Theu´das, a Jewish insurgent, who was slain, while a band of followers that he had induced to join him were scattered and brought to nought. This statement was made by Gamaliel at the meeting of the Sanhedrim held about A.D. 33, to consider what measures should be taken for the suppression of the Gospel now preached and recommended by the virgin zeal of Peter and the apostles (; , sq.). Josephus (Antiq. xx. 5. 1) tells us of a Theudas who, under the procurator Phadus (A.D. 44), set up for a prophet, and brought ruin on himself and many whom he deluded, and attempts have been made, though not very successfully, to identify the Theudas of Gamaliel with the insurgent spoken of by Josephus, who appeared eleven years later.
These remarks have been made to meet the ordinary view of the case. But the name Theudas is an Aramaic form of the Greek Theodotos, which is a literal translation of the Hebrew Matthias or Matthew. It is, then, of a Matthew that Luke speaks; and in Josephus (Antiq. xvii. 6. 2-4) we find a detailed account of one Matthew, a distinguished teacher among the Jews, who, in the latter days of Herod the Great, raised a band of his scholars to effect a social reform in the spirit of the old Hebrew constitution, by 'destroying the heathen works which the king had erected contrary to the law of their fathers.' A large golden eagle, which the king had caused to be erected over the great gate of the Temple, in defiance of the law that forbids images or representations of any living creatures, was an object of their special dislike, which, on hearing a false report that Herod was dead, Matthias and his companions proceeded to demolish; when the king's captain, supposing the undertaking to have a higher aim than was the fact, came upon the riotous reformers with a band of soldiers, and arrested the proceedings of the multitude. Dispersing the mob, he apprehended forty of the bolder spirits, together with Matthias and his fellow-leader Judas. Matthias was burnt.
This Encyclopedia of Biblical Literature is a 6 volume set in 1 book. It has over 2Read More
John Kitto was an English biblical scholar of Cornish descent.Born in Plymouth, John Kitto was a sickly child, son of a Cornish stonemason. The drunkenness of his father and the poverty of his family meant that much of his childhood was spent in the workhouse. He had no more than three years of erratic and interrupted education. At the age of twelve John Kitto fell on his head from a rooftop, and became totally and permanently deaf. As a young man he suffered further tragedies, disappointments and much loneliness. His height was 4 ft 8 in, and his accident left him with an impaired sense of balance. He found consolation in browsing at bookstalls and reading any books that came his way.
From these hardships he was rescued by friends who became aware of his mental abilities and encouraged him to write topical articles for local newspapers, arranging eventually for him to work as an assistant in a local library. Here he continued to educate himself.
One of his benefactors was the Exeter dentist Anthony Norris Groves, who in 1824 offered him employment as a dental assistant. Living with the Groves family, Kitto was profoundly influenced by the practical Christian faith of his employer. In 1829 he accompanied Groves on his pioneering mission to Baghdad and served as tutor to Groves's two sons. In 1833 Kitto returned to England via Constantinople, accompanied by another member of the Groves mission, Francis William Newman. Shortly afterwards he married, and in due course had several children.
A London publisher asked Kitto to write up his travel journals for a series of articles in the Penny Magazine, a publication read at that time by a million people in Britain, reprinted in America and translated into French, German and Dutch. Other writing projects followed as readers enquired about his experiences in the East amidst people living in circumstances closely resembling those of Bible times.
Wikipedia