Julius

Biblical Account

Julius is named only in Acts 27. Paul had appealed to Caesar (the Roman emperor) before the governor Festus (see Felix and Festus), and as a result he was to be sent to Rome. The man placed in charge of Paul and several other prisoners was "one named Julius, a centurion of Augustus' band" (Acts 27:1). A centurion was a Roman army officer who commanded about one hundred soldiers.

The principal scenes in which Julius appears are as follows:

• When the ship reached Sidon the next day, Julius "courteously entreated Paul, and gave him liberty to go unto his friends to refresh himself" (Acts 27:3).
• At Myra he found a ship of Alexandria sailing to Italy and transferred the party to it (Acts 27:6).
• Paul warned that continuing the voyage would be dangerous, but "the centurion believed the master and the owner of the ship, more than those things which were spoken by Paul" (Acts 27:11). The ship was afterward caught by a tempestuous wind called Euroclydon and drifted for a long time.
• When the sailors tried to slip away secretly in the ship's boat, Paul alerted the centurion and the soldiers, and the soldiers "cut off the ropes of the boat" (Acts 27:31–32).
• When the ship ran aground, the soldiers planned to kill the prisoners lest any should swim out and escape. The centurion, "willing to save Paul," prevented this and brought everyone safely to land (Acts 27:42–44).

Significance Within Scripture

The narrator of Acts recounts this voyage in the first person plural ("we"). Traditionally, this narrator has been identified as the author, Luke. Julius is therefore portrayed as a figure observed firsthand by someone who sailed on the same ship with Paul. In Luke's writings, Roman centurions generally appear in a favorable light; examples include the centurion of Luke 7 and Cornelius in Acts 10, and Julius fits this pattern. In addition, Julius's restraint of the soldiers is read as part of the fulfillment of the promise that Paul must be brought before Caesar and that those sailing with him would not lose their lives (Acts 27:22–24).

Interpretation and Points of Discussion

• Augustus' band: Scholars disagree about exactly what unit this was. Some regard it as a special-duty unit directly under the emperor, while others see it as an ordinary auxiliary unit.
• Julius's faith: Sermons sometimes add the interpretation that Julius came to believe in Christ through Paul's influence. The text, however, says nothing about his faith.
• Textual variant in Acts 28:16: Some later manuscripts contain an additional clause stating that after arriving in Rome the centurion handed over the prisoners. This clause is absent from the text of the New Korean Revised Version.
• The change in Julius's attitude is also frequently noted. At first he followed the captain's judgment rather than Paul's warning (27:11), but in the midst of the crisis he accepted Paul's word (27:31–32).

No significant denominational differences in the interpretation of this figure are known.

In the Korean Church

In the Korean church, Julius is mentioned chiefly in sermons on the "Euroclydon storm" passage of Acts 27. Acts 27:11 in particular is often cited as an example of an attitude that trusts human experience and expertise more than the word of God. In Sunday school, he appears in lessons on Paul's shipwreck, but he is seldom treated as a central figure in his own right.