Julian Is Not in the Bible — but Julius Is, in Acts 27

Julian is not in the Bible, but the name it grew from is. Julian comes from the Roman name Iulianus, taken from the family name Julius, and Acts 27 tells of a centurion named Julius who guarded Paul on his voyage to Rome.

The first thing Luke tells us about that centurion is a kindness. Julius was a Roman officer with prisoners to deliver, and he treated the apostle in his charge as a man with friends and needs. Luke never says what Julius believed. He shows us instead how, on that long voyage, God’s care for Paul came to him through a stranger’s decency.

What does Julian mean?

Julian means “of Julius,” that is, belonging to the Julian family. The Julii were a patrician family of Rome who claimed descent from Iulus, the son of Aeneas, and their most famous member was Julius Caesar. What Julius itself meant is uncertain: it may come from the Greek ioulos, “downy-bearded,” or it may be connected with the god Jupiter.

Julian has been used in England since the Middle Ages, when it was also a woman’s name, from Juliana. Other forms include Julián in Spanish, Julien in French and Giuliano in Italian. It has had mixed company: several early saints bore it, among them the legendary Julian the Hospitaller, and so did Julian the Apostate, the fourth-century emperor who was the last pagan to rule Rome.

Is Julian in the Bible?

Not as Julian, and it has no Hebrew form, since the name is Latin. Two related names do appear in the New Testament. One is Julius, the centurion of Acts 27. The other is Julia, the feminine of Julius, one of the believers Paul greets at the end of his letter to the Romans: “Greet Philologus, Julia, Nereus and his sister, and Olympas and all the Lord’s people who are with them” (Romans 16:15).

Julius the centurion

Writing in the first person, Luke begins the account of the voyage: “When it was decided that we would sail for Italy, Paul and some other prisoners were handed over to a centurion named Julius, who belonged to the Imperial Regiment” (Acts 27:1). The next day the ship put in at Sidon, “and Julius, in kindness to Paul, allowed him to go to his friends so they might provide for his needs” (Acts 27:3).

Weeks later a storm drove the ship across the Mediterranean until it ran aground off Malta. “The soldiers planned to kill the prisoners to prevent any of them from swimming away and escaping. But the centurion wanted to spare Paul’s life and kept them from carrying out their plan” (Acts 27:42-43). He ordered those who could swim to make for land first, and the rest followed on planks and pieces of the ship. All 276 people on board reached the shore. Luke does not say whether Julius ever became a believer.

Julian of Norwich

The best-known Christian to bear the name was a woman. Julian of Norwich (about 1343 to after 1416) was an English anchoress who lived in a cell attached to St Julian’s Church in Norwich. Her writings, now called Revelations of Divine Love, describe visions she received during a severe illness, and they are the earliest surviving writings in English attributed to a woman.

Julius brought everyone on his broken ship safe to the shore of Malta. Centuries later, in a small cell in Norwich, a woman whose name meant “of Julius” wrote the line most often quoted from her: “All shall be well, and all shall be well, and all manner of thing shall be well.”

Related reading

• Is Your Name in the Bible? A Directory of 231 Names