CHAPTER XI

CHRISTIANITY REACHES ANTIOCH

As we have seen, the first twelve chapters of the book of Acts describe the gradual expansion of the church in Palestine, from the eleven disciples gathered in the upper room just after the resurrection to the time when Christianity first began to spread beyond the borders of the Jewish land. The remainder of the book (chapters 13-28) is devoted almost entirely to the work of Paul and shows the further development of the Christian mission in the provinces along the north coast of the Mediterranean until it reached Rome itself and Paul found hearers in the very capital of the empire. In this latter part of the book Luke has made use of a diary written by someone who accompanied Paul on certain of his journeys-most probably, Luke himself, Paul's physician and traveling companion. This is very different from the earlier part of the volume, where his sources were the accounts which had been handed down in Palestine or elsewhere, stories which he had been told by men more closely in touch with the events related, even from the days of the first "eyewitnesses and ministers of the Word." These stories which record the origin and earliest development of our religion can teach us much if we study them carefully and sympathetically.

A religious movement.-In the first place, the church was not a school of philosophy. There were many such schools in the ancient world. Teachers of Stoicism, Epicureanism, Platonism, Cynicism were to be found in

every great city-many of them teaching on the street corners or in hired halls to crowds of listeners. But the church was the expression or outward manifestation of a new religion taking powerful hold of the souls of men. And religion in ancient times was always belief in the "supernatural." Without miracles it is difficult to see how the Christian religion could ever have originated or spread abroad in the world in which it arose. Everyone in those days believed in miracles-Jews, Greeks, barbarians. A miracle was the surest proof of the divine authority of a teacher and of God's approval of his teaching.

Its spread among the poor.-In the second place, Christianity arose among the lowly. It was not the educated, or the wealthy, or the socially prominent who crowded into the church by the thousands (Acts 2: 41 and 4:4) in the first days. "Not many wise, not many noble have part therein; but God has chosen the weak ones of earth to put to shame the strong" (1 Corinthians 1: 26, 27). It was the religion of workingmen and women, poor artisans and peasants, publicans and fishers and villagers, and it was destined soon to win soldiers, tentmakers and dyers, and slaves attached to the great households in the chief cities. The religious authorities of the Jewish people at Jerusalem despised the new sect as "men ignorant of the Law," and therefore having no right to teach the people. It seemed absurd, to the educated priests and rabbis of the capital, for Galilæan peasants and fishermen to be proclaiming the Messiahship and resurrection of Jesus of Nazareth, whom they had put to death. The names of believers mentioned in the first twelve chapters of the Acts are the names of obscure men and women, made great only by their devotion to Jesus and the gospel, or preserved

to later history only by their relation to its earliest teachers.

Its rapid growth. In the third place, these old traditions reflect an exceedingly rapid extension of the Christian movement. The story of Pentecost with men from almost every region of the Jewish Dispersion in the audience of the apostles, and three thousand baptized on a single day, can scarcely be an exaggeration. Persecution, when it came, served only to extend the preaching of the message. Even martyrdom, as in the death of Stephen, impressed the persecutors with the courage and faith of the disciples, and broke down the wall of bigotry and prejudice. If we make a list of the cities and districts mentioned in Luke's narrative up to the first missionary journey of Paul (that is, which were evangelized in the eighteen years between 29 and 47 A. D.), we discover the following: Jerusalem (Acts 2: 5, etc.), the cities near by (5:16), the regions of Judæa and Samaria (8:1; 11: 29), the city of Samaria (8:5), many villages of Samaria (8: 25), Azotus (8: 40), Cæsarea (8:40; 10: 1), Damascus (9:2, 10, 19), Tarsus (9:30, 11:25), Galilee (9:31), Lydda (9:32), Sharon (9:35), Joppa (9:36), Phoenicia, Cyprus, Antioch (11:19)— fourteen are mentioned by name, not counting "the cities near by." To these should be added, perhaps, Ethiopia (8:39), with its one messenger of the gospel, the steward of the royal treasury; and Cyrene (11:20), if we are to translate "men from Cyrene."

No mention is made of Egypt; but if Ethiopia and Cyrene were evangelized this early, surely Alexandria must have heard the good tidings, for there was in the whole world no greater center of both orthodox and Hellenistic Judaism than the great cosmopolitan city in the Nile delta, with its million or more Jews-over half

the city's total population. We infer from tradition and from the later strength of the church there that Alexandria received the gospel early; but no records have come down to us, and the early history of the church in Egypt is quite obscure. It is to be noted that Paul, who refused to labor in any other man's field, never even mentions Egypt, though for years he cherished the plan of visiting Rome, and even Spain, on the very "borders of the west." Moreover, Apollos, one of the most gifted preachers of apostolic times, came to Ephesus from Alexandria and taught in the church there (Acts 18:24, 25). That other cities, not mentioned in Acts, should be added to this list is beyond doubt. The record of Luke is incomplete, and there must have been disciples in the cities and villages visited by Jesus during his ministry and mentioned in the Gospels (for example, Bethany, Emmaus, Jericho, Arimathæa, Nazareth, Sychar, Chorazin, Capernaum, Bethsaida, Cana, Nain).

THE GOSPEL TO THE GENTILES

It was Luke's main purpose in writing the Acts to show how Christianity spread geographically from Jerusalem to Rome, and was gradually planted in all the chief cities of the northern and eastern part of the empire. But he has also shown Christianity overstepping the narrow bounds of the Jewish religion, with its ancient, now antiquated beliefs and conceptions. The Jews believed that no one could be saved without accepting Judaism, and the earliest followers of Jesus in Jerusalem shared this belief. If any but Jews heard the gospel and desired to be baptized, they must also take upon themselves the "yoke of the Law," receive its rites, and share its obligations. Christianity to them was not a new universal religion; it was only a higher,

purified and perfected form of Judaism. The baptism of the Ethiopian was no exception, for he was perhaps already a proselyte to the Jewish faith. And Cornelius and his family were "God-fearing"; they leaned strongly toward Judaism, and were Jews in everything but the name. Still, as we have seen, Peter's fellowship with Gentiles, especially in eating at table with them, caused consternation among the orthodox disciples at Jerusalem. His only apology was the fact that the Holy Spirit had been given them, "even as it was given us at the first."

But the day was soon coming when the doors of the church would be thrown wide open to the Gentiles. The man who opened them widest and stood most firmly for the principle of freedom was Saint Paul, who called himself "Apostle to the Gentiles." He was the strongest advocate of religious freedom in all the early churchbut he was not the first. Already, tendencies were operative which were leading inevitably in this direction. It would not be long until the church irresistibly broke over the barriers. Luke has indicated this very clearly in his account of the church in Antioch (Acts 11: 19-26).

The Gospel preached in Antioch.-Antioch was the third largest city in the empire. It was formed of four unwalled cities which had grown up side by side at different times on the banks of the Orontes River, eight miles from its mouth at Seleucia, and were later inclosed within one large wall with towers. Its streets and public buildings were among the finest in the world. A large part of its population was Jewish, and in addition there was a large body of proselytes. Although a center of learning, its fame was due, rather, to its luxury and lax ways of living. It was a wealthy city and busy, but