very next chapter the Apostle twice uses the same words. After condemning the hasty and unrighteous judgment of man, he says: "For we know that the judgment of God is according to truth.... who will render to every one according to his works; to them who by patience in well-doing seek for glory and honour and incorruption, eternal life: but unto them that act out of factious spirit and do not obey the truth but obey unrighteousness, anger, and wrath: affliction and distress upon every soul of man that worketh evil, both of Jew and of Greek [———], A. V. "of the Jew first, and also of the Gentile"; but glory and honour and peace to every one that worketh good, both to Jew and to Greek [———], A. V. "to the Jew first, and also to the Gentile"). For there is no respect of persons with God."(1) How is it possible that, if the Apostle had intended to assert a priority of any kind accorded to the Jew before the Gentile, he could at the same time have added: "For there is no respect of persons with God "? If salvation be "to the Jew first," there is very distinctly respect of persons with God. The very opposite, however, is repeatedly and emphatically asserted by Paul in this very epistle. "For there is no difference between Jew and Greek" [———], he says, "for the same Lord of all is rich unto all them that call upon him. For whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved."(2) Here, we have the phrase without [———]. Nothing could be more clear and explicit. The precedence of the Jew is directly excluded. At the end of the second chapter, moreover, he explains his idea of a Jew:
"For he is not a Jew who is one outwardly; neither is that circumcision which is outwardly in flesh, but he is a Jew who is one inwardly, and circumcision is of the heart, in spirit not letter."(1) If anything further were required to prove that the Apostle does not by the expression: [———], intend to indicate any priority accorded to the Jew, it is supplied by the commencement of the third chapter. "What then is the advantage of the Jew? or what the profit of circumcision?" It is obvious that if the Apostle had just said that the Gospel was the power of God unto salvation, "to Jew first and also to Greek," he had stated a very marked advantage to the Jew, and that such an inquiry as the above would have been wholly unnecessary. The answer which he gives to his own question, however, completes our certainty. "Much every way," he replies; but in explaining what the "much" advantage was, we hear no more of "to Jew first:" "Much every way: for first indeed they were entrusted with the oracles of God."(1) And, after a few words, he proceeds: "What then? are we better? Not at all; for we before brought the charge that both Jews and Greeks [———] are all under sin."(3) Here, again, there is no [———]. There can be no doubt in the mind of any one who understands what Paul's teaching was, and what he means by claiming the special title of "Apostle to the Gentiles," that in going "to the Heathen" after his visit to Jerusalem, as before it, there was no purpose in his mind to preach to the Jews first and only on being rejected by them to turn to the Gentiles, as the Acts would have us suppose; but that the principle which regulated his proclamation of the Gospel was that which we have
already quoted: "For there is no difference between Jew and Greek; for the same Lord of all is rich unto all them that call upon him. For whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved."(1)
Still more incongruous is the statement of the Acts that Paul took Timothy and circumcised him because of the Jews. According to this narrative, shortly after the supposed Council of Jerusalem at which it was decided that circumcision of Gentile Converts was unnecessary; immediately after Paul had in spite of great pressure refused to allow Titus to be circumcised; and after it had been agreed between the Apostle of the Gentiles and James and Cephas and John that while they should go to the circumcision, he, on the contrary, should go to the heathen, Paul actually took and circumcised Timothy. Apologists, whilst generally admitting the apparent contradiction, do not consider that this act involves any real inconsistency, and find reasons which, they affirm, sufficiently justify it. Some of these we shall presently examine, but we may at once say that no apologetic arguments seem to us capable of resisting the conclusion arrived at by many independent critics, that the statement of the Acts with regard to Timothy is opposed to all that we know of Paul's views, and that for unassailable reasons it must be pronounced unhistorical.(2) The author of the Acts says: "And he (Paul) came to Derbe and Lystra. And behold a certain disciple was there, named Timothy, son of a
believing Jewish woman, but of a Greek father; who was well reported of by the brethren in Lystra and Iconium. Him would Paul have to go forth with him; and took and circumcised him because of the Jews which were in those places [———]; for they all knew that his father was a Greek [———]."(1) The principal arguments of those who maintain the truth and consistency of this narrative briefly are: Paul resisted the circumcision of Titus because he was a Greek, and because the subject then actually under consideration was the immunity from the Jewish rite of Gentile Christians, which would have been prejudiced had he yielded the point. On the other hand, Timothy was the son of a Jewish mother, and whilst there was no principle here in question, Paul circumcised the companion whom he had chosen to accompany him in his missionary journey, both as a recognition of his Jewish origin and to avoid offence to the Jews whom they should encounter in the course of their ministry, as well as to secure for him access to the synagogues which they must visit: Paul in this instance, according to all apologists putting in practice his own declaration (1 Cor. ix. 19-20): "For being free from all men, I made myself servant unto all that I might gain the more; and unto the Jews I became as a Jew, that I might gain Jews."
It must be borne in mind that the author who chronicles the supposed circumcision of Timothy makes no allusion to the refusal of Paul to permit Titus to be circumcised; an omission which is not only singular in itself, but significant when we find him, immediately after, narrating so singular a concession of which the