death,--the date of the journey referred to in Acts xi. 30 is assigned to about a.d. 45. If, therefore, we count back fourteen or seventeen years, we have as the date of the conversion, on the first hypothesis, a.d. 31, and on the second, a.d. 28, neither of which of course is tenable. In order to overcome this difficulty, critics(1) at one time proposed, against the unanimous evidence of MSS., to read instead of [------] in Gal. ii. 1, [------] "after four years;" but this violent remedy is not only generally rejected, but, even if admitted for the sake of argument, it could not establish the identity, inasmuch as the statements in Gal. ii. 1 ff. imply a much longer period of missionary activity amongst the Gentiles than Paul could possibly have had at that time, about which epoch, indeed, Barnabas is said to have sought him in Tarsus, apparently for the purpose of first commencing such a career;a certainly the account of his active ministry begins in the Acts only in Ch. xiii. Then, it is not possible to suppose that, if such a dispute regarding circumcision and the Gospel of the uncircumcision as is sketched in Gal. ii. had taken place on a previous occasion, it could so soon be repeated, Acts xv., and without any reference to the former transaction. Comparatively few critics, therefore, have ventured to maintain that the second visit recorded in the Epistle is the same as the second mentioned in the Acts (xi. 30), and in modern times the theory is almost entirely abandoned. If, therefore, it be admitted that Paul mentions all the journeys which he had made to Jerusalem up to the time at which he wrote, and that his second visit was not the second visit {221} of the Acts, but must be placed later, it follows clearly upon the Apostle's own assurance that the visit mentioned in Acts xi. 30, xii. 25, cannot have taken place and is unhistorical, and this is the conclusion of the majority of critics,(1) including many apologists, who, whilst suggesting that, for some reason, Barnabas may alone have gone to Jerusalem without Paul, or otherwise deprecating any imputation of conscious inaccuracy to the author, still substantially confirm the result that Paul did not on that occasion go to Jerusalem, and consequently that the statement is not historical. On the other hand, it is suggested that the additional visit to Jerusalem is inserted by the author with a view to conciliation, by representing that Paul was in constant communication with the Apostles and community of Jerusalem, and that he acted with their approval and sympathy. It is scarcely possible to observe the peculiar variations between the narratives of the Acts and of Paul without feeling that the author of the former deliberately sacrifices the independence and individuality of the great Apostle of the Gentiles. The great mass of critics agree in declaring that the {222}