ACTS 18

D. CORINTH (18:1–17)

1. Paul Arrives in Corinth (18:1–4)

1 After that, Paul left Athens and came to Corinth.

2 There he met with a Jew named Aquila, whose family belonged to Pontus; he had recently come from Italy, with his wife Priscilla, because of Claudius’s edict that all Jews should leave Rome. So Paul joined them,

3 and stayed with them and worked, because he followed the same trade: they were tentmakers by trade.¹

4 He discoursed in the synagogue every sabbath, speaking persuasively to both Jews and Greeks.²

1 From Athens Paul continued his journey in a southwesterly direction, until he reached Corinth.

Corinth, on the Isthmus of Corinth, the land-bridge connecting the Peloponnese with Central and Northern Greece, occupied a most favorable position for commercial enterprise, at the junction of sea routes to the west and east and of land routes to the north and south. It had two ports—Lechaeum, on the Gulf of Corinth (leading to the Ionian Sea and the central and western Mediterranean), and Cenchreae, on the Saronic Gulf (leading to the Aegean Sea and eastern Mediterranean and Black Sea). For long Corinth was a political, commercial, and naval rival of Athens. In 146 B.C., in savage reprisal for an anti-Roman revolt, Corinth was leveled to the ground by the Roman general L. Mummius, and the site lay derelict for a century. Then in 44 B.C., the city was refounded by Julius Caesar and given the status of a Roman colony, with the title Laus Iulia Corinthus (“Corinth, the praise of Julius”). In 27 B.C. it became the seat of administration of the Roman province of Achaia. Corinth was not long in regaining its old commercial prosperity.³ In earlier days Corinth had acquired a reputation for sexual license remarkable even in classical antiquity,⁴ and with the regaining of commercial prosperity Roman Corinth regained something of this old reputation: it is plain to readers of Paul’s Corinthian correspondence that the Christian community which he founded in Corinth had difficulty in maintaining the standard of sexual conduct which the gospel required.⁵

2–3 Even so, Corinth was the kind of city which Paul’s strategic eye discerned as a promising center for intensive evangelism, and there he settled for a considerable time. Not long after, he met a married couple, recently come to Corinth from Italy, with whom he quickly formed a firm and lifelong friendship. These were Aquila and Priscilla, “tentmakers”—or perhaps, more generally, leatherworkers⁶—by trade. It was this that first apparently brought Paul into contact with them, for he himself had been apprenticed to the same trade. This trade was closely connected with the principal product of Paul’s native province, a cloth of goats’ hair called cilicium, used for cloaks, curtains, and other fabrics designed to give protection against wet. In Judaism it was not considered proper for a scribe or rabbi to receive payment for his teaching, so many of them practised a trade in addition to their study and teaching of the law.⁷ Paul, as a matter of policy, earned his living in this way during his missionary career (cf. 20:34; 1 Cor. 9:3–18; 2 Cor. 11:7; 1 Thess. 2:9; 2 Thess. 3:8).⁸

Aquila and Priscilla, we are told, had come to Corinth because the Emperor Claudius had ordered all Jews to leave Rome. This was not the only occasion on which the authorities at Rome saw fit to clean up the city by expelling undesirable groups of oriental incomers. Claudius’s edict is usually connected with a statement by Suetonius, that he banished the Jews from Rome because they were “indulging in constant riots at the instigation of Chrestus.”⁹ This Chrestus may have been an otherwise unknown trouble-maker who was active in Jewish circles in Rome about the middle of the first century, but in that case Suetonius would probably have called him “a certain Chrestus.”¹⁰ Most probably he had the Founder of Christianity in mind but, writing some seventy years after these events, he mistakenly supposed that “Chrestus,” who was mentioned in one of his sources of information as the leader of one of the parties involved, was actually in Rome at the time, taking a prominent part in the contention.¹¹ Suetonius’s statement, in fact, points to dissension and disorder within the Jewish community of Rome resulting from the introduction of Christianity into one or more of the synagogues of the city.

It is difficult to say whether Aquila and Priscilla had any part in this dissension or were simply involuntary victims of the emperor’s expulsion order. In Paul’s references to them he does not suggest that they were converts of his; the greater likelihood is that they were Christians before they left Rome, founder-members, perhaps, of the Roman church.¹² More often than not, Priscilla is named before her husband by both Luke and Paul;¹³ some have inferred from this that she belonged to a higher social class than he—that she was connected, by emancipation if not by birth, with the noble Roman family called gens Prisca. It cannot be known if, like Aquila, she was Jewish by birth. When Paul mentions her in his letters, he uses her more formal name Prisca; Luke calls her by her more familiar name Priscilla, following a practice which is evident in the names of other characters in his narrative.¹⁴ Whatever their antecedents were,¹⁵ Priscilla and Aquila came to Corinth to pursue their trade there, and were joined before long by Paul as a fellow-tradesman.

4 A great commercial city like Corinth inevitably had a considerable Jewish colony, and Paul was able immediately to follow his usual procedure and proclaim the Christian message in the local synagogue.¹⁶ Here, sabbath by sabbath, he held discourse with the Jews and God-fearing Gentiles, showing how Jesus had fulfilled the Old Testament prophecies. According to the Western text, he did so by “inserting the name of the Lord Jesus” as an interpretative expansion in those passages which—as the event proved—pointed forward to him. Even if the Western addition is no part of the original text, it does give us a convincing picture of the sort of thing Paul did.¹⁷

2. Paul Spends Eighteen Months in Corinth (18:5–11)

5 When Silas and Timothy came back from Macedonia, Paul devoted himself to preaching, testifying to the Jews that the Messiah was Jesus.¹⁸

6 When they opposed and reviled him, he shook out his clothes and said to them, “Your blood is on your own heads; I am clear of it. From now on I will go to the Gentiles.”

7 So, quitting the synagogue,¹⁹ he went into the house of a God-fearer called Titius²⁰ Justus, whose house was next door to the synagogue.

8 Crispus, the ruler of the synagogue, with all his household, became a believer in the Lord, and many of the Corinthians, as they listened, believed and were baptized.

9 Then the Lord spoke to Paul in a vision by night: “Do not be afraid,” he said; “speak, and do not be silent,

10 for I am with you, and no assailant will do you any harm. I have many people²¹ in this city.”

11 So he remained there for a year and six months, teaching the word of God among them.

5 After a few weeks, Paul was rejoined by his companions Silas and Timothy, who had returned from Macedonia (perhaps by sea). The news that they brought—especially Timothy’s news about the steadfastness of the sorely tried converts of Thessalonica—came as a great relief to Paul.²² At the same time, a gift of money from his friends in Philippi relieved him for the time being of the necessity to support himself by tentmaking;²³ he was able therefore to concentrate on the preaching of the gospel, and he sought to convince his Jewish hearers that the promised Messiah had come, and had come in the person of Jesus.

6–7 At last his witness in the synagogue stirred up such intense opposition there that he had to find some other place in which to prosecute his evangelism. By a spectacular gesture (shaking out his cloak so that not a speck of dust from the synagogue might adhere to it²⁴) he expressed his resolve to have done with that building and his abhorrence of the slanderous talk in which his opponents were indulging—not so much against Paul himself as against the one whom Paul proclaimed as Messiah and Lord. He had discharged his responsibility to them, he assured them; if they would not accept the news of salvation which he brought, he was now free of blame.²⁵

As at Pisidian Antioch and elsewhere, so at Corinth too he would take his saving message to people who knew how to appreciate it. And he had not far to go. For adjoining the synagogue was the house of a God-fearing Gentile who had listened to Paul and been persuaded of the truth of his words. This man now placed his house at Paul’s disposal, and people who had been accustomed to attend the synagogue did not have to leave their habitual route if they wished to go on hearing Paul: they made their way toward the synagogue, as usual, but turned in next door.

The most probable form of this God-fearer’s name, as given by Luke, is Titius Justus—a Roman nomen and cognomen suggesting that he was a Roman citizen, perhaps a member of one of the families settled in Corinth by Julius Caesar when he made it a Roman colony. But what was his praenomen? There is much to be said for the view, favored by W. M. Ramsay and E. J. Goodspeed, that it was Gaius—that this man is the Gaius named by Paul in 1 Cor. 1:14 as one of the few converts in Corinth whom he baptized with his own hands.²⁶ If so, he is almost certainly to be identified also with “Gaius, who is host to me and to the whole church,” as Paul puts it in Rom. 16:23. A man whose house was large enough to accommodate Paul’s voluntary congregation and (later) the whole church of Corinth (if the identification is well founded) would have been a fairly well-to-do citizen.

8 In 1 Cor. 1:14 Paul mentions another Corinthian convert who was baptized by him personally, Crispus by name. Luke shows us who this Crispus was—no less than the ruler of the synagogue. He and his family²⁷evidently followed Paul on his departure from the synagogue, and joined the new Christian community in Corinth. Many other Corinthians came to hear the good news, and believing it they were baptized and swelled the new community.

9–10 Shortly after Paul’s leaving the synagogue, he had an encouraging experience: he received one of the visions which came to him at critical junctures in his life, heartening him for whatever might lie ahead.²⁸ On this occasion the risen Christ appeared to him by night and assured him that no harm would befall him in Corinth, for all the opposition his witness might stir up. His opponents had made it impossible for him to stay in Thessalonica and Beroea; his opponents in Corinth would not have similar success, however hard they might try to force his departure. He had come to Corinth full of misgivings—“in much fear and trembling,” he says himself (1 Cor. 2:3)—but he should abandon all fear and go on proclaiming the gospel boldly. He would reap an abundant harvest by so doing, for the Lord had many in Corinth who were marked out by him as his own people.²⁹

11 Thus filled with fresh confidence, Paul stayed in Corinth and continued his work of preaching and teaching for a year and a half. The next five years, in fact, were devoted not so much to traveling as to inaugurating and consolidating Christian witness in two important centers west and east of the Aegean—first Corinth and then Ephesus. The time spent in Corinth probably stretched from the fall of A.D. 50 to the spring of A.D. 52; we are able to date this period of Paul’s career with considerable accuracy from the following mention of Gallio as proconsul of Achaia.

3. Paul before Gallio (18:12–17)

12 When Gallio was proconsul of Achaia, the Jews made a concerted attack on Paul. They brought him before the tribunal³⁰

13 with the charge:³¹ “This man incites people to worship God in a manner contrary to the law.”

14 When Paul was on the point of defending himself, Gallio said to the Jews, “Listen, Jews.³² If this were a crime, or some act of malicious fraudulence,³³ it would be reasonable for me to take up your case.

15 But if these are disputes about words and names and your own law, see to it yourselves. I refuse to be a judge of such things.”

16 So he drove them from the tribunal.

17 Then all³⁴ (the bystanders) seized Sosthenes, the ruler of the synagogue, and proceeded to beat him up in front of the tribunal. But Gallio paid no heed to this.³⁵

12 Paul received a divine promise that no harm would befall him through any attack in Corinth, but he was not promised that no attack would be made. An attack was indeed made on him, and one which might have had serious consequences. On this occasion his Jewish opponents, instead of stirring up the city rabble against him or accusing him before the civic authorities, approached the Roman administration of the province. Any decision taken by civic magistrates, like the politarchs of Thessalonica, would have effect only within their limited jurisdiction, but the verdict of a Roman governor would not only be effective within his province but could be followed as a precedent by governors of other provinces. Had the proconsul of Achaia³⁶ pronounced a judgment unfavorable to Paul, the progress of Christianity during the next decade or so could have been attended by much greater difficulties than were actually experienced.

Gallio was a son of the elder Seneca, the rhetorician (c. 50 B.C.-C. A.D. 40), and brother of the younger Seneca, the Stoic philosopher (c. 3 B.C.-A.D. 65). His name was originally Marcus Annaeus Novatus; but after his father brought him to Rome from his native Cordova in the principate of Tiberius, he was adopted by the rhetorician Lucius Junius Gallio, and there-after bore the same name as his adoptive father. His contemporaries speak of him as a man of great personal charm—“no mortal,” said his brother Seneca, “is so pleasant to any one person as Gallio is to everybody.”³⁷ After holding the praetorship in Rome, he was appointed proconsul of Achaia. From an inscription at Delphi in Central Greece, recording a directive from the Emperor Claudius, it can be inferred rather precisely that he entered on his proconsulship in the summer of A.D. 51.³⁸ He left Achaia because of a fever (perhaps before his year of office had expired) and went on a cruise for his health.³⁹ At a later date, after his consulship (A.D. 55),⁴⁰ he took a cruise from Rome to Egypt because of threatened phthisis.⁴¹ In A.D. 65, like other members of his family, he fell victim to Nero’s suspicions.⁴²

13 The charge which was preferred against Paul before Gallio was that of propagating a religion and on that basis forming a society not countenanced by Roman law. The Jewish community and synagogue of Corinth, like Jewish communities and synagogues elsewhere throughout the empire, had the status of a collegium licitum,⁴³ but Paul’s accusers maintained that the gospel which he preached had nothing to do with their ancestral faith: it was no true form of Judaism, and therefore should not share in the protection extended to Judaism by Roman law. Paul should be prohibited from further propagation of the gospel, if not indeed punished for his activity in propagating it thus far.

14–16 An elaborate podium overlooking the lower terrace of the forum of Roman Corinth is commonly pointed out as Gallio’s tribunal, where he sat to administer justice.⁴⁴ On this occasion, Paul was about to open his mouth in reply to the charge brought against him, when Gallio abruptly brought the proceedings to an end. Listening to the charge, he quickly decided that the dispute was internal to the Jewish community, that it concerned conflicting interpretations of Jewish religious law. Paul was obviously as much a Jew as his accusers were. What Paul was propagating, Gallio reckoned, was simply a variety of Judaism which did not happen to commend itself to the leaders of the local Jewish community; and he had no intention of adjudicating on a matter of this kind. Had Paul been charged with a recognizable crime or misdemeanor, he said, he would naturally have taken the matter up;⁴⁵ but as it was plainly a disagreement about Jewish religious terminology, they must settle it themselves. So he bade them begone from his tribunal.

17 As they went away, an incident occurred which reveals how prone the populace of these Gentile cities was to anti-Jewish demonstrations. Taking advantage of the rebuff which the proconsul had dealt to the Jewish leaders, the crowd of bystanders seized one of those leaders, Sosthenes (possibly the successor to Crispus as ruler of the synagogue),⁴⁶ and beat him up in the very presence of the proconsul, who had not yet left the tribunal. But Gallio turned a blind eye to this brutal ventilation of anti-Jewish sentiment.

Gallio’s ruling meant in effect that Paul and his associates, so long as they committed no breach of public order, continued to share the protection which Roman law granted to the practice of Judaism. It probably served as a precedent for other Roman judges, especially as it proceeded from a man whose brother (Seneca) occupied a position of influence at the imperial court. It meant that for the next ten or twelve years, until imperial policy toward Christians underwent a complete reversal,⁴⁷ the gospel could be proclaimed in the provinces of the empire without fear of coming into conflict with Roman law. The next charges brought against Paul before a Roman judge were personal to himself.⁴⁸ Luke’s account of Gallio’s decision is of high relevance to the apologetic motive of his history. And it may be that, as Ramsay thought, the memory of Gallio’s decision was one of the things that encouraged Paul, some years later, to appeal “from the petty outlying court of the procurator of Judaea, who was always much under the influence of the ruling party in Jerusalem, to the supreme tribunal of the Empire.”⁴⁹

E. EPHESUS (18:18–19:20)

1. Hasty Visit to Ephesus (18:18–21)

18 So Paul spent many more days there; then, talking his leave of the brothers, he set sail for Syria, in the company of Priscilla and Aquila. He had his hair cut short in Cenchreae, for he was under a vow.⁵⁰

19 They landed at Ephesus, and⁵¹’ Paul left his companions there. He himself went into the synagogue and held discourse with the Jews.

20 They asked him to stay with them longer, but he did not consent;

21 he took his leave of them, saying,⁵² “I will come back to you, God willing,” and set sail from Ephesus.

18 Paul was not likely to leave Corinth immediately after Gallio had given his decision. That decision, which (without Gallio’s intending it so) proved so favorable for Paul’s mission, was probably given in the summer or early fall of A.D. 51; Paul stayed on for the ensuing winter. At last, however, he left Corinth, for he wished to pay a short visit to Syria and Judaea. Along with Priscilla and Aquila, therefore, he sailed across the Aegean from Cenchreae, the eastern port of Corinth. Before setting sail, he had his hair cut: he had allowed it to grow long for the duration of a vow which he had undertaken. This was probably not a formal Nazirite vow, which could not properly be undertaken outside the Holy Land,⁵³ but a private vow, the fulfilment of which was an act of thanksgiving—possibly for the divine promise of verse 10, which had been confirmed by his preservation from harm throughout his Corinthian ministry.

19 The ship on which they embarked took them to Ephesus. Here Priscilla and Aquila settled down for some years, either transferring their business from Corinth to Ephesus or leaving their Corinthian branch in the care of a manager (as perhaps they had already left their Roman branch) and opening a new branch in Ephesus.

Ephesus was at this time the greatest commercial city of Asia Minor north of the Taurus range, although its harbor required constant dredging because of the alluvium carried down by the Caÿster, at the mouth of which it stood. Standing on the main route from Rome to the east, it enjoyed political importance in addition to its geographical advantages: it was the seat of adminstration of the province of Asia, and at the same time a free Greek city, with its own senate and civic assembly; it was an assize town, and prided itself especially on its title “Temple Warden of Artemis” (cf. 19:35). The great temple of Ephesian Artemis, built to replace an earlier one which was destroyed by fire in 356 B.C., was reckoned one of the seven wonders of the ancient world. Much of the site of Roman Ephesus is unoccupied; it has been excavated over many years by Austrian archaeologists, who have restored some of the buildings. Part of the site is occupied by the town of Selçuk, formerly called Ayasoluk (a name commemorating the Ephesian residence of “John the Divine”).⁵⁴

There was a large settlement of Jews at Ephesus. The privileges granted them in 44 B.C. by Dolabella (a partisan of Julius Caesar, and Roman consul in that year) were subsequently confirmed by the civic authorities⁵⁵ and by the Emperor Augustus and his lieutenants.⁵⁶ Paul now paid a brief visit to their synagogue before continuing his journey.

20–21 According to the Western text, Paul was eager to reach Jerusalem in time for one of the Jewish festivals. If the festival was Passover, there was probably a good reason for his haste: the seas were closed to navigation until March 10,⁵⁷ and in A.D. 52 Passover fell in early April. He had time to hold some preparatory discourse with the members of the synagogue, but although they were interested in what he had to say and asked him to stay longer, he was unable to do so. A ship was about to leave the Ephesian harbor which might bring him to Judaea in time for his appointment, so he bade them farewell and promised, if it were God’s will, to come back and spend more time with them.

2. Brief Visit to Judaea and Syria (18:22–23)

22 Having landed at Caesarea, he went up and greeted the church, and then went down to Antioch.

23 Having spent some time there, he departed and went through the Galatian region and Phrygia, city by city, strengthening all the disciples.

22 Paul’s ship from Ephesus brought him to Caesarea, then the chief Mediterranean port of Palestine. When the wind is east of north, it is easier to put in at Caesarea than at Seleucia. Having landed at Caesarea, he went up to Jerusalem and greeted the mother-church. Jerusalem is not mentioned, but it is certainly implied:⁵⁸ a reference in a Judaean setting to “the church” without qualification could only be to the church of Jerusalem, and it is from Jerusalem, not from Caesarea, that one would “go down”. (One would not “go down” from a place on the coast, like Caesarea, to an inland city, like Antioch.) Whether he had any special commission to discharge in Jerusalem in connection with the festival or otherwise, Luke does not say. A few scholars attach considerable importance to this Jerusalem visit, identifying it with the visit described by Paul in Gal. 2:1–10.⁵⁹ Apart from chronological problems involved in this identification, there is the major difficulty that Barnabas, who accompanied Paul to Jerusalem on the occasion mentioned in Gal. 2:1, was no longer in his company at this time.

When Paul had completed whatever he had to do in Jerusalem, he “went down” to Antioch (for the expression we may compare 11:27, where a group of prophets “came down” from Jerusalem to Antioch).⁶⁰

23 Antioch (on the Orontes) was the city from which Paul had set out on his missionary journey with Silas (as on his earlier missionary journey with Barnabas), and, although Antioch was no longer his base, he may well have told the church there of God’s continued dealings with him and of other Gentiles who had entered by the same “door of faith” as the Gentiles of Cyprus and South Galatia, whose conversion he and Barnabas had reported to that church some years before (14:27).

After spending some time in Antioch, he set out on his travels again. An impression of haste is given by the succession of participles in the Greek text of verses 22 and 23; in fact a journey of about 1500 miles is covered in these two verses and in 19:1. Luke was probably dependent here on a skeleton itinerary—not the same itinerary as that represented by the “we” narrative of Acts, which includes more detail. From Antioch Paul set out for central Asia Minor by the same land route which he and Silas had previously followed, crossing the Taurus range by the Cilician Gates. Although “the Galatian region and Phrygia” here is not the same phrase as is used in 16:6 (“the Phrygian and Galatian region”),⁶¹ there is probably not much material difference between them. W. M. Ramsay and W. M. Calder thought (rightly, it may be) that “the Galatic region” here meant Lycaonia Galatica (i.e., that part of Lycaonia which lay within the province of Galatia, as distinct from eastern Lycaonia, which formed part of the kingdom of Antiochus).⁶²

In any case, Paul seems to have passed once more through Derbe, Lystra, Iconium, and Pisidian Antioch, not carrying out pioneer evangelism but giving help and encouragement to old friends and converts. On this occasion no hindrance was placed on his westward path, so his way was now open to Ephesus.

3. Apollos (18:24–28)

24 Now a Jew named Apollos,⁶³ whose family belonged to Alexandria, came to Ephesus. He was a man of learning,⁶⁴ well versed in the scriptures.

25 He had been instructed⁶⁵ in the way of the Lord and was aglow with the Spirit;⁶⁶ as he spoke, he taught the story of Jesus accurately, although the only baptism he knew was John’s.

26 He began to express himself freely in the synagogue. When Priscilla and Aquila⁶⁷ heard him, they took him home with them and set forth the way of God to him more accurately.

27 When he wished to cross over to Achaia, the brothers encouraged him and wrote to the disciples there, asking them to give him a welcome. When he arrived, he gave great help to the believers through (divine) grace;⁶⁸

28 he argued strenuously and convincingly with the Jews, and that in public, as he showed⁶⁹ by the scriptures that the Messiah was Jesus.

24–25 Between Paul’s departure from Ephesus (after his hasty visit) and his return to it (after he had been to Judaea and Syria) another extremely interesting Christian arrived in the city. This was Apollos, a Jew from Alexandria—perhaps a traveling merchant of a type not unknown in the first century,⁷⁰ who gave welcome help in the synagogues of cities which he visited. It is not expressly stated (except in the Western text) that Apollos received his accurate instruction in “the way of the Lord” (i.e., the gospel) in his native Alexandria, but he may well have done so. The gospel certainly reached Alexandria at a very early date, although the origins of Alexandrian Christianity are lost in obscurity (only in the second half of the second century does the obscurity begin to be dissipated).⁷¹

Apollos’s understanding of Christianity deviated in at least one important respect from the form of Christianity, based on Jerusalem, which is depicted for us in Acts: the only baptism of which he knew was the baptism administered by John the Baptist; baptism in the name of Jesus, as proclaimed by Peter on the day of Pentecost (cf. 2:38), was evidently unknown to him. It has been suggested that his “accurate” knowledge of the story of Jesus came to him from a primitive gospel writing not unlike our Gospel of Mark;⁷² it is doubtful, however, if the word “instructed” would be satisfied by a reading knowledge; it rather implies listening to a teacher. But Apollos combined great knowledge of the scriptures with a masterly skill in expounding their messianic content, and this was coupled with spiritual fervor—an expression which probably denoted not so much an enthusiastic temperament as possession by the Spirit of God (which is what it means when used by Paul in Rom. 12:11).⁷³ It may seem strange, no doubt, that someone who was indwelt and empowered by the Spirit should nevertheless know nothing of Christian baptism; but primitive Christianity was made up of many strands, and of some of those strands we have little or no knowledge. Even after his further instruction, Apollos is not said to have received Christian baptism.⁷⁴

26 Priscilla and Aquila, who continued to attend the synagogue in Ephesus after Paul’s departure, listened to Apollos when he began to expound the scriptures there, and were greatly impressed by the learning and skill which he devoted to the defense of the gospel. No one else, in their experience, came so near their friend Paul in this ability. As they listened, they became aware of some gaps in his knowledge, accurate as it was, so they took him home and set forth “the way of God” to him more accurately still (they themselves had probably had the same experience when they met Paul and he supplemented the knowledge of the Way which they had acquired in Rome). Arnold Ehrhardt remarks that Paul was a greater asset to the Jerusalem church than it gave him due credit for, for either directly (as in 19:1–7) or indirectly, through his disciples (as here), he brought deviant forms of primitive Christianity into line with the Jerusalem way.⁷⁵ That the Jerusalem way is the norm is taken for granted by Luke.⁷⁶ But Priscilla and Aquila’s procedure was admirable: how much better it is to give such private help to a teacher whose understanding of his subject is deficient than to correct or denounce him publicly!

27–28 After some time, Apollos wished to cross the Aegean and visit Greece: according to the Western text, he was invited to do so by some Corinthians who made his acquaintance in Ephesus. At all events, he went to Corinth, armed with a letter of introduction from his friends in Ephesus to the Corinthian church. He proved himself a tower of strength to the believers in Corinth, both by his teaching in the church and by his preaching to those outside, especially to the Jews of Corinth, as he argued cogently (refuting all counter-arguments) that the Messiah of whom the scriptures spoke must be identified with Jesus of Nazareth.⁷⁷ The influence that Apollos exercised in Corinth may be gauged from the references made to him in Paul’s Corinthian correspondence. Paul speaks of him as watering the seed which he himself had sown.⁷⁸ If some of the Corinthian Christians were disposed to claim Apollos as a party leader to the detriment of Paul⁷⁹ (impressed perhaps by his Alexandrian methods of biblical interpretation), there is no hint that Apollos himself encouraged this tendency, and Paul speaks of him in warm terms as an appreciated colleague.⁸⁰

1. The Western text of vv. 2 and 3 appears to have run somewhat as follows: “And he found Aquila, a man of Pontus by family, who had lately come from Italy with Priscilla his wife, and he joined them. Now these had departed from Rome because Claudius Caesar had commanded all Jews to leave Rome, and they settled in Achaia. And Paul became known to Aquila because he was of the same race and the same trade, and he stayed with them and worked, for they were tentmakers by trade."

2. The Western text of v. 4 runs: “And entering into the synagogue each sabbath day he held discourse, inserting the name of the Lord Jesus, and spoke persuasively not only to Jews but also to Greeks."

3. See O. Broneer, “Corinth: Center of St. Paul’s Missionary Work in Greece,” BA 14 (1951), pp. 78–96; J. Wiseman, The Land of the Ancient Corinthians (Göteborg, 1978), and “Corinth and Rome, I: 228 B.C.–A.D. 267,” ANRW 2.7.1 (Berlin, 1979), pp. 438–548; J. Murphy-O’Connor, St. Paul’s Corinth: Texts and Archaeology. GNS 6 (Wilmington, DE, 1983).

4. In classical Greek (lit., “act the Corinthian”) means to practise fornication; (“Corinthian companions”) or (“Corinthian girls”) were harlots. The temple of Aphrodite on Acrocorinthus (the acropolis of Corinth) gave religious sanction to this kind of activity. In Roman Corinth the temple of Aphrodite was on a much more modest scale than its classical predecessor.

5. Cf. 1 Cor. 5:1–13; 6:12–20; 2 Cor. 12:21.

6. For this extended sense of cf. the extended sense of Eng. “saddler,” which has come to mean a worker or dealer in leather and not only a maker of saddles.

7. Hillel is credited with the observation: “He who makes a profit from the crown of the Torah shall waste away” ( 4.7)—i.e., one should not give religious instruction for money. At a later date, Gamaliel III commended the study of the Torah in combination with some “secular” occupation: “All study of the Torah which is not combined with work will ultimately be futile and lead to sin” ( 2.2). Greek culture, on the other hand, tended to despise manual labor; an exception is provided by scientific writers, who speak respectfully of craftsmen. In their attitude L. C. A. Alexander finds a possible background for Luke’s totally matter-of-fact reference to Paul’s practice here (“Luke’s Preface in the Context of Greek Preface-Writing,” NovT 28 [1986], p. 70).

8. R. F. Hock, who examines Paul’s manual work in a Hellenistic social setting (cf. “Paul’s Tentmaking and the Problem of his Social Class,” JBL 97 [1978], pp. 555–64; “The Workshop as a Social Setting for Paul’s Missionary Preaching,” CBQ 41 [1979], pp. 438–50; The Social Context of Paul’s Ministry: Tentmaking and Apostleship [Philadelphia, 1980]), discerns a polemic note in Paul’s own references to it; there is no such note in Luke’s record here.

9. Life of Claudius 25.4. The question arises of the relation between this action and that recorded by Dio Cassius (History 60.6): “As the Jews had again increased in numbers, but could with difficulty be banished from the capital without a tumult because of their number, he [Claudius] did not actually expel them, but forbade them to meet in accordance with their ancestral customs.” The action recorded by Dio is dated at the beginning of Claudius’s principate. E. M. Smallwood rightly distinguishes two actions—the earlier one, when Claudius imposed limited restrictions on the Jews of Rome, and the later one, when (the limited restrictions having proved ineffective) he expelled them (The Jews under Roman Rule [Leiden, 1976], pp. 210–16). The expulsion order is most probably to be dated in A.D. 49—a date which has the doubtful authority of Orosius (History 7.6.15–16) but fits in well with other chronological data.

10. Chrestus (Gk. , “useful”) was a common name in the Graeco-Roman world, especially among slaves, and appears as a variant spelling for the unfamiliar Christus (). (In Greek the two words were pronounced alike.) For the view that the reference is to some messianic claimant actually present in Rome at the time see R. Eisler, The Messiah Jesus and John the Baptist (London, 1931), p. 581; E. A. Judge and G. S. R. Thomas, “The Origin of the Church at Rome,” RTR 25 (1966), p. 87.

11. For a similar inference in the twentieth century see R. Graves and J. Podro. Jesus in Rome (London, 1957), pp. 38–53.

12. See A. Harnack, “Probabilia über Adresse und den Verfasser des Hebäerbriefs,” ZNW 1 (1900), pp. 16–41, especially pp. 32ff.

13. Cf. vv. 18, 26; Rom. 16:3; 2 Tim. 4:19.

14. “Luke regularly uses the language of conversation, in which the diminutive forms were usual; and so he speaks of Priscilla, Sopatros and Silas always, though Paul speaks of Prisca, Sosipatros and Silvanus” (Ramsay, St. Paul the Traveller [London, ¹⁴1920], p. 268).

15. “There is probably much to discover with regard to this interesting pair” (St. Paul the Traveller, p. 269) these words are as true today as when Ramsay first penned them in 1895. There is no reason to connect this Priscilla with the lady of the same name after whom the Cemetery of Priscilla on the Via Salaria, one of the earliest Christian catacombs in Rome, is named. Nor should the name of Aquila be connected with the Acilii Glabriones, a noble Roman family which owned a crypt in this cemetery.

16. A fragmentary door-inscription in Greek, found at Corinth, and dated variously between 100 B.C. and A.D. 400, evidently read when complete: “Synagogue of the Hebrews” (cf. B. Powell, “Greek Inscriptions from Corinth,” AJA 2,7 [1903], pp. 60–61, § 40; A. Deissmann, Light from the Ancient East, E.T. [London, ²1927], p. 16).

17. For such an interpretative insertion cf. Isa. 42:1: 52:13 in the Targum of Jonathan, where “Messiah” is inserted after “my servant,” or Isa. 42:1 LXX, where “Jacob” is inserted before “my servant” and “Israel” before “my chosen one.”

18. The Western text characteristically amplifies to “the Lord Jesus,” and goes on: “And while much discussion was taking place and the scriptures were being interpreted …”

19. Gk. ("thence"), which the Western text mistakenly interprets as “from Aquila” (but Paul did not move his private lodgings from Aquila’s house to that of Titius Justus, but made Titius Justus’s house his teaching base instead of the synagogue).

20. Titius is spelled as Titus in E 36 1175 1739 al syr^pesh cop and omitted from A B2 D^* and the Byzantine text.

21. Gk. . As in 15:14, , the designation of Israel as the people of God, now embraces all believers without distinction, Gentiles as well as Jews.

22. Cf. 1 Thess. 3:6–10.

23. Cf. 2 Cor. 11:9; also Phil. 4:16, which probably means, “Both (when I was) in Thessalonica, and more than once (in other places) you sent me something for my need.”

24. Cf. 13:51.

25. For the general sense cf. Ezek. 33:5.

26. Cf. W. M. Ramsay, Pictures of the Apostolic Church (London, 1910), p. 205, n. 2; E. J. Goodspeed, “Gaius Titius Justus,” JBL 69 (1950), pp. 382–83.

27. For the conversion of households cf. 16:15, 31–34.

28. Cf. 23:11; 27:23–24.

29. Cf. p. 349, n. 21.

30. The Western text reads, “the Jews with one accord [, translated “concerted” above], having taken counsel among themselves against Paul, laid hands on him and led him to the proconsul.”

31. The Western text reads “shouting against him and saying.”

32. Gk. (the Western text has the fuller form ).

33. Gk. . Moulton and Milligan, Vocabulary of the Greek Testament (London, 1930), p. 563, quote the sense “false pretences” for (cf. 13:10, ).

34. The Western and Byzantine texts read “all the Greeks” (a correct gloss).

35. The Western text paraphrases, “Gallio pretended not to see.”

36. Achaia was governed by a proconsul from 27 B.C. to A.D. 15, when it was combined with Macedonia and Moesia to form one imperial province; in A.D. 44 it was handed back to the senate and was once more governed by a proconsul. “It was a province of the second rank”; the proconsul held office “after holding the praetorship, and generally before the consulship” (Ramsay, St. Paul the Traveller, p. 258).

37. Seneca, Natural Questions 4a, Preface, 11; cf. Statius, Silvae 2.7.32; Dio Cassius, Hist. 61.35.

38. This inscription, dated in the period of Claudius’s twenty-sixth acclamation as imperator (i.e., within the first seven months of A.D. 52), refers to “my friend Gallio, proconsul of Achaia,” in terms which imply that Gallio has held that office recently but holds it no longer. The summer of A.D. 51 is thus indicated as the latest date for Gallio’s taking up the proconsulship. On this inscription (SIG 2³, § 801) see A. Brassac, “Une inscription de Delphes et la chronologie de Saint Paul.” RB 10 (1913), pp. 36–53, 207–17; A. Plassart, “L’inscription de Delphes mentionnant le Proconsul Gallion,” RÉG 80 (1967), pp. 372–78; B. Schwank, “Der sogenannte Brief an Gallio und die Datierung des 1 Thess.,” BZ n.s. 15 (1971), pp. 265–66; J. H. Oliver, “The epistle of Claudius which mentions the Proconsul Junius Gallio,” Hesperia 40 (1971), pp. 239–40; K. Haacker, “Die Gallio-Episode und die paulinische Chronologie,” BZ n.s. 16 (1972), pp. 252–55; C. J. Hemer, “Observations on Pauline Chronology,” in Pauline Studies, ed. D. A. Hagner and M. J. Harris (Exeter/Grand Rapids, 1980), pp. 6–9; J. Murphy-O’Connor, St. Paul’s Corinth, pp. 149–50, where Paul’s appearance before Gallio is dated between July and October, A.D. 51. G. Lüdemann (Paul, Apostle to the Gentiles: Studies in Chronology, E.T. [London, 1984], pp. 158–75), who dates Paul’s evangelization of Corinth ten years earlier than this, assigns the Gallio incident to Paul’s last visit to the city (cf. 20:2–3) a conclusion to be accepted only if the evidence for it were singularly compelling (which it is not).

39. Seneca, Moral Epistles 104.1.

40. On the date of his consulship see E. M. Smallwood, “Consules Suffecti of A.D. 55.” Historia 17 (1968), p. 384.

41. Pliny, Natural History 31.33.

42. Dio Cassius, Hist. 62.25.

43. See S. Applebaum, “The Legal Status of the Jewish Communities in the Diaspora,” in The Jewish People in the First Century, ed. S. Safrai and M. Stern, 1 (Assen, 1974), pp. 420–63, especially p. 460; also Schürer, pp. 107–25.

44. It has been held, however, that this was used only for specially formal occasions and not for trivial hearings like that recorded here; cf. E. Dinkier, “Das Bema zu Korinth,” in Signum Crucis: Aufsätze zum Neuen Testament und zur christlichen Archäologie (Tübingen, 1967), pp. 118–33.

45. Gk. (for this legal sense of , meaning “accept a complaint,” cf. BAGD, p. 65).

46. If this is the Sosthenes of 1 Cor. 1:1, then he became a Christian soon after this painful experience. But there is no means of knowing if the same person is intended.

47. Nero’s action against the Christians of Rome in the aftermath of the fire of A.D. 64 was evidently a personal initiative. But with the growth of Gentile Christianity it was no longer possible for the church to profit from the protection extended by Roman law to the synagogue.

48. Cf. 24:5–8.

49. St. Paul the Traveller, p. 260.

50. The Western text (represented by lat^h) ascribes the vow and the hair-cutting to Aquila (“Aquila, who since he had made a vow, had shorn his head”); the Latin Vulgate ascribes the action to both Priscilla and Aquila (“who had shorn their heads in Cenchreae, for they had a vow”).

51. The Western text inserts “on the following sabbath.”

52. The Western and Byzantine texts add: “I must by all means keep the coming festival in Jerusalem, but …”

53. If the vow was made in another country, its fulfillment required a residence of at least thirty days in Judaea, and at the end of that time the hair would be shorn and offered in the temple (cf. Num. 6:18). The vow mentioned in 21:23–26 below was a real Nazirite vow (see the Mishnaic tractate Nāzîr). It is grammatically possible to make Aquila the subject of the following verbs, but “the natural emphasis marks Paul as the subject here” (Ramsay, St. Paul the Traveller, p. 263).

54. Ayasoluk is a corruption of Gk. , “the holy divine.” The hill on which Justinian’s basilica of St. John stands is still commonly called the hill of Ayasoluk.

55. Cf. Josephus, Ant. 14.225–27.

56. Cf. Josephus, Ant. 16.162–68, 172–73. On Ephesus see O. Benndorf and others, Forschungen in Ephesos, I- (Vienna, 1906- ); W. M. Ramsay, Letters to the Seven Churches of Asia (London, 1909), pp. 210–50; D. Magie, Roman Rule in Asia Minor (Princeton, 1950), I, pp. 74–76; II, pp. 885–88; F. Miltner, Ephesos: Stadt der Artemis und des Johannes (Vienna, 1958); J. Keil, Ephesos: Ein Führer durch die Ruinenstätte und ihre Geschichte (Vienna, ²1964); also “Asia,” RAC I, cols. 740–49; C. Foss, Ephesus After Antiquity (Cambridge, 1979); D. Knibbe and W. Alzinger, “Ephesos vom Beginn der römischen Herrschaft in Kleinasien bis zum Ende der Prinzipatszeit: Geschichte und Archäologie,” ANRW 2.7.2 (Berlin, 1980), pp. 748–830; C. J. Hemer, The Letters to the Seven Churches of Asia in their Local Setting (Sheffield, 1986), pp. 35–56.

57. Vegetius, On Military Affairs 4.39.

58. Pace B. H. Streeter, “The Primitive Text of the Acts,” JTS 34 (1933), p. 237, who maintains that Caesarea is intended and that the Western text of 19:1 (see p. 362, n. 1) should be transferred to this point, as explaining Paul’s failure to carry out his original plan to go to Jerusalem, voiced by him in the Western text of v. 21 above (see p. 354, n. 52).

59. J. Knox, Chapters in a Life of Paul (Nashville, TN, 1950), pp. 68–69; J. van Bruggen, “Na Veertien Jaren” (Kampen, 1973), pp. 40–43, 223–25; G. Lüdemann, Paul, Apostle to the Gentiles: Studies in Chronology, pp. 152–56. According to Knox and Lüudemann this was Paul’s only visit to Jerusalem between those of 9:26 (= Gal. 1:18) and 21:15. J. Wellhausen earlier held this visit to be a doublet of that in 21:15 (“Noten zur Apostelgeschichte,” NGG [1907], pp. 1–25; “Kritische Analyse der Apostelgeschichte,” AGG n.s. 15.2 [1914], pp. 37–38), followed by A. Loisy, Les Actes des Apôtres (Paris, 1920), pp. 708–9.

60. That different verbs are used— in 11:27 (cf. 15:1, 30) and here—does not affect the force of the common prefix .

61. is used substantivally here, adjectivally in 16:6.

62. See W. M. Ramsay, HDB II (Edinburgh, 1899), p. 90 (s.v. “Galatia. Region of’); W. M. Calder, “Asia Minor in the New Testament,” in Commentary on the Bible, ed. A. S. Peake, Supplement (London, 1936), p. 32. K. Lake agrees (Beginnings 1.5, pp.239–40) that Ramsay’s view, which he himself accepted when he wrote The Earlier Epistles of St. Paul (London, 1911), pp. 260–61, “certainly fits the facts.”

63. calls him “Apelles,” D “Apollonius” (the full form of his name) and the Latin Vulgate “Apollo.”

64. Gk. (the adjective means “learned” in both classical and Modern Greek; the meaning “eloquent” is secondary).

65. The Western text adds “in his native place” ().

66. Or “fervent in spirit” (Gk. ).

67. The Western text reverses the order to “Aquila and Priscilla” (see p. 326, n. 20, on 17:12).

68. It is difficult to decide whether “through (divine) grace” should be construed with “help” or “believe.” In the Western text v. 27 is expanded: “And some Corinthians who were on a visit to Ephesus and had heard him invited him to cross over with them to their native place. When he consented, the Ephesians wrote to the disciples to receive the man; and when he took up residence in Achaia he was of great help in the churches.”

69. The Western text reads “discoursed and showed.”

70. Like Ananias in Adiabene (Josephus, Ant. 20.34–42).

71. See H. I. Bell, Jews and Christians in Egypt (London, 1924); “Evidences of Christianity in Egypt during the Roman Period,” HTR 37 (1944), pp. 185–208; W. Bauer, Orthodoxy and Heresy in Earliest Christianity (1934, ²1964), E.T. (Philadelphia, 1971), pp. 44–60; E. Molland, The Conception of the Gospel in Alexandrian Theology (Oslo, 1938); C. H. Roberts, “The Christian Book and the Greek Papyri,” JTS 50 (1949), pp. 155–68; Manuscript, Society and Belief in Early Christian Egypt (London, 1971); S. G. F. Brandon, The Fall of Jerusalem and the Christian Church (London, 1951), pp. 217–43; A. Ehrhardt, “Christianity before the Apostles’ Creed,” The Framework of the New Testament Stories (Manchester, 1964), pp. 151–99; L. W. Barnard, “St. Mark and Alexandria,” HTR 57 (1964), pp. 145–50; “St. Stephen and Early Alexandrian Christianity,” NTS 7 (1960–61), pp. 31–45; M. Smith, Clement of Alexandria and a Secret Gospel of Mark (Cambridge, MA, 1973); E. A. Judge and S. R. Pickering, “Papyrus Documentation of Church and Community in Egypt to the Mid-Fourth Century,” JAC 20 (1977), pp. 47–71. Those works which are based on papyrus evidence (e.g., those by H. I. Bell. C. H. Roberts, E. A. Judge, and S. R. Pickering) are less speculative than some of the others listed.

72.F. Blass, Philology of the Gospels (London, 1898), pp. 29–31.

73. “The use of the expression ‘fervent in the Spirit’ is unambiguously defined by Rom. 12:11 as a phrase current in the language of Christian edification; and its position between two clauses concerned with Apollos as a Christian establishes its meaning” (E. Käsemann, “The Disciples of John the Baptist in Ephesus,” E.T. in Essays on New Testament Themes [London, 1964], p. 143). G. W. H. Lampe goes farther (indeed too far): “Possibly a direct commission from the Lord was deemed to have been conferred upon him [by] the Spirit, for he ranked high among the apostles, being regarded by the Corinthians as standing approximately upon the same level as St. Peter or St. Paul” (The Seal of the Spirit [London, 1951], p. 66). See also J. H. A. Hart, “Apollos,” JTS 7 (1905–6), pp. 16–28; B. T. D. Smith, “Apollos and the Twelve Disciples at Ephesus,” JTS 16 (1914–15), pp. 241–46; H. Preisker, “Apollos und die Johannesjünger in Act 18, 24–19, 6,” ZAW 30 (1931), pp. 301–4; E. Schweizer, “Die Bekehrung des Apollos, Ag 18, 24–26,” Beiträge zur Theologie des Neuen Testaments: Neutestamentliche Aufsätze (1955–1970) (Zürich, 1970), pp. 71–79; C.K. Barrett, “Apollos and the Twelve Disciples of Ephesus,” in The New Testament Age: Essays in Honor of Bo Reicke, ed. W. C. Weinrich, I (Macon, GA, 1984), pp. 29–39.

74. B. T. D. Smith (“Apollos and the Twelve Disciples at Ephesus,” p. 245) thinks it “may safely be inferred from the narrative” that he did now receive Christian baptism. But this is not a safe inference. Apollos, if he had already received the Spirit, was not on the same footing as the disciples of 19:1–7. For him, as evidently for the original apostles, John’s baptism plus the receiving of the Spirit conveyed all that Christian baptism could have conveyed. (The baptism of the Gentile Cornelius in 10:44–48 after his reception of the Spirit was a sign of his being welcomed into the community of God’s believing people.)

75. The Framework of the New Testament Stories, p. 94.

76. Cf. G. W. H. Lampe, St. Luke and the Church of Jerusalem (London, 1969), p. 26.

77. The same turn of phrase is used of him here as is used of Paul in v. 5 above.

78. 1 Cor. 3:6.

79. 1 Cor. 1:12; 3:4.

80. Cf. 1 Cor. 16:12. Luther’s suggestion that Apollos was the writer to the Hebrews (in a sermon on 1 Cor. 3:4ff. in 1537 [Weimar edition 45, p. 389] and in his Commentary on Genesis, 1545 [Weimar edition 44, p. 709]) has been propounded afresh and supported with new arguments by (among others) T. W. Manson, “The Problem of the Epistle to the Hebrews” (1949), Studies in the Gospels and Epistles (Manchester, 1962), pp. 242–58; W. F. Howard, “The Epistle to the Hebrews,” Interpretation 5 (1951), pp. 80–91; C. Spicq, L’Épître aux Hébreux (Paris, 1952–53), I, pp. 209–19; H. W. Montefiore, A Commentary on the Epistle to the Hebrews (New York/London, 1964), pp. 9–29.

ACTS 19

4. Paul and the Twelve Disciples of Ephesus (19:1–7)

1 While Apollos was at Corinth, Paul passed through the higher country and came down to Ephesus.¹ There he found some disciples.

2 “Did you receive the Holy Spirit when you believed?” he asked them. “No,” said they; “we never even heard that the Holy Spirit is available.”²

3“What baptism did you receive,³ then?” he asked. “John’s baptism,” said they.

4 Then Paul said, “John baptized with a baptism of repentance, telling the people to believe in the one who was coming after him, that is to say, in Jesus.”

5 When they heard this, they were baptized into the name of the Lord Jesus.⁴

6 Then, when Paul had laid his hands on them, the Holy Spirit came on them, and they proceeded to speak with tongues and to prophesy.

7 The men were about twelve in all.

1 Having visited the churches of South Galatia, Paul continued his westward way to Ephesus, “taking the higher-lying and more direct route, not the regular trade route on the lower level down the Lycus and Maeander valleys.”⁵ Part of Asian Phrygia, through which he passed, was popularly known as Upper Phrygia. He would approach Ephesus from the north side of Mount Messogis (modern Aydin Daglari).

By the time he reached Ephesus, Apollos had crossed the Aegean to Corinth. Shortly after his arrival in Ephesus, Paul met a dozen men whose knowledge of the Way was considerably more defective than Apollos’s had been before Priscilla and Aquila gave him the instructions he lacked. When the men are called “disciples” without further qualification, that (in accordance with Luke’s usage) seems to mean that they were disciples of Jesus.⁶ Had Luke meant to indicate that they were disciples of John the Baptist (as has sometimes been deduced from v. 3), he would have said so explicitly.⁷ How they acquired their knowledge of Jesus can only be guessed—it must have been from a source independent of the main Jerusalem-based stream which Luke traces in Acts—but when they heard of him, they believed in him. This at least is implied in Paul’s question, “Did you receive the Holy Spirit when you believed?”⁸

2 Paul’s question implies something else: when he met them and conversed with them, he not only sensed that their knowledge of the Way was defective; he was able to put his finger on the defect. There was nothing to show that they had ever received the Holy Spirit. Hence his straightforward question. Their answer to it proved that his diagnosis was correct.

Their answer must be understood in its context. Standing by itself, it might mean that the very expression “Holy Spirit” was new to them. If they had any Old Testament background at all, they would have had some idea of the Spirit of God, sometimes called his “Holy Spirit.”⁹ More particularly, since they had received John’s baptism, they would presumably have been told that John’s baptism was preparatory, in view of the approach of one who was going to baptize with the Holy Spirit.¹⁰ If so, they did not know that Jesus, in whom they had believed, was the one who would administer this baptism with the Holy Spirit, or that this baptism had now been inaugurated. Certainly they had never received the Holy Spirit. In this they were less advanced than Apollos, who when he came to Ephesus was already “aglow with the Spirit” (18:25).¹¹

3 Paul’s question about their baptism implies a connection between the receiving of the Spirit and baptism.¹² He assumed that they had been baptized (an unbaptized believer is scarcely contemplated in the New Testament), or else they themselves had mentioned their baptism. It was an anomaly in his eyes that a baptized person should not have received the Spirit, so he questioned them more closely, and learned that they had received John’s baptism. Where and from whom they had received it is not said: it is conceivable that they had received it at John’s own hands in Judaea a quarter of a century before, but there are other possibilities. There is no way of knowing if John’s distinctive ministry was continued by some of his disciples after his death.

4 John’s baptism was one of preparation rather than one of fulfilment, as Christian baptism now was. Accordingly, Paul explained to them the anticipatory character of John’s baptism and its close association with his announcement of the stronger one than himself who was about to come. Paul’s summary of John’s message combines the Markan account, with its emphasis on repentance, and the Johannine account, in which John points expressly to Jesus as the coming baptizer with the Holy Spirit.¹³ Now that Jesus had come and accomplished his mission on earth, now that he had returned to the Father’s presence and sent to his followers the promised gift of the Holy Spirit, an anticipatory baptism was no longer appropriate or adequate.

5–7 The twelve men then received baptism “into the name of the Lord Jesus” (the same form of words as is used of the Samaritan believers in 8:16). This is the only account of rebaptism found in the New Testament. The apostles themselves (or many of them) appear to have received John’s baptism, but no question of rebaptism was raised for them. Probably their endowment with the Spirit at Pentecost transformed the preparatory significance of the baptism which they had already received into the consummative significance of Christian baptism. Similarly there is no suggestion that Apollos was required to receive Christian baptism over and above the baptism of John, which he already knew; his existing experience of the Spirit would have made such a requirement unnecessary. But the Ephesian disciples had no such experience of the Spirit. They were therefore baptized in a Christian sense, and when Paul laid his hands on them, they received the Spirit in pentecostal fashion, with audible signs of his entering into them. There may be an intentional parallel here between the imposition of Paul’s hands on these men and the imposition of Peter’s (and John’s) hands on the Samaritan converts at an earlier date.¹⁴ G. W. H. Lampe, in pursuance of his thesis, finds that Paul’s coming to Ephesus marks “another decisive moment in the missionary history.”¹⁵ Ephesus was to be a new center for the Gentile mission—the next in importance after Antioch on the Orontes—and these twelve disciples were probably to be the nucleus of the Ephesian church. By this exceptional procedure, then, they were integrated into the church’s missionary program.¹⁶

5. The Lecture Hall of Tyrannus (19:8–10)

8 Paul then went into the synagogue and spoke freely¹⁷ for three months; in his discourses he spoke persuasively about the kingdom of God.

9 But when some were obstinate and would not believe,¹⁸ but spoke evil of the Way in front of the congregation, Paul withdrew from them and took the disciples away, discoursing day by day in the lecture hall of Tyrannus.¹⁹

10 This went on for two years, so that all those who lived in Asia, both Jews and Greeks, heard the word of the Lord.

8 Paul had already established relations with the Jews who met in the Ephesian synagogue, when he paid them a flying visit on his way from Corinth to Judaea. Then they had pressed him unsuccessfully to stay longer. Now, however, having completed his business in Judaea and Syria, he had come back to Ephesus and resumed his synagogue discourses in accordance with his promise. But the familiar pattern of events began to reproduce itself. For three months he enjoyed the freedom of the synagogue, debating with its members and setting forth the truth about the kingdom of God—that is to say, all that is implied in the death and exaltation of Jesus.²⁰

9 In extending this liberty to Paul for three months, the synagogue authorities in Ephesus showed themselves more enlightened than their counterparts in Thessalonica, who had tolerated him for no more than three weeks. But at last the weight of opposition to his preaching, even in Ephesus, reached a point where he could no longer make use of the synagogue as his teaching center. He had to find a new center where he would not be interrupted with public slanders directed against the gospel and the Savior whom it proclaimed. This center he found in the lecture hall of Tyrannus. Tyrannus (a name otherwise attested in Ephesus) is usually supposed to have been the lecturer who regularly taught there; it is just possible, however, that he was the owner of the building, who was willing to rent it to Paul at times when it was not required by the regular lecturer (or lecturers). According to the Western text, Paul had the use of the building from 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. Whatever the textual basis of this reading may be, it probably represents what actually happened. Tyrannus (if he was the lecturer) no doubt delivered his lectures in the early morning. At 11 a.m. public activity came to a stop in the cities of Ionia (as in many other parts of the Mediterranean world),²¹ and Lake and Cadbury are no doubt right in saying that more people would be asleep at 1 p.m. than at 1 a.m.²² But Paul, after spending the early hours at his tentmaking (cf. 20:34), devoted the burden and heat of the day to his more important and more exhausting business, and must have conveyed something of his own energy and zeal to his hearers, who had followed him from the synagogue to this lecture hall, for they were prepared to forgo their own siesta in order to listen to Paul.

10 For two full years this work went on.²³ While Paul stayed in Ephesus, a number of his colleagues carried out missionary activity in neighboring cities. During those years his colleague Epaphras appears to have evangelized the cities of the Lycus valley, Colossae, Laodicea, and Hierapolis—cities which Paul evidently did not visit in person (Col. 1:7–8; 2:1; 4:12–13). Perhaps all seven of the churches of Asia addressed in the Revelation of John were also founded about this time. The province was intensively evangelized, and remained one of the leading centers of Christianity for many centuries.

6. Conflict with the Magicians (19:11–19)

11 God accomplished mighty works of no ordinary character through Paul.

12 Sweat-rags and aprons which had been in contact with his body were actually taken from him and applied to those who were sick, so that their diseases left them and evil spirits were expelled.

13 Some of the itinerant Jewish exorcists also undertook to pronounce the name of the Lord Jesus over those who were possessed by evil spirits. “I adjure you,” one would say, “by that Jesus whom Paul proclaims.”

14 There were seven sons of one Sceva, a Jewish chief priest, who were doing this.²⁴

15 But the evil spirit answered them, “Jesus I know, and Paul I know, but who are you?”

16 Then the man who was possessed by the evil spirit sprang on them and overpowered them; indeed, he so got the better of them all²⁵ that they made their escape from that house naked and wounded.

17 This became known to all those who lived in Ephesus, Jews and Greeks alike. Fear fell on them all, and the name of the Lord Jesus was magnified.

18 Many of those who believed also came and made confession, divulging their spells.²⁶

19 A considerable number of those who had practised magic arts²⁷brought their scrolls together and burned them in the sight of all. They reckoned up their value, and found that it amounted to fifty thousand silver coins.

11–12 Paul’s ministry in Ephesus was marked by manifestations of divine power, especially in healing and exorcism. The use of pieces of material which had been in contact with Paul for the healing of the sick is reminiscent of the healing of those who touched the fringe of Jesus’ cloak (Mark 5:27–34; 6:56). One may also detect a parallel here to the healing effect of Peter’s shadow in 5:15.²⁸ The pieces of material were presumably those which Paul used in his tentmaking or leather-working—the sweat-rags for tying around his head and the aprons for tying around his waist.²⁹ No intrinsic healing efficacy is ascribed to these things; the healing efficacy lay in the powerful name of Jesus.

13 So potent did this name, as invoked by Paul, prove in the exorcizing of demons from those who were possessed by them that other exorcists began to invoke it too. Among practitioners of magic in ancient times Jews enjoyed high respect,³⁰ for they were believed to have exceptionally effective spells at their command. In particular, the fact that the name of the God of Israel was not to be pronounced by vulgar lips was generally known among the pagans, and misinterpreted by them according to regular magical principles. Several magical papyri which have survived from those days to ours contain attempts to reproduce the true pronunciation of the ineffable name—Iaō, Iabe, Iaoue, and so forth—as well as other Jewish expressions and names such as Sabaoth and Abraham, used as elements in magic spells.³¹ The closest parallel to the Ephesian exorcists’ misuse of the name of Jesus appears in a magical papyrus belonging to the Bibliothèque Nationale in Paris, which contains the adjuration: “I adjure you by Jesus, the God of the Hebrews.”³²

14–16 Among those Jewish exorcists were the sons of one Sceva,³³ a Jew, described here as a chief priest. It is possible that this Sceva actually belonged to a Jewish chief-priestly family, but more probably “Jewish chief priest” (or even “Jewish high priest”) was his self-designation, set out on a placard: Luke might have placed the words between quotation marks had these been invented in his day.³⁴ The Jewish high priest was the one man who was authorized to pronounce the otherwise ineffable name; this he did once a year, in the course of the service prescribed for the day of atonement.³⁵ Such a person would therefore enjoy high prestige among magicians. It was not the ineffable name, however, but the name of Jesus that Sceva’s sons employed in their attempt to imitate Paul’s exorcizing ministry. But when they tried to use it, like an unfamiliar weapon wrongly handled it exploded in their hands. “That Jesus whom Paul proclaims” was a name well known to the demon that they were trying to cast out,³⁶ but what right had they to use it? The man possessed by the demon, energized with abnormal strength, assaulted the would-be exorcists so violently that they ran for their lives from the building in which they were, their clothes torn off and their bodies battered.

17 The news of this incident spread quickly and filled those who heard it with awe; this name, invoked by Paul and his colleagues with such beneficial effects, was plainly no name to be trifled with.

18–19 The whole atmosphere of this passage, in fact, tallies admirably with the reputation which Ephesus had in antiquity as a center of magical practice. Shakespeare sums up that reputation in words which he puts into the mouth of the Syracusan Antipholus in his Comedy of Errors:

“They say this town is full of cozenage,

As, nimble jugglers that deceive the eye,

Dark-working sorcerers that change the mind,

Soul-killing witches that deform the body,

Disguised cheaters, prating mountebanks,

And many such-like liberties of sin.”³⁷

Yet even among the Ephesian practitioners of magic the gospel proved its power. Many of them believed, and came to Paul and his fellow-missionaries, confessing their sorcery and revealing their spells. According to magical theory, the potency of a spell is bound up with its secrecy; if it be divulged, it becomes ineffective. So these converted magicians renounced their imagined power by rendering their spells inoperative. Many of them also gathered their magical papyri together and made a bonfire of them. A number of such magical scrolls have survived to our day; there are specially famous examples in the London, Paris, and Leiden collections.³⁸ The special connection of Ephesus with magic is reflected in the term “Ephesian letters” for magical scrolls.³⁹ The spells with which they abound are for the most part the merest gibberish, a rigmarole of words and names considered to be unusually potent, arranged sometimes in patterns which were essential to the efficacy of the spell. They fetched high prices. On the present occasion it was reckoned that documents to the value of 50,000 drachmae went up in smoke. (The public burning of literature as an open repudiation or condemnation of its contents can be paralleled from both ancient and modern times.)

7. Further Progress Report (19:20)

20 So mightily did the word of the Lord keep on spreading and increasing in strength.

20 Luke pauses at this point to make a fifth report of progress.⁴⁰ One further episode from Paul’s Ephesian ministry remains to be related, but the plan of Acts requires a break here.

1. The Western text reads: “But when Paul wished, according to his own plan, to go to Jerusalem, the Spirit bade him return to Asia, and having passed through the upper country he came to Ephesus.” See p. 354, n. 52; p. 356, n. 58 (on 18:21–22).

2. Lit., “if there is a Holy Spirit” (). The Western text reads “if any are receiving the Holy Spirit.”

3. Lit., “into what were you baptized?”

4. The Western text adds “Christ” and continues: “for the remission of sins” (ineptly, because this was the purpose of John’s baptism, which these disciples had already received).

5. W. M. Ramsay, St. Paul the Traveller (London, ¹⁴1920), p. 265; cf. The Church in the Roman Empire (London, ⁴1895), pp. 93–96.

6. Cf. A. Ehrhardt, The Acts of the Apostles (Manchester, 1969), pp. 101–2; J. A. T. Robinson, The Priority of John (London, 1985), p. 172.

7. The idea that there was a group of disciples of John the Baptist at Ephesus (against whom, incidentally, the fourth Evangelist is alleged to polemicize) has no substantial evidence in its favor, certainly not in the Fourth Gospel.

8. The clause “when you believed” renders the Gk. aorist participle , the “coincident aorist participle” which “is doctrinally important” (J. H. Moulton, MHT I, p. 131n.). Cf. 11:17; Eph. 1:13.

9. Cf. Num. 11:16–17, 24–29; Joel 2:28–32; and, for the expression “Holy Spirit,” Isa. 63:10–11.

10. Cf. 1:5; 11:16. With the wording of their reply, “We never even heard if there is a Holy Spirit,” cf. John 7:39, “Spirit was not yet,” where the Western and Byzantine texts add “given.”

11. Seep. 359 with n. 73.

12. Cf. 2:38.

13. With v. 4a cf. Mark 1:4; with v. 4b cf. John 1:26–34. See on 13:24–25 (p. 258 with n. 76).

14. Luke appears deliberately but unobtrusively to trace a number of parallels between Peter’s ministry and Paul’s; e.g., both, at an early point in their ministry, heal lame men (3:2–8; 14:8–10); both exorcize demons (5:16; 16:18); both have triumphant encounters with sorcerers (8:18–24; 13:6–11); both raise the dead (9:36–41; 20:9–12); both have miraculous escapes from prison (12:7–11; 16:25–26). Cf. the exposition of v. 12 below (pp. 367–68).

15. The Seal of the Spirit (London, 1951), p. 76. See also B. T. D. Smith, “Apollos and the Twelve Disciples at Ephesus,” JTS 16 (1915), pp. 241–46; N. B. Stonehouse, “Repentance, Baptism and the Gift of the Holy Spirit,” in Paul before the Areopagus and Other New Testament Studies (Grand Rapids, 1957), pp. 80–82; E. Käsemann, “The Disciples of John the Baptist in Ephesus,” E.T. in Essays on New Testament Themes (London, 1964), pp. 136–48; J. K. Parratt. “The Rebaptism of the Ephesian Disciples,” ExT 79 (1967–68), pp. 182–83; C. K. Barrett, “Apollos and the Twelve Disciples of Ephesus,” in The New Testament Age: Essays in Honor of Bo Reicke, ed. W. C. Weinrich, I (Macon, GA, 1984), pp. 29–39.

16. On the Jerusalem way as the norm see p. 360 with nn. 75 and 76.

17. Gk. . The Western text adds “with great power.”

18. Gk. , “were disobedient.”

19. The Western text adds “from fifth to the tenth hour.”

20. See on 1:3 (pp. 32, 33 with nn. 17–19).

21. Cf. Martial, Epigrams 4.8.3: “Rome prolongs her varied tasks to the fifth hour.”

22. Beginnings 1.4, p. 239.

23. The period indicated in v. 10 may have been rather more than two years; then, if we add the three months of v. 8, we have something approaching the three years of 20:31—probably from the fall of 52 to the summer of 55.

24. V. 14 is expanded as follows in the Western text: “among whom also the sons of Sceva a priest wished to do the same (they were accustomed to exorcize such people), and entering into the demon-possessed man they began to invoke the Name, saying, ‘We charge you by Jesus, whom Paul proclaims, to come out.’ ” While most Western witnesses omit the number of the sons, the Latin codex gigas says “two sons” (cf. n. 25 below).

25. Gk. (“both”); there is good evidence for the use of this word in the sense of “all” in later Greek. Cf. F. G. Kenyon (ed.), Greek Papyri in the British Museum, II (London, 1898), p. 221, on P. Lond. 336.13 (A.D. 167), where refers to five men: “ in late Byzantine Greek … and it is possible that colloquially the use existed earlier.” A similar observation (as pointed out by E. Haenchen, ad loc.) was made about the same time by E. Nestle in Berliner Philologische Wochenschrift 18 (1898), col. 254. The apparent discrepancy between here and in v. 14 led the Western revisers to omit the numeral there.

26. Gk. , here a technical term for magic practices (the verb also has the technical sense of “practise magic” in appropriate contexts).

27. Gk. , lit. “superfluous works,” another technical term for magic practices (like Lat. curiosa). Cf. G. A. Deissmann, Bible Studies, E.T. (Edinburgh, ²1909), p. 323, n. 5.

28. See p. 364, n. 14.

29. Both the Greek words used here are of Latin origin: from sudaria. “sweat-rags” (cf. Luke 19:20; John 11:44; 20:7), and from semicinctia, “aprons.”

30. See M. Simon, Verus Israel (Paris, 1948), pp. 394–416.

31. See G. A. Deissmann, Bible Studies, pp. 322–36; New Docs, 1 (1976), § 8.

32. K. Preisendanz, Papyri Graecae Magicae, I (Leipzig, 1928), Pap. Bibl. Nat. Suppl. gr. 574, lines 3018–19. The use by Jews of Jesus’ name in healing was sternly denounced by some rabbis; cf. Tos. Hullîn 2.22–23; TJ Shabbāt 14.4.14d and Άbôdāh Zārāh 2.2.40d–41a; TB Άbôdāh Zārāh 27b.

33. On the name Sceva see B. A. Mastin, “Scaeva the chief priest,” JTS n.s. 27 (1976), pp. 405–12; “A Note on Acts 19:14,” Biblica 59 (1978), pp. 97–99.

34. Mastin suggests that his designation was intended to “authenticate the activity of his sons as bona fide exorcists” (“Scaeva the chief priest,” p. 405). The Western text calls him , not .

35. Mishnah, Yômā 5.1; 6.2.

36. It is doubtful if we should attach great importance to the change of verb: “Jesus I know () and Paul I know ().” There was a distinction in fact, in that he knew Jesus by name and Paul by sight, but that is not the normal distinction in meaning between the two Greek verbs.

37. Act 1, scene 2, lines 97–102.

38. The best collection of such documents is Preisendanz’s (I, 1928; II, 1931); see n. 32 above. Cf. G. A. Deissmann, Light from the Ancient East, E.T. (London, ²1927), pp. 254–64, 302–8, 453–60. A papyrus amulet in the library of Princeton University has been edited with translation and notes by B. M. Metzger in Papyri in the Princeton University Collections, III (1942), pp. 78–79; he has given a popular account of it in “St. Paul and the Magicians,” Princeton Seminary Bulletin 38 (1944), pp. 27–30, where he describes it as “a firsthand specimen of the same sort of magical craft which Paul encountered at Ephesus.” See now H. D. Betz (ed.), The Greek Magical Papyri in Translation, I-(Chicago, 1986-).

39. Gk. (Anaxilas, quoted by Athenaeus, Deipnosophists 12.548c; Plutarch, Convivial Questions (Table Talk) 706e; Clement of Alexandria, Miscellanies 5.8.45.2; cf. A. Deissmann, “Ephesia Grammata,” in Abhandlungen zur semitischen Religionskunde und Sprachwissenschaft W. W. Graf von Baudissin … überreicht (Giessen, 1918), pp. 121–24; E. Kuhnert, RE 5, cols. 2771–73 (s.v. “Ephesia Grammata”); K. Preisendanz, RAC 5, cols. 515–20 (s.v.“Ephesia Grammata”).

40. See on 6:7 (p. 123, n. 20).

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