Acts 12:20-25 Christianity under Roman government and Greek Culture & History

Acts 12:20-23 Herod gives a speech and is struck down. We don't have any information on why Herod was angry with the people of Tyre and Sidon, but they were trying to cozy up to him, which seems to have been very important since they got their food from his country. So he came and gave a speech, as any politician might. Nothing wrong with that, except that the sycophants in the crowd, in an effort to win him over, started calling his speech the voice of a god. As we have discussed before, worship is reserved to the one true God alone. The problem with worshipping people is that even when we have done amazing and wonderful things, if people worship us and we accept it, we are unable to not allow it to affect our view of ourselves. Only God can exercise infinite power and perfection and remain loving and gracious. Perhaps Herod was not to blame for others saying his voice was that of a god, not a man. But he did not rebuke them to set the record straight, but allowed their praise of him to rest on him, which resulted in his immediate judgment. As noted elsewhere, the apostles did not make this mistake.

Acts 12:24-25 The church flourishes and Saul and Barnabas return to Antioch. The death of Herod most likely ended that particular episode of persecution.  So the church was able to grow and the word of God multiplied. Saul and Barnabas, who evidently had remained in Jerusalem during this series of events, now returned to Antioch. John Mark, who likely had some family connection to Peter, perhaps to the church leadership, perhaps was recognized as a young man with great potential for the kingdom of God, went with them. He would eventually write one of the gospels. But there is more to the story. He starts out here, perhaps as Peter's protégé, but with Saul and Barnabas, on a trip to Antioch.

          Antioch (on the Orontes) keeps popping up in Acts, and it is ironic that this is a city that was named for Antiochus I, one of the early Seleucid rulers. It was founded shortly after the death of Alexander the Great in 323 BC. The early Seleucid rulers ruled the Seleucid Empire (which included central Anatolia, the Levant, Mesopotamia, Kuwait, Persia, Afghanistan, Turkmenistan, India, and Pakistan) from the city, one of sixteen named for a member of  Seleucus' family. Antiochus Epiphanies, a.k.a. Antiochus IV, ruled from 175 to 164 BC. He was a tyrant who attempted to suppress the Jewish religion and force the people of that region to become Hellenized. The apocryphal books record the struggle between the orthodox and Hellenized Jews,  many deeds by Antiochus Epiphanies against the Jews, and the rebellion of the Jews under the family of the Maccabees. For the Jews of Jesus' time, although this had happened nearly two hundred years prior, the Hasmonean rule had only ended in 63BC with the Roman general Pompey's conquest of Judea, and the dynasty itself had ended in 37 BC with the designation of Herod as the King of Judea by the Roman Senate. After the Romans took over, the Jews were hoping and expecting another deliverer, as cropped up numerous times in the gospels. Many of the Jews were unable to understand if Jesus was the Messiah, why He didn't lead a rebellion and defeat the Romans militarily.

          Antioch was one of the four great cities of Syria. In addition to being the city from which the Seleucid dynasty ruled the Seleucid empire, it was a large metropolis and a trading center. It probably epitomized the Hellenistic culture. These characteristics made it an ideal place for sending out missionaries to the Gentile world. From the viewpoint of the church in Jerusalem, there would have been an understandable concern that the Christian faith might become compromised by the Hellenistic culture therein. Paul even alluded to this in I Corinthians 9:21. Paul's theology as detailed in his letters showed that although Jesus was a Jew and Christianity is based on God's revelation of Himself to the Jews over the course of 2,000 years, Jesus is Lord of all peoples and cultures, and the truths of Christianity are applicable to all mankind. This would not mean selling out to the gentile, worldly Hellenistic culture, but redeeming gentiles out of their cultural background, just as Jesus redeemed Jews out of their cultural background.