How Far Did Early Missionaries Travel?

 Part  One - Voyages to the Western Mediterranean and China

At Colossians 1:23 the Apostle Paul wrote about 60 C.E. that, "the good news was preached in all creation that is under heaven."

What exactly did he mean by that? Exactly how far had Christian missionaries traveled by his day? Some have suggested that he meant just the Mediterranean world his readers would have been familiar with.

 But this known world would have included lands far beyond  the Eastern end of the Mediterranean. Long before Paul's day Phoenician and other mariners  had traveled across the entire Mediterranean to the Atlantic.  There are reports of the Phoencians sailing regularly to both to Gadir ( the modern port city of Cadiz)  and to Tarshish by the ninth century B.C.E.   Still others had sailed down the Red Sea  --  as far as India and  even China by the  second  century B.C.E.

So the "known world"   could have referred to other areas beyond the Eastern end of Mediterranean  or The Great Sea as it was called then.

In Part Two we'll take a quick look  at a Phoenician voyage around Africa organized by Pharaoh Necho of Egypt in the seventh century B.C.E.

Wine As A Medicine.

During Bible Times wine was prescribed and used as a  potent medicine.

There are a number of examples of this in the Bible. One is at Luke 10: 30-34 where the Good Samaritan poured oil and wine on the wounds of a a traveler after he had been attacked and left for dead by robbers.  Another is at 1 Timothy 5:23 where Paul told Timothy, "Do not drink water any longer, but use a little wine for your sake of your stomach and your frequent cases of sickness."

This was regarded as wise medical treatment at the time.  According to the book  Ancient Wine which describes win as a "analgesic, disinfectant, and general remedy all rolled into one."
Because of this it  played a major role in Egyptian, Mesopotamian, and Syrian health care.

Two other publications support this.  The Oxford Companion to Wine  says that wine is actually man's "oldest documented medicine"  and  The Origins and Ancient History of Wine says:
"It has been shown experimentally that living typhoid and other dangerous microbes rapidly die when mixed with wine."

And modern research supports these claims showing. Researchers have found  that there are more than 500 compounds contained in wine and that some of these  can protect persons from such diseases as typhoid  as well a provide a number of other medicinal benefits.

The Garment That Made Them Gamble

According to John 19: 223 four Roman soldiers who witnessed Christ's death on the torture stake cast lots to see who would take the inner garment he had worn

 You might wonder why they would view his inner garment as such a prize. I mean inner garments were not unique. Natives of the Middle during that time often wore these under their clothes much as we would wear a sweat shirt today. They were not that unique.

Early tailors made from rectangular pieces of linen or wool that when finished reached to the wearer's knees after the clothes maker had sewn together two pieces of rectangular cloth along three sides and left holes for head and arms.

More expensive garments were made from one longer piece of cloth and folder in the middle with a hole left for the head. The sides then were hemmed up with holes for both arms on the sides according to the publication  Jesus and His World.  Still not that unusual.

But both the loom and the tunic produced on it were very unique -- at least in Palestine. The operator worked with an upright loom with two sets of of vertical threads -- one at the front of the loom and one at the rear.

Unlike other looms the operator making this style of garment alternated the shuttle on the machine which carried the weft threat alternatively between the two enabling the weaver to produce sa cylindrical garments -- with no seams.

This style of inner garment was very rare in Palestine of that time and would have been a prized possession -- something Roman soldiers saw as something worth casting lots for.  The rest of Jesus' clothes they apparently just divided  up. 

Creators of Durable Portable Shelters

Modular, portable buildings had an early start in the Middle East. Archaeological evidence shows that during the time of Roman occupation of Egypt young men about 13 began learning a trade.  One of these was tent making -- a craft that might take them several years to master according to the book The Social Context of Paul's Ministry.

It was not just a matter of grabbing a needle and start sewing. There was much to learn such as how to cut material to size and shape and sewing it all together  with a variety of awls and needles  and using a variety of stitching techniques.

Tent makers also had to learn how to weave different materials to work with before  sewing them together. Different materials included goal and camel hair, which expanded when wet, blocking out the rain as well as leather and even linen --used to create sun awnings to cover the atria of private houses and possibly other buildings.

Once they mastered their trade, as the Apostle Paul did according to Acts18:3young Jewish men, as well as men from surrounding countries had valuable skills that enabled to earn a living almost anywhere they traveled -- either making new  or repairing old tents for others.

This is a trade that exists down to this day in the Middle Eastern countries.

Critical Reactions to Warnings

How do you respond to warnings about disasters? Are you like the thousands fleeing Hurricane Sandy or those who stubbornly refused to listen?  Your reaction could mean your life.

Take the one Jesus made about Jerusalem for instance. Jesus warned, as recorded at Luke Luke 21: 20, 2,1 that the city was going to be destroyed.  Most of the inhabitants of that city unfortunately had rejected him as the Messiah and did not listen when he said, "When you see Jerusalem surrounded by the encamped armies...Then let those in Judea begin fleeing to the mountains, and let those in the midst of her withdraw." because Jerusalem was going to be destroyed.

What happened?  Several decades  later Cestius Gallus'  Roman army surrounded Jerusalem while crushing a Palestinian revolt according to Josephus and was on the verge of sacking the city when Gallus, for some reason, ordered a withdrawal.

There were two completely different responses to this sudden retreat.  Encouraged by this sudden change of fortune most of the inhabitants thought the danger was over and  ignored  Jesus' warning to flee the city when this happened. 

But Judean Christians listened and fled to Pella,  a mountain city  in the Decapolis region,  according  church historian Eusebius. They stayed their faithfully for years, not returning to Jerusalem which appeared to be still thriving. It must have been tempting to return. 

But by remaining in Pella  these disciples of Jesus escaped the returning Roman armies in 70 C.E. In that year the Roman General Titus led another army that besieged and laid waste to the entire city. Hundreds of thousands perished  as the Roman legions had no pity on those who refused to heed Jesus prophetic warning and continued to defy Rome.

  

Ancient Brew Masters

The desire to relax and celebrate with the help  intoxicating drinks made by ancient brew masters and wine makers is  as old as human history. Right from  Genesis where Noah is depicted as enjoying his  wine after the flood down through the Old Testament or Hebrew Scriptures and the Christian Greek Scriptures or New Testament there are frequent references to wine and intoxicating  liquors.

Two of these references  are at Deuteronomy 14: 26  where God spoke of enjoying wine and intoxicating liquor and Luke 1:15 where he showed that John the Baptist should not touch "wine or strong drink" at all as a special evangelist going in advance of  the promised Messiah, Jesus Christ.

This was not a blanket prohibition against the consumption of such drinks, however. Jesus, himself on at least one occasion during his  earthly lifetime, turned water into wine during a wedding feast and the Apostle Paul on at least one other occasion suggested to Timothy that he take a little wine, "for his stomach's sake."

Just what Luke meant by "strong drink" is unclear, but certainly the Jews and other peoples had a wide variety of types of alcoholic beverages other than grapes.  Other drinks were made other fruits such as dates, figs, apples, and pomegranates as well as honey. He apparently did not have in mind anything like the gins, vodka, or whiskeys we enjoy today though.

The forerunners of our Seagram's and other distillers of grains and other crops to make such beverages were a much later development in man's history, but the early Jewish and other peoples of the Middle East, such as the Egyptians, Babylonians, and Philistines did  consume beers made from crops such as barley.

They all enjoyed their refreshing beers. Archaeologists have found evidence of this in the form of paintings  of brewers in Egyptian tombs, artifacts showing Babylonian nobles as well as commoners enjoyed their beer on a daily basis. And in addition to these discoveries  searchers  have found jugs with strainer spouts to prevent Philistine drinkers from swallowing  the barley husks as they drank in archaeological digs through modern day Palestine.

So the idea of relaxing and celebrating with the help of  wines and other alcoholic beverages has a long history starting with the ancient Brew Masters such as Noah and others of his era.

Part of The Roots of Modern Publishing

By the time of the Apostle  Paul and other scribes the development of pens and various types of inks was well under way in the Middle East -- the roots of the sophisticated inks used in publishing today.

He and others  used pens, not unlike early quills  or even our modern fountain pens, particularly  the ones without an ink reservoir office workers and students used to tip into the ink bottle to pick up enough ink on the to write a few  words.   Most of us remember those you used to have sitting on your desks as well as in the paper blotter to used to dry the  words to keep them from smudging if you turned to page?

Paul and other used a pen made from a reed carved to a point with a slit in the centre on one end just like a modern fountain pen or a brush to paint the words onto the writing surface

The ink Paul and other scribes used was usually black, but according The Aid to Bible Understanding  some ancients also produced colored inks by adding iron oxides and tinctures to other colors such a rich gold. But apparently black ink predominated and was made basically from amorphous soot or crystalline charcoal contained in a liquid containing gum, blue or varnish which bound the ink to the scrolls.

This ink was not kept in a liquid form however. The ink was stored in dried cakes or bars and when writing the writer had to moisten sufficiently to transfer the ink to the tip of his brush or reed pen.

These early writers worked with two basic ink varieties. Some were quite resistant to smudging once they had dried -- even after they had been soaked in water for several weeks. Others could be wiped out with a damp cloth or sponge. ( Some scholars believe that this feature of some of the inks was the basis for the warning at Exodus 32:33 where Jehovah warned: " Whoever has sinned against me I shall wipe him out of my book.") That would create a very vivid impression in the mind of the listener or reader.

The editors of  Aid to Bible Understanding do not mention  when the first inks were produced or who came up with the idea, but do explain  that," To make the best inks much time was required to grind and disperse the pigments into their  vehicles,"  the liquid mediums containing that gum glue or varnish.