The Bible says in Acts 21:38 "Art not thou that Egyptian, which before these days madest an uproar, and leddest out into the wilderness four thousand men that were murderers?"
What has happened here is that the captain of the local garrison in Jerusalem had been informed of a riot taking place in the outer court of the Jewish temple. The crowd was attempting to beat a man to death. As it turned out this man was the apostle Paul. It was his job to maintain law and order so with that he had his men wade into the mass of people and take Paul prisoner.
This Roman centurion didn't know who he had on his hands now but he knew he had some notable person (a minor celebrity) to be sure. As it turned out he had confused Paul for an Egyptian insurrectionist and as such had arrested him simply because the Jewish mob was trying to kill him. The Egyptian who he had confused Paul with had a one time thousands who followed him into the wilderness because of his promises. Among those promises was that he would soon have the power to knock down the walls of the Roman castle that stood next to the Jewish temple so that the people could take the soldiers by surprise and kill all of their oppressors.
Before that could happen the regional governor had caught wind of this and sent troops to capture and or kill the renegades. So when this false prophet couldn't deliver on his promises the people turned their backs on him and he ran away. Some time had now passed and the sudden uproar convinced the centurion that this man had returned and his former followers were still mad at him and were now trying to kill him for his failure.
It is interesting that this Egyptian was noteworthy enough for his rebellion against Rome to get a brief mention in the Bible. That there was enough known about him for this tribune to suspect that Paul was this very man and based this conclusion solely on the reaction of the Jews he arrested Paul. Yet when it comes down to it in a day and age where ones name seemed to tell everything about them we don't know the Egyptian's name, Josephus mentioned him in his book but he didn't even write this guys name down. Just because you do something big doesn't mean you actually become somebody important for it. Our modern celebrities are celebrated for being good looking, having some talent, or being in the right place at the right time. Yet the vast majority will be forgotten quicker than their rise to fame took. They'll make some one mad, be shown to be a phony, the good looks will fail, or some thing else will come along and they will be has-beens. In this life fame is fleeting. The real question is this, does God know your name?
Revelation 3:5 "He that overcometh, the same shall be clothed in white raiment; and I will not blot out his name out of the book of life, but I will confess his name before my Father, and before his angels."
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