Read the passage and its setting
Acts 19:11–19:20, King James Version
Italic words were supplied in the English translation for clarity.
Acts 19:11–19:20
Extraordinary healings expose magical imitation
The Main Point
God works unusual miracles through Paul, itinerant exorcists misuse Jesus' name and are overpowered, fear spreads, believers confess practices, costly magic books are burned, and the word grows.
What Is Happening Here?
God works unusual miracles through Paul, itinerant exorcists misuse Jesus' name and are overpowered, fear spreads, believers confess practices, costly magic books are burned, and the word grows.
What Came Before—and What Comes Next?
Acts 19:8–19:10 has just shown that Paul reasons about God's kingdom in the synagogue for three months, then withdraws disciples amid hardened opposition and teaches daily in Tyrannus's hall for two years, reaching Asia's inhabitants.
Acts 19:21–19:22 will show that Paul resolves in the Spirit to travel through Macedonia and Achaia to Jerusalem and then see Rome, while sending Timothy and Erastus ahead.
Follow the Witness from Jerusalem to Rome
See why this section appears here and how the author's witness movement leads to its meaning.
Why Is This Passage Here?
God works unusual miracles through Paul, itinerant exorcists misuse Jesus' name and are overpowered, fear spreads, believers confess practices, costly magic books are burned, and the word grows. This position makes the preceding development answerable to a new geographic, social, or institutional setting.
Follow the Scene or Speech
God works unusual miracles through Paul, itinerant exorcists misuse Jesus' name and are overpowered, fear spreads, believers confess practices, costly magic books are burned, and the word grows.
The unit distinguishes narrated event, participant speech, the narrator's framing, material uncertainty, and the ethical boundary: The scene does not endorse relic sales, formulaic exorcism, anti-medical practice, coercive book burning, or fabricated deliverance claims.
What Is the Author Saying?
Why This Interpretation Fits
Unit movement
God works unusual miracles through Paul, itinerant exorcists misuse Jesus' name and are overpowered, fear spreads, believers confess practices, costly magic books are burned, and the word grows.
Narrator and speech control
Acts narrates this event selectively. Participant speech or interpretation is not automatically the narrator's evaluation, and description is not automatically command.
Material limit
The narrator explicitly calls the miracles extraordinary, making them a poor template for routine commerce; the sons of Sceva tradition and the value calculation contain textual and historical questions.
Understand the Meaning and Its Boundaries
Clarify the words that matter and keep the conclusion no broader than the passage allows.
Words That Matter
Extraordinary healings expose magical imitation
See the cited Greek text for the unit's individual expressions ·
This study phrase gathers the unit's narrated movement without claiming that it is one Greek lemma: God works unusual miracles through Paul, itinerant exorcists misuse Jesus' name and are overpowered, fear spreads, believers confess practices, costly magic books are burned, and the word grows.
What the Passage Is Not Saying
Reading Acts 19:11–19:20 within Luke-Acts and the complete thought unit rules out this use:
The scene does not endorse relic sales, formulaic exorcism, anti-medical practice, coercive book burning, or fabricated deliverance claims.
Context check: God works unusual miracles through Paul, itinerant exorcists misuse Jesus' name and are overpowered, fear spreads, believers confess practices, costly magic books are burned, and the word grows. Acts narrates this event selectively. Participant speech or interpretation is not automatically the narrator's evaluation, and description is not automatically command.
What Remains True Today
Faithful witness preserves the unit's narrated sequence, speaker and narrator distinction, Jewish and Gentile identities, affected people, and material uncertainty. The scene does not endorse relic sales, formulaic exorcism, anti-medical practice, coercive book burning, or fabricated deliverance claims.
Respond and Remember
Let the meaning shape life carefully, then practice explaining the section in context.
How This Should Shape Us
Why these applications follow
God works unusual miracles through Paul, itinerant exorcists misuse Jesus' name and are overpowered, fear spreads, believers confess practices, costly magic books are burned, and the word grows.
God works unusual miracles through Paul, itinerant exorcists misuse Jesus' name and are overpowered, fear spreads, believers confess practices, costly magic books are burned, and the word grows. Acts narrates this event selectively. Participant speech or interpretation is not automatically the narrator's evaluation, and description is not automatically command.
Faithful witness preserves the unit's narrated sequence, speaker and narrator distinction, Jewish and Gentile identities, affected people, and material uncertainty. The scene does not endorse relic sales, formulaic exorcism, anti-medical practice, coercive book burning, or fabricated deliverance claims.
What accountable response follows?
First identify the verse role and speaker within Acts 19:11–19:20; then state the contextual meaning—God works unusual miracles through Paul, itinerant exorcists misuse Jesus' name and are overpowered, fear spreads, believers confess practices, costly magic books are burned, and the word grows. Preserve the proportionate truth that witness remains accountable to context, evidence, and affected people; finally apply this safeguard: The scene does not endorse relic sales, formulaic exorcism, anti-medical practice, coercive book burning, or fabricated deliverance claims.
A Concrete Example
When Acts 19:11–19:20 is cited today, name the speaker, authority, people affected, evidence, and uncertainty before proposing an analogy; then test the proposed action against this boundary: The scene does not endorse relic sales, formulaic exorcism, anti-medical practice, coercive book burning, or fabricated deliverance claims.
Teach It Back
Explain Acts 19:11–19:20 in your own words, naming its movement, speaker or narrator role, one source-controlled detail, one uncertainty, one affected person, and one conclusion the passage does not authorize.
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Go Deeper
The main explanation above stands on its own. Open these optional sections for fuller language, history, disagreements, and source locations.
Read it sentence by sentenceEach line inside the larger movement
Narrative or speech movement
God works unusual miracles through Paul, itinerant exorcists misuse Jesus' name and are overpowered, fear spreads, believers confess practices, costly magic books are burned, and the word grows.
Interpretive control
Acts narrates this event selectively. Participant speech or interpretation is not automatically the narrator's evaluation, and description is not automatically command.
Ethical boundary
The scene does not endorse relic sales, formulaic exorcism, anti-medical practice, coercive book burning, or fabricated deliverance claims.
Original-language wording and grammarTechnical detail appears only where it helps
Extraordinary healings expose magical imitation
This study phrase gathers the unit's narrated movement without claiming that it is one Greek lemma: God works unusual miracles through Paul, itinerant exorcists misuse Jesus' name and are overpowered, fear spreads, believers confess practices, costly magic books are burned, and the word grows.
How certain? probableWhat the first readers would have understoodRelevant history and culture
Setting and recoverable limits
The narrator explicitly calls the miracles extraordinary, making them a poor template for routine commerce; the sons of Sceva tradition and the value calculation contain textual and historical questions. Geography, chronology, social practice, Roman procedure, and institutional reconstruction are claimed only to the degree supported by the cited sources.
How certain? probableWhy translations sometimes differMaterial translation choices
Pinned KJV and Greek control
The pinned KJV remains the displayed text. SBLGNT, STEP morphology, and the NET notes were checked for Acts 19:11–19:20; older KJV wording is explained only where it materially affects understanding.
How certain? strongEarlier Scripture and inherited backgroundSupported quotations, allusions, and inherited ideas
Israel's Scriptures and Jewish setting
Acts continues Israel's scriptural story through Jewish witnesses, synagogues, temple worship, Torah practice, diaspora communities, and contested interpretations. God works unusual miracles through Paul, itinerant exorcists misuse Jesus' name and are overpowered, fear spreads, believers confess practices, costly magic books are burned, and the word grows.
How certain? strongHow this connects with the rest of ScriptureThe passage's own meaning remains primary
Luke-Acts and responsible canonical reading
Luke's first volume is the immediate literary horizon. Later canonical connections must preserve Acts 19:11–19:20's own sequence, Jewish setting, speakers, and unresolved questions.
How certain? strongTextual variantsManuscript differences only when they affect meaning
Material textual or translation issue
The narrator explicitly calls the miracles extraordinary, making them a poor template for routine commerce; the sons of Sceva tradition and the value calculation contain textual and historical questions.
How certain? probableWhere careful interpreters disagreeThe strongest options and their difficulties
Which judgment needs visible uncertainty?
Best judgment: The narrator explicitly calls the miracles extraordinary, making them a poor template for routine commerce; the sons of Sceva tradition and the value calculation contain textual and historical questions.
How certain? probableTheology that emerges from this passageConclusions drawn after reading the complete section
Theological contribution
Acts joins divine initiative, the Spirit, human witness, communal discernment, and accountable action in this movement: God works unusual miracles through Paul, itinerant exorcists misuse Jesus' name and are overpowered, fear spreads, believers confess practices, costly magic books are burned, and the word grows.
How certain? strongTheological contribution
God's action in Acts 19:11–19:20 is narrated as particular gift, judgment, guidance, or preservation; it is not a technique readers can control or a warrant for the misuse explicitly rejected here.
How certain? strongCommon ways this passage gets misusedFair explanation, context check, and stronger reading
The scene does not endorse relic sales, formulaic exorcism, anti-medical practice, coercive book burning, or fabricated deliverance claims.
A vivid event or line in Acts 19:11–19:20 can be detached from its narrator, speaker, first audience, ancient institutions, literary placement, and later Acts parallels.
God works unusual miracles through Paul, itinerant exorcists misuse Jesus' name and are overpowered, fear spreads, believers confess practices, costly magic books are burned, and the word grows. Acts narrates this event selectively. Participant speech or interpretation is not automatically the narrator's evaluation, and description is not automatically command.
Keep description distinct from command, actor interpretation distinct from authorial evaluation, and original setting distinct from faithful application.
God works unusual miracles through Paul, itinerant exorcists misuse Jesus' name and are overpowered, fear spreads, believers confess practices, costly magic books are burned, and the word grows.
Research trail and exact locationsThe source record behind this section
Supports: Exact displayed KJV wording, order, paragraph metadata, supplied-word markup, and unit coverage.
Acts 19:11–19:20, pinned eng-kjv2006 USFM-derived repository corpus
Supports: Greek wording and punctuation control, without pretending one edition is a complete apparatus.
SBLGNT official text, Acts 19:11-19:20
Supports: Morphology and lexical cross-check for words explicitly discussed in this unit.
STEP Bible Data, TAGNT rows for Acts 19:11-19:20
Supports: Verse-attached textual, translation, language, geography, chronology, and historical notes actually printed for the unit.
NET Bible First Edition Acts PDF, printed pp. 2104-2205, exact tn/tc/sn entries attached to 19:11–19:20
Supports: Introductory critical orientation to the unit's place in Luke-Acts, with contested judgments retained as interpretations.
Yale Bible Study Acts course, course unit 'Co-operative Ministry,' Acts 18-20 study guide
Supports: One complete confessional commentary reading, independently checked against the text and critical controls.
Thompson, online Acts commentary, heading and paragraphs explicitly covering Acts 19:11–19:20
Supports: Direct manuscript evidence only where a material Western reading is named; Bezae is not treated as the Western text as a whole.
IGNTP Codex Bezae Acts transcription, verse-addressable witness at 19:11–19:20, checked with SBLGNT and the NET tc note
Sources for This Section
These records identify the source, the claim it supports, and the exact location used. A source remains evidence to evaluate; it does not replace the biblical text.
Biblical text
King James (Authorized) Version — eng-kjv2006
eBible.org and CrossWire Bible Society
USFM archive eng-kjv2006_usfm.zip; source files dated 2026-08-19; downloaded 2026-08-24; archive SHA-256 aec1b3b26c622fd3d963d2bbac963016b9513246ffbfa20da00bb100372ea007; normalized corpus SHA-256 09aef51d90488aa7b9722b3fd9a93f4b25f6bf2064c5fd798fb39673c300ddf2.
Supports: Exact displayed KJV wording, order, paragraph metadata, supplied-word markup, and unit coverage.
Exact location: Acts 19:11–19:20, pinned eng-kjv2006 USFM-derived repository corpus
Open source ↗Greek textual evidence
The Greek New Testament: SBL Edition
Michael W. Holmes, editor; Society of Biblical Literature and Logos
Society of Biblical Literature and Logos Bible Software, 2010
Supports: Greek wording and punctuation control, without pretending one edition is a complete apparatus.
Exact location: SBLGNT official text, Acts 19:11-19:20
Open the Acts Greek text file ↗Lexical and grammatical evidence
STEP Bible Data
Tyndale House Cambridge
Tyndale House Cambridge, repository snapshot verified 2026
Supports: Morphology and lexical cross-check for words explicitly discussed in this unit.
Exact location: STEP Bible Data, TAGNT rows for Acts 19:11-19:20
Open source ↗open translation and translator notes
NET Bible First Edition Notes: Acts
Biblical Studies Press
Biblical Studies Press, 2006
Supports: Verse-attached textual, translation, language, geography, chronology, and historical notes actually printed for the unit.
Exact location: NET Bible First Edition Acts PDF, printed pp. 2104-2205, exact tn/tc/sn entries attached to 19:11–19:20
Open source ↗open university bible study course
Acts of the Apostles Course and Study Guides
Yale Divinity School faculty
Yale Bible Study, 2019
Supports: Introductory critical orientation to the unit's place in Luke-Acts, with contested judgments retained as interpretations.
Exact location: Yale Bible Study Acts course, course unit 'Co-operative Ministry,' Acts 18-20 study guide
Open source ↗open confessional commentary
The Acts of the Apostles
Alan J. Thompson
The Gospel Coalition, 2023
Supports: One complete confessional commentary reading, independently checked against the text and critical controls.
Exact location: Thompson, online Acts commentary, heading and paragraphs explicitly covering Acts 19:11–19:20
Open source ↗primary manuscript transcription
Codex Bezae: Electronic Transcription of Acts
International Greek New Testament Project
Institute for Textual Scholarship and Electronic Editing, University of Birmingham, 2012 transcription; current online edition
Supports: Direct manuscript evidence only where a material Western reading is named; Bezae is not treated as the Western text as a whole.
Exact location: IGNTP Codex Bezae Acts transcription, verse-addressable witness at 19:11–19:20, checked with SBLGNT and the NET tc note
Open source ↗