cannot be established, but on the contrary must be much widened before it can justly be taken as that existing between Paul and the elder Apostles. We do not go so far as to say that there was open enmity between them, or active antagonism of any distinct character on the part of the Twelve to the Apostle of the Gentiles, but there is every reason to believe that they not only disliked his teaching, but endeavoured to counteract it by their own ministry of the circumcision. They not only did not restrain the opposition of their followers, but they abetted them in their counter-assertion of judaistic views. Had the Twelve felt any cordial friendship for Paul, and exhibited any active desire for the success of his ministry of the uncircumcision, it is quite impossible that his work could have been so continuously and vexatiously impeded by the persecution of the Jewish Christian party. The Apostles may not have possessed sufficient influence or authority entirely to control the action of adherents, but it would be folly to suppose that, if unanimity of views had prevailed between them and Paul, and a firm and consistent support had been extended to him, such systematic resistance as he everywhere encountered from the party professing to be led by the "pillar" Apostles could have been seriously maintained, or that he could have been left alone and unaided to struggle against it. If the relations between Paul and the Twelve had been such as are intimated in the Acts of the Apostles, his epistles must have presented undoubted evidence of the fact Both negatively and positively they testify the absence of all support, and the existence of antagonistic influence on the part of the elder Apostles, and external evidence fully confirms the impression which the epistles produce.(1)
From any point of view which may be taken, the Apocalypse is an important document in connection with this point. If it be accepted as a work of the Apostle John—the preponderance of evidence and critical opinion assigns it to him—this book, of course, possesses the greatest value as an indication of his views. If it be merely regarded as a contemporary writing, it still is most interesting as an illustration of the religious feeling of the period. The question is: Does the Apocalypse contain any reference to the Apostle Paul, or throw light upon the relations between him and the elder Apostles? If it does so, and be the work of one of the [———], nothing obviously could be more
instructive. In the messages to the seven churches, there are references and denunciations which, in the opinion of many able critics, are directed against the Apostle of the Gentiles and his characteristic teaching.(1) Who but Paul and his followers can be referred to in the Epistle to the Church of Ephesus: "I know thy works, and thy labour, and thy patience, and that thou canst not bear wicked persons: and didst try them which say they are Apostles and are not, and didst find them liars"?(2) Paul himself informs us not only of his sojourn in Ephesus, where he believed that "a great and effectual door" was opened to him, but adds, "there are many adversaries" [———].(3) The foremost charge brought against the churches is that they have those that hold the teaching of Balaam, who taught Balak to cast a stumbling-block before the sons of Israel, "to eat things offered unto idols."(4) The teaching of Paul upon this point is
well known, 1 Cor. viii. 1 ff., x. 25 ff., Rom. xiv. 2 ff., and the reference here cannot be mistaken; and when in the Epistle to the church of Thyatira, after denouncing the teaching "to eat things offered unto idols," the Apocalyptist goes on to encourage those who have not this teaching, "who knew not the depths of Satan, [———],(1) as they say" the expression of Paul himself is taken to denounce his doctrine; for the Apostle, defending himself against the attacks of those parties "of Cephas" and "of Christ" in Corinth, writes: "But God revealed (them) to us through his Spirit; for the Spirit searcheth all things, even the depths of God" [———]—"the depths of Satan" rather, retorts the judaistic author of the Apocalypse. [———] does not occur elsewhere in the New Testament Again, in the address to the churches of Smyrna and Philadelphia, when the writer denounces those "who say that they are Jews, and are not, but a synagogue of Satan,"(2) whom has he in view but those Christians whom Paul had taught to consider circumcision unnecessary and the law abrogated? We find Paul in the Epistle to the Corinthians, so often quoted, obliged to defend himself against these judaising parties upon this very point: "Are they Hebrews? so am I. Are they Israelites? so am I. Are they Abraham's seed? so am I."(3) It is manifest that his adversaries had vaunted their own Jewish origin as a title of superiority over the Apostle of the Gentiles. We
have, however, further evidence of the same attack upon Paul regarding this point. Epiphanius points out that the Ebionites denied that Paul was a Jew, and asserted that he was born of a Gentile father and mother, but that, having gone up to Jerusalem, he became a proselyte and submitted to circumcision in the hope of marrying a daughter of the high priest. But afterwards, according to them, enraged at not securing the maiden for his wife, Paul wrote against circumcision and the Sabbath and the law.(1) The Apostle Paul, whose constant labour it was to destroy the particularism of the Jew, and raise the Gentile to full, free, and equal participation with him in the benefits of the New Covenant, could not but incur the bitter displeasure of the Apocalyptist, for whom the Gentiles were, as such, the type of all that was common and unclean. In the utterances of the seer of Patmos we seem to hear the expression of all that judaistic hatred and opposition which pursued the Apostle who laid the axe to the root of Mosaism and, in his efforts to free Christianity from trammels which, more than any other, retarded its triumphant development, aroused against himself all the virulence of Jewish illiberality and prejudice. The results at which we have arrived might be singularly confirmed by an examination of the writings of the first two centuries, and by observing the attitude