Acts 17:30

17:30 Therefore, although God has overlooked ¹  such times of ignorance, ²  he now commands all people ³  everywhere to repent, ⁴ 

Acts 17:1

Paul and Silas at Thessalonica

17:1 After they traveled through ⁵  Amphipolis ⁶  and Apollonia, ⁷  they came to Thessalonica, ⁸  where there was a Jewish synagogue. ⁹ 

Acts 4:5

4:5 On the next day, ¹⁰  their rulers, elders, and experts in the law ¹¹  came together ¹²  in Jerusalem. ¹³ 

Titus 3:3-5

3:3 For we too were once foolish, disobedient, misled, enslaved to various passions and desires, spending our lives in evil and envy, hateful and hating one another. 3:4 ¹⁴  But “when the kindness of God our Savior and his love for mankind appeared, 3:5 he saved us not by works of righteousness that we have done but on the basis of his mercy, through the washing of the new birth and the renewing of the Holy Spirit,

¹ tn Or “has deliberately paid no attention to.”

² tn Or “times when people did not know.”

³ tn Here ἀνθρώποις (anqrwpoi") has been translated as a generic noun (“people”).

⁴ sn He now commands all people everywhere to repent. God was now asking all mankind to turn to him. No nation or race was excluded.

⁵ tn BDAG 250 s.v. διοδεύω 1 has “go, travel through” for this verse.

⁶ sn Amphipolis. The capital city of the southeastern district of Macedonia (BDAG 55 s.v. ᾿Αμφίπολις). It was a military post. From Philippi this was about 33 mi (53 km).

⁷ sn Apollonia was a city in Macedonia about 27 mi (43 km) west southwest of Amphipolis.

⁸ sn Thessalonica (modern Salonica) was a city in Macedonia about 33 mi (53 km) west of Apollonia. It was the capital of Macedonia. The road they traveled over was called the Via Egnatia. It is likely they rode horses, given their condition in Philippi. The implication of v. 1 is that the two previously mentioned cities lacked a synagogue.

⁹ sn See the note on synagogue in 6:9.

¹⁰ tn Grk “It happened that on the next day.” The introductory phrase ἐγένετο (egeneto, “it happened that”), common in Luke (69 times) and Acts (54 times), is redundant in contemporary English and has not been translated.

¹¹ tn Or “and scribes.” The traditional rendering of γραμματεύς (grammateu") as “scribe” does not communicate much to the modern English reader, for whom the term might mean “professional copyist,” if it means anything at all. The people referred to here were recognized experts in the law of Moses and in traditional laws and regulations. Thus “expert in the law” comes closer to the meaning for the modern reader.

¹² tn Or “law assembled,” “law met together.”

¹³ map For location see Map5-B1; Map6-F3; Map7-E2; Map8-F2; Map10-B3; JP1-F4; JP2-F4; JP3-F4; JP4-F4.

¹⁴ tn Verses 4-7 are set as poetry in NA²⁶/NA²⁷. These verses probably constitute the referent of the expression “this saying” in v. 8.