The life and work of St. Paul

THE SECOND CAPITAL OP CHRISTIAKITY. 161
Gentiles were such only as had already embraced the " Noachian dispensation,"
or whether they included others who had in no sense become adherents of the
synagogue, we are not told. Greek proselytes were at this period common in
every considerable city of the Empire, 1 and it is reasonable to suppose that
they furnished a majority, at any rate, of the new converts. However this
may have been, the work of these nameless Evangelists was eminently
successful. It received the seal of God's blessing, and a large multitude of
Greeks turned to the Lord. The fact, so much obscured by the wrong reading
followed by our English Version, is nothing less than the beginning, on a
large scale, of the conversion of the Gentiles. It is one of the great momenta
in the asceusive work begun by Stephen, advanced by Philip, authorised by
Peter, and finally culminating in the life, mission, and Epistles of St. Paul.
When the news reached Jerusalem, it excited great attention, and the
members of the Church determined to despatch one of their number to watch
what was going on. Their choice of an emissary showed that as yet the counsels
of the party of moderation prevailed, for they despatched the large-hearted and
conciliatory Barnabas. His Levitical descent, and the sacrifice which he had
made of his property to the common fund, combined with his sympathetic
spirit and liberal culture to give him a natural authority, which he had always
used on the side of charity and wisdom.
The arrival of such a man was an especial blessing. This new church,
which was so largely composed of Gentiles, was destined to be a fresh starting,
point in the career of Christianity. Barnabas saw the grace of God at work,
and rejoiced at it, and justified his happy title of " the son of exhortation,"
evidence in favour of *EAAi)[>< is indeed defective, since it is only found in A (which also
has 'EXAi^M, even in is. 29, where EXA/nncras is the only possible reading) and D. N has
ayyeXrra!, which has been altered into 'EXA^a*; hut both N and B read *al before
cAaAovp, which indicates a new and important statement. Some of the most important
versions are valueless as evidence of reading in this instance, because they have no
specific word by which to distinguish 'E\\tivi