f his teaching. Philo
gives important testimony to the existence of a 'liberal' school among
the Jews of the Dispersion, who, under pretext of spiritualising the
traditional law, left off keeping the Sabbath and the great festivals,
and even dispensed with the rite of circumcision. Thus the admission of
Gentiles on very easy terms into the Church was no new idea to the
Palestinian Jews; it was known to them as part of the shocking laxity
which prevailed among their brethren of the Dispersion. With Stephen,
this kind of liberalism seemed to have entered the group of 'disciples.'
He was accused of saying that Jesus was to destroy the temple and change
the customs of Moses. In his bold defence he admitted that in his view
the Law was valid only for a limited period, which would expire so soon
as Jesus returned as Messiah. This was quite enough for the Sanhedrin.
They stoned Stephen, and compelled the 'disciples' to disperse and fly
for their lives. Only the Apostles, whose devotion to the Law was well
known, were allowed to remain. This last fact, briefly recorded in Acts,
is important as an indication that the persecution was directed only
against the liberalising Christians, and that these were the great
majority. Saul, it seems, had no quarrel with the Twelve; his hatred and
fanaticism were aroused against a sect of Hellenist Jews who openly
proclaimed that the Law had been abrogated in advance by their Master,
who, as Saul observed with horror, had incurred the curse of the Law by
dying on a gibbet. All the Pharisee in him was revolted; and he led the
savage heretic-hunt which followed the execution of Stephen.

What caused the sudden change which so astonished the survivors among
his victims? To suppose that nothing prepared for the vision near
Damascus, that the apparition in the sky was a mere 'bolt from the
blue,' is an impossible theory. The best explanation is furnished by a
study of the Apostle's character, which we really know very well. The
author of the Epistles was certainly not a man who could watch a young
saint being battered to death by howling fanatics, and feel no emotion.
Stephen's speech may have made him indignant; his heroic death, the very
ideal of a martyrdom, must have awakened very different feelings. An
undercurrent of dissatisfaction, almost of disgust, at the arid and
unspiritual seminary teaching of the Pharisees now surged up and came
very near the surface. His bigotry sustained him as a pe