[333] 6. LAND. (XXVII 27) BUT WHEN THE FOURTEENTH NIGHT WAS COME, AS WE WERE DRIVEN TO AND FRO IN THE ADRIA, TOWARDS MIDNIGHT THE SAILORS SURMISED THAT SOME LAND WAS NEARING THEM; (28) AND THEY SOUNDED, AND FOUND TWENTY FATHOMS; AND AFTER A LITTLE SPACE THEY SOUNDED AGAIN, AND FOUND FIFTEEN FATHOMS. (29) AND FEARING LEST HAPLY WE SHOULD BE CAST ON ROCKY GROUND THEY LET GO FOUR ANCHORS FROM THE STERN, AND PRAYED THAT DAY COME ON. (30) AND AS THE SAILORS WERE SEEKING TO MAKE THEIR ESCAPE FROM THE SHIP, AND HAD LOWERED THE BOAT INTO THE SEA, UNDER PRETENCE OF LAYING OUT ANCHORS FROM THE BOW, (31) PAUL SAID TO THE CENTURION AND THE SOLDIERS, "UNLESS THESE ABIDE IN THE SHIP, YOU CANNOT BE SAVED". (32) THEN THE SOLDIERS CUT AWAY THE ROPES OF THE BOAT AND LET HER FALL AWAY. (33) AND WHILE THE DAY WAS COMING ON, PAUL BESOUGHT THEM ALL TO TAKE SOME FOOD, SAYING: "THIS DAY IS THE FOURTEENTH DAY THAT YOU WATCH AND CONTINUE FASTING, AND HAVE TAKEN NOTHING. (34) WHEREFORE, I BESEECH YOU TO TAKE SOME FOOD, FOR THIS IS FOR YOUR SAFETY; FOR THERE SHALL NOT A HAIR PERISH FROM THE HEAD OF ANY OF YOU."(35) AND WHEN HE HAD SAID THIS HE TOOK BREAD AND GAVE THANKS [334] TO GOD IN THE PRESENCE OF ALL; AND HE BRAKE IT, AND BEGAN TO EAT. (36) THEN WERE THEY ALL OF GOOD CHEER, AND THEMSELVES ALSO TOOK SOME FOOD. (37) AND WE WERE IN ALL ON THE SHIP 276 SOULS. (38) AND WHEN THEY HAD EATEN ENOUGH, THEY PROCEEDED TO LIGHTEN THE SHIP, THROWING OUT THE WHEAT INTO THE SEA.

Luke seems to have had the landsman's idea that they drifted to and fro in the Mediterranean. A sailor would have known that they drifted in a uniform direction; but it seems hardly possible to accept Smith's idea that the Greek word ({diapheromenõn}) can denote a straight drifting course.

The name Adria has caused some difficulty. It was originally narrower in application; but in the usage of sailors it grew wider as time passed, and Luke uses the term that he heard on shipboard, where the sailors called the sea that lay between Malta, Italy, Greece, and Crete "the Adria". As usual, Luke's terminology is that of life and conversation, not of literature. Strabo the geographer, who wrote about A.D. 19, says that the Ionian sea on the west of Greece was "a part of what is now called Adria,"implying that contemporary popular usage was wider than ancient usage. In later usage the name was still more widely applied: in the fifth century "the Adria"extended to the coast of Cyrene; and mediæval sailors distinguished the Adriatic, as the whole Eastern half of the Mediterranean, from the Aegean sea (see p. 298).

On the fourteenth midnight, the practised senses of the sailors detected that land was nearing: probably, as Smith suggests, they heard the breakers, and, as an interesting confirmation of his suggestion, one old Latin version reads [335] "that land was resounding". 1 was now necessary to choose where they should beach the vessel; for the sound of the breakers warned them that the coast was dangerous. In the dark no choice was possible; and they therefore were forced to anchor. With a strong wind blowing it was doubtful whether the cables and anchors would hold; therefore, to give themselves every chance, they let go four anchors. Smith quotes from the sailing directions that in St. Paul's Bay (the traditional scene of the wreck), "while the cables hold there is no danger, as the anchors will never start". He also points out that a ship drifting from Cauda could not get into the bay without passing near the low rocky point of Koura, which bounds it on the east. The breakers here warned the sailors; and the charts show that after passing the point the ship would pass over 20 fathoms and then over 15 fathoms depth on her course, W. by N.

Anchoring by the stern was unusual; but in their situation it had great advantages. Had they anchored by the bow, the ship would have swung round from the wind; and, when afterwards they wished to run her ashore, it would have been far harder to manage her when lying with her prow pointing to the wind and away from the shore. But, as they were, they had merely to cut the cables, unlash the rudders, and put up a little foresail (v.40); and they had the ship at once under command to beach her at any spot they might select.

As the ship was now lying at anchor near some land, the sailors were about to save themselves by the boat and abandon the ship to its fate without enough skilled [336] hands to work it; but Paul, vigilant ever, detected their design, and prevented it. Then, in order that the company might have strength for the hard work that awaited them at daybreak, he encouraged them once more with the assurance of safety, urged them to eat with a view thereto, and himself set the example. There is perhaps an intention in v.35 to represent Paul as acting like Jesus at the last Passover; and the resemblance is more pointed if the words added in one MS. and some versions are original, "giving also to us". But it would be necessary to understand "us"to mean only Luke and Aristarchus (as Dr. Blass agrees); and this is harsh after the word has been so often used in a much wider sense. It is characteristic of Christianity in all periods to seek after resemblances between the Founder and any great hero of the faith at some crisis of history; and this addition seems a later touch to bring out the resemblance.

FOOTNOTES:

1 Resonare Gig. Compared with {prosachein} B, as Prof. Rendel Harris suggests to me, this implies an early Greek reading {prosêchein}.