Acts 20

Acts 20

Acts 15:22-24 in Latin (left column) and Greek (right column) in Codex Laudianus, written about AD 550.
Book Acts of the Apostles
Bible part New Testament
Order in the Bible part 5
Category Church history

Acts 20 is the twentieth chapter of the Acts of the Apostles in the New Testament of the Christian Bible. It records the third missionary journey of Paul.[1] The book containing this chapter is anonymous, but early Christian tradition uniformly affirmed that Luke composed this book as well as the Gospel of Luke.[2]

Text

The original text is written in Koine Greek and is divided into 38 verses. Some most ancient manuscripts containing this chapter are:

Location

This chapter mentions the following places (in order of appearance):

Structure

In the New King James Version, this chapter is sub-divided as:

Verse 4

And Sopater of Berea accompanied him to Asia — also Aristarchus and Secundus of the Thessalonians, and Gaius of Derbe, and Timothy, and Tychicus and Trophimus of Asia.[3]

Verse 9

And in a window sat a certain young man named Eutychus, who was sinking into a deep sleep. He was overcome by sleep; and as Paul continued speaking, he fell down from the third story and was taken up dead.[4]

Eutychus was a young man of Troas tended to by St. Paul. The name Eutychus means "fortunate". Eutychus fell asleep due to the long nature of the discourse Paul was giving and fell from his seat out of a three story window.[5]

Verse 10

Paul raiseth Eutychus to life, from Figures de la Bible, 1728.
But Paul went down, fell on him, and embracing him said, “Do not trouble yourselves, for his life is in him.”[6]

After Eutychus fell down to his death, Paul then picked him up, insisting that he was not dead, and carried him back upstairs; those gathered then had a meal and a long conversation which lasted until dawn. After Paul left, Eutychus was found to be alive. It is unclear whether the story intends to relate that Eutychus was killed by the fall and Paul raised him, or whether he simply seemed to be dead, with Paul ensuring that he is still alive.[7][8] Regardless of the result of the fall, the implication of the passage is Eutychus' complete recovery, whether by resurrection, by healing or by neither.

Verse 12

And they brought the young man in alive, and they were not a little comforted.[9]

Paul's Maritime Journey

Paul's journey through the northern Aegean Sea is detailed in verses 13 to 16. The text states that Paul, having left Philiipi after the Days of Unleavened Bread, had a desire urgently to travel to Jerusalem and needed to be there by the Day of Pentecost, even choosing to avoid returning to Ephesus and being delayed there. As there are fifty days from the Feast of Unleavened Bread (Passover) to Pentecost, and five days were taken on travel from Philippi to Troas and seven days spent waiting in Troas, Paul and his party had around 38 days available for travel to Jerusalem.

Paul appears to have made the arrangements to charter a ship, but Luke and his companions began the journey from Troas and sailed around Cape Baba to Assos. Paul travelled overland from Troas to Assos and embarked there. The ship sailed southwards to Lesbos, calling at Mitylene, then passed Chios and arrived at Samos, staying at Trogyllium. They passed Ephesus and came into port at Miletus, calling for the elders of the church in Ephesus to travel to Miletus for a meeting.[10] The elders of the church (Greek: τους πρεσβυτερους της εκκλησιας) were also referred to as overseers (Greek: επισκοπους) in verse 28.

Miletus is about 40 miles south of Ephesus. The Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary noted that in view of Paul's haste, more time might have been lost in calling for the elders to come from Ephesus than would have been lost if Paul had actually gone to Ephesus himself, but surmised that either his decision was made because of 'unfavorable winds and stormy weather [which] had overtaken them' or 'he was unwilling to run the risk of detention at Ephesus by the state of the church and other causes'.[11]

Verse 24

[Paul said:] “But none of these things move me; nor do I count my life dear to myself, so that I may finish my race with joy, and the ministry which I received from the Lord Jesus, to testify to the gospel of the grace of God.”[12]

Verse 28

[Paul said:] “Take heed therefore unto yourselves, and to all the flock, over the which the Holy Ghost hath made you overseers, to feed the church of God, which he hath purchased with his own blood.”[13]

Peculiar to Luke's writings (Acts 5:53; Luke 12:1; Luke 17:3; Luke 21:34).[14] Compare 1 Timothy 3:2-7; 4:16; 6:11.[11]

This word is usually also rendered as "bishops." Both "elders" and "bishops" have been originally and apostolically synonymous, which now it is not [Alford].[11] The distinction between these offices cannot be certainly traced till the second century, nor was it established till late in that century.[11]

This is the proper word for "tending" in relation to τὸ ποίμνιον (to poimnion), "the flock", as ποιμήν (poimen), the "pastor", or "shepherd".[14] The pastor is to feed the flock of Christ (see John 10:11, 16; John 21:17; Hebrews 13:20; 1 Peter 5:2, 3). St. Peter applies the titles of "Shepherd and Bishop of souls" to the Lord Jesus (1 Peter 2:25). St. Paul does not use the metaphor elsewhere, except indirectly, and in a different aspect (1 Corinthians 9:7).[14]

Textus Receptus has τοῦ Θεοῦ, but most uncials have τοῦ Κυρίου ("of [the] Lord"). Meyer thinks that the external evidence for τοῦ Κυρίου is decisive, and that the internal evidence from the fact that ἐκκλησία τοῦ Κυρίου occurs nowhere else in St. Paul's writings, is decisive also. But on the other hand, both the Codex Vaticanus (B) and the Codex Sinaiticus (א), the two oldest manuscripts, have Θεοῦ (Θυ).[14] The Vulgate, too, and the Syriac have it; and such early Fathers as Ignatius (in his Epistle to the Ephesians) and Tertullian use the phrase, "the blood of God," which seems to have been derived from this passage. And Alford reasons powerfully in favor of Θεοῦ, dwelling upon the fact that the phrase ἐκκλησία τοῦ Θεοῦ occurs ten times in St. Paul's writings, that of ἐκκλησία τοῦ Κυρίου not once.[14] The chief authorities on each side of the question are:[14]

(1) in favor of τοῦ Κυρίου, Lachmann, Tischendorf, Bornemann, Lunge, Olshausen, Davidson, Meyer, Hackett, as also Grotius, Griesbaeh (doubtfully), Wetstein, Le Clerc, and others;
(2) in favor of τοῦ Θεοῦ, Bengel, Mill, Whitby, Wolf, Scholz, Knapp, Alford, Wordsworth, etc., and Textus Receptus.

It should be added that the evidence for τοῦ Θεοῦ has been much strengthened by the publication by Tischendorf, in 1563, of rite Codex Sinaiticus, and in 1867 of the Codex Vaticanus, from his own collation. The result is that τοῦ Θεοῦ seems to be the true reading (see the first of the two collects for the Ember weeks in the Book of Common Prayer). With regard to the difficulty that this reading seems to imply the unscriptural phrase, "the blood of God," and to savor of the Monophysite heresy, it is obvious to reply that there is a wide difference between the phrase as it stands and such a one as the direct "blood of God," which Athanasius and others objected to.[14]

Verse 35

[Paul said:] "I have shown you in every way, by laboring like this, that you must support the weak. And remember the words of the Lord Jesus, that He said, 'It is more blessed to give than to receive.'"[15]

This verse is unusual in that it records a saying of Jesus that did not come to be recorded in any of the gospels.[16]

See also

References

  1. ↑ Halley, Henry H. Halley's Bible Handbook: an abbreviated Bible commentary. 23rd edition. Zondervan Publishing House. 1962.
  2. ↑ Holman Illustrated Bible Handbook. Holman Bible Publishers, Nashville, Tennessee. 2012.
  3. ↑ Acts 20:4
  4. ↑ Acts 20:9
  5. ↑ Arndt, William & Gingrich, F. W. (1967), Greek-English Lexicon of the New Testament (University of Chicago Press).
  6. ↑ Acts 20:10
  7. ↑ The Case of Eutychus
  8. ↑ Eutychus (WebBible Encyclopedia) - ChristianAnswers.Net
  9. ↑ Acts 20:12
  10. ↑ Acts 20:17
  11. 1 2 3 4 Robert Jamieson, A. R. Fausset and David Brown. Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary on Acts 20, accessed 14 October 2015
  12. ↑ Acts 20:24
  13. ↑ Acts 20:28
  14. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 The Pulpit Commentary, edited by H.D.M. Spence and Joseph S. Exell, 1890.
  15. ↑ Acts 20:35
  16. ↑ Asimov's Guide to the Bible: The New Testament, p. 413.
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