Acts 19:18-28

Christian Standard Bible

¹⁸ And many who had become believers came confessing and disclosing their practices, ¹⁹ while many of those who had practiced magic^(A) collected their books and burned them in front of everyone. So they calculated their value and found it to be fifty thousand pieces of silver. ²⁰ In this way the word of the Lord spread and prevailed.^(B)

The Riot in Ephesus

²¹ After these events, Paul resolved by the Spirit^[a] to pass through Macedonia and Achaia and go to Jerusalem. “After I’ve been there,” he said, “It is necessary for me to see Rome as well.”^{(C) 22} After sending to Macedonia two of those who assisted him, Timothy and Erastus,^(D) he himself stayed in Asia for a while.^(E)

²³ About that time there was a major disturbance about the Way.^{(F) 24} For a person named Demetrius, a silversmith who made silver shrines of Artemis, provided a great deal of business for the craftsmen. ²⁵ When he had assembled them, as well as the workers engaged in this type of business, he said, “Men, you know that our prosperity is derived from this business. ²⁶ You see and hear that not only in Ephesus, but in almost all of Asia, this man Paul has persuaded and misled a considerable number of people by saying that gods made by hand are not gods.^{(G) 27} Not only do we run a risk that our business may be discredited, but also that the temple of the great goddess Artemis may be despised and her magnificence come to the verge of ruin—the very one all of Asia and the world worship.”

²⁸ When they had heard this, they were filled with rage and began to cry out, “Great is Artemis of the Ephesians!”