II. THE HELLENIST APOSTLES.

II. THE HELLENIST APOSTLES.SAUL,AFTERWARDS NAMEDPAUL.HIS COUNTRY.Onthe farthest north-eastern part of the Mediterranean sea, where its waters are bounded by the great angle made by the meeting of the Syrian coast with the Asian, there is a peculiarity in the course of the mountain ranges, which deserves notice in a view of the countries of that region, modifying as it does, all their most prominent characteristics. The great chain of Taurus, which can be traced far eastward in the branching ranges of Singara, Masius and Niphates, running connectedly also into the distant peaks of mighty Ararat, here sends off a spur to the shore of the Mediterranean, which under the name of Mount Amanus meets its waters, just at their great north-eastern angle in the ancient gulf of Issus, now called the gulf of Scanderoon. Besides this connection with the mountain chains of Mesopotamia and Armenia on the northeast, from the south the great Syrian Lebanon, running very nearly parallel with the eastern shore of the Mediterranean, at the Issic angle, joins this common center of convergence, so insensibly losing its individual character in the Asian ridge, that by many writers, Mount Amanus itself is considered only a regular continuation of Lebanon. These, however, are as distinct as any of the chains here uniting, and the true Libanic mountains cease just at this grand natural division of Syria from the northern coast of the Mediterranean. A characteristic of the Syrian mountains is nevertheless prominent in the northern chain. They all take a general course parallel with the coast and very near it, occasionally sending out lateral ridges which mark the projections of the shore with high promontories. Of these, however, there are much fewer on the southern coast of Asia Minor; and the western ridge of Taurus, after parting from the grand angle of convergence, runs exactly parallel to the margin of the sea, in most parts about seven miles distant.The country thus fenced off by Taurus, along the southern coast of Asia Minor, is very distinctly characterized by these circumstances connected with its orography, and is in a very peculiar manner bounded and inclosed from the rest of the continent, by these natural features. The great mountain barrier of Taurus, as above described, stretches along the north, forming a mighty wall, which is at each end met at right angles by a lateral ridge, of which the eastern is Amanus, descending within a few rods of the water, while the western is the true termination of Taurus in that direction,——the mountains here making a grand curve from west to south, and stretching out into the sea, in a bold promontory, which definitely marks the farthest western limit of the long, narrow section, thus remarkably enclosed. This simple natural division, in the apostolic age, contained two principal artificial sub-divisions. On the west, was the province of Pamphylia, occupying about one fourth of the coast;——and on the east, the rest of the territory constituted the province ofCilicia, far-famed as the land of the birth of that great apostle of the Gentiles, whose life is the theme of these pages.Cilicia,——opening on the west into Pamphylia,——is elsewhere inclosed in mountain barriers, impenetrable and impassable, except in two or three points, which are the only places in which it is accessible by land, though widely exposed, on the sea, by its long open coast. Of these two adits, the most important, and the one through which the vast proportion of its commercial intercourse with the world, by land, has always been carried on, is the eastern, which is just at the oft-mentioned great angle of the Mediterranean, where the mountains descend almost to the waters of the gulf of Issus. Mount Amanus, coming from the north-east, and stretching along the eastern boundary of Cilicia an impassable barrier, here advances to the shore; but just before its base reaches the water, it abruptly terminates, leaving between the high rocks and the sea a narrow space, which is capable of being completely commanded and defended from the mountains which thus guard it; and forming the only land passage out of Cilicia to the eastern coast of the Mediterranean, it was thence anciently called “the gates of Syria.” Through these “gates,” has always passed all the traveling by land between Asia Minor and Palestine; and it is therefore an important point in the most celebrated route in apostolic history. The other main opening in the mountain walls of this region, is the passage through theTaurus, made by the course of the Sarus, the largest river of the province, which breaks through the northern ridge, in a defile that is called “the gates of Cilicia.”The boundaries of Cilicia are then,——on the north, mountainous Cappadocia, perfectly cut off by the impenetrable chain of Taurus, except the narrow pass through “the gates of Cilicia;”——on the east, equally well guarded by Mount Amanus, Northern Syria, the only land passages being through the famed “Syrian gates,” and another defile north of the coast, toward the Euphrates;——on the south, stretches the long margin of the sea, which in the western two-thirds of the coast takes the name of “the Cilician strait,” because it here flows between the mainland and the great island of Cyprus, which lies off the shore, always in sight, being less than thirty miles distant, the eastern third of the coast being bounded by the waters of the gulf of Issus;——and on the west Cilicia ends in the rough highlands of Pamphylia. The territory itself is distinguished by natural features, into two divisions,——Rocky Cilicia and “Level Cilicia,”——the former occupying the western third, and the latter the eastern part,——each district being abundantly well described by the term applied to it. Within the latter, lay the opening scenes of the apostle’s life.Thus peculiarly guarded, and shut off from the world, it might be expected that this remarkable region would nourish, on the narrow plains of its fertile shores, and the vast rough mountains of its gigantic barriers, a race strongly marked in mental, as in physical characteristics. In all parts of the world, the philosophical observer may notice a relation borne by man to the soil on which he lives, and to the air which he breathes,——hardly less striking than the dependence of the inferior orders of created things, on the material objects which surround them. Man is an animal, and his natural history displays as many curious correspondences between his varying peculiarities and the locality which he inhabits, as can be observed between the physical constitution of inferior creatures, and the similar circumstances which affect them. The inhabitants of a wild, broken region, which rises into mighty inland mountains, or sends its cliffs and vallies into a vast sea, are, in all ages and climes, characterized by a peculiar energy and quickness of mind, which often marks them in history as the prominent actors in events of the highest importance to mankind in all the world. Even the dwellers of the cities of such regions, share in that peculiar vivacity of their countrymen,which is especially imbibed in the air of the mountains; and carry through all the world, till new local influences have again subjected them, the original characteristics of the land of their birth. The restless activity and dauntless spirit of Saul, present a striking instance of this relation of scenery to character. The ever-rolling waters of the tideless sea on one side presenting a boundless view, and on the other the blue mountains rearing a mighty barrier to the vision,——the thousand streams thence rolling to the former,——the white sands of the long plains, gemmed with the green of shaded fountains, as well as the active movements of a busy population, all living under these same inspiring influences,——would each have their effect on the soul of the young Cilician as he grew up in the midst of these modifying circumstances.Along these shores, from the earliest period of Hellenic colonization, Grecian enterprise had planted its busy centers of civilization. On each favorable site, where agriculture or commerce could thrive, cities grew up in the midst of prosperous colonies, in which wealth and power in their rapid advance brought in the lights of science, art, literature, and all the refinements and elegances which Grecian colonization made the invariable accompaniments of its march,——adorning its solid triumphs with the graceful polish of all that could exalt the enjoyment of prosperity. Issus, Mopsuestia, Anchialus, Selinus and others, were among the early seats of Grecian refinement; and the more modern efforts of the Syro-Macedonian sway, had blessed Cilicia with the fruits of royal munificence, in such cities as Cragic Antioch, Seleucia the Rocky, and Arsinoe; and in still later times, the ever-active and wide-spreading beneficence of Roman dominion, had still farther multiplied the peaceful triumphs and trophies of civilization, by here raising or renewing cities, of which Baiae, Germanicia and Pompeiopolis are only a specimen. But of all these monuments of ancient or later refinement, there was none of higher antiquity or fame thanTarsus, the city where was born this illustrious apostle, whose life was so greatly instrumental in the triumphs of Christianity.Tarsusstands north of the point of a wide indentation of the coast of Cilicia, forming a very open bay, into which, a few miles south, flow the waters of the classic Cydnus, a narrow stream which runs a brief course from the barrier of Taurus, directly southward to the sea. The river’s mouth forms a spacious and convenient harbor, to which the light vessels of ancient commerceall easily found safe and ready access, though most of the floating piles in which the productions of the world are now transported, might find such a harbor altogether inaccessible to their heavier burden.Ammianus Marcellinus, the elegant historian of the decline of the Roman empire, speaks in high descriptive terms, both of the province, and the city which makes it eminent in Christian history. In narrating important events here performed during the times whose history he records, he alludes to the character of the region in a preliminary description. “After surmounting the peaks of Taurus, which towards the east rise into higher elevation, Cilicia spreads out before the observer, in far stretching areas,——a land, rich in all good things. To its right (that is the west, as the observer looks south from the summits of Taurus) is joined Isauria,——in equal degree verdant with palms and many fruits, and intersected by the navigable river Calycadnus. This, besides many towns, has two cities,——Seleucia, the work of Seleucus Nicator of Syria, and Claudiopolis, a colony founded by Claudius Caesar. Isauria however, once exceedingly powerful, has formerly been desolated for a destructive rebellion, and therefore shows but very few traces of its ancient splendor. ButCilicia, which rejoices in the river Cydnus, isennobledbyTarsus, a splendid city,——by Anazarbus, and by Mopsuestia, the dwelling-place of that Mopsus, who accompanied the Argonauts. These two provinces (Isauria or ‘Cilicia the Rocky,’ and Cilicia proper or ‘level’) being formerly connected with hordes of plunderers in a piratical war, were subjugated by the proconsul Servilius, and made tributary. And these regions, placed, as it were, on a long tongue of land, are separated from the eastern world by Mount Amanus.”This account by Ammianus Marcellinus is found in bookXIV.of his history, (p.19, edited by Vales.)The native land of Saul was classic ground. Within the limits of Cilicia, were laid the scenes of some of the most splendid passages in early Grecian fable; and here too, were acted some of the grandest events in authentic history, both Greek and Roman. The very city of his birth, Tarsus, is said to have been founded by Perseus, the son of Jupiter and Danae, famed for his exploit at another place on the shore of this part of the Mediterranean. More authentic history however, refers its earliest foundation to Sardanapalus, king of Assyria, who built Tarsus and Anchialus in Cilicia, nine hundred years before Christ. Its origin is by others ascribedto Triptolemus with an Argive colony, who is represented on some medals as the founder. These two stories may be made consistent with each other, on the supposition that the same place was successively the scene of the civilizing influence of each of these attributed founders. So too, may be taken, the legend which Ammianus Marcellinus records and approves,——that it was founded by Sandan, a wealthy and eminent person from Ethiopia, who at some early period not specified, is said to have built Tarsus. It was however, at the earliest period that is definitely mentioned, subject to the Assyrian empire; and afterwards fell under the dominion of each of the sovranties which succeeded it, passing into the hands of the Persian and of Alexander, as each in turn assumed the lordship of the eastern world. While under the Persian sway, it is commemorated by Xenophon as having been honored by the presence of the younger Cyrus, when on his march through Asia to wrest the empire from his brother. On this occasion, he entered this region through the northern “gates of Cilicia,” and passed out through the “gates of Syria,” a passage which is, in connection with this event, very minutely described by the elegant historian of that famous expedition.Sardanapalus.——The fact of the foundation both of Tarsus and Anchialus by this splendid but unfortunately extravagant monarch, the last of his line, is commemorated by Arrian, who refers to the high authority of an inscription which records the event.“Anchialus is said to have been founded by the king of Assyria, Sardanapalus. The fortifications, in their magnitude and extent, still, in Arrian’s time, bore the character of greatness, which the Assyrians appear singularly to have affected in works of the kind. A monument, representing Sardanapalus, was found there, warranted by an inscription in Assyrian characters, of course in the old Assyrian language, which the Greeks, whether well or ill, interpreted thus: ‘Sardanapalus, son of Anacyndaraxes, in one day founded Anchialus and Tarsus. Eat, drink, play: all other human joys are not worth a fillip.’ Supposing this version nearly exact, (for Arrian says it was not quite so,) whether the purpose has not been to invite to civil order a people disposed to turbulence, rather than to recommend immoderate luxury, may perhaps reasonably be questioned. What, indeed, could be the object of a king of Assyria in founding such towns in a country so distant from his capital, and so divided from it by an immense extent of sandy desert and lofty mountains, and, still more, how the inhabitants could be at once in circumstances to abandon themselves to the intemperate joys which their prince has been supposed to have recommended, is not obvious; but it may deserve observation that, in that line of coast, the southern of Lesser Asia, ruins of cities, evidently of an age after Alexander, yet barely named in history, at this day astonish the adventurous traveler by their magnificence and elegance.” (Mitford’s Greece,Vol. IX.pp.311, 312.)Over the same route passed the conquering armies of the great Alexander. At Issus, within the boundaries of Cilicia, he met, in their mightiest array, the vast hosts of Darius, whom here vanquishing, he thus decided the destiny of the world. Before this great battle, halting to repose at Tarsus, he almost met his death,by imprudently bathing in the classic Cydnus, whose waters were famed for their extreme coldness. By a remarkable coincidence, the next conqueror of the world, Julius Caesar, also rested at Tarsus for some days before his great triumphs in Asia Minor. Cilicia had in the interval between these two visits passed from the Macedonian to the Roman dominion, being made a Roman province by Pompey, about sixty years before Christ, at the time when all the kingdoms of Asia and Syria were subjugated. After this it was visited by Cicero, at the time of his triumphs over the cities of eastern Cilicia; and its classic stream is still farther celebrated in immortal verse and prose, as the scene where Marcus Antony met Cleopatra for the first time. It was the Cydnus, down which she sailed in her splendid galley, to meet the conqueror, who for her afterwards lost the empire of the world. During all the civil wars which desolated the Roman empire through a long course of years in that age, Tarsus steadily adhered to the house of Caesar, first to the great Julius and afterwards to Augustus. So remarkable was its attachment and devotion to the cause of Julius, that when the assassin Cassius marched through Asia into Syria to secure the dominion of the eastern world, he laid siege to Tarsus, and having taken it, laid it waste with the most destructive vengeance for its adherence to the fortunes of his murdered lord; and such were its sufferings under these and subsequent calamities in the same cause, that when Augustus was at last established in the undivided empire of the world, he felt himself bound in honor and gratitude, to bestow on the faithful citizens of Tarsus the most remarkable favors. The city, having at the request of its inhabitants received the new name ofJuliopolis, as a testimony of their devotion to the memory of their murdered patron, was lavishly honored with almost every privilege which the imperial Augustus could bestow on these most faithful adherents of his family. From the terms in which his acts of generosity to them are recorded, it has been inferred,——though not therein positively stated,——that he conferred on it the rank and title of a Roman colony, or free city, which must have given all its inhabitants the exalted privileges ofRoman citizens. This assertion has been disputed however, and forms one of the most interesting topics in the life of the great apostle, involving the inquiry as to the mode in which he obtained that inviolable privilege, which, on more than one occasion, snatched him from the clutches of tyrannical persecutors. Whether he held this privilege in common with all thecitizens of Tarsus, or inherited it as a peculiar honor of his own family, is a question yet to be decided. But whatever may have been the precise extent of the municipal favors enjoyed by Tarsus, it is certain that it was an object of peculiar favor to the imperial Caesars during a long succession of years, not only before but after the apostle’s time, being crowned with repeated acts of munificence by Augustus, Adrian, Caracalla and Heliogabalus, so that through many centuries it was the most favored city in the eastern division of the Roman empire.The history of Cilicia since the apostolic age, is briefly this: It remained attached to the eastern division of the Roman empire, until about A. D. 800, when it first fell under the Muhammedan sway, being made part of the dominion of the Califs by Haroun Al Rashid. In the thirteenth century it reverted to a Christian government, constituting a province of the Armenian kingdom of Leo. About A. D. 1400, it fell under the sway of BajazetII., Sultan of the Ottoman empire, and is at present included in that empire,——most of it in a single Turkish pashalic, under the name of Adana.Roman citizens.——Witsius very fully discusses this point, as follows. (Witsiuson the Life of Paul§1.¶ V.)“It is remarkable that though he was of Tarsus, he should say that he was aRomancitizen, and that too by the right ofbirth: Actsxxii.28. There has been some discussion whether he enjoyed that privilege in common with all the Tarsans, or whether it was peculiar to his family. Most interpreters firmly hold the former opinion. Beza remarks, ‘that he calls himself a Roman, not by country, but by right of citizenship; since Tarsus had the privileges of a Roman colony.’ He adds, ‘Mark Antony, the triumvir, presented the Tarsans with the rights of citizens of Rome.’ Others, without number, bear the same testimony. Baronius goes still farther,——contending that ‘Tarsus obtained from the Romans, themunicipalright,’ that is, the privileges of free-born citizens of Rome; understanding Paul’s expression in Actsxxi.39, to mean that he was amunicepsof Tarsus, or a Tarsan with the freedom of the city of Rome. Now themunicipaltowns, or free cities, had rights superior to those of mere colonies; for thefree-citizenswere not only called Roman citizens as thecolonistswere, but also, as Ulpian records, could share in all the honors and offices of Rome. Moreover, thecolonieshad to live under the laws of the Romans, while the municipal towns were allowed to act according their own ancient laws, and country usages. To account for the distinction enjoyed by Tarsus, in being called a ‘municipiumof Romans,’ the citizens are said to have merited that honor, for having in the civil wars attached themselves first to Julius Caesar, and afterwards to Octavius, in whose cause they suffered much. For so attached was this city to the side of Caesar, that, as Dion Cassius records, their asked to have their name changed from Tarsus toJuliopolis, in memory of Julius and in token of good will to Augustus; and for that reason they were presented with the rights of a colony or amunicipium, and this general opinion is strengthened by the high testimony of Pliny and Appian. On the other hand Heinsius and Grotius strongly urge that these things have been too hastily asserted by the learned; for scarcely a passage can be found in the ancient writers, where Tarsus is called a colony, or even amunicipium. ‘And how could it be a colony,’ asks Heinsius, ‘when writers on Roman law acknowledge but two in Cilicia? Ulpian (Liber I.De censibus) says of the Roman colonies in Asia Minor, “there is in Bithynia the colony of Apamea,——in Pontus, Sinope,——in Cilicia there are Selinus and Trajanopolis.” But why does he pass over Tarsus or Juliopolis, if that had place among them?’ Baronius proves it to have been amunicipium, only from the Latin version of Acts, where that word is used; though the term in the original Greek (πολιτης) means nothing more than the common word, citizen, (as it is rendered in the English version.) Pliny also calls Tarsus not a colony, nor amunicipium, but a free city. (libera urbs.) BookV.chap xxvii.Appian in the first book of the civil wars, says that Antony granted to the Tarsansfreedom, but says nothing of the rights of amunicipium, or colony. Wherefore Grotius thinks that the only point established is, that some one of the ancestors of Paul, in the civil wars between AugustusCaesar, and Brutus and Cassius, and perhaps those between this Caesar and Antony, received the grant of the privileges of a Roman citizen. Whence he concludes that Paul must have been of an opulent family. These opinions of Grotius have received the approval of other eminent commentators. These notions however, must be rejected as unsatisfactory; because, though some writers have but slightly alluded to Tarsus as afree city, yet Dio Chrysostom, (in Tarsica posteriore,) has enlarged upon it in a tone of high declamation. ‘Yours, men of Tarsus, was the fortune to be first in this nation,——not only because you dwell in the greatest city of Cilicia, and one which was a metropolis from the beginning,——but also because the second Caesar was remarkably well-disposed and gracious towards you. For, the misfortunes which befell the city in his cause, deservedly secured to you his kind regard, and led him to make his benefits to you as conspicuous as the calamities brought upon you for his sake. Therefore did Augustus confer on you everything that a man could on friends and companions, with a view to outdo those who had shown him so great good-will,——your land, laws, honors, the right of the river and of the neighboring sea.’ On which words Heinsius observes in comment, that bylandis doubtless meant that he secured to them their own territory, free and undisturbed. Bylawsare meant such as relate to the liberty usually granted to free towns.Honorplainly refers to the right of citizenship, as the most exalted he could offer. The point then seems to be established, if this interpretation holds good, and it is evidently a rational one. For when he had made up his mind to grant high favors to a city, in return for such great merits, why, when it was in his power, should Augustus fail to grant it the rights of Roman citizenship, which certainly had been often granted to other cities on much slighter grounds? It would be strange indeed, if among the exalted honors which Dio proclaims, that should not have been included. This appears to be the drift, not only of Dio’s remarks, but also of Paul’s, who offers no other proof of his being a Roman citizen, than that he was a Tarsan, and says nothing of it as a special immunity of his own family, although some such explanation would otherwise have been necessary to gain credit to his assertion. Whence it is concluded that it would be rash to pretend, contrary to all historical testimony, any peculiar merits of the ancestors of Paul, towards the Romans, which caused so great an honor to be conferred on aJewishfamily.”But from all these ample and grandiloquent statements of Dio Chrysostom, it by no means follows that Tarsus had the privilege of Roman citizenship; and the conclusion of the learned Witsius seems highly illogical. The very fact, that while Dio was panegyrizing Tarsus in these high terms, and recounting all the favors which imperial beneficence had showered upon it, he yet didnotmention among these minutiae, the privilege of citizenship, is quite conclusive against this view; for he would not, when thus seeking for all the particulars of its eminence, have omitted the greatest honor and advantage which could be conferred on any city by a Roman emperor, nor have left it vaguely to be inferred. Besides, there are passages in the Acts of the Apostles which seem to be opposed to the view, that Tarsus was thus privileged. In Actsxxi.39, Paul is represented as distinctly stating to the tribune, that he was “acitizenof Tarsus;” yet inxxii.24, 25, it is said, that the tribune was about proceeding, without scruple, to punish Paul with stripes, and was very much surprised indeed, to learn that he was a Roman citizen, and evidently had no idea that a citizen of Tarsus was, as a matter of course, endowed with Roman citizenship;——a fact, however, with which a high Roman officer must have been acquainted, for there were few cities thus privileged, and Tarsus was a very eminent city in a province adjoining Palestine, and not far from the capital of Judea. And the subsequent passages ofchap. xxii.represent him as very slow indeed to believe it, after Paul’s distinct assertion.Hemsen is very clear and satisfactory on this point, and presents the argument in a fair light. See his note in his “Apostel Paulus” onpp.1, 2. He refers also to a work not otherwise known here;——John Ortwin Westenberg’s “Dissert. de jurisp. Paul. Apost.” Kuinoel in Act. Apost.xvi.37. discusses the question of citizenship.“It ought not to seem very strange, that the ancestors of Paul should have settled in Cilicia, rather than in the land of Israel. For although Cyrus gave the whole people of God an opportunity of returning to their own country, yet many from each tribe preferred the new country, in which they had been born and bred, to the old one, of which they had lost the remembrance. Hence an immense multitude of Jews might be found in almost all the dominions of the Persians, Greeks, Romans and Parthians; as alluded to in Actsii.9, 10. But there were also other occasions andcauses for the dispersion of the Jews. Ptolemy, the Macedonian king of Egypt, having taken Jerusalem from the Syro-Macedonians, led away many from the hill-country of Judea, from Samaria and Mount Gerizim, into Egypt, where he made them settle; and after he had given them at Alexandria the rights of citizens in equal privilege with the Macedonians, not a few of the rest, of their own accord, moved into Egypt, allured partly by the richness of the land, and partly by the good will that Ptolemy had shown towards their nation. Afterwards, Antiochus the Great, the Macedonian king of Syria, about the thirtieth year of his reign, two hundred years before the Christian era, brought out two thousand Jewish families from Babylonia, whom he sent into Phrygia and Lydia with the most ample privileges, that they might hold to their duty the minds of the Greeks, who were then inclining to revolt from his sway. These were from Asia Minor, spread abroad over the surrounding countries, between the Mediterranean sea, the Euphrates and Mount Amanus, on the frontiers of Cilicia. Besides, others afterwards, to escape the cruelty of Antiochus Epiphanes, betook themselves to foreign lands, where, finding themselves well settled, they and their descendants remained. Moreover, many, as Philo testifies, for the sake of trade, or other advantages, of their own accord left the land of Israel for foreign countries: whence almost the whole world was filled with colonies of Jews, as we see in the directions of some of the general epistles, (Jamesi.1: 1 Peteri.1.) Thus also Tarsus had its share of Jewish inhabitants, among whom were the family of Paul.” (Witsius in Vita Pauli,§1.¶ v.)Nor were the solid honors of this great Asian city, limited to the mere favors of imperial patronage. Founded, or early enlarged by the colonial enterprise of the most refined people of ancient times, Tarsus, from its first beginning, shared in the glories of Helleno-Asian civilization, under which philosophy, art, taste, commerce, and warlike power attained in these colonies a highth before unequalled, while Greece, the mother country, was still far back in the march of improvement. In the Asian colonies arose the first schools of philosophy, and there is hardly a city on the eastern coast of the Aegean, but is consecrated by some glorious association with the name of some Father of Grecian science. Thales, Anaxagoras, Anaximander, and many others of the earliest philosophers, all flourished in these Asian colonies; and on the Mediterranean coast, within Cilicia itself, were the home and schools of Aratus and the stoic Chrysippus. The city of Tarsus is commemorated by Strabo as having in very early times attained great eminence in philosophy and in all sorts of learning, so that “in science and art it surpassed the fame even of Athens and Alexandria; and the citizens of Tarsus themselves were distinguished for individual excellence in these elevated pursuits. So great was the zeal of the men of that place for philosophy, and for the rest of the circle of sciences, that they excelled both Athens and Alexandria, and every other place which can be mentioned, where there are schools and lectures of philosophers.” Not borrowing the philosophic glory of their city merely from the numbers of strangers who resorted thither to enjoy the advantages of instruction there afforded, as is almost universally the case in all thegreat seats of modern learning; but entering themselves with zeal and enjoyment into their schools of science, they made the name ofTarsusfamous throughout the civilized world, for the cultivation of knowledge and taste. Even to this day the stranger pauses with admiration among the still splendid ruins of this ancient city, and finds in her arches, columns and walls, and in her chance-buried medals, the solid testimonies of her early glories in art, taste and wealth. Well then might the great apostle recur with patriotic pride to the glories of the city where he was born and educated, challenging the regard of his military hearers for his native place, by the sententious allusion to it, as “NO MEAN CITY.”“It appears on the testimony of Paul, (Actsxxi.39,) that Tarsus was a city of no little note, and it is described by other writers as the most illustrious city of all Cilicia; so much so indeed, that the Tarsans traced their origin to Ionians and Argives, and a rank superior even to these;——referring their antiquity of origin not merely to heroes, but even to demi-gods. It was truly exalted, not only by its antiquity, situation, population and thriving trade, but by the nobler pursuits of science and literature, which so flourished there, that according to Strabo it was worthy to be ranked with Athens and Alexandria; and we know that Rome itself owed its most celebrated professors to Tarsus.” (Witsius.§1,¶ iv.)The testimony of Strabo is found in his Geography, bookXIV.Cellarius (Geog. Ant.) is very full on the geography of Cilicia, and may be advantageously consulted. Conder’s Modern Traveler (Syria and Asia Minor 2.) gives a very full account of its ancient history, its present condition, and its topography.The present appearance of this ancient city must be a matter of great interest to the reader of apostolic history; and it can not be more clearly given than in the simple narrative of the enterprising Burckhardt, who wrote his journal on the very spot which he describes. (Life of Burckhardt, prefixed to his travels in Nubia,pp. xv. xvi.)“The road from our anchoring place to Tarsus crosses the above-mentioned plain in an easterly direction: we passed several small rivulets which empty themselves into the sea, and which, to judge from the size of their beds, swell in the rainy season to considerable torrents. We had rode about an hour, when I saw at half an hour’s distance to the north of our route, the ruins of a large castle, upon a hill of a regular shape in the plain; half an hour further towards Tarsus, at an equal distance from our road, upon a second tumulus, were ruins resembling the former; a third insulated hillock, close to which we passed midway of our route, was over-grown with grass, without any ruins or traces of them. I did not see in the whole plain any other elevations of ground but the three just mentioned. Not far from the first ruins, stands in the plain an insulated column. Large groups of trees show from afar the site of Tarsus. We passed a small river before we entered the town, larger than those we had met on the road. The western outer gate of the town, through which we entered, is of ancient structure; it is a fine arch, the interior vault of which is in perfect preservation: on the outside are some remains of a sculptured frieze. I did not see any inscriptions. To the right and left of this gateway are seen the ancient ruined walls of the city, which extended in this direction farther than the town at present does. From the outer gateway, it is about four hundred paces to the modern entrance of the city; the intermediate ground is filled up by a burying ground on one side of the road, and several gardens with some miserable huts on the other. * * * * The little I saw of Tarsus did not allow me to estimate its extent; the streets through which I passed were all built of wood, and badly; some well furnished bazars, and a large and handsome mosque in the vicinity of the Khan, make up the whole register of curiosities which I am able to relate of Tarsus. Upon several maps Tarsus is marked as a sea town: this is incorrect; the sea is above three miles distant from it. On our return home, we started in a south-west direction, andpassed, after two hours and a half’s march, Casal, a large village, half a mile distant from the sea-shore, called the Port of Tarsus, because vessels freighted for Tarsus usually come to anchor in its neighborhood. From thence turning towards the west, we arrived at our ship at the end of two hours. The merchants of Tarsus trade principally with the Syrian coast and Cyprus: imperial ships arrive there from time to time, to load grain. The land trade is of very little consequence, as the caravans from Smyrna arrive very seldom. There is no land communication at all between Tarsus and Aleppo, which is at ten journeys (caravan traveling) distant from it. The road has been rendered unsafe, especially in later times, by the depredations of Kutshuk Ali, a savage rebel, who has established himself in the mountains to the north of Alexandretta. Tarsus is governed by an Aga, who I have reason to believe is almost independent. The French have an agent there, who is a rich Greek merchant.”A fine instance of the value of the testimony of the Fathers on points where knowledge of the Scriptures is involved, is found in the story by Jerome, who says that “Paul was born at Gischali, a city of Judea,” (in Galilee,) “and that while he was a child, his parents, in the time of the laying waste of their country by the Romans, removed to Tarsus, in Cilicia.” And yet this most learned of the Fathers, the translator of the whole Bible into Latin, did not know, it seems, that Paul himself most distinctly states in his speech to the Jewish mob, (Actsxxii.3,) that he was “bornin Cilicia,” as the common translation has it;——in Greek,γεγενημενος εν Κιλικια,——words which so far from allowing any such assertion as Jerome makes, even imply that Paul, with Tristram Shandy-like particularity, would specify that he was “begottenin Cilicia.” Jerome’s ridiculous blunder, Witsius, after exposing its inconsistency with Jewish history, indignantly condemns, as “a most shameful falsehood,” (putidissimafabula,) which is as hard a name as has been applied to anything in this book.But if this blunder is so shameful in Jerome, what shall be said of the learned Fabricius, who (Bibliotheca Graeca,IV.p.795,) copies this story from Jerome as authentic history, without a note of comment, and without being aware that it most positively contradicts the direct assertion of Paul? And this blunder too is passed over by all the great critical commentators of Fabricius, in Harles’s great edition. Keil, Kuinoel, Harles, Gurlitt, and others equally great, who revised all this, are involved in the discredit of the blunder. “Non omnes omnia.”HIS GRECIAN LEARNING.In this splendid seat of knowledge, Saul was born of purely Jewish parents. “A Hebrew of the Hebrews,” he enjoyed from his earliest infancy that minute religious instruction, which every Israelite was in conscience bound to give his children; and with a minuteness and attention so much the more careful, as a residence in a foreign land, far away from the consecrated soil of Palestine and the Holy city of his faith, might increase the liabilities of his children to forget or neglect a religion of which they saw so few visible tokens around them, to keep alive their devotion. Yet, though thus strictly educated in the religion of his fathers, Saul was by no means cut off by this circumstance from the enjoyment of many of the advantages in profaner knowledge, afforded in such an eminent degree by Tarsus; but must, almost without an effort, have daily imbibed into his ready and ever active mind, much of the refining influence of Grecian philosophy. There is no proof, indeed, that he ever formally entered the schools of heathen science; such a supposition, is, perhaps, inconsistentwith the idea of his principles of rigid Judaism, and is rendered rather improbable by the great want of Grecian elegance and accuracy in his writings; which are so decidedly characterized by an unrhetorical style, and by irregular logic, that they never could have been the production of a scholar, in the most eminent philosophical institutions of Asia. But a mere birth and residence in such a city, and the incidental but constant familiarity with those so absorbed in these pursuits, as very many of his fellow-citizens were, would have the unavoidable effect of familiarizing him also with the great subjects of conversation, and the grand objects of pursuit, so as ever after to prove an advantage to him in his intercourse with the refined and educated among the Greeks and Romans. The knowledge thus acquired, too, is ever found to be of the most readily available kind, always suggesting itself upon occasions when needed, according to the simple principle of association, and thus more easily applied to ordinary use than that which is more regularly attained, and is arranged in the mind only according to formal systems. Thus was it, with most evident wisdom, ordained by God, that in this great seat of heathen learning, that apostle should be born, who was to be the first messenger of grace to the Grecian world, and whose words of warning, even Rome should one day hear and believe.HIS FAMILY AND BIRTH.The parents of Saul were Jews, and his father at least, was of the tribe of Benjamin. In some of those numerous emigrations from Judea which took place either by compulsion or by the voluntary enterprise of the people, at various times after the Assyrian conquest, the ancestors of Saul had left their father-land, for the fertile plains of Cilicia, where, under the patronizing government of some of the Syro-Macedonian kings, they found a much more profitable home than in the comparatively uncommercial land of Israel. On some one of these occasions, probably during the emigration under Antiochus the Great, the ancestors of Saul had settled in Tarsus, and during the period intervening between this emigration and the birth of Saul, the family seems to have maintained or acquired a very respectable rank, and some property. From the distinct information which we have that Saul was a free-bornRoman citizen, it is manifest that his parents must also have possessed that right; for it has already been abundantly shown that it was not common to the citizens of Tarsus, but must have been a peculiar privilege of his family. After the subjugationof Cilicia, (sixty-two years before Christ,) when the province passed from the Syrian to the Roman sway, the family were in some way brought under the favorable notice of the new lords of the eastern world, and were honored with the high privilege of Roman citizenship, an honor which could not have been imparted to any one low either in birth or wealth. The precise nature of the service performed by them, that produced such a magnificent reward, it is impossible to determine; but that this must have been the reason, it is very natural to suppose. But whatever may have been the extent of the favors enjoyed by the parents of Saul, from the kindness of their heathen rulers, they were not thereby led to neglect the institutions of their fathers,——but even in a strange land, observed the Mosaic law with peculiar strictness; for Saul himself plainly asserts that his father was a Pharisee, and therefore he must have been bound by the rigid observances of that sect, to a blameless deportment, as far as the Mosaic law required. Born of such parents, the destined apostle at his birth was made the subject of the minute Mosaic rituals. “Circumcised the eighth day,” he then received the name ofSaul, a name connected with some glorious and some mournful associations in the ancient Jewish history, and probably suggested to the parents on this occasion, by a reference to its signification, for Hebrew names were often thus applied, expressing some circumstance connected with the child; and in this name more particularly, some such meaning might be expected, since, historically, it must have been a word of rather evil omen. The original Hebrew means “desired,” “asked for,” and hence it has been rather fancifully, but not unreasonably conjectured that he was an oldest son, and particularly desired by his expecting parents, who were, like the whole Jewish race, very earnest to have a son to perpetuate their name,——a wish however, by no means peculiar to the Israelites.The name Saul is in Hebrew,שאולthe regular noun from the passiveKalparticiple ofשאל(sha-alandsha-el) “ask for,” “beg,” “request;” and the name therefore means “asked for,” or “requested,” which affords ground for Neander’s curious conjecture, above given.Of thetimeof his birth nothing is definitely known, though it is stated by some ancient authority of very doubtful character, that he was born in the second year after Christ. All that can be said with any probability, is, that he was born several years after Christ; for at the time of the stoning of Stephen, (A. D. 34,) Saul was a “youngman.”HIS TRADE.There was an ancient Jewish proverb,——often quoted with great respect in the Rabbinical writings,——“He that does not teach his son a trade, trains him to steal.” In conformity with this respectable adage, every Jewish boy, high or low, was invariably taught some mechanical trade, as an essential part of his education, without any regard to the wealth of his family, or to his prospect of an easy life, without the necessity of labor. The consequence of this was, that even the dignified teachers of the law generally conjoined the practice of some mechanical business, with the refined studies to which they devoted the most of their time, and the surnames of some of the most eminent of the Rabbins are derived from the trades which they thus followed in the intervals of study, for a livelihood or for mental relaxation. The advantages of such a variation from intense mental labor to active and steady bodily exercise, are too obvious, both as concerns the benefit of the body and the mind, to need any elucidation; but it is a happy coincidence, worth noticing, that, the better principles of what is now called “Manual Labor Instruction,” are herein fully carried out, and sanctioned by the authority and example of some of the most illustrious of those ancient Hebrew scholars, whose mighty labors in sacred lore, are still a monument of the wisdom of a plan of education, which combines bodily activity and exertion with the full development of the powers of thought. The labors of such men still remain the wonder of later days, and form in themselves, subjects for the excursive and penetrating range of some of the greatest minds of modern times, throwing more light on the minute signification and local application of scripture, than all that has been done in any other field of illustrative research.“In the education of their son, the parents of Saul thought it their duty according to the fashion of their nation, not only to train his mind in the higher pursuits of a liberal education, but also to accustom his hands to some useful trade. As we learn from Actsxviii.3, ‘he was by trade a tent-maker,’ occupying the intervals of his study-hours with that kind of work. For it is well established that this was the usual habit of the most eminent Jewish scholars, who adopted it as much for the sake of avoiding sloth and idleness, as with a view to provide for their own support. The Jews used to sum up the duties of parents in a sort of proverb, that ‘they should circumcise their son, redeem him, (Leviticus chapterxxvii.) teach him the law and atrade, and look out a wife for him.’ And indeed the importance of some business of this kind was so much felt, that a saying is recorded of one of the most eminent of their Rabbins, that ‘he who neglects to teach his son a trade, does the same as to bring him up to be a thief.’ Hence it is that the wisest Hebrews held it an honor to take their surnames from their trades; as Rabbins Nahum and Meir, thescrivenersor book writers,” (a business corresponding to that of printers in these times,) “Rabbi Johanan theshoemaker, Rabbi Juda thebaker, and Rabbi Jose thecurrierortanner. Howtrifling then is the sneer of some scoffers who have said that Paul was nothing but a stitcher of skins, and thence conclude that he was a man of the lowest class of the populace.” (Witsius§ I.¶12.)

HIS COUNTRY.Onthe farthest north-eastern part of the Mediterranean sea, where its waters are bounded by the great angle made by the meeting of the Syrian coast with the Asian, there is a peculiarity in the course of the mountain ranges, which deserves notice in a view of the countries of that region, modifying as it does, all their most prominent characteristics. The great chain of Taurus, which can be traced far eastward in the branching ranges of Singara, Masius and Niphates, running connectedly also into the distant peaks of mighty Ararat, here sends off a spur to the shore of the Mediterranean, which under the name of Mount Amanus meets its waters, just at their great north-eastern angle in the ancient gulf of Issus, now called the gulf of Scanderoon. Besides this connection with the mountain chains of Mesopotamia and Armenia on the northeast, from the south the great Syrian Lebanon, running very nearly parallel with the eastern shore of the Mediterranean, at the Issic angle, joins this common center of convergence, so insensibly losing its individual character in the Asian ridge, that by many writers, Mount Amanus itself is considered only a regular continuation of Lebanon. These, however, are as distinct as any of the chains here uniting, and the true Libanic mountains cease just at this grand natural division of Syria from the northern coast of the Mediterranean. A characteristic of the Syrian mountains is nevertheless prominent in the northern chain. They all take a general course parallel with the coast and very near it, occasionally sending out lateral ridges which mark the projections of the shore with high promontories. Of these, however, there are much fewer on the southern coast of Asia Minor; and the western ridge of Taurus, after parting from the grand angle of convergence, runs exactly parallel to the margin of the sea, in most parts about seven miles distant.The country thus fenced off by Taurus, along the southern coast of Asia Minor, is very distinctly characterized by these circumstances connected with its orography, and is in a very peculiar manner bounded and inclosed from the rest of the continent, by these natural features. The great mountain barrier of Taurus, as above described, stretches along the north, forming a mighty wall, which is at each end met at right angles by a lateral ridge, of which the eastern is Amanus, descending within a few rods of the water, while the western is the true termination of Taurus in that direction,——the mountains here making a grand curve from west to south, and stretching out into the sea, in a bold promontory, which definitely marks the farthest western limit of the long, narrow section, thus remarkably enclosed. This simple natural division, in the apostolic age, contained two principal artificial sub-divisions. On the west, was the province of Pamphylia, occupying about one fourth of the coast;——and on the east, the rest of the territory constituted the province ofCilicia, far-famed as the land of the birth of that great apostle of the Gentiles, whose life is the theme of these pages.Cilicia,——opening on the west into Pamphylia,——is elsewhere inclosed in mountain barriers, impenetrable and impassable, except in two or three points, which are the only places in which it is accessible by land, though widely exposed, on the sea, by its long open coast. Of these two adits, the most important, and the one through which the vast proportion of its commercial intercourse with the world, by land, has always been carried on, is the eastern, which is just at the oft-mentioned great angle of the Mediterranean, where the mountains descend almost to the waters of the gulf of Issus. Mount Amanus, coming from the north-east, and stretching along the eastern boundary of Cilicia an impassable barrier, here advances to the shore; but just before its base reaches the water, it abruptly terminates, leaving between the high rocks and the sea a narrow space, which is capable of being completely commanded and defended from the mountains which thus guard it; and forming the only land passage out of Cilicia to the eastern coast of the Mediterranean, it was thence anciently called “the gates of Syria.” Through these “gates,” has always passed all the traveling by land between Asia Minor and Palestine; and it is therefore an important point in the most celebrated route in apostolic history. The other main opening in the mountain walls of this region, is the passage through theTaurus, made by the course of the Sarus, the largest river of the province, which breaks through the northern ridge, in a defile that is called “the gates of Cilicia.”The boundaries of Cilicia are then,——on the north, mountainous Cappadocia, perfectly cut off by the impenetrable chain of Taurus, except the narrow pass through “the gates of Cilicia;”——on the east, equally well guarded by Mount Amanus, Northern Syria, the only land passages being through the famed “Syrian gates,” and another defile north of the coast, toward the Euphrates;——on the south, stretches the long margin of the sea, which in the western two-thirds of the coast takes the name of “the Cilician strait,” because it here flows between the mainland and the great island of Cyprus, which lies off the shore, always in sight, being less than thirty miles distant, the eastern third of the coast being bounded by the waters of the gulf of Issus;——and on the west Cilicia ends in the rough highlands of Pamphylia. The territory itself is distinguished by natural features, into two divisions,——Rocky Cilicia and “Level Cilicia,”——the former occupying the western third, and the latter the eastern part,——each district being abundantly well described by the term applied to it. Within the latter, lay the opening scenes of the apostle’s life.Thus peculiarly guarded, and shut off from the world, it might be expected that this remarkable region would nourish, on the narrow plains of its fertile shores, and the vast rough mountains of its gigantic barriers, a race strongly marked in mental, as in physical characteristics. In all parts of the world, the philosophical observer may notice a relation borne by man to the soil on which he lives, and to the air which he breathes,——hardly less striking than the dependence of the inferior orders of created things, on the material objects which surround them. Man is an animal, and his natural history displays as many curious correspondences between his varying peculiarities and the locality which he inhabits, as can be observed between the physical constitution of inferior creatures, and the similar circumstances which affect them. The inhabitants of a wild, broken region, which rises into mighty inland mountains, or sends its cliffs and vallies into a vast sea, are, in all ages and climes, characterized by a peculiar energy and quickness of mind, which often marks them in history as the prominent actors in events of the highest importance to mankind in all the world. Even the dwellers of the cities of such regions, share in that peculiar vivacity of their countrymen,which is especially imbibed in the air of the mountains; and carry through all the world, till new local influences have again subjected them, the original characteristics of the land of their birth. The restless activity and dauntless spirit of Saul, present a striking instance of this relation of scenery to character. The ever-rolling waters of the tideless sea on one side presenting a boundless view, and on the other the blue mountains rearing a mighty barrier to the vision,——the thousand streams thence rolling to the former,——the white sands of the long plains, gemmed with the green of shaded fountains, as well as the active movements of a busy population, all living under these same inspiring influences,——would each have their effect on the soul of the young Cilician as he grew up in the midst of these modifying circumstances.Along these shores, from the earliest period of Hellenic colonization, Grecian enterprise had planted its busy centers of civilization. On each favorable site, where agriculture or commerce could thrive, cities grew up in the midst of prosperous colonies, in which wealth and power in their rapid advance brought in the lights of science, art, literature, and all the refinements and elegances which Grecian colonization made the invariable accompaniments of its march,——adorning its solid triumphs with the graceful polish of all that could exalt the enjoyment of prosperity. Issus, Mopsuestia, Anchialus, Selinus and others, were among the early seats of Grecian refinement; and the more modern efforts of the Syro-Macedonian sway, had blessed Cilicia with the fruits of royal munificence, in such cities as Cragic Antioch, Seleucia the Rocky, and Arsinoe; and in still later times, the ever-active and wide-spreading beneficence of Roman dominion, had still farther multiplied the peaceful triumphs and trophies of civilization, by here raising or renewing cities, of which Baiae, Germanicia and Pompeiopolis are only a specimen. But of all these monuments of ancient or later refinement, there was none of higher antiquity or fame thanTarsus, the city where was born this illustrious apostle, whose life was so greatly instrumental in the triumphs of Christianity.Tarsusstands north of the point of a wide indentation of the coast of Cilicia, forming a very open bay, into which, a few miles south, flow the waters of the classic Cydnus, a narrow stream which runs a brief course from the barrier of Taurus, directly southward to the sea. The river’s mouth forms a spacious and convenient harbor, to which the light vessels of ancient commerceall easily found safe and ready access, though most of the floating piles in which the productions of the world are now transported, might find such a harbor altogether inaccessible to their heavier burden.Ammianus Marcellinus, the elegant historian of the decline of the Roman empire, speaks in high descriptive terms, both of the province, and the city which makes it eminent in Christian history. In narrating important events here performed during the times whose history he records, he alludes to the character of the region in a preliminary description. “After surmounting the peaks of Taurus, which towards the east rise into higher elevation, Cilicia spreads out before the observer, in far stretching areas,——a land, rich in all good things. To its right (that is the west, as the observer looks south from the summits of Taurus) is joined Isauria,——in equal degree verdant with palms and many fruits, and intersected by the navigable river Calycadnus. This, besides many towns, has two cities,——Seleucia, the work of Seleucus Nicator of Syria, and Claudiopolis, a colony founded by Claudius Caesar. Isauria however, once exceedingly powerful, has formerly been desolated for a destructive rebellion, and therefore shows but very few traces of its ancient splendor. ButCilicia, which rejoices in the river Cydnus, isennobledbyTarsus, a splendid city,——by Anazarbus, and by Mopsuestia, the dwelling-place of that Mopsus, who accompanied the Argonauts. These two provinces (Isauria or ‘Cilicia the Rocky,’ and Cilicia proper or ‘level’) being formerly connected with hordes of plunderers in a piratical war, were subjugated by the proconsul Servilius, and made tributary. And these regions, placed, as it were, on a long tongue of land, are separated from the eastern world by Mount Amanus.”

HIS COUNTRY.

Onthe farthest north-eastern part of the Mediterranean sea, where its waters are bounded by the great angle made by the meeting of the Syrian coast with the Asian, there is a peculiarity in the course of the mountain ranges, which deserves notice in a view of the countries of that region, modifying as it does, all their most prominent characteristics. The great chain of Taurus, which can be traced far eastward in the branching ranges of Singara, Masius and Niphates, running connectedly also into the distant peaks of mighty Ararat, here sends off a spur to the shore of the Mediterranean, which under the name of Mount Amanus meets its waters, just at their great north-eastern angle in the ancient gulf of Issus, now called the gulf of Scanderoon. Besides this connection with the mountain chains of Mesopotamia and Armenia on the northeast, from the south the great Syrian Lebanon, running very nearly parallel with the eastern shore of the Mediterranean, at the Issic angle, joins this common center of convergence, so insensibly losing its individual character in the Asian ridge, that by many writers, Mount Amanus itself is considered only a regular continuation of Lebanon. These, however, are as distinct as any of the chains here uniting, and the true Libanic mountains cease just at this grand natural division of Syria from the northern coast of the Mediterranean. A characteristic of the Syrian mountains is nevertheless prominent in the northern chain. They all take a general course parallel with the coast and very near it, occasionally sending out lateral ridges which mark the projections of the shore with high promontories. Of these, however, there are much fewer on the southern coast of Asia Minor; and the western ridge of Taurus, after parting from the grand angle of convergence, runs exactly parallel to the margin of the sea, in most parts about seven miles distant.The country thus fenced off by Taurus, along the southern coast of Asia Minor, is very distinctly characterized by these circumstances connected with its orography, and is in a very peculiar manner bounded and inclosed from the rest of the continent, by these natural features. The great mountain barrier of Taurus, as above described, stretches along the north, forming a mighty wall, which is at each end met at right angles by a lateral ridge, of which the eastern is Amanus, descending within a few rods of the water, while the western is the true termination of Taurus in that direction,——the mountains here making a grand curve from west to south, and stretching out into the sea, in a bold promontory, which definitely marks the farthest western limit of the long, narrow section, thus remarkably enclosed. This simple natural division, in the apostolic age, contained two principal artificial sub-divisions. On the west, was the province of Pamphylia, occupying about one fourth of the coast;——and on the east, the rest of the territory constituted the province ofCilicia, far-famed as the land of the birth of that great apostle of the Gentiles, whose life is the theme of these pages.

Cilicia,——opening on the west into Pamphylia,——is elsewhere inclosed in mountain barriers, impenetrable and impassable, except in two or three points, which are the only places in which it is accessible by land, though widely exposed, on the sea, by its long open coast. Of these two adits, the most important, and the one through which the vast proportion of its commercial intercourse with the world, by land, has always been carried on, is the eastern, which is just at the oft-mentioned great angle of the Mediterranean, where the mountains descend almost to the waters of the gulf of Issus. Mount Amanus, coming from the north-east, and stretching along the eastern boundary of Cilicia an impassable barrier, here advances to the shore; but just before its base reaches the water, it abruptly terminates, leaving between the high rocks and the sea a narrow space, which is capable of being completely commanded and defended from the mountains which thus guard it; and forming the only land passage out of Cilicia to the eastern coast of the Mediterranean, it was thence anciently called “the gates of Syria.” Through these “gates,” has always passed all the traveling by land between Asia Minor and Palestine; and it is therefore an important point in the most celebrated route in apostolic history. The other main opening in the mountain walls of this region, is the passage through theTaurus, made by the course of the Sarus, the largest river of the province, which breaks through the northern ridge, in a defile that is called “the gates of Cilicia.”

The boundaries of Cilicia are then,——on the north, mountainous Cappadocia, perfectly cut off by the impenetrable chain of Taurus, except the narrow pass through “the gates of Cilicia;”——on the east, equally well guarded by Mount Amanus, Northern Syria, the only land passages being through the famed “Syrian gates,” and another defile north of the coast, toward the Euphrates;——on the south, stretches the long margin of the sea, which in the western two-thirds of the coast takes the name of “the Cilician strait,” because it here flows between the mainland and the great island of Cyprus, which lies off the shore, always in sight, being less than thirty miles distant, the eastern third of the coast being bounded by the waters of the gulf of Issus;——and on the west Cilicia ends in the rough highlands of Pamphylia. The territory itself is distinguished by natural features, into two divisions,——Rocky Cilicia and “Level Cilicia,”——the former occupying the western third, and the latter the eastern part,——each district being abundantly well described by the term applied to it. Within the latter, lay the opening scenes of the apostle’s life.

Thus peculiarly guarded, and shut off from the world, it might be expected that this remarkable region would nourish, on the narrow plains of its fertile shores, and the vast rough mountains of its gigantic barriers, a race strongly marked in mental, as in physical characteristics. In all parts of the world, the philosophical observer may notice a relation borne by man to the soil on which he lives, and to the air which he breathes,——hardly less striking than the dependence of the inferior orders of created things, on the material objects which surround them. Man is an animal, and his natural history displays as many curious correspondences between his varying peculiarities and the locality which he inhabits, as can be observed between the physical constitution of inferior creatures, and the similar circumstances which affect them. The inhabitants of a wild, broken region, which rises into mighty inland mountains, or sends its cliffs and vallies into a vast sea, are, in all ages and climes, characterized by a peculiar energy and quickness of mind, which often marks them in history as the prominent actors in events of the highest importance to mankind in all the world. Even the dwellers of the cities of such regions, share in that peculiar vivacity of their countrymen,which is especially imbibed in the air of the mountains; and carry through all the world, till new local influences have again subjected them, the original characteristics of the land of their birth. The restless activity and dauntless spirit of Saul, present a striking instance of this relation of scenery to character. The ever-rolling waters of the tideless sea on one side presenting a boundless view, and on the other the blue mountains rearing a mighty barrier to the vision,——the thousand streams thence rolling to the former,——the white sands of the long plains, gemmed with the green of shaded fountains, as well as the active movements of a busy population, all living under these same inspiring influences,——would each have their effect on the soul of the young Cilician as he grew up in the midst of these modifying circumstances.

Along these shores, from the earliest period of Hellenic colonization, Grecian enterprise had planted its busy centers of civilization. On each favorable site, where agriculture or commerce could thrive, cities grew up in the midst of prosperous colonies, in which wealth and power in their rapid advance brought in the lights of science, art, literature, and all the refinements and elegances which Grecian colonization made the invariable accompaniments of its march,——adorning its solid triumphs with the graceful polish of all that could exalt the enjoyment of prosperity. Issus, Mopsuestia, Anchialus, Selinus and others, were among the early seats of Grecian refinement; and the more modern efforts of the Syro-Macedonian sway, had blessed Cilicia with the fruits of royal munificence, in such cities as Cragic Antioch, Seleucia the Rocky, and Arsinoe; and in still later times, the ever-active and wide-spreading beneficence of Roman dominion, had still farther multiplied the peaceful triumphs and trophies of civilization, by here raising or renewing cities, of which Baiae, Germanicia and Pompeiopolis are only a specimen. But of all these monuments of ancient or later refinement, there was none of higher antiquity or fame thanTarsus, the city where was born this illustrious apostle, whose life was so greatly instrumental in the triumphs of Christianity.

Tarsusstands north of the point of a wide indentation of the coast of Cilicia, forming a very open bay, into which, a few miles south, flow the waters of the classic Cydnus, a narrow stream which runs a brief course from the barrier of Taurus, directly southward to the sea. The river’s mouth forms a spacious and convenient harbor, to which the light vessels of ancient commerceall easily found safe and ready access, though most of the floating piles in which the productions of the world are now transported, might find such a harbor altogether inaccessible to their heavier burden.

Ammianus Marcellinus, the elegant historian of the decline of the Roman empire, speaks in high descriptive terms, both of the province, and the city which makes it eminent in Christian history. In narrating important events here performed during the times whose history he records, he alludes to the character of the region in a preliminary description. “After surmounting the peaks of Taurus, which towards the east rise into higher elevation, Cilicia spreads out before the observer, in far stretching areas,——a land, rich in all good things. To its right (that is the west, as the observer looks south from the summits of Taurus) is joined Isauria,——in equal degree verdant with palms and many fruits, and intersected by the navigable river Calycadnus. This, besides many towns, has two cities,——Seleucia, the work of Seleucus Nicator of Syria, and Claudiopolis, a colony founded by Claudius Caesar. Isauria however, once exceedingly powerful, has formerly been desolated for a destructive rebellion, and therefore shows but very few traces of its ancient splendor. ButCilicia, which rejoices in the river Cydnus, isennobledbyTarsus, a splendid city,——by Anazarbus, and by Mopsuestia, the dwelling-place of that Mopsus, who accompanied the Argonauts. These two provinces (Isauria or ‘Cilicia the Rocky,’ and Cilicia proper or ‘level’) being formerly connected with hordes of plunderers in a piratical war, were subjugated by the proconsul Servilius, and made tributary. And these regions, placed, as it were, on a long tongue of land, are separated from the eastern world by Mount Amanus.”

This account by Ammianus Marcellinus is found in bookXIV.of his history, (p.19, edited by Vales.)

The native land of Saul was classic ground. Within the limits of Cilicia, were laid the scenes of some of the most splendid passages in early Grecian fable; and here too, were acted some of the grandest events in authentic history, both Greek and Roman. The very city of his birth, Tarsus, is said to have been founded by Perseus, the son of Jupiter and Danae, famed for his exploit at another place on the shore of this part of the Mediterranean. More authentic history however, refers its earliest foundation to Sardanapalus, king of Assyria, who built Tarsus and Anchialus in Cilicia, nine hundred years before Christ. Its origin is by others ascribedto Triptolemus with an Argive colony, who is represented on some medals as the founder. These two stories may be made consistent with each other, on the supposition that the same place was successively the scene of the civilizing influence of each of these attributed founders. So too, may be taken, the legend which Ammianus Marcellinus records and approves,——that it was founded by Sandan, a wealthy and eminent person from Ethiopia, who at some early period not specified, is said to have built Tarsus. It was however, at the earliest period that is definitely mentioned, subject to the Assyrian empire; and afterwards fell under the dominion of each of the sovranties which succeeded it, passing into the hands of the Persian and of Alexander, as each in turn assumed the lordship of the eastern world. While under the Persian sway, it is commemorated by Xenophon as having been honored by the presence of the younger Cyrus, when on his march through Asia to wrest the empire from his brother. On this occasion, he entered this region through the northern “gates of Cilicia,” and passed out through the “gates of Syria,” a passage which is, in connection with this event, very minutely described by the elegant historian of that famous expedition.

The native land of Saul was classic ground. Within the limits of Cilicia, were laid the scenes of some of the most splendid passages in early Grecian fable; and here too, were acted some of the grandest events in authentic history, both Greek and Roman. The very city of his birth, Tarsus, is said to have been founded by Perseus, the son of Jupiter and Danae, famed for his exploit at another place on the shore of this part of the Mediterranean. More authentic history however, refers its earliest foundation to Sardanapalus, king of Assyria, who built Tarsus and Anchialus in Cilicia, nine hundred years before Christ. Its origin is by others ascribedto Triptolemus with an Argive colony, who is represented on some medals as the founder. These two stories may be made consistent with each other, on the supposition that the same place was successively the scene of the civilizing influence of each of these attributed founders. So too, may be taken, the legend which Ammianus Marcellinus records and approves,——that it was founded by Sandan, a wealthy and eminent person from Ethiopia, who at some early period not specified, is said to have built Tarsus. It was however, at the earliest period that is definitely mentioned, subject to the Assyrian empire; and afterwards fell under the dominion of each of the sovranties which succeeded it, passing into the hands of the Persian and of Alexander, as each in turn assumed the lordship of the eastern world. While under the Persian sway, it is commemorated by Xenophon as having been honored by the presence of the younger Cyrus, when on his march through Asia to wrest the empire from his brother. On this occasion, he entered this region through the northern “gates of Cilicia,” and passed out through the “gates of Syria,” a passage which is, in connection with this event, very minutely described by the elegant historian of that famous expedition.

Sardanapalus.——The fact of the foundation both of Tarsus and Anchialus by this splendid but unfortunately extravagant monarch, the last of his line, is commemorated by Arrian, who refers to the high authority of an inscription which records the event.

“Anchialus is said to have been founded by the king of Assyria, Sardanapalus. The fortifications, in their magnitude and extent, still, in Arrian’s time, bore the character of greatness, which the Assyrians appear singularly to have affected in works of the kind. A monument, representing Sardanapalus, was found there, warranted by an inscription in Assyrian characters, of course in the old Assyrian language, which the Greeks, whether well or ill, interpreted thus: ‘Sardanapalus, son of Anacyndaraxes, in one day founded Anchialus and Tarsus. Eat, drink, play: all other human joys are not worth a fillip.’ Supposing this version nearly exact, (for Arrian says it was not quite so,) whether the purpose has not been to invite to civil order a people disposed to turbulence, rather than to recommend immoderate luxury, may perhaps reasonably be questioned. What, indeed, could be the object of a king of Assyria in founding such towns in a country so distant from his capital, and so divided from it by an immense extent of sandy desert and lofty mountains, and, still more, how the inhabitants could be at once in circumstances to abandon themselves to the intemperate joys which their prince has been supposed to have recommended, is not obvious; but it may deserve observation that, in that line of coast, the southern of Lesser Asia, ruins of cities, evidently of an age after Alexander, yet barely named in history, at this day astonish the adventurous traveler by their magnificence and elegance.” (Mitford’s Greece,Vol. IX.pp.311, 312.)

Over the same route passed the conquering armies of the great Alexander. At Issus, within the boundaries of Cilicia, he met, in their mightiest array, the vast hosts of Darius, whom here vanquishing, he thus decided the destiny of the world. Before this great battle, halting to repose at Tarsus, he almost met his death,by imprudently bathing in the classic Cydnus, whose waters were famed for their extreme coldness. By a remarkable coincidence, the next conqueror of the world, Julius Caesar, also rested at Tarsus for some days before his great triumphs in Asia Minor. Cilicia had in the interval between these two visits passed from the Macedonian to the Roman dominion, being made a Roman province by Pompey, about sixty years before Christ, at the time when all the kingdoms of Asia and Syria were subjugated. After this it was visited by Cicero, at the time of his triumphs over the cities of eastern Cilicia; and its classic stream is still farther celebrated in immortal verse and prose, as the scene where Marcus Antony met Cleopatra for the first time. It was the Cydnus, down which she sailed in her splendid galley, to meet the conqueror, who for her afterwards lost the empire of the world. During all the civil wars which desolated the Roman empire through a long course of years in that age, Tarsus steadily adhered to the house of Caesar, first to the great Julius and afterwards to Augustus. So remarkable was its attachment and devotion to the cause of Julius, that when the assassin Cassius marched through Asia into Syria to secure the dominion of the eastern world, he laid siege to Tarsus, and having taken it, laid it waste with the most destructive vengeance for its adherence to the fortunes of his murdered lord; and such were its sufferings under these and subsequent calamities in the same cause, that when Augustus was at last established in the undivided empire of the world, he felt himself bound in honor and gratitude, to bestow on the faithful citizens of Tarsus the most remarkable favors. The city, having at the request of its inhabitants received the new name ofJuliopolis, as a testimony of their devotion to the memory of their murdered patron, was lavishly honored with almost every privilege which the imperial Augustus could bestow on these most faithful adherents of his family. From the terms in which his acts of generosity to them are recorded, it has been inferred,——though not therein positively stated,——that he conferred on it the rank and title of a Roman colony, or free city, which must have given all its inhabitants the exalted privileges ofRoman citizens. This assertion has been disputed however, and forms one of the most interesting topics in the life of the great apostle, involving the inquiry as to the mode in which he obtained that inviolable privilege, which, on more than one occasion, snatched him from the clutches of tyrannical persecutors. Whether he held this privilege in common with all thecitizens of Tarsus, or inherited it as a peculiar honor of his own family, is a question yet to be decided. But whatever may have been the precise extent of the municipal favors enjoyed by Tarsus, it is certain that it was an object of peculiar favor to the imperial Caesars during a long succession of years, not only before but after the apostle’s time, being crowned with repeated acts of munificence by Augustus, Adrian, Caracalla and Heliogabalus, so that through many centuries it was the most favored city in the eastern division of the Roman empire.

Over the same route passed the conquering armies of the great Alexander. At Issus, within the boundaries of Cilicia, he met, in their mightiest array, the vast hosts of Darius, whom here vanquishing, he thus decided the destiny of the world. Before this great battle, halting to repose at Tarsus, he almost met his death,by imprudently bathing in the classic Cydnus, whose waters were famed for their extreme coldness. By a remarkable coincidence, the next conqueror of the world, Julius Caesar, also rested at Tarsus for some days before his great triumphs in Asia Minor. Cilicia had in the interval between these two visits passed from the Macedonian to the Roman dominion, being made a Roman province by Pompey, about sixty years before Christ, at the time when all the kingdoms of Asia and Syria were subjugated. After this it was visited by Cicero, at the time of his triumphs over the cities of eastern Cilicia; and its classic stream is still farther celebrated in immortal verse and prose, as the scene where Marcus Antony met Cleopatra for the first time. It was the Cydnus, down which she sailed in her splendid galley, to meet the conqueror, who for her afterwards lost the empire of the world. During all the civil wars which desolated the Roman empire through a long course of years in that age, Tarsus steadily adhered to the house of Caesar, first to the great Julius and afterwards to Augustus. So remarkable was its attachment and devotion to the cause of Julius, that when the assassin Cassius marched through Asia into Syria to secure the dominion of the eastern world, he laid siege to Tarsus, and having taken it, laid it waste with the most destructive vengeance for its adherence to the fortunes of his murdered lord; and such were its sufferings under these and subsequent calamities in the same cause, that when Augustus was at last established in the undivided empire of the world, he felt himself bound in honor and gratitude, to bestow on the faithful citizens of Tarsus the most remarkable favors. The city, having at the request of its inhabitants received the new name ofJuliopolis, as a testimony of their devotion to the memory of their murdered patron, was lavishly honored with almost every privilege which the imperial Augustus could bestow on these most faithful adherents of his family. From the terms in which his acts of generosity to them are recorded, it has been inferred,——though not therein positively stated,——that he conferred on it the rank and title of a Roman colony, or free city, which must have given all its inhabitants the exalted privileges ofRoman citizens. This assertion has been disputed however, and forms one of the most interesting topics in the life of the great apostle, involving the inquiry as to the mode in which he obtained that inviolable privilege, which, on more than one occasion, snatched him from the clutches of tyrannical persecutors. Whether he held this privilege in common with all thecitizens of Tarsus, or inherited it as a peculiar honor of his own family, is a question yet to be decided. But whatever may have been the precise extent of the municipal favors enjoyed by Tarsus, it is certain that it was an object of peculiar favor to the imperial Caesars during a long succession of years, not only before but after the apostle’s time, being crowned with repeated acts of munificence by Augustus, Adrian, Caracalla and Heliogabalus, so that through many centuries it was the most favored city in the eastern division of the Roman empire.

The history of Cilicia since the apostolic age, is briefly this: It remained attached to the eastern division of the Roman empire, until about A. D. 800, when it first fell under the Muhammedan sway, being made part of the dominion of the Califs by Haroun Al Rashid. In the thirteenth century it reverted to a Christian government, constituting a province of the Armenian kingdom of Leo. About A. D. 1400, it fell under the sway of BajazetII., Sultan of the Ottoman empire, and is at present included in that empire,——most of it in a single Turkish pashalic, under the name of Adana.

Roman citizens.——Witsius very fully discusses this point, as follows. (Witsiuson the Life of Paul§1.¶ V.)

“It is remarkable that though he was of Tarsus, he should say that he was aRomancitizen, and that too by the right ofbirth: Actsxxii.28. There has been some discussion whether he enjoyed that privilege in common with all the Tarsans, or whether it was peculiar to his family. Most interpreters firmly hold the former opinion. Beza remarks, ‘that he calls himself a Roman, not by country, but by right of citizenship; since Tarsus had the privileges of a Roman colony.’ He adds, ‘Mark Antony, the triumvir, presented the Tarsans with the rights of citizens of Rome.’ Others, without number, bear the same testimony. Baronius goes still farther,——contending that ‘Tarsus obtained from the Romans, themunicipalright,’ that is, the privileges of free-born citizens of Rome; understanding Paul’s expression in Actsxxi.39, to mean that he was amunicepsof Tarsus, or a Tarsan with the freedom of the city of Rome. Now themunicipaltowns, or free cities, had rights superior to those of mere colonies; for thefree-citizenswere not only called Roman citizens as thecolonistswere, but also, as Ulpian records, could share in all the honors and offices of Rome. Moreover, thecolonieshad to live under the laws of the Romans, while the municipal towns were allowed to act according their own ancient laws, and country usages. To account for the distinction enjoyed by Tarsus, in being called a ‘municipiumof Romans,’ the citizens are said to have merited that honor, for having in the civil wars attached themselves first to Julius Caesar, and afterwards to Octavius, in whose cause they suffered much. For so attached was this city to the side of Caesar, that, as Dion Cassius records, their asked to have their name changed from Tarsus toJuliopolis, in memory of Julius and in token of good will to Augustus; and for that reason they were presented with the rights of a colony or amunicipium, and this general opinion is strengthened by the high testimony of Pliny and Appian. On the other hand Heinsius and Grotius strongly urge that these things have been too hastily asserted by the learned; for scarcely a passage can be found in the ancient writers, where Tarsus is called a colony, or even amunicipium. ‘And how could it be a colony,’ asks Heinsius, ‘when writers on Roman law acknowledge but two in Cilicia? Ulpian (Liber I.De censibus) says of the Roman colonies in Asia Minor, “there is in Bithynia the colony of Apamea,——in Pontus, Sinope,——in Cilicia there are Selinus and Trajanopolis.” But why does he pass over Tarsus or Juliopolis, if that had place among them?’ Baronius proves it to have been amunicipium, only from the Latin version of Acts, where that word is used; though the term in the original Greek (πολιτης) means nothing more than the common word, citizen, (as it is rendered in the English version.) Pliny also calls Tarsus not a colony, nor amunicipium, but a free city. (libera urbs.) BookV.chap xxvii.Appian in the first book of the civil wars, says that Antony granted to the Tarsansfreedom, but says nothing of the rights of amunicipium, or colony. Wherefore Grotius thinks that the only point established is, that some one of the ancestors of Paul, in the civil wars between AugustusCaesar, and Brutus and Cassius, and perhaps those between this Caesar and Antony, received the grant of the privileges of a Roman citizen. Whence he concludes that Paul must have been of an opulent family. These opinions of Grotius have received the approval of other eminent commentators. These notions however, must be rejected as unsatisfactory; because, though some writers have but slightly alluded to Tarsus as afree city, yet Dio Chrysostom, (in Tarsica posteriore,) has enlarged upon it in a tone of high declamation. ‘Yours, men of Tarsus, was the fortune to be first in this nation,——not only because you dwell in the greatest city of Cilicia, and one which was a metropolis from the beginning,——but also because the second Caesar was remarkably well-disposed and gracious towards you. For, the misfortunes which befell the city in his cause, deservedly secured to you his kind regard, and led him to make his benefits to you as conspicuous as the calamities brought upon you for his sake. Therefore did Augustus confer on you everything that a man could on friends and companions, with a view to outdo those who had shown him so great good-will,——your land, laws, honors, the right of the river and of the neighboring sea.’ On which words Heinsius observes in comment, that bylandis doubtless meant that he secured to them their own territory, free and undisturbed. Bylawsare meant such as relate to the liberty usually granted to free towns.Honorplainly refers to the right of citizenship, as the most exalted he could offer. The point then seems to be established, if this interpretation holds good, and it is evidently a rational one. For when he had made up his mind to grant high favors to a city, in return for such great merits, why, when it was in his power, should Augustus fail to grant it the rights of Roman citizenship, which certainly had been often granted to other cities on much slighter grounds? It would be strange indeed, if among the exalted honors which Dio proclaims, that should not have been included. This appears to be the drift, not only of Dio’s remarks, but also of Paul’s, who offers no other proof of his being a Roman citizen, than that he was a Tarsan, and says nothing of it as a special immunity of his own family, although some such explanation would otherwise have been necessary to gain credit to his assertion. Whence it is concluded that it would be rash to pretend, contrary to all historical testimony, any peculiar merits of the ancestors of Paul, towards the Romans, which caused so great an honor to be conferred on aJewishfamily.”

But from all these ample and grandiloquent statements of Dio Chrysostom, it by no means follows that Tarsus had the privilege of Roman citizenship; and the conclusion of the learned Witsius seems highly illogical. The very fact, that while Dio was panegyrizing Tarsus in these high terms, and recounting all the favors which imperial beneficence had showered upon it, he yet didnotmention among these minutiae, the privilege of citizenship, is quite conclusive against this view; for he would not, when thus seeking for all the particulars of its eminence, have omitted the greatest honor and advantage which could be conferred on any city by a Roman emperor, nor have left it vaguely to be inferred. Besides, there are passages in the Acts of the Apostles which seem to be opposed to the view, that Tarsus was thus privileged. In Actsxxi.39, Paul is represented as distinctly stating to the tribune, that he was “acitizenof Tarsus;” yet inxxii.24, 25, it is said, that the tribune was about proceeding, without scruple, to punish Paul with stripes, and was very much surprised indeed, to learn that he was a Roman citizen, and evidently had no idea that a citizen of Tarsus was, as a matter of course, endowed with Roman citizenship;——a fact, however, with which a high Roman officer must have been acquainted, for there were few cities thus privileged, and Tarsus was a very eminent city in a province adjoining Palestine, and not far from the capital of Judea. And the subsequent passages ofchap. xxii.represent him as very slow indeed to believe it, after Paul’s distinct assertion.

Hemsen is very clear and satisfactory on this point, and presents the argument in a fair light. See his note in his “Apostel Paulus” onpp.1, 2. He refers also to a work not otherwise known here;——John Ortwin Westenberg’s “Dissert. de jurisp. Paul. Apost.” Kuinoel in Act. Apost.xvi.37. discusses the question of citizenship.

“It ought not to seem very strange, that the ancestors of Paul should have settled in Cilicia, rather than in the land of Israel. For although Cyrus gave the whole people of God an opportunity of returning to their own country, yet many from each tribe preferred the new country, in which they had been born and bred, to the old one, of which they had lost the remembrance. Hence an immense multitude of Jews might be found in almost all the dominions of the Persians, Greeks, Romans and Parthians; as alluded to in Actsii.9, 10. But there were also other occasions andcauses for the dispersion of the Jews. Ptolemy, the Macedonian king of Egypt, having taken Jerusalem from the Syro-Macedonians, led away many from the hill-country of Judea, from Samaria and Mount Gerizim, into Egypt, where he made them settle; and after he had given them at Alexandria the rights of citizens in equal privilege with the Macedonians, not a few of the rest, of their own accord, moved into Egypt, allured partly by the richness of the land, and partly by the good will that Ptolemy had shown towards their nation. Afterwards, Antiochus the Great, the Macedonian king of Syria, about the thirtieth year of his reign, two hundred years before the Christian era, brought out two thousand Jewish families from Babylonia, whom he sent into Phrygia and Lydia with the most ample privileges, that they might hold to their duty the minds of the Greeks, who were then inclining to revolt from his sway. These were from Asia Minor, spread abroad over the surrounding countries, between the Mediterranean sea, the Euphrates and Mount Amanus, on the frontiers of Cilicia. Besides, others afterwards, to escape the cruelty of Antiochus Epiphanes, betook themselves to foreign lands, where, finding themselves well settled, they and their descendants remained. Moreover, many, as Philo testifies, for the sake of trade, or other advantages, of their own accord left the land of Israel for foreign countries: whence almost the whole world was filled with colonies of Jews, as we see in the directions of some of the general epistles, (Jamesi.1: 1 Peteri.1.) Thus also Tarsus had its share of Jewish inhabitants, among whom were the family of Paul.” (Witsius in Vita Pauli,§1.¶ v.)

Nor were the solid honors of this great Asian city, limited to the mere favors of imperial patronage. Founded, or early enlarged by the colonial enterprise of the most refined people of ancient times, Tarsus, from its first beginning, shared in the glories of Helleno-Asian civilization, under which philosophy, art, taste, commerce, and warlike power attained in these colonies a highth before unequalled, while Greece, the mother country, was still far back in the march of improvement. In the Asian colonies arose the first schools of philosophy, and there is hardly a city on the eastern coast of the Aegean, but is consecrated by some glorious association with the name of some Father of Grecian science. Thales, Anaxagoras, Anaximander, and many others of the earliest philosophers, all flourished in these Asian colonies; and on the Mediterranean coast, within Cilicia itself, were the home and schools of Aratus and the stoic Chrysippus. The city of Tarsus is commemorated by Strabo as having in very early times attained great eminence in philosophy and in all sorts of learning, so that “in science and art it surpassed the fame even of Athens and Alexandria; and the citizens of Tarsus themselves were distinguished for individual excellence in these elevated pursuits. So great was the zeal of the men of that place for philosophy, and for the rest of the circle of sciences, that they excelled both Athens and Alexandria, and every other place which can be mentioned, where there are schools and lectures of philosophers.” Not borrowing the philosophic glory of their city merely from the numbers of strangers who resorted thither to enjoy the advantages of instruction there afforded, as is almost universally the case in all thegreat seats of modern learning; but entering themselves with zeal and enjoyment into their schools of science, they made the name ofTarsusfamous throughout the civilized world, for the cultivation of knowledge and taste. Even to this day the stranger pauses with admiration among the still splendid ruins of this ancient city, and finds in her arches, columns and walls, and in her chance-buried medals, the solid testimonies of her early glories in art, taste and wealth. Well then might the great apostle recur with patriotic pride to the glories of the city where he was born and educated, challenging the regard of his military hearers for his native place, by the sententious allusion to it, as “NO MEAN CITY.”

Nor were the solid honors of this great Asian city, limited to the mere favors of imperial patronage. Founded, or early enlarged by the colonial enterprise of the most refined people of ancient times, Tarsus, from its first beginning, shared in the glories of Helleno-Asian civilization, under which philosophy, art, taste, commerce, and warlike power attained in these colonies a highth before unequalled, while Greece, the mother country, was still far back in the march of improvement. In the Asian colonies arose the first schools of philosophy, and there is hardly a city on the eastern coast of the Aegean, but is consecrated by some glorious association with the name of some Father of Grecian science. Thales, Anaxagoras, Anaximander, and many others of the earliest philosophers, all flourished in these Asian colonies; and on the Mediterranean coast, within Cilicia itself, were the home and schools of Aratus and the stoic Chrysippus. The city of Tarsus is commemorated by Strabo as having in very early times attained great eminence in philosophy and in all sorts of learning, so that “in science and art it surpassed the fame even of Athens and Alexandria; and the citizens of Tarsus themselves were distinguished for individual excellence in these elevated pursuits. So great was the zeal of the men of that place for philosophy, and for the rest of the circle of sciences, that they excelled both Athens and Alexandria, and every other place which can be mentioned, where there are schools and lectures of philosophers.” Not borrowing the philosophic glory of their city merely from the numbers of strangers who resorted thither to enjoy the advantages of instruction there afforded, as is almost universally the case in all thegreat seats of modern learning; but entering themselves with zeal and enjoyment into their schools of science, they made the name ofTarsusfamous throughout the civilized world, for the cultivation of knowledge and taste. Even to this day the stranger pauses with admiration among the still splendid ruins of this ancient city, and finds in her arches, columns and walls, and in her chance-buried medals, the solid testimonies of her early glories in art, taste and wealth. Well then might the great apostle recur with patriotic pride to the glories of the city where he was born and educated, challenging the regard of his military hearers for his native place, by the sententious allusion to it, as “NO MEAN CITY.”

“It appears on the testimony of Paul, (Actsxxi.39,) that Tarsus was a city of no little note, and it is described by other writers as the most illustrious city of all Cilicia; so much so indeed, that the Tarsans traced their origin to Ionians and Argives, and a rank superior even to these;——referring their antiquity of origin not merely to heroes, but even to demi-gods. It was truly exalted, not only by its antiquity, situation, population and thriving trade, but by the nobler pursuits of science and literature, which so flourished there, that according to Strabo it was worthy to be ranked with Athens and Alexandria; and we know that Rome itself owed its most celebrated professors to Tarsus.” (Witsius.§1,¶ iv.)

The testimony of Strabo is found in his Geography, bookXIV.Cellarius (Geog. Ant.) is very full on the geography of Cilicia, and may be advantageously consulted. Conder’s Modern Traveler (Syria and Asia Minor 2.) gives a very full account of its ancient history, its present condition, and its topography.

The present appearance of this ancient city must be a matter of great interest to the reader of apostolic history; and it can not be more clearly given than in the simple narrative of the enterprising Burckhardt, who wrote his journal on the very spot which he describes. (Life of Burckhardt, prefixed to his travels in Nubia,pp. xv. xvi.)

“The road from our anchoring place to Tarsus crosses the above-mentioned plain in an easterly direction: we passed several small rivulets which empty themselves into the sea, and which, to judge from the size of their beds, swell in the rainy season to considerable torrents. We had rode about an hour, when I saw at half an hour’s distance to the north of our route, the ruins of a large castle, upon a hill of a regular shape in the plain; half an hour further towards Tarsus, at an equal distance from our road, upon a second tumulus, were ruins resembling the former; a third insulated hillock, close to which we passed midway of our route, was over-grown with grass, without any ruins or traces of them. I did not see in the whole plain any other elevations of ground but the three just mentioned. Not far from the first ruins, stands in the plain an insulated column. Large groups of trees show from afar the site of Tarsus. We passed a small river before we entered the town, larger than those we had met on the road. The western outer gate of the town, through which we entered, is of ancient structure; it is a fine arch, the interior vault of which is in perfect preservation: on the outside are some remains of a sculptured frieze. I did not see any inscriptions. To the right and left of this gateway are seen the ancient ruined walls of the city, which extended in this direction farther than the town at present does. From the outer gateway, it is about four hundred paces to the modern entrance of the city; the intermediate ground is filled up by a burying ground on one side of the road, and several gardens with some miserable huts on the other. * * * * The little I saw of Tarsus did not allow me to estimate its extent; the streets through which I passed were all built of wood, and badly; some well furnished bazars, and a large and handsome mosque in the vicinity of the Khan, make up the whole register of curiosities which I am able to relate of Tarsus. Upon several maps Tarsus is marked as a sea town: this is incorrect; the sea is above three miles distant from it. On our return home, we started in a south-west direction, andpassed, after two hours and a half’s march, Casal, a large village, half a mile distant from the sea-shore, called the Port of Tarsus, because vessels freighted for Tarsus usually come to anchor in its neighborhood. From thence turning towards the west, we arrived at our ship at the end of two hours. The merchants of Tarsus trade principally with the Syrian coast and Cyprus: imperial ships arrive there from time to time, to load grain. The land trade is of very little consequence, as the caravans from Smyrna arrive very seldom. There is no land communication at all between Tarsus and Aleppo, which is at ten journeys (caravan traveling) distant from it. The road has been rendered unsafe, especially in later times, by the depredations of Kutshuk Ali, a savage rebel, who has established himself in the mountains to the north of Alexandretta. Tarsus is governed by an Aga, who I have reason to believe is almost independent. The French have an agent there, who is a rich Greek merchant.”

A fine instance of the value of the testimony of the Fathers on points where knowledge of the Scriptures is involved, is found in the story by Jerome, who says that “Paul was born at Gischali, a city of Judea,” (in Galilee,) “and that while he was a child, his parents, in the time of the laying waste of their country by the Romans, removed to Tarsus, in Cilicia.” And yet this most learned of the Fathers, the translator of the whole Bible into Latin, did not know, it seems, that Paul himself most distinctly states in his speech to the Jewish mob, (Actsxxii.3,) that he was “bornin Cilicia,” as the common translation has it;——in Greek,γεγενημενος εν Κιλικια,——words which so far from allowing any such assertion as Jerome makes, even imply that Paul, with Tristram Shandy-like particularity, would specify that he was “begottenin Cilicia.” Jerome’s ridiculous blunder, Witsius, after exposing its inconsistency with Jewish history, indignantly condemns, as “a most shameful falsehood,” (putidissimafabula,) which is as hard a name as has been applied to anything in this book.

But if this blunder is so shameful in Jerome, what shall be said of the learned Fabricius, who (Bibliotheca Graeca,IV.p.795,) copies this story from Jerome as authentic history, without a note of comment, and without being aware that it most positively contradicts the direct assertion of Paul? And this blunder too is passed over by all the great critical commentators of Fabricius, in Harles’s great edition. Keil, Kuinoel, Harles, Gurlitt, and others equally great, who revised all this, are involved in the discredit of the blunder. “Non omnes omnia.”

HIS GRECIAN LEARNING.In this splendid seat of knowledge, Saul was born of purely Jewish parents. “A Hebrew of the Hebrews,” he enjoyed from his earliest infancy that minute religious instruction, which every Israelite was in conscience bound to give his children; and with a minuteness and attention so much the more careful, as a residence in a foreign land, far away from the consecrated soil of Palestine and the Holy city of his faith, might increase the liabilities of his children to forget or neglect a religion of which they saw so few visible tokens around them, to keep alive their devotion. Yet, though thus strictly educated in the religion of his fathers, Saul was by no means cut off by this circumstance from the enjoyment of many of the advantages in profaner knowledge, afforded in such an eminent degree by Tarsus; but must, almost without an effort, have daily imbibed into his ready and ever active mind, much of the refining influence of Grecian philosophy. There is no proof, indeed, that he ever formally entered the schools of heathen science; such a supposition, is, perhaps, inconsistentwith the idea of his principles of rigid Judaism, and is rendered rather improbable by the great want of Grecian elegance and accuracy in his writings; which are so decidedly characterized by an unrhetorical style, and by irregular logic, that they never could have been the production of a scholar, in the most eminent philosophical institutions of Asia. But a mere birth and residence in such a city, and the incidental but constant familiarity with those so absorbed in these pursuits, as very many of his fellow-citizens were, would have the unavoidable effect of familiarizing him also with the great subjects of conversation, and the grand objects of pursuit, so as ever after to prove an advantage to him in his intercourse with the refined and educated among the Greeks and Romans. The knowledge thus acquired, too, is ever found to be of the most readily available kind, always suggesting itself upon occasions when needed, according to the simple principle of association, and thus more easily applied to ordinary use than that which is more regularly attained, and is arranged in the mind only according to formal systems. Thus was it, with most evident wisdom, ordained by God, that in this great seat of heathen learning, that apostle should be born, who was to be the first messenger of grace to the Grecian world, and whose words of warning, even Rome should one day hear and believe.HIS FAMILY AND BIRTH.The parents of Saul were Jews, and his father at least, was of the tribe of Benjamin. In some of those numerous emigrations from Judea which took place either by compulsion or by the voluntary enterprise of the people, at various times after the Assyrian conquest, the ancestors of Saul had left their father-land, for the fertile plains of Cilicia, where, under the patronizing government of some of the Syro-Macedonian kings, they found a much more profitable home than in the comparatively uncommercial land of Israel. On some one of these occasions, probably during the emigration under Antiochus the Great, the ancestors of Saul had settled in Tarsus, and during the period intervening between this emigration and the birth of Saul, the family seems to have maintained or acquired a very respectable rank, and some property. From the distinct information which we have that Saul was a free-bornRoman citizen, it is manifest that his parents must also have possessed that right; for it has already been abundantly shown that it was not common to the citizens of Tarsus, but must have been a peculiar privilege of his family. After the subjugationof Cilicia, (sixty-two years before Christ,) when the province passed from the Syrian to the Roman sway, the family were in some way brought under the favorable notice of the new lords of the eastern world, and were honored with the high privilege of Roman citizenship, an honor which could not have been imparted to any one low either in birth or wealth. The precise nature of the service performed by them, that produced such a magnificent reward, it is impossible to determine; but that this must have been the reason, it is very natural to suppose. But whatever may have been the extent of the favors enjoyed by the parents of Saul, from the kindness of their heathen rulers, they were not thereby led to neglect the institutions of their fathers,——but even in a strange land, observed the Mosaic law with peculiar strictness; for Saul himself plainly asserts that his father was a Pharisee, and therefore he must have been bound by the rigid observances of that sect, to a blameless deportment, as far as the Mosaic law required. Born of such parents, the destined apostle at his birth was made the subject of the minute Mosaic rituals. “Circumcised the eighth day,” he then received the name ofSaul, a name connected with some glorious and some mournful associations in the ancient Jewish history, and probably suggested to the parents on this occasion, by a reference to its signification, for Hebrew names were often thus applied, expressing some circumstance connected with the child; and in this name more particularly, some such meaning might be expected, since, historically, it must have been a word of rather evil omen. The original Hebrew means “desired,” “asked for,” and hence it has been rather fancifully, but not unreasonably conjectured that he was an oldest son, and particularly desired by his expecting parents, who were, like the whole Jewish race, very earnest to have a son to perpetuate their name,——a wish however, by no means peculiar to the Israelites.

HIS GRECIAN LEARNING.

In this splendid seat of knowledge, Saul was born of purely Jewish parents. “A Hebrew of the Hebrews,” he enjoyed from his earliest infancy that minute religious instruction, which every Israelite was in conscience bound to give his children; and with a minuteness and attention so much the more careful, as a residence in a foreign land, far away from the consecrated soil of Palestine and the Holy city of his faith, might increase the liabilities of his children to forget or neglect a religion of which they saw so few visible tokens around them, to keep alive their devotion. Yet, though thus strictly educated in the religion of his fathers, Saul was by no means cut off by this circumstance from the enjoyment of many of the advantages in profaner knowledge, afforded in such an eminent degree by Tarsus; but must, almost without an effort, have daily imbibed into his ready and ever active mind, much of the refining influence of Grecian philosophy. There is no proof, indeed, that he ever formally entered the schools of heathen science; such a supposition, is, perhaps, inconsistentwith the idea of his principles of rigid Judaism, and is rendered rather improbable by the great want of Grecian elegance and accuracy in his writings; which are so decidedly characterized by an unrhetorical style, and by irregular logic, that they never could have been the production of a scholar, in the most eminent philosophical institutions of Asia. But a mere birth and residence in such a city, and the incidental but constant familiarity with those so absorbed in these pursuits, as very many of his fellow-citizens were, would have the unavoidable effect of familiarizing him also with the great subjects of conversation, and the grand objects of pursuit, so as ever after to prove an advantage to him in his intercourse with the refined and educated among the Greeks and Romans. The knowledge thus acquired, too, is ever found to be of the most readily available kind, always suggesting itself upon occasions when needed, according to the simple principle of association, and thus more easily applied to ordinary use than that which is more regularly attained, and is arranged in the mind only according to formal systems. Thus was it, with most evident wisdom, ordained by God, that in this great seat of heathen learning, that apostle should be born, who was to be the first messenger of grace to the Grecian world, and whose words of warning, even Rome should one day hear and believe.

HIS FAMILY AND BIRTH.

The parents of Saul were Jews, and his father at least, was of the tribe of Benjamin. In some of those numerous emigrations from Judea which took place either by compulsion or by the voluntary enterprise of the people, at various times after the Assyrian conquest, the ancestors of Saul had left their father-land, for the fertile plains of Cilicia, where, under the patronizing government of some of the Syro-Macedonian kings, they found a much more profitable home than in the comparatively uncommercial land of Israel. On some one of these occasions, probably during the emigration under Antiochus the Great, the ancestors of Saul had settled in Tarsus, and during the period intervening between this emigration and the birth of Saul, the family seems to have maintained or acquired a very respectable rank, and some property. From the distinct information which we have that Saul was a free-bornRoman citizen, it is manifest that his parents must also have possessed that right; for it has already been abundantly shown that it was not common to the citizens of Tarsus, but must have been a peculiar privilege of his family. After the subjugationof Cilicia, (sixty-two years before Christ,) when the province passed from the Syrian to the Roman sway, the family were in some way brought under the favorable notice of the new lords of the eastern world, and were honored with the high privilege of Roman citizenship, an honor which could not have been imparted to any one low either in birth or wealth. The precise nature of the service performed by them, that produced such a magnificent reward, it is impossible to determine; but that this must have been the reason, it is very natural to suppose. But whatever may have been the extent of the favors enjoyed by the parents of Saul, from the kindness of their heathen rulers, they were not thereby led to neglect the institutions of their fathers,——but even in a strange land, observed the Mosaic law with peculiar strictness; for Saul himself plainly asserts that his father was a Pharisee, and therefore he must have been bound by the rigid observances of that sect, to a blameless deportment, as far as the Mosaic law required. Born of such parents, the destined apostle at his birth was made the subject of the minute Mosaic rituals. “Circumcised the eighth day,” he then received the name ofSaul, a name connected with some glorious and some mournful associations in the ancient Jewish history, and probably suggested to the parents on this occasion, by a reference to its signification, for Hebrew names were often thus applied, expressing some circumstance connected with the child; and in this name more particularly, some such meaning might be expected, since, historically, it must have been a word of rather evil omen. The original Hebrew means “desired,” “asked for,” and hence it has been rather fancifully, but not unreasonably conjectured that he was an oldest son, and particularly desired by his expecting parents, who were, like the whole Jewish race, very earnest to have a son to perpetuate their name,——a wish however, by no means peculiar to the Israelites.

The name Saul is in Hebrew,שאולthe regular noun from the passiveKalparticiple ofשאל(sha-alandsha-el) “ask for,” “beg,” “request;” and the name therefore means “asked for,” or “requested,” which affords ground for Neander’s curious conjecture, above given.

Of thetimeof his birth nothing is definitely known, though it is stated by some ancient authority of very doubtful character, that he was born in the second year after Christ. All that can be said with any probability, is, that he was born several years after Christ; for at the time of the stoning of Stephen, (A. D. 34,) Saul was a “youngman.”HIS TRADE.There was an ancient Jewish proverb,——often quoted with great respect in the Rabbinical writings,——“He that does not teach his son a trade, trains him to steal.” In conformity with this respectable adage, every Jewish boy, high or low, was invariably taught some mechanical trade, as an essential part of his education, without any regard to the wealth of his family, or to his prospect of an easy life, without the necessity of labor. The consequence of this was, that even the dignified teachers of the law generally conjoined the practice of some mechanical business, with the refined studies to which they devoted the most of their time, and the surnames of some of the most eminent of the Rabbins are derived from the trades which they thus followed in the intervals of study, for a livelihood or for mental relaxation. The advantages of such a variation from intense mental labor to active and steady bodily exercise, are too obvious, both as concerns the benefit of the body and the mind, to need any elucidation; but it is a happy coincidence, worth noticing, that, the better principles of what is now called “Manual Labor Instruction,” are herein fully carried out, and sanctioned by the authority and example of some of the most illustrious of those ancient Hebrew scholars, whose mighty labors in sacred lore, are still a monument of the wisdom of a plan of education, which combines bodily activity and exertion with the full development of the powers of thought. The labors of such men still remain the wonder of later days, and form in themselves, subjects for the excursive and penetrating range of some of the greatest minds of modern times, throwing more light on the minute signification and local application of scripture, than all that has been done in any other field of illustrative research.

Of thetimeof his birth nothing is definitely known, though it is stated by some ancient authority of very doubtful character, that he was born in the second year after Christ. All that can be said with any probability, is, that he was born several years after Christ; for at the time of the stoning of Stephen, (A. D. 34,) Saul was a “youngman.”

HIS TRADE.

There was an ancient Jewish proverb,——often quoted with great respect in the Rabbinical writings,——“He that does not teach his son a trade, trains him to steal.” In conformity with this respectable adage, every Jewish boy, high or low, was invariably taught some mechanical trade, as an essential part of his education, without any regard to the wealth of his family, or to his prospect of an easy life, without the necessity of labor. The consequence of this was, that even the dignified teachers of the law generally conjoined the practice of some mechanical business, with the refined studies to which they devoted the most of their time, and the surnames of some of the most eminent of the Rabbins are derived from the trades which they thus followed in the intervals of study, for a livelihood or for mental relaxation. The advantages of such a variation from intense mental labor to active and steady bodily exercise, are too obvious, both as concerns the benefit of the body and the mind, to need any elucidation; but it is a happy coincidence, worth noticing, that, the better principles of what is now called “Manual Labor Instruction,” are herein fully carried out, and sanctioned by the authority and example of some of the most illustrious of those ancient Hebrew scholars, whose mighty labors in sacred lore, are still a monument of the wisdom of a plan of education, which combines bodily activity and exertion with the full development of the powers of thought. The labors of such men still remain the wonder of later days, and form in themselves, subjects for the excursive and penetrating range of some of the greatest minds of modern times, throwing more light on the minute signification and local application of scripture, than all that has been done in any other field of illustrative research.

“In the education of their son, the parents of Saul thought it their duty according to the fashion of their nation, not only to train his mind in the higher pursuits of a liberal education, but also to accustom his hands to some useful trade. As we learn from Actsxviii.3, ‘he was by trade a tent-maker,’ occupying the intervals of his study-hours with that kind of work. For it is well established that this was the usual habit of the most eminent Jewish scholars, who adopted it as much for the sake of avoiding sloth and idleness, as with a view to provide for their own support. The Jews used to sum up the duties of parents in a sort of proverb, that ‘they should circumcise their son, redeem him, (Leviticus chapterxxvii.) teach him the law and atrade, and look out a wife for him.’ And indeed the importance of some business of this kind was so much felt, that a saying is recorded of one of the most eminent of their Rabbins, that ‘he who neglects to teach his son a trade, does the same as to bring him up to be a thief.’ Hence it is that the wisest Hebrews held it an honor to take their surnames from their trades; as Rabbins Nahum and Meir, thescrivenersor book writers,” (a business corresponding to that of printers in these times,) “Rabbi Johanan theshoemaker, Rabbi Juda thebaker, and Rabbi Jose thecurrierortanner. Howtrifling then is the sneer of some scoffers who have said that Paul was nothing but a stitcher of skins, and thence conclude that he was a man of the lowest class of the populace.” (Witsius§ I.¶12.)

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