07-Saul of Tarsus

There were two souls living side by side in the heart of the young man, Saul, and they struggled for the mastery, even as Jacob and Esau struggled in the womb of their mother.

Saul was raised in Tarsus in the modest home of his father, a goat’s hair weaver. He knew very early in life that he lived on a little island set in an ocean of paganism, sinfulness and despair, and that whatever was fine, decent, and godly was to be found in his father’s house and in the synagogue, God’s house.

As a little boy he learned the Torah, the Prophets and other sacred books in the school attached to the synagogue. Even then, he was deeply affected by the prophets, and his mind was filled with fiery visions of the “last days.” His father also made sure Saul was educated in Greek literature. So Saul grew up, as many Hellenized Jews did, with a thorough knowledge of the books and culture of the surrounding world, and, in spite of his contempt for the idol worship of the Gentiles, he developed a grudging admiration for their serenity, their joy of life, and their feeling for the beautiful.

Tarsus was the crown of the province of Cilicia. It was set like a jewel in the green plain under the shadow of Mount Taurus. The melting snows of the mountain fed the Cydnus River, which connected the rich little inland province of Asia Minor with the Mediterranean. Great rafts of felled trees and galaxies of ships carrying wheat, oil, and wine floated down the river. A score of jargons and dialects could be heard in the streets, for the city was full of Greek craftsmen, Egyptian cooks, Assyrian perfume mixers, Sidonian merchants, and Roman legionaries, officials, and tax gatherers.

But above all, there were philosophers, teachers, and their pupils. Tarsus ranked with Alexandria and Rome as the city of scholars and thinkers. Every school of thought was represented there. The academies were famous for their courses in arithmetic, rhetoric, and astronomy. The loftiest moral codes were also taught.

So the people seemed to have everything they needed for happiness, including the supreme protection of Roman citizenship since the time of Pompey.

But neither earthly riches, wisdom, nor the privileges of Roman citizenship, could provide her inhabitants with the one highest happiness a man can know. They could not provide him with faith.

All the moralistic teachings of the sages did not place a single binding obligation on the population, for they were just philosophies, not practices. By day the Greek sages preached the highest morality, the virtues of modesty, and contentment with the bare necessities of life. But without the true God, the words of the sages were as empty as the clashing of cymbals. So the days of Tarsus were like the days of a drunkard, and the nights were the nights of harlots.

Clouds of incense swirled from everywhere around Saul. Orgies like those of Sodom and Gomorrah were repeated nightly, as the image of man, created in God’s image, was defiled by the removal of all boundaries of sex. Men, crazed with drink, and painted like whores, wandered the streets. No one was spared. Even children were pulled into the torrent of wastefulness. And it was the followers of Plato and the pupils of the Stoics who practiced all this.

As a young man, Saul was constantly tormented by the question, why had God created Jews and Gentiles? How could Gentiles be guilty if God hadn’t revealed Himself to them? He knew that Messiah would one day come to the Gentiles and offer to make them Jews, and either they would accept or be doomed to hell. But why the delay?

Saul had lived his whole life in anticipation of the great event, and even sometimes thought that perhaps he could be an instrument for its’ hastening. At first he thought of it as entirely a Jewish thing, but with the years, he began to think of a Messiah for the world. The Messianic passages in the prophets, especially Daniel, and in the Hellenistic literature, led him to believe that Messiah would change the entire world order. Thus his concept of Messiah evolved from that of an earthly liberator to a divine redeemer, and he dedicated his life to the vision of such a Messiah.

He told no one of these thoughts and feelings, of course. But because he not only had a great love for the Jewish people, but also compassion toward the Gentiles, he began to live consciously in the spirit of this vision. He spent every possible moment in the study of sacred texts and secular books. He denied himself the luxuries of ordinary life and ignored his parents’ hints that it was time for him to take a wife. His health, never very good anyway, suffered from the severe discipline he imposed on himself. He often worked himself into a frenzy, which terrified his parents, but they couldn’t persuade him to change.

He started to talk about going to Jerusalem where he could feel himself close to the Temple, the heart of Israel, and where he could sit and learn at the feet of Rabban Gamaliel. This struck a chord with his parents, for what Jewish parent of the dispersion didn’t dream of having a son study in the Holy City, and especially learn from Gamaliel?

So when a time came for his father to go up to Jerusalem on one of his pilgrimages, Saul’s mother lovingly packed Saul’s bags with a student’s mantle and shirts she wove for him. Saul’s father had a married sister who lived in Jerusalem, so Saul wouldn’t be a complete stranger there, and his father also took a letter of introduction to the chief of the Pharisees.


Soon after arriving in Jerusalem, Saul met Joseph Barnabas. The two young men were drawn to each other by their common education in Jewish-Hellenistic literature, and above all, by their common faith in the coming of Messiah. But it was hardly an equal friendship. Under Saul’s dominating spirit, Barnabas was like clay in the hands of a potter. Before he knew it, his opinions of Messiah had also changed from a deliverer of the Jews into a deliverer of mankind. So while on the one hand, the wealthy, aristocratic young man of Cyprus was overwhelmed by the disciplined bearing of Saul, on the other hand, Saul found the one spirit to whom he could pour out all his dreams and visions of Messiah.

This friendship endured until the day Barnabas declared that he had found Messiah.


The break turned out to be more painful for Saul than for Joseph, and he set out to vent his bitterness on the “disciples” who’d robbed him of his friend. Barnabas had been the only one of Gamaliel’s students who’d been able to put up with the harsh ways of Saul and to endure his overbearing spirit. Once he was gone, Saul realized how few friends he had. Saul was considered a hard man, quick-tempered and slow to forgive. Above all he was known for his obstinacy. When he made up his mind on a question, it was useless to try to change him. His arguments were passionate, and he had no regard to feelings of others.

But if the other students couldn’t love Saul, they did respect him, for the fire of a great love for God and for Israel burned in his heart. No one could ever challenge the purity of his motives, for whatever he said or did, he was sincere; there was nothing of self in him. Faith in the heavenly Father was not a separate refuge or reward for his righteousness; he desired neither glory nor praise. Faith was the only possession of worth, and for its sake alone, the burden of life was bearable. Life for its own sake wasn’t worth the tribulation or torments involved. The only happiness lay in the bond with a heavenly Father.

Saul was not only a powerful preacher, he subjected himself to the disciplines he preached. He’d known the torments of the flesh since childhood, for a malarial disease had fastened on his bones and eaten into their marrow. His bones became soft, his blood watery. But no word of complaint ever passed his lips, not even to his dearest friend. It was a point of pride with him to bear his affliction like a secret gift from God, for “whom God loves, he punishes,” says the scripture, and the sages taught, “Afflictions are God’s gifts to his saints.”

Saul thought that even nurturing this pride was a sin. So he fought with his pride, and he would have exposed his sorrow with others, in order to lower himself in their esteem. But he couldn’t bring himself to do it. This pride was his second nature.

In spite of his physical distresses, Saul was determined to be the most disciplined student in his submission to the rules and ordinances of the House of Hillel. He wouldn’t sleep on a soft bed, or even lie down on a bamboo mattress. In the summer he slept in the courtyard of the house of study. In the winter he slept on a hard bench in the dormitory. During the week his food consisted almost entirely of flat cakes of bread, a little fruit, and a few olives. He drank only water, rarely touching wine. Most of the time he was under the secret vows of a Nazarite, even though this was against the spirit of the House of Hillel, and Rabban Gamaliel reproved him sharply for it. He said that they who multiply vows multiply sin. They transgress the commandment to greatly care for one’s body. Playing the saint too much leads to pride of spirit. It was said that this reproof was the only thing that kept Saul from going out into the wilderness and joining the Essenes. And it was one of the rare times he allowed himself to submit to outside influence.

But Rabban Gamaliel could never persuade Saul to take a wife, as nearly all the other students had done. Gamaliel’s advice to his pupils was to marry young, so as to have “bread in their basket,” and so that they might not be haunted by the desires of the flesh. He taught them that there were two things that are good for a man to do in his youth, to take a wife and to choose a path for himself.
But Paul’s answer was, “God’s Torah is my wife, and I will follow along whatever path God leads me.”


If Paul didn’t choose a path, he did at least choose an occupation, pursuing the trade of goat’s hair weaver he’d learned in his hometown. Two or three times a week he hired himself out to a fellow countryman, a tent maker, who had his workshop in the Kidron Valley, under the wall of the road to the Mount of Olives. He did this at the expense of his studies.

While every student was supposed to memorize the verses of the Hebrew text, there were also many oral laws and ordinances to memorize. There were customs and regulations to learn, as well as the parables and aphorisms that embodied them. The studies of Rabban Gamaliel’s pupils covered every branch of life, and there weren’t enough hours in the day to master them all. Saul couldn’t keep pace with the curriculum because of his trade, and he couldn’t be persuaded to find an easier way, as the other students had done. For while they paid lip service to hard work, they lived either on public charity or the gifts of relatives. But Paul regarded the earning of his bread by the labor of his hands to be an important principle of the moral life. By being dependent on no one else for his daily bread, he was free to act and speak as his conscience dictated, and he considered this more essential to the moral life than training and knowledge. Even the pressure of his time-honored teacher couldn’t change that.

This obstinate pursuit of a trade gave him an advantage denied his fellow pupils, for he learned the ways of life, not from theories of law, but by contact with reality. He came in daily contact with the very poorest of the poor, and saw first hand the hills and valleys man must confront and the winding paths life must follow. He saw men and women prepared to sell all they had for a morsel of bread. He saw women give away their hair, God’s natural adornment, to the hairdressers, to cover the heads of others. He saw the worn out bodies of old laborers thrown into the street like garbage. He knew that for the poor man there was no hope but in the life to come, when Messiah would raise him up.

Saul felt strongly that this hope was not just for the children of Israel. Paul found many aliens in Jerusalem living in the lower city, from all parts of the world, even Samaria, who had a longing for Messiah within them. They’d heard of the resurrection from some Jewish neighbor, perhaps, or some preacher, and they longed for a share of the inheritance. Their hope in this life was so low that they wanted to come under the skirts of the mantle, so to speak.

Saul listened carefully when he heard these forlorn, abandoned people talk of Messiah. He discussed it with his fellow workers at the loom. He overheard small groups whispering about it in the dark corners of the synagogues. Donkey and camel drivers at the pool of Siloam had this hope on their lips, as did washerwomen kneeling by the Kidron stream.

But Saul also knew how deep the Galileans had planted the roots of the false Messiah. For if Messiah had come, Israel would certainly no longer be chained to Rome. These men were deluding the people with false hope. They were an abomination, deceivers, preying on the pitiful longings of the people.

The worst of it, of course, was not just they reached the ignorant. They’d reached the best in Israel, his tenderhearted susceptible friend. Barnabas had fallen into their trap and was lost to him. He’d been parched with thirst, and they’d given him poison to drink.

Many others were lost as well, such as Stephen, and the gentle-spirited Philip, and Nicholas the saintly Gentile. The number of victims grew daily, and the rabbis stood by and did nothing. Where was a new Phineas, to defend the honor of God with fitting zeal?


One hot afternoon, a few men were sitting on the stone benches around the water cistern at the Study House of the Prince of the Pharisees. They were discussing the incident of the followers of the new Messiah having been arrested by the Temple Overseer and then released by the High Priest.

“Once they were brought before the High Priest, they should have been pronounced guilty and wiped out,” said Saul, every word falling like a hammer blow.

“But why such a bloody sentence on someone just because they believe in the resurrection?”

“No sir!” answered Saul. “Not because they believe in the resurrection, but because they preach a false Messiah, one who was hanged, no less. It is written, ‘The curse of God rests on one who is hanged.’”

“What about all the others hanged on the cross by Herod and Varus? Does the curse of God rest on them too? No way! They were saints, and they died to sanctify the Name of God. Now was this rabbi Messiah? No Jewish court found him guilty. The rabbis weren’t present at his trial, so in our eyes he must be counted innocent. And if there is any truth in what his followers say about his raising the dead, then this would be proof that he’s sinless, and the saying that the curse of God rests on one who is hanged wouldn’t apply to him. On the contrary, he’d be considered a martyr and a saint.”

“And I say that for these very reasons, setting the disciples free will be a calamity for all generations to come. As soon as the common people hear about this, they’ll flock to listen to their doctrine. From now on, they’ll gather souls without number.”

“But if their cause is just, why shouldn’t they?”

“But don’t you see where this leads?”

“So because you’re afraid of what might happen, you want to condemn Jews to death against the Torah?”

“For the greater glory of God and of His holy Temple,” cried Saul.

“And I say that for the greater glory of God and of His Torah, they’ve earned life,” answered the first student.

And the students shrank away from Saul.