' The statement of Josephus that Judsea was attached to the province of Syria and placed under its governor (Ant. xvii. xiii. 5; XVIII. i. 1, iv. 6) appears to be incorrect; on the contrary, Judaja probably formed thenceforth a procuratorial province of itself ' (T. Monimsen, The Provinces of the Roman Enijiire'^, Eng. tr., 1909, ii. ISon. ; cf. Schiirer, i. ii. 42 f.). The governor was a man of equestrian rank, so that Judaea belonged to the third class of imperial provinces mentioned by Strabo (xvii. iii. 25). The usual designation for such a governor — eTriVpoTros — occurs frequently in .Josephus, though he occasionally uses iTrapxos or riyeiMMv. The last term, which is equivalent to praises, is the one most often employed in the NT.
It was usual to speak of Jerusalem and Judiea, instead of 'and the rest of Judaea' (Mt 4-^ Mk 1^ Ac 1^, etc.). The Talmud explains this practice by saying that the holy city formed a division by itself (A. Neubauer, La Geogr. du Talmud, 1868, p. 56). The occurrence of Judaea between Meso- potamia and Cappadocia in Ac 2** is veiy peculiar. Jerome reads Syria instead ; Tertullian suggests Armenia (c. Jud. vii.) ; and Bithynia, Idumea, and India have also been proposed (EGT in loco). AVlien Palestine was divided into First, Second, and Third (Code of Theodosius, A.D. 409), Palest ma Prima comprehended the old districts of Judaea and Samaria ; and this division is still observed in the ecclesiastical documents of the Eastern Church.
James Strahan.
JUDAH.— See Tribes.
JUDAIZING. — It is obvious that the transition from Judaism to Christianity could hardly be made without difficulty. To the Jew it must have seemed almost incredible that he should divest himself of the observance of Mosaic Law, and equallj' incredible that the Gentile should be admitted into the Kingdom of God without accept- ing the same Law. It was inevitable that the question should soon arise in the early tlays of the Church, whether the Church of tiie future should be Catholic or Jewish. It was only to be expected that this controversy should give rise to a party in the Church who were in favour of the latter alternative, consisting of those who, being Chris- tians, yet retained their affection for the Mosaic Law and wished to impose it upon every member of the Christian Church. On the other hand, the keen intellect of a Stephen or a Paul saw at once that any attempt to enforce the Mosaic Law or even the initiatory rite of circumcision upon the Gentiles, meant stagnation and death to the Church.
No inconsiderable part of the Acts and the Epistles is taken up with the description of the attempts of the Judaizers to gain their end, and of the resolute resistance to them of St. Paul and those who thought with him.
1. In the Acts. — In the Acts the three most im- portant crises of this (juestion are (a) the speech of St. Stephen, (b) the conversion of Cornelius, and (c) the Council at Jerusalem.
(a) The importance of St. Stephen's speech con- sists in the principles which underlie the historical summary which is its main feature. He had been accused of blaspheming the Temple and the Law. No doubt, the charges were exaggerated and his
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language distorted by false witnesses. But there was that half truth in them which made them colourable. The principles which come out in the speech are those which we can also trace in Christ's attitude towards Judaism, viz. that Christianity would fulfil and also succeed the older dispensation.
{b) The imijortance of the incident of Cornelius is emphasized by the two-fold account of it in the Acts and by the two special manifestations of the Divine will made to St. Peter to teach him what he should do. The vision of the sheet, with the clean and unclean animals, showed that the Apostle's act was a new departure, requiring special and Divine sanction ; and the outpouring of the Holy Spirit, prior to baptism, was needed to teach him that he might initiate his converts into the Christian Church by that sacrament.
(c) Now, as the first of these incidents had dealt with the general principles regulating the relation of Christianity to Judaism, and the second had shown that Gentiles were to be admitted into tlie Christian body, so the third determined what re- quirements, if any, should be made of Gentile con- verts. The four precepts required are not to be regarded simply as concessions to Jewish prejudices. Three out of the four deal with great mysteries of human life and induce corresponding forms of reverence. Nor were these precepts intended to be applied either universally or permanently, but rather to meet a local and temporary difficulty.
In addition to these three important incidents, there are many references in the Acts to this question, showing the prominent place it took in the Church thought and life of the day. We cannot go into all these references, but, as an example, we may quote the narrative in Ac 21-'"^- in which St. Paul is advised to take some step that may disarm the prejudices of the Judaizers against him.
2. In St. Paul's Epistles. — When we turn to the Epistles, we have to notice that St. Paul was attacked on personal as well as on doctrinal grounds, and that his authority as an apostle was called in question. This was especially tlie case at Corinth, as we learn from the Second Epistle to the Corinthians. In the First Epistle he had dealt with the divisions in that Church (see DIVI- SIONS). But in the Second Epistle he defends his own apostolic authority. He could produce no commendatory letter from the Church in Jerusalem as his opponents were able to do, nor Avould he do so ; he did not derive his authority from any apostle, but direct from the Lord Jesus Himself.