¹ E.g., Knox, W. L., Some Hellenistic Elements in Primitive Christianity, Schweich Lectures, 1942 (London: Milford, 1944) 13–14Google Scholar; Dibelius, Martin, Aufsätze zur Apostelgeschichte, FRLANT 60; (ed. Greeven, Heinrich; Göttingen: Vandenhoeck und Ruprecht, 1951) esp. 172–80Google Scholar; Plümacher, Eckhard, Lukas als hellenistischer Schriftsteller: Studien zur Apostelgeschichte, SUNT 9 (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck und Ruprecht, 1972) esp. 14–15Google Scholar, 137; Pokorný, Petr;, “Die Romfahrt des Paulus und der antike Roman,” ZNW 64 (1973) 233–44CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Pokorný, however, pursues interests quite different from this article.

² E.g., Lake, Kirsopp and Cadbury, Henry J., “The Acts of the Apostles,” in Foakes-Jackson, F. J., ed., The Beginnings of Christianity, 4, 1 (London: Macmillan, 1920–1933), on Acts 27–28Google Scholar; Munck, Johannes, The Acts of the Apostles, (Anchor Bible; Garden City: Doubleday, 1967) xlii–xliii, 249–53.Google Scholar

³ See Conzelmann, Hans, Die Apostelgeschichte, (HNT 7; Tübingen: Mohr, 1963Google Scholar) Appendix, and Haenchen, Ernst, Die Apostelgeschichte (Meyer K.; Göttingen: Vandenhoeck und Ruprecht, 1965) 633–34.Google Scholar

⁴ Note esp. Haenchen, Apostelgeschichte, 635; cf. O'Neill, J. C., The Theology of Acts in its Historical Setting (London: S.P.C.K., 1961) 62–63.Google Scholar

⁵ E.g., Goulder, M. D. (Type and History in Acts [London: S.P.C.K., 1964] 36–40Google Scholar) has argued that Paul's voyage and shipwreck are a typos of Jesus' crucifixion and death, a difficult view to defend.

⁶ Herodotus 3. 39–44, 120–29.

⁷ Herodotus 4. 200–05.

⁸ See Immerwahr, Henry R., Form and Thought in Herodotus (Cleveland: American Philological Association, 1966)Google Scholar, “Conclusion: History and the Order of Nature,” 306–26.

⁹ Garry Trompf discusses the importance of retributive logic in ancient thought with particular reference to Polybius and Luke in The Idea of Historical Recurrence in Western Thought (Unpublished diss.; Australian National University, 1974).Google Scholar

¹⁰ The Greeks and the Irrational, Sather Classical Lectures 25 (Berkeley: University of California, 1951) 35–37, 38, 43–48.Google Scholar

¹¹ Bk. 22. 1–6.

¹² For documentation and discussion see R., and Blum, E., The Dangerous Hour: The Lore of Crisis and Mystery in Rural Greece (London: Chatto and Windus, 1970) 298–300Google Scholar, 359, et passim.

¹³ Peri tou Hērodou phonou, 82–83. Plūmacher, Lukas, 14–15 cites numerous Hellenistic models for Luke's narrative of the shipwreck, but no one to our knowledge has yet sought to illuminate the meaning of Luke's narrative in light of this passage from Antiphon.

¹⁴ Antiphon, Peri tou Hērodou phonou, 10–11.

¹⁵ The translation is ours.

¹⁶ It is possible, too, that the idea of polluted objects or persons being engulfed at sea and the pollution thus “washed away” lay behind the thinking of Helos and his audience. Although we have been unable to find an explicit articulation of this idea in Classical Antiquity, it is well-attested in modern Greek folklore; see Blum The Dangerous Hour, 32, 34, 64, 188.

¹⁷ Homer Od. 12. 127–41, 259–446.

¹⁸ Div. inst. 2.17 (PL 6. cols. 290–91).

¹⁹ Div. inst. 2. 8 (PL 6. cols. 337–39).

²⁰ For the number, see v. 37 (with textual variants). In vv. 35–36, Luke states that Paul thanked God and broke bread in the presence of all ((πάντων),), and that all ((πάντες)) were thereby encouraged.

²¹ Even the modern critic, cf. esp. Hanson, R. P. C., “The Acts,” The New Clarendon Bible, The New Testament (Oxford: Clarendon, 1967) 28–35.Google Scholar

²² It is not impossible that Julius (the centurion of 27:3, 31) secured Paul's freedom (see 28:31b, yet cf. 2 Tim 4:16–17) in view of the events at sea. That is a tantalizing question about historicity, however, and it is Lukan theology which concerns us here. Perhaps Luke omitted reference to a final trial because he wished to arouse his readers’ curiosity, but there seems more promise in the assumption that, in not mentioning it, Luke avoided real politico-theological difficulties. By the time of Paul's arrival, the emperor was revered as a god, and while the normal inclination of Luke's non-Christian readers would have been to declare Caesar's judgment divine, the Evangelist himself was doubtless of the opinion that Nero was a mere mortal, and one who did not know the true god. The theology of Acts is such that Paul's innocence was established by a divinely controlled happening en route to Rome which made the emperor's judgment superfluous.

²³ Here we do not wish to discount Luke's preoccupations with Jewish questions (esp. in 28: 17–28), nor the evident influence of Jewish historiography (Paul's relative freedom in captivity may have been consciously paralleled to Jehoiachin's condition in Babylon which is described at the very end of the Deuteronomic history, 2 Kgs 24:29–30, cf. Trompf, Idea of Historical Recurrence, 250). What happened to Paul, too, may represent a deliberate contrast to the fate of Jonah.

²⁴ See Cadbury, Henry J., The Book of Acts in History (London: Black, 1955) 25–26Google Scholar; and Haenchen, Ernst, “Das ‘Wir’ in der Apostelgeschichte und das Itinerar,” ZThK 58 (1961) 360Google Scholar, n. 93, on feared piratical “barbarians.” The double meaning of “non-Greek-speaking natives” and “uncivilized men” (who are likely to harm strangers but who are surprisingly kind) seems intended.

²⁵ Although Luke expressed their thoughts with his usual feeling for dramatic impact, this does not mean that 28:4 and 6 lose any of their value as passages indicating the forms of retributive logic prevalent at the level of village consciousness, let alone among intellectuals and urban dwellers of the Mediterranean basin.

²⁶ See supra on Lactantius.

²⁷ Trompf, Garry, “La section médiane de l'Evangile de Luc; l'organisation des documents,” in RHPhR 53 (1973) 141–54Google Scholar, and cf. Idea of Historical Recurrence, 291–99.