Corpus-Paul

[Richard Fellows <rfellows AT shaw.ca>]

Tim wrote:
> Interesting proposal, Richard. Not sure I'm ready to buy that Paul's
> commitment was to a seven year cycle. Still, the sabbatical year is an
> attractive explanation for why Judeans in particular required help, when
the
> famine was widespread across the empire. In terms of the Agabus prophecy
in
> Acts, I've often wondered why the prophecy of an empire-wide famine
prompted
> support for the Judean believers in particular - although I suspect that
> Judea was less prosperous on the whole than other regions.

I'm not sure that Paul committed to a seven year cycle per se, but I imagine
that he was keen to give aid to Judea whenever the need was greatest (see 2
Cor 8:14). The need in Judea would correspond to periods of failed harvests
and also Sabbatical years.
2 Cor 8:14 seems to indicate that Paul expected that Judea would be able to
send contributions to Achaia in the future (though other interpretations
have been offered). The Sabbatical year would explain the present poverty in
Judea and it also explains why Paul expected that poverty to be temporary.

I assume that Paul was involved in three collections for Judea:
1. A collection from Antioch following Agabus's visit.
2. A collection from Galatia following Gal 2:10, related to the Sabbatical
year.
3. A collection from Macedonia and Achaia, related to the next Sabbatical
year.

Some have attempted to combine 1 and 2, and I can't rule this out. Others
consider 1 to be fictitious. I disagree, and here's why.

An interesting thing about Agabus is his name. It means 'Locust' and is
probably unattested elsewhere. Locusts were associated with food shortages
in OT prophecies (Exodus 10:4-19; Deut 28:38,42; 1 Kings 8:38; 2 Chron 7:13;
Psalm 78:46; Psalm 105:34; Joel 1:4; 2:25; Amos 4:9; 7:1), so it seems
likely that "Agabus" was a nickname given to this prophet because of his
prediction of the famine. We know from the later incident (Acts 21:10-11)
that he was indeed an prophet in the style of OT prophets, since he
performed an acted prophecy "He came to us and took Paul's belt, bound his
own feet and hands with it, and said, "Thus says the Holy Spirit, 'This is
the way the Jews in Jerusalem will bind the man who owns this belt and will
hand him over to the Gentiles.'"'  It was common for prophets to take new
names (Barnabas, Elymas-BarJesus, and arguably Manaen, the Bar-Sabbas
brothers and the later Theudas, and John the Baptist in a sense).  The name
'Agabus' is very appropriate for the man who predicted the famine, and this
is not the sort of thing that Luke would make up, since it is not a Greek
name. This suggests that there is at least an element of truth to Luke's
report.

Some have wondered why Agabus and the other prophets journeyed to Antioch. I
suggest that they went to Antioch to report that famine was expected in
Judea and to ask for aid. In Acts 11:28 Agabus predicted a universal famine
and this does not exclude the possibility that a more immediate local Judean
famine had already been anticipated. The prophecy of Acts 11:28 on its own
does not explain why aid was sent from Antioch to Judea, since the
prediction was of universal famine, so it is likely that Agabus and the
other prophets had reported a local Judean famine. The prophecy of Acts
11:28 perhaps just extended the famine in space and time. The fact the
Agabus has his name before the prophecy of Acts 11:28 seems to confirm this.

Richard.