* McGiffert (History of Christianity in the Apostolic Age, p. 172fE.) is almost alone in arguing that the two visits of Ac 15 and Ac 11 are really one and the same. VOL. I. — 28
panion is Barnabas (Gal 2^ Ac IP") ; each account mentions the relief of the poor (Gal 2", Ac 11-").
In support of the alternative view it is argued :
(i. ) That in Ac 15 and Gal 2^-i" the chief persons are the same — St. Paul and Barnabas on the one hand, St. Peter and St. James on the other ; (ii.) the sub- ject of discussion is the same, i.e. the circumcision of Gentile converts ; (iii.) the result is the same, i.e. the exemption of Gentile converts from the enact- ments of the Law, and the recognition by St. Peter, St. James, and St. John of the apostleship of St. Paul and Barnabas (Lightfoot, Gal.^, p. 123 tt'.)-
The acceptance of either view involves difficulties. Against the former it has been objected :
(i.) That Acts does not mention any meeting be- tween St. Paul and the three in connexion with the ' famine visit,' but rather suggests that they were absent from Jerusalem at the time. This is not a serious difficulty. The argument from silence is always precarious, and the only passage which suggests that the apostles were not in Jerusalem is the statement that, from the house of John Mark's mother, St. Peter went eis erepov Tbirov (Ac 121'^), which need not necessarily mean that he left the city.
(ii.) That the language of Gal 2- (Tpix<^ ^ ^dpa/xov) implies that St. Paul had already done much mis- sionary work amongst Gentiles, \\ hereas the events of Ac 1127-3" took place before his first missionary journey. It is doubtful, however, if this objection has any weight, in view of the fact that at any rate fourteen years had elapsed since the Apostle first realized his special vocation to preach to the Gen- tiles (Ac 222').
(iii.) That it is chronologically impossible. The date of the famine (and therefore of St. Paul's visit to Jerusalem) is fixed by the independent evidence of Josephus between A.D. 46 and 48. On this theory, therefore, the date of St. Paul's con- version would be not later than A.D. 33, even if the fourteen years of Gal 2^ are reckoned from that event, and as early as A.D. 30, if the.y are reckoned from his first visit to Jerusalem (Gal V^). Most recent students of NT chronology, however (except Harnack, who accepts the date A.D. 30), place St. Paul's conversion between A.D. 33 and 37. The difficulty is real but not fatal. All chronological schemes for the period A.D. 29-46 are merely tenta- tive, and those who argue for the later date usually take their stand on the assumption that the visit of Gal 2 is the same as that of Ac 15.
The alternative theory, that Gal 2 and Ac 15 refer to the .same occasion, presents special difficul- ties of its own.
(i.) St. Paul's account of his dealings with the mother church is incomplete. He is guilty of con- cealing his second visit to Jerusalem, and thereby his personal defence against the Judaizers is in- validated. The usual answers to this objection are : (a) St. Paul omits his second visit because he did not meet the apostles on that occasion (see above), or (^) St. Paul refers only to those visits of which his adversaries had given a distorted account.
(ii. ) The most obvious inference from the narrative of Gal 2 is that St. Paul's dispute with Cephas at Antioch (2^^) took place after the apostolic meeting at Jerusalem* (2^'^"). But such a dispute is quite incomprehensible if the relation between Jewish and Gentile converts had already been settled. It is just possible, however, that the quarrel occurred before the meeting. It may be that the absence from 2^' of the ^Treira of the earlier sections {V^--^ 2^) indicates that the writer is no longer following strict chronological order.
(iii.) Ac 15 states that the Council of Jerusalem
* ' Gal 211-16 forms the climax, from St. Paul's point of view, in his triumphant assertion of the free Christian rights belong- ing to Gentile converts ' (Mofifatt, LSiT, p. 101).
434 GALATIAXS, EPISTLE TO THE
GALATIA^^S, EPISTLE TO THE
dealt with and settled the very question which St. Paul discusses in the Epistle. It is incredible that the Apostle should describe a private interview with the three which occurred at the time of the Council without alluding either to the Council itself or to its decrees, although the official decision, that Gentiles need not be circumcised, would have provided a conclusive argument against the Juda- izers. Again, St. Paul could not truthfully have said ovd^v irpocxavidevTo (Gal 2"), after accepting the 'Gentile food restrictions'* passed by the Council (Ac 15-^). These objections are as weighty as any argument from silence can be. They are satis- factorily met only by the assumption that the Acts' account of the Council is wholly or partly unhistorical.
The identity of the visit of Gal 21-'" must be left uncertain. If it be that of Ac 11, the narrative of Galatians is free from difficulties, but some altera- tion is necessary in the generally accepted chrono- logy of the primitive Apostolic Age. If it be that of Ac 15, doubt arises as to the historicity of the Acts' account of the Council, and the reason for St. Paul's silence concerning his second visit to Jerusalem must be left to conjecture.