in it. To seek to keep religious
blessings to one's self is a conclusive proof that they are not really
possessed. If we have them we shall long to impart them. Formal
religionists always dislike missionary enterprise.
The tribune no doubt had been standing silently watching, in his
strong, contemptuous Roman way, the paroxysm of rage sweeping over his
troublesome charge. Of course he did not understand a word that the
culprit had been saying, and could not make out what had produced the
outburst. He felt that there was something here that he had not
fathomed, and that he must get to the bottom of. It was useless to lay
hold of any of these shrieking maniacs and try to get a reasonable word
out of them. So he determined to see what he could make of the orator,
who had already astonished him by traces of superior education, and was
evidently no mere vulgar firebrand or sedition-monger. He might have
tried gentler means of extracting the truth than scourging, but that
process of 'examination,' as it is flatteringly called, was common, and
has not been antiquated for so many centuries that we need wonder at
this Roman officer using it.
Paul submitted, and was already tied up to some whipping-post, in an
attitude which would expose his back to the lash, when he quietly
dropped, to the inferior officer detailed to superintend the flogging,
the question which fell like a bombshell. Possibly the Apostle had not
known what the soldiers were ordered to do with him till he was tied
up. We cannot tell why he did not plead his citizenship sooner. But we
may remember that at Philippi he did not plead it at all till after the
scourging. Why he delayed so long in the present instance, and why he
at last spoke the magic words, 'I am a Roman citizen,' we cannot say.
But we may gather the two lessons that Christ's servants are often wise
in submitting silently to wrongs, and that they are within their rights
in availing themselves of legal defences against illegal treatment.
Whether silence or protest is the more expedient must be determined in
each case by conscience, guided by the sought-for guidance of the
enlightening Spirit. The determining consideration should be, Which
course will best glorify my Master?
The information brought the tribune in haste to the place where the
Apostle was still tied up. The tables were turned indeed. His brief
answer, 'Yea,' was accepted at once, for to claim the sacred name of
Roman falsely would have been too dangerous, and no doubt Paul's
bearing impressed the tribune with a conviction of his truthfulness. A
hint of contempt and doubt lies in his remark that he had paid dearly
for the franchise, which remark implies, 'Where did a poor man like you
get the money then?' A shameful trade in selling citizens' rights was
carried on in the degraded days of the Empire by underlings at court,
and no doubt the tribune had procured his citizenship in that way.
Paul's answer explains that he was born free, and so was above his
questioner.
That discovery put an end to all thought of scourging. Paul was at once
liberated, and the tribune, terrified that he might be reported, seeks
to repair his error and changes his tactics, retaining Paul for safety
in the castle, and summoning the Sanhedrim, to try to find out more of
this strange affair through them. The great council of the nation had
sunk low indeed when it had to obey the call of a Roman soldier.
Thus once more, as so continually in the Acts, Rome is friendly to the
Christian teachers and saves them from Jewish fury. To point out that
early protection and benevolent sufferance is one purpose of the whole
book. The days of Roman persecution had not yet come. The Empire was
favourable to Christianity, not only because its officials were too
proud to take interest in petty squabbles between two sects of Jews
about their absurd superstitions, but reasons of political wisdom
combined with supercilious indifference to bring about this attitude.
The strong hand of Rome, too, if it crushed national independence, also
suppressed violence, kept men from flying at each other's throats,
spread peace over wide lands, and made the journeyings of Paul and the
planting of the early Christian Churches possible. It was a
God-appointed, though an imperfect, and in some aspects, mischievous
unity, and prepared the way for that higher form of unity realised in
the Church which finally shattered the coarser Empire which had at
first sheltered it. The Caesars were doing God's work when they were
following their own lust of empire. They were yoked to Christ's
chariot, though unwitting and unwilling. To them, as truly as to Cyrus,
might the divine voice have said, 'I girded thee, though thou hast not
known Me.'