8. From Philippi the travellers took the Roman road to Amphipolis. This city stood on high ground about three miles from the sea and thirty-three from Philippi. It was colonized by Athenians and called Amphipolis from being nearly surrounded by the river Strymon.
9. The next point reached was Apollonia, but the exact location is not known. It is laid down in some of the ancient itineraries as being thirty miles from Amphipolis. Thence they travelled to Thessalonica, thirty-seven miles distant from Apollonia. This was a very important place and is even now second only to Constantinople. Its present name is Saloniki and it is at the head of the Thermaic Gulf. It was a busy commercial town at the time of the visit of the two missionaries. Here Paul and Silas remained for several weeks, publicly explaining and proving the new doctrines of the gospel, Acts 17:1–10.
10. Opposition from the Jews arising, they left for Berœa. Berœa is now called Verria, and is sixty miles west by north from Thessalonica. It is a large town at present, having some 20,000 inhabitants. Here the usual vexation and opposition onthe part of the Jews made it necessary that the apostle Paul should leave the town, and at night and alone he went down to the seashore to a shipping town about twenty-five miles distant, called Dium, and from thence he set sail for Athens, which was by sea about 270 miles distant. We now may read the history as recorded in Acts 17.
11. Athens at the time of the apostle’s visit was included in the Roman province of Achaia. It was not then in its palmiest days of prosperity, but it was nevertheless the centre of art and learning and a city of great voluptuousness and idolatry. It contained one large Agora, “the market” or place of assembling of its citizens, a large square or open place which not only contained but was surrounded by the finest sculptures and buildings perhaps at that time existing in the world. The apostle came here alone, 1 Thess. 3:1, and while waiting for his companions he met and preached to many in the Agora, until he attracted so much attention that he was invited to the great assembling-place on the north of the Agora called the Areopagus, where the most important court or council of the Areopagus was held. Solon gave the court censorial and political powers, but St. Paul was called here more because of the curious desire of the Athenians to hear about this new doctrine.At this place he delivered that masterly address recorded in Acts 17.[197]
His labors at Athens did not meet with muchsuccess, although some were persuaded and believed, and one of the court itself, Dionysius by name, who afterwards became a bishop of a Christian community formed there.Paul soon left Athens for Corinth.[198]
12. Corinth was a rival of Athens in luxury and magnificence, in commerce and in wealth, and was perhaps even in art second only to Athens. It was situated upon the isthmus of the Peloponnesus and noted for its Acropolis, built upon an elevation 1,886 feet above the city on the south. It was sacked and nearly destroyed by the Romans, B. C. 146, and nearly all the treasures of art were carried to Rome, but the city was restored under Julius Cæsar. Only a few ruins remain. The modern town is on the Gulf of Corinth, three miles north from the site of the old city, and contains about 2,600 inhabitants.It is 45 miles a little south of due west from Athens.[199] Here Paul remained for nearly two years, A. D. 52, 53, and preached with great success;and while here he wrote the Epistle to the Thessalonians[200] and planted other churches in Achaia, 2 Cor. 1:1.
13. Cenchreæ was five and a half miles east-southeast of Corinth on the shore of the Gulf of Ægina. It was an important port at the time when the apostle visited it.At present it is called Kekriais[201] and is not inhabited; the only remains are of anancient dry dock. From this place Paul set sail for Ephesus, 235 miles almost due east.
14. Ephesus is 35 miles south-southeast from Smyrna, near where the river Cayster empties into the Gulf of Scala Nova. It was the capital of Ionia and had one of the seven churches mentioned in the book of Revelation. The ruins which remain consist chiefly of a magnificent theatre, supposed to be large enough to accommodate 30,000 people, a stadium or gymnasium, besides walls and towers and remains of the temple of Diana, for which it was most famous. The worship of Diana was attended with the study and practice of magic in various forms,and the “magical letters” spoken of by many classic authors[202] as “Ephesian letters” were in use at the time of the apostle’s visit.The temple was in its splendor also at that time.[203]
On this the first visit, A. D. 54, of the apostle to Ephesus he remained but a short time, and then departed for Jerusalem, Acts 18:19–21, and thence down to Antioch.