Dating the New Testament

Paul’s early journeys and famine relief visit.

Going back to Acts 11 we have a visit to Judea.

Acts 11:28-30 “One of them named Agabus stood up and began to indicate by the Spirit that there would certainly be a great famine all over the world. And this took place in the reign of Claudius. And in the proportion that any of the disciples had means, each of them determined to send a contribution for the relief of the brethren living in Judea. And this they did, sending it in charge of Barnabas and Saul to the elders.”

This visit is known as the “famine relief visit” as it provided relief from a famine which raged through the area in 46 and 47 AD. Probably the visit was in 46AD, early because of the prophetic warning. Note, by the way, that this visit to Judea included a visit to Jerusalem (Acts 12:25). The Apostles then returned to Antioch, probably spending the winter there before setting off on the first missionary journey in 47, a journey that would easily be completed within a single year. This leaves a year between the end of the first missionary journey and the start of the second in 48/49AD. This year contained the council of Jerusalem.


Acts 15:1-3 “Some men came down from Judea and began teaching the brethren, ‘Unless you are circumcised according to the custom of Moses, you cannot be saved.’And when Paul and Barnabas had great dissension and debate with them, the brethren determined that Paul and Barnabas and some others of them should go up to Jerusalem to the apostles and elders concerning this issue. Therefore, being sent on their way by the church, they were passing through both Phoenicia and Samaria, describing in detail the conversion of the Gentiles, and were bringing great joy to all the brethren.”

This journey to Jerusalem is taken along the coastal routs, with calls at the various ecclesias of Phoenicia and Samaria on the way. This would mean that it could be undertaken early in the year. The trouble could already have been brewing by the time that Paul and Barnabas returned to Antioch as Mark left Paul at Perga in Pamphilia (Acts 13:13) and returned to Jerusalem, no doubt taking the news that Paul had been converting Gentiles. The men who came from Judea could therefore have arrived in Antioch even before Paul did. The Council of Jerusalem could therefore have been early in 48AD.


It is therefore possible that Paul left Antioch for the Second Missionary Journey in the autumn of 48AD, although it could have been the spring of 49. However, it seems more likely to me that he would set off fairly promptly with the news for the Galatian ecclesias that they need not keep the law. Notice that one of his companions on the second missionary journey was Silas. Silas appears in the letter sent from the Council of Jerusalem: “Therefore we have sent Judas and Silas, who themselves will also report the same things by word of mouth.” (Acts 15:27) It seems likely that the initial purpose of Paul’s second missionary journey was to deal with the same problems as the council of Jerusalem, and it is likely that Silas was chosen by him for this reason. Paul would no doubt be keen to ensure that the news was carried without delay, which argues in favour of a departure in the autumn of 48. This being the case, he would have spent the winter of 48/49 in Galatia.


The other event in this period is the death of Herod Agrippa I in Caesarea (Acts 12:20-25). The account of this appears at about the same time as that of the famine relief visit. There are several possibilities here. One is that Josephus, the secular source from which the date is calculated, is mistaken. It is also possible that Acts is recounting events out of chronological order. Finally, there may have been another, earlier famine, of which we know nothing. This makes the chronology of the early period rather less solid than the chronology for the second half of Acts.


We therefore have a full chronology of the Acts period from the Famine Relief Visit to the end of the Acts narrative. This includes the place where Paul wintered for every year from 45/46AD to 61/62AD. As every winter is accounted for we can be certain that there are no protracted wanderings not accounted for in the Acts narrative. It is possible, for instance, that Paul made short journeys away from Ephesus in 53 or 54 AD but these cannot have been longer than a month or two; they could certainly not last a year, or extend over a winter.

We have looked at the chronology of Paul’s progress from Corinth to Rome. Lets now look at the period earlier than the stay in Corinth to produce a somewhat looser chronology for the first half of Acts.