Acts 28:17-22

CRITICAL REMARKS

Acts 28:17. The best authorities omit Paul. The chief of the Jews.—Better, those that were the chief (first, or principal men) of the Jews, or, otherwise, those that were of the Jews first. Most likely the parties summoned were the rulers of the synagogues, and such as were socially exalted.

Acts 28:18. Would have let me go, or desired to set me at liberty.—Bethge and Holtzmann, who regard this address of Paul’s to the Jews of Rome as a pure compilation of Luke’s, pronounce the statement in this clause incorrect, and as justified neither by Acts 25:9 nor by any other verse. But the apostle’s intention obviously was to say that the Roman officials who examined him had found no fault in him, and would have dismissed him from the bar had it not been for the opposition of the Jews; and this is distinctly the impression one receives from reading the accounts of the different trials the apostle underwent.

Acts 28:21. We neither received letters out of Judæa concerning thee.—Zeller, Baur, Wendt, and Holtzmann think it incredible that the Jews of Rome had no knowledge of Paul, of his missionary labours, or of his imprisonment. But the Jewish leaders do not say they were entirely ignorant of either the apostle or his doings; merely they assert they had received no official intelligence regarding him from the Palestinian Church, either by letter or by messenger (see “Homiletical Analysis”).

Acts 28:22. As concerning this sect.—The above critics also pronounce it strange that the Jewish leaders should have affected to be ignorant of the existence of a Christian Church in Rome, and detect in their statement a deliberate misrepresentation of history on the part of the author of the Acts for the purpose of sustaining his theory that Paul was an orthodox Jew, who only turned to the Gentile mission in Rome as elsewhere after the Jews had declined to accept his gospel. (See “Homiletical Analysis.”)

HOMILETICAL ANALYSIS.—Acts 28:17

An Interview with the Jewish Chiefs; or, an Explanation of his Imprisonment

I. The assembly convened.—

1. The place. Either Paul’s own private dwelling (Acts 28:30), which doubtless, through the kindness of Luke, Aristarchus, and other Christian friends, he had been enabled to hire; or a temporary lodging which had been provided for him by some of the Roman brethren “Tradition points to the vestibule of the Church of Santa Maria, at the junction of the Via Lata and the Corso, as the site of this dwelling; but it has been urged by Dr. Philip, at present working as a missionary in the Ghetto at Rome, in a pamphlet On the Ghetto (Rome, 1874), that this site, forming part of the old Flaminian way, was then occupied by arches and public buildings, and that it was far more probable Paul would fix his quarters near those of his own countrymen. He adds that a local tradition points to No. 2 in the Via Stringhari, just outside the Ghetto, as having been St. Paul’s dwelling place, but does not give any documentary evidence as to its nature or the date to which it can be traced back” (Plumptre).

2. The time. After three days, which most likely the apostle spent in recruiting his wearied frame after the long and fatiguing journey he had undergone. It showed his zeal for the cause he represented, that he rested only three days. If any part of these days was devoted to social intercourse, it would certainly be with Luke, Aristarchus, and the friends who had so kindly met him at Appii Forum and The Three Taverns.

3. The guests. In other circumstances Paul would have sought out his countrymen at their synagogues. As this was impossible in the position in which he then was, he could only invite them to wait on him at his lodging. Accordingly at his request they come—the chief men or rulers of the synagogues, and others probably of high rank to whom invitations had been issued. The Jewish community in Rome inhabited the “Trastevere” or district beyond the river, a part of the city then notorious as the residence of a low rabble and a place of the meanest merchandise. The beginnings of the Jewish colony in that quarter could have been traced back to the captives brought to the capital by Pompey after his eastern campaign, many of whom had become freemen, and to whom additions were constantly made as the years went on, in consequence of the mercantile relations which subsisted between Rome and the East. Many of these colonists were wealthy, and contributed largely for sacred purposes to the mother country. (See Conybeare and Howson, ii. 388, 389; compare “Hints” on Acts 28:17).

II. The explanation offered.—

1. A protestation of his innocence. To the leaders of the Jewish community Paul explicitly affirmed that, though a prisoner, as they beheld, he had been guilty of no offence against the people—i.e., the Jewish nation or against the customs of their fathers. Paul had all along contended that Christianity formed the legitimate because divinely promised development of Judaism, and that in seeking to carry over his countrymen to an acceptance of Jesus of Nazareth as Messiah, he was not actuated by hostility to the ancestral religion. Nay, he had even shown by his unwonted zeal in attending the Jewish feasts and by his observance of a Nazarite vow (Acts 21:26), that he was well disposed towards the customs of the fathers; and, though critics like Zeller (Die Apostelgeschichte, p. 292) cannot understand how Paul with a good conscience could have advanced the claim here put into his lips, when he knew that his whole activity aimed at nothing else than to subvert the Mosaic religion through faith in Christ, and that his whole religious consciousness had its middle point in the abrogation of the Law through the gospel, it is by no means hard to comprehend if one remembers that Paul never did insist upon a Jew renouncing Moses before he exercised faith in Christ.

2. A vindication of his appeal. The apostle doubtless felt that his countrymen in Rome would want to understand how he came to be a prisoner if he had not been chargeable with any offence; and in order to meet this unspoken but natural request, he proceeded to relate how the Roman officials who examined him were so convinced of his innocence that they would willingly have set him at liberty had it not been for the interference of the Jews—i.e., of the Sanhedrists—and how solely, as a means of self-defence, and not at all because he intended to prefer any accusation against the nation, he had been obliged to appeal unto Cæsar. The accuracy of this statement also has been challenged by Holtzmann (Hand Commentar, in loco), and that on two grounds: first, that the Roman officials expressed no such desire to liberate Paul as Luke here states; and, second, that it was not the Jews but Festus (Acts 25:9) who constrained Paul to appeal to Caesar. But one who reads between the lines at Acts 25:9 can have no difficulty in perceiving that, while Festus demanded of Paul whether he would go to Jerusalem to be judged, Festus himself felt inwardly disposed to discharge the apostle, and probably would have done so but for the threatening attitude assumed by the Sanhedrists; and that his actual proposal partook of the nature of a compromise, which enabled him neither to condemn Paul nor to displease the Jews. Moreover, if this explanation be correct, it will show how Paul could speak of the Jews rather than of Festus as the parties whose action constrained his appeal.

3. A reason stated for his invitation. He wished himself to place his case before the bar of their unbiassed judgments, and to let them know that he was in reality a sufferer for one of the main points of the national faith, that in fact he was a prisoner for the hope of Israel. Perhaps also he cherished the expectation that in this way he would obviate any hostile interposition on their part in the course of his trial (Holtzmann).

III. The answer returned.—

1. A confession of ignorance. About the details of his case. The Jewish leaders assured the apostle that they had neither received letters from Judæa concerning him, nor had any of the brethren arrived in the city to report or speak harm of him. According to some interpreters the synagogue chiefs imagined that Paul half suspected they might have heard disingenuous and depreciatory rumours concerning him from the Judæan metropolis, and were desirous of disabusing his mind of any such suspicion. Others are at a loss to understand how people, living in the centre of the world, as the Roman Jews did, could have professed to be unacquainted with the extraordinary commotion excited by Paul in every Jewish community into which he had hitherto come. It should, however, be noted that they do not assert they had never before heard of Paul—in which case they would scarcely have accepted his invitation to wait upon him in his lodging; but only that they had received no official papers from Judæa about his case, and that no personal messenger had arrived with tidings to his disadvantage. Both of which statements might easily have been true. Until Paul had appealed to Cæsar the Jerusalem Sanhedrists had no special reason for sending word about him to the Roman Christians; and even after that event, as no great interval elapsed between the appeal and the voyage to Rome, it is easy to comprehend how communications or passengers from Judæa may not have had time to reach Rome before the apostle himself arrived.

2. An expression of desire. To hear what Paul himself had to say about the new sect of which he was so distinguished a champion, and which, they told him, as a reason for their request, it had come to their ears, was everywhere spoken against. How they could have pretended to be so ignorant of Christianity as to represent it as a sect of which they had only incidentally heard has perplexed the critics, some of whom do not hesitate to suggest that the synagogue leaders told a lie (Schneckenburger, Tholuck), while others see in the narrative a falsification of actual history on the part of the writer, for the purpose either of vindicating Paul’s character as that of an orthodox Jew (Zeller), or of showing how Paul in Rome, as elsewhere, commenced a Christian mission only after the gospel had been rejected by the Jews (Baur, Holtzmann). That a large and important Christian Church existed in Rome at this date the Epistle to the Romans written from Corinth shows, not to speak of the evidence supplied by the Neronic persecution, of which Tacitus says, “Nero subdidit reos et quæsitissimis pænis affecit quos per flagitia invisos, vulgus Christianos appellabat” (Annals, 15:44). That the Jewish leaders were ignorant of the existence of such a Christian community is inconceivable. Nor do they deny that they were cognisant of its existence. Only they express themselves concerning it with caution, talking of it as a sect everywhere spoken against, about which they were anxious to receive further information. As to the reason of this reserve various explanations have been offered; as, for instance, that even before Claudius had banished the Jews from Rome the Christians had separated themselves from the synagogue, so that they remained practically unknown to the Jews who returned after the edict of banishment had been recalled (Olshausen); that the Jews purposely deceived Paul in order to obtain from him intelligence about the sect (Tholuck); and that the Jews seeing Paul apparently in favour with the Roman authorities, did not wish to assume an attitude of strong opposition towards the Christians, and therefore carefully concealed their private opinions (Philippi).

Learn.—

1. That the love of a truly Christian heart for the salvation of others is practically unquenchable. Paul’s desire for the conversion of his countrymen was a remarkable phenomenon. Had he not imbibed much of his Master’s spirit, his love for his own kinsman must have long since been extinguished.
2. That a truly Christian heart is incapable of revenge. Paul had nothing to accuse his nation of, although they had unjustly hurled against him baseless charges, loaded him with undeserved chains, and even pitilessly thirsted for his blood as well as frequently attempted his life.
3. That Christ’s followers are tender of the errors and superstitions of others. Paul in preaching Christ never ran down Moses or depreciated the value of his religious institutions.
4. That good men are always careful of their own good names. Paul desired to protect himself against the calumnies that he feared might have reached the ears of his countrymen in Rome.
5. That the Christian Church has in no age lacked detractors. As in the first, so in the nineteenth century, this sect is everywhere by some, though happily now nowhere by all, spoken against.

HINTS AND SUGGESTIONS

Acts 28:17. The Jews in Rome.—“The Jewish quarter in Rome had for almost a hundred years been the unceasing object of attention, of sport, and of anger, to the metropolis. Before the first Jewish war the number of the Jews in Rome had been of less importance, but Pompey, Cassius, and Antoninus had sold numerous Jewish prisoners of war as slaves, who either soon were made free because they were of little value as slaves, or indeed were even many times bought free. These liberti formed the proper root of the Jewish community in Rome, on which account the Romish Jews were styled simply the Libertines.” So, at least, narrates Philo the origin of the Jewish community in Rome. “Cæsar desired for himself no employment for his genius, reports the philosopher, and made no secret that he approved of the Jews when they abominated such. Otherwise had he not permitted that a large part of the town on that side of the Tiber should be occupied by those of whom the greater number were freed men—that is, persons who were set free by their masters, because they could not be constrained to forsake the customs of their fathers. He knew also that they sent to Jerusalem collections under the. name of ‘firstfruits,’ by means of representatives who offered these on their behalf. Intentionally had they been restricted with their retail traffic to the fourteenth district across the Tiber, whither all dirty trades were banished. Their quarter lay upon the slope of the Vatican, and stretched itself over one of the flat islands in the Tiber, which were exposed to inundations, and at which the Tiber boats coming from Ostia were accustomed to land. Here, where the ships’ cargoes were discharged, was for the Jewish brokers the correct place which from year to year they in greater numbers occupied.” … “To the grief of the Roman world the Jewish immigrants in no way restricted themselves to business in general, but with that manysidedness which was peculiar to them, no department of life was safe from their invasion. Whilst great and small, from Josephus, the favourite of Flavius, who dwelt in the palace at Septizonium, down to the female beggar who was stationed on the Capena, they loved to make gain, and by their Oriental manners, which were strange to the metropolitan, and the abomination in which the Romans held the gods and mysterious writings of the East, they largely increased their power, on the other hand we see them, through their pliantness, accommodating themselves to the manners of the metropolis, and developing an incredible allsidedness. What business had the son of Israel not practised in the capital of the world? Merchant, banker, shopkeeper, pedlar, as a rule, he was also an officer, and frequently a soldier; he was scholar, poet, critic, yea, even actor and singer. He swore by the temple of the Thunderer, and declaimed in mythological rôles tragic trimeters to the astonishment of the court. He practised also as a physician, and the doctor of Herod stood in such favour that one had better lock up his silver if he allowed himself to bargain with him. This emancipated Jew loved to imitate all the ways of the heathen. In spite of certain mockery from the heathen, he pressed into the public baths, and with the persistence peculiar to him blocked up the best places, doubly pleased if he succeeded in concealing his Jewish origin. The sportive youth of the metropolis he joined in all playgrounds with success; in short, no place was either so holy or profane that it could not lodge a Jewish guest. The speech of this Jewish community in Rome was the Greek, as indeed Paul had written in Greek to the Christian Church there. The inscriptions upon the Jewish churchyard in the Transtiberine quarter and upon the other superior churchyard on the Appian Way at Capena and upon the third in the Catacombs are composed in a Hebraising Greek, less often in bad Latin, never in Hebrew. Consequently even in the Metropolis the Jewish Greek jargon of Asia Minor was spoken, as Martial makes merry over the manner of speech even of the literary Jews” (Hausrath, der Apostel Paulus, pp. 474–478).

Acts 28:20. The Hope of Israel.

I. Implanted in Israel’s heart by God.
II. Recorded in their sacred scriptures.
III. Fulfilled by the resurrection of Jesus Christ.
IV. Published to the Jewish people.

V. Rejected by the unbelieving portion of the nation.

Paul’s Chain.

I. A disgrace to Israel.

II. An honour to Paul.

III. A comfort to Christians.—In case they should be called upon to suffer for the truth.

Acts 28:22. Everywhere spoken Against. That this could have been said of Christianity about the middle of the first century was a signal testimony to many things.

I. To the truthfulness of Christ’s prediction.—That against His people men should say all manner of evil (Matthew 5:11; John 16:2).

II. To the wickedness of the human heart.—Which could speak evil of those who were really the lights of the world and the salt of the earth (Matthew 5:13).

III. To the success of Christianity.—Which had made its presence known and felt even in the centre of the world (Romans 1:8).

IV. To the spiritual power of the gospel.—Which roused against itself the opposition of the world.

Acts 28:22. Everywhere spoken against; or, Popular Objections against Christianity.—Now, as in Paul’s day, Christianity is objected to by various classes of persons, and on widely different grounds; as, e.g.—

I. The supernatural character of its origin.—This has been a difficulty with Christianity from the beginning. Christ advanced this claim on behalf of His doctrine when He first promulgated it (John 7:16); and indeed the New Testament writers generally maintain that, like Mosaism, Christianity has its source in Divine revelation, and not merely in such Divine revelation as might be imparted to the human mind through, but in such as transcended, ordinary channels. The Pharisees and Jews generally rejected this claim on the ground that they found it impossible to accept as Divine revelation what seemed to them so unmistakably to set aside the revelation which they believed had been given to Moses (John 9:29). Scientific men at the present day reject it as in their judgment incompatible with the Reign of Law, affirming in vindication of their action that, if there be a God, of which many of them are not sure, they have no knowledge of any action of His that transcends the bounds of natural law (2 Peter 3:4). Philosophers reject it on the ground that a supernatural origin is not required for the production of what they find to be the essence or kernel of Christianity; after having stripped off what they regard as the legendary accretions with which it has come down through the past nineteen centuries, all that is valuable in it, they affirm may be sufficiently accounted for by the evolution of the human mind. Students of comparative religion, as they are called, reject it on the plea that other religions, such as Mohammedanism and Buddhism, claim to have originated in the same way, and yet their claims have not been accepted by the critical faculty of mankind, though as religions they contain not a few of the same doctrines as Christianity itself.

II. The metaphysical character of its doctrines.—Not so much the circumstance that the Christian documents record miracles, in which the scientific and philosophic worlds do not believe—though, of course, to many this does constitute a serious difficulty in accepting the religion which these documents teach; but the circumstance that as a religion Christianity claims to be based on a series of supernatural facts, which, if once admitted, not only explain and justify the miracles complained of, but render all other objections to Christianity itself unreasonable, These facts are:

1. The incarnation of the Second Person in the Godhead in the person of Jesus; which, if true, involves not only Christ’s supreme divinity, but demands also a plurality of persons in the Godhead.

2. The vicarious sacrifice of Jesus Christ upon the cross, which, if true, involves the antecedent doctrine of the fall of man, the total corruption of the race, and the inability of man to save himself, as well as the possibility of a free salvation.

3. The resurrection of Christ from the dead, which again, if true, involves the truth of the two preceding, and the certainty of both a future resurrection of the dead (Acts 24:15; 1 Corinthians 15:20) and a final judgment of the world (Acts 17:31).

4. The necessity of a free justification by Divine grace, and an entire regene ration by the Holy Spirit, in order to salvation—which, once more, if true, lays the axe at the root of self-sufficiency and pride, and thus inevitably excites the hostility of the natural heart. It is perfectly well known that not one of these doctrines is palatable to the world, and even within the precincts of the Church itself there are those who in some surprising manner claim to be counted Christians who repudiate them all.

III. The objectionable character of its precepts.—Many of the objections urged against these are indeed unreasonable and contradictory, having only this in common, that they dislike Christianity and often lead to its rejection.

1. According to one class of objectors, the precepts of Christianity are too humbling. This holds good, especially of the commandments, to repent of sin and believe in Jesus Christ. Did repentance of sin mean nothing more than a formal, conventional, and external acknowledgment that one had not behaved exactly as he should have done—an acknowledgment which one might condescendingly make without unduly putting an indignity upon his self-respect; and were faith in Jesus Christ nothing beyond an equally generous recognition on man’s part that Christ had lived in His day and generation a noble and self-sacrificing life, from which all subsequent ages had received an inspiration and impulse for good, then the acceptance of Christianity by men’s hearts would not have been so difficult as it is But repentance being an inward and real sorrow for sin, which prostrates the soul before God in self-humiliation, and faith signifying the soul’s absolute and final surrender to Jesus Christ for salvation and eternal life, the soul instinctively becomes conscious of antagonism against demands so imperious and exacting.

2. To a second class, the precepts of Christianity are too severe—too lofty, too spiritual, too inward, too thoroughgoing. Easily enough summed up in love to God and love to man, when it comes to be understood that what Christianity regards as a perfect discharge of these duties is not the performance of a few external, conventional, and formal courtesies to God in the shape of bodily worship, however elaborate or costly, and philanthropies to man in the shape of munificent and frequent gifts of charity; but the continual up-going of the heart towards God in adoring love and obedience, and outgoing of the heart towards man in sympathy and succour—then Christianity is felt to be too exalted, too inward, too exacting a religion for the natural man, with the almost inevitable result that it is spoken against and rejected.

3. A third class complain that the precepts of Christianity are too impracticable. While to many the Sermon on the Mount, with its doctrines of non-resistance of evil, renunciation of wealth, love to enemies, doing unto others as one would that others should do unto him, etc., is esteemed the very essence of Christ’s religion, the class of objectors now alluded to pronounce its programme impracticable and visionary—in fact, declare its non-suitability to the exigencies of modern civilisation, shrink not from saying that its morality will not do for either commercial or political life, and that if Christianity insists on its doing, Christianity must go to the wall. Of course Christianity will not go to the wall, but the nation and the people shall go to the wall that propose to transact their business s and conduct their politics on other principles than its.

IV. The visionary character of its rewards.—Had Christianity proposed to confer on its adherents immediate benefits of a material kind, such as increased wealth, power, pleasure, fame, such as the world thirsts for, its reputation might have stood higher to day than it does with the unbelieving world. But the chief blessings which Christianity undertakes to confer on its adherents are of a spiritual sort (see Ephesians 1:3), and to be enjoyed in their fulness in a future world. Not that Christianity has nothing to confer on its adherents here, because it has (see 1 Timothy 4:8)—it has a sense of the pardoning mercy of God, peace of conscience, joy in the Holy Ghost, a growing enlightenment in the truth of God with a growing conformity to the image of God, and over and above these it has all things needful for life and godliness (2 Peter 1:3), all those “other things” which the heavenly Father knows His children require (Matthew 6:33). But because Christianity sets a higher value on its spiritual blessings than on its temporal gifts (John 6 :), teaches men to set their affections on things above rather than on things on the earth (Colossians 3:1), and encourages them to seek for their inheritance in the future life rather than in this (1 Peter 1:3), men pronounce it visionary, otherworldly, illusory, and pass it by for what they imagine to be a more substantial good, but what they eventually discover to be a shadow.