The Antioch Episode
In the unhappy sequel to the Jerusalem conference, Cephas (Peter),
leader of the Jewish Christian mission, appeared at Antioch (we would like
to know how often he had been there before), and the findings of the
conference were put to the test. Was it a certain euphoria overflowing
from the conference which prompted a generous gesture from Cephas, namely,
to share table fellowship with gentiles? Had there been table fellowship
in the congregation between Jews and gentiles before the conference, or
had Cephas introduced a new arrangement? We do not know. Whatever euphoria
there might have been was dispelled by the arrival of representatives from
James, Peter’s fellow advocate of the Jewish mission. The brave
experiment in common meals—we cannot tell whether or not the food was
ceremonially clean—came to an end. Even though the sympathies of Cephas
apparently lay with integrated dining, he was obliged to return to
traditional dietary practice. Barnabas joined Cephas and others in
withdrawing from the common meals, and thus defaulted from his position of
leadership in the gentile mission.17 For both Cephas and Barnabas, their
actions represented to some degree a compromise. As Paul then observed,
Cephas, Barnabas and the other Jewish Christians stood accused of
hypocrisy.
The view is widely held that Paul came out the loser in this
confrontation.18 But it is far from clear what the outcome was.19
More to the point is the evidence of the unfortunate consequences which
followed. To some degree or other, everybody concerned was a loser,
together with others who were not directly involved. The Jacobite attempt
to turn the clock backward apparently did not stop at the Antioch city
limits, but, as we shall see, likely extended into Galatia, and probably
also into areas of other Pauline foundations. Paul’s intemperate
responses to this Judaizing tide, not only at Antioch but likewise in his
Galatian letter, have earned him an undeserved reputation as anti-Jewish.
Did this dismal incident then invalidate the work of the Jerusalem
conference? It was not so much that at Antioch “the original [Jerusalem]
agreements were broken,” as Betz holds,20 but that the
episode revealed their inadequacy. The general principles agreed upon at
the conference probably had not been implemented by means of canonical
stipulations.
17Could Barnabas seriously have entertained
the possibility of bringing gentiles into the fellowship of believers and
then refusing to eat with them?
18In his Paul, Judaism and the Gentiles: A
Sociological Approach, SNTSMS 56 (Cambridge: Cambridge University,
1986) 56, Francis Watson gives his version of Paul as loser: “It seems
that James’ attempt to impose the law on the Antiochene Gentile
Christians was successful. If Paul had won the argument, he would surely
have said so. . . . This event therefore represented a disaster for Paul:
his work in Antioch, based on the premise of the law-free gospel for the
Gentiles, had been destroyed at a stroke. . . . The Antiochenes had
submitted to the authority of the leaders in Jerusalem, and this in effect
constituted a vote of no confidence in Paul’s leadership. He left
Antioch because he had to.” Thus, Francis Watson, and others. But it is
not a question of who won the argument. Rather, the action of James still
left unsettled the resolution of the original dilemma, i.e. how the early
church was to accommodate the legitimate claims of Jewish identity and the
claims of the gentile mission, and at the same time how it was to enjoy
the unity of Christian sisters and brothers, whether Jew or gentile. The
apostolic leadership had found no easy solution. In the light of this
situation, one finds it curious that scholars should declare Paul the
loser when he remained true to his principles, and should ignore the
“cave-in” of Cephas and Barnabas when they had not.
19Betz carefully sizes up the situation and wisely
declares, “The result of this confrontation is unknown” (Galatians
104).
20Galatians 104.
What effect this incident had upon Paul’s broader mission enterprise
is difficult to say. But this much is clear:
 | The controversy in Antioch was relatively less threatening to his
mission enterprise than later opposition in Galatia and elsewhere was to be. That is, Antioch was
not a Pauline foundation, however much or little he had invested in
the gentile mission there; whereas in Galatia, Philippi and
Corinth it was a
question of the survival of his major mission fields, not to
mention the health and nurture of his children (Galatians 4:19). |
| In the showdown at Antioch he had decisively sided with the mission
which ultimately was to survive, and he had repudiated a dual standard
for acceptance by God, one for the Jewish and one for the gentile
believer. |
| Click on The Antioch
Episode, in Paul and Antioch (2), for more
detailed discussion of the episode. |
In the sequel to the sequel, Paul departed from Antioch, not so much in
anger as in regret at the way things had turned out. According to the
chronology being proposed here, Paul left, not to begin his independent
gentile mission but to continue it. As this stage, he was headed to Asia
for the fruitful period of work in Ephesus.
The Question of the Return Visit to Galatia
If Paul was headed westward from Antioch to Asia, we would like to know
whether he made the considerable detour to pay a return visit to Galatia.
“Possible, but not certain,” is the answer. The to proteron of
Galatians 4:13 permits, but does not require, the rendering, “the former
[of two times];”21 it may also mean, “the first time,”22
or “once,” or “the only earlier time.”23 The choice
depends upon what other information we have.
What then are the possibilities? Unless one is willing to argue for a
sea voyage from Antioch to Ephesus—with no stops in Galatia!—Paul
traveled overland from Antioch to Ephesus. In this case, Galatia is not on
the way, either.
What kinds of factors may Paul have considered, in deciding whether to
make the detour to Galatia?
| Were there opportunistic considerations, to the effect that he might
not be passing this way again, especially if he was already looking
beyond Asia Minor and the Aegean basin to Rome as a staging area for
Spain, “the limits of the west,” as 1 Clement describes it? If so,
was this not the best time to visit Galatia? |
| Were there pastoral and personal considerations, taking into
account his preference for re-visiting his churches in person, instead
of depending just upon his deputies and upon letters, especially as
the Galatians were his children whom he had begotten (4:19)? |
| Do some of the previous warnings he mentions in the letter (5:17-21,
and especially 1:9) belong not to the founding visit but to a second
visit? |
| Was it not prudent to communicate the findings of the Jerusalem
conference to his churches in Galatia, especially the exemption from
law observance which he had won, and the obligation which he had
undertaken to raise a collection from his churches for Jerusalem? |
| How was he to balance his desire to re-visit the Galatians with the
urgency to begin his work in Ephesus? |
The view adopted here is that we have a modest balance of the evidence
in favor of a second visit, without our being able to offer strong
confirmation.24 If Paul did not re-visit Galatia, it is likely
that he went directly to Ephesus and deputized Titus or another of his
associates to visit the Galatian congregations and commence work on the
collection. 21The former time would of course imply a latter
time.
22BAGD 722.
23Betz, Galatians 11.
24I have been presupposing the “territory
hypothesis,” or North Galatia, for the location of the Galatians
addressed in the letter. If sufficiently convincing arguments were offered
for the “province hypothesis,” or South Galatia, i.e. in Pisidian
Antioch, Iconium, Lystra, and Derbe, then the case for a return visit to
Galatia would become stronger, since Paul might well have been passing
through these towns on the way to Asia from Antioch. But the arguments for
the province hypothesis rest largely upon evidence from Acts and
consequently are not given much weight here, especially since Acts appears
to differentiate Galatia from the above mentioned towns (16:1-6).
Controversy, the Collection, and the Outcome of Paul’s Work in
Galatia
However we are to identify the opponents in Galatia, the controversy
did have to do with whether circumcision and Torah observance were binding
upon gentile converts in Galatia. The teachers in question had probably
attacked Paul, as a way of undermining his law-free gospel, and had been
proclaiming a different gospel (Galatians 1:6-9). Their attack against
Paul probably did not originate spontaneously, but had the support, if not
the initiative, of a major Christian center such as Jerusalem or Antioch.
This movement presumably was intending to bring the believers in the
Galatian communities into substantial conformity with Torah. How well did
they succeed? The answer to that is connected with the topic of the
collection. [Click on Collection,
for a more comprehensive discussion.] Probably somewhat earlier than the
rise of the controversy Paul had instituted the collection in Galatia,
either in person during a return visit, or by engaging one of his
associates, perhaps Titus, in the project there. In 1 Corinthians 16:1-2, he explains the plan which he had already provided for the
Galatians in the administration of the collection: they were to put
something aside on the first day of the week so that the collection would
be ready at an appointed time for delivery to Jerusalem. But for some
reason Paul refrains from actively promoting the collection in the
Galatian letter.25 The explanation of this silence is probably
to be found in the lapse of work on the collection as a result of the
growing opposition to Paul in Galatia.26 A parallel situation
is to be found at Corinth, where Paul was obliged to postpone work on the
collection until the apostle’s differences with Corinth had been
reconciled.27 Achaia finally did complete work on the
collection, as we learn from Romans 15:26. Macedonia, after a late start,28
was also included in the collection. But Galatia is omitted from the list
altogether.
25Unless one follows Lightfoot in reading Galatians 6:7-10 as
an appeal for the Galatians to be generous in their contribution! This
point is noted by Howard L. Ramsey, The Place of Galatians in the
Career of Paul (Ph.D. Thesis, Columbia University, 1960) 87.
26This is also the view of Gerd Luedemann, Paul,
Apostle to the Gentiles: Studies in Chronology (Philadelphia:
Fortress, 1984) 86-87.
27In 2 Corinthians 8, Paul is seeking to
reinstitute work on the collection in Corinth, after the better part of a
year (2 Corinthians 8:8-11); this period when the collection had
lapsed probably corresponds to the period when the conflict with Corinth
was intense. Click on Collection
at Corinth.
282 Corinthians 8:1-5. This omission of Galatia
in Romans 15:26 is significant.29 We are probably to conclude
that the collection in Galatia was never completed after the project was
put aside.30 From this line of reasoning we may draw a further
conclusion about the outcome of Paul’s efforts to save Galatia for the
gentile mission. Whereas at Corinth the renewal and completion of the
collection followed upon and were probably made possible by reconciliation
between Paul and Corinth,31 in Galatia the failure of the
collection project is probably a reliable indicator that alienation
continued. Other indicators support this view. At the time Paul wrote his
letter to Galatia,32 some or most of the congregations were at
the point of abandoning, or had already abandoned, Paul’s law-free
gospel.33 As Vielhauer observes, it has not been demonstrated
that the letter succeeded in winning them back.34 The bare
preservation of the letter is virtually the only evidence that the letter
had its wished for result.35 29This
significance is muted or over-ridden by interpreters (regrettably the
majority) who give precedence to Acts 20:4, with its list of people who
accompany Paul to Jerusalem. (One can hardly imagine why Paul might have
omitted Galatia from the list in Romans 15:26; it would surely have
strengthened his position if he could have included Galatia, and
Asia/Ephesus as well, among those foundations which had contributed to the
purse.) We would be surprised if the author of Acts had good information
about the churches which contributed, when he is unaware
of the collection
project, or has chosen to suppress it. If the list is authentic, it could
represent the names of those delegated, by Paul or by certain churches, to
accompany (suneipeto) the collection; such a function is not
necessarily the same as if they were representing the churches which had contributed.
30Georgi appeals to Acts 20:4 for evidence to the
contrary; this appeal to the evidence of Acts is representative of
Georgi’s readiness to favor Acts over the evidence of the letters at
crucial points. See Remembering the Poor 111, 122-3.
31One recognizes that a substantial body of opinion
would make 2 Corinthians 10–13 Paul’s last word to the
Corinthians; in that case, such interpreters have not offered a credible
explanation of how the collection could be completed under the
circumstances of continued alienation.
32A date not long after 1 Corinthians for the
composition of Galatians is preferred in this web site, but the
difficulties of dating the letter are well known. There are too many
silences, about where he is, who his companions are, where he has been,
and what his travel plans are, for us to be certain.
33Betz (Galatians 267) refers to the following
texts as indicating how close the Galatians were to the brink: 1:6;
3:1; 4:9-11, 15a, 16, 19, 21; 5:4, 7;
6:12-16.
34Vielhauer, Philipp, Geschichte der urchristlichen
Literatur (Berlin/New York: de Gruyter, 1975) 125.
35Vielhauer, Geschichte 125 (citation from Betz, Galatians
28, n. 36). Whatever happened in the short-run, the future was not bright
for Jewish Christianity (or, shall we say, Christian Judaism?) because of
some or all of the following considerations: (a) the end of the
Jerusalem based leadership of the Jewish Christian mission, occasioned by the death of James (62
C.E.)
and the departure or death of Cephas and John; (b) the fall of
Jerusalem (70 C.E.); (c) the exclusion of Christians from the synagogue (ninth
decade C.E.?); and (d) the rapid growth of Gentile Christianity.
Some of the pertinent points which emerge from the foregoing discussion
may be summarized as follows:
| In calling attention to some of the methodologically confusing
consequences of harmonizing the letters and Acts, we have sought to
justify our consistently letters-based approach to Galatians. |
| Chronology [A], which places three of the four great founding
missions before the Jerusalem conference, has been shown to provide a
coherent view of the relations between Paul and the Galatian
congregations, though of course its validity is not proved by this
fact alone. |
| The founding of gentile congregations in Galatia (and elsewhere)
before the Jerusalem conference gives point to Paul’s championing of
the gentile mission for precisely these gentiles (Galatians 2:5). |
| The Jerusalem conference authorized what was in effect a dual
mission strategy, without making sufficient provision for integrating
the two communities which resulted. |
| The Antioch episode revealed how broad the chasm was between Jewish
and gentile Christianity. The tension between the two would not soon
find an agreeable resolution.36 |
| Paul earnestly sought to bring about reconciliation with the
Galatians, but it is doubtful that he succeeded to any great extent. |
36For
one aspect of this continuing problem see the discussion in Paul J.
Achtemeier, The Quest for Unity in the New Testament Church: A Study in
Paul and Acts (Philadelphia: Fortress, 1987) 62-66.
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