Discovery BoxActs 8:36 
Context8:36 Now as they were going along the road, they came to some water, and the eunuch said, “Look, there is water! What is to stop me 1 from being baptized?”
Acts 21:16
Context21:16 Some of the disciples from Caesarea 2 came along with us too, and brought us to the house 3 of Mnason of Cyprus, a disciple from the earliest times, 4 with whom we were to stay.
Acts 23:23
Context23:23 Then 5 he summoned 6 two of the centurions 7 and said, “Make ready two hundred soldiers to go to Caesarea 8 along with seventy horsemen 9 and two hundred spearmen 10 by 11 nine o’clock tonight, 12
Acts 25:23
Context25:23 So the next day Agrippa 13 and Bernice came with great pomp 14 and entered the audience hall, 15 along with the senior military officers 16 and the prominent men of the city. When Festus 17 gave the order, 18 Paul was brought in.
Acts 27:2
Context27:2 We went on board 19 a ship from Adramyttium 20 that was about to sail to various ports 21 along the coast of the province of Asia 22 and put out to sea, 23 accompanied by Aristarchus, a Macedonian 24 from Thessalonica. 25
Acts 27:17
Context27:17 After the crew 26 had hoisted it aboard, 27 they used supports 28 to undergird the ship. Fearing they would run aground 29 on the Syrtis, 30 they lowered the sea anchor, 31 thus letting themselves be driven along.
1 tn Or “What prevents me.” The rhetorical question means, “I should get baptized, right?”
2 sn Caesarea was a city on the coast of Palestine south of Mount Carmel (not Caesarea Philippi). See the note on Caesarea in Acts 10:1.
map For location see Map2 C1; Map4 B3; Map5 F2; Map7 A1; JP1 F4; JP2 F4; JP3 F4; JP4 F4.
3 tn Grk “to Mnason…”; the words “the house of” are not in the Greek text, but are implied by the verb ξενισθῶμεν (xenisqwmen).
4 tn Or perhaps, “Mnason of Cyprus, one of the original disciples.” BDAG 137 s.v. ἀρχαῖος 1 has “ἀ. μαθητής a disciple of long standing (perh. original disc.) Ac 21:16.”
5 tn Grk “And.” Since this represents a response to the reported ambush, καί (kai) has been translated as “then” to indicate the logical sequence.
6 tn Grk “summoning…he said.” The participle προσκαλεσάμενος (proskalesameno") has been translated as a finite verb due to requirements of contemporary English style.
7 sn See the note on the word centurion in 10:1.
8 sn Caesarea was a city on the coast of Palestine south of Mount Carmel (not Caesarea Philippi). See the note on Caesarea in Acts 10:1. This was a journey of about 65 mi (just over 100 km).
map For location see Map2 C1; Map4 B3; Map5 F2; Map7 A1; JP1 F4; JP2 F4; JP3 F4; JP4 F4.
9 tn Or “cavalrymen.”
10 tn A military technical term of uncertain meaning. BDAG 217 s.v. δεξιολάβος states, “a word of uncertain mng., military t.t., acc. to Joannes Lydus…and Theophyl. Sim., Hist. 4, 1 a light-armed soldier, perh. bowman, slinger; acc. to a scholion in CMatthaei p. 342 body-guard….Spearman Goodspd., NRSV; ‘security officer’, GDKilpatrick, JTS 14, ’63, 393f.”
sn Two hundred soldiers…along with seventy horsemen and two hundred spearmen. The resulting force assembled to guard Paul was almost a full cohort. The Roman commander was taking no chances, but was sending the issue up the chain of command to the procurator to decide.
11 tn Grk “from.”
12 tn Grk “from the third hour of the night.”
13 sn See the note on King Agrippa in 25:13.
14 tn Or “great pageantry” (BDAG 1049 s.v. φαντασία; the term is a NT hapax legomenon).
sn Agrippa and Bernice came with great pomp. The “royals” were getting their look at Paul. Everyone who was anyone would have been there.
15 tn Or “auditorium.” “Auditorium” may suggest to the modern English reader a theater where performances are held. Here it is the large hall where a king or governor would hold audiences. Paul once spoke of himself as a “spectacle” to the world (1 Cor 4:8-13).
16 tn Grk “the chiliarchs” (officers in command of a thousand soldiers). In Greek the term χιλίαρχος (ciliarco") literally described the “commander of a thousand,” but it was used as the standard translation for the Latin tribunus militum or tribunus militare, the military tribune who commanded a cohort of 600 men.
17 sn See the note on Porcius Festus in 24:27.
18 tn Grk “and Festus ordering, Paul was brought in.” Because of the length and complexity of the Greek sentence, a new sentence was begun in the translation, and καί (kai) has not been translated. The participle κελεύσαντος (keleusanto") has been taken temporally.
19 tn Grk “Going on board.” The participle ἐπιβάντες (epibante") has been translated as a finite verb due to requirements of contemporary English style.
20 sn Adramyttium was a seaport in Mysia on the western coast of Asia Minor.
21 tn Grk “places.”
22 tn Grk “Asia”; in the NT this always refers to the Roman province of Asia, made up of about one-third of the west and southwest end of modern Asia Minor. Asia lay to the west of the region of Phrygia and Galatia. The words “the province of” are supplied to indicate to the modern reader that this does not refer to the continent of Asia.
23 tn BDAG 62 s.v. ἀνάγω 4 states, “as a nautical t.t. (ἀ. τὴν ναῦν put a ship to sea), mid. or pass. ἀνάγεσθαι to begin to go by boat, put out to sea.”
sn Although not explicitly stated, the ship put out to sea from the port of Caesarea (where the previous events had taken place (cf. 25:13) and then sailed along the Asiatic coast (the first stop was Sidon, v. 3).
24 sn A Macedonian. The city of Thessalonica (modern Salonica) was in the Roman province of Macedonia in Greece.
25 map For location see JP1 C1; JP2 C1; JP3 C1; JP4 C1.
26 tn Grk “After hoisting it up, they…”; the referent (the ship’s crew) has been specified in the translation for clarity.
27 tn The participle ἄραντες (arantes) has been taken temporally.
28 tn Possibly “ropes” or “cables”; Grk “helps” (a word of uncertain meaning; probably a nautical technical term, BDAG 180 s.v. βοήθεια 2).
29 tn BDAG 308 s.v. ἐκπίπτω 2 states, “drift off course, run aground, nautical term εἴς τι on someth….on the Syrtis 27:17.”
30 tn That is, on the sandbars and shallows of the Syrtis.
sn On the Syrtis. The Syrtis was the name of two gulfs on the North African coast (modern Libya), feared greatly by sailors because of their shifting sandbars and treacherous shallows. The Syrtis here is the so-called Great Syrtis, toward Cyrenaica. It had a horrible reputation as a sailors’ graveyard (Pliny, Natural History 5.26). Josephus (J. W. 2.16.4 [2.381]) says the name alone struck terror in those who heard it. It was near the famous Scylla and Charybdis mentioned in Homer’s Odyssey.
31 tn Or perhaps “mainsail.” The meaning of this word is uncertain. BDAG 927 s.v. σκεῦος 1 has “τὸ σκεῦος Ac 27:17 seems to be the kedge or driving anchor” while C. Maurer (TDNT 7:362) notes, “The meaning in Ac. 27:17: χαλάσαντες τὸ σκεῦος, is uncertain. Prob. the ref. is not so much to taking down the sails as to throwing the draganchor overboard to lessen the speed of the ship.” In spite of this L&N 6.1 states, “In Ac 27:17, for example, the reference of σκεῦος is generally understood to be the mainsail.” A reference to the sail is highly unlikely because in a storm of the force described in Ac 27:14, the sail would have been taken down and reefed immediately, to prevent its being ripped to shreds or torn away by the gale.
