The city clerk quieted the crowd. He is the head of the city executive, the annually elected chief administrative assistant to the magistrates. He also serves as liaison to the Roman authorities. Three assertions by the clerk show that the assembly is unnecessary, a fourth that it is positively dangerous to this free city's well-being: (1) The Ephesians' reputation as guardians of the temple and image of Artemis is safe (vv. 35-36). (2) These Christians' reputations are unsullied (v. 37). (3) The crowd can have recourse before regular courts and legislature (vv. 38-39). (4) The crowd is in danger of coming under the charge of rioting without cause (vv. 40-41).

The clerk declares as "undeniable facts" the universal reputation of Ephesus as guardian (neokoros, a title later used of cities responsible for a temple devoted to the imperial cult [Sherwin-White 1963:88]) of the temple and the image, which fell from heaven (diopetes). While a meteorite at Taurus was worshiped as an image of Artemis (Euripides Iphigenia in Taurica 87-88; 1384), no extrabiblical source reports such at Ephesus. The clerk may be speaking of the ancient age of the image, which was so old that it was viewed as fashioned in heaven (Longenecker [1981:502] takes the reference literally). Such an affirmation speaks to both Demetrius's anxiety and Paul's polemic about gods made with human hands (vv. 26-27). The clerk announces that Artemis's reputation is safe and she does not fall into the category of idols that Paul is critiquing.

A temple's roles as a bank and a worship center were interdependent. Fear of the god deterred robbers. The wealth of the bank enhanced the prestige of the god. Thus "to commit sacrilege" literally was "to rob temples" (noun hierosylos). This the Christians have not done. Further, their challenges to polytheism and idolatry have not involved the crime of public blasphemy. Either the clerk views the "heaven-fashioned" image as beyond Paul's charges. Or, if Paul's approach has been the same as at Athens, Paul's polemic involves reasoning on a generic level: the nature of deity and the worship appropriate to it from human beings, who are its offspring. No direct attack on Artemis, a concrete case, is necessary. Paul's tactics have much to teach us about effective "speaking the truth in love" to devotees of non-Christian religions.

The clerk suggests two legitimate means of redress: the court system and the legislature—the citizens' assembly meeting at its duly constituted times (one regular and two extra sessions per month, per Sherwin-White [1963:87], using the inscription of Salutaris and Chrysostom Homilies 42). The courts could handle private financial disputes, while the citizens' assembly could deal with any alleged attack on the city's prestige.

The real danger (contrast v. 27) is to be charged with rioting without cause; the city could lose status as a free city if it failed to maintain law and order through its own local authorities. With this caution the clerk exercises his authority by dismissing the assembly.

Luke teaches us through this clerk that so long as Christians do not strain the social fabric of a culture through "public blasphemy of the gods," fair-minded government officials should protect Christians from rash, illegal acts of persecutors. This is one of the means by which law-abiding witness to the gospel, which transforms culture, may advance unhindered.