"vain"." Such would have been the oppofition and fury of the Jewish chriftians themfelves against his gofpel, from their known bigotry to the law. This is not at all furprizing, if St. Paul did not preach to the idolatrous Gentiles till after his being the fecond time at Jerufalem: fince then the third time of his being there, in the year 49 (or, as he expreffes it "fourteen years" after his converfion, which was in the year 35), was the next time of his being there, after his preaching to, or becoming the apostle of, the Gentiles. But his filence about this matter to all the apoftles, till the third time of his being at Jerufalem, can never be accounted for, if he had preached the gofpel to the idolatrous Gentiles before his being there the fecond time; no more than his not preaching it to the idolatrous Gentiles before his fecond time of being there can be accounted for, if it had been revealed to him before that time. 5. As St. Paul did not communicate the gospel he preached to the idolatrous Gentiles, to any of the apoftles at Jerufalem till the third time of his being there, and then only to three of them privately; fo he does not feem to have communicated it to the elders, and the church of the believing Jews at Jerufalem, till the fifth time of his being there, ☐ Ver. 2. about 66 about the year 58, as feems to be pretty plainly intimated in the Acts"; for then St. Luke fays, that "Paul went unto James, all "the elders being prefent, and declared particularly what things God had wrought 86 among the Gentiles by his minftiry. And "when they heard it, they glorified the "Lord:" and then give him advice how to clear himself to the multitude, from a calumny that seems to have been raised against him (and, as it fhould seem, on the very firft news that had reached the church of Jerufalem of his teaching the idolatrous Gentiles), namely, that he taught the Jews that were among "the Gentiles to forfake Mofes ";" being fatisfied themselves with the account he gave of the gospel he preached to the Gentiles; and withal intimating, that the Jewish converts perhaps might not be diffatisfied with that account neither, when they came to hear of his fuccefs among the idolatrous Gentiles, no more than they were with the decree about the profelytes of the gate. But that, as the thing that provoked them was the report, that he taught the " Jews among the Gentiles to "forfake Mofes," it would be neceffary for him to fhew them that that was falfe; and that he was fo far from teaching the Jews that were among the Gentiles any fuch thing, that he himself alfo walked orderly, and " Chap. xxi. 17, 18, 19. Р w Ver. 21. 66 kept 66 kept the law:" which he might do, by vowing the vow of a Nazarite. Thus this myftery revealed to Saul was made known by him to the Jewish church but by very flow degrees, for very wife reafons (fome of which I have endeavoured to point out in the Preface), and agreeably to other revelations of myfteries, very obfervable in fcripture. Now is it likely, that Saul fhould be an apostle the first time of his being at Jerufalem, much less at his converfion three years before that, and yet that the gospel of his apostleship should not be known to the elders, and the reft of the church at Jerufalem, till the fifth time of his being there, namely, about the year 58, twenty years after the first time of his being at Jerufalem, or twenty three years after the time of his converfion, when the contrary opinions fuppofe him to be an apoftle? The reafon of his not communicating it to the elders the fourth time of his being at Jerufalem seems to have been, that, he had no proper opportunity to do it during the fhort ftay he then made there; or, which is more likely, because Gođ did not like that it fhould be declared fo foon. There is another incident in the account which we have of St. Paul's coming to Jerufalem at this time, which may ferve to fhew us that this was the firft time of his declaring declaring the converfion of the idolatrous Gentiles to the church of Jerufalem; which is this. He at this time brought "alms with him to his nation" (or to the faints of his nation), as he tells Felix*; these alms he had collected with great induftry, by writing letters, and fending meffengers and making journies himself to the feveral churches of Afia, Macedonia, and Greece, from which he collected them. Some of these churches gave very liberally; and the contributions at laft, through his care, being fo confiderable, Paul would not be entrusted with them alone, but had meffengers of thefe churches joined in the truft; and hired fhips, and afterwards carriages, to carry himfelf, the meffengers, and contributors, to Jerufalem: a thing not ufual with St. Paul, who fometimes "wrought "with his hands, to fupply his own neceffi"ties and the neceffities of those who were with him." Now it is highly probable that he laboured this collection, which he had never made among the idolatrous Gentile converts before, that fo he might reconcile the minds of the Jewish believers to the account of the converfion of these idolatrous Gentiles, which he now defigned to impart to the church of Jerufalem, as news he thought proper to impart to them now, Y. 2 Cor. viii. 1-6. * Acts XXX. 17. though though he had never thought it fit to impart it to them before. If this was not the reason of Paul's making and carrying these collections to Jerufalem now, why did not he make and carry them thither at the end of his fecond apoftolick journey, anno 54; fince that was after the agreement made between the apostles of the circumcifion and himself, and Barnabas, about this matter; that agreement being made at the end of his first apoftolick journey, anno 49? And on this account it is, that he is fo folicitous that the alms might be well accepted of the faints at Jerufalem, as we may see he was, by his defiring the Romans to pray for him, "That the fervice "which he had for Jerufalem, or this minif"try, might be accepted of the faints there a." Alms are feldom unwelcome; what could then make him doubt, whether these alms would be well accepted of the faints at Jerufalem, efpecially fince the alms which he carried to the poor faints at Jerufalem from Antioch had been received b? What could be the reason then why he fo much feared whether these alms would be well accepted; but that, as they came from devout Gentiles, thefe came from the idolatrous Gentiles, converted indeed to the faith, but who did not abstain from things offered to idols, from things ftrangled, and from blood; and whom 2 Rom. xv. 25. 26, 27, 28, 31. Acts xi. 29, 30. he |