So that not only this our craft is in danger to be set at nought; but also that the temple of the great goddess Diana should be despised, and her magnificence should be destroyed, whom all Asia and the world worshippeth.
So that not only this our craft, х meros (G3313)] - literally, 'our share' (of the business), Is in danger to be set at nought; but ... - q.d., 'that indeed is a small matter; but there is something far worse.' So the masters of the poor Pythoness put forward the religious revolution which Paul was attempting to effect at Philippi, as the sole cause of their zealous alarm, to cloak the self-interest which they felt to be touched by his success (Acts 16:19-21). In both cases religious zeal was the hypocritical pretext; self-interest the real moving cause of the opposition made.
But also that the temple of the great goddess Diana should be despised ('counted as nought'), and her magnificence should be destroyed, whom all Asia and the world worshippeth. (For full particulars on this subject the reader is referred to Howson, and to a recent work, entitled, 'Ephesus and the Temple of Diana,' by
E. Falkener, 1862, from which we give the following summary, and of the former of which we avail ourselves in the sequel of the exposition.) The antiquity of Ephesus is amazing, and its history long, varied, and splendid. Its ruins, if excavated, would, no doubt, richly reward the pains, if even the site of the temple were ascertained. It is still, however, an unexplored mine. The ruins, though principally Grecian, are some of them of older date. The city seems to have been geometrically planned. It contained vast public buildings besides the temple. The Agora (G58) was probably above 300 feet square, with a vestibule of at least 400 more.
The Gymnasia were probably five in number-one of them not less than 450 by 377 feet in area, while the largest was 925 by 685, occupying 15 acres of ground, or twice the enclosure of the British Museum. The Theatre (Acts 19:29) was the largest ever erected, being 660 feet in diameter (40 feet more than the major axis of the Coliseum). Allowing 15 feet to each, it would accommodate 56,700 spectators (whereas Drury Lane Theatre, in London, holds only 3,200, and Covent Garden 2,800). It contained also innumerable temples. But all is now a desert. It is with the temple, however, and its worship that we have here chiefly to do. It was reckoned one of the wonders of the world. It was built about 550 BC, of pure white marble, and though burned by a fanatic on the night of the birth of Alexander the Great, B.C. 356, was rebuilt with more splendour than before. It was 425 feet long by 220 broad, and the columns, 127 in number, were 60 feet in height, each of them the gift of a king, and thirty-six of them enriched with ornament and colour.
It was what the Bank of England is in the modern world, the larger portion of the wealth of Western Asia being stored up in it. It was continually receiving new decorations and additional buildings, statues, and pictures by the most celebrated artists, and kindled unparalleled admiration, enthusiasm, and superstition. Its very site is now a matter of uncertainty. The little wooden image of Diana was as primitive and rude as its shrine was sumptuous; not like the Greek Diana, in the form of an imposing huntress, but quite Asiatic, in the form of a many-breasted female (emblematic of the manifold ministrations of nature to man), terminating in a shapeless block. Like some other far-famed idols, it was believed to have fallen from heaven (Acts 19:35); and models of it were not only sold in immense numbers to private persons, but set up for worship in other cities. What power must have attended the preaching of that one man by whom the death-blow was felt to be given to so gigantic and witching a superstition!