Acts 1:4

1:4 While he was with them, ¹  he declared, ²  “Do not leave Jerusalem, ³  but wait there ⁴  for what my ⁵  Father promised, ⁶  which you heard about from me. ⁷ 

Acts 13:41

13:41 ‘Look, you scoffers; be amazed and perish! ⁸ 

For I am doing a work in your days,

a work you would never believe, even if someone tells you.’” ⁹ 

Acts 16:16

Paul and Silas Are Thrown Into Prison

16:16 Now ¹⁰  as we were going to the place of prayer, a slave girl met us who had a spirit that enabled her to foretell the future by supernatural means. ¹¹  She ¹²  brought her owners ¹³  a great profit by fortune-telling. ¹⁴ 

Acts 17:23

17:23 For as I went around and observed closely your objects of worship, ¹⁵  I even found an altar with this inscription: ¹⁶  ‘To an unknown god.’ Therefore what you worship without knowing it, ¹⁷  this I proclaim to you.

Acts 24:5

24:5 For we have found ¹⁸  this man to be a troublemaker, ¹⁹  one who stirs up riots ²⁰  among all the Jews throughout the world, and a ringleader ²¹  of the sect of the Nazarenes. ²² 

[1:4]  ¹ tn Or “While he was assembling with them,” or “while he was sharing a meal with them.” There are three basic options for translating the verb συναλίζω (sunalizw): (1) “Eat (salt) with, share a meal with”; (2) “bring together, assemble”; (3) “spend the night with, stay with” (see BDAG 964 s.v.). The difficulty with the first option is that it does not fit the context, and this meaning is not found elsewhere. The second option is difficult because of the singular number and the present tense. The third option is based on a spelling variation of συναυλιζόμενος (sunaulizomeno"), which some minuscules actually read here. The difference in meaning between (2) and (3) is not great, but (3) seems to fit the context somewhat better here.

[1:4]  ² tn Grk “ordered them”; the command “Do not leave” is not in Greek but is an indirect quotation in the original (see note at end of the verse for explanation).

[1:4]  ³ map For location see Map5 B1; Map6 F3; Map7 E2; Map8 F2; Map10 B3; JP1 F4; JP2 F4; JP3 F4; JP4 F4.

[1:4]  ⁴ tn The word “there” is not in the Greek text (direct objects in Greek were frequently omitted when clear from the context).

[1:4]  ⁵ tn Grk “the,” with the article used as a possessive pronoun (ExSyn 215).

[1:4]  ⁶ tn Grk “for the promise of the Father.” Jesus is referring to the promised gift of the Holy Spirit (see the following verse).

[1:4]  ⁷ tn Grk “While he was with them, he ordered them not to leave Jerusalem, but to wait there for ‘what my Father promised, which you heard about from me.’” This verse moves from indirect to direct discourse. This abrupt change is very awkward, so the entire quotation has been rendered as direct discourse in the translation.

[13:41]  ⁸ tn Or “and die!”

[13:41]  ⁹ sn A quotation from Hab 1:5. The irony in the phrase even if someone tells you, of course, is that Paul has now told them. So the call in the warning is to believe or else face the peril of being scoffers whom God will judge. The parallel from Habakkuk is that the nation failed to see how Babylon’s rising to power meant perilous judgment for Israel.

[16:16]  ¹⁵ tn Grk “Now it happened that.” 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.

[16:16]  ¹⁶ tn Or “who had a spirit of divination”; Grk “who had a spirit of Python.” According to BDAG 896-97 s.v. πύθων, originally Πύθων (Puqwn) was the name of the serpent or dragon that guarded the Delphic oracle. According to Greek mythology, it lived at the foot of Mount Parnassus and was killed by Apollo. From this, the word came to designate a person who was thought to have a spirit of divination. Pagan generals, for example, might consult someone like this. So her presence here suggests a supernatural encounter involving Paul and her “spirit.” W. Foerster, TDNT 6:920, connects the term with ventriloquism but states: “We must assume, however, that for this girl, as for those mentioned by Origen…, the art of ventriloquism was inseparably connected with a (supposed or authentic) gift of soothsaying.” It should also be noted that if the girl in question here were only a ventriloquist, the exorcism performed by Paul in v. 18 would not have been effective.

[16:16]  ¹⁷ tn Grk “who.” Because of the awkwardness in English of having two relative clauses follow one another (“who had a spirit…who brought her owners a great profit”) the relative pronoun here (“who”) has been translated as a pronoun (“she”) and a new sentence begun in the translation.

[16:16]  ¹⁸ tn Or “masters.”

[16:16]  ¹⁹ tn On this term see BDAG 616 s.v. μαντεύομαι. It was used of those who gave oracles.

[17:23]  ²² tn Or “your sanctuaries.” L&N 53.54 gives “sanctuary” (place of worship) as an alternate meaning for the word σεβάσματα (sebasmata).

[17:23]  ²³ tn Grk “on which was written,” but since it would have been carved in stone, it is more common to speak of an “inscription” in English. To simplify the English the relative construction with a passive verb (“on which was inscribed”) was translated as a prepositional phrase with a substantive (“inscription”).

[17:23]  ²⁴ tn BDAG 13 s.v. ἀγνοέω 1.b has “Abs. ὅ ἀγνοοῦντες εὐσεβεῖτε what you worship without knowing it (on the subject matter Maximus Tyr. 11, 5e: all sorts of philosophers ἴσασιν οὐκ ἑκόντες καὶ λέγουσιν ἄκοντες sc. τὸ θεῖον = they know and name God without intending to do so) Ac 17:23.” Paul, in typical Jewish Christian style, informs them of the true God, of whom their idols are an ignorant reflection.

[24:5]  ²⁹ tn Grk “For having found.” The participle εὑρόντες (Jeurontes) has been translated as a finite verb due to requirements of contemporary English style.

[24:5]  ³⁰ tn L&N 22.6 has “(a figurative extension of meaning of λοιμός ‘plague,’ 23.158) one who causes all sorts of trouble – ‘troublemaker, pest.’ … ‘for we have found this man to be a troublemaker” Ac 24:5.”

[24:5]  ³¹ tn Or “dissensions.” While BDAG 940 s.v. στάσις 3 translates this phrase “κινεῖν στάσεις (v.l. στάσιν) τισί create dissension among certain people Ac 24:5,” it is better on the basis of the actual results of Paul’s ministry to categorize this usage under section 2, “uprising, riot, revolt, rebellion” (cf. the use in Acts 19:40).

[24:5]  ³² tn This term is yet another NT hapax legomenon (BDAG 894 s.v. πρωτοστάτης).

[24:5]  ³³ sn The sect of the Nazarenes is a designation for followers of Jesus the Nazarene, that is, Christians.