The great mass of critics agree in declaring that the
second visit described in the Epistle is identical with the third recorded in the Acts (xv.), although a wide difference of opinion exists amongst them as to the historical value of the account contained in the latter. This general agreement renders it unnecessary for us to enter at any length into the arguments which establish the identity, and we shall content ourselves with very concisely stating some of the chief reasons for this conclusion. The date in both cases corresponds, whilst there are insuperable chronological objections to identifying the second journey of the Epistle with any earlier or later visit mentioned in Acts. We have referred to other reasons against its being placed earlier than the third visit of Acts, and there are still stronger objections to its being dated after the third. It is impossible, considering the object of the Apostle, that he could have passed over in silence such a visit as that described Acts xv., and the only alternative would be to date it later than the composition of the Epistle, to which the narrative of the Acts as well as all other known facts would be irreconcilably opposed. On the other hand, the date, the actors, the cause of dispute, and probably the place (Antioch) in which that dispute originated, so closely correspond, that it is incredible that such a coincidence of circumstances should again have occurred.
"Without anticipating our comparison of the two accounts of this visit, we must here at least remark that the discrepancies are so great that not only have apologetic critics, as we have indicated, adopted the theory that the second visit of the Epistle is not the same as the third of the Acts, but is identical with the second (xi. 30), of which so few particulars are given, but
some, and notably Wieseler,(1) have maintained it to have been the same as that described in Acts xviii. 21 ff., whilst Paley and others(2) have been led to the hypothesis that the visit in question does not correspond with any of the visits actually recorded in the Acts, but is one which is not referred to at all in that work. These
theories have found very little favour, however, and we mention them solely to complete our statement of the general controversy. Considering the fulness of the report of the visit in Acts xv. and the peculiar nature of the facts stated by the Apostle himself in his letter to the Galatians, the difficulty of identifying the particular visit referred to is a phenomenon which cannot be too much considered. Is it possible, if the narrative in the Acts were really historically accurate, that any reasonable doubt could ever have existed as to its correspondence with the Apostle's statements? We may here at once say that, although many of the critics who finally decide that the visit described in Acts xv. is the same as that referred to in the second chapter of the Epistle argue that the obvious discrepancies and contradictions between the two accounts may be sufficiently explained and reconciled, this is for very strong reasons disputed,1 and the narrative in the Acts, when tested by the authentic statements of the Apostle, pronounced inaccurate and unhistorical.
It is only necessary to read the two accounts in order to understand the grounds upon which even apologists like Paley and Wieseler feel themselves compelled
