BITHYNIA

(Bi·thynʹi·a).

A Roman province in the northern part of Asia Minor. It was located in what is now NW Turkey, extending eastward from Istanbul along the southern shore of the Black Sea. On Paul’s second missionary journey, after he and Silas had been joined by Timothy at Lystra, they endeavored to travel into Bithynia, but “the spirit of Jesus did not permit them.” (Acts 16:7) The area if not mentioned as being the scene of apostolic preaching, but there obviously were Christians there when Peter wrote his first canonical letter about 62-64 C.E. (1 Pet. 1:1) Pliny the Younger, writing from Bithynia to the Roman emperor while Pliny was special commissioner, makes mention of numerous Christians in the province, stating that at the beginning of the second century Christianity was “not confined to the cities only, but has spread its infection among the neighbouring villages and country.”

In pre-Christian times the area was governed by a line of independent kings, the last of whom, Nicomedes III, bequeathed it to the Roman Republic in 74 B.C.E. In the days of the apostles it was bounded by Propontis and Mysia on the W, by Asia and Galatia on the S and by Pontus on the E, although the latter territory had been added to it by the Romans to make the one province of Pontus and Bithynia (65-63 B.C.E.). Bithynia contains fertile, generally mountainous country that lends itself to the cultivation of the vine. The southern “Mysian” Olympus range is thickly wooded with oak, beech, chestnut and walnut trees.

At later times Bithynia was accorded some prominence by professed Christians, two of its cities, Nicaea and Chalcedon, being selected as centers for notable councils. The former was the site of the formulation of the Nicene Creed in 325 C.E.