SOSTHENES, Chief of the Synagogue of Corinth. The Jews of Corinth laying hold of St. Paul, carry’d him before the Tribunal of Gallio, and accused him of attempting to introduce a new Way of worshipping God among them. But the Proconsul sent them back again, and told them, That he would not enter into any Controversy, that had relation only to their own Laws and Ceremonies. Then they seized Sosthenes, the Chief of the Synagogue,1 and began to beat him before the Tribunal; but Gallio would take no Cognizance of the Matter. This is the Account we have of it in the Acts. ‘Tis disputed whether they were Jews or Gentiles, that thus laid hold on Sosthenes and beat him. The Greek printed Copy of the Acts intimates, they were the Gentiles. St. Austin2 and Bede read in the same manner. They imagin’d, that the Pagans seeing Gallio’s ill Reception of the Jews, the more to insult them, had a mind to abuse the Chief of their Synagogue, who was at their Head; whether it was meerly out of Hatred to the Jews, or out of Friendship to St. Paul. This Opinion is follow’d by Cajetan, Lyran, Grotius, and some others.
Others3 think, that Sosthenes, however Head of the Synagogue, yet might be a Friend and secret Disciple of St. Paul’s; and that the other Jews, seeing themselves neglected by Gallio, might vent their Malice upon Sosthenes the Head of their Synagogue. These will also have it, that this is the same Sosthenes whose Name is read, with that of St. Paul, at the Beginning of the first Epistle to the Corinthians, written from Ephesus in the 56th Year of the vulgar Era, three Years after this Scuffle happen’d at Corinth. However, it must be own’d, that this Opinion has not always been universal in the Church; since, in the Time of Eusebius,4 it was thought, that Sosthenes was one of the seventy-two Disciples, and consequently he could not be Chief of the Synagogue of Corinth twenty Years after the Death of Jesus Christ. The Greeks keep his Feast upon the 8th of December, and give him the Title of an Apostle, as being one of the Seventy. They also make him the first Bishop of Colophon. The Latins, ever since the ninth Century, honour him as a Disciple of St. Paul’s, upon the 11th of June, and the 28th of November. See M. de Tillemont, t. 1. Hist. Eccl. Not. 45. upon St. Paul p. 592.
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