Acts 28:16

And when we came to Rome There was much that might have been said of this land journey from Puteoli to Rome, and the writer of the Acts was one of the fellow-travellers. But it is foreign to his purpose to dwell on anything which does not concern the spread of the Gospel according to the command of Jesus (Acts 1:8), and so he leaves all the glorious sights and scenery unmentioned, and tells us no word of the many monuments which stood along the Appian Way, only noticing, what his history required, the two little bands, that represented Christ's cause and the work of the Gospel, in the great city to which they were approaching.

the centurion delivered the prisoners to the captain of the guard: but For these words there is no text in the oldest Greek MSS. which we possess. But the words are not of the same character as many of the sentences which seem introduced into the text of the Acts by later hands. They are entirely independent of anything either in the Acts or the Epistles of St Paul, and it is not easy to understand why they should have been added to the original text. There is moreover such similarity between the ending of the first and last words in the clause, that the eye of an early scribe may have passed over from the one to the other, and thus omitted the clause, and in this way may have originated the text of the MSS. which leave the passage out.

The "Captain of the Guard" here alluded to was probably the "præfectus prætorio," one of whose duties was to take charge of those persons from the provinces whose causes were to be brought before the Emperor.

Paul was suffered to dwell[R. V.abide] by himself This lenity was probably due to the commendation of the centurion Julius, who cannot but have found that he had charge of no ordinary prisoner in St Paul, and having been saved and aided by the Apostle's advice would naturally wish to do something in return.

with a soldier that kept[R. V.guarded] him The custom was that the prisoner should be chained by one hand to the soldier while he was on guard. And to this chain the Apostle often makes allusion in the Epistles (Ephesians, Philippians, Colossians and Philemon) written during this imprisonment. See also below, Acts 28:20. The frequent change of the person who guarded him would give the Apostle an opportunity of spreading the knowledge of his cause, and the message of the Gospel, very widely among the Prætorian guards who had him in charge, and many things would have been heard by them from the soldiers who had sailed with St Paul, which would make them ready to attend to the narrative of their prisoner.