Pontus

Pontus is a province of Asia Minor, named once in the UPDV as one of the regions of the Dispersion that Peter's first letter addresses.

Among the Provinces of the Dispersion

The opening of First Peter places Pontus at the head of a five-province list of the addressees: "Peter, an apostle of Jesus Christ, to the elect who are sojourners of the Dispersion in Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia, and Bithynia" (1Pe 1:1). The geography sweeps a great arc across Asia Minor — Pontus on the Black Sea coast in the northeast, Galatia and Cappadocia in the interior, Asia on the Aegean coast, and Bithynia returning to the northwest — and Pontus stands first in the sequence. The recipients are characterized as elect sojourners scattered through these provinces, so Pontus is named here as one of the territories where the readers Peter writes to live as the diaspora of the gospel.