Thessalonica

Paul and Silas reached Thessalonica after passing through Amphipolis and Apollonia, and there they found a synagogue of the Jews. The city appears in Acts, where its people are called Thessalonians, and Aristarchus and Secundus travel with Paul from there. Two letters in the New Testament are addressed to the church of the Thessalonians, which Paul greets with “Grace be unto you, and peace.” Near the end of his life he also writes that Demas had left him and gone to Thessalonica. Acts 17 tells how the church began, and 1 Thessalonians 1 shows how Paul remembered it.

4 verses

Acts

Acts 17:1

Now when they had passed through Amphipolis and Apollonia, they came to Thessalonica, where was a synagogue of the Jews:

Acts 20:4

And there accompanied him into Asia Sopater of Berea; and of the Thessalonians, Aristarchus and Secundus; and Gaius of Derbe, and Timotheus; and of Asia, Tychicus and Trophimus.

1 Thessalonians

1 Thessalonians 1:1

Paul, and Silvanus, and Timotheus, unto the church of the Thessalonians which is in God the Father and in the Lord Jesus Christ: Grace be unto you, and peace, from God our Father, and the Lord Jesus Christ.

2 Timothy

2 Timothy 4:10

For Demas hath forsaken me, having loved this present world, and is departed unto Thessalonica; Crescens to Galatia, Titus unto Dalmatia.

From Easton's Bible Dictionary

Matthew George Easton, 1897

A large and populous city on the Thermaic bay. It was the capital of one of the four Roman districts of Macedonia, and was ruled by a praetor. It was named after Thessalonica, the wife of Cassander, who built the city. She was so called by her father, Philip, because he first heard of her birth on the day of his gaining a victory over the Thessalians. On his second missionary journey, Paul preached in the synagogue here, the chief synagogue of the Jews in that part of Macedonia, and laid the foundations of a church (Acts 17:1-4; 1 Thes. 1:9). The violence of the Jews drove him from the city, when he fled to Berea (Acts 17:5-10). The “rulers of the city” before whom the Jews “drew Jason,” with whom Paul and Silas lodged, are in the original called politarchai, an unusual word, which was found, however, inscribed on an arch in Thessalonica. This discovery confirms the accuracy of the historian. Paul visited the church here on a subsequent occasion (20:1-3). This city long retained its importance. It is the most important town of European Turkey, under the name of Saloniki, with a mixed population of about 85,000.

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From Smith's Bible Dictionary

William Smith, 1884

The original name of this city was Therma; and that part of the Macedonian shore on which it was situated retained through the Roman period the designation of the Thermaic Gulf. Cassander the son of Antipater rebuilt and enlarged Therma, and named it after his wife Thessalonica, the sister of Alexander the Great. The name ever since, under various slight modifications, has been continuous, and the city itself has never ceased to be eminent. Saloniki is still the most important town of European Turkey, next after Constantinople. Strabo in the first century speaks of Thessalonica as the most populous city in Macedonia. Visit of Paul . --St. Paul visited Thessalonica (with Silas and Timothy) during his second missionary journey, and introduced Christianity there. The first scene of the apostle’s work at Thessalonica was the synagogue. (Acts 17:2,3) It is stated that the ministrations among the Jews continued for three weeks. ver. 2. Not that we are obliged to limit to this time the whole stay of the apostle at Thessalonica. A flourishing church was certainly formed there; and the epistles show that its elements were more Gentile than Jewish. [For persecution and further history see PAUL] Circumstances which led Paul to Thessalonica . --Three circumstances must here be mentioned which illustrate in an important manner this visit and this journey as well as the two Epistles to the Thessalonians.

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(1.) This was the chief station on the great Roman road called the Via Egnatia , which connected Rome with the whole region to the north of the AEgean Sea.

(2.) Placed as if was on this great road, and in connection with other important Roman ways. Thessalonica was an invaluable centre for the spread of the gospel. In fact it was nearly if not quite on a level with Corinth and Ephesus in its share of the commerce of the Levant.

(3.) The circumstance noted in (Acts 17:1) that here was the synagogue of the Jews in this part of Macedonia, had evidently much to do with the apostle’s plans,and also doubtless with his success. Trade would inevitably bring Jews to Thessalonica; and it is remarkable that they have ever since had a prominent place in the annals of the city. Later ecclesiastical history . --During several centuries this city was the bulwark not simply of the later Greek empire, but of Oriental Christendom, and was largely instrumental in the conversion of the Slavonians and Bulgarians. Thus it received the designation of "the orthodox city;" and its struggles are very prominent in the writings of the Byzantine historians.