ACTS: RIOT in EPHESUS

Riot in Ephesus

The Passage: Acts 19:21 – 20:2

Structure:

a. 19:21-22, Journey to Macedonia

 b. 19:23-27, Agitation of Demetrius

  c. 19:28, Great is Artemis of Ephesus

   d. 19:29, city was filled with confusion

    e. 19:30-31, Paul was prevented from going to the crowd

   d’. 19:32, assembly was in chaos

  c’. 19:33-34, Great is Artemis of Ephesus

 b’. 19:35-40, persuasion of city clerk

a’. 20:1-2, travel to Macedonia  

Historical and geographical context: St. Paul is planning to leave toward Macedonia and Greece. He sent two of his companions ahead while (for unknown reason) staying in Ephesus a little longer. We know the name of one of the companions: Timothy. Acts 19:22 name one more person: Erastus. Later we find out the names of two other Pauline companions: Gaius and Aristarchus (Acts 19:29).

Theology: Note that the whole riot began “concerning the Way”. We discussed the theology of the Way in some of the previous lessons (cp. 19_Conversion of Saul). What is interesting is the “concern” rose up in Ephesus. Maybe (apart from sociological and personal reasons) the figure of Artemis of the Ephesians herself is the reason. She was a Greek goddess of birds, beasts (lions), and fish (or streams of water, including the underearth ones). So, in some sense she was the one who would control the interactions between three main environments: air, earth, underworld. No wonder that her worshipers came into clinch with the followers of Jesus, who is the ONLY Way to the Father (John 14:6).   

The riot is triggered by a fear of loss of business. Demetrius is not a Christian man, he was not illuminated by the Holy Spirit, and sees the world through the lenses of his devotion to the goddess – he believes that the whole world worships Artemis (Acts 19:27). It is not simple jealousy. He, probably, had a family to feed. At the same time, Paul and the others did not deviate from the truth. When we share the Gospel, we need to understand that sometimes a parson’s life is at stake (job, housing, marriage etc.).    

Gods made with hands – the phrase is a self-identity made by Artemis worshiper. He confesses that his job is to make gods with his own hands (Acts 19:26). We need to read it in comparison to Ps. 115:1-8, where psalmist begins with the fact that Glory belongs to the LORD, not to us – humans. Yet, there are people who believe that they can make gods, but these gods can’t speak, hear, eat etc. As an outcome – those who make them become like them (Ps. 115:8).  

Safety first! Paul wanted to go to save his friends from the rioting crowd. Neither members of the church nor his VIP friends [v. 31] thought it was a good idea. He was basically not allowed to go – what a blessing to have wise friends!

Long and loud, with one voice – signs of devotion and unity. The growth of the cults is the unpaid debts of the Church (attributed to Walter Martin, Kingdom of the Cults). Our worship should be characterized by the same features – men together (1 Tim. 2:8) proclaiming/singing the praises to the LORD, beautified by the voices of sisters in Christ.    

Town clerk’s speech achieved the goal – we don’t know was he a believer or not. Yet, he was able to quiet the crowd (v. 35) and break through their mental wall (v. 34, two hours of yelling) with reasoning (v. 35- 40). Please note that the Christians being present there (v. 29) did not object to the description of a-whole-city devotion to the Artemis (35-37). Looks like the missiology of the Apostolic church was not based on fighting with other deities, but to present Jesus as the Messiah.  

Other themes:

Crowd management – in the last years we witnessed a few riots when thousands of people filled the streets with violence and destruction of property. Acts 19:32 tells us that crowds are NOT self-organized entities. To make sure that people complete a mission – whatever the mission is – there must be an order in the ranks.