Turkey/Greece Trip -May 29, 2025 - Corinth
“And he (Paul) stayed a year and six months, teaching the word of God among them…At Cenchreae he had cut his hair, for he was under a vow.” Acts 18: 11, 18
This morning we headed to the Corinth area where Paul worked and taught for a year and a half with Pricilla and Aquilla and where he appears before Gallio the proconsul of Achaia to defend his teachings. At Corinth, we are able to see several areas of shops - one of which would have been where Paul, Pricilla and Aquilla made tents. Likely people from far and wide attending the Isthmian games in the Corinth area would have been customers needing tents and tent repair. We can also see the Bema area of the public agora where Paul would have appeared before Gallio.
First we stopped at the Corinth canal - the modern man made canal that crosses the 3 mile Corinth isthmus connecting the Saronic Gulf and Corinth Gulf which means the Agean and Ionian Seas are connected. In ancient times, there was a paved track across this isthmus called the Diolkos. A ship and / or their cargo could be dragged across this track and save sailors the dangerous passage around the Peloponnese Peninsula . Nero (using Jewish slave labor) first attempted to carve out a canal in the 1st c AD. This couldn’t be accomplished until the 1800’s and the use of dynamite.
Corinth is an amazing biblical archeological site! Reading from Acts, it becomes very easy to envision Paul’s work there and the environment in which he lived. The Acrocorinth (acropolis) with its Aphrodite temple remains looms over the entire site from every angle. The remains of the Temple of Apollo date to 550 BC.
Our last night! Every day seems a week long when you are seeing and learning new things continually, but overall the weeks have gone fast. We had a final dinner together in the Plaka tonight. Thanking God for a safe and enriching journey! PB, Margery and Jacob
Corinth
