The Making of the New Testament

CHAPTER IV

PAUL AS PRISONER AND CHURCH FATHER

The second period of Paul's literary career begins after an interval of several years. This interval is covered indeed, so far as the great events of the Apostle's personal story are concerned, by the last nine chapters of Acts, but exceedingly obscure as respects the fortunes of his mission-field and the occasion for the group of Epistles which come to us after its close. It is barely possible that a fragment or two from the so-called Pastoral Epistles (1st Timothy, 2nd Timothy, Titus), which seem to be compiled long after Paul's death on the basis of some remnants of his correspondence, may have been written shortly after the arrest in Jerusalem and "first defence." In 2nd Tim. iv. 11-18 a journey is referred to from Troas by way of Ephesus which coincides in many respects with that of Acts xx. If the fragment could be taken out from its present setting it might be possible to identify the two; for it is clear from the forecast of Acts xx. 25, 38 that Paul never did revisit this region. The grip of Rome upon her troublesome prisoner was not relaxed until his martyrdom, probably some considerable time before the "great multitude" whom Nero condemned after the conflagration of 64. However, until analysis can dissect out with greater definiteness the genuine elements of the Pastoral Epistles, they cannot be used to throw light upon the later period of Paul's career. A historical background has indeed been created to meet their requirements – a release of Paul, resumption of missionary activities on the coasts of the Ægean, renewed imprisonment in Rome and ultimate martyrdom. But this has absolutely no warrant outside the Pastorals themselves, and is both inconsistent with Acts and open to criticism intrinsically. The story thus created of a release, second visitation of the Greek churches, and second imprisonment must, therefore, be regarded as fictitious, and the Pastoral Epistles in their present form as products of the post-Pauline age.

It is our task to trace the development among the Greek churches of Christianity conceived as a "revelation of God in Christ," alongside of its development in the 'apostolic' church, until the period of 'catholic' unity and the completed canon. Upon this development the story of Paul's personal fortunes in Acts throws but little light. We merely see that his great peace-making visit to Jerusalem was suddenly interrupted by his arrest in the temple, while engaged in an act of worship undoubtedly intended by him to demonstrate his willingness in the interest of unity to "become as under the Law to them that are under the Law." After this his great delegation from the Gentile churches must have scattered to their homes. Paul remained a prisoner for two years in Cæsarea, and after an adventurous journey covering the ensuing autumn and winter (59-60), spent two more years in less rigid confinement at Rome. We need no hint from his request in 2nd Tim. iv. 13 for "books and parchments" to infer that the years of forced seclusion in Cæsarea were marked by study and meditation; but narrative and inference together convey but little of what we mainly desire to know: the course of religious development in the Pauline churches, as a background for the literature.

On the other hand recent research into religious conditions in the early Empire has removed the principal objections to the authenticity of Philippians, Philemon, Colossians, and even Ephesians. We are far from being compelled to come down to the time of the great Gnostic systems of the second century to find a historical situation appropriate to this group of letters purporting to be written by Paul from his captivity. Indeed they exhibit on any theory of their origin a characteristic and legitimate development of the Pauline gospel of Son ship by the Spirit of Adoption abolishing the dispensation of Law. It is a development almost inevitable in a conception of 'the gospel' formed on Greek ideas of Redemption, if we place in opposition to it a certain baser type of superstitious, mongrel Judaism, revealed in the Epistles themselves, repeatedly referred to in Acts, and now known to us by a mass of extraneous documentary material.

The new disturbers of the churches' peace revealed in the Epistles of the Captivity are still of Jewish origin and tendency; but at least in the region of Colossæ (in the Lycus Valley, adjacent to southern Galatia) the issue is no longer that between Law and Grace, but concerns the nature and extent of the Redemption. The trouble still comes from a superstitious exaltation of the Mosaic revelation; but those whom Paul here opposes do not "use the Law lawfully," frankly insisting on its permanent obligation as the will of God for all sons, unaffected by the Cross. It is now admitted to be an "ordinance of angels"; but the observance of it is inculcated because man's redemption can only come through conciliation of these higher beings. Mystical union with superhuman Powers is to be promoted by its observances. This superstition is neither purely Jewish, nor purely Greek. It is composite – Hellenistic. Judaism is imitated in the superstitious reverence for the Law; but the conception of Redemption leaves behind every thought of national particularism and is openly individualistic. The redemption sought is that of the individual soul from the limitations of humanity, and doubtless the name of Jesus played an important rôle in the emancipation, as in the exorcisms of the sons of Sceva (Acts xix. 13 f.); only it was not "above every name."

But even Jewish apocalypses such as Enoch and Baruch with all their superstitious angelology and demonology manage somehow to cling to the ancient Jewish faith in the primacy of man, and Paul in like manner upholds against the theosophists the doctrine of the believer's Son ship and joint-heirship with Christ. In fact the Adoption, Redemption and Inheritance accorded in the gift of the Spirit are to his mind gifts so great and exalted as to make it a "gratuitous self-humiliation" to pay homage, in Mosaic or other ceremonial, to "angels," "principalities," or "powers." In Christ we already have a foothold in the heavenly regions. We were foreordained in his person to be "heirs" "before the foundation of the world." His resurrection and ascension "to the right hand of God" participated in by us through "the Spirit" was a "triumph" over the 'Elements' and 'Rulers.' They should be beneath the Christian's feet in feeling, as they soon will be in reality.

This exalted doctrine of Christ's Son ship as compared with the mere temporary authority of "angels and principalities and powers," secures to the Epistles of the Captivity their well-deserved title of "Christological"; for they lay the foundation for all later doctrines of the Logos or Word. It is well to realize, however, that the doctrine is in origin and meaning simply a vindication of the divine dignity of manhood.

An idea of outward conditions at the time of writing may be gained from the two Epistles of the group most universally admitted to be genuine, Philemon and Philippians. Both are written from captivity, almost certainly in Rome, because the writer is expecting, if released, to revisit the Ægean coasts, which was not Paul's expectation in Cæsarea. But there is a wide difference between the two as respects the circumstances presupposed. The tone of Philemon is hopeful, sprightly, even jocose. Paul is in company with a group of "fellow-workers" which significantly includes "Mark," as well as two companions of the voyage to Rome, "Aristarchus" of Thessalonica, and "Luke" (Acts xxvii. 2). Epaphras, his "fellow-prisoner," appears in Colossians as the founder of that church and a teacher in the adjacent towns of Hierapolis and Laodicea. He has brought to Paul either of his own knowledge or by report from others, disturbing news of the inroads of the heresy. Onesimus, whose case occasions the letter to Philemon, is an escaped slave of this friend and convert of Paul. The apostle is sending back the slave with the request that he be forgiven and manumitted. The interrelation of the persons mentioned in Philemon and Colossians shows that the occasion is the same. Tychicus (cf. Acts xx. 3) the bearer of Colossians (Col. iv. 7) accompanies Onesimus. Ephesians (if authentic) belongs to the same group, being also carried by Tychicus (Eph. vi. 21). It was certainly not intended for Ephesus, but for some church or churches not directly known to Paul (i. 15; iii. 2). It bears much the same relation to Colossians as Romans to Galatians. In spite of copious evidences of its use reaching back even to Clement of Rome (95) the genuineness of Ephesians is more seriously questioned than that of any other Pauline letter save the Pastorals. In the present writer's judgment this suspicion is unfounded, but the question of Pauline, semi-Pauline or deutero-Pauline is immaterial to the general development.

Philippians is of later date than Philemon and its companions. Paul has been in circumstances of dire physical distress, and is comforting his correspondents in view of an immediately impending decision of his case (ii. 23). The issue will be life or death, and Paul has no earthly (but only super-earthly) reasons for hoping the verdict may not be adverse. He is still expecting, if released, to revisit the Ægean coast (ii. 24); but it is only smiling through his tears when he tells the Philippians that their need of him is so great that he is confident he will be spared to them (Phil. 1. 12-30). Knowing that this journey was never made, we can but infer that the fate so near at hand in Phil. ii. 17 came actually to pass. Paul's blood was "poured out a libation," as tradition of extreme antiquity credibly reports, and it can hardly have been after a release, return to Greece and second arrest. The passage in 2nd Tim iv. 5-8 which repeats the figure of the libation (Phil. ii. 17), treating it no longer as doubtful, but a tragic certainty, will have been penned (if authentic) but a few weeks at most after Philippians, and immediately before the end. If Philemon-Colossians-Ephesians be dated in 62, Philippians, with the possible fragments in 2nd Timothy, may be dated a few months later.

Conditions at Philippi appear only in a favourable light from this latest authentic epistle. Paul can thank God upon every remembrance of these loyal and liberal Macedonian friends. In Rome, however, he is still affected by Judaizing opposition, though his attitude toward it (in Rome at least) shows the significant difference from Galatians that he can now be thankful that Christ is preached even thus (Phil. i. 15-18). Moreover there is a difference in the type of legalism represented; for while in his warning to the Philippians of the possible coming of the heretics Paul is moved to recall his own renunciation of legalistic righteousness, the terms of opprobrium applied to the disturbers imply an immorality and assimilation to heathenism (Phil. iii. 2 19; cf. Rom. xvi. 17-20) which could not justly be said to characterize the legalism of the synagogue.

The doctrinal elements of Philippians consist of two passages: (1) the denunciation of the "concision" (a term applied to the heathenized renegade Jew) ending with a reminder of the high enthronement of our spiritual Redeemer (iii. 1-21); (2) the definition of the "mind," or "disposition," of Christ exhibited in his self-abnegating incarnation, obedient suffering, and supreme exaltation (ii. 5-11). Both passages are characteristic of Paul's gospel in general, which is always, as against that of the Judaizers, the gospel of a drama, or spectacle, witnessed; not a gospel of teachings heard. It is a gospel about Jesus, not of precepts inculcated by Jesus, a drama of redemption for all mankind out of servitude into Son ship, wherein the cross is central. Both passages are also characteristic, as we shall see, of the later period of Paul's literary activity; for even in Philippians, the dominant doctrinal motive is the Redemption to which Paul is looking forward, and this is now conceived even more strongly than in the earlier letters in terms of personal religion. He anticipates "departing to be with Christ" (i. 23) rather than awaiting Him on earth (1st Thess. iv. 17). The "goal" toward which the Christian "presses on" is personal immortality through mystic union with Christ in the life of God (iii. 10-14). This too is a real doctrine of the Kingdom of God; but its starting-point is humanity's triumph over its enemies 'sin' and 'death,' not Israel's triumph over its oppressors. Still more in the Colossian group does it become apparent how the 'far-off, divine event' is a unity of mankind through the Spirit corresponding to the Stoic figure of the members and the body rather than the 'Kingdom of David.'

Again the opponents in Phil. iii. 2, 18 f. are not mere Pharisaic legalists, unable to see that Law and Grace are mutually exclusive systems, and nullifying the significance of the Cross by perpetuating the system it was intended to abolish. If we may explain the difference by Colossians, they are Jews of heathenish tendencies, pretended adherents of the gospel, who nullify its significance by perpetuating regard for the Law; only the servility deplored is not servility toward God, but toward "angels" (Col. ii. 18).

To appreciate the enlargement which has come to Christianity beyond its merely 'apostolic' form through the independent development of the Greek churches in this second period we must realize that Paul's 'gospel of the uncircumcision' differed in respect to promise as well as law. The coming Kingdom which he preached was something more than "the kingdom of our father David" extended from Jerusalem. What it really was becomes fully apparent only in the 'Christological Epistles.' But we must study the opposition to appreciate how differently the idea of Redemption had developed on Greek soil.

That aspect of Judaism which was most conspicuous to the outsider in Paul's day was not the legalism of the scribes and the Palestinian synagogue, perpetually embalmed in the Talmud and orthodox rabbinism of to-day. It was the superstition and magic which excite the contempt of satirists like Horace, Juvenal, and Martial, and call forth descriptions like that of the letter of Hadrian to Servianus, characterizing the Samaritans, Jews and Christians dwelling in Egypt as "all astrologers, haruspices, and quacksalvers." It is this type of Jew who is most widely known in the contemporary Hellenistic world; whose spells and incantations, framed in Old Testament language, are perpetuated in the leaden incantation rolls and magic papyri of the Berlin collection; whose portrait is painted in the Simon Magus of Acts viii. 14-24, the Elymas the sorcerer of Acts xiii. 6-12, the "strolling Jews, exorcists," and the "seven sons of Sceva" of Acts xix. 13-20. A Christian writer early in the second century is so impressed with this characteristic of contemporary Judaism that he even distinguishes as the third type of religion, besides idolatry and Christianity, "the Jews, who fancy that they alone know God, but do not, worshipping angels and archangels, the moon and the month," and seeks to prove his case by citing the Old Testament festal system. Indeed this idea of Judaism is the predominant one among the second-century apologists. Jewish "superstition" is a notorious fact of the time. The transcendentalizing of Jewish theology after the Persian period had led inevitably to an elaborate angelology and demonology. When as part of this process a more and more supernatural character was attributed to the Law it could but have a two-fold effect. The learned and orthodox would treat it soberly as a revelation of the divine will. This is the legalistic development we see in the Talmud and the Palestinian synagogue. The ignorant and superstitious, especially in the Greek-speaking world, would use it as a book of magic. This is what we see among many Jewish sects, particularly in Samaria, Egypt and among the Greek-speaking Jews. The tendency was marked even in Galilee. Jesus Himself stigmatizes the morbid craving of His countrymen for miracles as the mark of an "adulterous" generation, because the power invoked was not divine, but always angelic, or even demonic. Paul alludes to the same trait (1st Cor. i. 22). But while there is a singular absence both from the Pauline and the Johannine writings of any reference to exorcism, the typical miracle of Synoptic story, it has been justly remarked that no element of Paul's thought has been so little affected by that of Jesus as his angelology and demonology. Paul's world-view, like that of the apocalypses of his time, is a perfect phantasmagoria of angels and demons, "gods many and lords many." His conception of the redemption conflict is not a wrestling against flesh and blood, but against "world-rulers of this (lower region of) darkness," against "archangels," "elements," "principalities," "powers." The one thing which takes away all harmful influence from this credulity (if we must apply an unfairly modern judgment to an ancient writer) is his doctrine of the Son ship and Lordship of Jesus, with whom the redeemed are "joint-heirs" of the entire creation and thus superior to angels. In this respect Paul has imbibed the mind of Christ. Jesus' remedy for superstition is not scientific but religious. It does not deny the popularly assumed relation to "spirits" good or evil, but affirms a direct relation to the Infinite Spirit, which reduces all angels and demons to insignificance save as "ministers." Paul's world-view starts with the creation of man to be lord and heir of the world (Gal. iv. 1; 1st Cor. iii. 22; cf. Gen. i. 28). The "purpose of God, which he purposed in Christ Jesus, before the creation, unto a dispensation of the fulness of the ages" is "to our glory." It would be frustrated if the "Second Adam" did not become the Heir, in whom the redeemed creation would find the goal of its long expectancy. Paul has a cosmology as well as "Enoch." He could not be a worthy follower of Jesus – he could not even be a loyal "son of the Law" without holding to the accepted doctrine of the Inheritance intended for Messiah and his obedient people. It did not make him less firm in this conviction when as a Christian he thought of Jesus as the Messiah, and of Jew and Gentile united in his kingdom; only the starting-point is not the subjection of the sons of Abraham under Gentiles, but the subjection of the sons of Adam under "world-rulers of this darkness." When he combines Ps. viii. and Ps. cx. in his depiction of the reign of Christ in 1st Cor. xv. 24-27, it is a sure indication of its scope as Paul understood it. He included in the lordship over creation, and the subjection of all "enemies" which the exalted Christ is awaiting "at the right hand of God," the subjection of "angels, and principalities, and powers and every name that is named, whether of beings in heaven, or on earth, or under the earth." Paul pursues, then, the method of the apocalyptic writers in making his doctrine of Redemption and the Kingdom transcendental. By making it cosmic he undermines its Jewish particularism. He avoids the superstition by holding firmly to Jesus' doctrine of Son ship by moral affinity with God.

In the Christological Epistles accordingly it is apparent that the Pauline churches are learning to think of the coming Kingdom in a widely different way from the 'apostolic.' The Greek doctrine of mystic union, not the rabbinic of a "share in the world to come," is the basis. In due time we shall see how difficult the process of reconciliation became between Greek and Semitic thought in this field also. For the present we can only note how in the great theme of the Unity of the Spirit in Eph. iv. 1 – vi. 9 it is not the 'apostolic' ideal of a restoration of the kingdom to Israel according to the oath sworn to Abraham (Luke i. 68-75; cf. Acts i. 6) that dominates, but an enlargement of the figure of the body and members, a figure commonly employed by Stoic writers, to apply to the unity of the church in Corinthians and Romans. In the Epistles of the Captivity the doctrine of the Kingdom is a social organism permeated and vitalized by Christ's spirit of service. Personal immortality is union with the life of God.

In view of the notoriety of Ephesus as the very centre of the trade in magic (so much so that spells and incantations were technically known as "Ephesian letters") and of what Acts tells us of the enormous destruction there of "books of magic" effected by Paul's preaching, it is not surprising that Asia and Phrygia should appear a few years after Paul's departure as the hot-bed of a "philosophy and vain deceit, after the tradition of men, after the 'elements' of the world, and not after Christ." Acts xx. 29 makes Paul predict the heresy.

Such was especially the case at Colossæ, a little town long after notorious for its superstition, where Epaphras, now Paul's fellow-prisoner, had founded the church. Epaphras himself at the time of Paul's writing was in great anxiety both for this church and for the adjoining churches at Hierapolis and Laodicea. Colossians is written to meet this danger, and was sent by the same bearers as the note to Philemon. It was to be exchanged, after being read at Colossæ, for another epistle sent simultaneously to Laodicea. Whether our Ephesians is this companion letter or only a deutero-Pauline production framed on the basis of some genuine letter written on this occasion, is a disputed point among critics. In Marcion's canon our Ephesians was called "Laodiceans," and in our own oldest textual authorities it has no address. We may assume that Ephesians is really the companion letter, whose original address was for some reason cancelled;15 or that it is but partially from Paul's own hand. Neither view will materially alter our conception of his teaching, or the special application of it to the circumstances of the churches of the Lycus Valley. The important thing to observe is that whereas the application in Colossians is specific, in Ephesians it is systematic and general. Colossians wages a direct polemic against those who are making believers the spoil of mere 'Elements' by introducing distinctions of "meats and drinks" (a step beyond Mosaism), with observance of "feast days, new moons and sabbaths." In Ephesians we have, either altogether at first hand, or to a greater or less extent at second, a general, affirmative presentation of Paul's doctrine of Lordship in Christ. It has only incidental allusion to being "deceived with empty words" (v. 6), and a warning not to be "children tossed to and fro and carried about with every wind of doctrine, by the sleight of men in craftiness, after the wiles of error" (iv. 14).

Colossians and Ephesians develop, accordingly, that (cosmological) wisdom of God conveyed to Paul by the Spirit of Christ in a "mystery," at which he had only hinted in 1st Cor. ii. 1-16. Paul's gnosis, or insight, concerns the purpose of God in creation, hidden even from the (angelic) "world-rulers," who are coming to nought. The Spirit of Christ, who as the divine Wisdom had been the agent of creation, is given to Christian apostles and prophets. It affords them in the revelation of this "mystery" a philosophy both of creation and redemption which puts to shame mere speculative reasoning. The Inheritance – the things God prepared for those that love Him – consists (as an apocalyptic writer had said) of "things which eye had not seen, nor ear heard, nor had entered into the heart of man to conceive." Paul had purposely refrained from unfolding this revealed cosmology and philosophy of history to the Corinthians, in order to avoid just the evils which the teaching of Apollos had apparently precipitated at the time when 1st Corinthians was written. Still, we can gain from this very epistle (1st Cor. viii. 6; xv. 24-28) a partial conception of his doctrine of Christ as the beginning and end of the creation, the Wisdom of God by whom and for whom as Heir, all things were created. From Romans i. – viii. and ix. – xi. we can easily see that as Second Adam the Messiah was to Paul the key to the world's development and to human history; for since the triumph of Satan in Eden the whole creation had waited, groaning, for the advent of the sons. Galatians makes it no less clear that he thought of the Cross as the epoch-making event, which marks the transition from the period of the control of the world by secondary agencies, to the rule of the Son. This "mystery" is simply brought out and developed now in the Epistles of the Captivity. The effort and prayer is that the readers may "have the eyes of their heart enlightened," obtain something of Paul's own insight into the riches of the inheritance they are to share with Christ, something of Paul's experience of the power of God in raising Christ from the dead and setting Him on the throne of glory. If they but realize what Son ship and heirship with Christ implies – if they but take in the fact that by the resurrection Spirit within them they have already in a sense shared in this deliverance and this exaltation, they will be forearmed against all the vain deceits of theosophy. It is in fact this resurrection Spirit which brings about the unity of the world as a single organism. It extends from the uppermost height to the nethermost abyss. And because it is the Spirit of Jesus, it fills all it touches with the disposition to loving service. It affords a new ethics and a new politics whose keynote is the law of love in imitation of God and Christ. All social relations are recreated by it, beginning with family and church. Hence we must think of our redemption as like Israel's from the bondage and darkness of Egypt. The principalities and powers of this world, spiritual hosts of wickedness in the super terrestrial regions, are vainly endeavouring to hold back the people of God, in "this darkness." We have only to wait like Israel at the Passover "with our loins girt, and our feet shod." The Deliverer will soon appear from heaven, clad in armour of salvation, as in the ancient passover songs, cleaving the darkness with his sword of light, and leading forth the captives.