Acts 17:6-12

17:6 When they did not find them, they dragged ¹  Jason and some of the brothers before the city officials, ²  screaming, “These people who have stirred up trouble ³  throughout the world ⁴  have come here too, 17:7 and ⁵  Jason has welcomed them as guests! They ⁶  are all acting against Caesar’s ⁷  decrees, saying there is another king named ⁸  Jesus!” ⁹  17:8 They caused confusion among ¹⁰  the crowd and the city officials ¹¹  who heard these things. 17:9 After ¹²  the city officials ¹³  had received bail ¹⁴  from Jason and the others, they released them.

Paul and Silas at Berea

17:10 The brothers sent Paul and Silas off to Berea ¹⁵  at once, during the night. When they arrived, ¹⁶  they went to the Jewish synagogue. ¹⁷  17:11 These Jews ¹⁸  were more open-minded ¹⁹  than those in Thessalonica, ²⁰  for they eagerly ²¹  received ²²  the message, examining ²³  the scriptures carefully every day ²⁴  to see if these things were so. 17:12 Therefore many of them believed, along with quite a few ²⁵  prominent ²⁶  Greek women and men.

[17:6]  ¹ tn See BDAG 977-78 s.v. σύρω on this verb. It was used in everyday speech of dragging in fish by a net, or dragging away someone’s (presumably) dead body (Paul in Acts 14:19).

[17:6]  ² tn L&N 37.93 defines πολιτάρχης (politarch") as “a public official responsible for administrative matters within a town or city and a member of the ruling council of such a political unit – ‘city official’” (see also BDAG 845 s.v.).

[17:6]  ³ tn Or “rebellion.” BDAG 72 s.v. ἀναστατόω has “disturb, trouble, upset,” but in light of the references in the following verse to political insurrection, “stirred up rebellion” would also be appropriate.

[17:6]  ⁴ tn Or “the empire.” This was a way of referring to the Roman empire (BDAG 699 s.v. οἰκουμένη 2.b).

[17:7]  ⁵ tn Grk “whom.” Because of the awkwardness in English of having two relative clauses follow one another (“who have stirred up trouble…whom Jason has welcomed”) the relative pronoun here (“whom”) has been replaced by the conjunction “and,” creating a clause that is grammatically coordinate but logically subordinate in the translation.

[17:7]  ⁶ tn Grk “and they.” Because of the length of the Greek sentence, the conjunction καί (kai) has not been translated here. Instead a new English sentence is begun.

[17:7]  ⁷ tn Or “the emperor’s” (“Caesar” is a title for the Roman emperor).

[17:7]  ⁸ tn The word “named” is not in the Greek text, but is supplied for clarity.

[17:7]  ⁹ sn Acting…saying…Jesus. The charges are serious, involving sedition (Luke 23:2). If the political charges were true, Rome would have to react.

[17:8]  ⁹ tn Grk “They troubled the crowd and the city officials”; but this could be understood to mean “they bothered” or “they annoyed.” In reality the Jewish instigators managed to instill doubt and confusion into both the mob and the officials by their false charges of treason. Verse 8 suggests the charges raised again Paul, Silas, Jason, and the others were false.

[17:8]  ¹⁰ tn L&N 37.93 defines πολιτάρχης (politarch") as “a public official responsible for administrative matters within a town or city and a member of the ruling council of such a political unit – ‘city official.’”

[17:9]  ¹³ tn Grk “And after.” 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.

[17:9]  ¹⁴ tn Grk “they”; the referent (the city officials) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

[17:9]  ¹⁵ tn That is, “a payment” or “a pledge of security” (BDAG 472 s.v. ἱκανός 1) for which “bail” is the most common contemporary English equivalent.

[17:10]  ¹⁷ sn Berea (alternate spelling in NRSV Beroea; Greek Beroia) was a very old city in Macedonia on the river Astraeus about 45 mi (75 km) west of Thessalonica.

[17:10]  ¹⁸ tn Grk “who arriving there, went to.” Because of the length and complexity of the Greek sentence, the relative pronoun (οἵτινες, Joitine") has been left untranslated and a new English sentence begun. The participle παραγενόμενοι (paragenomenoi) has been taken temporally.

[17:10]  ¹⁹ sn See the note on synagogue in 6:9.

[17:11]  ²¹ tn Grk “These”; the referent (the Jews in the synagogue at Berea) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

[17:11]  ²² tn Or “more willing to learn.” L&N 27.48 and BDAG 404 s.v. εὐγενής 2 both use the term “open-minded” here. The point is that they were more receptive to Paul’s message.

[17:11]  ²³ sn Thessalonica was a city in Macedonia (modern Salonica).

[17:11]  ²⁴ tn Or “willingly,” “readily”; Grk “with all eagerness.”

[17:11]  ²⁵ tn Grk “who received.” Here the relative pronoun (“who”) has been translated as a pronoun (“they”) preceded by a semicolon, which is less awkward in contemporary English than a relative clause at this point.

[17:11]  ²⁶ tn This verb (BDAG 66 s.v. ἀνακρίνω 1) refers to careful examination.

[17:11]  ²⁷ tn BDAG 437 s.v. ἡμέρα 2.c has “every day” for this phrase in this verse.

[17:12]  ²⁵ tn Grk “not a few”; this use of negation could be misleading to the modern English reader, however, and so has been translated as “quite a few” (which is the actual meaning of the expression).

[17:12]  ²⁶ tn Or “respected.”