Imprisonment at Ephesus

I'll go ahead and start a discussion to invite participants.

Some evangelicals in particular seem averse to the idea that Paul might have been imprisoned at Ephesus. It is not that evangelicals can't take this position, because Arnold suggests in the IVP Dictionary of Paul and His Letters that "most" scholars think he was. Nevertheless, many conservatives seem to have a knee jerk reaction against it. I've asked myself why and have come up with a few possible explanations:

1. Because it is usually connected with the authorship of some New Testament book like Philippians or Philemon.

Since tradition has long associated the writing of these books with Rome, I wonder if some have a negative reaction because of a generally negative reaction to more recent reconstructions or because of a "traditionalist" attitude.

I might add that what I might call evangelical traditions--distinct positions taken by the majority of evangelicals since the inception of evangelicalism in the late 40's--do not always take traditional positions. For example, the traditional position on the audience of Galatians was northern Galatia, while most evangelicals favor the South Galatia hypothesis.

2. Because of a misunderstanding of imprisonment as a Roman practice. A minor factor in the negative feeling of some against an Ephesian imprisonment may be the misunderstanding that imprisonment was not a punishment in the Roman empire but a holding before trial. Perhaps some viewing imprisonment as a punishment feel like there would need to be more evidence than there is if in fact Paul was sentenced to imprisonment. But no one was sentenced to imprisonment in the Roman Empire. The closest sentence was exile.

3. Because Acts doesn't mention such an imprisonment. I suspect this is the biggest culprit for the sometimes averse attitude of some. Acts doesn't explicitly mention any arrest of Paul at Ephesus. Indeed, there is more evidence for such an arrest in Acts for Paul at Corinth than at Ephesus, since Paul appeared before Gallio there.

4. Perhaps some don't like hypotheses without significant evidence. Remember, I am not asking why some conclude against an Ephesian imprisonment--only why some have a knee jerk reaction against it.

There is in my opinion a good deal of reason to believe in not only one, but two arrests of Paul at Ephesus, given the comments he makes first in 1 Corinthians 15:32 and then at least a year later in 2 Corinthians 1:8. The first may have been somewhat routine. The second I suspect may have been more serious and may have had something to do with the riot of Acts 19.

So what do you think? Take me to task.