Eighteen months at Corinth; Gallio dismisses the charges
At Corinth Paul worked as a tentmaker with Aquila and Priscilla, Jews recently expelled from Rome by Claudius. The Lord encouraged him in a vision, and he stayed a year and six months. When the Jews brought him before the proconsul Gallio, Gallio refused to hear the case.
The Lord said to Paul in the night by a vision, “Don’t be afraid, but speak and don’t be silent; for I am with you, and no one will attack you to harm you, for I have many people in this city.”
Acts 18:9–10 (World English Bible)
Corinth was a wealthy, notoriously immoral port city. Crispus, the ruler of the synagogue, believed with his household, and many Corinthians were baptized. Gallio, brother of the philosopher Seneca, regarded the dispute as a question of Jewish law and drove the accusers from his judgment seat.
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Dating notes
The one firmly dated point in Paul's life: a letter of Claudius inscribed at Delphi shows Gallio was proconsul of Achaia in AD 51–52, so Paul stood before him about AD 51. Claudius expelled the Jews from Rome about AD 49 (Suetonius). Ussher: AD 54.