But without resorting to either of these violent meth- ods, the dithculty may be solved with perfect satisfac- tion by the simple hypothesis that there were two in- surgents of the same name. Since Luke represents Theudas as having preceded Judas the Galihean (q. v.), it is certain that he could not have appeared later, at all events, than the latter part of the reign of Herod the Great. The very year, now, of that monarch's death was remarkably turbulent; the land was overrun with belligerent parties, under the direction of insurrectionary chiefs or fanatics (Jrtpn /.ivpia Sropvl3wv t;^('jUfi'« Tr)p 'lovcaiav KartXcii-ificnn, .Josephus, .) nt. xvii, 12,4). The whole of these, with three exceptions, are passed over bj' Josephus without particularizing their leaders, so that it need create little surprise that one in which com- paratively so small a number were concerned (Gama- . liel's 400 can hardly be made to tally with Josephus's TrXtTirrot; oi^Xot,') sbotdd have been omitted by him, or spoken of in ccpially general terms. The name Theu- das was one of no unfrequent occurrence (see above), while the fact that there were as many as three impos- tors of the name of Simon (Josephus, A tit. xvii, 12, 6 ; xx, 4, 2), besides Simon JIagus, and as many Judases (ibid, xvii, 12, 5: War, i, 33, 2-4). mentioned by .Josephus in the space of about ten years iiicre.isos the probaliility that there may have been two named Theudas in the space of forty years. This mode of reconciling Luke with Josephus, which has commended itself to such crit- ics as Beza, Scaliger, Casaubon, and Bengel, in earlier times, and Kuinol, Olshauscn, Winer, and Kbrard, in later days, is ably supported by Anger (De Tempp. in A ct. Apoxl. Ralione, p. 1H5), anil also by Lardner {Credi- hilily,\, 404-414), who remarks that "it is not at all strange that there should be two impostors in .ludsea of the same name in the comp.ass of forty years, and that they should come to the same end; on the contrary, it is strange that any learned man should find this hard to believe." So impartial a witness as Jost, the histo-
rian of the Jews^Gescliichfe der Israeliten, ii, Anh. p. 76), admits the reasonableness of such combinations, and holds in this case to the credibility of Luke, as well as that of Josephus. Moreover, .Josejdius was by no means infallible, as Strauss and critics of his school may al- most be said to take for granted; and it is possible cer- taiidy (this is the position of some) that Josephus him- self may have misplaced the time of Tlieudas, instead of Luke, who is charged with that oversight. Calvin's view tliat Judas the (ialiliean appeared not after, but A(;/!»/Y', Theudas (/(fr« tovtov- inxiiper vel pneteiea), and that the examination of the a]iostles before the Sanhedrim occurred in the time of Claudius (contrary to the manifest chronological order of the Acts), de- serves mention only as a waymark of the progress which has been made in Biblical exegesis since his time.
2. Another explanation (essentially different only as proposing to identify the person) is that Luke's Theu- das may have been one of the three insurgents whose names are mentioned by Josephus in connection with the disturbances that took place about the time of Her- od's death. Soinitag {Theol. Stud. ?/. Kritik. 1837, p. 622, etc.; translated in the Biblioth. Sacra, 1848, p. 409 sq.) has advanced this view, and supported it with much learning and ability. He argues that the Theudas re- ferred to by Gamaliel is the individual who occurs in Josephus under the name oi Simon ( II '(/?•, ii, 4, 2; Ant. xvii, 10, 6), a slave of Herod, who attempted to make himself king amid the confusion which attended the vacancy of the throne when that monarch died. He urges the following reasons for that opinion : first, this Simon, as he was the most noted among those who dis- turbed the public peace at that time, would be apt to occur to Gamaliel as an illustration of his point; sec- ondh', he is described as a man of the same lofty pre- tensions (67j'ai fi'^jot,' tXiriaaQ nap' uvTii'ovv — Xi-ywv tlvai Tiva lavTov}; thirdly, he died a violent death, which Josephus does not mention as true of the other two insurgents; fourthly, he appears to have had com- paratively few adherents, in conformity with Luke's ioati rerpoKoaiiiji'; and, lastly, his having been origi- nally a slave accounts for the twofold ajipellation, since it was very common among the Jews to assume a dif- ferent name on changing their occupation or mode of life. It is very possible, therefore, that Gamaliel speaks of him as Theudas because, having borne that name so long at Jerusalem, he was best known by it to the mem- bers of the Sanhedrim ; and tliat Josepluis, on the con- trary, who wrote for Komans and (Jreeks, speaks of him as Simon because it was under that name that he set himself u|i as king, and thus acquired his foreign noto- riety (see Tacit. IJist. v, 9).
3. Wieseler (Cfiron. Synops. of Gospels, transl. p. 90- 92) considers Luke's Theudas to have been the same with Matthias or JMalthew, the son of Margaloth (Mat- thias = n*ri*5 being the Hebrew form of 96()0orot: = Gfu^ac), of whom Josephus (.4 »/. xvii, 6, 2-4) gives a detailed account as a distinguished teacher among the Jews, who, in the latter days of Herod the Great, raised a band of his scholars to effect a social reform in the spirit of the old Hebrew constitution, by "destroying the heathen works which the king had erected contrary to the law of their fathers." A large golden eagle, W'hich the king had caused to be erected over the great gate of the Temple, in defiance of the law that forbids images or representations of any living creatures, was an object of their special dislike, which, on hearing a false report that Herod was dead, Matthias and his companions proceeded to demolish; when the king's captain, supposing the undertaking to have a higher aim than was the fact, came upon the riotous reformers with a band of soldiers, and arrested the proceedings of the multitude. Dispersing the mob, he apprehended forty of the bolder spirits, together with Matthias and his fellow-leader Judas. ]\Latthias was burned. Now, had we used the term Theudas for the term Matthias,