Bible. New Testament -- Criticism, interpretation, etc.; Christianity -- Origin; Paul, the Apostle, Saint
Of the incidents mentioned by Paul, as belonging to this other visit,
scarcely can any one, unless it be that of his having Barnabas for a
companion, be found, that presents itself as being the same with any
incident mentioned in the Acts, in the account given of the above named
Deputation Visit. But, between the two accounts, neither does any
repugnance manifest itself: and, forasmuch as, in a statement, the
purpose of which required that no interview, in which anything material
passed between him and the Apostles, should pass unnoticed,--he mentions
no more than one visit besides the first,--it seems reasonable to
conclude, that it was but one and the same visit, that, in the penning
of both these accounts, was in view.
As far as appears, it is from the account thus given by Paul of the
second, of the two visits mentioned by him as made to Jerusalem, that
the received chronology has deduced the year, which it assigns to the
Deputation Visit, as recorded in the Acts.
In Paul's account alone--in Paul's, and not in that in the Acts--is the
distance given in a determinate number of years. According to one of two
interpretations, 17--the number above mentioned as adopted in the
current chronology--is the number of years mentioned by Paul as
intervening between those two visits. But even in this place, a
circumstance that must not pass altogether unnoticed is,--that,
according to another interpretation, to which the text presents itself
as almost equally open, the length of the interval would be considerably
greater. Galatians i. 17: "Neither went I up to Jerusalem to them which
were Apostles before me: but I went into Arabia, and returned again unto
Damascus. Then after three years I went up to Jerusalem to see Peter,
and abode with him fifteen days." After what period?--after that of his
conversion? or after the expiration of this his second visit to
Damascus? Reckoning from this latter period, the interval may be ever so
much greater than that of the three years: for, to the three years may
be added an indefinite length of time for the second, and even for the
first, of his abodes at Damascus. But, as we advance, reason will appear
for concluding, that, being in the eyes of the Damascus rulers, as well
as the Jerusalem rulers, a traitor--in the highest degree a traitor--his
abode at Damascus could not, at either of these times, have been other
than short as well as secret.
Gal. ii. 1: "Then, fourteen years after, I went up again to Jerusalem
with Barnabas, and took Titus also." This being supposed to be the
Deputation Visit, these fourteen added to the former three, make the
seventeen.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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