In Acts 4.36, we’re introduced to a man named Joseph.
He’s introduced in such a way as to suggest we’ve previously heard of him. (‘Thus Joseph sold a field...’.)
And, immediately afterwards, we’re told three things about him.
First, the apostles give him the (nick?)name ‘Barnabas’.
Second, he’s a Levite.
And, third, he’s a native of Cyprus.
So, who might he be?
Well, we’ve only met one Joseph before in the book of Acts.
That particular Joseph is mentioned in 1.23 and is also named ‘Bar-Sabbas’,
which is a curious detail.
Like the modern-day Amharic name ‘feresanbat’, the name ‘Bar-Sabbas’ is likely to have been given to people who were been born on the Sabbath.
(For similar conventions, consider names like ‘Haggai’ = ‘born on a feast-day’ and ‘Shabbethai’ = ‘born on the Sabbath’.)
As such, it’s a pretty multi-cultural name. It’s grounded in a thoroughly Jewish word and custom, yet ends in a Greek suffix (-as).
It’s therefore a good fit for a Jew who, like the Joseph of Acts 4, happens to be a native of Cyprus.
Might, therefore, the Joseph of Acts 4 be the Joseph-aka-Barnabas mentioned in Acts 1?
If so, it would explain why the apostles chose to name him ‘Bar-Nabas’. (Just as the name ‘Saul’ sounds like ‘Paul’, so the name ‘Bar-Nabas’ sounds like ‘Bar-Sabbas’, right?)
Furthermore, we’d expect the name ‘Bar-Sabbas’ to be borne by a Levite,
since the only people with similar names (viz. ‘Shabbethai’) in the OT are Levites (cp. Ezra 10.15, Neh. 8.7, 11.16).
It’d therefore be quite neat if the Joseph-aka-Barsabbas of Acts 1 turned out to be the Levite named Barnabas of Acts 4.
And it might not be entirely coincidental that the Joseph of Acts 4 would have made an apt replacement for Judas,
which the Joseph of Acts 1 was (almost) chosen out to do,
since, while Judas was bought a piece of land and ended up facedown in the midst of it, Barnabas freely sold the land he owned for the sake of God’s kingdom and laid it at the feet of the apostles.
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Joseph is a well known type/picture of Christ, so it’s natural for us (as Christians) to want us to map his experiences directly onto Jesus’s, all of which is well and good…
…But we can learn a great deal from a contemplation of Joseph’s life in its original (OT) context. For a start, let’s have a think about Genesis’s general flow.
As the book unfolds, God chooses out a line of promise. One by one its offshoots are peeled away as the story zooms in God’s chosen people (Israel).
The text of Mark 2.26 has caused quite a few folk quite a few problems.
Jesus seems to have thought David took the showbread from the sanctuary when Abiathar was the high priest, but the text of Samuel suggests he did it on Abimelech’s watch.
What’s gone wrong here?
Well, first of all, we need to consider a couple of relevant historical questions.
Question #1: Did Abiathar ever hold the office of high priest?
Well, we’re told three main things about him in his prophecies’ first two verses:
🔹 he was a priest;
🔹 he lived in Anathoth; and
🔹 he was the son of a certain Hilkiah.
Below, we’ll consider these facts in a bit more detail.
Let’s start with Anathoth.
Anathoth wasn’t just any old city; it was a highly significant one.
It was allotted to the line of Aaron, i.e., the line of Israel’s high priest (Josh. 21.13ff.).
As a result, it was where Eli lived.
That’s why when Solomon deposed Abiathar the priest—who was the son of Ahimelech, the son of Ahitub, the son of Phinehas, the son of Eli (I Sam. 14.3, 22.9ff., 22.20, 23.6, 30.7)—, he sent him back to ‘his estate’ in Anathoth (I Kgs. 2.26–27).