e Jonah i. 5. boat: 17 which when they had taken up, they used helps, undergirding the ship; and, fearing lest they should fall into the quicksands, strake sail, and so were driven. 18 And we being exceedingly tossed with a tempest, the next day they lightened the ship; 19 and the third day, we cast out with our own hands the tackling of the ship. e t render, the quicksand, i. e. the Syrtis: see note. .... it on board. This had not been done at first, because the weather was moderate, and the distance they had to go, short. Under such circumstances, it is not usual to hoist boats on board, but it had now become necessary. In running down upon Clauda, it could not be done, on account of the ship's way through the water. To enable them to do it, the ship must have been rounded to, with her head to the wind, and her sails, if she had any set at the time, trimmed, so that she had no head-way, or progressive movement. In this position she would drift, broadside to leeward. I conclude they passed round the east end of the island: not only because it was nearest, but because an extensive reef with numerous rocks extends from Gozzo to the N.W., which renders the passage between the two isles very dangerous' (Sailing Directions, p. 207). In this case the ship would be brought to on the starboard tack, i. e. with the right side to windward." "St. Luke tells us they had much difficulty in securing the boat. He does not say why: but independently of the gale which was raging at the time, the boat had been towed between twenty and thirty miles after the gale had sprung up, and could scarcely fail to be filled with water." Smith, pp. 64, 65. 17.] taken up, i. e. taken on board. helps, i. e. measures to strengthen the ship, strained and weakened by labouring in the gale. Pliny calls the typhoon "the chief pest of sailors, breaking not only the yards, but even the ribs of the vessels themselves." Grotius, Heinsius, &c., are clearly wrong in interpreting helps to mean the help of the passengers.' undergirding] or frapping the ship. "To frap a ship (ceintrer un vaisseau) is to pass four or five turns of a large cable-laid rope round the hull or frame of a ship, to support her in a great storm, or otherwise, when it is apprehended that she is not strong enough to resist the violent efforts of the sea: this expedient, however, is rarely put in practice." Falconer's Marine Dict. :--Smith, p. 60, who brings several instances of the practice, in our own times. [See additional ones in Conybeare and Howson, ii. 404 f.] the quicksand] The Syrtis, on the African coast; there were two, the greater and the lesser, of which the former was the nearer to them. lowered the gear] "It is not easy to imagine a more erroneous translation than that of our authorized version: Fearing lest they should fall into the quicksands, they strake sail, and were so driven.' It is, in fact, equivalent to saying that, fearing a certain danger, they deprived themselves of the only possible means of avoiding it." Smith, p. 67. He goes on to explain, that if they had struck sail, they must have been driven directly towards the Syrtis. They therefore set what sail the violence of the gale would permit them to carry, turning the ship's head off shore, she having already been brought to on the starboard tack (right side to the wind). The adoption of this course would enable them to run before the gale, and yet keep wide of the African coast, which we know they did. They lowered the gear, i. e. they sent down upon deck the gear connected with the fair-weather sails, such as the topsails. A modern ship sends down top-gallant masts and yards, a cutter strikes her topmast, when preparing for a gale. this case it was perhaps the heavy yard which the ancient ships carried, with the sail attached to it, and the heavy ropes, which would by their top-weight produce uneasiness of motion as well as resistance to the wind. See a letter addressed to Mr. Smith by Capt. Spratt, R.N., quoted in Conybeare and Howson, ii. p. 405, note 5. In 20 And when neither sun nor stars in many days appeared, hath given thee all them that h fore, sirs, be of good cheer: for I believe God, that it a render, should have been spared. rigging. with our own hands is used as shewing the urgency of the danger-when the seamen would with their own hands, cast away what otherwise was needful to the ship and themselves. 20.] The sun and stars were the only guides of the ancients when out of sight of land. The expression, all hope was taken away, seems, as Mr. Smith has noticed, to betoken that a greater evil than the mere force of the storm (which perhaps had some little abated :-no small tempest seems to imply that it still indeed raged, but not as before) was afflicting them, viz. the leaky state of the ship, which increased upon them, as is shewn by their successive lightenings of her. 21. after long abstinence] "What caused Z 2 literally, Men. b render, hath been. should have turned to your own account this harm and loss. This may perhaps be what our translators meant by gained: but it is by no means clear. 23.] Paul characterizes himself as dedicated to and the servant of God, to give solemnity and bespeak credit for his announcement. At such a time, the servants of God are highly esteemed. 24. all them that sail with thee] Bengel remarks, that "Paul is in the sight of God the chief man in the ship and the director of its course." 26. we must be cast...] Spoken prophetically, as also ver. 31: not perhaps from actual revelation imparted in the vision, but by a power imparted to Paul himself of penetrating the future at this crisis, and announcing the Divine counsel. 27. the fourteenth night] The reckoning of days counts from their leaving Fair Havens: see vv. 18, 19. in Adria] Adria, in the wider sense, embraces not only the Venetian Gulf, but the sea to the south of Greece-so Ptolemy, "The Peloponnesus is bounded on the W. and S. by the Adriatic Sea and again, Sicily is bounded.. on the N. by the Sea of Adria." In fact, he bounds Italy on the S., Sicily on the E., Greece on the S. and W., and Crete on the W. by this Sea, which notices sufficiently indicate its dimensions. So also Pausanias, speaking of the straits of Messina, accounts for their tempestuous character by the meeting of the Tyrrhenian and the Adriatic seas. с to some country; 28 and sounded, and found it twenty fathoms; and when they had gone a little further, they sounded again, and found it fifteen fathoms. 29 Then fearing lest we should have fallen upon rocks, they cast four anchors out of the stern, and wished for the day. 30 And as the shipmen were about to flee out of the ship, when they had let down the boat into the sea, under colour as though they would have a cast anchors out of the foreship, 31 Paul said to the centurion and to the soldiers, cliterally, rough places. the shipmen deemed] What gave rise to this suspicion? Probably the sound (or even the apparent sight) of breakers. "If we assume that St. Paul's Bay, in Malta, is the actual scene of the shipwreck, we can have no difficulty in explaining what these indications must have been. No ship can enter it from the east without passing within a quarter of a mile of the point of Koura: but before reaching it, the land is too low and too far from the track of a ship driven from the eastward, to be seen in a dark night. When she does come within this distance, it is impossible to avoid observing the breakers: for with north-easterly gales, the sea breaks upon it with such violence, that Capt. Smyth, in his view of the headland, has made the breakers its distinctive character." Smith, p. 79.-I recommend the reader to study the reasonings and calculations by which Mr. Smith (pp. 79-86) has established, I think satisfactorily, that this land could be no other than the point of Koura, east of St. Paul's Bay, in Malta. 28. fathoms] The measure here rendered fathom is described as being the length of the outstretched arms, from finger to finger. It is therefore very nearly our fathom, which is six feet. Every particular here corresponds with the actual state of things. At twenty-five fathoms' depth (as given in evidence at the court-martial on the officers of the Lively, wrecked on this point in 1810), the curl of the sea was seen on the rocks in the night, but no land. The twenty fathoms would occur somewhat past this: the fifteen fathoms, in a direction W. by N. from the former, after a time sufficient to prepare for the unusual measure of anchoring by the stern. And just so are the soundings (see Capt. Smyth's chart, Smith, p. 88), and the shore is here full of rough places, mural precipices, upon which the sea must have been breaking with great violence. 29. out of the stern] The usual way of anchoring in ancient, as well d d better, carried: as in modern navigation, was by the bow. Except these abide in the ship, ye cannot be saved. 32 Then the soldiers cut off the ropes of the boat, and let her fall off. 33 And while the day was coming on, Paul besought them all to take meat, saying, This day is the fourteenth day that ye have tarried and continued fasting, having taken nothing. 34 Wherefore I pray you to take some f meat for this is for your ghealth: for * there shall not an hair fall from the head of of any you. 35 And when he had thus spoken, he took bread, and gave thanks to God in presence of them all and when he had broken it, he began to eat. 36 Then were they all of good cheer, and they also took some meat. 37 And we were in all in the ship two hundred threescore and sixteen m souls. 38 And when they had eaten enough, they light- mch. 1. 41 ened the ship, i and cast out the wheat into the sea. f e literally, until it was about to become day. hread, perish. laid out from both ends of a ship." ib.' And But it does not therefore follow, that the k 1 Kings i. 52. Matt. x. 30. Luke xii. 7: 11 xx. 18. Matt. xv. 36. 1 Tim. iv. 3, 4. ii. vii. 14. Rom. xiii. 1. 1 Pet. iii. 20. grender, safety. i render, casting. And family (Meyer), but simply as a pious Jew, 1 39 And when it was day, they knew not the land: but they discovered a certain creek with a shore, j into the which they were minded, if it were possible, to ↳ thrust in the ship. 40 And when they had taken up the anchors, they committed themselves unto the sea, and loosed the rudder bands, and hoised up the mainsail to the wind, and made toward shore. 41 And falling into a place n 2 Cor. xi. 25. Where two seas met," they ran the ship aground; and the forepart stuck fast, and remained unmoveable, but the hinder part was broken with the violence of the waves. render, run the ship aground. m render, left them in. foresail. j render, on. 1 render, cut off. n render, enough to be of consequence in a ship ready to sink from hour to hour. 39.] It may be and has been suggested, that some of the Alexandrian seamen must have known Malta ;-but we may answer with Mr. Smith that "St. Paul's Bay is remote from the great harbour, and possesses no marked features by which it might be recognized" (p. 100). a creek with a shore] properly, a creek having a sandy beach. What is meant is a creek with a smooth, sandy beach, as distinguished from a rocky inlet. They were minded, not to thrust in,' as A.V., but to strand, to run aground, their ship. 40.] (1) They cut away (or, cut round) all four anchors (the round may allude to the cutting round each cable in order to sever it, or to the going round and cutting all four), and left them in the sea (literally "into the sea," i. e. in the sea, into which they had been cast'). This they did to save time, and not to encumber the water-logged ship with their additional weight. (2) They let loose the ropes which tied up the rudders. "Ancient ships were steered by two large paddles, one on each quarter. When anchored by the stern in a gale, it would be necessary to lift them out of the water, and secure them by lashings or rudder bands, and to loose these bands when the ship was again got under way." Smith, p. 101. (3) They raised their "artěmon to the wind. It would be impossible in the limits of a note to give any abstract of the long and careful reasoning by which Mr Smith has made it appear that the 'artemon' was the foresail of the ancient ships. I will only notice from him, that the rendering 'mainsail' in our A. V. was probably a mistaken translation from Bayfius or De Baif, the earliest of the modern writers on naval matters, and perhaps the only one extant This when the translation was made: he says, "The artemon is the largest sail in the ship, as see Acts xxvii. ... even now the Venetians retain the name." These words, "the largest sail," they rendered by mainsail; whereas the largest sail of the Venetian ships at the time was the foresail.-The French artimon,' even now in use, means the sail at the stern (mizen). But this is no clue to the ancient meaning, any more than is our word mizen to the meaning of the French misaine, which is the foresail. 41. a place where two seas met] At the west end of St. Paul's Bay is an island, Selmoon or Salmonetta, which they could not have known to be such from their place of anchorage. island is separated from the mainland by a channel of about 100 yards wide, communicating with the outer sea. Just within this island, in all probability, was the place where the ship struck, in a place where two seas met. they ran the ship aground] "The circumstance which follows, would, but for the peculiar nature of the bottom of St. Paul's Bay, be difficult to account for. The rocks of Malta disintegrate into very minute particles of sand and clay, which when acted on by the currents, or by surface agitation, form a deposit of tenacious clay: but in still water, where these causes do not act, mud is found: but it is only in the creeks where there are no currents, and at such a depth as to be undisturbed by the waves, that mud occurs.... A ship therefore, impelled by the force of the gale into a creek with a bottom such as that laid down in the chart, would strike a bottom of mud, graduating into tenacious clay, into which the fore part would fix itself and be held fast, while the stern was exposed to the force of the waves." Smith, p. 103. |