Paul carried two names, spoke three languages and held a citizenship that most of the men he preached to could never obtain. The profile of Paul sets out what the sources allow about his birth, his family and his training.1 This article follows the Roman in him in two parts: the name and the tongues here, then the citizenship and the appeal to Caesar, and what their use reveals.
Two names
Acts calls him Saul for twelve chapters and Paul for the rest. The change is made in a single verse, on Cyprus, in the house of the Roman proconsul Sergius Paulus: “Then Saul, (who also is called Paul,).”2 From that verse the Hebrew name disappears from the narrative, and the Latin name that matched the governor’s remains.
7ὃς ἦν σὺν τῷ ἀνθυπάτῳ Σεργίῳ Παύλῳ, ἀνδρὶ συνετῷ. οὗτος προσκαλεσάμενος Βαρναβᾶν καὶ Σαῦλον ἐπεζήτησεν ἀκοῦσαι τὸν λόγον τοῦ θεοῦ· 8ἀνθίστατο δὲ αὐτοῖς Ἐλύμας ὁ μάγος, οὕτως γὰρ μεθερμηνεύεται τὸ ὄνομα αὐτοῦ, ζητῶν διαστρέψαι τὸν ἀνθύπατον ἀπὸ τῆς πίστεως. 9Σαῦλος δέ, ὁ καὶ Παῦλος, πλησθεὶς πνεύματος ἁγίου ἀτενίσας εἰς αὐτὸν
7Which was with the deputy of the country, Sergius Paulus, a prudent man; who called for Barnabas and Saul, and desired to hear the word of God. 8But Elymas the sorcerer (for so is his name by interpretation) withstood them, seeking to turn away the deputy from the faith. 9Then Saul, (who also is called Paul,) filled with the Holy Ghost, set his eyes on him,3
The coincidence is in the text. Luke, who arranged the narrative, chose to record the change of name at the moment his hero won his first Roman official.
A man who had been Shaʾul of the tribe of Benjamin, named for Israel’s first king, became Paulus, “the small one,” in the presence of a Paulus who governed a province. The name he kept was the name that opened Roman doors.
Three tongues
Before the Roman garrison in Islamicjerusalem, Paul asked the chief captain in Greek whether he might speak, and the captain, surprised, asked whether he was not the Egyptian who had led four thousand assassins into the wilderness.4 Given leave, Paul turned to the crowd and spoke in Hebrew, and Luke notes that the crowd fell silent on hearing it.5
37Μέλλων τε εἰσάγεσθαι εἰς τὴν παρεμβολὴν ὁ Παῦλος λέγει τῷ χιλιάρχῳ· Εἰ ἔξεστίν μοι εἰπεῖν τι πρὸς σέ; ὁ δὲ ἔφη· Ἑλληνιστὶ γινώσκεις; 38οὐκ ἄρα σὺ εἶ ὁ Αἰγύπτιος ὁ πρὸ τούτων τῶν ἡμερῶν ἀναστατώσας καὶ ἐξαγαγὼν εἰς τὴν ἔρημον τοὺς τετρακισχιλίους ἄνδρας τῶν σικαρίων; 39εἶπεν δὲ ὁ Παῦλος· Ἐγὼ ἄνθρωπος μέν εἰμι Ἰουδαῖος, Ταρσεὺς τῆς Κιλικίας, οὐκ ἀσήμου πόλεως πολίτης· δέομαι δέ σου, ἐπίτρεψόν μοι λαλῆσαι πρὸς τὸν λαόν. 40ἐπιτρέψαντος δὲ αὐτοῦ ὁ Παῦλος ἑστὼς ἐπὶ τῶν ἀναβαθμῶν κατέσεισε τῇ χειρὶ τῷ λαῷ, πολλῆς δὲ σιγῆς γενομένης προσεφώνησεν τῇ Ἑβραΐδι διαλέκτῳ λέγων
37And as Paul was to be led into the castle, he said unto the chief captain, May I speak unto thee? Who said, Canst thou speak Greek? 38Art not thou that Egyptian, which before these days madest an uproar, and leddest out into the wilderness four thousand men that were murderers? 39But Paul said, I am a man which am a Jew of Tarsus, a city in Cilicia, a citizen of no mean city: and, I beseech thee, suffer me to speak unto the people. 40And when he had given him licence, Paul stood on the stairs, and beckoned with the hand unto the people. And when there was made a great silence, he spake unto them in the Hebrew tongue, saying,6
The scene shows the instrument at work. Greek for the officer, Hebrew for the crowd, and a Roman name for the record.
ʿĪsā ibn Maryam ʿalayhi al-salām, peace be upon him spoke Aramaic to Galilean fishermen; the gospels preserve his words in that tongue.7 Paul spoke whatever the room required, and the room was often Roman.
The orator of these scenes belongs to Acts. There Paul opens his defence before governors with the courtesies of a trained speaker, and stretches out his hand as the schools of rhetoric taught.8
His letters report what his hearers in Corinth said of him: that his letters were weighty and powerful, “but his bodily presence is weak, and his speech contemptible”; and he concedes that he is “rude in speech.”9 Martin read the concession as historical evidence that Paul, by the standards of his day, was a poor public speaker, and the polished Paul of Acts as the author’s portrait.10
- See Who was Paul of Tarsus?. ↩
- Acts 13:9; cf. Acts 13:7 for the proconsul. ↩
- Acts 13:7–9 (SBLGNT; KJV). ↩
- Acts 21:37–38. ↩
- Acts 21:40; 22:2. ↩
- Acts 21:37–40 (SBLGNT; KJV). ↩
- Mark 5:41; 7:34; 15:34. See How Paul came to own the New Testament. ↩
- Acts 24:10; 26:1–3. ↩
- 2 Corinthians 10:10; 11:6. ↩
- Dale B. Martin, “‘Luke’ versus Paul,” unpublished notes toward a book, written 18 March 2019 and revised 31 May and 5 June 2019, sent to the author in early 2023, section “Paul as Public Speaker and Rhetorician,” published on this site with his permission: “Luke” versus Paul: the notes of Dale B. Martin. ↩
