Toto

In another thread, it was suggested that Paul's Epistle to the Romans, along with the Acts of the Apostles, provides some evidence that Paul was in Rome.

We have discussed whether Acts has historical value often enough, so I would like to consider the evidence in the Epistle to the Romans.

Aside from the fact that the letter can at best be evidence that Paul wanted to go to Rome, but had not at the time it was written, there are problems in assuming that the letter originally referred to Rome at all.

The letter starts out greeting the church at Rome, which Paul has not yet visited. (Why do Christian legends then claim that Paul founded the Church at Rome? Where did this church come from?)

Rom 1:13 I do not want you to be unaware, brothers, that I planned many times to come to you (but have been prevented from doing so until now)

And Rom 15: 23 But now that there is no more place for me to work in these regions, and since I have been longing for many years to see you, 24 I plan to do so when I go to Spain. I hope to visit you while passing through and to have you assist me on my journey there, after I have enjoyed your company for a while. 25 Now, however, I am on my way to Jerusalem in the service of the saints there. . . . 28 So after I have completed this task and have made sure that they have received this fruit, I will go to Spain and visit you on the way.

But then in Rom 16, Paul commends Phoebe and sends greetings to his friends Aquila and Prisca (Priscilla).

Rom 16:3 Greet Priscilla and Aquila, my fellow workers in Christ Jesus. 4 They risked their lives for me. Not only I but all the churches of the Gentiles are grateful to them. 5 Greet also the church that meets at their house.

The problem with this is that Aquila and Prisca were in Ephesus by most reckoning.

From Helmut Koestler
The author of Acts tries to explain their names in Rom 16 by having Prisca and Aquila come from Rome, but still has not figured out how or why to get them back to Rome from Ephesus to receive the greetings in the letter.

It may be that Rom 16 was a separate letter, an introduction of Phoebe to the Church at Ephesus. (Robert Price has opined this.) According to van Manem, Marcion's version omitted the last two chapters (15 and 16), according to Origen.

But even without the last chapter, there are problems. Why would Paul go to Spain?

It is most likely that this letter was never written to Rome, but to a church of another locality. When (probably) Marcion collected the letter, he edited it to reference Rome, by changing only those few geographical references, substituting Spain for another closer location. [Jay Raskin suggested on the Jesus Mysteries list that the Epistle to the Romans was originally part of an Epistle to the Thessalonians.]

Van Manen notes that "the words "in Rome" (en 'Rome) and "to those in Rome" (tois en 'Rome) … are wanting in some MSS in 1:7, 15."

How reasonable is it to assume that Paul, whose travels had been confined to the eastern Mediterranean, primarily in present day Greece and Turkey, would want to go to Spain, skipping over Egypt, the Dalmatian Coast, Sicily, Corsica, France, and other closer locales? He didn't speak the language, and had no base of support there. As stated in Henry Wansbrough: An Introduction to the Pauline Letters, in an attempt to explain the letter to the Romans as an attempt to build up support for such a mission:
Van Manen also casts doubt on the idea that Romans was a letter, as it reads more like a doctrinal essay. Van Manem also disputes the dating of the epistle:

The net result: the Epistle to the Romans might not have been authored by Paul, might not have been addressed to the Romans, and in any case provides no evidence that Paul was ever in Rome.

Peter Kirby

It is possible that chapter 16 was part of a separate letter, but that does not directly affect this discussion. Why should Paul want to go to Spain instead of Dalmatia or Egypt? Why not? Perhaps Wansbrough is right and some of those in Rome had connections in Spain. That is indeed what Romans 15:24 says. And there was plenty of commerce between Rome and the Iberian peninsula, such that the emperor himself would soon enough be a Spaniard. I conclude that there is no problem with accepting the epistle's references to Rome.

The main piece of evidence that Paul was in Rome is Acts. The Epistle of Paul to the Romans provides some corroboration of Acts, in respect of Paul's intention to go to Rome, which raises the probability of Luke's accuracy here. A reference to Peter and Paul commanding the church of Rome in Ignatius also provides some corroboration, as I don't buy the argument that his epistles are inauthentic. The description in 1 Clement of Paul reaching the west provides a better piece of evidence than Ignatius, as 1 Clement was probably written in the 60s CE. So the evidence is (1) Acts, written by a companion of Paul, (2) the Epistle of Paul to the Romans, confirming his intention to visit Rome, (3) 1 Clement, stating that Paul traveled to the west, and (4) Ignatius, though weaker than the rest of the evidence, is to be considered. Against it, there truly is nothing.

best wishes,
Peter Kirby

Diogenes the Cynic

Why do you think that Acts was written by a companion of Paul's?

Peter Kirby

Chief among the features of Luke-Acts that have been thought to support the idea that the author knew Paul are the "we passages" found in 16:10-17, 20:5-15, 21:1-18, and 27:1-28:16. For example, Acts 16:10-17 reads, "We set sail from Troas, making a straight run for Samothrace, and on the next day to Neapolis, and from there to Philippi, a leading city in that district of Macedonia and a Roman colony. We spent some time in that city. ... As we were going to the place of prayer, we met a slave girl with an oracular spirit, who used to bring a large profit to her owners through her fortune-telling. She began to follow Paul and us, shouting, 'These people are slaves of the Most High God, who proclaim to you a way of salvation.'" It continues that Paul exorcised her and was imprisoned for his trouble. Paul was saved as an answer to his prayer, and he proceeded to travel through Thessalonica, Beroea, and Athens. Paul set sail for Syria by way of Ephesus, landed in Caesarea, and went to Antioch. After travelling around Galatia and Phrygia, Paul came to Ephesus in Asia Minor where Apollos was baptizing in the name of John. After an upset with the silversmiths in Ephesus, the first person narration picks up again as follows: "When the disturbance was over, Paul had the disciples summoned and, after encouraging them, he bade them farewell and set out on his journey to Macedonia. As he travelled throughout those regions, he provided many words of encouragement for them. Then he arrived in Greece, where he stayed for three months. But when a plot was made against him by the Jews as he was about to set sail for Syria, he decided to return by way of Macedonia. Sopater, the son of Pyrrhus, from Beroea, accompanied him, as did Aristarchus and Secundus from Thessalonica, Gaius from Derbe, Timothy, and Tychicus and Trophimus from Asia who went on ahead and waited for us at Troas. We sailed from Philippi after the feast of Unleavened Bread, and rejoined them five days later in Troas, where we spent a week. On the first day of the week when we gathered to break bread, Paul spoke to them because he was going to leave on the next day, and he kept on speaking until midnight. ... We went ahead to the ship and set sail for Assos where we were to take Paul on board, as he had arranged, since he was going overland. When he met us in Assos, we took him aboard and went on to Mitylene. We sailed away from there on the next day and reached a point of Chios, and a day later we reached Samos, and on the following day we arrived at Miletus. Paul had decided to sail past Ephesus in order not to lose time in the province of Asia, for he was hurrying to be in Jerusalem, if at all possible, for the day of Pentecost." (Acts 20:1-16) Notice that the first passage refers to "Paul and us" and that the "we" who sailed to Assos are distinct from Paul, who travelled overland. Notice also that the "we" narration drops off at Philippi and then picks up in the second passage with "We sailed from Philippi." This nonchalant and matter-of-fact dovetailing convinces me that the author of Acts was among those who were left behind at Philippi and joined up with Paul to sail from there later. The distinction between Paul and "us" discredits the idea that the first person perspective in these passages is some kind of literary device, which would take the perspective of Paul (for example increasing the drama of Paul's adventure or increasing the connection of Paul to the group), and for which there is no precedent in ancient literature (in reference to Robbins). The alternative is that the author of Acts was making a false affectation to being a companion of Paul. This prompts the question of why the author made this claim in such a subtle way, instead of ensuring that the reader could not miss it by emphasizing the point, as apocryphal writers often did. It also leaves us wondering as to why the false claim to participation is restricted to a few passages, leaving Paul alone for most of the narrative--though this is understandable if the author's participation was in fact sporadic. The most probable conclusion is that Luke had travelled with Paul at times, a fact of which Luke's patron Theophilus was already aware.

(From my site.)

I'm not committed to the name Luke, but it's better than any other.

best wishes,
Peter Kirby

Diogenes the Cynic

Even if you don't buy the "we passages" as a literary convention (I won't debate it), why couldn't the author of Acts simply have incorporated some (possibly genuine) memoir in his own larger narrative?

The late date (pushing 100 CE at a minimum) and historical errors in Acts would seem tp preclude Luke's having been a companion of Paul, not to mention the fact that Luke's credibility as an authentic historian is completely shot by his own Gospel, as well as some supernatural elements in Acts.

We know that Luke copied freely from other sources for his Gospel (Mark, Q/Matthew, possibly others). I see no reason not to assume he did not do the same with Acts.

Diogenes the Cynic

I'm not sure that Theophilus is really a person, by the way. "Lover of God" could well be a form of address to the audience at large rather than a specific person.

Peter Kirby

One answer, which I have not verified, is that the style is the same in the "we passages" and the rest of Acts.

My answer is that the author of Acts is a good storyteller, a man of letters even, who would have been able to transform first person narration into third, unless he wished to claim presence on the scene.

Why do you think the date is "pushing 100 CE at a minimum"?

Please point out which errors in Acts preclude authorship by a companion of Paul.

What is an authentic historian?

What are the criteria?

Furthermore, why can't a companion of Paul be other than an "authentic historian"?

The "most excellent Theophilus" mentioned in the preface of Luke is most likely his patron, as seen in the similar references to "most excellent X" in the prefaces to the De libris propriis liber of Galenus, the De antiquis oratoribus of Dionysius Halicarnassensis, the Scriptor De Divinatione of Melampus, the Peri ton kata antipatheian kai sumpatheian of Nepualius, and both Josephi vita and Contra Apionem of Josephus. As I went over with Bernard Muller, Theophilus is a quite common name. However, it is not quite common to refer to the reader in general as Theophilus. I know of no instance. (Luke itself not being an instance to be cited to support such an interpretation that even proponents regard as merely plausible...but which I regard as improbable.)

best wishes,
Peter Kirby

Toto

It is possible that Paul wanted to go to Spain, but it seems unlikely. If Paul had that intention, one would expect to find more discussion, more preparation.

Acts says nothing about Paul's intention of going to Rome (or Spain IIRC). Paul was arrested and transported to Rome under armed guard. This does nothing for Luke's accuracy. It just shows that both Luke and Marcion (or whoever edited Paul's letters) wanted to connect Paul to Rome.

Where is this reference? A casual search did not turn it up, but I think I recall something like that. But who founded that church, if Paul was writing to an existing church that he had never visited?

You are referring to this (but your web site dates 1 Clement to 80-140. I think only Ellegard tries to date 1 Clement that early):

I think that Jay Raskin thought that the the "extreme limit of the west" was Achaia, the western part of Greece, and that this phrase was later interpreted as Spain. I don't know his current thoughts on the matter. But this is a rather vague statement.

I don't understand your belief that Acts was written by a companion of Paul, which is contrary to most scholarship and seems to depend on that slim thread of the "we passages", but I've debated it before and have nothing new to add.

Vorkosigan

The idea that ancient fiction writers, who wrote complicated frame stories with numerous shifts of person is, could not create the "we" passages in Acts is, not to put too fine a point on it, insupportable. Take the end of Chareas and Callirhoe, when the hero and heroine are united in front of the city. Narration shifts between the third person narrator, a narration of the tale in the second person as the father describes the son's adventures to the son for the whole city to here, long narrations in the first person interspersed with third person narration, and then, the last sentence that steps out of the story completely and finishes the frame established in the very first sentence of the story. Or the sequence in Leukippe and Kleitophon where there is a set of nested first person narrations as a pair of actors explain how they faked the execution of Leukippe. Producing the effect of the "we" passages would be a no-brainer for polished member of the literati like the writer of Luke.

But let's look at what's really going in these passages. I've taken these from the New American Bible

• 9 During (the) night Paul had a vision. A Macedonian stood before him and implored him with these words, "Come over to Macedonia and help us."
  10 When he had seen the vision, we 3 sought passage to Macedonia at once, concluding that God had called us to proclaim the good news to them.

The passages actually start in 16:9. One way that the "realism" of the WE passages is inflated is by artificially shortening them -- to the passages that only contain WE. This is a deliberate apologetic move. Don't be fooled by it. The sequence of events begins in v9 and is begun conventionally....

..... a common convention in Greek fiction writing: a character receives a dream/vision from the divine and immediately embarks on a course of action, often involving travel. Or else the dream explains the upcoming action, or some relationship. There is a literary device here, but it is the dream which functions as a convention (characters get dreams all the time) and a device -- it is used to move the story along. Here are some similar passages from the summaries of ancient novels at the Petronian Society. These are from Heliodorus' complex Ethiopian Tale....

• During the night the robber chief Thyamis has a dream in which he is back at his home in Memphis and there Isis commends Charicleia to him, saying that he shall have her and not have her, shall do her wrong and slay her, but she shall not die. In the morning Thyamis determines that the dream meant he shall have as a wife and enjoy her sexually.
  
  Worn out with worry, they fall into an exhausted sleep, during which Charicleia dreams of a bloody man cutting out her right eye. She wonders if it means that she will lose Theagenes, but Knemon asserts it means one of her parents has died. They decide to go toward the village of Chemmis, Knemon going with Thermouthis by one route in order to escape from him at some point, and Theagenes and Charicleia by another.
  
  That night in a dream a old man comes to him in a dream, apparently Odysseus, who chides him for not honoring him and predicting that Calasiris will soon suffer ordeals like his own, while also promising a happy ending for Charicleia.

From Xenophon's Ephesian Tale

• After a few days they set sail again, and soon the wind becomes slack. The sailors begin to drink, and Habrocomes has a dream which suggests an impending disaster from which only Anthia and he will escape.
  
  That night in a dream Habrocomes sees his father looking all over the world for him, and sees himself as a horse and looking for his mare.
  
  At Tarentum Anthia dreams she is with Habrocomes again, but some beautiful woman takes him away from her. She awakes, believes Habrocomes has betrayed her, and wishes to kill herself.

And from my favorite, Luekippe and Kleitophon:

• And thus, due to custom, all punishments must be postponed for the duration of the embassy. The leader of this embassy is Sostratos, Leukippe's father, who has had a dream that he would find his daughter and his brothers' son (Kleitophon) in Ephesus

I think that's enough. So here we have the standard pattern: the hero has received a dream from the divine, and now heads off to far parts to carry out some task.

Back to Paul:

• 11 We set sail from Troas, making a straight run for Samothrace, and on the next day to Neapolis, 12 and from there to Philippi, a leading city in that district of Macedonia and a Roman colony.

Here is a straight narration of a voyage, common enough in Greek fiction. There are millions of such passages. Like "The next day they left Cilicia and made for Mazacus, a fine big town in Cappadocia, for from it Hippothous intended to recruit able-bodied young men to reconstitute his band" or "but the ship for Alexandria with Habrocomes on board went off course and was wrecked at the Paralian mouth of the Nile Delta, next to the Phoenician coast." First person narrative of this is also common. WE passage continues:

• We spent some time in that city. 13 On the sabbath we went outside the city gate along the river where we thought there would be a place of prayer. We sat and spoke with the women who had gathered there. 14 One of them, a woman named Lydia, a dealer in purple cloth, from the city of Thyatira, a worshiper of God, 5 listened, and the Lord opened her heart to pay attention to what Paul was saying. 15 After she and her household had been baptized, she offered us an invitation, "If you consider me a believer in the Lord, come and stay at my home," and she prevailed on us. 16 As we were going to the place of prayer, we met a slave girl with an oracular spirit, 6 who used to bring a large profit to her owners through her fortune-telling. 17 She began to follow Paul and us, shouting, "These people are slaves of the Most High God, who proclaim to you a way of salvation."18 She did this for many days. Paul became annoyed, turned, and said to the spirit, "I command you in the name of Jesus Christ to come out of her." Then it came out at that moment. 19

Here is a normal sequence of events in a Greek novel. The hero goes to the city, and by the gate meets an oracle. Again from the summary of Heliodorus:

• He leaves Egypt and goes to Delphi where he might take refuge in religous contemplation. When he arrives at Delphi the oracle immediately proclaims that the gods will take him back to Egypt. This welcome impresses the population, who give him a home in the temple, where he served and engaged in philosophic discussions.
  
  At that moment a messenger announces that an embassy has arrived from Thessaly lead by a descendent of Achilles to perform a important ritual sacrifice. Charicles tells Calasiris that he will see his adopted daughter -- Charicleia -- at the rite conducted by the Thessalians. The moment they all arrive at the temple of Apollo, the oracle sings out
  One who starts in grace and ends in glory, another goddess born:
  Of these I bid you have regard, O Delphi,
  Leaving my temple here and cleaving Ocean's swelling tides,
  To the black land of the Sun they will travel,
  Where they will reap the reward of those whose lives are passed in virtue:
  A crown of white on brows of black. (Morgan's translation).
  The population, too caught up in the coming festivities, take no note of this oracle, but Calasiris does.

..and from Achilles Tatius:

• In Egypt Polydius, while searching for other robbers, comes to Coptus and captures Amphinomus and Anthia, who does not tell him her full story. Needless to say, Polydius soon falls deeply in love with Anthia. At Memphis he tries to use force on her, but she escapes to the temple of Isis and pleads for help to the goddess. At this point Polydius comes to the temple and promises Anthia never to use force again. A few days later Anthia goes to the temple of Apis, and after praying to the god, hears a chorus of children in front of the temple sing "Anthia soon will regain her husband Habrocomes."

So what looks like history is actually a compendium of common scenes in Greek fiction: the traveler receives a divine visitation, springs into action, goes to a city, meets an oracle.....

...meanwhile more conventions of Greek fiction pop up: the traveler is falsely accused of a crime.

• When her owners saw that their hope of profit was gone, they seized Paul and Silas and dragged them to the public square before the local authorities. 20 They brought them before the magistrates 7 and said, "These people are Jews and are disturbing our city 21
  and are advocating customs that are not lawful for us Romans to adopt or practice." 22
  The crowd joined in the attack on them, and the magistrates had them stripped and ordered them to be beaten with rods.

The poor prisoners are dragged before the local potentate -- Habrocomes before the prefect of Egypt, Chareas and Callirhoe before the King of Persia -- and then are tortured. Torture is of course par for the course for heroes in the ancient Greek novels. Just one example of the same sequence of false accusation -- arrest -- torture:

• But Anthia suggests that Habrocomes in fact give in. Meanwhile, impatient Manto writes a letter, proposing to Habrocomes directly, and, when Habrocomes rejects her, Manto goes to her father, who has just returned with Moeris, the man he intends his daughter to marry, and tells him she has been raped by Habrocomes. Habrocomes is arrested and tortured.

or from Heliodorus:

• Arsake still has not be able to seduce Theagenes, and she is worried about the absence of Achaimenes. Cybele convinces her to use torture to get Theagenes to comply, and he is chained and tossed into prison where he is tortured.

I could multiply this by the thousand, but I don't want to bore. Meanwhile

• 23 After inflicting many blows on them, they threw them into prison and instructed the jailer to guard them securely. 24 When he received these instructions, he put them in the innermost cell and secured their feet to a stake.

...the stage is set. The prisoners have been tortured and cannot get out. The situation is hopeless.

• 25 About midnight, while Paul and Silas were praying and singing hymns to God as the prisoners listened, 26 there was suddenly such a severe earthquake that the foundations of the jail shook; all the doors flew open, and the chains of all were pulled loose.

Note the detail: it is midnight, the witching hour. Anyone who thinks there is history here is committing a EUI: Exegesis Under the Influence of Christianity. Here too we have a common sequence found in ancient novels -- the divine hears prayer and grants it, effecting miraculous escape. Compare the misadventures of Habrocomes in Xenophon's Ephesian Tale

• Meanwhile Habrocomes is ordered crucified, but, while on the cross, he prays to the Nile and to the Sun. The wind rises and casts his cross into the Nile, and he is fished out. Habrocomes is then sentenced to be burned at the stake, but the Nile's flood puts out the flames.

• 27 When the jailer woke up and saw the prison doors wide open, he drew (his) sword and was about to kill himself, thinking that the prisoners had escaped.

The guard who kills himself when his task is also found here and there in Hellenistic fiction..... Chap 13 of the Satyricon, where a guard has become distracted boinking a widow in the tomb of her husband:

• ....Unfortunately, a family member of one of the robbers seizes the opportunity to take down one of the bodies and give it a proper burial.
  
  The soldier finds himself in a fix. He is sure to be executed for dereliction of duty. Not wanting to wait for judgment, he announces his intention to kill himself and invites the lady to mourn him in that very tomb.

So our "historical" passage whose narration "discredits" the idea that it is a literary device turns out, on close inspection, to be composed of stereotypical scenes from Greek novels. Interesting that the narration can't possibly be a literary device/convention, although everything in its neighborhood seems to be.

Vorkosigan

seebs

I don't know about whether Paul was in Rome. It has been asserted in some debates about interpretation of Romans 1 that the discussion of backsliding, with idols (1:23) and sex (1:26-27) is a reference to non-Christian temples in Rome. I have generally accepted that reference at face value, although I see nothing in it that would confirm that Paul actually made it to Rome at any time.