Kisah Para Rasul 17:1

Paul and Silas at Thessalonica

17:1 After they traveled through ¹  Amphipolis ²  and Apollonia, ³  they came to Thessalonica, ⁴  where there was a Jewish synagogue. ⁵ 

Kisah Para Rasul 17:4

17:4 Some of them were persuaded ⁶  and joined Paul and Silas, along with a large group ⁷  of God-fearing Greeks ⁸  and quite a few ⁹  prominent women.

[17:1]  ¹ tn BDAG 250 s.v. διοδεύω 1 has “go, travel through” for this verse.

[17:1]  ² sn Amphipolis. The capital city of the southeastern district of Macedonia (BDAG 55 s.v. ᾿Αμφίπολις). It was a military post. From Philippi this was about 33 mi (53 km).

[17:1]  ³ sn Apollonia was a city in Macedonia about 27 mi (43 km) west southwest of Amphipolis.

[17:1]  ⁴ sn Thessalonica (modern Salonica) was a city in Macedonia about 33 mi (53 km) west of Apollonia. It was the capital of Macedonia. The road they traveled over was called the Via Egnatia. It is likely they rode horses, given their condition in Philippi. The implication of v. 1 is that the two previously mentioned cities lacked a synagogue.

[17:1]  map For location see JP1 C1; JP2 C1; JP3 C1; JP4 C1.

[17:1]  ⁵ sn See the note on synagogue in 6:9.

[17:4]  ⁶ tn Or “convinced.”

[17:4]  ⁷ tn Or “a large crowd.”

[17:4]  ⁸ tn Or “of devout Greeks,” but this is practically a technical term for the category called God-fearers, Gentiles who worshiped the God of Israel and in many cases kept the Mosaic law, but did not take the final step of circumcision necessary to become a proselyte to Judaism. See further K. G. Kuhn, TDNT 6:732-34, 743-44. Luke frequently mentions such people (Acts 13:43, 50; 16:14; 17:17; 18:7).

[17:4]  ⁹ 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).