Acts 19:24

For a certain man … shrines for Diana Better, shrines of Diana. These appear to have been little models in silver either of the temple or of the shrine in which the image was preserved. We may be quite sure that the ingenuity of Greek artists devised forms enough and sizes enough to suit all needs. Smaller specimens might be carried about and worn as ornaments and amulets at the same time; the larger could be kept in the houses of their possessors, and would be a sign of wealth as well as of devotion.

The Greek name rendered Diana is Artemis, but this Ephesian Artemis was totally distinct from Artemis the Greek goddess, the sister of Apollo. It is believed that the Ephesian worship was originally Asiatic, and that when the Greeks sent colonies to Asia Minor they found it already established there, and from some resemblance which they discovered in the worship they gave the Asian divinity the name of Artemis. The Ephesian Artemis was the personification of the fruitful and nurturing powers of nature, and so the image in the temple represented her with many breasts. Her whole figure is said to have been like a mummy, standing upright and tapering downwards to a point. Her crown and girdle and the pedestal on which the figure stood had engraved signs or letters, and the body was covered with figures of mystical animals. All these things would furnish abundant variety for the craft of the silversmiths.

brought no small gain unto the craftsmen The Rev. Ver.renders "no little business." The word no doubt means primarily "employment" by which a living is made. But we have it used twice in chap. Acts 16:16; Acts 16:19 of the "gain" made by the Philippian masters from the ravings of the girl who was possessed. And here too "gain" seems the better sense. It was because their gains were going that the uproar was made, and probably Demetrius himself, the most fierce of all the rioters, did none of the work, but through employing many workmen had a large share of the gains. He calls the gain a business or craft (the same word) in Acts 19:25, that being, as has been said, the first sense of the word, but there is no need to cast aside the other sense of the word here.