Acts 17

The TorahRooted Bible (TRB), translated directly from the Hebrew and Greek.

Thessalonica

¹ Now when they had passed through Amphipolis and Apollonia, they came to Thessalonica, where there was a synagogue of the Jews. ² Then Paul, as his custom was, went in to them, and for three Shabbats reasoned with them from the Scriptures, ³ explaining and demonstrating that the Messiah had to suffer and rise again from the dead, and that, "This Yeshua, whom I proclaim to you, is the Messiah." ⁴ And some of them were persuaded and joined Paul and Silas, along with a great multitude of the devout Greeks, and not a few of the leading women.

⁵ But the Jews who were not persuaded took some wicked men of the marketplace, gathered a crowd, and set the city in an uproar; and they attacked the house of Jason and sought to bring them out to the people. ⁶ But when they did not find them, they dragged Jason and some brothers to the rulers of the city, crying out, "These who have turned the world upside down have come here too, ⁷ and Jason has received them. And they all act contrary to the decrees of Caesar, saying there is another king, Yeshua." ⁸ And they troubled the crowd and the rulers of the city when they heard these things. ⁹ So when they had taken security from Jason and the rest, they let them go.

Berea

¹⁰ Then the brothers immediately sent Paul and Silas away by night to Berea. When they arrived, they went into the synagogue of the Jews. ¹¹ These were more noble than those in Thessalonica; they received the word with all eagerness, and searched the Scriptures daily to find out whether these things were so. ¹² Therefore many of them believed, and also not a few of the Greek women of high standing, and of men.

¹³ But when the Jews from Thessalonica learned that the word of Elohim was proclaimed by Paul at Berea also, they came there too and stirred up the crowds. ¹⁴ Then immediately the brothers sent Paul away, to go as far as the sea; but Silas and Timothy remained there. ¹⁵ So those who conducted Paul brought him to Athens; and receiving a command for Silas and Timothy to come to him with all speed, they departed.

Paul in Athens

¹⁶ Now while Paul waited for them at Athens, his spirit was provoked within him when he saw that the city was full of idols. ¹⁷ Therefore he reasoned in the synagogue with the Jews and with the devout persons, and in the marketplace daily with those who happened to be there. ¹⁸ Then certain of the Epicurean and Stoic philosophers encountered him. And some said, "What does this babbler want to say?" Others said, "He seems to be a proclaimer of foreign gods," because he preached Yeshua and the resurrection. ¹⁹ And they took him and brought him to the Areopagus, saying, "May we know what this new teaching is of which you speak? ²⁰ For you are bringing some strange things to our ears. Therefore we want to know what these things mean." ²¹ For all the Athenians and the foreigners who were there spent their time in nothing else but to tell and to hear some new thing.

²² Then Paul stood in the midst of the Areopagus and said, "Men of Athens, I see that in all things you are very religious; ²³ for as I was passing through and considering the objects of your worship, I even found an altar with this inscription: 'To an unknown god.' Therefore, the One whom you worship without knowing, Him I proclaim to you: ²⁴ Elohim, who made the world and everything in it, since He is Lord of heaven and earth, does not dwell in temples made with hands, ²⁵ nor is He served by human hands, as though He needed anything, since He Himself gives to all life and breath in every way. ²⁶ And He has made from one blood every nation of men to dwell on all the face of the earth, and has determined their appointed times and the boundaries of their dwellings, ²⁷ so that they should seek the Lord, if perhaps they might feel their way toward Him and find Him, though He is not far from each one of us; ²⁸ for in Him we live and move and have our being; as also some of your own poets have said, 'For we are also His offspring.' ²⁹ Therefore, since we are the offspring of Elohim, we ought not to think that the Divine Nature is like gold or silver or stone, something shaped by the art and imagination of man. ³⁰ So then, having overlooked the times of ignorance, Elohim now commands all people everywhere to repent, ³¹ because He has set a day on which He will judge the world in righteousness by the Man whom He has appointed, having given assurance of this to all by raising Him from the dead."

³² And when they heard of the resurrection of the dead, some mocked, while others said, "We will hear you again on this matter." ³³ So Paul departed from among them. ³⁴ However, some men joined him and believed, among them Dionysius the Areopagite, a woman named Damaris, and others with them.

Notes

• 17:2 "As his custom was" (kata to eiōthos) is the same expression Luke uses of Yeshua going into the synagogue on Shabbat (Luke 4:16). Paul, himself a Jew, went first to the synagogue in city after city (13:14; 14:1; 17:10; 18:4) and reasoned "from the Scriptures," the Torah, the Prophets and the Writings, since the New Testament had not yet been written. "Three Shabbats" is sabbata tria; the plural can also name the week, and some Bibles read "three weeks."
• 17:11 "More noble" (eugenesteroi) first meant "of better birth" and came to mean "more generous, more open-minded." The Bereans received the word eagerly and still examined the Scriptures daily, the Hebrew Scriptures, to see whether what they heard agreed with them; Luke praises them for it, even though the teacher was Paul.
• 17:23 Ancient writers mention altars "to unknown gods" at Athens (Pausanias, in the second century, and Philostratus). Paul does not say the Athenians already knew Elohim; he takes their own confession of not knowing and proclaims to them the Creator, in words close to the Hebrew Scriptures: Elohim "who created the heavens," who "gives breath to the people" on the earth (Isaiah 42:5), and who does not dwell in temples made with hands (verses 24-25; 1 Kings 8:27).
• 17:28 "In Him we live and move and have our being" is often traced to Epimenides of Crete, and "For we are also His offspring" comes from Aratus, a poet of Cilicia, Paul's home region (Phaenomena, line 5). Paul quotes lines written about Zeus and turns them toward the one Creator who made every nation "from one blood" (verse 26); "from one blood" is the reading of the Majority Text, and many modern Bibles read "from one man."
• 17:31 "He will judge the world in righteousness" echoes the Psalms, where Yahweh "will judge the world in righteousness" (Psalms 96:13; 98:9). Paul ends where the Hebrew Scriptures point, a day of judgment, and names the Judge only as "the Man whom He has appointed," whom Elohim raised from the dead.

Acts 16 · Acts 18

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