Acts 16:1-5 Paul, in Lystra, adds
Timothy to his party. Paul's return to the churches in Galatia that he had
visited on his first missionary trip had the primary purpose of encouraging
them in the faith, and delivering the official decree from the Jerusalem
council. In Lystra, he met Timothy, the son of a devout woman who was himself
also well spoken of. In his letters to Timothy written some years later, Paul
refers to him as his true child in the faith (I Tim 1:2) and his beloved son (2
Tim 1:2). He also recalls the sincere faith that his grandmother and mother
had, and his conviction that Timothy had the same quality of faith (2 Tim 1:5).
The
puzzling thing about this passage is that Paul circumcised Timothy because of
the Jews in that region, because everyone knew his father was Greek. In view of
the recent decree of the Jerusalem council, it is difficult to understand why
Paul would have done this. The text suggests that he wanted the Jews in that
region to accept Timothy, which implies that his mother must have been Jewish
(or else the whole issue would have been moot). But it still seems to run counter
to the whole flow of what the Holy Spirit had been doing through the Jerusalem
council, in freeing Christianity from its cultural captivity to the Jewish
faith. In Galatians 5:6 and 6:16, Paul tells the very people in this region
that circumcision and uncircumcision are nothing, but what matters is obeying
the commandments of God, and faith working through love. This all leads one
(this author) to wonder if Paul slipped on this point and rationalized an act
that he later came to recognize as in error. He noted in Galatians 2:3 that
Titus was not required to be circumcised, and in Galatians that he did not
yield in subjection to the Judaizers at all, in the context of the Jerusalem
council. But here, it almost seems like he did.
From John Piper, March 7, 1983, three
differences between Titus and Timothy cases:
1)
Titus was a pure Greek (Galatians 2:3). Timothy was born of a Greek father and
a Jewish mother. According to 2 Timothy 3:15, from childhood Timothy had been
taught the Old Testament scriptures. In other words, his Jewish mother brought
him up as a Jew. But his Greek father had not allowed the circumcision. For
Titus the pressure was to become Jewish. Timothy was already very Jewish by
race and by training. For him to be circumcised would not have had the
implication of moving from Gentile status to Jew status.
2)
The people Paul resisted in Galatians 2:3-5 were false brothers. The Jews to
whom he catered in Acts 16:3 were not even Christians. The pressure in
Galatians 2:3-5 was from professing believers upon another believer to perform
a work of law in order to be accepted. But Acts 16:2 says Timothy was “well spoken of by all the brethren at Lystra and Iconium.” No Christians were pushing for Timothy’s circumcision. Rather it was “because of the Jews that were in those places” (16:3) that Paul had Timothy circumcised. “Jews” is used over 85 times in Acts and almost without exception
refers to non-Christians. And here they appear to be distinct from “brethren.”
So it appears that Timothy’s
circumcision was not motivated by “Christian” pressure from within but by a missionary strategy from
without.
3)
Titus was a “test case”
in Jerusalem (Galatians 2:1), but Timothy was to be a constant travel companion
(Acts 16:3). Therefore, in Titus’
case a clear theological issue was at stake. But in Timothy’s case, what was at stake was how unbelieving Jews might
best be won to Christ. So just as Christian freedom caused Paul to resist Titus’ circumcision, this same freedom allowed him to remove the
stumbling block of Timothy’s
lack of circumcision. Paul applied his principle from 1 Corinthians 9:20, “To the Jews I became a Jew in order to win the Jews.”
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