The life and work of St. Paul

THE EPISTLE TO "THE EPHE8IAN8." 647
which he is an ambassador not inviolable, not splendid, but
" an ambassador
iu a coupling-chain." 1
He sends no news or personal salutations, because he is sending the faitiiful
and beloved Tychicus, who will tell them, as well as other cities, all his affairs ;
but he concludes with a blessing of singular fulness :
" Peace to the brethren and love with faith from God the Father and the Lord
Jesus Christ. Grace be with all who love our Lord Jesus Christ in incorruption." a
Wo have now examined all the Epistles of St. Paul except the last group
of all the three addressed to Timothy and Titus. These are usually known
as the Pastoral Epistles, because they sketch the duties of the Christian
Pastor. Of the Epistle to the Hebrews I have said nothing, because I hope
to speak of it hereafter, and because, for reasons which appear to me abso-
lutely convincing, I cannot regard it as a work of St. Paul's. But even if the
Epistle to the Hebrews be accepted as having been written by the Apostle, it
adds nothing to our knowledge of his history. But for the preservation of
the Pastoral Epistles, we should not know a single additional fact about him,
except such as we can glean from vague and wavering traditions.
The Acts of the Apostles ends with the statement that Paul remained a
period of two whole years in his own hired lodging, and received all who
came in to visit him, preaching the kingdom of God and teaching the tilings
concerning the Lord Jesus Christ with all confidence unmolestcdly. 3 The
question why St. Luke deliberately ended his sketch of the Apostle at tliat
point, is one which can never receive a decisive answer. He only related circumstances
of which he was an eyewitness, or which he knew from trustworthy
information, and for that reason his narrative, in spito of its marked lacunae,
is far more valuable than if it had been constructed out of looser materials.
It may, however, be safely asserted that since he had been with St. Paul
during at least a part of the Roman imprisonment, he brought down his story
to the period at which he first wrote his book. A thousand circumstances may
liave prevented any resumption of his work as a chronicler, but it is incon-
ceivable that St. Paul should have died almost immediately afterwards, by a
martyr's death, and St. Luke have been aware of it before his book was published,
and yet that he should not have made the faiutost allusion to the
subject. 4 The conjecture that Theophilus know all the rest, so that it was
ijeedless to commit it to writing, is entirely valueless, for whoever Theophilus
1
Vi. 10 20. In ver. 18 it is
irepl rr&vnav ruv iyitav teal ujrep ejioS.
- vi. 21
"Paradoxon : miUldus
24.
8 The cadence is expressive of stability ; of motion succeeded by rest ; of action settled
habet splendidos legates " (Bengel).
In repose. "An emblem of the history of the Church of Christ, and of the life of every
true believer in Him " (Bishop Wordsworth).
4 So far as anything can be said to be probable in the midst of sxicli uncertainties, the
probability is that the leisure of his attendance on St. Paul during the Koman imprisonment
had enabled St. Luke to draw up the main part of his work that he concluded it
;
exactly at the point at which St. Paul was expecting immediate liberation, and that
he either published it at .the first favourable opportunity after that time, or waa prevented
it may be even by death from ever continuing or completing his task.