Tlieu'das, a person incidentally mentioned but once in the New Test. (Acts v, 3tj), and concerning whom much controversy has arisen.
I. The Name. — This, in the original, is QivSag (a form which likewise occurs in Josephus, Ant. xx, 5, 1), and, if Greek, may be for Gfotiaf, as a contraction of BeocJo- TOQ or Oeudujpoc, i. e. God-given = Johanan (comp. Vulg. Theodas^ A similar form, QiuoSat;, occurs in Diogenes Laert. ix, 116. If Hebrew (Simonis, Onomast. N. T. p. 72), it may = miD, praise. The Mishna has a similar form, D'Tir {Bechor. iv, 4).
II. Scriptural Statement. — According to Luke's report of Gamaliel's speech before the Jewish Sanhedrim, on the occasion of the first arraignment of the apostles (A.D. 29), Theudas was the leader of a popular tumult some time previously {irpb tovtwv twv t'lpepwi') (Acts v, 34-36). He is spoken of as a religious impostor of high pretensions (Afyoij' liiHii riva kavrov), to whom a considerable body of adherents {avSpihv dpi^fxhi; wq TerpaKorriuji') ch)sely attached themselves (TruorreKo^- \)]^>j, 7rpofT£K\('S//, A. B.), but who was ultimately slain ((ivilpE^ij), and his party annihilated (tyb'oi'TO tic; ov- Sei'). (Gamaliel, it appears, was counselling prudent and temperate measures towards the apostles. Previous well-known examples, he said, had made it plain that the leaders of a bad cause would soon bring all to ruin, while those of a different kind would be sure to succeed. The first case he appeals to is that of Theudas, as above recited. He then goes on to notice the case of Judas of Galilee, who rose after Theudas in the days of the taxing, and after c'oUecting a considerable band was de- feated and slain. Now there can be no doubt that the Judas here spoken of was the Judas Gaulonites of Jose- phus, or Judas the Galiliean, who, in the time of Cyre- nius, raised a disturbance by opposing the census then ordered to be taken by the Homan government, and was cut off (Josephus, Ant. xviii, 1, 2; War, ii, 12). Thus far there is no ilifficulty ; it is only by a compari- son of contemporaneous history that a discrepancy is alleged as arising.
III. Adjustment of the Accotmt with .Josephus. — No in- surgent of this name is mentioned by the Jewish histo- rian at the period to which Gamaliel must refer, but he gives statements of several somewhat similar occur- rences about that time.
1. A religious impostor {y<ir]q tic avijp) named Theu- das is described by him as having raised a strikingly analogous commotion in the reign of Claudius, when Cuspius Fadus was procurator of Judaga. Josephus's account of the matter {Ant. xx, 5, 1) is that this fanat- ic, laying claim to prophetical powers, persuaded a very large body {rov irXnarov o;^Xoi') to follow liim to the .Jordan, taking their effects along with them, with the assurance that the waters would divide before him as they had done before Elijah and Elisha in the days of old; but being unexpectedly attacked by a squadron of cavalry sent out after him by Fadus, his followers were killed or taken prisoners, and the leader himself, being taken, was beheaded. The reign of Claudius and the procuratorship of Fadus fix this incident at about A.D. 44, i. e. some fifteen vears later than the deliverv of Gama-
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liel's speech ; and some forty after the scriptural event, since Luke places his Thcuilas, in tlie order of time, be- fore Jiiilas the (ialilivan, who made his apjjcarance soon after the dithronement of Archelaus, i. e. A.I). C or 7 (Joseplms, War, ii, «, 1 ; An/, xviii, 1, 0; xx, 5, '2).
Now, if we are to reijard it as certain that there was only one .Jewish insurgent named Theiidas, it follows that cither Luke or Josephus must be guilty of a chron- ological bhuuier. The hypothesis that Josephus has misplaced Tlieudas, though not impossible, and main- tained by ISIichaelis {Kiiiltit. in X. T. i, (ilS) and Jalm (Arrfia'ol. ii. "-'), is a way of cutting the knot which no imbiassed critic would desire to resort to. That the er- ror is Luke's, though taken for granted by most modern German critics (Eichhorn, De Wette, Credner, Meyer, Baur, etc.), is even more improbable when we take into account the great historical accuracy of his narrative, wliich closer researches are continually placing in a stronger light, and the date of the publication of the Acts. (It may not be amiss to remind the reader of some tine remarks, in illustration of Luke's historical ac- curacy, in Tholuck's Ghmhu-urdujknt der evang. Ge- schichte, p. lGl-177, 375-389. See also Ebrard, Eran- geliiche Kritik, p. G78 s(j. ; and Lechlcr, Das Apostolische Zeitulter, p. 6 sii.) Few things are, therefore, less cred- ible than that a careful author like Luke, writing with- in a fow^ years of the event, should have been betrayed into such a glaring historical mistake as antedating the insurrection of Theudas by nearly half a century. That he should have done this by an \ntvnUona\ prulcpds, as is supposed by some (Vales. A d Eiineh. //. E. ii, 11), is as completely at variance with the simplicity and unartis- tic character of his narrative. It is the height of in- justice to charge that the writer of the Acts either fab- ricated the speech jnit into the mouth of (iamaliel, or that he carelessly or surreptitioush' wrought into it a transaction which took place forty years or more after the time when it is said to have occurred (see Zeller, Die A postdf/esckichte, p. 132 sq.).