Ver. 25. Luke gives no reason why Barnabas goes to seek Saul, but Barnabas who had already vouched for Saul’s sin- cerity before the Church of Jerusalem, ix. 27, could scarcely be ignorant that the sphere of his friend’s future work was to be the Gentile world. In ix. 30 Saul was sent away to Tarsus, and now Bar-
26. ἐγένετο δὲ αὐτοὺς ἐνιαυτὸν + ὅλον συναχθῆναι ἐν τῇ ἐκκλησίᾳ, καὶ e . ” c , , cal διδάξαι ὄχλον ἱκανόν, Χρηµατίσαι τε πρῶτον ἐν ᾽Αντιοχεία τοὺς
1 αντους, but αυτοις ΔΑΒΕ, 13, 61, so Tisch., W.H., R.V., Wendt. ενιαντον AB 13, Syr. Harcl., Did., Ath.; Tisch., W.H., R.V., Weiss, Wendt prefix και, t see Blass’s comment on β, in loco, p. 136.
2 apwrov SBD? 36, 163, so Tisch.. W.H., Blass, Weiss, Wendt; πρωτως, see also Alford’s note on its force; D, Gig., Par. read και τοτε πρωτον, so Hilg. Harnack regards the tore as secondary, and introduced by the Western reviser to mark that the disciples were then called Christians, which in Harnack’s opinion was very improbable, see Sitzungsberichte d. Konigl. preuss. Akad. d. Wissenschaften zu Berlin, xvii., p. 4, 1899. Xprorrav. $31 has Χρηστιανοι, ‘“recte,” Blass (so 61), but there is no reason to suppose that this was the original, although it may well have been a corrupted form, cf. the testimony of Tert., Just. Mar., Lactant.; D has Χρειστ.
nabas goes to Tarsus to seek him; each statement is the complement of the other, and a long period intervenes not marked by any critical event in Saul’s history. So also Paul’s own statement, Gal. 1. 21, 22, marks the same period, and the two writers complete each other. Ramsay, St. Paul, pp. 45, 46, on Luke’s style and reading in D above.—ava{nrijoa:, cf. Luke ii. 44, 45, nowhere else in N.T., a word therefore not only common to, but peculiar to Luke’s writings.—éva: giving idea of thoroughness; it was not known at what precise spot Saul was prosecuting his work, so the word implies effort or thoroughness in the search ; evpov implies the same uncertainty. In LXX, cf. Job iii. 4, x. 6, 2 Macc. xiii. 21. Calvin comments on the fresh proof of the “‘ simplicitas”’ of Barnabas ; he might have retained the chief place at Antioch, but he goes for Paul: ‘‘ videmus ergo ut sui oblitus nihil aliud spectat, nisi ut emineat unus Christus”.
Ver. 26. ἐγένετο δὲ αὐτοὺς, see critical notes, if dative αὐτοῖς = accidit eis, see Plummer, St. Luke, p. 45, on the use of éyévero.—éviavTov ὅλον: “even a whole year” Κ.Υ.- συναχθῆναι ἐν τῇ ἐκκλ.: ‘they were gathered together in the Church,” so R.V. margin. Rendall holds that ἐν is fatal to the A.V. and R.V. text, and renders “they [i.e., Bar- nabas and Saul] were brought together in the Church,” an intimate association of inestimable value. Hort adopts as “the least difficult explanation of this curious word” “were hospitably received in the Church,” so Wendt, Weiss, Nésgen, cf. Matt. xxv. 35 ; Deut. xxii. 2, Josh. ii. 18, Judg. xix. 18, 2 Sam. xi. 27.---διδάξαι... χρηµατίσαι: both infinitives depend upon ἐγένετο, ‘“‘and that the disciples,” etc., suggesting that the name “ Christian” followed as result upon the widespread
teaching of the Apostles amongst the Gentiles. If St. Luke, as Eusebius states, was himself a native of Antioch, it has been well noted that he might well record such a distinction for his city as the origin of the name “ Chris- tian’”’.—xpypatioar: prim. to transact business (χρῆμα), passes into the mean- ing of taking a name from one’s public business, so to receive a name, to be called, cf. Rom. vii. 3, so in Josephus and Philo, and instances in Grimm- Thayer. See also x. 22 for another shade of meaning, and so elsewhere in N.T.; and for its use to express a reply or information by a king or those in authority to inquiry, see Deissmann, Bibelstudien, p. 11δ.---πρῶτον, see criti- cal notes.—Xprotiavovs: in the N.T. the Christians always named themselves µαθηταί, ἀδελφοί, ἅγιοι, πιστοί, etc., but on no occasion ‘ Christians,” whilst the Jews not only refused to recognise that Jesus had any claim to be the Christ, but also called His followers Ναζωραῖοι (xxiv. 5), or spake of them as ἢ αἴρεσις αὕτη (xxviii. 22, cf. xxiv. 14). On the probably contemptuous use of the word in 1 Peter iv. 16 and Acts xxvi. 28 as not inconsistent with the above state- ments, see Wendt, edition 1899, ix loco, and ‘‘ Christian” in Hastings’ B.D. But whilst it is difficult to find an origin for the title amongst Christians or amongst Jews, there is no difficulty in attributing it to the keen-witted populace of Antioch, already famous for their bestowal of nick- names, although perhaps the possibility that the name may have originated amongst the Latin - speaking official retinue of the legatus at Antioch should not be excluded (though there is no evidence whatever that it became at this early date an official name). But there is no need to suppose that the name