Not Paul, but Jesus

by Jeremy Bentham

ARABIA-VISIT—MENTIONED BY PAUL, NOT ACTS.

Not altogether without special reason, seems the veil of obscurity to have been cast over this long interval. In design, rather than accident, or heedlessness, or want of information,—may be found, it should seem, the cause, of a silence so pregnant with misrepresentation. In addition to a length of time, more or less considerable, spent in Damascus, a city in close communication with Jerusalem, in giving proofs of his conversion,—three years spent in some part or other of the contiguous indeed, but wide-extending, country of Arabia—(spent, if Paul is to be believed, in preaching the religion of Jesus, and at any rate in a state of peace and innoxiousness with relation to it)—afforded such proof of a change of plan and sentiment, as, in the case of many a man, might, without miracle or wonder, have sufficed to form a basis for the projected alliance:—this proof, even of itself; much more, when corroborated, by the sort of certificate, given to the Church by its preeminent benefactor Barnabas, who, in introducing the new convert, to the leaders among the Apostles, for the special purpose of proposing the alliance,—took upon himself the personal responsibility, so inseparably involved in such a mark of confidence.

In this state of things then, which is expressly asserted by Paul to have been, and appears indubitably to have been, a real one,—considerations of an ordinary nature being sufficient—to produce—not only the effect actually produced—but, in the case of many a man, much more than the effect actually produced,—there was no demand, at that time, for a miracle: no demand for a miracle, for any such purpose, as that of working, upon the minds of the Apostles, to any such effect as that of their maintaining, towards the new convert, a conduct free from hostility, accompanied with a countenance of outward amity. But, for other purposes, and in the course of his intercourse with persons of other descriptions, it became necessary for him to have had these visions: it became necessary—not only for the purpose of proving connection on his part with the departed Jesus, to the satisfaction of all those by whom such proof would be looked for,—but, for the further purpose, of ascribing to Jesus, whatsoever doctrines the prosecution of his design might from time to time call upon him to promulgate;—those doctrines, in a word, which, (as will be seen), being his and not Jesus's—not reported by anyone else as being Jesus's—we shall find him, notwithstanding, preaching, and delivering,—so much at his ease, and with unhesitating assurance.

A miracle having therefore been deemed necessary (the miracle of the conversion-vision), and reported accordingly,—thus it is, that, by the appearance of suddenness, given to the sort and degree of confidence thereupon reported as having been bestowed upon him by the Apostles, a sort of confirmation is, in the Acts account, given to the report of the miracle: according to this account, it was not by the three or four years passed by him in the prosecution of their designs, or at least without obstruction given to them;—it was not by any such proof of amity, that the intercourse, such as it was, had been effected:—no: it was by the report of the vision—that report which, in the first instance, was made to them by their generous benefactor and powerful supporter, Barnabas; confirmed, as, to every candid eye it could not fail to be, by whatever accounts were, on the occasion of the personal intercourse, delivered from his own lips. "But Barnabas (says the author) took him and brought him to the Apostles, and declared unto them how he had seen the Lord by the way, and that he had spoken to him, and how he had preached boldly at Damascus in the name of Jesus." Acts 9:27.

When in the year 57, Paul,[18] to so many other boastings, was added the sufferings he would have us think were courted and endured by him, while preaching in the name of Jesus, that gospel, which he proclaims to have been his own, and not that of the Apostles, little assuredly did he think, that five years after, or thereabout, from the hand of one of his own attendants, a narrative was to appear, in which, of these same sufferings a so much shorter list would be given; or that, by an odd enough coincidence, more than seventeen centuries after, by a namesake of his honored patron, Doctor Gamaliel, the contradiction thus given to him, would be held up to view.

In the second of his epistles to his Corinthians, dated A.D. 57,—the following is the summary he gives of those same sufferings. Speaking of certain unnamed persons, styled by him false Apostles, but whom reasons are not wanting for believing to have been among the disciples of the real ones,—"Are they," says he, 2 Cor. xi. 23, "ministers of Christ? I speak as one beside himself, I am more: in labours more abundant: in stripes above measure: in prisons more frequent: in deaths, oft.—Of the Jews five times received I forty stripes, save one.—Thrice was I beaten with rods; once was I stoned: thrice I suffered shipwreck: a night and a day have I been in the deep." Thus far as per Paul.

Add from his former Epistle to the same in the same year, battle with beasts, one. "If, after the manner of men, I have fought with beasts at Ephesus, what advantageth it me," continues he, 1 Cor. XV. 32, "if the dead rise not, let us eat and drink, for tomorrow we die."

Let us now see how the account stands, as per Acts. On the part of this his panegyrist, whether any such habit had place as that of cutting down below their real amount, either the sufferings or the actings of his hero, the reader will have judged. Of both together, let it not be forgotten, the Acts' account comes some five years lower, than the date of the above tragical list: in it are included those sufferings and perils which we have seen, namely, those produced by the voyage to Rome, and which, at the time of Paul's list, had not taken their commencement. Now then for the Acts' list. Stripes, nine-and-thirty in a parcel, none: difference five. Beatings with rods, saving one possible one, of which presently, none; difference, three. Stoning, one[19]. Shipwreck, as yet none: the accident at Malta being three years subsequent. "Night and day in the deep,"—according as it was on or in the deep—either nothing at all, or an adventure considerably too singular to have been passed over. Diving-bells are not commonly supposed to have been, at that time of day, in use; but whoever has a taste for predictions, may, if it be agreeable to him, see those same scientific instruments or the equivalent in this Gospel of Paul's predicted.

As to the parcels of stripes, the self-constituted Apostle takes credit for, they would have been,—supposing them administered,—administered, all of them, according to law, meaning always the law of Moses: for, it is in that law, (namely in Deuteronomy XXV. 3) that the clause, limiting to nine-and-thirty, the number to be given at a time, is to be found. Of these statements of Paul's, let it not pass unnoticed, the place is—a formal and studied Epistle, not an extempore speech: so that the falsehood in them, if any, was not less deliberate than the Temple perjury.

Of all these same boasted bodily sufferings, eight in the whole, when put together,—one was, at the outset, reserved for consideration: let us see what light, if any, is cast upon it by the Acts. One beating, the Acts informs us of: and it was a beating by order of magistrates: and accordingly, a beating according to law. But the law, according to which it was given, was not Jewish law: the magistrates, by whose order it was given, were not Jewish magistrates. The magistrates were heathens: and it was for being Jews, and preaching in the Jewish style, that Paul, and his companion Silas, were thus visited. It was at Philippi that the affair happened: it was immediately preceded by their adventure with the divineress, as per Acts 16:16; 34, Chap. 13: and brought about by the resentment of her masters, to whose established business, the innovation, introduced by these interlopers, had given disturbance: it was followed—immediately followed—by the earthquake, which was so dexterous in taking irons off. Whether therefore this beating was in Paul's account comprised in the eight stripings and beatings, seems not possible, humanly speaking, to know: not possible, unless so it be, that Paul, being the wandering Jew, we have sometimes heard of, is still alive,—still upon the look-out, for that aërial voyage, which, with or without the expectation of an aërostatic vehicle, we have seen him so confident in the assurance of.