Thessalonica, Athens and Corinth: Paul plants churches in Greece

These two chapters of Acts record the part of Paul's second journey (about AD 49 to 52) in which he carried the gospel from Macedonia into Greece proper. After a night vision at Troas he had crossed to Macedonia and founded the church at Philippi (Acts 16). He travelled on along the Egnatian Way, the main Roman road through the region, through Amphipolis and Apollonia to Thessalonica, the capital of the province of Macedonia and a large port city. The companions named are Silas and Timothy, and the narrator's 'we' of the Philippi section is absent from these chapters.

Luke's account is anchored in datable facts. Acts 18:2 says Aquila and Priscilla had recently come from Italy because Claudius had ordered all Jews to leave Rome. The Roman historian Suetonius (Life of Claudius 25) reports that Claudius expelled Jews from Rome because of disturbances at the instigation of 'Chrestus', which some scholars take as a garbled reference to Christ, though this is debated; a date about AD 49 is common but not certain. Acts 18:12 names Gallio as proconsul of Achaia, and a fragmentary inscription found at Delphi, preserving a letter of Claudius, is usually read as dating his term to about AD 51 to 52. If Paul's eighteen months in Corinth overlapped Gallio's arrival, they fall roughly between AD 50 and 52.

The cities were very different. Thessalonica had a synagogue and a mixed population; Athens was no longer a political power but remained the intellectual symbol of the Greek world; Corinth, rebuilt as a Roman colony in 44 BC, was a commercial city on the isthmus with two harbours. From Thessalonica and Corinth Paul wrote letters, and Acts 17 and 18 explain how those churches began.

Acts is historical narrative with theology carried by speeches. The two chapters give contrasting models of Paul's preaching. To Jews and God-fearing Gentiles in a synagogue he argues from the Scriptures (17:2-3); to Greek philosophers he begins with creation, quotes their poets, and reaches the resurrection and judgment (17:22-31). The method varies with the audience, but the content is constant: Jesus, risen, is Lord. Narrative does not make every approach a rule; it shows how one apostle adapted the message without altering it.

The Areopagus speech is the one example in Acts of Paul preaching to a purely pagan audience. It should be read as a summary, since it would have taken far longer than the few minutes the text takes to read. Notice its structure: the Creator (verses 24-25), humanity and its search (26-28), the error of idols (29), and the call to repent in view of a coming judgment by a man God raised (30-31). The cultural references can be checked: the altar to an unknown god (17:23) fits Greek writers' reports of altars of this kind, and the quotation in verse 28 of 'we are his offspring' is generally traced to the poet Aratus, with the line about living and moving and having being often traced to Epimenides, though the latter is less certain.

When reading the Corinth account, remember that Luke selects. The long eighteen months are told in a few verses, and Paul's own letters add detail about his state of mind (1 Corinthians 2:1-5; 1 Thessalonians 3:1-6).

17:1-9. At Thessalonica Paul follows his custom and goes to the synagogue, where for three Sabbaths he reasons from the Scriptures that the Messiah had to suffer and rise from the dead, and that Jesus is that Messiah. Some Jews, many devout Greeks and several leading women believe. Jealous opponents gather a mob from the marketplace and drag Jason, Paul's host, before the city officials, whom Luke calls politarchs; the title is attested in inscriptions from Macedonian cities, which supports Luke's precision. The charge is that these men who have turned the world upside down have come here, and that they say there is another king, Jesus, acting against the decrees of Caesar. Jason posts bond and is released.

17:10-15. The believers send Paul and Silas away by night to Berea. The Jews there are more noble-minded than those in Thessalonica, because they receive the word eagerly and examine the Scriptures daily to see whether these things are so. Many believe. When agitators arrive from Thessalonica, Paul is escorted to Athens, while Silas and Timothy stay behind.

17:16-21. Paul is provoked by a city full of idols. He debates in the synagogue and in the marketplace daily. Epicurean and Stoic philosophers engage him. Epicureans taught that the gods were remote and that life should aim at calm; Stoics taught a rational order running through the universe and acceptance of fate. Some call him a babbler, literally a seed-picker, a bird picking up scraps; others think he preaches foreign gods because he speaks of Jesus and the resurrection (anastasis). They bring him to the Areopagus, the council that met on or near the hill of Ares.

17:22-31. Paul begins courteously: he sees that they are very religious, and he has found an altar inscribed to an unknown god. This he proclaims to them. The God who made the world and everything in it does not live in temples made by hands and is not served by human hands as though he needed anything; he gives to all life and breath. From one man he made every nation to live on the earth, setting their times and boundaries, so that they might seek God and perhaps find him, though he is not far from each one of us. Quoting their poets, he says we are his offspring, so we should not think the divine is like gold, silver or stone. God overlooked the times of ignorance but now commands all people everywhere to repent, because he has set a day to judge the world by a man whom he appointed, and has given proof by raising him from the dead.

17:32-34. Some mock at the resurrection of the dead; others want to hear more. A few believe, among them Dionysius, a member of the Areopagus, and a woman named Damaris.

18:1-17. Paul goes to Corinth and finds Aquila and Priscilla, Jewish believers expelled from Rome, who share his trade; the Greek word (skēnopoios) is usually translated tentmaker, though it may cover leatherworking. When Silas and Timothy come from Macedonia (18:5), Paul devotes himself to preaching that Jesus is the Christ. When the synagogue opposes him he shakes out his garments and turns to the Gentiles, moving next door to the house of Titius Justus. Crispus, the synagogue leader, believes with his household. In a night vision the Lord tells Paul not to be afraid, to speak and not be silent, since 'I am with you' and he has many people in the city. Paul stays a year and six months. The Jews bring him before Gallio at the bema (judgment seat), who dismisses the case as a matter of their own law. Sosthenes, the synagogue ruler, is beaten before the bema, and Gallio takes no notice.

18:18-28. Paul sails to Ephesus with Priscilla and Aquila, leaves them there, goes to Jerusalem and Antioch. Apollos, an eloquent Alexandrian Jew who knew only the baptism of John, is taught more accurately by Priscilla and Aquila and then helps believers in Achaia, showing from the Scriptures that Jesus is the Christ.

The chapters teach the doctrine of God the Creator and Judge before it teaches anything about Christ. Paul's speech draws on Old Testament teaching (Genesis 1; Psalm 50:7-15; Isaiah 42:5; 45:18-22) to say that God made everything, needs nothing, and holds all people accountable. It also teaches that idolatry is the human mistake of making God small. The inclusion of Gentiles in this vision, set out in the claim that all nations come from one man, belongs to the Bible's story from Genesis 10 to Revelation 7:9.

The chapters also teach that the resurrection of Jesus is God's public proof and the centre of the gospel. In both cities Paul preaches that the Messiah suffers and rises. In Thessalonica the point is argued from the Old Testament, as Luke says in 17:3; in Athens the resurrection is the sticking point, because no pagan category could hold it.

The practical theology of these chapters is that gospel work is done with ordinary means: reasoning, tentmaking, hospitality in a home, a couple who explain Scripture to a gifted preacher. God also works through the opposition. In the vision at Corinth the Lord's promise 'I am with you' echoes Isaiah 41:10 and 43:5 and stands beside Matthew 28:20.

In Thessalonica Paul shows from the Scriptures that the Messiah had to suffer and rise, and that Jesus is that Messiah (17:3). The Old Testament connection is fulfilment: the suffering servant of Isaiah 53, the righteous sufferer of Psalm 22 and the promise of Psalm 16:10 are the kind of texts the apostles used (compare Luke 24:25-27, 44-46; Acts 2:25-31; 13:33-35). Luke does not list the passages here, so the particular texts are our inference. The title Jesus bears in the accusation, 'another king', is true in a sense the accusers did not grasp: he is the king of Psalm 2 and Daniel 7:13-14.

In Athens the same Jesus is presented as the man God has appointed to judge the world, which draws on the vision of the one like a son of man given authority to judge (Daniel 7:13-14) and on Jesus' own teaching (John 5:27). The proof is his resurrection. Paul does not name him in the speech, but the 'man' and the resurrection are plainly Jesus.

At Corinth Paul and Apollos both centre on the claim that Jesus is the Christ (18:5, 28). The Lord's own voice in the night vision, 'I am with you', shows the risen Jesus directing and protecting the mission from heaven, as he promised before his ascension.