29. But Wieseler, p. 99, ff., after Anger, de temp. in Act. Ap. ration, p. io6, ff., has an argu ment to which both attach high importance, de rived from the notice of a Sunday (Acts xx. 7), the 1.2th day after leaving Philippi, which depar ture was ' after the days-of Azyma ' (15-21 Nisan), and, indeed, very soon after, for the Apostle Mist ed, if it were possible, to reach Jerusalem for the Pentecost,' v. 16, and of the 43 days which he had before him from 22 Nisan to the day of Pente cost, the days specified or implied in the narrative, Acts xx. xxi., amount to 35 to the landing at Cmsarea (comp. Chrysost. in Act. Hone. xlv. i), leaving but eight days for the stay there (Wpas 7rXe(ain, xxi. to), and the journey to Jerusalem. Wieseler concludes that the departure from Philippi was on the 23d Nisan, which being 12 days before the Sunday at Troas, would be Wednesday, conse quently the 15th Nisan fell on a Tuesday. Accord ing to his method of Jewish calen dar reckoning (from which the present writer dissents), from A.D. 56 to 59 inclusive, the only year in which 15th Nisan would fall on a Tuesday would be 58, which is his date for St. Paul's arrival at Jerusalem. Were it worth while, the argument might be claimed for the year 55 (the date assigned by the ancients), in which year the day of true full moon = 15 Nisan was 1st April and Tuesday. But in fact it proves nothing; the chain is no stronger than its weakest link, and a single ' perhaps ' in the reckoning is enough to invalidate the whole concatenation.
30. On the whole, it seems to the present writer that neitherin the Acts norm the historyof the times have we the means of settling this part of the chro nology. Josephus in particular, from whom are fetched the combinations which recent German writers deem so unanswerable, is discredited in this part of the history (written probably from his own resources and the inaccurate recollections of his boyhood) by the infinitely higher authority of Tacitus, who drew his information from the public records. Only, in whatever degree it is probable that the first residence at Corinth commenced A. D. 49, in the same it is probable that the arrest at Jerusalem belongs to the year 55, six years being sufficient, as nearly all enquirers are agreed, for the intermediate occurrences. Then, if the arrival at Rome took place, as the ancients say, in the second year of Nero, it will be necessary (with Petavius) to refer the Stepla (xxiv. 27) to the term of Felix's
(sole) procuratorship.
31. That the two years' imprisonment,with which the narrative in the Acts ends, did not terminate in the Apostle's death, but that he was set at liberty,. and suffered martyrdom under Nero at a later time, appears to have been the unanimous belief of the ancients (see the testimonies in Ordo Send. sec. 130). And, indeed, in no•other way is it pos sible to find a place for the three pastoral Epistles, and especially to account for statements in the Second Epistle to Timothy. Wieseler's forced ex planations have satisfied and can satisfy no one. (See also Lange Apostal. Zeitaller, ii. 386, ff., and in Herzog's Eneyd. s. v. Paulus 244, ff., and Huther in Meyer's krit. exeg. Komm. p. 25, ff. Meyer himself, Rdmerbr. Einleit, p. 12, ff., owns that the three pastoral Epistles ' stand or fall together,' and that if they be genuine, the conclusion is inevitable : which he turns into an argument against their genuineness). But if, after his release, the apostle visited not only Spain (as Ewald admits, Gesch. vi. 631, on the unquestionable testimony of Clemens, Ron. c. 3), but Greece and Asia, as is clear from the Epistles to Timothy and Titus, scant room is left for these movements between the late dates, assigned with almost one consent by recent German writers, to the close of the first imprisonment (63 and 64), and the year 65 or 66, which the ancients give as the date of St. Paul's martyrdom. So far, there fore, it is more probable that the first imprisonment ended in one of the years 58-60. Another con sideration points the same way : when Popptea's influence was established (58-65), which, after she became a )t (i.e., at least as early as 61), was freely used in favour of the Jews, it would-certainly have been invoked against the Apostle by his enemies (comp. Ewald vi. 621) ; and even if he escaped with life, his confinement would not have been of the mild character described in the con cluding verse of the Acts : more especially as his ' bonds in Christ were manifest in all•the palace' (pra:toriurn), Phil. i. 13, and among his converts were some `of Cmsar's household,' ib. iv. 22.. — H. B.