convinced Izates that circumcision was unavoidable for a proselyte. Izates was then circumcised (the story is told by Josephus in his Jewish Antiquities 20). The parallel with the references in the Pauline letters suggests that this is what all the above texts had in mind. That is to say, what is in view in them all was not initial evangelization of Gentiles but the concern to ensure that they were properly converted. Probably, therefore, Mt. 23:15 refers to Pharisees, or their successors (Matthew