Matthew Henry on Acts 27:12-20
In these verses we have,
I. The ship putting to sea again, and pursuing her voyage at first with a promising gale. Observe, 1. What induced them to leave the fair havens: it was because they thought the harbour not commodious to winter in; it was pleasant enough in summer but in the winter they lay bleak. Or perhaps it was upon some other account incommodious; provisions perhaps were scarce and dear there; and they ran upon a mischief to avoid an inconvenience, as we often do. Some of the ship's crew, or of the council that was called to advise in this matter, were for staying there, rather than venturing to sea now that the weather was so uncertain: it is better to be safe in an incommodiou…
Read the whole note in the consoleJamieson-Fausset-Brown on Acts 27:14
a tempestuous--"typhonic"
wind--that is, like a typhon or tornado, causing a whirling of the clouds, owing to the meeting of opposite currents of air.
called Euroclydon--The true reading appears to be Euro-aquilo, or east-northeast, which answers all the effects here ascribed to it.
Adam Clarke on Acts 27:14
A tempestuous wind, called Euroclydon - Interpreters have been greatly perplexed with this word; and the ancient copyists not less so, as the word is variously written in the MSS. and versions. Dr. Shaw supposes it to be one of those tempestuous winds called levanters, which blow in all directions, from N.E. round by the E. to S.E. The euroclydon, from the circumstances which attended it, he says, "seems to have varied very little from the true east point; for, as the ship could not bear, αντοφθαλμειν, loof up, against it, Act 27:15, but they were obliged to let her drive, we cannot conceive, as there are no remarkable currents in that part of the sea, and as the rudder could be of little us…
Read the whole note in the consoleJohn Gill on Acts 27:14
But not long after,.... They had not been long at sea, but
there arose against it; the ship, or the island of Crete, or both:
a tempestuous wind, called Euroclydon; in the Greek text it is a "Typhonic" wind, so called, not from the name of a country from whence it blew; rather from Typho, the same with Python, an Heathen deity, who is said to be drowned in the lake Serbonis, or in the river Orontes; about which places this sort of wind is observed to be frequent, and which may take its name from him, being supposed to be raised by him. This wind may very well be thought to be the same which is called Typhon, and is by writers (s) represented as a very tempestuous one, as a sort of whirlwin…
