Chapter XXVIII: Part 28

“It is remarkable that though he was of Tarsus, he should say
that he was a ROMAN citizen, and that too by the right of
_birth_: Acts xxii. 28. There has been some discussion whether
he enjoyed that privilege in common with all the Tarsans, or
whether it was peculiar to his family. Most interpreters firmly
hold the former opinion. Beza remarks, ‘that he calls himself a
Roman, not by country, but by right of citizenship; since Tarsus
had the privileges of a Roman colony.’ He adds, ‘Mark Antony,
the triumvir, presented the Tarsans with the rights of citizens
of Rome.’ Others, without number, bear the same testimony.
Baronius goes still farther,――contending that ‘Tarsus obtained
from the Romans, the _municipal_ right,’ that is, the privileges
of free-born citizens of Rome; understanding Paul’s expression
in Acts xxi. 39, to mean that he was a _municeps_ of Tarsus,
or a Tarsan with the freedom of the city of Rome. Now the
_municipal_ towns, or free cities, had rights superior to those
of mere colonies; for the _free-citizens_ were not only called
Roman citizens as the _colonists_ were, but also, as Ulpian
records, could share in all the honors and offices of Rome.
Moreover, the _colonies_ had to live under the laws of the
Romans, while the municipal towns were allowed to act according
their own ancient laws, and country usages. To account for the
distinction enjoyed by Tarsus, in being called a ‘_municipium_
of Romans,’ the citizens are said to have merited that honor,
for having in the civil wars attached themselves first to Julius
Caesar, and afterwards to Octavius, in whose cause they suffered
much. For so attached was this city to the side of Caesar, that,
as Dion Cassius records, their asked to have their name changed
from Tarsus to _Juliopolis_, in memory of Julius and in token of
good will to Augustus; and for that reason they were presented
with the rights of a colony or a _municipium_, and this general
opinion is strengthened by the high testimony of Pliny and
Appian. On the other hand Heinsius and Grotius strongly urge
that these things have been too hastily asserted by the learned;
for scarcely a passage can be found in the ancient writers,
where Tarsus is called a colony, or even a _municipium_. ‘And
how could it be a colony,’ asks Heinsius, ‘when writers on
Roman law acknowledge but two in Cilicia? Ulpian (_Liber I.
De censibus_) says of the Roman colonies in Asia Minor, “there
is in Bithynia the colony of Apamea,――in Pontus, Sinope,――in
Cilicia there are Selinus and Trajanopolis.” But why does he
pass over Tarsus or Juliopolis, if that had place among them?’
Baronius proves it to have been a _municipium_, only from the
Latin version of Acts, where that word is used; though the term
in the original Greek (πολιτης) means nothing more than the
common word, citizen, (as it is rendered in the English version.)
Pliny also calls Tarsus not a colony, nor a _municipium_,
but a free city. (libera urbs.) Book V. chap xxvii. Appian
in the first book of the civil wars, says that Antony granted
to the Tarsans _freedom_, but says nothing of the rights of a
_municipium_, or colony. Wherefore Grotius thinks that the only
point established is, that some one of the ancestors of Paul, in
the civil wars between Augustus Caesar, and Brutus and Cassius,
and perhaps those between this Caesar and Antony, received the
grant of the privileges of a Roman citizen. Whence he concludes
that Paul must have been of an opulent family. These opinions of
Grotius have received the approval of other eminent commentators.
These notions however, must be rejected as unsatisfactory;
because, though some writers have but slightly alluded to Tarsus
as a _free city_, yet Dio Chrysostom, (_in Tarsica posteriore_,)
has enlarged upon it in a tone of high declamation. ‘Yours,
men of Tarsus, was the fortune to be first in this nation,――not
only because you dwell in the greatest city of Cilicia, and one
which was a metropolis from the beginning,――but also because the
second Caesar was remarkably well-disposed and gracious towards
you. For, the misfortunes which befell the city in his cause,
deservedly secured to you his kind regard, and led him to make
his benefits to you as conspicuous as the calamities brought
upon you for his sake. Therefore did Augustus confer on you
everything that a man could on friends and companions, with a
view to outdo those who had shown him so great good-will,――your
land, laws, honors, the right of the river and of the
neighboring sea.’ On which words Heinsius observes in comment,
that by _land_ is doubtless meant that he secured to them their
own territory, free and undisturbed. By _laws_ are meant such
as relate to the liberty usually granted to free towns. _Honor_
plainly refers to the right of citizenship, as the most exalted
he could offer. The point then seems to be established, if this
interpretation holds good, and it is evidently a rational one.
For when he had made up his mind to grant high favors to a city,
in return for such great merits, why, when it was in his power,
should Augustus fail to grant it the rights of Roman citizenship,
which certainly had been often granted to other cities on much
slighter grounds? It would be strange indeed, if among the
exalted honors which Dio proclaims, that should not have been
included. This appears to be the drift, not only of Dio’s
remarks, but also of Paul’s, who offers no other proof of his
being a Roman citizen, than that he was a Tarsan, and says
nothing of it as a special immunity of his own family, although
some such explanation would otherwise have been necessary to
gain credit to his assertion. Whence it is concluded that it
would be rash to pretend, contrary to all historical testimony,
any peculiar merits of the ancestors of Paul, towards the Romans,
which caused so great an honor to be conferred on a _Jewish_
family.”

But from all these ample and grandiloquent statements of Dio
Chrysostom, it by no means follows that Tarsus had the privilege
of Roman citizenship; and the conclusion of the learned Witsius
seems highly illogical. The very fact, that while Dio was
panegyrizing Tarsus in these high terms, and recounting all
the favors which imperial beneficence had showered upon it, he
yet did _not_ mention among these minutiae, the privilege of
citizenship, is quite conclusive against this view; for he would
not, when thus seeking for all the particulars of its eminence,
have omitted the greatest honor and advantage which could be
conferred on any city by a Roman emperor, nor have left it
vaguely to be inferred. Besides, there are passages in the
Acts of the Apostles which seem to be opposed to the view,
that Tarsus was thus privileged. In Acts xxi. 39, Paul is
represented as distinctly stating to the tribune, that he was
“a _citizen_ of Tarsus;” yet in xxii. 24, 25, it is said, that
the tribune was about proceeding, without scruple, to punish
Paul with stripes, and was very much surprised indeed, to learn
that he was a Roman citizen, and evidently had no idea that a
citizen of Tarsus was, as a matter of course, endowed with Roman
citizenship;――a fact, however, with which a high Roman officer
must have been acquainted, for there were few cities thus
privileged, and Tarsus was a very eminent city in a province
adjoining Palestine, and not far from the capital of Judea. And
the subsequent passages of chap. xxii. represent him as very
slow indeed to believe it, after Paul’s distinct assertion.

Hemsen is very clear and satisfactory on this point, and
presents the argument in a fair light. See his note in his
“Apostel Paulus” on pp. 1, 2. He refers also to a work not
otherwise known here;――John Ortwin Westenberg’s “Dissert. de
jurisp. Paul. Apost.” Kuinoel in Act. Apost. xvi. 37. discusses
the question of citizenship.

“It ought not to seem very strange, that the ancestors of
Paul should have settled in Cilicia, rather than in the land
of Israel. For although Cyrus gave the whole people of God
an opportunity of returning to their own country, yet many
from each tribe preferred the new country, in which they had
been born and bred, to the old one, of which they had lost the
remembrance. Hence an immense multitude of Jews might be found
in almost all the dominions of the Persians, Greeks, Romans
and Parthians; as alluded to in Acts ii. 9, 10. But there were
also other occasions and causes for the dispersion of the Jews.
Ptolemy, the Macedonian king of Egypt, having taken Jerusalem
from the Syro-Macedonians, led away many from the hill-country
of Judea, from Samaria and Mount Gerizim, into Egypt, where
he made them settle; and after he had given them at Alexandria
the rights of citizens in equal privilege with the Macedonians,
not a few of the rest, of their own accord, moved into Egypt,
allured partly by the richness of the land, and partly by
the good will that Ptolemy had shown towards their nation.
Afterwards, Antiochus the Great, the Macedonian king of Syria,
about the thirtieth year of his reign, two hundred years before
the Christian era, brought out two thousand Jewish families from
Babylonia, whom he sent into Phrygia and Lydia with the most
ample privileges, that they might hold to their duty the minds
of the Greeks, who were then inclining to revolt from his sway.
These were from Asia Minor, spread abroad over the surrounding
countries, between the Mediterranean sea, the Euphrates and
Mount Amanus, on the frontiers of Cilicia. Besides, others
afterwards, to escape the cruelty of Antiochus Epiphanes, betook
themselves to foreign lands, where, finding themselves well
settled, they and their descendants remained. Moreover, many, as
Philo testifies, for the sake of trade, or other advantages, of
their own accord left the land of Israel for foreign countries:
whence almost the whole world was filled with colonies of Jews,
as we see in the directions of some of the general epistles,
(James i. 1: 1 Peter i. 1.) Thus also Tarsus had its share
of Jewish inhabitants, among whom were the family of Paul.”
(Witsius in Vita Pauli, § 1. ¶ v.)

Nor were the solid honors of this great Asian city, limited to the mere favors of imperial patronage. Founded, or early enlarged by the colonial enterprise of the most refined people of ancient times, Tarsus, from its first beginning, shared in the glories of Helleno-Asian civilization, under which philosophy, art, taste, commerce, and warlike power attained in these colonies a highth before unequalled, while Greece, the mother country, was still far back in the march of improvement. In the Asian colonies arose the first schools of philosophy, and there is hardly a city on the eastern coast of the Aegean, but is consecrated by some glorious association with the name of some Father of Grecian science. Thales, Anaxagoras, Anaximander, and many others of the earliest philosophers, all flourished in these Asian colonies; and on the Mediterranean coast, within Cilicia itself, were the home and schools of Aratus and the stoic Chrysippus. The city of Tarsus is commemorated by Strabo as having in very early times attained great eminence in philosophy and in all sorts of learning, so that “in science and art it surpassed the fame even of Athens and Alexandria; and the citizens of Tarsus themselves were distinguished for individual excellence in these elevated pursuits. So great was the zeal of the men of that place for philosophy, and for the rest of the circle of sciences, that they excelled both Athens and Alexandria, and every other place which can be mentioned, where there are schools and lectures of philosophers.” Not borrowing the philosophic glory of their city merely from the numbers of strangers who resorted thither to enjoy the advantages of instruction there afforded, as is almost universally the case in all the great seats of modern learning; but entering themselves with zeal and enjoyment into their schools of science, they made the name of TARSUS famous throughout the civilized world, for the cultivation of knowledge and taste. Even to this day the stranger pauses with admiration among the still splendid ruins of this ancient city, and finds in her arches, columns and walls, and in her chance-buried medals, the solid testimonies of her early glories in art, taste and wealth. Well then might the great apostle recur with patriotic pride to the glories of the city where he was born and educated, challenging the regard of his military hearers for his native place, by the sententious allusion to it, as “NO MEAN CITY.”

“It appears on the testimony of Paul, (Acts xxi. 39,) that
Tarsus was a city of no little note, and it is described by
other writers as the most illustrious city of all Cilicia; so
much so indeed, that the Tarsans traced their origin to Ionians
and Argives, and a rank superior even to these;――referring their
antiquity of origin not merely to heroes, but even to demi-gods.
It was truly exalted, not only by its antiquity, situation,
population and thriving trade, but by the nobler pursuits
of science and literature, which so flourished there, that
according to Strabo it was worthy to be ranked with Athens
and Alexandria; and we know that Rome itself owed its most
celebrated professors to Tarsus.” (Witsius. § 1, ¶ iv.)

The testimony of Strabo is found in his Geography, book XIV.
Cellarius (Geog. Ant.) is very full on the geography of Cilicia,
and may be advantageously consulted. Conder’s Modern Traveler
(Syria and Asia Minor 2.) gives a very full account of its
ancient history, its present condition, and its topography.

The present appearance of this ancient city must be a matter of
great interest to the reader of apostolic history; and it can
not be more clearly given than in the simple narrative of the
enterprising Burckhardt, who wrote his journal on the very spot
which he describes. (Life of Burckhardt, prefixed to his travels
in Nubia, pp. xv. xvi.)

“The road from our anchoring place to Tarsus crosses the
above-mentioned plain in an easterly direction: we passed
several small rivulets which empty themselves into the sea, and
which, to judge from the size of their beds, swell in the rainy
season to considerable torrents. We had rode about an hour, when
I saw at half an hour’s distance to the north of our route, the
ruins of a large castle, upon a hill of a regular shape in the
plain; half an hour further towards Tarsus, at an equal distance
from our road, upon a second tumulus, were ruins resembling
the former; a third insulated hillock, close to which we passed
midway of our route, was over-grown with grass, without any
ruins or traces of them. I did not see in the whole plain any
other elevations of ground but the three just mentioned. Not far
from the first ruins, stands in the plain an insulated column.
Large groups of trees show from afar the site of Tarsus. We
passed a small river before we entered the town, larger than
those we had met on the road. The western outer gate of the town,
through which we entered, is of ancient structure; it is a fine
arch, the interior vault of which is in perfect preservation:
on the outside are some remains of a sculptured frieze. I did
not see any inscriptions. To the right and left of this gateway
are seen the ancient ruined walls of the city, which extended
in this direction farther than the town at present does. From
the outer gateway, it is about four hundred paces to the modern
entrance of the city; the intermediate ground is filled up by
a burying ground on one side of the road, and several gardens
with some miserable huts on the other. * * * * The little I saw
of Tarsus did not allow me to estimate its extent; the streets
through which I passed were all built of wood, and badly; some
well furnished bazars, and a large and handsome mosque in the
vicinity of the Khan, make up the whole register of curiosities
which I am able to relate of Tarsus. Upon several maps Tarsus
is marked as a sea town: this is incorrect; the sea is above
three miles distant from it. On our return home, we started in
a south-west direction, and passed, after two hours and a half’s
march, Casal, a large village, half a mile distant from the
sea-shore, called the Port of Tarsus, because vessels freighted
for Tarsus usually come to anchor in its neighborhood. From
thence turning towards the west, we arrived at our ship at the
end of two hours. The merchants of Tarsus trade principally with
the Syrian coast and Cyprus: imperial ships arrive there from
time to time, to load grain. The land trade is of very little
consequence, as the caravans from Smyrna arrive very seldom.
There is no land communication at all between Tarsus and Aleppo,
which is at ten journeys (caravan traveling) distant from
it. The road has been rendered unsafe, especially in later
times, by the depredations of Kutshuk Ali, a savage rebel,
who has established himself in the mountains to the north of
Alexandretta. Tarsus is governed by an Aga, who I have reason to
believe is almost independent. The French have an agent there,
who is a rich Greek merchant.”

A fine instance of the value of the testimony of the Fathers on
points where knowledge of the Scriptures is involved, is found
in the story by Jerome, who says that “Paul was born at Gischali,
a city of Judea,” (in Galilee,) “and that while he was a child,
his parents, in the time of the laying waste of their country
by the Romans, removed to Tarsus, in Cilicia.” And yet this most
learned of the Fathers, the translator of the whole Bible into
Latin, did not know, it seems, that Paul himself most distinctly
states in his speech to the Jewish mob, (Acts xxii. 3,) that
he was “_born_ in Cilicia,” as the common translation has
it;――in Greek, γεγενημενος εν Κιλικια,――words which so far
from allowing any such assertion as Jerome makes, even imply
that Paul, with Tristram Shandy-like particularity, would
specify that he was “_begotten_ in Cilicia.” Jerome’s ridiculous
blunder, Witsius, after exposing its inconsistency with Jewish
history, indignantly condemns, as “a most shameful falsehood,”
(_putidissima_ fabula,) which is as hard a name as has been
applied to anything in this book.

But if this blunder is so shameful in Jerome, what shall be said
of the learned Fabricius, who (Bibliotheca Graeca, IV. p. 795,)
copies this story from Jerome as authentic history, without a
note of comment, and without being aware that it most positively
contradicts the direct assertion of Paul? And this blunder
too is passed over by all the great critical commentators of
Fabricius, in Harles’s great edition. Keil, Kuinoel, Harles,
Gurlitt, and others equally great, who revised all this, are
involved in the discredit of the blunder. “Non omnes omnia.”

HIS GRECIAN LEARNING.

In this splendid seat of knowledge, Saul was born of purely Jewish parents. “A Hebrew of the Hebrews,” he enjoyed from his earliest infancy that minute religious instruction, which every Israelite was in conscience bound to give his children; and with a minuteness and attention so much the more careful, as a residence in a foreign land, far away from the consecrated soil of Palestine and the Holy city of his faith, might increase the liabilities of his children to forget or neglect a religion of which they saw so few visible tokens around them, to keep alive their devotion. Yet, though thus strictly educated in the religion of his fathers, Saul was by no means cut off by this circumstance from the enjoyment of many of the advantages in profaner knowledge, afforded in such an eminent degree by Tarsus; but must, almost without an effort, have daily imbibed into his ready and ever active mind, much of the refining influence of Grecian philosophy. There is no proof, indeed, that he ever formally entered the schools of heathen science; such a supposition, is, perhaps, inconsistent with the idea of his principles of rigid Judaism, and is rendered rather improbable by the great want of Grecian elegance and accuracy in his writings; which are so decidedly characterized by an unrhetorical style, and by irregular logic, that they never could have been the production of a scholar, in the most eminent philosophical institutions of Asia. But a mere birth and residence in such a city, and the incidental but constant familiarity with those so absorbed in these pursuits, as very many of his fellow-citizens were, would have the unavoidable effect of familiarizing him also with the great subjects of conversation, and the grand objects of pursuit, so as ever after to prove an advantage to him in his intercourse with the refined and educated among the Greeks and Romans. The knowledge thus acquired, too, is ever found to be of the most readily available kind, always suggesting itself upon occasions when needed, according to the simple principle of association, and thus more easily applied to ordinary use than that which is more regularly attained, and is arranged in the mind only according to formal systems. Thus was it, with most evident wisdom, ordained by God, that in this great seat of heathen learning, that apostle should be born, who was to be the first messenger of grace to the Grecian world, and whose words of warning, even Rome should one day hear and believe.

HIS FAMILY AND BIRTH.

The parents of Saul were Jews, and his father at least, was of the tribe of Benjamin. In some of those numerous emigrations from Judea which took place either by compulsion or by the voluntary enterprise of the people, at various times after the Assyrian conquest, the ancestors of Saul had left their father-land, for the fertile plains of Cilicia, where, under the patronizing government of some of the Syro-Macedonian kings, they found a much more profitable home than in the comparatively uncommercial land of Israel. On some one of these occasions, probably during the emigration under Antiochus the Great, the ancestors of Saul had settled in Tarsus, and during the period intervening between this emigration and the birth of Saul, the family seems to have maintained or acquired a very respectable rank, and some property. From the distinct information which we have that Saul was a free-_born_ Roman citizen, it is manifest that his parents must also have possessed that right; for it has already been abundantly shown that it was not common to the citizens of Tarsus, but must have been a peculiar privilege of his family. After the subjugation of Cilicia, (sixty-two years before Christ,) when the province passed from the Syrian to the Roman sway, the family were in some way brought under the favorable notice of the new lords of the eastern world, and were honored with the high privilege of Roman citizenship, an honor which could not have been imparted to any one low either in birth or wealth. The precise nature of the service performed by them, that produced such a magnificent reward, it is impossible to determine; but that this must have been the reason, it is very natural to suppose. But whatever may have been the extent of the favors enjoyed by the parents of Saul, from the kindness of their heathen rulers, they were not thereby led to neglect the institutions of their fathers,――but even in a strange land, observed the Mosaic law with peculiar strictness; for Saul himself plainly asserts that his father was a Pharisee, and therefore he must have been bound by the rigid observances of that sect, to a blameless deportment, as far as the Mosaic law required. Born of such parents, the destined apostle at his birth was made the subject of the minute Mosaic rituals. “Circumcised the eighth day,” he then received the name of _Saul_, a name connected with some glorious and some mournful associations in the ancient Jewish history, and probably suggested to the parents on this occasion, by a reference to its signification, for Hebrew names were often thus applied, expressing some circumstance connected with the child; and in this name more particularly, some such meaning might be expected, since, historically, it must have been a word of rather evil omen. The original Hebrew means “_desired_,” “asked for,” and hence it has been rather fancifully, but not unreasonably conjectured that he was an oldest son, and particularly desired by his expecting parents, who were, like the whole Jewish race, very earnest to have a son to perpetuate their name,――a wish however, by no means peculiar to the Israelites.

The name Saul is in Hebrew, שאול the regular noun from the
passive _Kal_ participle of שאל (_sha-al_ and _sha-el_) “ask
for,” “beg,” “request;” and the name therefore means “asked for,”
or “requested,” which affords ground for Neander’s curious
conjecture, above given.

Of the _time_ of his birth nothing is definitely known, though it is stated by some ancient authority of very doubtful character, that he was born in the second year after Christ. All that can be said with any probability, is, that he was born several years after Christ; for at the time of the stoning of Stephen, (A. D. 34,) Saul was a “_young_ man.”

HIS TRADE.

There was an ancient Jewish proverb,――often quoted with great respect in the Rabbinical writings,――“He that does not teach his son a trade, trains him to steal.” In conformity with this respectable adage, every Jewish boy, high or low, was invariably taught some mechanical trade, as an essential part of his education, without any regard to the wealth of his family, or to his prospect of an easy life, without the necessity of labor. The consequence of this was, that even the dignified teachers of the law generally conjoined the practice of some mechanical business, with the refined studies to which they devoted the most of their time, and the surnames of some of the most eminent of the Rabbins are derived from the trades which they thus followed in the intervals of study, for a livelihood or for mental relaxation. The advantages of such a variation from intense mental labor to active and steady bodily exercise, are too obvious, both as concerns the benefit of the body and the mind, to need any elucidation; but it is a happy coincidence, worth noticing, that, the better principles of what is now called “MANUAL LABOR INSTRUCTION,” are herein fully carried out, and sanctioned by the authority and example of some of the most illustrious of those ancient Hebrew scholars, whose mighty labors in sacred lore, are still a monument of the wisdom of a plan of education, which combines bodily activity and exertion with the full development of the powers of thought. The labors of such men still remain the wonder of later days, and form in themselves, subjects for the excursive and penetrating range of some of the greatest minds of modern times, throwing more light on the minute signification and local application of scripture, than all that has been done in any other field of illustrative research.

“In the education of their son, the parents of Saul thought it
their duty according to the fashion of their nation, not only
to train his mind in the higher pursuits of a liberal education,
but also to accustom his hands to some useful trade. As we learn
from Acts xviii. 3, ‘he was by trade a tent-maker,’ occupying
the intervals of his study-hours with that kind of work. For it
is well established that this was the usual habit of the most
eminent Jewish scholars, who adopted it as much for the sake of
avoiding sloth and idleness, as with a view to provide for their
own support. The Jews used to sum up the duties of parents in a
sort of proverb, that ‘they should circumcise their son, redeem
him, (Leviticus chapter xxvii.) teach him the law and a _trade_,
and look out a wife for him.’ And indeed the importance of
some business of this kind was so much felt, that a saying is
recorded of one of the most eminent of their Rabbins, that ‘he
who neglects to teach his son a trade, does the same as to bring
him up to be a thief.’ Hence it is that the wisest Hebrews held
it an honor to take their surnames from their trades; as Rabbins
Nahum and Meir, the _scriveners_ or book writers,” (a business
corresponding to that of printers in these times,) “Rabbi
Johanan the _shoemaker_, Rabbi Juda the _baker_, and Rabbi Jose
the _currier_ or _tanner_. How trifling then is the sneer of
some scoffers who have said that Paul was nothing but a stitcher
of skins, and thence conclude that he was a man of the lowest
class of the populace.” (Witsius § I. ¶ 12.)

The trade which the parents of Saul selected for their son, is described in the sacred apostolic history as that of a “tent-maker.” A reference to the local history of his native province throws great light on this account. In the wild mountains of Cilicia, which everywhere begin to rise from the plains, at a distance of seven or eight miles from the coast, anciently ranged a peculiar species of long-haired goats, so well known by name throughout the Grecian world, for their rough and shaggy aspect, that the name of “Cilician goat” became a proverbial expression, to signify a rough, ill-bred fellow, and occurs in this sense in the classic writers. From the hair of these, the Cilicians manufactured a thick, coarse cloth,――somewhat resembling the similar product of the camel’s hair,――which, from the country where the cloth was made, and where the raw material was produced, was called _cilicium_ or _cilicia_, and under this name it is very often mentioned, both by Grecian and Roman authors. The peculiar strength and incorruptibility of this cloth was so well known, that it was considered as one of the most desirable articles for several very important purposes, both in war and navigation, being the best material for the sails of vessels, as well as for military tents. But it was principally used by the Nomadic Arabs of the neighboring deserts of Syria, who, ranging from Amanus and the sea, to the Euphrates, and beyond, found the tents manufactured from this stout cloth, so durable and convenient, that they depended on the Cilicians to furnish them with the material of their moveable homes; and over all the east, the _cilicium_ was in great demand, for shepherd’s tents. A passage from Pliny forms a splendid illustration of this interesting little point. “The wandering tribes, (_Nomades_,) and the tribes who plunder the Chaldeans, are bordered by Scenites, (_tent-dwellers_,) who are themselves also wanderers, but take their name from their tents, which they raise of _Cilician_ cloth, wherever inclination leads them.” This was therefore an article of national industry among the Cilicians, and afforded in its manufacture, profitable employment to a great number of workmen, who were occupied, not in large establishments like the great manufactories of modern European nations, but, according to the invariable mode in eastern countries, each one by himself, or at most with one or two companions. Saul, however, seems to have been occupied only with the concluding part of the manufacture, which was the making up of the cloth into the articles for which it was so well fitted by its strength, closeness and durability. He was a maker of tents of Cilician camlet, or goat’s-hair cloth,――a business which, in its character and implements, more resembled that of a sail-maker than any other common trade in this country. The details of the work must have consisted in cutting the camlet of the shape required for each part of the tent, and sewing it together into the large pieces, which were then ready to be transported, and to form, when hung on tent-poles, the habitations of the desert-wanderers.

This illustration of Saul’s trade is from Hug’s Introduction,
Vol. II. note on § 85, pp. 328, 329, original, § 80, pp. 335,
336, translation. On the manufacture of this cloth, see Gloss.
Basil, _sub voc._ Κιλικιος τραγος, &c. “Cilician goat,――a
rough fellow;――for there are such goats in Cilicia; whence also,
things made of their hair are called _cilicia_.” He quotes also
Hesychius, Suidas, and Salmasius in Solinum, p. 347. As to the
use of the cloths in war and navigation, he refers to Vegetius,
De re milit. IV. 6, and Servius in Georgica III. 312.――The
passage in Pliny, showing their use by the Nomadic tribes of
Syria and Mesopotamia for _shepherd’s tents_, is in his Natural
History, VI. 28. “Nomadas infestatoresque Chaldaeorum, Scenitae
claudunt, et ipsi vagi, sed a tabernaculis cognominati quae
ciliciis metantur, ubi libuit.” The reading of this passage
which I have adopted is from the Leyden Hackian edition of
Pliny, which differs slightly from that followed by Hug, as the
critical will perceive. Hemsen quotes this note almost verbatim
from Hug. (Hemsen’s “Apostel Paulus,” page 4.)

The particular species or variety of goat, which is thus
described as anciently inhabiting the mountains of Cilicia,
can not now be distinctly ascertained, because no scientific
traveler has ever made observations on the animals of that
region, owing to the many difficulties in the way of any
exploration of Asia Minor, under the barbarous Ottoman sway.
Neither Griffith’s Cuvier nor Turton’s Linnaeus contains any
reference to Cilicia, as inhabited by any species or variety
of the genus _Capra_. The nearest approach to certainty, that
can be made with so few data, is the reasonable conjecture
that the Cilician goat was a variety of the species CAPRA
_Aegagrus_, to which the common domestic goat belongs, and which
includes several remarkable varieties,――at least six being well
ascertained. There are few of my readers, probably, who are not
familiar with the descriptions and pictures of the famous Angora
goat, which is one of these varieties, and is well-known for
its long, soft, silky hair, which is to this day used in the
manufacture of a sort of camlet, in the place where it is found,
which is Angora and the region around it, from the Halys to the
Sangarius. This tract of country is in Asia Minor, only three
or four hundred miles north of Cilicia, and therefore at once
suggests the probability of the Cilician goat being something
very much like the Angora goat. (See Modern Traveler, III. p.
339.) On the other side of Cilicia also, in Syria, there is an
equally remarkable variety of the goat, with similar long, silky
hair, used for the same manufacture. Now Cilicia, being directly
on the shortest route from Angora to Syria, and half-way between
both, might very naturally be supposed to have another variety
of the CAPRA _Aegagrus_, between the Angoran and the Syrian
variety, and resembling both in the common characteristic of
long shaggy or silky hair; and there can be no reasonable doubt
that future scientific observation will show that the Cilician
goat forms another well-marked variety of this widely diffused
species, which, wherever it inhabits the mountains of the
warm regions of Asia, always furnishes this beautiful product,
of which we have another splendid and familiar specimen in
the Tibet and Cashmere goats, whose fleeces are worth more
than their weight in gold. The hair of the Syrian and Cilician
goats, however, is of a much coarser character, producing a much
coarser and stouter fibre for the cloth.

On the subject of Paul’s trade, the learned and usually
accurate Michaelis was led into a very great error, by taking
up too hastily a conjecture founded on a misapprehension of the
meaning given by Julius Pollux, in his Onomasticon, on the word
σκηνοποιος (_skenopoios_,) which is the word used in Acts xiii.
3, to designate the trade of Saul and Aquilas. Pollux mentions
that in the language of the old Grecian comedy, σκηνοποιος was
equivalent to μηχανοποιος, (_mechanopoios_,) which Michaelis
very erroneously takes in the sense of “a maker of mechanical
instruments,” and this he therefore maintains to have been
the trade of Saul and Aquilas. But it is capable of the most
satisfactory proof, that Julius Pollux used the words here
merely in the technical sense of theatrical preparation,――the
first meaning simply “a scene-maker,” and the second “a
constructor of theatrical machinery,”――both terms, of course,
naturally applied to the same artist. (Michaelis, Introduction,
IV. xxiii. 2. pp. 183‒186. Marsh’s translation.――Hug, II. § 85,
original; § 80, translation.)

The Fathers also made similar blunders about the nature of
Saul’s trade. They call him σκυτοτομος, (_skutotomos_,) “a
skin-cutter,” as well as σκηνορραφος, “a tent-maker.” This
was because they were entirely ignorant of the material used
for the manufacture of tents; for, living themselves in the
civilized regions of Greece, Italy, &c. they knew nothing of
the habitations of the Nomadic tent-dwellers. Chrysostom in
particular, calls him “one who worked in skins.”

Fabricius gives some valuable illustrations of this point.
(Bibliotheca Graeca, IV. p. 795, _bb._) He quotes Cotelerius,
(ad. Apost. Const. II. 63,) Erasmus, &c. (ad Acts xviii. 3,)
and Schurzfleisch, (in diss. de Paulo, &c.) who brings sundry
passages from Dio Chrysostom and Libanius, to prove that there
were many in Cilicia who worked in _leather_, as he says;
in support of which he quotes Martial, (epigraph xiv. 114,)
alluding to “_udones cilicii_,” or “_cilician cloaks_,” (used
to keep off rain, as water-proof,)――not knowing that this word,
_cilicium_, was the name of a very close and stout cloth, from
the goat’s hair, equally valuable as a covering for a single
person, and for the habitation of a whole family. In short,
Martial’s passage shows that the Cilician camlet was used like
the modern camlet,――for _cloaks_. Fabricius himself seems to
make no account of this _leather_ notion of Schurzfleisch; for
immediately after, he states (what I can not find on any other
authority) that “even at this day, as late books of travels
testify, variegated cloths are exported from Cilicia.” This is
certainly true of Angora in Asia Minor, north-west of Cilicia,
(Modern Traveler, III. p. 339,) and may be true of Cilicia
itself. Fabricius notices 2 Corinthians v. 1: and xii. 9, as
containing figures drawn from Saul’s trade.

HIS EDUCATION.

But this was not destined to be the most important occupation of Saul’s life. Even his parents had nobler objects in view for him, and evidently devoted him to this handicraft, only in conformity with those ancient Jewish usages which had the force of law on every true Israelite, whether rich or poor; and accordingly he was sent, while yet in his youth, away from his home in Tarsus, to Jerusalem, the fountain of religious and legal knowledge to all the race of Judah and Benjamin, throughout the world. To what extent his general education had been carried in Tarsus, is little known; but he had acquired that fluency in the Greek, which is displayed in his writings, though contaminated with many of the provincialisms of Cilicia, and more especially with the barbarisms of Hebrew usage. Living in daily intercourse, both in the way of business and friendship, with the active Grecians of that thriving city, and led, no doubt, by his own intellectual character and tastes, to the occasional cultivation of those classics which were the delight of his Gentile acquaintances, he acquired a readiness and power in the use of the Greek language, and a familiarity with the favorite writers of the Asian Hellenes, that in the providence of God most eminently fitted him for the sphere to which he was afterwards devoted, and was the true ground of his wonderful acceptability to the highly literary people among whom his greatest and most successful labors were performed, and to whom all of his epistles, but two, were written. All these writings show proofs of such an acquaintance with Greek, as is here inferred from his opportunities in education. His well-known quotations also from Menander and Epimenides, and more especially his happy impromptu reference in his discourse at Athens, to the line from his own fellow-Cilician, Aratus, are instances of a very great familiarity with the classics, and are thrown out in such an unstudied, off-hand way, as to imply a ready knowledge of these writers. But all these were, no doubt, learned in the mere occasional manner already alluded to in connection with the reputation and literary character of Tarsus. He was devoted by all the considerations of ancestral pride and religious zeal to the study of “a classic, the best the world has ever seen,――the noblest that has ever honored and dignified the language of mortals.”

HIS REMOVAL TO JERUSALEM.

Strabo, in speaking of the remarkable literary and philosophical zeal of the refined inhabitants of Tarsus, says that “after having well laid the foundations of literature and science in their own schools at home, it was usual for them to resort to those in other places, in order to zealously pursue the cultivation of their minds still further,” by the varied modes and opportunities presented in different schools throughout the Hellenic world,――a noble spirit of literary enterprise, accordant with the practice of the most ancient philosophers, and like the course also pursued by the modern German scholars, many of whom go from one university to another, to enjoy the peculiar advantages afforded by each in some particular department. It was therefore, only in a noble emulation of the example of his heathen fellow-townsmen, in the pursuit of profane knowledge, that Saul left the city of his birth and his father’s house, to seek a deeper knowledge of the sacred sources of Hebrew learning, in the capital of the faith. This removal to so great a distance, for such a purpose, evidently implies the possession of considerable wealth in the family of Saul; for a literary sojourn of that kind, in a great city, could not but be attended with very considerable expense as well as trouble.

HIS TEACHER.

Saul having been thus endowed with a liberal education at home, and with the principles of the Jewish faith, as far as his age would allow,――went up to Jerusalem to enjoy the instruction of Gamaliel. There is every reason to believe that this was Gamaliel the elder, grandson of Hillel, and son of Simeon, (probably the same, who, in his old age, took the child Jesus in his arms,) and father of another Simeon, in whose time the temple was destroyed; for the Rabbinical writings give a minute account of him, as connected with all these persons. This Gamaliel succeeded his ancestors in the rank which was then esteemed the highest; this was the office of “head of the college,” otherwise called “Prince of the Jewish senate.” Out of respect to this most eminent Father of Hebrew learning, as it is recorded, Onkelos, the renowned Chaldee paraphrast, burned at his funeral, seventy pounds of incense, in honor to the high rank and learning of the deceased. This eminent teacher was at first not ill-disposed towards the apostles, who, he thought, ought to be left to their own fate; being led to this moderate and reasonable course, perhaps, by the circumstance that the Sadducees, whom he hated, were most active in their persecution. The sound sense and humane wisdom that mark his sagely eloquent opinion, so wonderful in that bloody time, have justly secured him the admiration and respect of all Christian readers of the record; and not without regret would they learn, that the after doings of his life, unrecorded by the sacred historian, yet on the testimony of others, bear witness against him as having changed from this wise principle of action. If there is any ground for the story which Maimonides tells, it would seem, that when Gamaliel saw the new heretical sect multiplying in his own days, and drawing away the Israelites from the Mosaic forms, he, together with the Senate, whose President he was, gave his utmost endeavors to crush the followers of Christ, and composed a form of prayer, by which God was besought to exterminate these heretics; which was to be connected to the usual forms of prayer in the Jewish liturgy. This story of Maimonides, if it is adopted as true, on so slight grounds, may be reconciled with the account given by Luke, in two ways. First, Gamaliel may have thought that the apostles and their successors, although heretics, were not to be put down by human force, or by the contrivances of human ingenuity, but that the whole matter should be left to the hidden providence of God, and that their extermination should be obtained from God by prayers. Or, second,――to make a more simple and rational supposition,――he may have been so struck by the boldness of the apostles, and by the evidence of the miracle performed by them, as to express a milder opinion on them at that particular moment; but afterwards may have formed a harsher judgment, when, contrary to all expectation, he saw the wonderful growth of Christianity, and heard with wrath and uncontrollable indignation, the stern rebuke of Stephen. But these loose relics of tradition, offered on such very suspicious authority as that of a Jew of the ages when Christianity had become so odious to Judaism by its triumphs, may without hesitation be rejected as wholly inconsistent with the noble spirit of Gamaliel, as expressed in the clear, impartial account of Luke; and both of the suppositions here offered by others, to reconcile sacred truth with mere falsehood, are thus rendered entirely unnecessary.

_At the feet_ of this Gamaliel, then, was Saul brought up.
(Acts xxii. 3.) It has been observed on this passage, by
learned commentators, that this expression refers to the fashion
followed by students, of sitting and lying down on the ground or
on mats, at the feet of their teacher, who sat by himself on a
higher place. And indeed so many are the traces of this fashion
among the recorded labors of the Hebrews, that it does not seem
possible to call it in question. The labors of Scaliger in his
“Elenchus Trihaeresii,” have brought to light many illustrations
of the point; besides which another is offered in a well-known
passage from פרקי אבות PIRKE ABOTH, or “Fragments of the Fathers.”
Speaking of the wise, it is said, “Make thyself dusty in
the dust of their feet,”――הוי מתאבק בעפר רגליהם――meaning that the
young student is to be a diligent hearer at the feet of the
wise;――thus raising a truly “learned dust,” if the figure may be
so minutely carried out. The same thing is farther illustrated
by a passage which Buxtorf has given in his Lexicon of the
Talmud, in the portion entitled ברכית (BERACHOTH,) מנעו בניכם מן ההגיון
והושיבום בין ברכי תלמידי חכמים “Take away your sons from the study of the
Bible, and make them sit between the knees of the disciples of
the wise;” which is equivalent to a recommendation of oral, as
superior to written instruction. The same principle, of varying
the mode in which the mind receives knowledge, is recognized
in modern systems of education, with a view to avoid the
self-conceit and intolerant pride which solitary study is apt
to engender, as well as because, from the living voice of the
teacher, the young scholar learns in that practical, simple mode
which is most valuable and efficient, as it is that, in which
alone all his knowledge of the living and speaking world must be
obtained. It should be observed, however, that Buxtorf seems to
have understood this passage rather differently from Witsius,
whose construction is followed in the translation given above.
Buxtorf, following the ordinary meaning of הגיבן (HEG-YON,) seems
to prefer the sense of “meditation.” He rejects the common
translation――“study of the Bible,” as altogether irreligious.
“In hoc sensu, praeceptum impium est.” He says that other Glosses
of the passage give it the meaning of “boyish talk,” (_garritu
puerorum_.) But this is a sense perfectly contradictory to all
usage of the word, and was evidently invented only to avoid
the seemingly irreligious character of the literal version.
But why may not all difficulties be removed by a reference to
the primary signification, which is “solitary meditation,” in
opposition to “instruction by others?”

We have in the gospel history itself, also, the instance of
Mary. (Luke x. 39.) The passage in Mark iii. 32, “The multitude
sat down around him,” farther illustrates this usage. There
is an old Hebrew tradition, mentioned with great reverence by
Maimonides, to this effect. “From the days of Moses down to
Rabban Gamaliel, they always studied the law, standing; but
after Rabban Gamaliel was dead, weakness descended on the world,
and they studied the law, sitting.” (_Witsius._)

HIS JEWISH OPINIONS.

Jerusalem was the seat of what may be called the great Jewish University. The Rabbins or teachers, united in themselves, not merely the sources of Biblical and theological learning, but also the whole system of instruction in that civil law, by which their nation were still allowed to be governed, with only some slight exceptions as to the right of punishment. There was no distinction, in short, between the professions of divinity and law, the Rabbins being teachers of the whole Mosaic system, and those who entered on a course of study under them, aiming at the knowledge of both those departments of learning, which, throughout the western nations, are now kept, for the most part, entirely distinct. Saul was therefore a student both of theology and law, and entered himself as a hearer of the lectures of one, who may, in modern phrase, be styled the most eminent professor in the great Hebrew university of Jerusalem. From him he learned the law and the Jewish traditional doctrines, as illustrated and perfected by the Fathers of the ♦Pharisaic order. His steady energy and resolute activity were here all made available to the very complete attainment of the mysteries of knowledge; and the success with which he prosecuted his studies may be best appreciated by a minute examination of his writings, which everywhere exhibit indubitable marks of a deep and critical knowledge of all the details of Jewish theology and law. He shows himself to have been deeply versed in all the standard modes of explaining the Scriptures among the Hebrews,――by allegory,――typology, accommodation and tradition. Yet though thus ardently drinking the streams of Biblical knowledge from this great fountain-head, he seems to have been very far from imbibing the mild and merciful spirit of his great teacher, as it had been so eminently displayed in his sage decision on the trial of the apostles. The acquisition of knowledge, even under such an instructor, was, in Saul, attended with the somewhat common evils to which a young mind rapidly advanced in dogmatical learning, is naturally liable,――a bitter, denunciatory intolerance of any opinions contrary to his own,――a spiteful feeling towards all doctrinal opponents, and a disposition to punish speculative errors as actual crimes. All these common faults were very remarkably developed in Saul, by that uncommon harshness and fierceness by which he was so strongly characterized; and his worst feelings broke out with all their fury against the rising heretics, who, without any regular education, were assuming the office of religious teachers, and were understood to be seducing the people from their allegiance and due respect to the qualified scholars of the law. The occasion on which these dark religious passions first exhibited themselves in decided action against the Christians, was the murder of Stephen, of which the details have already been fully given in that part of the Life of Peter which is connected with it. Of those who engaged in the previous disputes with the proto-martyr, the members of the Cilician synagogue are mentioned among others; and with these Saul would very naturally be numbered; for, residing at a great distance from his native province, he would with pleasure seek the company of those residents in Jerusalem who were from Cilicia, and join with them in the study of the law and the weekly worship of God. What part he took in these animated and angry discussions, is not known; but his well-known power in argument affords good reason for believing, that the eloquence and logical acuteness which he afterwards displayed in the cause of Christ, were now made use of, against the ablest defenders of that same cause. His fierce spirit, no doubt, rose with the rest in that burst of indignation against the martyr, who fearlessly stood up before the council, pouring out a flood of invective against the unjust destroyers of the holy prophets of God; and when they all rushed upon the preacher of righteousness, and dragged him away from the tribunal to the place of execution, Saul also was consenting to his death; and when the blood of the martyr was shed, he stood by, approving the deed, and kept the clothes of them who slew him.

♦ “Pharasaic” replaced with “Pharisaic”

HIS PERSECUTING CHARACTER.