Acts 21:3

Acts 21:3. Now when we had discovered Cyprus. The Greek word here rendered ‘when we had discovered,' is a nautical expression such as an eye-witness, familiar with the language of sea-Suing men, would have used; literally, having had (Cyprus) brought up to sight, made visible to us above the horizon. There are many such-like phrases in the ‘Acts' which taste, so to speak, of the salt sea. It seems more than probable that Luke the physician, the compiler of these apostolic memoirs, had in some portion of his life been connected with some of the great trading ships of the Levant; very likely he had been employed on board in a professional capacity. The ship of Paul, we read, passed ‘Cyprus,' the island he knew so well, the home probably still of his old friend Barnabas, on the left, as they sailed by it to the southward.

And sailed into Syria. The geographical name Syria is here employed in the Roman sense, according to which Phoenicia and Palestine were considered parts of the province of Syria. The distance between Patara and Tyre was 340 geographical miles.

And landed at Tyre. In St. Paul's days the glory of Tyre, as described in the prophecies of Isaiah and Ezekiel, had long since faded. Its merchants were no more princes. The modern cities of Antioch and Cæsarea had proved successful rivals to the old capital of Phoenicia. In honour of its ancient grandeur, the Roman Empire gave it the privilege of a ‘free city.' It retained a considerable position among cities, however, until the close of the thirteenth century, when it was taken and destroyed by the Saracens. It has never risen since that awful ruin above the condition of a wretched village. It now, indeed, fulfils the old prophecy, and is literally, with its shapeless ruins by the sea, only ‘a place to spread nets upon' (Ezekiel 26:14). Writing of Tyre, Dr. Hackett says: ‘Its most important ruins lie at present beneath the sea; it was with melancholy interest that I looked down upon them through the calm waters, in the long twilight which closed the 10th of May 1852.'

For there the ship was to unlade her burden. Literally, ‘for thither' (ε ̓ κει ͂ σε γα ̀ ρ). For having come thither, the ship was unlading, etc.