Acts 7:58

7:58 When they had driven him out of the city, they began to stone him, and the witnesses laid their cloaks at the feet of a young man named Saul.

Acts 8:1

8:1 And Saul agreed completely with killing him.

Saul Begins to Persecute the Church

Now on that day a great persecution began against the church in Jerusalem, and all except the apostles were forced to scatter throughout the regions of Judea and Samaria.


tn Grk “And when.” Because of the length of the Greek sentence and the tendency of contemporary English style to use shorter sentences, καί (kai) has not been translated here; a new sentence is begun instead.

sn They began to stone him. The irony of the scene is that the people do exactly what the speech complains about in v. 52.

tn Or “outer garments.”

tn The term ἀναίρεσις (anairesi") can refer to murder (BDAG 64 s.v.; 2 Macc 5:13; Josephus, Ant. 5.2.12 [5.165]).

tn Or “severe.”

tn Grk “Now there happened on that day a great persecution.” It is less awkward to say in English “Now on that day a great persecution began.”

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

sn All. Given that the Jerusalem church is still active after this and that the Hellenists are the focus of Acts 6-8, it is possible to argue that only the Hellenistic Christians were forced to scatter.

tn Or “countryside.”