568 WORD STUDIES IN THE NEW TESTAMENT. ([Cu. XXI.
29. Trophimus. See on ch. xx. 4. As an Ephesian he would be known to the Asiatic Jews.
30. Drew him out of thetemple. Better, as Rey., dragged (eiAxov). Out of the sacred enclosure and down the steps to the outer court, as they would not defile the temple proper with blood.
The doors were shut. Between the inner and outer courts.
31. Chief captain (yercdpy@). A commander of a thousand men. See on Mark vi. 21; and on centurion, Luke vii. 2.
Band (o7eépys). Or cohort. See on Mark xv. 16. These troops were quartered in the tower of Antonia, which was at the northwestern corner of the temple-area, and communicated with the temple-cloisters by staircases.
32. Centurions. See on Luke vii. 2. Unto them (éz’ avtovs). Better, wpon them.
33. Chains (drvcecr). See on Mark vy. 4.
34. Castle (aapewPoryv). Better, barracks. The main tower had a smaller tower at each corner, the one at the south- eastern corner being the largest and overlooking the temple. In this tower were the quarters of the soldiers. The word is de- rived from the verb tapeuBarra, to put in beside, used in mil- itary language of distributing auxiliaries among regular troops and, generally, of drawing up in battle-order. Hence the noun means, a body drawn up in battle-array, and passes thence into the meaning of an encampment, soldiers’ quarters, barracks. In Heb. xi. 34, it occurs in the earlier sense of an army ; and in Heb. xiii. 11, 13; Apoe. xx. 9, in the sense of an encampment. In grammatical phraseology it signifies a parenthesis, according to its original sense of insertion or interpolation.
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35. Stairs. Leading from the temple-court to the tower. There were two flights, one to the northern and the other to the western cloister, so that the guard could go different ways among the cloisters in order to watch the people at the Jewish festivals.
So it was (cuvéBy). Lit., 7t happened. The verb means, lit- erally, to come together; hence, of a coincidence of events. It is designedly introduced here to express more vividly the fact of the peculiar emergency and the peril of Paul’s situation. Things came to such a@ pass that he had to be carried up the stairs.
37. Canst thou speak (yweoxes). Lit., dost thou know ? So Rey.
38. Art thou not (ov« dpa av ei). Indicating the officer’s surprised recognition of his own mistake. “Thou art not, then, as I supposed.” Rev. properly adds then (dpa).
The Egyptian. A false prophet, who, in the reign of Nero, when Felix was governor of Judaea, collected a multitude of thirty thousand, whom he led from the wilderness to the Mount of Olives, saying that the walls of Jerusalem would fall down at his command and give them free entrance to the city. Felix with an army dispersed the multitude, and the Egyptian him- self escaped. There is a discrepancy in the number of fol- Jowers as stated by Josephus (30,000) and as stated by the commandant here (4,000). It is quite possible, however, that Josephus alludes to the whole rabble, while Lysias is referring only to the armed followers. :
Madest an uproar. Better, as Rev., stirred up to sedition. The rendering of the A. V. is too vague. The verb means to unsettle ov upset, and the true idea is given in the A. V. of Acts xvii. 6, have turned the world upside down. Compare Gal. vy. 12, and kindred words in Mark xv. 7; Luke xxiii. 19.
That were murderers (tv cixapiwv). The A. V. is too
570 WORD STUDIES IN THE NEW TESTAMENT. [Ca XXII.
general, and overlooks the force of the article, which shows that the word refers toa class. Rev., rightly, the assassins. The word, which occurs only here, and notably on the lips of a Roman officer, is one of those Latin words which “ followed the Roman domination even into those Eastern provinces of the em- pire which, unlike those of the West, had refused to be Latin- ized, but still retained their own language” (Trench, “ Syn- onyms”). The Sicarii were so called from the weapon which | they used—the sica, or short, curved dagger. Josephus says: “There sprang up in Jerusalem another description of robbers called Sikars, who, under the broad light of day, and in the very heart of the city, assassinated men; chiefly at the festivals, however, when, mixing among the crowd, with daggers con- cealed under their cloaks, they stabbed those with whom they were at variance. When they fell, the murderers joined in the general expressions of indignation, and by this plausible pro- ceeding remained undetected” (“Jewish War,” c. xiii.). The general New Testament term for murderer is hovers (see Matt. xxii. 7; Acts iji. 14; xxviii. 4, etc.).