106. XXXVII. Cornelius And Peter

XXXVII. CORNELIUS AND PETER

Acts 10.—“I think the narrative of this chapter, which is very circumstantial, will supply a coincidence of dates so casual and inartificial as to be strongly characteristic of truth.”

Cornelius sees a vision at Cæsarea about the ninth hour of a certain day. In obedience to this vision he sends men to Joppa, to Peter, despatching them thither on the same day he saw the vision. (Acts 10:5; Acts 10:8.) They reach Joppa the next day, “on the morrow.” (Acts 10:9.) They lodge with Peter at Joppa that night. (Acts 10:23.) They set out with Peter on the next day, “on the morrow,” (τη επαυριον) from Joppa to return to Cornelius at Cæsarea (Acts 10:23): and on “the morrow after” (τη επαυριον) they arrive at Cæsarea again. (Acts 10:24.)

Cornelius now proceeds to inform Peter how it happened that he had sent for him; and begins with telling him very incidentally, “Four days ago I was fasting until this hour” (Acts 10:30), and so on. Now this date exactly tallies with the time which his messengers had been in going to and returning from Joppa, as we gather it piece-meal from the previous narrative—a narrative which is so far from thrusting the time upon our notice, that it requires a little attention to make it out. Indeed, in the Greek, “the morrow” and “the morrow after (Acts 10:23),” as it is properly expressed in the translation, are both simply τη επαυριον, the writer not perceiving or thinking about the ambiguity of the term; and consequently careless about impressing his reader with the fact (familiar to himself), that the messengers were two days on their return from Joppa, as they were two days in going there; and never dreaming about making the time consumed in the journey coincide with the date incidentally assigned by Cornelius to his vision. And here again, be it observed, we detect the marks of truth in a transaction of which the supernatural forms a fundamental part.