14
ACCOUNT
ACHAICUS
ACCOUNT. — It will be sufficient merely to mention the use of the verb 'account' (\oylfofj.ai) in the sense of ' reckon,' ' deem,' ' consider' (Ro 8***, 1 Co 41, He ll'^ 2 P 3'5). Simple uses of the noun are found in Ac 19^", when the 'town-clerk' {q.v.) of Ephesus warns his fellow-citizens of the difficulty of giving ' account (\6yos) of this concourse ' ; and in Ph 4'" ' the fruit that increaseth to your account.' The only significant passages where the word is found are those dealing with the Judgment.
Tlie declaration in Ro W^, 'Each one of us shall give account of himself to God,' must be studied in the light of the paragraph (vv.'^-i^) of which it is the conclusion. Those who are them- selves liable to judgment must not set themselves up as judges of one another, either to make light of sincere scruples or to reprove laxity. For one man to judge another is to usurp the prerogative of God, to whom alone (as universal sovereign and object of worship) man is answerable. The passage should be compared with 2 Co 5^", where the ' judg- ment-seat ' is called Christ's ; see also 1 Co 4^. St. Paul applies this doctrine, which is found in the Synoptic Gospels and was an integral part of primitive Christian teaching, to Jew and Gentile, to himself and his converts, to those who have died before the Parousia and those who are alive at it. The life in the body provides the oppor- tunity for moral action, and by the use they have made of it men are sentenced (cf. Gal 6**). A. Menzies {Com. on 2 Cor.) calls attention {a) to this aspect of the Judgment in contrast with that which represents the saints as judging the world and angels (1 Co 6-^- ; cf. Mt 19-») ; (6) to the incon- sistency between the doctrine of justification by faith alone, and the doctrine of final judgment of men according to their actions. There is, however, in the present writer's opinion, no inconsistency here. The NT generally represents the saved as judged as well as the unsaved. The judgment of the latter, however, is retributory and involves rejection ; that of the former is for a place, higher or lower, within the heavenly Kingdom ; and this place is in accordance with the faithfulness and quality of their service while in the body. St. Paul, as the above references prove, is emphatic as to the fact and nature of this judgment (cf. 1 Co 3'^''^), and shows that, however true it is that salvation is by grace, there will be gradations in standing and in reward in the after-life. This is in harmony with the teaching of our Lord in the Synoptics, especially in the parables of service and reward (Lk 19i8-2» etc. ; cf. Mk 10^»). Cf. also, as to the fact of the saints having to give an account of their earthly stewardship, He 13''', 1 P 4^ : ' [evil- doers and slanderers of Christians] shall give account to him that is ready to judge tlie quick and the dead ' (in 1" to the Father, in V^ and 5^ to Christ). These may be regarded as special instances of the General Judgment already referred to. The expression dnodLOovai \6yov generally im- plies that defence is not easy.
LiTRRATURE.— See lit. on art. Judgment ; the Comm. in loce. ; W. N. Clarke, An Outline of Christian Theol., 1898, p. 459 ff.
E. Griffith-Jones. ACCURSED.— See Anathema.
ACCUSATION.— See Trial-at-Law.
ACELDAMA.— See Akeldama.
ACHAIA. — Achaia {'Axa'ta) was, in the classical period, merely a strij) of fertile coast-land stretch- ing along the soutli of the Gulf of Corinth, from the river Larisus, which separated it from FAia, to tlie Sythas, which divided it from Sicyonia, while tne higher mountains of Arcadia bounded it on the south. Its whole length was about 65 miles, its
breadth from 12 to 20 miles, and its area about 650 sq. miles.
The Achseans were probably the remnant of a Pelasgian race once distributed over the whole Peloponnesus. Though they were celebrated in the heroic age, they rarely figured in the great Hellenic period, keeping themselves as far as possible aloof from the conflicts between the Ionian and Doric States, happy in their own almost uninterrupted prosperity. It is not till the last struggle for Hellenic independence that they appear on the stage of history.
The cities which formed the famous Achaean League became the most powerful political body in Greece ; and, when the Romans subdued the country (146 B.C.), they at once honoured the brave con- federation and spared the feelings of all the Hellenes by calling the new province not Greece but Achaia. As constituted by Augustus in 27 B.C., the province included Thessaly, ^tolia, Acharnania, and part of Epirus (Strabo, XVII. iii. 25), being thus almost co-extensive with the modern kingdom of Greece. As a senatorial province Achaia was governed by a proconsul, who was an ex-prajtor. In A.D. 15 Tiberius took it from the Senate, adding it to Macedonia to form an Imperial province under the government of a legatus ; but in 44 Claudius re- stored it to the Senate. ' Proconsul ' (avBdiraros, Ac 18^^) was therefore the governor's correct official title at the time of St. Paul's residence in Corinth. Nero, as 'a born Philhellene,' wished to make Greece absolutely free.