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Commentaries and Other Bible Study Helps - Prayer Tents - Prayer Tents
18:1-22 Paul Witnesses in Corinth. Corinth was Paul's last major place of witness on his second journey. His initial establishment of work there (vv. 1-11) is followed by an account of a specific incident when the Jews brought him for trial before the proconsul (vv. 12-17). But Paul was able to stay "many days longer" (v. 18). Then, after completing his Corinthian ministry, Paul returned to Antioch, making a brief stop at Ephesus (vv. 18-22).
18:1 Corinth was
18:2 Claudius's expulsion of the Jews from Rome in seems to have resulted from a disturbance in the Jewish synagogues created by the Christian message. Aquila and Priscilla had much in common with Paul, being Jews, tentmakers, and possibly already Christians when they fled from Rome.
18:3 First Corinthians 9 may reflect this period of Paul's ministry in Corinth, when he supported himself rather than receiving assistance from the Corinthians.
18:4 he reasoned . . . and tried to persuade. See note on 17:17. synagogue. The Jewish philosopher Philo emphasized the city of Corinth as a home for Jewish people (Embassy to Gaius 281; cf. neighboring Sicyon in 1 Macc. 15:23). Several funerary epigraphs also confirm a later Jewish presence, as does a rather crude post-Pauline inscription found near the road to Lechaion designating the "Synagogue of the Hebrews." Greeks in a synagogue context are God-fearers.
18:5 Paul apparently had sent Silas and Timothy from Athens to visit the Macedonian churches (see note on 17:15). When they again joined Paul in Corinth, they probably were the ones who brought a contribution for Paul's ministry from the Macedonian churches (see 2 Cor. 11:9).
18:6 when they opposed and reviled him. Paul will spend much time with audiences where there is interest and response, even if they don't immediately believe (see v. 4), but he will not spend time where he simply faces hostile opposition. Shaking garments was a gesture of rejection, much like shaking the dust from one's feet (cf. 13:51). Your blood be on your own heads reflects Ezekiel's words about God's prophetic watchman (Ezek. 33:1-7). "Blood" means "the responsibility for your judgment by God." Paul had faithfully discharged his responsibility, so that at the final judgment no part of these Jews' failure to believe could be attributed to his failure to tell them about Christ (but cf. note on Acts 18:7).
18:7 Paul did not completely give up on witnessing to the Jews of Corinth, as his relocating next door to the synagogue indicates. Paul's Jewish opponents cannot have been very pleased about his choice of a new location in such close proximity to the synagogue. Nothing more is known of Titius Justus. He is not the Titus who was with Paul long before the founding of the Corinthian church (Gal. 2:1).
18:8 Both Jews and Gentiles were won to the Lord, Crispus (see 1 Cor. 1:14) representing the former and many of the Corinthians the latter. believed and were baptized. Baptism seems to have followed closely after each person's profession of faith.
18:9-11 Up to this point, opposition to his ministry had usually forced Paul to leave a place of witness. But the Lord in a vision assured him that he would have a successful ministry in Corinth and would suffer no further harm. In obedience Paul remained there for (, during which time he wrote 1-2 Thessalonians). God's assurance was immediately confirmed by Paul's deliverance from an attempt to condemn him before the proconsul. Acts 18:10-11 gives helpful insight into Paul's understanding of God's providence and predestination in relation to human responsibility for preaching the gospel. Though God had told Paul, "I have many in this city who are my people," indicating that many in Corinth would come to faith in Christ, this did not lead Paul to conclude that he had no further part to play. Rather, Paul stayed a year and six months, longer than he stayed at any city except Ephesus, preaching the gospel in order that through his preaching those whom God had chosen would come to faith (cf. note on 27:30). Predestination implied successful evangelism.
18:12 The proconsul of a province was its chief judicial officer. Since Gallio served in this role , this provides one of the key dates used in computing dates for Paul's various missionary journeys. The tribunal (Gk. bēma) was the proconsul's judgment seat. It has been excavated in Corinth and was located in the open air in the marketplace.
18:14 Gallio's judgment--that the Jewish accusations against the Christians concerned only matters of their own religion--established the important legal precedent that Christians were innocent of transgressing Roman law when merely teaching and following Christian doctrine. A similar judgment comes later, in 25:19.
18:17 Sosthenes may have been a Jewish convert to Christianity, for Paul mentions someone by that name as his "coauthor" in 1 Cor. 1:1. In Acts 18:8, Crispus had been called "the ruler of the synagogue," but Sosthenes may have succeeded him when Crispus became a Christian, or there may have been more than one person with this office in that synagogue.
18:18 The many days longer that Paul continued in Corinth seems to be in addition to the of v. 11. Syria refers to his sponsoring church of Antioch in Syria. Cenchreae was about
18:21 Paul declines to stay in Ephesus but will return . . . if God wills, affirming that his plans are ultimately in God's hands (cf. 1 Cor. 4:19; James 4:15). Paul's brief appearance in the synagogue prepared the way for his later ministry in Ephesus (Acts 19). Indeed, his promise to return if God wills sets the stage and provides the main destination for his third missionary journey.
18:22 Leaving from the main Palestinian port of Caesarea (cf. 8:40; 9:30; 21:8) in the spring of , Paul went up and greeted the church, which most interpreters understand to mean the church in Jerusalem, which in that region could be called "the church" without further specification, and which was the location to which one would "go up" from Caesarea, given the higher altitude of Jerusalem. Then Paul went down (from Jerusalem) to Antioch (cf. 13:1-3; 14:26-28; 15:30-35; and see note on 11:19).
