Acts 16:15-16

16:15 After she and her household were baptized, she urged us, ¹  “If ²  you consider me to be a believer in the Lord, ³  come and stay in my house.” And she persuaded ⁴  us.

Paul and Silas Are Thrown Into Prison

16:16 Now ⁵  as we were going to the place of prayer, a slave girl met us who had a spirit that enabled her to foretell the future by supernatural means. ⁶  She ⁷  brought her owners ⁸  a great profit by fortune-telling. ⁹ 

[16:15]  ¹ tn Grk “urged us, saying.” The participle λέγουσα (legousa) is redundant in English and has not been translated.

[16:15]  ² tn This is a first class condition in Greek, with the statement presented as real or true for the sake of the argument.

[16:15]  ³ tn Or “faithful to the Lord.” BDAG 821 s.v. πίστος 2 states concerning this verse, “Of one who confesses the Christian faith believing or a believer in the Lord, in Christ, in God πιστ. τῷ κυρίῳ Ac 16:15.” L&N 11.17 has “one who is included among the faithful followers of Christ – ‘believer, Christian, follower.’”

[16:15]  ⁴ tn Although BDAG 759 s.v. παραβιάζομαι has “urge strongly, prevail upon,” in contemporary English “persuade” is a more frequently used synonym for “prevail upon.”

[16:16]  ⁵ tn Grk “Now it happened that.” The introductory phrase ἐγένετο (egeneto, “it happened that”), common in Luke (69 times) and Acts (54 times), is redundant in contemporary English and has not been translated.

[16:16]  ⁶ tn Or “who had a spirit of divination”; Grk “who had a spirit of Python.” According to BDAG 896-97 s.v. πύθων, originally Πύθων (Puqwn) was the name of the serpent or dragon that guarded the Delphic oracle. According to Greek mythology, it lived at the foot of Mount Parnassus and was killed by Apollo. From this, the word came to designate a person who was thought to have a spirit of divination. Pagan generals, for example, might consult someone like this. So her presence here suggests a supernatural encounter involving Paul and her “spirit.” W. Foerster, TDNT 6:920, connects the term with ventriloquism but states: “We must assume, however, that for this girl, as for those mentioned by Origen…, the art of ventriloquism was inseparably connected with a (supposed or authentic) gift of soothsaying.” It should also be noted that if the girl in question here were only a ventriloquist, the exorcism performed by Paul in v. 18 would not have been effective.

[16:16]  ⁷ tn Grk “who.” Because of the awkwardness in English of having two relative clauses follow one another (“who had a spirit…who brought her owners a great profit”) the relative pronoun here (“who”) has been translated as a pronoun (“she”) and a new sentence begun in the translation.

[16:16]  ⁸ tn Or “masters.”

[16:16]  ⁹ tn On this term see BDAG 616 s.v. μαντεύομαι. It was used of those who gave oracles.