Pisidia in the Bible Encyclopedia - ISBE
pi-sid'-i-a (ten Pisidian (Acts 14:24); in Acts 13:14,
Codices Sinaitica, Alexandrinus, Vaticanus, Ephraemi give
Antiocheian ten Pisidian, "the Pisidian Antioch," the other
manuscripts, Antiocheian tes Pisidias, "Antioch of Pisidia."
The former, but not the latter, reading correctly describes
the condition of affairs at the time when Paul traveled in
the country; see below):
1. Situation and History:
Pisidia, as a strict geographical term, was the name given
to the huge block of mountain country stretching northward
from the Taurus range where the latter overlooked the
Pamphylian coast land, to the valleys which connected Apamea
with Antioch, and Antioch with Iconium. It was bounded by
Lycia on the West, by the Phrygian country on the North, and
by Isauria on the East; but there is no natural boundary
between Pisidia and Isauria, and the frontier was never
strictly drawn. The name is used in its geographical sense
in the Anabasis of Xenophon, who informs us that the
Pisidians were independent of the king of Persia at the end
of the 5th century BC. Alexander the Great had difficulty in
reducing the Pisidian cities, and throughout ancient history
we find the Pisidian mountains described as the home of a
turbulent and warlike people, given to robbery and pillage.
The task of subjugating them was entrusted by the Romans to
the Galatian king Amyntas, and, at his death in 25 BC,
Pisidia passed with the rest of his possessions into the
Roman province Galatia. Augustus now took seriously in hand
the pacification of Pisidia and the Isaurian mountains on
the East Five military colonies were founded in Pisidia and
the eastern mountains--Cremna, Comama, Olbasa, Parlais and
Lystra--and all were connected by military roads with the
main garrison city Antioch, which lay in Galatian Phrygia,
near the northern border of Pisidia. An inscription
discovered in 1912 shows that Quirinius, who is mentioned in
Lk 2:2 as governor of Syria in the year of Christ's birth,
was an honorary magistrate of the colony of Antioch; his
connection with Antioch dates from his campaign against the
Homonades--who had resisted and killed Amyntas--about 8 BC
(see Ramsay in The Expositor, November, 1912, 385 ff, 406).
The military system set up in Pisidia was based on that of
Antioch, and from this fact, and from its proximity to
Pisidia, Antioch derived its title "the Pisidian," which
served to distinguish it from the other cities called
Antioch. It is by a mistake arising from confusion with a
later political arrangement that Antioch is designated "of
Pisidia" in the majority of the manuscripts.
Pisidia remained part of the province Galatia till 74 AD,
when the greater (southern) part of it was assigned to the
new double province Lycia-Pamphylia, and the cities in this
portion of Pisidia now ranked as Pamphylian. The northern
part of Pisidia continued to belong to Galatia, until, in
the time of Diocletian, the southern part of the province
Galatia (including the cities of Antioch and Iconium), with
parts of Lycaonia and Asia, were formed Into a province
called Pisidia, with Antioch as capital. Antioch was now for
the first time correctly described as a city "of Pisidia,"
although there is reason to believe that the term "Pisidia"
had already been extended northward in popular usage to
include part at least of the Phrygian region of Galatia.
This perhaps explains the reading "Antioch of Pisidia" in
the Codex Bezae, whose readings usually reflect the
conditions of the 2nd century of our era in Asia Minor. This
use of the term was of course political and administrative;
Antioch continued...
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