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Acts 18:12–17
“Gallio said to the Jews, ‘If it were a matter of wrongdoing or vicious crime, O Jews, I would have reason to accept your complaint. But since it is a matter of questions about words and names and your own law, see to it yourselves. I refuse to be a judge of these things’” (vv. 14–15).
Having received a promise of safety directly from the Lord in a vision, Paul experienced a fruitful ministry in Corinth that lasted about eighteen months (Acts 18:1–11). The Jews who opposed the Apostle in that city were not able to harm him, as God had said. Yet it was not for a lack of trying that the Jews could not hurt the Apostle. While the Apostle worked in Corinth, we see in today’s passage, the Jews attempted to get the Roman government to side with them against Paul and the other missionaries.
Corinth was the capital city of the Roman province of Achaia and was home to its proconsul or governor. Beginning in the summer of AD 51, Gallio, the brother of the first-century Stoic philosopher Seneca, served as proconsul. His term lasted four years, and he was known to be charming and pleasant to his subjects. Hoping to get Paul banished from Corinth, the Jews approached Gallio while the Apostle was in the city, accusing Paul of “persuading people to worship God contrary to the law” (vv. 12–13). Essentially, the Jews charged Paul with promoting an illegal religion, something that the Romans frowned on because they were wary of any unapproved faith group, since such groups had the potential to stir up unrest against the empire. Although the Jews did not worship the Roman gods, Judaism held the status of a legal religion in the Roman Empire, so the Jews were allowed to practice their faith in peace as long as they did not cause trouble for the imperial government. During the earliest days of the new covenant church, the Romans by and large regarded the Christians as following a form of Judaism and did not pay them much notice. Here the Jews were saying that Christianity is not an authentic form of Judaism, so Gallio should not tolerate the Christians in Achaia.
Gallio had no time for any of this, regarding the complaint against Paul as an intra-Jewish theological dispute over the right interpretation of the Jewish law. To Gallio, Paul was just another Jew with the legal right to practice his religion, and he had not forfeited that right by committing a vicious crime. Gallio therefore dismissed the complaint (vv. 14–17). The Jews attempted to silence Paul, but their plan backfired, for as many commentators note, Gallio’s decision actually guaranteed that Rome would continue to treat the Christians as part of the legal religion of Judaism for at least ten to twelve more years.
Coram Deo Living before the face of God
Gallio’s decision ensured that Christianity would be mostly tolerated by the government for many more years. As we are praying and making political decisions, we can ask God to give us leaders who legislate in all godliness, and we can pray that the Lord would give us freedom to preach the gospel unhindered.
For further study
- Ezra 8:21–23
- Nehemiah 1
- Romans 15:30–33
- 1 Timothy 2:1–2
The bible in a year
- Psalms 99–101
- Romans 13