Saul (Paul) the Apostle
Saul is a student at the rabbinical training center of Giscala, a renowned center in Upper Galilee. Jesus notices him when he goes there.[1] Saul later finds himself among the executioners of Stephen, his former companion, a student, like him, of Gamaliel.
Saul is ugly. The portrait, drawn by Maria Valtorta, is unflinching:
"Saul instead is short, thickset, almost rickety, his legs are short and thick, a little apart at the knees, which are clearly visible because he has taken his mantle off and he has on only a short greyish tunic. His arms are short and brawny like his legs, his neck is short and thickset, supporting a big brown head with short rough hair, with rather protruding ears, snub nose, thick lips, with high big cheek-bones, bulging forehead, dark rather bulging eyes, neither mild nor kind, but very intelligent under his very arched, thick, ruffled eyelashes. His cheeks are covered with a very thick beard, as bristly as his hair, but cut short. Perhaps because of his very short neck he seems to be slightly hunchbacked or to have very round shoulders."[2]
He is the most furious of furious against Stephen. It is impossible to describe the ferocity of his face.
According to Maria Valtorta, he is slightly younger than Jesus. When Jesus is fully twelve years old, Saul is still a child.[3]
His name
Shaoul (שאול) means "desired, asked of God". Historical reference: the first of the kings of Israel.
Where is he mentioned in the work?
Learn more about this character
Excerpts from the Dictionary of Gospel Characters, According to Maria Valtorta (Msgr. René Laurentin, François-Michel Debroise, Jean-François Lavère, Éditions Salvator, 2012):
Saint Paul (Roman name of Saul) is celebrated on June 29 together with Saint Peter. He would have been born between 5 and 15 AD.[4] According to Maria Valtorta's descriptions, he would have been about 27 years old at the stoning of Stephen followed by his conversion on the road to Damascus and 62 years old at his martyrdom. But according to Saint John Chrysostom[5] he was 68 at his beheading in 67, a less favored hypothesis.
In a dictation to Maria Valtorta, Jesus specifies that Paul was a Sanhedrist for a time.[6] This would explain the mission of arresting Christians that the Sanhedrin entrusts to him according to the Gospel.[7]
His appearance according to tradition
Paul describes himself as "The dwarf".[8] In the Acts of Paul and Thecla (a 2nd-century apocryphon), one of Paul’s disciples describes him with "a bald head, a long and broad nose, black, thick and joined eyebrows, broad shoulders, crooked legs". This description resembles the one given above by Maria Valtorta.
His origin
Paul, said of himself: "I am a Jew. Born in Tarsus in Cilicia, I was nevertheless raised here in this city (Jerusalem), and it was at the feet of Gamaliel that I was trained in the exact observance of the Law of our fathers. I was filled with zeal for God, as you all are today."[9]
According to Saint Jerome,[10] Giscala was the native village of Saint Paul's parents, before they emigrated to Tarsus. It is in this great rabbinical training center that Jesus meets Saul, according to Maria Valtorta.
The end of his life
The Acts of the Apostles end with Paul’s captivity in Rome. He benefits from the custodia militaris: he rents a house where he resides under the guard of a soldier. Nothing is said about the result of the trial before Caesar. It is likely that he benefited from a dismissal.
Freed in the spring of 63, he may have gone to Spain as suggested by his epistle to the Romans,[11] Clement of Rome[12] and some apocrypha.[13] Paul then went to Crete, Macedonia, up to Troas: there, he was again arrested.
According to Eusebius of Caesarea, he was imprisoned in Rome in the autumn of the year 67. There he wrote his second letter to Timothy: it contains his spiritual testament.
Paul was not crucified, but beheaded, under Nero, by virtue of his Roman citizenship.[14]
In 2009, his tomb was authenticated under the altar of the Church of Saint Paul Outside the Walls in Rome.
Notes and references
- ↑ GRM 340
- ↑ GRM 645.3.
- ↑ GRM 645
- ↑ See A.M. Gérard, Dictionary of the Bible, 1989.
- ↑ Saint John Chrysostom, Volume 6, Oration 30 on St Peter and St Paul cited by Tillemont, Memoir to serve Ecclesiastical History, volume 1 page 192 and note 1 page 541.
- ↑ Notebooks, dictation of December 29, 1943.
- ↑ Acts of the Apostles 9, 1-2.
- ↑ 1 Corinthians 15,8..
- ↑ Acts of the Apostles 22,3..
- ↑ St Jerome, De Viris illustribus, 5.
- ↑ Romans 15, 24,28
- ↑ Clement of Rome, Letter to the Corinthians.
- ↑ See A.M. Gérard, Dictionary of the Bible, 1989.
- ↑ Eusebius of Caesarea, Ecclesiastical History, II, 25,5.