Chú giải Kinh Thánh

In this chapter we have, I. Paul's coming to Corinth, his private converse with Aquila and Priscilla, and his public reasonings with the Jews, from whom, when they rejected him, he turned to the Gentiles, Ac 18:1-6. II. The great success of his ministry there, and the encouragement Christ gave him in a vision to continue his labours there, in hopes of further success, Ac 18:7-11. III. The molestations which after some time he met with there from the Jews, which he got pretty well through by the coldness of Gallio, the Roman governor, in the cause, Ac 18:12-17. IV. The progress Paul made through many countries, after he had continued long at Corinth, for the edifying and watering of the churches which he had founded and planted, in which circuit he made a short visit to Jerusalem, Ac 18:18-23. V. An account of Apollo's improvement in knowledge, and of his usefulness in the church, Ac 18:24-28.

Paul, leaving Athens, comes to Corinth, meets with Aquila and Priscilla, and labors with them at tent-making, Acts 18:1-3. He preaches, and proves that Jesus was the Christ, Acts 18:4, Acts 18:5. The Jews oppose and blaspheme; and he purposes to go to the Gentiles, Acts 18:6. Justus, Crispus, and several of the Corinthians believe, Acts 18:7, Acts 18:8. Paul has a vision, by which he is greatly comforted, Acts 18:9, Acts 18:10. He continues there a year and six months, Acts 18:11. Gallio being deputy of Achaia, the Jews make insurrection against Paul, and bring him before the deputy, who dismisses the cause; whereupon the Jews commit a variety of outrages, Acts 18:12-17. Paul sails to Syria, and from thence to Ephesus, where he preaches, Acts 18:18-20. He leaves Ephesus - goes to Caesarea, visits Antioch, Galatia, and Phrygia, Acts 18:21-23. Account of Apollos and his preaching, Acts 18:24-28.

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.

Ac 18:1-22.

PAUL'S ARRIVAL AND LABORS AT CORINTH, WHERE HE IS REJOINED BY SILAS AND TIMOTHY, AND, UNDER DIVINE ENCOURAGEMENT, MAKES A LONG STAY--AT LENGTH, RETRACING HIS STEPS, BY EPHESUS, CÆSAREA, AND JERUSALEM, HE RETURNS FOR THE LAST TIME TO ANTIOCH, THUS COMPLETING HIS SECOND MISSIONARY JOURNEY.

1-4. came to Corinth--rebuilt by Julius Cæsar on the isthmus between the Ægean and Ionian Seas; the capital of the Roman province of Achaia, and the residence of the proconsul; a large and populous mercantile city, and the center of commerce alike for East and West; having a considerable Jewish population, larger, probably, at this time than usual, owing to the banishment of the Jews from Rome by Claudius Cæsar

(Ac 18:2).

Such a city was a noble field for the Gospel, which, once established there, would naturally diffuse itself far and wide.

After these things - After what occurred at Athens, as recorded in the previous chapter.

Came to Corinth - Corinth was the capital of Achaia, called anciently Ephyra, and was seated on the isthmus which divides the Peloponnesus from Attica. The city itself stood on a little island; it had two ports, Lecheeum on the west, and Cenchrea on the east. It was one of the most populous and wealthy cities of Greece, and at the same time one of the most luxurious, effeminate, ostentatious, and dissolute. Lasciviousness here was not only practiced and allowed, but was consecrated by the worship of Venus; and no small part of the wealth and splendor of the city arose from the offerings made by licentious passion in the very temples of this goddess. No city of ancient times was more profligate. It was the Paris of antiquity; the seat of splendor, and show, and corruption. Yet even here, notwithstanding all the disadvantages of splendor, gaiety, and dissoluteness, Paul entered on the work of rearing a church; and here he was eminently successful. The two epistles which he afterward wrote to this church show the extent of his success; and the well-known character and propensities of the people will account for the general drift of the admonitions and arguments in those epistles. Corinth was destroyed by the Romans 146 years before Christ; and during the conflagration several metals in a fused state, running together, produced the composition known as Corinthian brass. It was afterward restored by Julius Caesar, who planted in it a Roman colony. It soon regained its ancient splendor, and relapsed into its former dissipation and licentiousness. Paul arrived there in 52 or 53 ad.

Paul departed from Athens - How long he stayed here, we cannot tell; it is probable it could not be less than three months; but, finding that the Gospel made little progress among the Athenians, he resolved to go to Corinth.

Corinth was situated on the isthmus that connects Peloponnesus to Attica; and was the capital of all Achaia, or Peloponnesus. It was most advantageously situated for trade; for, by its two ports, the Lecheum and Cenchreae, it commanded the commerce both of the Ionian and Aegean Sea. It was destroyed by the Romans under Mummius, about one hundred and forty-six years before Christ, in their wars with Attica; but was rebuilt by Julius Caesar, and became one of the most considerable cities of Greece. Like other kingdoms and states, it has undergone a variety of revolutions: from the oppressive and destructive government of the Turks it has been lately restored to that of the Greeks; but it is greatly reduced, its whole population amounting only to between thirteen and fourteen thousand souls. It is about 46 miles east of Athens, and 342 S.W. of Constantinople. Its public buildings were very superb; and there the order called the Corinthian Order, in architecture, took its rise.

After these things,.... The Arabic version renders it, "after these words, or discourses"; after the apostle's disputation with the philosophers, and his sermon in the Areopagus, the effects of which are before related:

Paul departed from Athens, and came to Corinth; the metropolis of Achaia, or Peloponnesus. The city was formerly called Ephyra, from Ephyra (p), the daughter of Oceanus, and had its name of Corinth from Corinthus, the son of Maratho, who repaired it when destroyed; or, as others say, from Corinthus the son of Pelops, others of Orestes, and others of Jupiter: though more probably it was so called from the multitudes of whores in this place, as if it was , "corai entha, here are girls, or whores"; for in the temple of Venus there were no less than a thousand whores provided, to be prostituted to all comers thither; See Gill on 2 Corinthians 12:21. It was situated between two great seas, the Aegean and Ionean; hence (q) Horace calls it Bimaris: it had a very strong tower, built on a high mount, called Acrocorinthus, from whence these two seas might be seen, and where was the fountain Pirene, sacred to the Muses: the city was about sixty furlongs, or seven miles and a half, from the shore (r): it was a city that abounded in riches and luxury. Florus (s) calls it the head of Achaia, and the glory of Greece; and Cicero (t), the light of all Greece: it was in time so much enlarged, and became so famous, that it was little inferior to Rome itself, on which account it grew proud and haughty; and using the Roman ambassadors with some degree of insolence, who were sent into Greece, on some certain occasion, first Metellus, and then Mummius, were sent against it, which latter took it, and burnt it; and the city then abounding with images and statues of gold, silver, and brass, were melted down together in the fire, and made what was afterwards called the Corinthian brass, which became so famous, and is often spoken of in history (u): but Julius Caesar, moved with the commodious situation of the place, rebuilt it (w), and it became a colony of the Romans, as Pliny (x) and Mela (y) both call it: and so it was at this time when the apostle was there. After this it came into the hands of the Venetians, from whom it was taken by Mahomet, the second son of Amurath, in the year 1458 (z); but is now again in the hands of the Venetians; and that and the country about it are called the Morea. And as the Gospel was to be preached to the worst of sinners, among whom God's chosen ones lay, the apostle was directed to come hither; and it appears by the sequel, that God had much people here, even more than at Athens, among the wise and learned.

(p) Vellei Patercull Hist. Rom. l. 1. Pausanias, Corinthiaca, sive l. 2. p. 85. (q) Carmin. l. 1. Ode 7. (r) Plin. Nat. Hist. l. 4. c. 4. (s) Hist. Rom. l. 2. c. 16. (t) Pro Lege Manilia Orat. 13. p. 636. (u) Florus, ib. (w) Pausauias, Corinthiaca, sive l. 2. p. 85, 89. (x) Nat. Hist. l. 4. c. 4. (y) De Situ Orbis, l. 2. c. 10. (z) Petav. Rationar. Temp. par. 1. p. 476.