Acts 13:13 - Arthur Peake's Commentary on the Bible

Acts 13:13 f. From Cyprus to Pamphylia and Pisidia. The seaport Attalia at the mouth of the Cestrus is not mentioned. Perga is on the river about eight miles from the sea; it is mentioned because there John-Mark left the party to return to Jerusalem, an act which Paul resented, though Mark's uncle, Barnabas, bore him no grudge for it (Acts 15:37-39), and Paul himself afterwards reinstated him (Colossians 4:10; 2 Timothy 4:11). For speculations as to Mark's reasons, cf. Ramsay's St. Paul the Traveller, pp. 89 ff. Barnabas and Paul go northward from Perga, and cross the great chain of the Taurus, arriving after a journey of 110 miles at Antioch in Pisidia. They are said to have passed through on their journey, not to have preached; Pisidia was infested by robbers, and there was many a ravine and torrent to be crossed. Throughout his travels Paul makes the towns his mark, and towns in which there was a population of Jews. Paul's reason for visiting these towns in the centre of Asia Minor may have been that he knew some members of the Jewish populations, and that he counted on their sympathy. If, as will be suggested later this journey and that of Acts 15:36 to Acts 16:5 are the same, here told at length, afterwards more briefly, motives of a more far-reaching kind may also have determined him. These towns had been distinguished by Augustus and put on the way to prosperity especially by a new system of roads. Pisidian Antioch was the military centre of the district, and had a large population of Jews from the time of its foundation, about 300 B.C.