CORINTH

The city of Corinth was a prosperous manufacturing and trading centre in Achaia, the southern province of Greece (see map under ACTS, BOOK OF). An overland route went north from Corinth to Macedonia, and sea routes went east, west and south. The city was so well known for its immorality and vice that people of the time commonly referred to a person of loose morals as one who ‘behaved like a Corinthian’ (cf. 1 Cor 6:9-11,15-18). Paul’s first visit to Corinth was on his second missionary journey.

He stayed eighteen months, and during that time he founded the Corinthian church (Acts 18:1-17). Another church was established at Cenchreae, the seaport a few kilometres east (Acts 18:18; Rom 16:1-2). Paul revisited the church at Corinth during his third missionary journey (Acts 20:2-3). He also wrote the church a number of letters, two of which have been preserved in the New Testament. (For the added information these letters give concerning life in Corinth see CORINTHIANS, LETTERS TO THE).