the Paul of the Acts be considered specially an Apostle of the Gentiles, and the statement of the Epistle to the Galatians(1) has no significance, if interpreted by the historical work.
Apologists usually reply to this objection, that the practice of Paul in the Acts is in accordance with his own words in the Epistle to the Romans, i. 16, in which, it is asserted, he recognizes the right of the Jews to precedence. In the Authorised Version this passage is rendered as follows:—"For I am not ashamed of the Gospel of Christ: for it is the power of God unto salvation to every one that believeth; to the Jew first and also to the Greek."(2) [———] As a matter of
fact we may here at once state that the word [———] "first," is not found in Codices B and G, and that it is omitted from the Latin rendering of the verse quoted by Tertullian.(3) That the word upon which the controversy turns should not be found in so important a MS. as the Vatican Codex or in so ancient a version as Tertullian's is very significant, but proceeding at once to the sense of the sentence, we must briefly state the reasons which seem to us conclusively to show that the usual reading is erroneous. The passage is an emphatic statement of the principles of Paul. He declares that he is not ashamed of the Gospel, and he immediately states the reason: "for it is a power of God unto salvation to everyone that believeth."(4) He is not ashamed of the Gospel because he recognizes its universality; for, in
opposition to the exclusiveness of Judaism, he maintains that all are "sons of God through faith in Christ Jesus... There is neither Jew nor Greek... for ye are all one man in Christ Jesus. And if ye be Christ's then are ye Abraham's seed, heirs according to promise."(1) "For in Christ Jesus neither circumcision availeth anything nor uncircumcision, but faith working through love."(2) The reason which he gives is that which lies at the basis of the whole of his special teaching; but we are asked to believe that, after so clear and comprehensive a declaration, he at once adds the extraordinary qualification: [———], rendered "to the Jew first and also to the Greek." What is the meaning of such a limitation? If the Gospel be a power of God unto salvation "to every one that believeth" [———], in what manner can it possibly be so "to the Jew first"? Can it be maintained that there are comparative degrees in salvation? "Salvation" is obviously an absolute term. If saved at all, the Jew cannot be more saved than the Greek. If, on the other hand, the expression be interpreted as an assertion that the Jew has a right of precedence either in the offer or the attainment of salvation before the Greek, the manner of its realization is almost equally inconceivable, and a host of difficulties, especially in view of the specific Pauline teaching, immediately present themselves. There can be no doubt that the judaistic view distinctly was that Israel must first be saved, before the heathen could obtain any part in the Messianic kingdom, and we have shown that this idea dominated primitive Christianity; and inseparable from this was the belief that the only way to a participation in its benefits lay through Judaism. The
heathen could only obtain admission into the family of Israel, and become partakers in the covenant, by submitting to the initiatory rite. It was palpably under the influence of this view, and with a conviction that the Messianic kingdom was primarily destined for the children of Israel, that the elder Apostles, even after the date of Paul's second visit to Jerusalem, continued to confine their ministry "to the circumcision." Paul's view was very different. He recognized and maintained the universality of the Gospel and, in resolving to go to the heathen, he practically repudiated the very theory of Jewish preference which he is here supposed to advance. If the Gospel, instead of being a power of God to salvation to every man who believed, was for the Jew first, the Apostolate of the Gentiles was a mere delusion and a snare. What could be the advantage of so urgently offering salvation to the Greek, if the gift, instead of being "for every one that believeth," was a mere prospective benefit, inoperative until the Jew had first been saved? "Salvation to the Jew first and also to the Greek," if it have any significance whatever of the kind argued,—involving either a prior claim to the offer of salvation, or precedence in its distribution,—so completely destroys all the present interest in it of the Gentile, that the Gospel must to him have lost all power. To suppose that such an expression simply means, that the Gospel must first be preached to the Jews in any town to which the Apostle might come before it could legitimately be proclaimed to the Gentiles of that town, is childish. We have no reason to suppose that Paul held the deputy Sergius Paulus, who desired to hear the word of God and believed, in suspense until the Jews of Paphos had
rejected it. The cases of the Ethiopian eunuch and Cornelius throw no light upon any claim of the Jew to priority in salvation. Indeed, not to waste time in showing the utter incongruity of the ordinary interpretation, we venture to affirm that there is not a single explanation, which maintains a priority assigned to the Jew in any way justifying the reference to this text, which is capable of supporting the slightest investigation. If we linguistically examine the expression [———], we arrive at the same conclusion, that [———] is an interpolation, for we must maintain that [———] with [———] and [———] must be applied equally both to "Jew" and "Greek," and cannot rightly be appropriated to the Jew only, as implying a preference over the Greek.(1) The sense, therefore, can only be properly and intelligibly given by disregarding [———] and simply translating the words: "both to Jew and Greek."(2) This was the rendering of the ancient Latin version quoted by Tertullian in his work against Marcion: "Itaque et hie, cum dicit: Non enim me pudet evangelii, virtus enim dei est in salutem omni credenti, Judæo et Græco, quia justitia dei in eo revelatur ex fide in fidem.,,(3) We are not left without further examples of the very same expression, and an examination of the context will amply demonstrate that Paul used it in no other sense. In the