Online Resource Library
Commentary Index | Return to PrayerRequest.comRobertson Word Pictures - Acts 23:20 - 23:20
(Show All Books | Show All Chapters)
This Chapter Verse Commentaries:
The Jews (hoi Ioudaioi). As if the whole nation was in the conspiracy and so in Act 23:12. The conspirators may have belonged to the Zealots, but clearly they represented the state of Jewish feeling toward Paul in Jerusalem.
Have agreed (sunethento). Second aorist middle indicative of suntithēmi, old verb to join together, to agree. Already this form in Luk 22:5 which see. See also Joh 9:22; Act 24:9.
To bring down (hopōs katagagēis). Very words of the conspirators in Act 23:15as if the young man overheard. Second aorist active subjunctive of katagō with hopōs in final clause, still used, but nothing like so common as hina though again in Act 23:23(Robertson, Grammar, p. 985).
As though thou wouldest inquire (hōs mellōn punthanesthai). Just as in Act 23:15except that here mellōn refers to Lysias instead of to the conspirators as in Act 23:15. The singular is used by the youth out of deference to the authority of Lysias and so modifies a bit the scheming of the conspirators, not “absurd” as Page holds.