28 ¹ Once we had made our way to safety we identified the island as Malta. 28 ² The rough islanders treated us with uncommon kindness: because it was cold and had started to rain, they lit a bonfire and made us all welcome. 28 ³ Paul had got together an armful of sticks and put them on the fire, when a viper, driven out by the heat, fastened on his hand. 28 ⁴ The islanders, seeing the snake hanging on to his hand, said to one another, 'The man must be a murderer; he may have escaped from the sea, but divine justice has not let him live.' 28 ⁵ Paul, however, shook off the snake into the fire and was none the worse. 28 ⁶ They still expected that any moment he would swell up or drop down dead, but after waiting a long time without seeing anything extraordinary happen to him, they changed their minds and now said, 'He is a god.'

28 ⁷ In the neighbourhood of that place there were lands belonging to the chief magistrate of the island, whose name was Publius. He took us in and entertained us hospitably for three days. 28 ⁸ It so happened that this man's father was in bed suffering from recurrent bouts of fever and dysentery. Paul visited him and, after prayer, laid his hands upon him and healed him; 28 ⁹ whereupon the other sick people on the island came also and were cured. 28 ¹⁰ They honoured us with many marks of respect, and when we were leaving they put on board provision for our needs.