Apostle makes no mention. Of course it is clear that Paul could not have consented to the circumcision of Titus, and we have only to consider in what manner the case of Timothy differed so as to support the views of those who hold that Paul, who would not yield to the pressure brought to bear upon him in the case of Titus, might, quite consistently, so short a time after, circumcise Timothy with his own hand. It is true that the necessity of circumcision for Gentile Christians came prominently into question, during Paul's visit to Jerusalem, from the presence of his uncircumcised follower Titus, and no doubt the abrogation of the rite must have formed a striking part of the exposition of his Gospel, which Paul tells us he made upon this occasion; but it is equally certain that the necessity of circumcision long continued to be pressed by the judaistic party in the Church. It cannot fairly be argued that, at any time, Paul could afford to relax his determined and consistent attitude as the advocate for the universality of Christianity and the abrogation of a rite, insistence upon which, he had been the first to recognise, would have been fatal to the spread of Christianity. To maintain that he could safely make such a concession of his principles and himself circumcise Timothy, simply because at that precise moment there was no active debate upon the point, is inadmissible; for his Epistles abundantly prove that the topic, if it ever momentarily subsided into stubborn silence, was continually being revived with renewed bitterness. Pauline views could never have prevailed if he had been willing to sacrifice them for the sake of conciliation, whenever they were not actively attacked.
The difference of the occasion cannot be admitted
as a valid reason; let us, therefore, see whether any difference in the persons and circumstances removes the contradiction. It is argued that such a difference exists in the fact that, whilst Titus was altogether a Gentile, Timothy, on the side of his mother at least, was a Jew; and Thiersch, following a passage quoted by Wetstein, states that, according to Talmudic prescriptions, the validity of mixed marriages between a Jewess and a Gentile was only recognized upon the condition that the children should be brought up in the religion of the mother. In this case, he argues, Paul merely carried out the requirement of the Jewish law by circumcising Timothy, which others had omitted to do, and thus secured his admission to the Jewish synagogues to which much of his ministry was directed, but from which he would have been excluded had the rite not been performed.(1) Even Meyer, however, in reference to this point, replies that Paul could scarcely be influenced by the Talmudic canon, because Timothy was already a Christian and beyond Judaism.(2) Besides, in point of fact, by such a marriage the Jewess had forfeited Jewish privileges. Timothy, in the eyes of the Mosaic law, was not a Jew, and held, in reality, no better position than the Greek Titus. He had evidently been brought up as a heathen, and the only question which could arise in regard to him was whether he must first become a Jew before he could be fully recognized as a Christian. The supposition that the circumcision of Timothy, the son of a Greek, after he had actually become a Christian without having passed through Judaism,
could secure for him free access to the synagogues of the Jews, may show how exceedingly slight at that time was the difference between the Jew and the Christian, but it also suggests the serious doubt whether the object of the concession, in the mind of the author of the Acts, was not rather to conciliate the Judaic Christians, than to represent the act as one of policy towards the unbelieving Jews. The statement of the Acts is that Paul circumcised Timothy "because of the Jews which were in those places; for they knew all that his father was a Greek." If the reason which we are discussing were correct, the expression would more probably have been: "for they knew that his mother was a Jewess." The Greek father might, and probably did, object to the circumcision of his son, but that was no special reason why Paul should circumcise him. On the other hand, the fact that the Jews knew that his father was a Greek made the action attributed to Paul a concession which the author of the Acts thus represented in its most conciliatory light. The circumcision of Timothy was clearly declared unnecessary by the apostolic decree, for the attempt to show that he was legitimately regarded as a Jew utterly fails. It is obvious that, according to Pauline doctrine, there could be no obligation for anyone who adopted Christianity to undergo this initiatory rite. It is impossible reasonably to maintain that any case has been made out to explain why Timothy, who had grown into manhood without being circumcised, and had become a Christian whilst uncircumcised, should at that late period be circumcised. Beyond the reference to a Talmudic prescription, in fact, with which there is not the slightest evidence that Paul was acquainted, and which, even if he did know of it, could not possibly have been recognised by him as
authoritative, there has not been a serious attempt made to show that the case of Timothy presents exceptional features which reconcile the contradiction otherwise admitted as apparent.
The whole apologetic argument in fact sinks into one of mere expediency: Timothy, the son of a Jewess and of a Greek, and thus having a certain affinity both to Jews and Gentiles, would become a much more efficient assistant to Paul if he were circumcised and thus had access to the Jewish synagogues; therefore Paul, who himself became as a Jew that he might win the Jews, demanded the same sacrifice from his follower. But can this argument bear any scrutiny by the light of Paul's own writings? It cannot. Paul openly claims to be the Apostle of the Gentiles, and just before the period at which he is supposed to circumcise Timothy, he parts from the elder Apostles with the understanding that he is to go to the Gentiles who are freed from circumcision. It is a singular commencement of his mission, to circumcise the son of a Greek father after he had become a Christian. Such supposed considerations about access to synagogues and conciliation of the Jews would seem more suitable to a missionary to the circumcision, than to the Apostle of the Gentiles. It must be apparent to all that in going more specially to the Gentiles, as he avowedly was, the alleged expediency of circumcising Timothy falls to the ground, and on the contrary that such an act would have compromised his whole Gospel. Paul's characteristic teaching was the inutility of circumcision, and upon this point he sustained the incessant attacks of the emissaries of James and the Judaistic party without yielding or compromise. What could have been more ill-advised under