Acts 21:1 - Exposition

When it came to pass float we were parted from them, and had set sail for it came to pass, that after we were gotten from them, and had launched, A.V.; Cos for Coos , A.V. and T.R.; next day for day following, A.V. Parted from them ( ἀποσπασθέντας ) . "Non sine desiderio magno" (Bengel). "He shows the violence of the parting by saying, ' Having torn ourselves away '" (Chrysostom). The word is properly applied to those who have been unwillingly torn away from their friends (Schleusner and Kuinoel); "denotes the painful separation wrung from them by necessity" (Meyer) In Acts 20:30 it was used in the active voice of false teachers "drawing away" the disciples, i.e. Christians, after them. In 2 Macc 12:10 it means simply" withdrawn," and so perhaps also in Luke 22:41 , though Meyer thinks that St. Luke chose the unusual word to denote the urgent emotion by which our Lord was as it were compelled to leave the companionship of the apostles, and be alone. σπᾶν (whence spasm) and its derivatives, of which Luke uses four—two of which are peculiar to him—are much employed by medical writers, as Hippocrates, Galen, Antaeus, etc. (Hobart, on Luke 22:1-71 .). Had set sail ( ἀναχθῆναι ἡμᾶς ). The word means" to go up to the sea from the land," as Luke 8:22 ; Acts 13:13 ; Acts 16:11 ; Acts 27:12 ; just as, on the contrary, κατάγειν and κατάγεσθαι are used of coming down to land from the sea (see Acts 27:3 in the T.R., and Acts 27:3 ; Acts 28:12 ). The same conception of putting out to sea being a going up, led to the phrase μετέωρος (high up) being applied to ships out at sea. From μετέωρος comes, of course, our word "meteor." Cos , or Coos, for it is written both ways, now called by the Turks Stanko ( ἐς τὰν κῶ ), a beautiful island, nearly opposite the Gulf of Halicarnassus, and separated from Cnidus by a narrow strait, about six hours' sail from Miletus. There is a city of the same name on its eastern coast. It was one of the six Dorian colonies which formed the confederation called the Dorian Hexapolis. It was famous for its wine and its textile fabrics (Howson, and Lewin, and 'Dict. of Geog.'). Rhodes ( ρόδος ); perhaps the "Isle of Roses;" the well-known mountainous island in the AE gean Sea, which lies nine or ten miles from the coast of Carts. Its inhabitants were Dorians, and it was one of the places which claimed the honor of being the birthplace of Homer. The towns are all situated on the seacoast, "Rhodes was the last Christian city to make a stand against the Saracens" (Howson). Patara ([ τὰ ] πάταρα ). A flourishing commercial city on the south-west coast of Lycia, with a good harbor. It was the port of Xauthus, the capital of Lycia. The name Patera is still attached to some extensive ruins on the seashore not far from the river Xanthus.