Acts - episode 3

Separate Barnabas and Saul for me

We continue to tell Saul/Paul’s story following the Acts of the Apostles. «Barnabas went out to Tarsus to look for Saul. When he had found him, he brought him to Antioch. It happened, that for a whole year they were gathered together with the Church, and taught many people. The disciples were first called Christians in Antioch» (Acts 11,25-26). Barnabas is «a Levite, a man of Cyprus by race» who joined to the first Church of Jerusalem, giving all his wealth to the community (Acts 4,36-37); he introduces Saul to the apostles after the conversion we told in the last post (Acts 9,27). «Now in the Church that was at Antioch there were some prophets and teachers: Barnabas, Simeon who was called Niger, Lucius of Cyrene, Manaen the foster brother of Herod the tetrarch, and Saul. As they served the Lord and fasted, the Holy Spirit said, “Separate Barnabas and Saul for me, for the work to which I have called them.” Then, when they had fasted and prayed and laid their hands on them, they sent them away» (Acts 13,1-3).



The laying on of the hands is an ancient gesture that was common in the Church of the origins: it is used to pray for the sick people’s healing, as Jesus did during His mission (do you remember Ananias who gives the sight back to Saul? See even Mark 16,17-18: «These signs will accompany those who believe: [...] they will lay hands on the sick, and they will recover»); to invoke the Holy Spirit (see e.g. Acts 8,17 and 19,6); finally, as in this case, to consecrate a person in order to accomplish a particular task (see even Acts 6,6). The laying on of hands has remained along the centuries in the Church’s liturgy: among the many possible examples I cite the sacraments of Confirmation and of Holy Orders that, to be valid, must include that gesture in their celebration.
«So, being sent out by the Holy Spirit, they went down to Seleucia. From there they sailed to Cyprus. When they were at Salamis, they proclaimed the word of God in the Jewish synagogues. They had also John as their attendant. When they had gone through the whole island as far as Paphos, they found a certain man, a sorcerer, a false prophet, a Jew, whose name was Bar-Jesus, who was with the proconsul, Sergius Paulus, a man of understanding. This man summoned Barnabas and Saul, and sought to hear the word of God. But Elymas the sorcerer (for so is his name by interpretation) withstood them, seeking to turn aside the proconsul from the faith. But Saul, who is also called Paul, filled with the Holy Spirit, fastened his eyes on him, and said, “Full of all deceit and all fraud, you son of the devil, you enemy of all righteousness, will you not cease to pervert the right ways of the Lord? Now, behold, the hand of the Lord is on you, and you will be blind, unable to see the sun for a time!” Immediately a mist and darkness fell on him. He went around seeking someone to lead him by the hand. Then the proconsul, when he saw what was done, believed, being astonished at the teaching of the Lord» (Acts 13,4-12). Here for the first time Luke reports Saul’s double name: since in the text the fact is treated like already known information, we can exclude the hypothesis that connects that name to the proconsul’s one («Sergius Paulus»: he «believed» after the extraordinary sign by the apostle). Instead, it is probably Saul’s Latin cognomen, a sort of nickname that was attributed to the Romans (I remind you that Saul was from Tarsus, therefore had the Roman citizenship), in addition to the first name (praenomen) and to the family’s one (nomen). In Latin “paulus” means “short”, in Greek “paulos” means “a little”: that nickname could find an explanation in Saul’s low height (see his physical description in the apocryphal text of the II century Acts of Paul and Thecla, 3). In his writings (that we will examine in the future) the apostle always calls himself “Paul”: maybe there is even a symbolical reason in the preference of that second name. Saul was the first king of Israel; he was extremely tall and good-looking, but he was finally rejected by God due to his disobedience. King Saul’s figure evokes a great and powerful character, so sure about his strength as to prefer a personal initiative over the Lord’s command. Saul who met the Resurrected Jesus on the way to Damascus certainly does not identify himself in those traits: «and last of all, as to the child born at the wrong time [a dead creature who can even kill his mother due to the difficult labor], he [Christ] appeared to me also. For I am the least of the apostles, who is not worthy to be called an apostle, because I persecuted the Church of God. But by the grace of God I am what I am. His grace which was bestowed on me was not futile» (1Cor 15,8-10).
Barnabas and Saul continue their journey to Perga, Antioch of Pisidia, Iconium, Lystra and Derbe; their preaching and the miracles they do bring to the Faith many persons, but even produce the harsh opposition of part of the local Jews. Therefore, the two missionaries exclaim: «It was necessary that God’s word should be spoken to you first. Since indeed you thrust it from you, and judge yourselves unworthy of eternal life, behold, we turn to the Gentiles» (Acts 13,46). After returning to the new communities they founded, to confirm their Faith and to appoint «elders for them» (see Acts 14,21-23), Paul and Barnabas «went down to Attalia. From there they sailed to Antioch [of Syria], from where they had been committed to the grace of God for the work which they had fulfilled. When they had arrived, and had gathered the Church together, they reported all the things that God had done with them, and that he had opened a door of faith to the nations» (Acts 14,25-27). Their testimony, with Apostle Peter’s one, will be fundamental in the Jerusalem council, when the Church takes a positive decision about the preaching to the Gentiles (see Acts - episode 1).
In the next post we will tell Paul’s second missionary journey.