Acts 28 is the twenty-eighth and final chapter of the Acts of the Apostles in the New Testament of the Christian Bible. It records the journey of Paul from Malta to Italy until he is at last settled in Rome. 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.[1]
The original text was written in Koine Greek. This chapter is divided into 31 verses.
Some early manuscripts containing the text of this chapter are:
This chapter mentions or alludes to the following places (in order of appearance):
Now when they had escaped, they then found out that the island was called Malta.[2] The text refers to Μελίτη (melitē),[3] which is generally acknowledged to mean the island of Malta. It has also been argued that the Dalmatian island of Meleda in the Adriatic Sea, known as Melita Illyrica, was the location. This reading was first put forward in the tenth century by Constantine the Porphyrogenite, and was advocated later by a Dalmatian monk, Padre Georgi, who was a native of Meleda.[4] William Robertson Nicoll argues that "there is no need... to refute [this] view", dismissing Georgi's argument because he was "no doubt jealous for the honour of his birthplace and his monastery".
The inhabitants of the island are called barbaroi in Greek, the standard term for non-Greek speakers. They originally came from Carthage and their native language was Punic. The castaways were brought to a local landowner with the common Roman praenomen, Publius (verse 7), whose Maltese title as 'first man' is attested from ancient inscriptions found in the island. The healing of Publius's sick father (verse 8) recalls Jesus' healing of Peter's mother-in-law, and as in the gospels, prompts other islanders to come for healing (verse 9), indicating that 'God whom Paul serves (Acts 27:23) is still with him' and that 'the whole shipwreck incident has served to load him with honor' (verse 10).
But they were expecting that he was going to swell up or suddenly drop dead. So after they had waited a long time and had seen nothing unusual happen to him, they changed their minds and said he was a god (theón)."[5]
From the Biblos Interlinear Bible:[6]
| hoi | de | prosedokōn | auton | mellein | pimprasthai | ē | katapiptein | aphnō | nekron |
| οἱ | δὲ | προσεδόκων | αὐτὸν | μέλλειν | πίμπρασθαι | ἢ | καταπίπτειν | ἄφνω | νεκρόν |
| - | but | they were expecting | him | to be going | to become inflamed | or | to fall down | suddenly | dead |
| epi | poly | de | autōn | prosdokōntōn | kai | theōrountōn | mēden | atopon | eis | auton | ginomenon |
| ἐπὶ | πολὺ | δὲ | αὐτῶν | προσδοκώντων | καὶ | θεωρούντων | μηδὲν | ἄτοπον | εἰς | αὐτὸν | γινόμενον |
| after a while | great | however | they | expecting | and | seeing | nothing | amiss | to | him | happening |
| metabalomenoi | elegon | auton | einai | theon |
| μεταβαλόμενοι | ἔλεγον | αὐτὸν | εἶναι | θεόν |
| having changed their opinion | said | he | was | a god |
The islanders regarded "Paul's imperviousness to snakebite" as a sign of his divine status. This was a common attitude among both Greek-speaking people and 'barbarians' (Greek: barbaroi for "non-Greek speaking people"). Chariton of Aphrodisias wrote in his historical novel, Callirhoe (mid first century CE, roughly contemporary with Acts), about a pirate who was saved from shipwreck, who then claimed divine intervention.[7] In this case the pirate was saved so that he could receive a just punishment for his crimes.
It happened that the father of Publius lay sick with fever and dysentery. And Paul visited him and prayed, and putting his hands on him, healed him.[8]
The Ethiopic version of Acts adds after "Paul went in to him and prayed", "and he entreated him to put his hand upon him" meaning either that Publius asked this favor on behalf of his father, or the Publius' father himself asked this.[10]
An Alexandrian ship wintered in the island gives weight to the identification of 'Melita' with Malta, on the usual line of sea travel from Alexandria to Italy, while the other suggestion, Meleda was far out of the way.[11] The ship stopped in the ports along the east coast of Sicily and the 'toe' of Italy (verses 12–13), featured prominently in ancient Greek writings of voyages to the area, but thereafter the account prefers the Italian names, such as "Puteoli" instead of the Greek Dicaearchia.[12] In Rome there were already 'brothers' (verse 15; NRSV: 'believers') who came out to provide Paul a ceremonial escort along the Appian Way leading into the city. Verse 16 reminds that Paul was still a prisoner with limited liberty.
After three months we sailed in an Alexandrian ship whose figurehead was the Twin Brothers, which had wintered at the island.[13]
Paul finally reached Rome, after a long journey starting in 20:21 9 and, as a faithful Jew, he started by approaching the leaders of the Jewish community in Rome to request a fair hearing on his gospel. Significantly, the Jewish community in Rome shows an open-minded attitude (verse 22) with no sign of the animosity which Paul has encountered in Asia Minor (Acts 21:27–28), while Paul called the leaders of the community as 'brothers' (verse 17), and assured them that his appeal to Caesar does not imply any disloyalty to 'my nation' (verse 19), hoping to get them on his side before word arrived from Jerusalem (verse 21). The community saw Paul's teaching as related to the 'sect which is spoken against' (verse 21, cf. Luke 2:34), but they want to decide themselves (verse 22) as Paul preach to them in similar way as in all his trials, using the term 'hope of Israel' (as he said to Agrippa in Acts 26:6–8) to refer the 'waiting for the consolation of Israel' for those in the temple (Luke 2:25–38).
The content of Paul's preaching to the local community was not recorded, but it can be inferred as a repetition of the arguments presented elsewhere in the book of Acts (verse 23). Some listeners were 'convinced' (verse 24), but the overall state of the community at that time was 'disharmony' (verse 25, from Greek asymphonoi, "disagreed"). The prophecy in 6:9–10 9 was cited (verses 26–27) to reflect Jewish rejection of Jesus as a tragic failure of 'this people' to 'take advantage of the proffered 'salvation' (verse 28: picking up earlier allusions to Isaiah in 26:12—23 9), and related to Simeon's prophecy in 2:30 9 (cf. Luke's citation in the parable of the sower (8:10 9) with 13:14-15 9; 4:12 9). The final two verses of the chapter record Paul's continued witness to 'all who came' (that is, Jews as well as Gentiles, verse 30) over a two-year period with the confidence that the 'proclamation of the gospel will go on into an uncertain future with all boldness and without hindrance' (verse 31).
[Paul said:] "Therefore let it be known to you that the salvation of God has been sent to the Gentiles, and they will hear it!"[19] There is a repeated pattern: 'Jewish rejection of the gospel leads to an emphasis on Gentile inclusion' (Acts 13:44-47).[20]
The narrative of Acts ends with Paul:
preaching the kingdom of God and teaching the things which concern the Lord Jesus Christ with all confidence, no one forbidding him.[21]
. Michael D. Coogan . The New Oxford Annotated Bible with the Apocryphal/Deuterocanonical Books: New Revised Standard Version, Issue 48 . Coogan . Michael David . Marc Zvi . Brettler . Carol Ann . Newsom . Pheme . Perkins. Augmented 3rd . Oxford University Press . 2007 . 9780195288810 .
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