Note 1 — Chapter IV · THE EPISTLES OF PAUL

Date of Paulines to be determined by contents Obviously the genuineness and date of the Pauline Epistles can only be determined by their contents, and not by a supposed deficiency of allusions to them in a literature that is well-nigh completely lost to us. Judged by these considerations, and by the hundreds of undesigned coincidences with the Book of Acts, we must conclude in regard to most of them that they are from the hand of the Paul who is so familiar a figure in that book. The author of the Paulines has just the same supreme and exclusive interest in the crucifixion, death, and resurrection of Jesus the Messiah as the Paul of Acts; he manifests everywhere the same aloofness from the earthly life and teaching of Jesus. They yield the same story as does Acts of his birth and upbringing, of his persecution of the Messianist followers of Jesus and of his conversion; much the same record of his missionary travels can be reconstructed from the Letters as we have in Acts. Yet there is no sign of borrowing on either side. By way of casting doubt on the Pauline Letters the deniers of the historicity insist on the fact that in Acts there is no hint of Paul ever having written Epistles to the Churches he created or visited. Why should there be? Undesigned agreement between Acts and PaulinesTo a companion Paul must have been much more than a mere writer of letters. To Luke the letter writing must have seemed the least important part of Paul’s activity, although for us the accident of their survival makes the Epistles seem of prime importance. In the Epistles, on the other hand, it is objected that there is no indication of any use of Acts. How could there be, seeing that the book was not penned (except on Van Manen’s hypothesis) until long after the Epistles had been written and sent? I admit that Paul’s account in Galatians of his personal history is difficult to reconcile with Acts, and has provided a regular crux for critics of every school.1 The numerous coincidences, however, of the two writings are all the more worthy of attention. If we found them agreeing pat with each other we should reasonably suspect some form of common authorship, if not of collusion. As it is they attest one another very much in the way in which the letters of Cicero attest and are attested by Sallust, Julius Cæsar, and other contemporary or later writers of Roman history. There is neither that complete accord nor complete discord between Acts and Paulines, which would lead a competent historian to distrust either as fairly contemporary and trustworthy witnesses to the same epoch and province of history.