Acts 17 - Introduction

XVII: 1. Luke now drops the pronoun of the first person, in which he has spoken of the apostolic company since they left Troas, and resumes the third person, which shows that he remained in Philippi after the departure of Paul and Silas. He also speaks of the these two brethren as if they constituted the whole company, until they are about to leave Berea, when Timothy is again mentioned. This leads to the presumption that Timothy remained with Luke, to still further instruct and organize the infant congregation in Philippi. Leaving the cause thus guarded behind them, Paul and Silas seek another field of labor. (1) "And having passed through Amphipolis and Apollonia, they went into Thessalonica, where was the synagogue of the Jews." The distance from Philippi to Amphipolis was thirty-three miles; from Amphipolis to Apollonia, thirty miles; and from Apollonia to Thessalonica, thirty-seven miles; making just one hundred miles to the next city which the apostles undertook to evangelize. The whole of this distance was over one of those celebrated military roads built by the Romans, and elegantly paved with flag-stones.

At Philippi there was no synagogue, and the swift passage of Paul and Silas through Amphipolis and Apollonia indicates that there was none in either of those cities; hence the synagogue in Thessalonica was the only one in a large district of the country, for which reason it is styled "the synagogue of the Jews." The existence of a synagogue in a Gentile city was always an indication of a considerable Jewish population. Thessalonica, on account of its commercial importance, was then, and continues to be, under its modern name Salonica, a great resort for Jews. It was a knowledge of this fact, no doubt, which hastened Paul to this city, anticipating, through the synagogue, a more favorable introduction to the people than he had enjoyed at Philippi.