Acts 19


Acts 19 is the nineteenth chapter of the Acts of the Apostles in the New Testament of the Christian Bible. It records part of the third missionary journey of Paul. The author of 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.

Text

The original text was written in Koine Greek. This chapter is divided into 41 verses.

Textual witnesses

Some early manuscripts containing the text of this chapter are:
This chapter mentions the following places :
This part of the third missionary journey of Paul took place in ca. AD 53–55.

Paul's ministry in Ephesus (19:1–22)

This part covers Paul's long stay in Ephesus, where he encountered "some disciples" of John the Baptist and confronted the influence of magic and occult in that city.

Verse 4

"Believe on him" is the translation used by the King James Version and New King James Version. The more natural phrase "believe in him" is used by the New American Standard Bible.

Verse 5

Verse 14

Sceva was a Jew called a "chief priest". Some scholars note that it was not uncommon for some members of the Zadokite clan to take on an unofficial high-priestly role, which may explain this moniker. However, it is more likely that he was an itinerant exorcist based on the use of the Greek term "going from place to place" in.
In this verse, it is recorded that he had seven sons who attempted to exorcise a demon from a man in Ephesus by using the name of Jesus as an invocation. This practice is similar to the Jewish practice, originating in the Testament of Solomon, of invoking Angels to cast out demons. Sorcery and exorcism are mentioned several times in Acts: Simon Magus and Elymas Bar-Jesus, and divination is illustrated by the girl at Philippi. "She was regarded as spirit-possessed, and it was the spirit who was addressed and expelled by Paul in ".

Verse 15

This evil spirit had heard of both Jesus and Paul, but not of the seven sons of Sceva, which soon received 'such a beating' from the spirit 'that they ran' ; theologian argues that this shows that power over evil spirits does not work in a mechanical way in the name of Jesus, but because one knows Jesus and, more importantly, is known by him.

Verse 19

Paul has already intended to have his trip to Jerusalem followed with a trip to Rome.

The riot in Ephesus (19:23–45)

The amount of money in the scroll-burning incident must have stirred many people, whole livelihood is threatened by the successful growth of the Christian church, and now is bolstering a serious opposition.

Verse 29