Discovery BoxActs 28:1 
Context28:1 After we had safely reached shore, 1 we learned that the island was called Malta. 2
Acts 28:7
Context28:7 Now in the region around that place 3 were fields belonging to the chief official 4 of the island, named Publius, who welcomed us and entertained us hospitably as guests for three days.
Acts 28:9
Context28:9 After this had happened, many of the people on the island who were sick 5 also came and were healed. 6
Acts 28:11
Context28:11 After three months we put out to sea 7 in an Alexandrian ship that had wintered at the island and had the “Heavenly Twins” 8 as its figurehead. 9
1 tn Grk “We having been brought safely through” [to land] (same verb as 27:44). The word “shore” is implied, and the slight variations in translation from 27:44 have been made to avoid redundancy in English. The participle διασωθέντες (diaswqente") has been taken temporally.
2 sn Malta is an island (known by the same name today) in the Mediterranean Sea south of Sicily. The ship had traveled 625 mi (1,000 km) in the storm.
map For location see JP4 A3.
3 tn BDAG 798 s.v. περί 2.a.γ states, “of nearby places…τὰ περὶ τὸν τὸπον the region around the place Ac 28:7.” The presence of ἐκεῖνον (ekeinon) results in the translation “that place.”
4 tn That is, the chief Roman official. Several inscriptions have confirmed the use of πρῶτος (prwtos) as an administrative title used on the island of Malta for the highest Roman official. See further BDAG 852 s.v. Πόπλιος.
5 tn BDAG 142 s.v. ἀσθένεια 1 states, “ἔχειν ἀ. be ill Ac 28:9.”
6 sn Many…also came and were healed. Again, here is irony. Paul, though imprisoned, “frees” others of their diseases.
7 tn BDAG 62 s.v. ἀνάγω 4, “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.”
8 tn Or “the ‘Twin Gods’”; Grk “the Dioscuri” (a joint name for the pagan deities Castor and Pollux).
sn That had the ‘Heavenly Twins’ as its figurehead. The twin brothers Castor and Pollux, known collectively as the Dioscuri or ‘Heavenly Twins,’ were the twin sons of Zeus and Leda according to Greek mythology. The Alexandrian ship on which Paul and his companions sailed from Malta had a carved emblem or figurehead of these figures, and they would have been the patron deities of the vessel. Castor and Pollux were the “gods of navigation.” To see their stars was considered a good omen (Epictetus, Discourses 2.18.29; Lucian of Samosata, The Ship 9).
9 tn Or “as its emblem.”
