Simon that the historian writes: ‘“‘ With © all his glory he took Joppa for an haven, and made an entrance to the isles of the sea” 1 Macc. xiv. 5 (about 144 B.c.). The Judaising of the city was the natural result of the Maccabean occupation, al- though the Syrians twice retook Joppa, and twice Hyrcanus regained it for the Jews. Taken by Pompey B.c. 63, re- stored to the Jews by Cesar 47, Jos., ART αν. Ay Ai Fy 057, 7, and Ant., xiv., 10, 6, and at length added to the kingdom of Herod the Great, Ant., xv., 7,3; B. F.,i., 20, 3, Joppa remained Jewish, imbued with all the fanatic patriotism of the mother-city, and in
250
1. ᾽ΑΝΗΡ δέ τις ἦν ἐν Καισαρείᾳ ὀνόματι Κορνήλιος,
, ~ - 2. ἑκατοντάρχης ἐκ σπείρης ] τῆς καλουµένης Ἰταλικῆς, εὐσεβὴς καὶ φοβούμενος τὸν Θεὸν σὺν παντὶ τῷ οἴκῳ αὐτοῦ, ποιῶν τε ἐλεημοσύνας
1 σπειρης NACEL, so Tisch., W.H., Blass, Weiss, Hilg.; but σπειρας in BP,
Chrys., W.H., alt., ΑΡΡ., p. 164.
the fierce revolt of 66 Α.Ρ. Joppa still re- mained alone in her undivided allegiance to Judaism, and against Joppa the first assault of Cestius Gallus was directed. On the Joppa which St. Peter entered, Acts x., and its contrast to the neigh- bouring Cesarea, see viii, 40 and G. A. Smith, Hist. Geog., p. 136 ff.; see also Schirer, Fewish People, div. ii., vol. i., Ῥ. 79 ff. E.T.; Hamburger, Real- Encyclopddie des Fudentums, Ἱ., 4, 601; B.D.?, “ Joppa”’.
CHAPTER X. Baptism of Cornelius and his friends,—Ver. 1. ἀνήρ τις: on the expression see Ramsay, St. Paul, p. 202.---ἐν K., see vill. 40.
Ver. 2.. éxatovtapxys: form general
in N.T.,. and so in later Greek, although χιλίαρχος is always retained in N.T., and ἑκατόνταρχος is also
found, Matt. viii. 5, 8 (W.H.), Luke vii. 2, Acts xxii. 25 (W.H.); so πα- τριάρχης, πολιτάρχης, ἐθνάρχης, see Winer-Schmiedel, p. 82, and note on forms employed in Josephus and LXX; W.H., Appendix, p. 163; Biass, Gram., pp. 28, 68; and Grimm-Thayer, sub v., for various authorities—é« σπεί- ρης τῆς Ἰ.: the word σπεῖρα here = cohors, although used in the N.T. in a more general way as of the band which arrested Jesus, and so also of Jewish troops in Judith xiv. 11, 2 Mace. viii. 23, xii. 20,22. Each legion was subdivided into ten cohorts, but besides the legionary cohorts there were auxiliary cohorts, and Josephus mentions that five of these co- horts were stationed at Czesarea at the time of the death of Herod Agrippa, com- posed to a great extent at all events of the inhabitants of Czesarea and Sebaste, Ant., xix.,9,2; xx., 8,7. There were in the provinces Italic cohorts composed of volunteer Roman citizens born in Italy, and in answer to the strictures of Schirer, who contends that there was no Italic cohort in Czesarea at this time, Blass, in loco, asks why one of the five cohorts mentioned by Josephus may not have been composed of Roman citizens who had made their home at Czsarea or Sebaste, a cohort known by the name mentioned. But Ramsay has given great
interest to the subject by his account of a recently discovered inscription at Car- nuntum—the epitaph of a young Roman soldier, a subordinate officer in the second Italic cohort, who died at Carnuntum while engaged on detached service from the Syrian army. He sees reason to infer that there was an Italic cohort stationed in Syria in Α.Ρ. 69, and al- though the new discovery does not prove anything with certainty for the period in Acts x., Say 40-44 A.D., yet it becomes in every way probable that at that date, when Cornelius is described as in x. 1, an Italic cohort recruited from the east was stationed in the province Syria. But even if it could be shown that no Italic cohort was stationed at Czsarea from A.D. 6-41, or again from 41-44 in the reign of Herod, it by no means follows that a centurion belonging to the cohort may not have been on duty there. He may have been so, even if his cohort was on duty elsewhere, and it would be a bold thing to deny such a possibility when the whole subject of detached ser- vice is so obscure; Ramsay, Expositor, September, 1896, also Expositor, Decem- ber, 1896 (Schirer’s reply), and January, 1897 (Ramsay); Schiirer, Fewish People, div. i., vol. ii., p. 53 ff. E.T.; Ramsay, Was Christ born at Bethlehem ? pp. 260- 269; O. Holtzmann, Neutest. Zeiige- schichte, p. 108; and Wendt, in loco, (1899).—etoeBys καὶ >. Tov Θεὸν: the adjective is only used here and in ver. 7 (xxii. 12), and once again in 2 Peter ii. 9 in the N.T. In the LXX it is found four times in Isaiah, thrice as an equiva-