The Name of Jesus Unsettles the City’s Religious Business

“The upper coasts” means the higher inland country, the route across the Phrygian uplands, rather than the main road down the Lycus valley past Colossae and Laodicea. That fits Paul’s remark that the Colossians had not seen his face (Colossians 2:1). The promise of 18:21, “I will return again unto you”, is kept.

The King James “since ye believed” is literally “when ye believed”, an aorist participle. Their reply, “we have not so much as heard whether there be any Holy Ghost”, uses the construction of John 7:39, “the Holy Ghost was not yet given”; they may mean they had not heard that the Spirit had come, rather than that they had never heard of him.

“Unto what” is “into what”, eis ti, the language of baptism into a name. Paul’s question assumes that baptism and the Spirit belong together, so an answer about the Spirit sends him straight back to the water. The reply is two words in Greek: “into John’s”.

The best manuscripts read simply “on Jesus”, without “Christ”, and in Greek the name comes last, held back as the point of the sentence. Paul summarises the Baptist exactly as Luke 3:16 does, and as he himself did in the synagogue at Pisidian Antioch (13:25).

This is the only account in the New Testament of people who had received one baptism being baptized again. The difference named is the name: John’s baptism looked forward to one who was coming, and this one is “in the name of the Lord Jesus”.

The laying on of hands and the coming of the Spirit repeat what Peter and John did in Samaria (8:17), one of several places where Acts sets Paul’s actions beside Peter’s. “Prophesied” is in the imperfect: they began prophesying and went on doing so.

Twelve is the number of Israel’s tribes and of the apostles, but the Book of Acts writes “about twelve”, which sounds more like a head count than a symbol. The verse is a small census of a small group.

Three months is the longest time Acts records Paul speaking in any one synagogue. It was also the synagogue that had asked him to stay longer on his first brief visit (18:20). “Disputing and persuading” describes argument aimed at conviction, not display.

“Hardened” is skleruno, the Septuagint’s verb for Pharaoh’s heart (Exodus 7:3). The “school” is schole, a lecture hall. Codex Bezae adds that Paul taught there “from the fifth hour to the tenth”, from about eleven to four, the hot midday hours when work stopped, so the hall was free and Paul’s workshop mornings were not lost.

Two years and three months in all, which Paul later rounds to “three years” when addressing the Ephesian elders (20:31). In this period Epaphras planted churches in Colossae, Laodicea and Hierapolis (Colossians 1:7, 4:13), and the seven churches of Revelation 2–3 all lie in this province.

“Special” is literally “not the ordinary ones”, ou tas tuchousas, “not the kind you meet by chance”, a litotes. The sentence makes God the subject and Paul’s hands the means, which governs how the next verse should be read.

Both words are Latin loanwords. “Handkerchiefs” are soudaria, sweat-cloths tied round the head, and “aprons” are simikinthia, a workman’s half-apron, the gear of Paul’s tentmaking. The same kind of thing is said of Peter’s shadow (5:15) and of the hem of Jesus’ garment (Luke 8:44).

“Vagabond” means wandering, going from place to place, and “exorcists” is a word found only here in the New Testament. “Adjure” is horkizo, to bind by oath, the formula of the magical papyri, which pile up divine names; one surviving Paris papyrus reads “I adjure you by Jesus the god of the Hebrews”.

No Jewish high priest named Sceva is known. He may have belonged to a high-priestly family, or the title may have been self-styled to impress clients, since a priestly pedigree was good advertising for exorcists. Sceva is a Latin name, meaning left-handed.

The spirit uses two different verbs. “Jesus I know” is ginosko, to recognise; “Paul I know” is epistamai, to be acquainted with. Jesus is known in one way and Paul in another, and the seven are not known at all. “Who are ye?” is the question the exorcists had no name to answer.

The oldest manuscripts read that he overpowered “both of them”, which may mean only two of the seven were present, or may be loose usage for all of them. “Naked” can mean stripped of outer clothing. The house they had entered as professionals they leave as a public joke.

“Fear fell on them all” is the reaction after Ananias and Sapphira, when “great fear came on all them that heard” (5:5, 11). Both Jews and Greeks hear of it, the same pairing as verse 10. The name that the exorcists could not use is honoured precisely because they failed.

“Believed” is a perfect participle: these were people who had already come to faith. “Deeds” is praxeis, which in the magical texts is a technical term for spells; revealing a spell was thought to rob it of its power. The believers confess and disclose, and the magic goes out of the practice.

“Curious arts” is perierga, meddlesome things, the stock term for magic. Ephesus gave its name to the “Ephesian letters”, magical words written on amulets. Fifty thousand pieces of silver were fifty thousand drachmas, and a drachma was about a day’s wage for a labourer in the ancient world.

“Prevailed” is ischuo, the verb used in verse 16, where the evil spirit “prevailed against” the exorcists. The spirit prevailed over the imitators; the word prevails over the magic. “Mightily” is kata kratos, by strength. The verse is one of the short summaries of growth that punctuate the book.

“Purposed in the spirit” could mean in Paul’s own spirit or by the Holy Spirit; the Greek allows both. “I must also see Rome” uses dei, the word of necessity. Writing to the Romans from Corinth a few months later, he says he has longed “these many years” to come to them (Romans 15:23).

An Erastus served as city treasurer of Corinth (Romans 16:23), and a Corinthian pavement inscription names an Erastus who paid for it as aedile; whether either is this Erastus is debated. Paul wrote 1 Corinthians from Ephesus in this period, and in it he says, “if Timotheus come” (16:10), which matches this journey.

Paul’s letters hint at dangers in Ephesus that Acts does not detail: “I have fought with beasts at Ephesus” (1 Corinthians 15:32), and trouble in Asia so severe “that we despaired even of life” (2 Corinthians 1:8). Whether this riot is part of what he meant is uncertain.

The “silver shrines” were miniature temples with the goddess seated inside, sold as votive offerings and souvenirs. Terracotta examples survive. Diana is the Roman name for Artemis, but the Artemis of Ephesus was an Asian mother goddess, her statue hung with rows of rounded objects, very different from the Greek huntress.

“Wealth” is euporia, prosperity or ease of means, from the same root as “according to his ability” in 11:29, where the Antioch believers gave as each prospered. There the root measured what could be given away; here it measures what might be lost. “Sirs” is simply “men”.

“Made with hands” is cheiropoietos, the word Stephen used of the temple (7:48) and Paul used at Athens (17:24). Demetrius, a hostile witness, confirms verse 10: the word has spread “almost throughout all Asia”, and it has done so deeply enough to affect sales.

“Set at nought” is apelegmos, discredit, found only here. The temple of Artemis at Ephesus was one of the Seven Wonders of the ancient world, and Pliny the Elder gives it 127 columns. “Magnificence” is megaleiotes, the word used when the crowds were amazed at “the mighty power of God” in Jesus’ healing (Luke 9:43).

“Great is Diana of the Ephesians” was a set acclamation; inscriptions from Ephesus hail “great Artemis”. “Full of wrath” is thumos, a boiling rage. Codex Bezae adds that they ran out into the street, which would explain how the whole city came to be involved in the next verse.

The theatre of Ephesus, cut into the slope of Mount Pion and still standing, held about 24,000 people. Aristarchus came from Thessalonica (20:4), sailed with Paul to Rome (27:2) and is called his “fellowprisoner” in Colossians 4:10. Gaius was a common name, and he may not be the Gaius of Derbe in 20:4.

“Unto the people” is demos, the civic assembly: Paul wanted to address the city in the theatre as its citizens met. “Suffered him not” is in the imperfect, “kept refusing to let him”, which suggests he tried more than once and was held back.

The “chief of Asia” are the Asiarchs, wealthy men honoured with a title linked to the provincial council, who presided over festivals of the imperial cult. Several could hold the title at once, so the plural is correct. That such men were Paul’s friends is notable. “Adventure” means venture, risk.

“Assembly” is ekklesia, the same word the New Testament uses for the church, here in its original civic sense: a meeting of citizens called to deliberate. This one has gathered without a question to deliberate. “Some … one thing, and some another” is the sound of a crowd with no agenda.

Alexander may have been put forward to dissociate the local Jews from Paul, since to pagan eyes both rejected images; that is an inference. The oldest manuscripts read that some of the crowd “instructed” or prompted him. A coppersmith named Alexander did Paul “much evil” (2 Timothy 4:14), but there is no way to know if he is this man.

Rhythmic acclamations were a feature of Greek civic life, and crowds could chant the same line for long stretches. Recognising a Jew, who would refuse the goddess any image, the crowd drowns him out. “With one voice” is the one point of unity the gathering reaches.

The “townclerk”, grammateus, was the chief civic officer of Ephesus, drafting decrees and dealing with the Roman governor; his title appears on the city’s inscriptions. “Worshipper” is neokoros, temple-warden, an honorific title Ephesus proudly used. “Fell down from Jupiter” is diopetes, fallen from the sky, perhaps originally a meteorite.

“Cannot be spoken against” is anantirretos, undeniable; its adverb is Peter’s “without gainsaying” (10:29). “Rashly” is propetes, headlong. The clerk argues that if the goddess is beyond dispute, there is no need to defend her by a riot.

“Robbers of churches” is hierosulos, temple robbers; the English “churches” here means shrines. Paul uses the related verb in Romans 2:22: “thou that abhorrest idols, dost thou commit sacrilege?” The clerk clears the prisoners of the two charges that would have mattered in law.

“The law is open” is literally “court days are being held”, the regular assizes. “Deputies” is anthupatoi, proconsuls, in the plural though Asia had one; it may be a general plural, or reflect a moment in AD 54 when the proconsul Silanus was murdered and two imperial agents ran the province, a suggestion some scholars make. “Implead” means sue.

“A lawful assembly” is ennomos ekklesia, the regular meeting of the citizen body held on fixed days under proper summons, as distinct from the crowd in the theatre. The clerk uses the word ekklesia in its correct legal sense to show what this gathering is not.

“Uproar” is stasis, riot or sedition, the charge Rome feared most in a provincial city; a city could lose privileges over it. “Concourse” is sustrophe, a disorderly mob, the word used of the conspirators who “banded together” against Paul in 23:12. The clerk’s fear is for Ephesus, not for Paul.

“Dismissed the assembly” is the formal language for closing a civic meeting. The clerk treats the riot as though it had been an assembly and adjourns it as one, restoring the forms. The next verse, 20:1, has Paul leave the city soon after.