=Antioch in Syria= was 300 miles north of Jerusalem and about fifteen miles from the Mediterranean shore, where was its port, then called Seleucia. It was the most beautiful city of Syria and at that time the most important.
=Antioch in Pisidia=, however, which is now called Yalobatch, is 500 miles northwest of Jerusalem and 100 north of the coast of the Mediterranean. This Antioch is partly on the southern declivity of a long range of mountains and owes its ancient name to the same king who gave name to the Syrian Antioch. This king was Seleucus, king of Syria, whose father’s name, Antiochus, he gave to these cities and his own to Seleucia, fifteen miles off, on the coast, of which we have already spoken.
Antioch was at this time the adopted city of a very active community of Christians, many of whom were Grecians and others Gentiles. Paul, whose special talents and education admirably fitted him for this class of converts, being now at Tarsus, was sent for, and he remained in Antioch for about a year; when he, with others, began a series of missionary tours whereby the gospel was not only extended throughout Western Asia but introduced into Europe, as we shall soon see.
=5.= A. D. 42. =About this period there came= to Antioch a prophet, by name Agabus, one of a number who not only foretold events but seemed endowed with extraordinary powers of exposition of the divine word.[187] This prophet announced that a great famine would soon call for generosity on the part of the church at Antioch towards the poorer members of the community in Judæa, Acts 11:28.
This announcement was made during the reign of Claudius, A. D. 41‒54, of which reign Tacitus says that it was distinguished for earthquakes, bad harvests, and general scarcity.[188] The Christians in Antioch, therefore, sent contributions to Jerusalem and commissioned Saul and Barnabas for the purpose of conveying these gifts, Acts 11:29.
For the first time we now read of the term “presbyters” in the Greek, or seniores in the Vulgate translation, and called “elders” in the English version, Acts 11:30.
=6. At this time= Herod Agrippa (see table page 229) ruled in Judæa. Claudius had known him as an earnest advocate of his rule before his succession to the empire, and he therefore rewarded Herod with the addition of Samaria and Judæa to those possessions of Philip Antipas which he before possessed. Herod had been imprisoned by Tiberius, but Caligula restored him to liberty and presented him with a golden chain of the same weight as the iron one he had worn in prison, and this chain he dedicated to the Temple when, A. D. 42, he arrived in Jerusalem. This Herod courted the favor of the Jews by many public acts. In his time the northern section of Jerusalem, now inclosed with a wall, was a suburb; and he inclosed it and, had not the prefect of Syria compelled him to stop, he would have strengthened all the fortifications of the city.