Acts 11:20-22

New English Translation

Footnotes

1. Acts 11:20 sn Cyprus was a large island in the Mediterranean off the south coast of Asia Minor.
2. Acts 11:20 sn Cyrene was a city on the northern African coast west of Egypt.
3. Acts 11:20 tn Grk “among them, coming to Antioch began to speak.” The participle ἐλθόντες (elthontes) has been translated as a finite verb due to requirements of contemporary English style.
4. Acts 11:20 sn Antioch was a city in Syria (not Antioch in Pisidia). See the note in 11:19.
5. Acts 11:20 sn The statement that some men from Cyprus and Cyrene…began to speak to the Greeks shows that Peter’s experience of reaching out to the Gentiles was not unique.
6. Acts 11:21 tn Grk “And the.” 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.
7. Acts 11:21 tn The participle πιστεύσας (pisteusas) is articular and thus cannot be adverbial. It is adjectival, modifying ἀριθμός (arithmos), but has been translated into English as a relative clause (“who believed”).
8. Acts 11:21 sn Again, the expression turned is a summary term for responding to the gospel.
9. Acts 11:22 tn Grk “Word.”
10. Acts 11:22 tn Grk “was heard in the ears,” an idiom. L&N 24.67 states that the idiom means “to hear in secret” (which it certainly does in Matt 10:27), but secrecy does not seem to be part of the context here, and there is no particular reason to suggest the report was made in secret.
11. Acts 11:22 tc ‡ Most mss read the infinitive “to travel” after “Barnabas.” διελθεῖν (dielthein) is found before ἕως (heōs) in D E Ψ 33 M and some versional mss. It is lacking in P⁷⁴ א A B 81 1739 and some versional mss. Although the infinitive with ἕως fits Lukan style, it has the appearance of a scribal clarification. The infinitive has the earmarks of a Western expansion on the text and thus is unlikely to be autographic. NA²⁸ has the infinitive in brackets, indicating doubt as to its authenticity.
12. Acts 11:22 sn Antioch was a city in Syria (not Antioch in Pisidia). See the note in 11:19. Again the Jerusalem church exercised an oversight role.