‘a regular declaration of war,’ a renewal of the struggle between the principle of Jewish privile and Christian universalism. This conflict, break- ing out in Antioch, spread rapidly over the field of St. Paul’s mission and raged bitterly in the Galatian and Corinthian Churches, where emis- saries from Jerus. appeared on the same errand as those who had ‘carried away’ the Jewish Christians of Antioch. ‘Evidently, the apostle had quitted Jerus. (after the Comma of Ac 15 and the under- standing with the “‘ Pillars”) and proceeded to his second Missionary Journey full of satisfaction at the victory he had el, and free from anxiety for the future. The decisive moment of the crisis se ops falls between the Thess, and Gal. Epp. What had happened meanwhile? The violent dis- cussion with St. Peter at Antioch, and all that the recital of this incident reveals to us,—the arrival of the emissaries from St. James in the Gentile Christian circle, and the countermission organized to rectify the work of St. Paul. A new situation suddenly presents itself to the apostle on his return from the second Missionary Journey’ (Sabatier, The Apostle Paul, pp. 10, 11, also 124-136). The Judaizers had recovered from the shock of their former overthrow; and the enormous accessions to the Church from heathenism were threatening to overwhelm them. They determined on a new and more artful attempt to capture the Gentile Churches. They did not now, as before, bluntly insist that circumcision was necessary to salvation (Ac 15'). But they maintained that the law of God created an indelible distinction between the circumcised Israelite and all others, and that this separation was guarded by the Levitical ordinances respecting meats. While the Messiah was the Saviour of all men, there belonged to His own people, with the apostles whom He chose from amongst them, an inalienable primacy. Only through circumcision and conformity to the sacred ordinances could Gentile believers become the legiti- mate heirs of faithful Abraham, and enter into al! the blessedness of the kingdom of God. Such was the theory of the new Judaizers, as we gather it from St. Paul’s polemic against them. They no longer denied the Christian status of uncircumcised believers in Christ, but they vindicated a higher status for the circumcised. Thus Peter and Bar- nabas, in withdrawing from the common Church table at Antioch under the pressure of these men, virtually ‘compelled the Gentiles to Judaize’; for only, it seemed, on this condition woald the latter be in communion with Jewish believers and be re- cognized as Christians in the fullest sense. ‘The decrees’ of the Jerus. Council, though certainly not designed for this pu , and not correspond- ing (as it has often been alleged) to the ‘Seven Com- mandments of the Sons of Noah’ imposed on the gér téshabh or sebomenos (Hort, Jud. Christianity, pp. 68-76), might with a little ingenuity be con- strued in favour of the distinction now alleged, as though they placed Gentile Christians on a footing resembling that of proselytes to Judaism.* The law was brought in again to complete the work of the gospel; and those who had ‘ begun in the spirit’ were to be ‘perfected by the flesh (Gal 3°).
While the legalists sought in this way to foist Judaism upon the Pauline Churches, they equally strove to destroy the influence of the Apostle Pau! They came forward as the authorized representa- tives of the chiefs at Jerus., and showed ‘letters of commendation’ to this effect (Gal 24, 2Co 3'); in their name they assumed to correct the imperfect doctrine of Paul, and to claim the allegiance οἱ
* Such abuse of the δόγματα by the Judalzers best explains Bt. Paul's silence respecting them, and their disappearance after Ac 164 (see, however, 21™)
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PAUL THE APOSTLE
all believers for the mother Church. Paul, they asserted, had no knowledge of Jesus Christ and no authority to preach Him, beyond what he had received from Peter and the Twelve. Amongst other proofs of this, they even argued at Corinth that his declining to receive a stipend betrayed the consciousness of inferior right. With these un- scrupulous opponents Paul was in conflict through- out the third tour, At the outset he had warned his Galatian converts against the seducers who were following on his track (Gal 1" 5°; ef. Ac 18%). His opponents anticipated his arrival at Corinth ; from Corinth he writes to Rome, expecting that they will carry the agitation there and may pre- possess the Roman Church against him. If these men were really supported, as they alleged, by the responsible heads of the Jewish Church, St. Paul’s position was almost untenable; but the studious respect shown in the Epp. of this period for the ‘Pillars’ indicates his confidence in their loyalty to the fellowship established between Ἡπακεῖν aul them (Gal 2%). The failure of the attack on St. Paul's apostleship goes far to prove that there was no schism between him and the Twelve.
This fourth period, therefore, of St. Paul’s ministry is distinguished as the period of his struggle with the Judaistie reaction in the Church, and of the four great evangelical Epistles which were its outcome. The evangelist becomes the controversialist ; the church-founder must defend the churches of his foundation. The apologetic and doctrinal interests now predominate in St. Paul’s work; he is employed in consolidating the conquests already won.