Acts 12:11

12:11 When ¹  Peter came to himself, he said, “Now I know for certain that the Lord has sent his angel and rescued ²  me from the hand ³  of Herod ⁴  and from everything the Jewish people ⁵  were expecting to happen.”

Acts 28:4

28:4 When the local people ⁶  saw the creature hanging from Paul’s ⁷  hand, they said to one another, “No doubt this man is a murderer! Although he has escaped from the sea, Justice herself ⁸  has not allowed him to live!” ⁹ 

[12:11]  ¹ tn Grk “And when.” Because of the difference between Greek style, which often begins sentences or clauses with “and,” and English style, which generally does not, καί (kai) has not been translated here.

[12:11]  ² tn Or “delivered.”

[12:11]  ³ sn Here the hand of Herod is a metaphor for Herod’s power or control.

[12:11]  ⁴ sn King Herod was Herod Agrippa I, the grandson of Herod I (Herod the Great).

[12:11]  ⁵ sn Luke characterizes the opposition here as the Jewish people, including their leadership (see 12:3).

[28:4]  ⁶ tn Although this is literally βάρβαροι (barbaroi; “foreigners, barbarians”) used for non-Greek or non-Romans, as BDAG 166 s.v. βάρβαρος 2.b notes, “Of the inhabitants of Malta, who apparently spoke in their native language Ac 28:2, 4 (here β. certainly without derogatory tone…).”

[28:4]  ⁷ tn Grk “his”; the referent (Paul) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

[28:4]  ⁸ tn That is, the goddess Justice has not allowed him to live. BDAG 250 s.v. δίκη 2 states, “Justice personified as a deity Ac 28:4”; L&N 12.27, “a goddess who personifies justice in seeking out and punishing the guilty – ‘the goddess Justice.’ ἡ δίκη ζῆν οὐκ εἴασεν ‘the goddess Justice would not let him live’ Ac 28:4.” Although a number of modern English translations have rendered δίκη (dikh) “justice,” preferring to use an abstraction, in the original setting it is almost certainly a reference to a pagan deity. In the translation, the noun “justice” was capitalized and the reflexive pronoun “herself” was supplied to make the personification clear. This was considered preferable to supplying a word like ‘goddess’ in connection with δίκη.

[28:4]  ⁹ sn The entire scene is played out initially as a kind of oracle from the gods resulting in the judgment of a guilty person (Justice herself has not allowed him to live). Paul’s survival of this incident without ill effects thus spoke volumes about his innocence.