Paul and the Python God
Is Paul a Snakecrusher under the Chief Snakecrusher?
Acts 16:16 As we were going to the place of prayer, we were met by a slave girl who had a spirit of divination and brought her owners much gain by fortune-telling. 17 She followed Paul and us, crying out, “These men are servants of the Most High God, who proclaim to you the way of salvation.” 18 And this she kept doing for many days. Paul, having become greatly annoyed, turned and said to the spirit, “I command you in the name of Jesus Christ to come out of her.” And it came out that very hour.
When you read this account, it sounds like one of several stories in the Gospels and Acts, of someone with an evil spirit confronting Jesus or the disciples. A spirit of divination sounds bad, but we probably don’t think too much more about what that means.
Divination is mentioned in the Old Testament a few times, namely Laban, Joseph, Balaam and Saul. Divination is also forbidden in the Law (Deut 18:10). This prohibition shows that divination was real, because otherwise why forbid and warn against an imaginary practice?
So if you are casually reading this passage and you notice “a spirit of divination”, that’s probably the context you have for this servant girl. Divination is a bad thing, but there’s not much else to take from her practice. It gives the sense that she’s on par with an astrologer or fortune teller or some cheap carnival act making money for her owners. That doesn’t seem too significant in the scope of the early church. As I said, there are multiple accounts of evil spirits being cast out, so what makes this one significant?
But, as we should continually ask of any passage of scripture, what if there is more going on here? What if this story opens up with the turn of one word?
Unfortunately, the word in Greek loses something when it’s translated “divination”. The word is actually “puthon”, or transliterated in English, “python”. Now you have a girl with a python spirit. That is an interesting detail. In other words, a giant demonic snake shows up in Philippi to confront Paul.
When I first came across this gem in the text, my thoughts immediately went to crushing snakes, which is accurate. But as I dug and asked a friend who had preached this passage, the rabbit trail went deeper.
Side Rant: I don’t understand why English Bibles translate the word “puthon” as divination. There is another word, “oionizomai”, which is used multiple times in the Septuagint for divination (Greek translation of the Old Testament). We have a Greek word, python, used only one time in the New Testamant, and is pregnant with rich biblical theology. What is the reason for flattening out this detail? I don’t think I’m at risk of missing the forest for the trees or straining at gnats when I say that this is a significant oversight. I have so much respect for the work of Bible translators, but sometimes it seems like modernity has infused too much vanilla into this work. In fairness and full disclosure, even the KJV translates it as a spirit of divination, so it’s not only new translations. I tried looking for a reason why, but was unsuccessful.
Let’s get back to the text and why this Spirit of a Python is so interesting. Paul is in Philippi, which was a leading city in Macedonia (Acts 16:12). It was also a Gentile city, and apparently didn’t have a synagogue since Paul and Silas went to a place of prayer to find believers. So it’s a thoroughly Hellenized culture. And here is where knowing a little Greek Mythology is helpful (I was pointed in this direction by my friend Will, and my daughters who have a surprisingly vast knowledge of Greek myth).
Here’s a quick primer on the Greek god, Apollo:
Apollo was a son of Zeus and the brother of Artemis, both of whom are mentioned in Acts (Ch 14, 19). There was an oracle at Delphi, considered sacred by the Greeks. The oracle was consulted by Greeks for military and political decisions. In other words, they used this place for divination and fortune telling. And on top of all that, it was inhabited by a giant serpent-dragon. Apollo killed the dragon and became known as Pythius as a result.
Now let’s put this background into our text. You have a servant girl, filled with an evil spirit. It’s the serpentine spirit of the Greek god, Apollo, whom people sought for divination. As Paul and Silas enter Greek towns, they are increasingly confronted with false gods. And it is clear, that while they are false gods, they are not impotent or make-believe gods. The early church had to deal with real demons, as witnessed repeatedly during Jesus’ earthly ministry. Jesus’ exorcised demons in the Jewish world, while Paul dealt with them in the Greek world.
Here’s one parallel from Luke 8. This is where Jesus confronts the demonaic. Notice the parallel to Paul’s interaction with the python girl.
When he saw Jesus, he cried out and fell down before him and said with a loud voice, “What have you to do with me, Jesus, Son of the Most High God? (Luke 8:28).
In both cases, the demon-possessed person recognizes the Most High God. The demoniac acknowledges Jesus as the Son, and the servant girl recognizes Paul as a servant of the Most High God (v 17).
If you have read this far, you might think, “that’s cool and interesting, but what are we supposed to do with all of this?”
For starters, scripture doesn’t always tie up cleanly into a simple propositional truth. If we slow down a bit and pay attention to what Luke and the other authors of scripture are doing, we might savor all that the text has for us.
I came up with a few angles that Luke seems to want the reader to notice, but for the sake of space, here’s the one that seems most clear.
Furthering the Snake Crusher Theme
The theme of Jesus crushing the snake is a prominent theme in scripture, harkening back to Genesis 3. It runs through the Old Testament and all the way to the cross, where Christ triumphed over the ultimate snake (Col. 2:15). But even after the ultimate crushing at the cross, we see a lesser snake-crushing in Acts 16.
Mark 16:17 promises that the disciples will do many signs, including casting out demons and handling snakes without harm. What if this is in mind in Acts 16? Paul, in the power of the Holy Spirit, is “handling” a snake without harm. This testifies to the power of the gospel spreading throughout the Greek world (and for good measure, Paul later handles a literal snake without harm too. Acts 28:3-6).
Another relevant New Testament passage is Romans 16:20.
The God of peace will soon crush Satan under your feet.
In the great cosmic war, Jesus delivered the fatal blow to Satan at the cross. But while the war is already decided, there are still many battles left to fight, and both of these passages show the handoff from Christ to his commissioned disciples to further the victory by crushing serpentine demons.
So when we get to Acts 16, if we have paid attention to the snake crusher theme in scripture, then it’s obvious what should happen next. Once the python is dispatched, the gospel goes forward into Macedonia with great power.
All of this should ultimately lead us to praise of our all-conquering God, as Moses sang in Exodus 15:
“Who is like you, O Lord, among the gods? Who is like you, majestic in holiness, awesome in glorious deeds, doing wonders?”
Some Answers, More Questions
As with many passages, as soon as you answer a few questions, more are raised. Here’s a few of mine that may or may not wind up as future notes, posts, booklets, books or dissertations (definitely not dissertations):
*The Greek gods in the book of Acts.
*The various gods who battle with the Triune God in scripture.
*The parallels between Jesus’ ministry in Luke and Paul’s in Acts.
*What is the relationship in scripture between exorcising demons and revival?
*How should we view demons today? It seems that more than anytime, maybe since the Enlightenment, our culture is more pagan and fascinated with demons. What can we learn from the biblical accounts?
*What is the relationship between Paul’s travels and the kind of demons he encounters? For example, he encounters Elymas in chapter 13 in a Jewish context. But as the book progresses, Paul finds himself increasingly in the Greek world and has to deal with a plethora of Greek gods.
*How does understanding Paul’s python encounter at Philippi affect our context for reading Philippians?