Acts 16:1

τινος omitted with אABCDE. Not represented in Vulg.

1. κατήντησεν. The preposition in this verb seems to have little or no force. Cf. its use in 2Ma 4:21; 2Ma 4:44.

εἰς Δέρβην καὶ … Λύστραν, to Derbe and Lystra. This is the beginning of that revisiting spoken of in Acts 15:36. See notes on Acts 14:6.

ἧν ἐκεῖ, was there. The verb does not make it certain that Lystra, to which ἐκεῖ is most naturally referred, was the birthplace of Timothy, but only his home at the date of Paul’s visit. He must however have resided there a good while to have earned the favourable report of the people both of that place and Iconium.

Τιμόθεος, Timothy. This is the person to whom St Paul addresses two Epistles, and who was the companion of his labours in this journey until his return into Proconsular Asia (Acts 20:4). He was the son of a Jewish-Christian mother, and his father was a Greek, whether a proselyte of the gate or not we are not told. The mother’s name was Eunice (2 Timothy 1:5) and the grandmother’s Lois. Timothy is spoken of as a fellow-worker with St Paul (Romans 16:21). From 1 Corinthians 4:17 we find that he was St Paul’s messenger to that Church, and he is joined with that Apostle in the greeting of 2nd Corinthians. He also went to and fro between St Paul and the Church in Thessalonica (1 Thessalonians 3:2; 1 Thessalonians 3:6) and must have been at Rome with St Paul soon after the Apostle’s arrival there, for he is mentioned in the Epistles, to the Philippians (Acts 1:1; Acts 2:19), to the Colossians (Acts 1:1) and to Philemon (1). An imprisonment which he underwent is alluded to (Hebrews 13:23), but we cannot be certain when or where it was. According to tradition (Eus. H. E. III. 14) he was the first bishop of Ephesus, and is said to have suffered martyrdom at the hands of the populace (Niceph. H. E. III. 11).

υἱὸς γυναικὸς Ἰουδαίας πιστῆς, the son of a Jewess which believed. Her earnest education of her son in the holy Scriptures (2 Timothy 3:15) from his early youth marks the character of the woman, and makes it probable that the husband of such a woman was at least a proselyte of the gate. Timothy’s father is so little mentioned that it seems likely he had died early.

πατρὸς δὲ Ἕλληνος, but of a father who was a Greek. The word Ἕλλην was widely used by the Jews about all who were not of their own nation. The world for them was divided into Ἰουδαῖοι καὶ Ἕλληνες. Cf. Acts 14:1; Romans 1:16, &c.