Bible Commentaries

CHAPTER 18

Acts 18:1. ὁ Παῦλος is wanting in important witnesses. Rightly deleted by Lachm. and Tisch. With χωρισθείς a church-lesson begins.

Acts 18:2. ἐχ] A B D E G א, min. Vulg. have ἀπό. So Lachm. Tisch. Born., and rightly, on account of the decisive attestation.

On preponderating evidence, τῇ τέχνῃ is, in Acts 18:3, to be adopted, with Lachm. and Tisch., instead of τὴν τέχυην.

Acts 18:5. τῷ λόγῳ] Elz. has τῷ πνεύματι, in opposition to A B D E G א, min. several vss. and Fathers. Defended by Rinck on the ground that τῷ λόγῳ is a scholion on διαμαρτ. But it was not διαμαρτ., but συνείχετο, that needed a scholion, namely, τῷ πνεύματι, which, being received into the text, displaced the original τῷ λόγῳ.

Acts 18:7. Ἰούστου] Syr. Erp. Sahid. Cassiod. have Τίτου; E א, min. Copt. Arm. Syr. p. Vulg. have Τίτου Ἰούστου; B D**: Τιτίου Ἰ. A traditional alteration.[71]

Acts 18:12. ἈΝΘΥΠΑΤΕΎΟΝΤΟς] Lachm. Born. read ἈΝΘΥΠΆΤΟΥ ὌΝΤΟς after A B D א, min. An explanatory resolution of a word not elsewhere occurring in the N.T.

Acts 18:14. ΟΎΝ] Lachm. and Born. have deleted it according to important testimony. But it was very easily passed over amidst the cumulation of particles and between ΜΕΝ and ΗΝ, especially as ΟὖΝ has not its reference in what immediately precedes.

Acts 18:15. ΖΉΤΗΜΑ] A B D** א, min. Theophyl. and several vss. have ΖΗΤΉΜΑΤΑ. Recommended by Griesb., adopted by Lachm. and Tisch. The singular was, in spite of the several objects afterwards named, very easily introduced mechanically as an echo of ἀδίκημα and ῥᾳδιούργημα.

γάρ] is to be deleted, with Lachm. Tisch. Born. in accordance with A B D א, Vulg. Copt., as a connective addition.

Acts 18:17. After πάντες, Elz. Born. read οἱ Ἕλληνες, which is wanting in A B א, Erp. Copt. Vulg. Chrys. Bed. Some more recent codd. have, instead of it, οἱ Ἰουδαῖοι. Both are supplementary additions, according to different modes of viewing the passage. See the exegetical remarks.

Acts 18:19. κατήντησε] Lachm. Tisch. read κατήντησαν, after A B E א, 40, and some vss. The sing. intruded itself from the context.

αὐτοῦ] ἐκεῖ, which Lachm. and Born. have according to important evidence, was imported as by far the more usual word.

Acts 18:21. ἀπετάξατο αὐτ. εἰπών] Lachm. Tisch. Born. read ἀποταξάμενος καὶ εἰπών (with the omission of καί before ἀνήχθη), after A B D E א, min. vss. Rightly; the Recepta is an obviously suggested simplification.

ΔΕῖ ΜΕ ΠΆΝΤΩς … ΕἸς ἹΕΡΟΣ.] is wanting in A B E א, min. Copt. Sahid. Aeth. Arm. Vulg., as well as ΔΈ after ΠΆΛΙΝ. Both are deleted by Lachm. and Tisch., and condemned already by Mill and Bengel. But the omission is far more easily accounted for than the addition of these words,—occasioned possibly by Acts 19:21, Acts 20:16, or by the πάλιν ἀνακ. presumed to be too abrupt,—as in what directly follows copyists, overlooking the reference of ἀναβάς in Acts 18:22, found no journey of the apostle to Jerusalem, and accordingly did not see the reason why Paul declined a longer residence at Ephesus verified by the course of his journey.

Acts 18:25. Ἰησοῦ] Elz. has κυρίου, against decisive testimony.

Acts 18:26. The order Πρίσκ. κ. Ἀκ. (Lachm.) is attested, no doubt, by A B E א, 13, Vulg. Copt. Aeth., but is to be derived from Acts 18:18.

τὴν τοῦ θεοῦ ὁδόν] A B א, min. vss. Lachm. have τὴν ὁδὸν τοῦ θεοῦ; E, vss. have τ. ὁδ. τοῦ κυρίου; D has only τὴν ὁδόν (so Born.). With the witnesses thus divided, the reading of Lachm. is to be preferred as the best attested.

[71] Occasioned by the circumstance that Justus does not elsewhere occur alone as a name, but only as a surname; and that the person here meant must be a different person from those named in Acts 1:23 and Colossians 4:11. Wieseler judges otherwise, on Galat. p. 573, and in Herzog’s Encykl. XXI. 276; he prefers Τίτου ʼΙούστου.

Acts 18:1-2. In Corinth, at which Paul had arrived after his parting from Athens (χωρισθ., comp. Acts 1:4), he met with the Jew Ἀκύλας (Greek form of the Latin Aquila, which is to be considered as a Roman name adopted after the manner of the times instead of the Jewish name; see Eust. ad Dion. Per. 381), a native of the Asiatic province of Pontus, but who had hitherto resided at Rome, and afterwards dwelt there also (Romans 16:3), and so probably had his dwelling-place in that city—an inference which is rendered the more probable, as his temporary removal to a distance from Rome had its compulsory occasion in the imperial edict. We make this remark in opposition to the view of Neander, who thinks that Aquila had not his permanent abode at Rome, but settled, on account of his trade, now in one and then in another great city forming a centre of commerce, such as Corinth and Ephesus. The conjecture that he was a freedman of a Pontius Aquila (Cic. ad Famil. x. 33. 4; Suet. Caes. 78), so that the statement Ποντικὸν τῷ γένει is an error (Reiche on Romans 16:3, de Wette), is entirely arbitrary. Whether Πρίσκιλλα (identical with Prisca, Romans 16:3, for, as is well known, many Roman names were also used in diminutive forms; see Grotius on Rom. l.c.) was a Roman by birth, or a Jewess, remains undecided. But the opinion—which has of late become common and is defended by Kuinoel, Olshausen, Lange, and Ewald—that Aquila and his wife were already Christians (having been so possibly at starting from Rome) when Paul met with them at Corinth, because there is no account of their conversion, is very forced. Luke, in fact, calls Aquila simply Ἰουδαῖον (he does not say, τινα μαθητὴν Ἰουδ.), whereas elsewhere he always definitely makes known the Jewish Christians; and accordingly, by the subsequent πάντας τοὺς Ἰουδαίους, he places Aquila (without any distinction) among the general body of the expelled Jews. He also very particularly indicates as the reason of the apostle’s lodging with him, not their common Christian faith, but their common handicraft, Acts 18:3. It is therefore to be assumed that Aquila and Priscilla were still Jews when Paul met with them at Corinth, but through their connection with him they became Christians.[72] This Luke, keeping in view the apostolic labours of Paul as a whole (comp. Baumgarten, p. 578), leaves the reader to infer, inasmuch as he soon afterwards speaks of the Christian working of the two (Acts 18:26). We may add that the reply to the question, whether and how far Christianity existed at all in Rome before the decree of Claudius (see on Rom., Introd. § 2), can here be of no consequence, seeing that, although there was no Christian church at Rome, individual Christians might still at any rate be found, and certainly were found, among the resident Jews there.

προσφάτως] nuper (Polyb. iii 37. 11, iii. 48. 6; Alciphr. i. 39; Jdt 4:3; Jdt 4:5; 2Ma 14:36), from πρόσφατος, which properly signifies fresh (= just slaughtered or killed), then generally new, of quite recent occurrence; see Lobeck, ad Phryn. p. 374 f.; Klausen, ad Aesch. Choeph. 756.

διὰ τὸ διατεταχ. Κλ. κ.τ.λ.] “Judaeos impulsore Chresto assidue tumultuantes Roma expulit,” Sueton. Claud. 25. As Chrestus was actually a current Greek and Roman name (Philostr. v. Soph. ii. 11; Inscr. 194; Cic. ad Fam. xi. 8), it is altogether arbitrary to interpret impulsore Chresto otherwise than we should interpret it, if another name stood instead of Chresto. Chrestus was the name of a Jewish agitator at Rome, whose doings produced constant tumults, and led at length to the edict of expulsion.[73] See also Wieseler, p. 122, and earlier, Ernesti, in Suet., l.c. This we remark in opposition to the hypothesis upheld, after older interpreters in Wolf, by most modern expositors, that Suetonius had made a mistake in the name and written Chresto instead of Christo—a view, in connection with which it is either thought that the disturbances arose out of Christianity having made its way among the Jewish population at Rome and simply affected the Jews themselves, who were thrown into a ferment by it, so that the portion of them which had come to believe was at strife with that which remained unbelieving (Wassenbergh, ad Valcken. p. 554; Kuinoel, Hug, Credner, Baur, Gieseler, Reuss, Thiersch, Ewald; also Lehmann, Stud. zur Gesch. d. apost. Zeitalt., Greifsw. 1856, p. 6 ff.; Sepp, Mangold, Beyschlag in the Stud. u. Krit. 1867, p. 652 f.; Laurent, neutest. Stud. p. 88, and others); or it is assumed (Paulus, Reiche, Neander, Lange, and others) that enthusiastic Messianic hopes excited the insurrection among the Jews, and that the Romans had manufactured out of the ideal person of the Messiah a rebel of the same name. While, however, the alleged error of the name has against it generally the fact that the names Christus and Christiani were well known to the Roman writers (Tacitus, Pliny, and Suetonius himself, Ner. 16), it may be specially urged against the former view, that at the time of the edict (probably in the year 52, see Anger, de temp. rat. p. 118; Wieseler, p. 125 ff.) the existence of an influential number of Christians at Rome, putting the Jewish population into a tumultuous ferment, is quite improbable; and against the latter view, that the Messianic hopes of the Jews were well enough known to the Romans in general (Tacit. Hist. v. 13) and to Suetonius in particular (Suet. Vesp. 4). Hence the change (attested by Tertull. Apol. 3, ad nat. i. 3, and by Lactant. Inst. div. iv. 7. 5) of Christus into Chrestos (Χρηστός) and of Christianus into Chrestianus (which pronunciation Tertullian rejects by perperam) may not be imputed to the compiler of a history resting on documentary authority, but to the misuse of the Roman colloquial language. Indeed, according to Tacit. Ann. xv. 44: “Nero … poenis affecit, quos … vulgus Christianos appellabat; auctor nominis ejus Christus,” etc., it must be assumed that that interchange of names only became usual at a later period; in Justin. Apol. I. 4, τὸ Χρηστόν is only an allusion to Χριστιανοί. The detailed discussion of the point does not belong to us here, except in so far as the narrative of Dio Cass. lx. 6 appears to be at variance with this passage and with Suet. l.c.: τούς τε Ἰουδαίους πλεονάσαντας αὖθις, ὥστε χαλεπῶς ἂν ἄνευ ταραχῆς ὑπὸ τοῦ ὄχλου σφῶν τῆς πόλεως εἰρχθῆναι, οὐκ ἐξήλασε μὲν, τῷ δὲ δὴ πατρίῳ νόμῳ βίῳ χρωμένους ἐκέλευσε μὴ συναθροίζεσθαι.[74] This apparent contradiction is solved by our regarding what Dio Cassius relates as something which happened before the edict of banishment (Wieseler, p. 123, and Lehmann, p. 5, view it otherwise), and excited the Jews to the complete outbreak of insurrection.[75] The words ὥστε … εἰρχθῆναι, which represent the ordinance as a precautionary measure against the outbreak of a revolt, warrant this view. From Acts 28:15 ff., Romans 16:3, it follows that the edict of Claudius, which referred not only to those making the tumult (Credner, Einl. p. 380), but, according to the express testimony of this passage, to all the Jews, must soon either tacitly or officially have passed into abeyance, as, indeed, it was incapable of being permanently carried into effect in all its severity. Therefore the opinion of Hug, Eichhorn, Schrader, and Hemsen, that the Jews returned to Rome only at the mild commencement of Nero’s reign, is to be rejected.

πάντας τοὺς Ἰουδαίους] with the exception of the proselytes, Beyschlag thinks, so that only the national Jews were concerned. But the proselytes of righteousness at least cannot, without arbitrariness, be excluded from the comprehensive designation.

[72] See also Herzog in his Encykl. I. p. 456.

[73] Herzog, in the Jahrb. f. D. Theol. 1867, p. 541, rightly defends this explanation (against Pressensé). The objection is entirely unimportant, which Mangold also (Römerbr. 1866) has taken, that short work would have been made with an insurgent Chrestus at Rome. He might have made a timely escape. Or may he not have been actually seized and short work made of him, without thereby quenching the fire?

[74] Ewald, p. 346, wishes to insert οὐ before χρωμένους, so that the words would apply to the Jewish-Christians.

[75] To place the prohibition mentioned by Dio Cassius as early as the first year of Claudius, A.D. 41 (Laurent, neutest. Stud. p. 89 f.), does not suit the peculiar mildness and favour which the emperor on his accession showed to the Jews, according to Joseph. Antt. xix. 5. 2 f. The subsequent severity supposes a longer experience of need for it. Laurent, after Oros. vi. 7, places the edict of expulsion as early as the ninth year of Claudius, A.D. 49; but he is in consequence driven to the artificial explanation that Aquila indeed left Rome in A.D. 49, but remained for some time in Italy, from which (ver. 2 : ἀπὸ τῆς ʼΙταλίας) he only departed in A.D. 53. Thus he would not, in fact, have come to Corinth at all as an immediate consequence of that edict, which yet Luke, particularly by the addition of προσφάτως, evidently intends to say.

Acts 18:3-4. It was a custom among the Jews, and admits of sufficient explanation from the national esteem for trade generally, and from the design of rendering the Rabbins independent of others as regards their subsistence (Juch. xliii. 1, 2), that the Rabbins practised a trade. Olshausen strangely holds that the practice was based on the idea of warding off temptations by bodily activity. Comp. on Mark 6:3, according to which Christ Himself was a τέκτων.

διὰ τὸ ὁμότεχνον εἶναι] sc. αὐτόν, because he (Paul) was of the same handicraft. Luke might also have written διὰ τὸ ὁμότεχνος εἶναι (Kühner, II. p. 352); but comp. on the accusative Luke 11:8, and see on the omission of the pronoun, where it is of itself evident from the preceding noun, Kühner, § 852 b, and ad Xen. Mem. i. 2. 49.

ἦσαν] the two married persons.

σκηνοποιοί] is not with Michaelis to be interpreted makers of art-instruments, which is merely based on a misunderstanding of Pollux, vii. 189, nor yet (with Hug and others) makers of tent-cloth. It is true that the trade of preparing cloth from the hair of goats, which was also used for tents (κιλίκια), had its seat in Cilicia (Plin. N. H. vi. 28; Veget. de re mil. iv. 6; Serv. and Philarg. ad Virg. Georg. iii. 313, vol. II. pp. 278 and 338, ed. Lion); but even apart from the fact that the weaving of cloth was more difficult to be combined with the unsettled mode of life of the apostle, the word imports nothing else than tent-maker (Pollux, l.c.; Stob. ecl. phys. i. 52, p. 1084), tent-tailor, which meaning is simply to be retained. Such a person is also called σκηνοῤῥάφος, Ael. V. H. ii. 1; and so Chrysostom[76] designates the apostle, whilst Origen makes him a worker in leather (Hom. 17 in Num.), thinking on leathern tents (comp. de Dieu).

ἔπειθε is the result of ΔΙΕΛΈΓΕΤΟ (Acts 17:2; Acts 17:17). He convinced, persuaded and won, Jews and Greeks (here—as it is those present in the synagogue that are spoken of—proselytes of the gate).

[76] See also Theodoret on 2 Corinthians 2:6 : τοσοῦτον ἴσχυε καὶ γράφων ὁ σκηνοῤῥάφος.

Acts 18:5. This activity on his part increased yet further when Silas and Timothy had come from Macedonia (Acts 17:14 f.), in whose fellowship naturally the zeal and courage of Paul could not but grow.

The element of increased activity, in relation to what is related in Acts 18:4, is contained in συνείχετο τῷ λόγῳ: he was wholly seized and arrested by the doctrine, so that he applied himself to it with assiduity and utmost earnestness. Comp. Wis 17:20, and Grimm in loc. So in the main, following the Vulgate (“instabat verbo”), most modern interpreters, including Olshausen, de Wette, Baumgarten, Lange, Ewald. Against my earlier rendering: he was pressed in respect of the doctrine (comp. on Php 1:23), he was hard-beset (comp. Chrysostom, reading τῷ πνεύματι: ἐπηρέαζον αὐτῷ, ἐφίσταντο αὐτῷ), it may be decisively urged, partly on linguistic grounds, that the dative with συνέχεσθαι is always the thing itself which presses (comp. Acts 28:8; Luke 8:37),[77] partly according to the connection, that there results in that view no significant relation to the arrival of Silas and Timothy.

τὸν Χριστὸν Ἰησοῦν, as in Acts 18:28.

[77] Comp. also Thuc. ii. 49. 3, iii. 98. 1; Arrian, vi. 24. 6; Plat. Soph. p. 250 D; Xen. Oec. i. 21, and many other passages; Heind. ad Plat. Soph. 46; particularly Wis 17:20; Herodian i. 17, 22; Ael. V. H. xiv. 22.

Acts 18:6. The refractoriness (Romans 13:2) and reviling, which he experienced from them amidst this increased activity, induced him to turn to the Gentiles.

ἐκτιναξ. τὰ ἱμάτ.] he shook out his garments, ridding himself of the dust, indicating contempt, as in Acts 13:51.

τὸ αἷμα ὑμῶν … ὑμῶν] sc. ἐλθέτω (Matthew 23:35), i.e. let the blame of the destruction, which will as a divine punishment reach you, light on no other than yourselves. Comp. 2 Samuel 1:16; 1 Kings 2:33; Ezekiel 3:16 ff; Ezekiel 33:4; Ezekiel 33:7 ff. On ἐπὶ or εἰς τ. κεφάλην, see Dem. p. 323, ult. 381. 15. On the elliptical mode of expression, see Matthew 27:25; 2 Samuel 1:16; Plat. Euthyd. p. 283 E; Arist. Plut. 526. The expression is not to be explained from the custom of laying the hands on the victim (Leviticus 16:31; comp. Herod. ii. 39), as Elsner and others suppose, or on the accused on the part of the witnesses (so Piscator); but in all languages (comp. Heinsius, ad Ov. Her. xx. 127) the head is the significant designation of the person himself. The significance here lies particularly in the conception of the divine punishment coming from above, Romans 1:18.

What Paul intends by the destruction which he announces as certainly coming, and the blame of which he adjudges to themselves, is not moral corruption (de Wette, who sees here an un-Pauline expression), but eternal ἀπώλεια, which is conceived as θάνατος (Romans 1:32; Romans 6:16; Romans 6:21; Romans 6:23; Romans 7:5; Romans 7:10; Romans 7:13; Romans 7:24; Romans 8:2; Romans 8:6 al.), and therefore symbolized as αἷμα (to be shed), because the blood is the seat of life (comp. on Acts 15:20). The setting in of this ἀπώλεια occurs at the Parousia (2 Thessalonians 1:8). Thus Paul, as his conduct was already in point of fact for his adversaries an ἐνδείξις ἀπωλείας (Php 1:28), expressly gives to them such an ἐνδείξις.

καθαρὸς ἐγώ] comp. Acts 20:26.

ἀπὸ τοῦ νῦν κ.τ.λ.] as in Acts 13:46.

Acts 18:7. Paul immediately gave practical proof of this solemn renunciation of the Jews by departing from the synagogue (ἐκεῖθεν, which Heinrichs and Alford after Calvin explain, contrary to the context, ex domo Aguilae), and went, not into the house of a Jew, but into that of a proselyte, the otherwise unknown Justus, who is not to be identified with Titus (Wieseler). That Paul betook himself to the non-Jewish house nearest to the synagogue, is entirely in keeping with the profoundly excited emotion under which he acted, and with his decision of character.

συνομορεῖν] to border upon, is not found elsewhere; the Greeks use ὁμορεῖν in that sense. Observe, moreover, that a change of lodging is not mentioned.

Acts 18:8. This decided proceeding made a remarkable impression, so that even Crispus, the president of the synagogue, whom the apostle himself baptized (1 Corinthians 1:14), with all his family, believed on the Lord (Acts 16:15; Acts 16:34), and that generally many Corinthians (Jews and Gentiles; for the house of the proselyte was accessible to both) heard him and received faith and baptism.

Acts 18:9-11.[78] But Jesus Himself, appearing to Paul in a night-vision (comp. Acts 9:10), infused into him courage for fearless continuance in work.

λάλει κ. μὴ σιωπ.] solemnly emphatic. Comp. Isaiah 62:1, and see on John 1:3; John 1:20.

διότι is both times simply propterea quod.

ἐγώ] Bengel well says: “fundamentum fiduciae.”

ἐπιθήσεταί σοι τοῦ κακ. σε] will set on thee (aggredi) to injure thee. On the classical expression ἐπιτίθεσθαί τινι, to set on one, i.e. impetum facere in aliq., see many examples in Wetstein and Kypke. The attempt, in fact, which was made at a later period under Gallio, signally failed.

διότι λαός κ.τ.λ.] gives the reason of the assurance, ἐγώ εἰμι μετά σου, κ. οὐδ. ἐπιθήσ. σοι τοῦ κακ. σε. Under His people Jesus understands not only those already converted, but likewise proleptically (comp. John 10:16; John 11:52) those who are destined to be members of the church purchased by His blood (Acts 20:28; Ephesians 1:14),—the whole multitude of the τεταγμένοι εἰς ζωὴν αἰώνιον (Acts 13:48) at Corinth.

ἐνιαυτὸν κ. μῆνας ἕξ] The terminus ad quem is the attempt of the Jews (Acts 18:12), and not (in opposition to Anger, de temp. rat. p. 62 f., and Wieseler, p. 45 f.) the departure of Paul, Acts 18:18. For after Luke in Acts 18:9-10 has narrated the address and promise of Jesus, he immediately, Acts 18:11, observes how long Paul in consequence of this had his residence, i.e. his quiet abode, at Corinth (ἐκάθισε, as in Luke 24:49), attending to his ministry; and he then in Acts 18:12-18 relates how on the other hand (δέ, Acts 18:12, marks a contrast to Acts 18:11) an attack broke out, indeed, against him under Gallio, but passed over so harmlessly that he was able to spend before his departure yet (observe this ἔτι, Acts 18:18) a considerable time at Corinth (Acts 18:18).

ἐν αὐτοῖς] i.e. among the Corinthians, which is undoubtedly evident from the preceding ἐν τῇ πόλ. τ.

[78] According to Laurent, neut. Stud. p. 148 f., ver. 11 was a marginal note of Luke to ἡμέρας ἱκανάς, ver. 18. But ver. 11 is by no means superfluous in its present textual position, but attests the fulfilment of the promise, ver. 10.