Sultan Dag Mts, near Pisidian Antioch

East-West Street, Antioch

East-West Street, Antioch

Shops, Antioch

St Paul's Church, Antioch - 4thC AD.
Recent excavations have revealed a 1st century building underneath the church, identified as a synagogue, probably the one in which Paul preached.

St Paul's Church, Antioch, looking northwest

Aqueduct, 1st Century AD

Aqueduct seen from Antioch

Wsstern Wall of Antioch

Theater at Antioch

Fountain and Pool, Antioch

Paul and Pisidian Antioch

Pisidian Antioch stood at th crossroads of the Mediterranean, Aegean and Central Anatolian regions.

The acropolis has an area of 460,000 square metres (115 acres) and is surrounded by fortified defence walls. The Territorium of the city is estimated to have been approximately 1,400 km˛ in ancient times. According to the 1950 census, there were 40 villages with 50,000 people living in the area. The population during the Roman period must have been a little more than this. (Wikipaedia)

After the death of Alexander the Great, Antioch was founded as a military base to control Galatian attacks, but the Galatians were not finally subdued until the Province of Galatia was established by the Romans in 25BC and Antioch became part of it.

"Antioch was a capital city for many different cultures because of the economic, military and religious activities of the region. This is the reason why Paul of Tarsus gave his first sermon to the Gentiles (Acts 13:13–52}, and visited the city once on each of his missionary journeys, helping to make Antioch a center of Christianity in Anatolia." (Wikipaedia) Antioch became an important centre later in the Christian era.

The photos on the left show that Antioch was a major Hellenistic centre in Paul's day. CLICK ON PHOTOS for larger images, credits and excellent descriptions of their historical significance - most of these photos have a close connection with Paul. (Holy Land Photos.Org).

There is an excellent survey of the archaeological finds at Antioch HERE on Wikipaedia, but unfortunately no photos.

Hellenistic City Wall - Bible Places.com

Paul's Visits to Antioch

"To these and other everyday questions the "spirit-filled" people had given a considered answer applicable to every case: "All things are lawful" (1 Corinthians 6:12 and 10:23). They paraded their freedom to the point of licentiousness, in contrast to the rest, whose scruples made them uneasy about any defilement and, to preserve their faith, forced them into a strict asceticism.

"The "spirituals" indeed went further: they even used their watchword "freedom" to justify intercourse with prostitutes, which in the common pagan view was quite unexceptionable and permissible. Why should the Christian have inhibitions in this matter? This sort of thing was just natural, the result of being in the world, and without effects on the "spirit-filled" person's "real self". (1 Corinthians 6:12 et seq).

"Paul does not deal with the question by way of casuistry and law. He allows freedom where it is compatible with faith. But he also says "No, and no again" where there is notorious playing fast and loose with the Christian faith, where outrage is done to moral principles accepted on all hands - even by the heathen (1 Corinthians 5:1 et seq) - and where it involves betrayal of the new life available in Christ to believers (1 Corinthians 6:1 et seq).

"1 Corinthians 8-10 in particular is significant in that Paul resolutely brushes aside all the enthusiansts' pseudo-theological arguments to justify themselves by taking the theme of responsibility for the others before God and the world as his line of approach to the questions. This is also very apparent in the detailed treatmnt of the serious abuses in the Corinthians' worship.

"When they celebrated the Lord's Supper, they were sincerely convinced that in the sacrament they participated in the redmption wrought by Christ. Yet, at the common meal accompanying it, those better off did not bother about the poorer who came later and had nothing with them.

"In Paul's view this was profanation of the "Body of Christ" - the church (1 Corinthians 20 and 11). He takes the same means of checking the tumultuous contests of the "spirituals" who broke out into ecstatic utterance during worship, and insists on the intelligible, clear word of preaching which might convince outsiders and unbelievers, and win them over...

Resources

Map of Antioch and historical information.

On This Site - The Cities and Districts of Paul's Churches:
Corinth     Colossae     Ephesus     Galatia     Philippi     Rome     Thessalonica

Saint Paul's Letters:
To the Churches in Galatia
To Timothy (2)

Books:
Paul     Gunther Bornkamm
The Search for the Twelve Apostles     W S McBirnie
Zondervan NIV Atlas of the Bible     Prof Carl Rasmussen

Saint Luke by Andrea Mantegna 15th C