Matronae
women lead New Testament · Acts · Romans A synagogue in Ephesus, on Paul's second missionary journey 52 CE
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Priscilla corrects Apollos

Apollos was already a well-known teacher — eloquent, mighty in the scriptures. But his theology was incomplete. Priscilla and Aquila took him aside and explained to him the way of God more accurately. Her name comes first.

Acts 18:24–26 describes a husband-wife team teaching a prominent male preacher — Apollos, later one of the leaders in the Corinthian church — a fuller theology of the gospel. Luke, a careful stylist, names Priscilla before Aquila in four of the six times the couple appears in the New Testament. In a culture where male-female pairs were almost always named husband-first, the reversal is a quiet insistence that she is the primary teacher. Paul later greets the "church that meets in their house" (Romans 16:5; 1 Corinthians 16:19), implying home congregations in both Rome and Ephesus.

Acts 18:24–26; Romans 16:3–5; 1 Corinthians 16:19; 2 Timothy 4:19. Source →