And after three months we sailed in a ship which had wintered in the island, an Alexandrian, with [the] Dioscuri for its ensign.
After three months on Malta the sailing season opened again, and Paul boarded a second ship from Alexandria — one that had waited out the winter in the same harbour. Luke even records its figurehead, the twin pagan sea-gods, and that small detail has drawn wide comment.
This ship is the counterpart of the one the storm destroyed. One writer traces the difference between them back to a warning the crew ignored.
In the early spring they took ship again. This ship was also from Alexandria, and it had escaped the storm. That storm wrecked their former ship, because the master and crew had ignored the apostle's warning. We do not hear of preaching, though we may be sure that the grace of Christ and the love of souls did not sleep in the hearts of His servants. But we see the place given to them, and to Paul in particular, by their past experience. It rose more and more as God saw fit to use each occasion where man's wisdom or power was of no use.
The name carved on the ship's bow came from Greek mythology.
The word Διόσκουροι means "young men, or sons of Zeus," their names being Castor and Pollux according to heathen mythology. People believed they were the guardians of sailing. Sailors sometimes carved a rough image of them on the bows of ships.
So Paul sailed the last stretch to Rome under the image of gods that sailors trusted to keep them safe.
Some writers treat the ship as a picture of the church, and see a warning in its idolatrous figurehead.
The next ship they board is no improvement in this respect either, being also of Alexandria, and carrying the idolatrous insignia "Castor and Pollux." Christianity, mixing with the world, will certainly find itself also mixed with idolatry.
But commentators differ over how far to press such pictures. One writer warns against them:
However, such an application needs caution. It is easy to make fanciful and far-fetched allegorical applications... We shall not attempt to look for an outline of church history in the events of this chapter. The central figure, the prisoner of the Lord, must occupy us more than anything else.
The figurehead is one of many small sailing details in Luke's account of this voyage. Together they are worth more than most readers realise.
Here we have more real information about an ancient merchant ship than perhaps all the surviving works of Greek and Roman authors give. It comes to us quite simply, in passing. What reader of any version, even a believer, would guess it? Every scholar ought to know it.
The kindness shown on Malta and the gifts loaded on board did not change Paul's position.
The new ship is loaded with gifts that thankfully acknowledge the benefits received. Yet Paul is after all still a prisoner, and the vessel's head, at much less distance than before, is pointing towards Rome!
That direction matched a promise the Lord had already given Paul.
Paul was travelling towards Rome in line with the Lord's words in Acts 23:11: "so you must testify also in Rome"! With these words ringing in his ears, Paul moved confidently.
- Waited. The ship that wintered on the island came through safely. The ship whose crew ignored Paul's warning did not. Listening to God's servant made the difference.
- Carved. The sign was the Dioskouroi — Castor and Pollux, "sons of Zeus." Sailors trusted them to guard ships and carved them on the bows.
- Mixed. Some writers see in that emblem a picture of Christianity blending with the world and picking up its idolatry. Another warns against pressing such pictures, and keeps the focus on the prisoner himself.
- Observed. Luke's passing sea details tell us more about an ancient merchant ship than nearly all surviving Greek and Roman writing.
- Pointed. Honoured on Malta yet still a prisoner, Paul sails on under pagan names toward Rome, where the Lord had said he would testify.
And having come to Syracuse we remained three days.
The ship carrying Paul to Rome has left Malta. Its first stop is Syracuse, on the coast of Sicily, where the travellers wait three days. It reads like one line from a travel diary. Yet commentators ask what those quiet days held, what the port's name means, and how far we should push such details.
Commentators trace the rest of the route, harbour by harbour:
They landed first at Syracuse, a seaport on the eastern shore of Sicily. They stayed three days at this famous port. Then they went on to Rhegium, on the mainland at the Straits of Messina, and from there to Puteoli, about 180 miles from Rhegium. At last the sea voyage, eventful as it had been, was over.
Some writers read this stage of the voyage as a picture of Christians drifting toward the world. They start with the ship, then with the name of the port:
The next ship they board is no better in this way either. It too comes from Alexandria, and it carries the idolatrous emblem "Castor and Pollux." Christianity, mixing with the world, will certainly find itself mixed with idolatry as well. Their first landing place was Syracuse, in Sicily. The name means "dragging unwillingly." It shows that not every Christian conscience was content to be drawn downward at that time, toward the world and its idolatry. They remained there three days.
Writers who take this approach do not all draw the same lesson from the same name. Another reads it not as reluctance in the traveller but as force applied from outside:
At Syracuse they land and stay for three days. Syracuse means "dragging unwillingly." That says enough about the use of arbitrary power, and the next port, Rhegium, "forcing the way through," makes the picture stronger.
One writer urges caution with this way of reading the chapter:
However, such an application needs caution. It is easy to make fanciful and far-fetched allegorical applications... We shall not try to find an outline of church history in the events of this chapter. The central figure, the prisoner of the Lord, must occupy us more than anything else.
Luke records no sermon at Syracuse and no converts. One writer refuses to read that silence as idleness:
In the early spring they took ship again... We do not hear of preaching, though we may be sure that the grace of Christ and the love of souls did not slumber in the hearts of His servants. But we do see how their past experience gave them, and Paul in particular, a higher and higher place. God saw fit to use every occasion where man's wisdom or power failed.
Paul had made plans of his own for Rome. He got there, but not in the way he had pictured:
Plans and desires he had cherished of still further journeys. He had hoped to visit Rome, and perhaps also Spain... His desire to reach Rome was granted, but in circumstances he had not imagined when he wrote his letter to the believers in that city. The divine promise that he would reach it came to him at a time, and in a place, he surely had not expected. At night, and in the prison at Jerusalem, the Lord appeared, and promised that he should witness for Him in Rome (Acts 23:11).
A note about a three-day stop looks like filler. Yet one writer finds the whole voyage full of interest, and rich in detail no other ancient source can match:
Then follows the voyage of the apostle to Rome, a narrative full of interest in every way. What believer can fail to find refreshment and cheer as he ponders its details? He sees the prisoner as complete master of the situation on board ship in storm and wreck, just as he was before judges and a king who declared him innocent. But no reader of any version, even a believing one, would guess what every scholar ought to know. This chapter gives more real information about an ancient merchant ship, told simply and in passing, than perhaps all the surviving works of Greek and Roman authors together.
- Carried. Syracuse is one stop in a chain of harbours ending at Puteoli — Paul is not steering the ship; it is carrying him.
- Named. Commentators read the name as "dragging unwillingly," but they differ: some see unwilling consciences, others see power pressing from outside.
- Cautioned. One writer warns that such pictures can become far-fetched, and that the prisoner himself should hold our attention.
- Quiet. Luke records no preaching here, yet the love of souls in Christ's servants did not sleep, and Paul's standing kept rising.
- Kept. The Lord's promise in the Jerusalem prison held at every stop — Paul reached Rome, but on terms he never planned.
Whence, going in a circuitous course, we arrived at Rhegium; and after one day, the wind having changed to south, on the second day we came to Puteoli,
These few lines close the sea journey to Rome. Luke names the ports, the wind and the days — and then, at the last harbour, names something no one expected: fellow believers.
Spring came, and the company boarded another ship from Alexandria. One commentator notes what that ship had escaped, and what the voyage did to Paul's standing among the men travelling with him:
In the early spring they boarded a ship again. This one was also from Alexandria, and it had escaped the storm that wrecked their earlier ship — a ship lost because the captain and crew had ignored the apostle's warning. We do not hear of any preaching, though we can be sure that the grace of Christ and love for souls were not asleep in the hearts of His servants. But we see the place given to them, and to Paul above all, rising higher and higher because of what the others had been through with them, as God chose to use every situation where human wisdom or power could do nothing.
Luke names two ports. One commentator places them on the map and explains how Puteoli got its name:
They soon reached Syracuse, a famous city in Sicily. After a stay of three days they followed the coast round to Rhegium, and the next day to Puteoli. Rhegium lay at the south-west tip of Italy, a port of Bruttium on the sea. Puteoli, in the Bay of Naples, was famous for its thirty-three mineral wells, which in fact gave it its name. It was famous too for its earth, still valued for its uses today.
Another writer listens to what the names themselves mean, and hears force in them:
At Syracuse they land and stay for three days. Syracuse means "dragging unwillingly," and says enough about the use of arbitrary power; Rhegium, which means "forcing the way through," makes that thought stronger. It is striking, at least, that here the Dioscuri — the gods believed to guide the ship's course — were once again its patron gods. Puteoli ends the voyage. Puteoli was Rome's chief harbour, though it lay some distance from the city.
Commentators differ here: others simply trace the route and the welcome waiting at the end of it.
The stop at Puteoli was not the first of its kind. Twice earlier in Acts, Luke records the same seven days after a sea voyage:
This is the third recorded occasion in Acts when Paul and his company, after a sea voyage, stay with the believers in the place where they landed for just seven days, and then start their journey again at once.
So why seven days? One commentator links the visit to what believers did together on the Lord's day:
Here they found believers, who begged the apostle and the rest to stay with them seven days. That was the usual length of a visit, and it came naturally to Christians who valued above all the joy of fellowship on the Lord's day and at His Supper, along with the many chances for building up, prayer and the word in between. "Then we went to Rome." What a contrast with the great men of the earth, winner or loser, who had so often taken the same road!
The week cost Paul time, but it did work he could not have arranged. One commentator shows how God used it to strengthen him:
Here the Lord works not by a vision, as He had done when Paul was in danger of giving way to depression (Acts 23:11), but by the faith and love of the believers from Rome. It seems that the delay at Puteoli, caused by believers there who wanted him to stay a week among them, gave time for the news of his arrival in Italy to reach the Christians in Rome, and for them to come and meet him. Clearly the authorities who held him prisoner raised no objection. Such was the moral respect he stirred in the Roman officials, and not least in the centurion, who had watched his ways and words the whole journey from east to west.
- Wind. After the shipwreck, a south wind carries the same prisoner on. The voyage that nearly killed him ends in a two-day run to Rome's harbour.
- Harbour. Puteoli, named for its mineral wells, was Rome's chief port; the land journey to the capital began there.
- Welcome. At the landing place they found believers, and it was those believers who asked for the week.
- Week. This is the third seven-day stop in Acts after a sea voyage. Commentators see believers waiting for the Lord's day and His Supper.
- Result. The week let news of Paul reach Rome, and believers came out to meet him. God strengthened His servant by their love, not by a vision.
where, having found brethren, we were begged to stay with them seven days. And thus we went to Rome.
Paul reaches Italy as a prisoner under guard. The first thing recorded on Italian soil is a welcome, not a court: Christians already living at Puteoli ask his party to stay a week. Who were these believers, and why did a prisoner on his way to trial stop for seven days?
The party lands and finds Christians waiting. The officer in charge lets his prisoner spend the week with them, and Paul draws strength from it.
Everything went well. They arrived at Puteoli and found brothers there. Those brothers begged that Paul might stay with them for a week, and the visit was gladly arranged. It seems that by this time the centurion in charge had taken the measure of his prisoners. He was willing to give Paul remarkable freedom. He was a spiritual man, in close touch with God and dependent on Him. Even so, he was not above thanking God and taking courage from the love and fellowship of saints who may have stood far below him in spiritual stature. It is striking to see this, and very encouraging for us. Let us be very careful not to despise, or even underestimate, the value of the fellowship of saints.
The length of the stay is not random. It matches a pattern that appears earlier in Acts, each time after a sea voyage.
Luke describes the journey to Rome and the stay at Puteoli (Acts 28:13-14). This is the third recorded time in Acts when Paul and his company, after a sea voyage, stay with the saints where they landed for exactly seven days. Each time they then set out again at once.
Why a week? One writer points to what those days made room for.
Here they found brothers who begged the apostle and the rest to stay with them seven days. That was the usual length of a visit. It came naturally to Christians who valued, above all, the joy of fellowship on the Lord's day and at His Supper, along with all the opportunities meanwhile for building up, prayer and the word.
The stop did more than delay him.
It seems that the brothers at Puteoli wanted him to stay a week among them. That delay gave the news of his arrival in Italy time to reach the saints in Rome, and they came out to meet him. The authorities who held him prisoner raised no difficulty at all. Such was the moral respect he had inspired among the Roman officials, and not least in the centurion. That officer had watched his ways and words all the journey from east to west.
Paul had prayed for a good journey to Rome. He got the journey, but not by the route he expected.
Paul had longed to see the saints at Rome. He had asked God to prosper his journey to them (Rom. 1:10-13). But the Lord arranged his way to Rome in a quite unexpected manner. Christian fellowship is sweet at all times. How precious it is in times of trouble! We can easily understand why Paul "thanked God and took courage."
The verse ends at the world's capital. Believers were there before Paul arrived, and one writer sees God's hand in that.
So the apostle comes to the capital of the world a prisoner. Such was the will of God. There were saints in it then, as we know from the letter written to them from Corinth (Rom. 16:3). Apostles founded many churches, but no apostle founded the one in Rome. So God went ahead of the pride of man and condemned it — the pride that later claimed such a founder, a tradition as groundless as most others. Yet more: the greatest witness of the gospel arrived there in chains.
The same writer sets that arrival beside the road's usual traffic.
"And so we came to Rome." What a contrast with the great ones of the earth, winners or losers, who had so often taken the same road!
- Found — At Puteoli the travellers find believers already there. The gospel reached Italy ahead of Paul, and no apostle founded the church in Rome.
- Fed — Seven days is the third such stay in Acts after a sea voyage. A week reaches the Lord's day, the Supper, prayer and the word together.
- Freed — The centurion had watched Paul the whole journey. He grants him remarkable freedom, and the guard's respect becomes the believers' opportunity.
- Forwarded — The week's delay lets news run ahead to Rome, so believers come out to meet him. Delay in God's hand is arrangement.
- Fortified — Paul drew courage from believers far below his own spiritual stature. Never underestimate the fellowship of the saints, above all in hard times.
And thence the brethren, having heard about us, came to meet us as far as Appii Forum and Tres Tabernae, whom when Paul saw, he thanked God and took courage.
Paul reaches the road into Rome as a prisoner, and believers he has never met walk out to greet him. His response — thanks to God, and fresh courage — shows what one simple act of love can do for even the strongest servant.
The two place names mark two separate welcoming parties, and neither spot was a place anyone would choose. One writer sets the meeting against the sordid reputation these stops had among travellers of the day.
From Rome, when the brothers heard that they had arrived in Italy, they "came as far as the Forum of Appius and Three Taverns to meet us." The Forum of Appius was less than forty miles from the great city, and Three Taverns more than thirty. Neither place had a good name, even among the pagans. A classical poet left a vivid record of passing through the more distant of the two. He wrote of its cheap but overpriced taverns and its quarrelling bargemen.
Paul had written to Rome asking for a good journey and a joyful arrival. He came as a prisoner instead, and still called it an answer.
When he wrote his letter, we may be sure he little thought he would see them as Rome's prisoner. He asked that he might have a good journey to them (Rom. 1:10), and had told them to pray that he might reach them with joy (Rom. 15:32). But it is beautiful and blessed to see this. The Spirit of God had given his journey and his arrival among them this character, yet he does not treat it as anything less than a full answer to his desires. "He thanks God," owning that God had answered what he asked.
The phrase itself admits something about Paul's condition. One writer weighs the words carefully.
The love of the brothers moves them to go and meet him. Paul, seeing them, thanks God and takes courage. He was then cast down — I do not say discouraged — but he needed to take courage. Here we find a difference in the inner state of Christians, and it is important to notice. One thing is the state of the soul in itself. Another is its strength when facing difficulties and the power of the enemy.
A humble believer can put fresh heart into the greatest of servants. Holding back from despised people costs us that blessing.
What a joy it is for a humble brother to be the means of giving the apostle Paul fresh cheer along the road of Christ! And how we rob ourselves and our brothers of so much blessing! Our faith is too small and our love too thin to stand with the most despised, and with those who suffer for the name of the Lord.
He was met by men, but his first word went upward. And the order of the verse — thanks, then courage — is itself instructive.
The kind interest and gracious concern of these men, to whom he was "unknown by face," stirred his warm heart to its depths. He forgot the dangers of the past, the weariness of travel, and the shame of his chains. Joy filled him at the sight of those who loved the Christ he served... But while he was certainly grateful to those kind brothers for their affectionate interest, his first thought was to give thanks to God.
Some might expect the Lord to be slighted when His servant is lifted by human company. The opposite is true.
He is a jealous God, I know, and will not allow us to have any other. He is a jealous Saviour, I also know... But in a great sense He is not a jealous Friend. He allows other connections and affections to move our hearts as well as Himself. When Paul saw the brethren he took courage. Did the Lord resent this?... No. He approved of His servant finding refreshment in the faces and company of fellow believers.
One writer, writing about believers meeting the Lord in the air, points back to this scene on the road.
The word used here only occurs three other times in the New Testament: Matthew 25:1 and 6, and Acts 28:15. In each case it means "going out and returning with." When the brothers from Rome "met" Paul, that is exactly what happened. They went out as far as the Forum of Appius. Having met him, they joined his company and returned with him to Rome. In just the same way, we will all meet our Lord in the air.
- Asked — Paul had prayed for a joyful journey to Rome. He arrived in chains, and still called it a full answer.
- Low — the verse admits he was cast down. A soul can be weak in itself and still hold its ground against the enemy.
- Met — believers came over thirty miles to a prisoner they had never seen. Their coming gave him courage.
- Thanked — men lifted him, but his first word went to God. Thanks came before courage.
- Ahead — the word for their meeting means going out and coming back together. It is the word for going out to meet the Lord in the air.
And when we came to Rome, [the centurion delivered up the prisoners to the praetorian prefect, but] Paul was allowed to remain by himself with the soldier who kept him.
Paul's long journey as a prisoner ends here. He enters the capital of the empire alive, and the guard takes charge of him. The verse is short, but it raises the questions that shape the rest of the book. Who held him? How much freedom did he have? And why did the great witness of the gospel enter Rome in chains?
Some translations add a line here about "the captain of the guard." The title names a real Roman post.
"Captain of the guard" in Acts 28:16 is the Greek word stratopedarches, which strictly means "commander of a camp." Here it means the prefect of the Praetorian Guard, the officer who took charge of state prisoners at Rome.
Paul passed from one officer's charge to another's, and he entered a city ruled by the man he had appealed to.
At last Paul entered Rome. What must he have felt as he walked through the grandest capital in the whole world! On the throne sat Nero, a monster of lust and cruelty, who had murdered his own mother and his wife. And it was to Nero that Paul had appealed. On arriving at Rome, the courteous Julius handed him over to the Captain of the guard, the praetorian prefect. This officer's duty was to hold in custody every accused person who had to be tried by Caesar.
Compare translations and you will find the middle of the verse missing in some. The reason lies in the oldest copies.
In Acts 28 it is admitted that the middle part of verse 16 rests on doubtful authority, and so does the whole of verse 29. The best witnesses stand against both, not only in the manuscripts but in the ancient versions.
Either way, the second half of the verse is not in doubt. Paul lived apart from the other prisoners, under a single guard.
Paul had written to the Christians in Rome about the visit he hoped to make.
So Paul arrived at Rome. His circumstances were very different from the ones he had pictured when he wrote ahead about what he planned to do (see Romans 15:22-32). Yet he did come to them with a certain measure of joy, by the will of God, and he came marked by "the fullness of the blessing of the gospel of Christ." God's hand was still over him. Though he was a prisoner, he was allowed to live by himself under guard, and this gave him a measure of liberty for service and testimony.
He had asked God long before for this visit to the believers at Rome. The chain did not cancel it.
These had been his desires (Romans 1:10-13), and every one of them is answered (Acts 28:15-24). He sees them, he takes courage, and through preaching he gathers fruit there as well as among other Gentiles.
Paul was not treated like the other prisoners.
When they came to Rome, the centurion let Paul live outside the prison, in the custody of a soldier, while the rest of the prisoners went to prison. Paul was no ordinary prisoner, as their trust in him shows. But the soldier was in effect a captive audience for the gospel!
The favour still had a hard edge.
However, Paul was allowed to live in his own rented house with a soldier to guard him. It was no small trial to be chained as a prisoner night and day and have no privacy.
The chain fixed him in one place. He used the place.
For two years he lived in Rome under light arrest, guarded by a soldier, in his own rented room. All that time he knew that martyrdom awaited him. He knew how to turn that humble room into a pulpit. There he preached the Kingdom of God and taught the things that concern the Lord Jesus Christ. There and in that occupation we see the last glimpse of that loved and honoured man.
Christians were already in the city; what was new was the way its foremost preacher entered it.
It is not that God had done no work there already. Many souls before this were calling on the name of the Lord, both Jews and Gentiles, as the letter to the Romans lets us see. But the great witness of the gospel was to enter Rome as a prisoner. If he was released later, he came back, a prisoner again, to die at Rome for Christ. It was indeed a solemn picture of what Rome would always prove to be to the gospel of God.
- Chain — The custody was real. A praetorian prefect held the empire's state prisoners, and Paul wore a chain day and night with no privacy.
- Concession — Within that chain came unusual favour. Other prisoners went to prison. The centurion trusted Paul to live on his own under one guard.
- Confirmation — Behind that favour was God's hand. It gave him room for service and testimony.
- Captive audience — The guard chained to him could not walk away. The rented room became a pulpit for the kingdom of God.
- Consequence — Every desire of Romans 1:10-13 was answered: he arrived, he took courage, he gathered fruit. And the great witness of the gospel entered the world's capital in chains.