ACC ~ Acts 19 v18 - 22

OVERVIEW:

The effect of Paul’s preaching here is quantified in economic terms, and thus this episode lays the foundation for Demetrius’s speech that follows. This passage presents problems to modern commentators inasmuch as scholars today are still struggling to come to a clearer picture of the ancient economy. What fifty thousand denarii, the standard silver coin, would have amounted to in terms of wages is a confusing subject in itself. The point, however, is clear that conversion to Christianity from magic requires the renouncing of all profit from the latter in order to reap the benefits of the faith. The jury is also out on Paul’s resolution “in the S/spirit” as to whether the spirit here is the Holy Spirit. The ancient commentators note the power of an honest confession of sins (AMMONIUS) or the power of Christian preaching to effect such a confession (EUSEBIUS). Didymus uses the incident to defend Christians against the charge of being magicians while Bede is fascinated by the symbolic potential of the fifty thousand pieces of silver.

19:19 | Those Who Practiced Magic

A FRUITFUL CONFESSION OF SINS. AMMONIUS: Every sinner must confess his sins and, through his self-conviction, turn away from continuing to commit them, so that he may become just according to the passage, “Confess your sins first so that you may be justified,” and the passage, “Just is the man who accuses himself.” The idolaters and magicians were so many in Ephesus that they prepared magicians’ books at a high price, as if these books held the most noble things in life. Upon believing in Christ, they did not sell them, even though there were many who wanted to obtain them, but they burned them. And they did this first so that no one could take part in their soul-destroying ruin, and second so that they could have no profit from it. For just as it is forbidden to offer to God the value of a dog or profit from impurity, so also did they judge it an injustice to lay at the apostles’ feet money from such a source. CATENA ON THE ACTS OF THE APOSTLES 19.18.

BRINGING FORBIDDEN THINGS TO LIGHT. EUSEBIUS OF CAESAREA: It shows what our Savior’s disciples were; it shows the extraordinary influence of their words when they addressed their audience, that people so touched the depths of their souls, caught hold of and pierced the individual conscience, that men no longer hid anything away in concealment but brought forth their forbidden things to light and themselves completed the indictment of themselves and their own former wickedness. It shows what their pupils were like, how pure and honorable in disposition, determined that nothing evil in them should lurk below the surface, and how boldly they prided themselves on their change from the worse to the better. Yes, they who gave their magic books to the flames and voted for their complete destruction left no one in any doubt that they would never again have anything to do with sorcery, and from that day forth they were pure from the slightest suspicion of it. PROOF OF THE GOSPEL 3.6.

DISCERNING MEANING IN FIFTY. BEDE: In the Gospel, too, debtors are forgiven debts that number fifty and five hundred denarii because, I believe, while we are subsisting with the five senses of the body in this life, we transgress the commandments of the Decalogue. Here, however, because of the enormity of the crime of magic, the number [fifty] is increased a thousandfold. Alternatively, “the number fifty is” often “related to repentance” and to the pardon of sins. Hence also the fiftieth psalm is the psalm of repentance, and the fiftieth year is the year of pardon. COMMENTARY ON THE ACTS OF THE APOSTLES 19.19B.

CHRIST’S DISCIPLES ARE NOT MAGICIANS. DIDYMUS THE BLIND: Let those who accuse Christ’s disciples of being magicians be refuted by this reading, since it shows clearly that all magic is destroyed by the power of their teaching. See these people, not being incompetent but having great ability in this art, after being purified of the magical arts or of their customary demons, how they gathered together all the books of magic and burned them before all present at that time, even though they were of great value. CATENA ON THE ACTS OF THE APOSTLES 19.19-20.

19:22 | Two Helpers Sent to Macedonia

SUPERSTITION AND PHILOSOPHY. CHRYSOSTOM: He sends them ahead to announce his coming and thus to rouse their expectations, but most of all to stay a while in Asia. And for good reason, since there ruled the tyranny of philosophers. He went and spoke with them more, since there was much superstition. CATENA ON THE ACTS OF THE APOSTLES 19.21.