Tool Beta
The Ancient World Behind the Text
Pick a passage anywhere in the New Testament. See the customs and ideas a first reader knew without being told.
Acts 18:1-11, Tentmakers in Corinth
In Corinth Paul lodges and works with Aquila and Priscilla, Jews lately expelled from Rome who share his trade. When the synagogue turns against him he moves next door to the house of Titius Justus, and the synagogue leader Crispus believes with his household.
Acts 18:1-11, in every translation this tool compares.
Paul moves on to Corinth and joins Aquila and Priscilla, Jewish refugees recently expelled from Rome under Claudius, who make tents as he does. He works with them during the week and argues in the synagogue on the Sabbath, then devotes himself fully to preaching once Silas and Timothy arrive. When synagogue opposition hardens, he moves his teaching to the house of a God-fearer next door, and the synagogue ruler Crispus believes with his household. Encouraged by a night vision promising protection, Paul stays eighteen months.
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- {"u":"https:\/\/jayms.com\/bible-study-tools-2\/ancient-world-ideas\/trade-guilds\/","n":"Trades and trade guilds","s":"Craftsmen of one trade lived and worked in the same streets and banded together in guilds, which set standards, defended their interests and met for meals in honor of a patron god.","r":""}
- {"u":"https:\/\/jayms.com\/bible-study-tools-2\/ancient-world-ideas\/synagogue\/","n":"The synagogue","s":"The local gathering place where Jews met on the Sabbath to pray and study Scripture. It was also a community center, run by people of standing.","r":""}
- {"u":"https:\/\/jayms.com\/bible-study-tools-2\/ancient-world-ideas\/house-churches\/","n":"House churches","s":"For their first three centuries Christians met in homes, the way some Jewish groups and private clubs did. A host with a large house gave the church its room, its table and often its protection.","r":""}
- {"u":"https:\/\/jayms.com\/bible-study-tools-2\/ancient-world-ideas\/roman-colony\/","n":"Roman colonies","s":"Cities refounded by Rome for its veterans and settlers, run on Roman law with Latin on their monuments. A colony was a small copy of Rome in the provinces, and its citizens were citizens of Rome.","r":""}
Corinth, destroyed by Rome in 146 BC, was refounded as a Roman colony in 44 BC, and Latin was the language of civic business (the cultural backgrounds notes; Wright and Bird). Claudius expelled the Jews of Rome, probably in AD 49, after trouble over one Chrestus, usually taken as debate about Jesus as the Christ (Keener and his notes; the ESV Study Bible); Wright adds that Chrestus and Christus sounded almost alike, and that the edict lapsed when Claudius died in AD 54, which is why Priscilla and Aquila are back in Rome in Romans 16:3. Guild banquets used sacrificial food, which shut out observant Jews and made them glad of Jewish partners (Keener). The word for tentmaker often meant a leatherworker (the cultural backgrounds notes; the CSB Study Bible), while Carson, Moo and Morris tie it to the goat-hair cloth of Paul's home region. People of status despised manual labor (Keener and his notes), but Jewish teachers commonly kept a trade (Wright). The inscribed synagogue lintel found at Corinth dates from the second to fifth centuries, so it shows a later synagogue, not Paul's (Price and House).
- NIV Cultural Backgrounds Study Bible, notes on Acts 18:1, 18:2, 18:3 and 18:7
- Craig S. Keener, The IVP Bible Background Commentary: New Testament, on Acts 18:2, 18:3, 18:6-7 and 18:8
- ESV Study Bible, study note on Acts 18:2
- CSB Study Bible, note on Acts 18:3
- N. T. Wright and Michael F. Bird, The New Testament in Its World, ch. 15, The Story of Paul's Life and Ministry
- N. T. Wright, Acts for Everyone, Part Two, comment on Acts 18:1-11
- D. A. Carson, Douglas J. Moo and Leon Morris, An Introduction to the New Testament, ch. 7, Paul, section Born in Tarsus of Cilicia (Acts 22:3)
- J. Randall Price and H. Wayne House, Zondervan Handbook of Biblical Archaeology, Acts 18:4 The Jewish Synagogue at Corinth
