This could not mean that they actually saw land in the inky blackness, since Luke always uses this word for supposing or theorizing without visible proof. Rather, like sailors have done for centuries, they were listening for waves crashing on rocks in the night, so they might not suddenly run aground. When they heard the roaring of waves on a reef, they immediately began taking soundings in order to determine just how close they were to running aground.
[St. Thomas Bay's] approach from the sea would be from the east/southeast, the precise direction a Euroclydon would be blowing [Acts 27:14] after two weeks of fury [fourteen days, Acts 27:27]. Its approach was punctuated by a long finger of shallow reef over which waves break even in relatively calm weather [see note, Acts 27:27]. Our maritime charts showed a sloping approach that coincided exactly with the sailors' soundings as recorded by Luke [Acts 27:28]. There, at the easternmost tip of Malta, currents and wind-driven swells come together in stormy weather in a way that can only be described aswaters colliding[where two seas meet,Acts 27:41]. And, finally, at its innermost reaches, where the sea meets the coastline of Malta, the cliffs so prominent everywhere along the eastern coastline give way to a gentle, sloping, inviting beachfront [Acts 27:39].
...these factors eventually led us...to two native [Maltese] divers who had already found four 1st-Century, Roman-style anchors, in exactly 90 feet of water—all with 40 yards of one another.
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The Kata Biblon Wiki English Translation (WET) and Wiki Latin Translation are publicly editable translations of the Greek New Testament, Greek Septuagint, and Hebrew Bible.
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