Acts Chapter 13 verse 41 Holy Bible

Pulpit Commentary

Pulpit CommentaryVerse 41. - If one for though a man, A.V. "Though" best expresses the ἐὰν and the כּי of the Hebrew. The passage is quoted nearly verbatim from the LXX. of Hebrews 1:5. The difference from the Hebrew arises from the LXX. having read in their copy בֹּגדְיִם, proud, arrogant men (καταφρονητάι), for בַגּוים, among the heathen, as is clear from their rendering the Hebrew בוגֵד, in Habakkuk 1:13 and Habakkuk 2:5, by the same word (καταφρονοῦντας and καταφρονητής). The rendering καὶ ἀφανίσθητε, and perish, for the Hebrew תְּמָהוּ (another form of the preceding verb הִתַּמְהוּ, which in the A.V. is construed with it, and the two together rendered "wonder marvelously"), is not so easily explained. The two best explanations seem to be (1) that the LXX. read תְּמָהוּ וְהתַּמְהוּ instead of the present order of the words, and so rendered the first word θαυμάσατε, wonder, and, taking the next word from another root, תָמַם, rendered it ἀφανίσθητε, perish; (2) that, reading the words in the same order in which they now stand in the Hebrew text, they rendered the first θαυμάσατε, or, with the intensive addition, θαυμασίᾳ, and took the second in the sense it has in Arabic, "to be altered" or "changed for the worse," and expressed it by ἀφανίσθητε, meaning" change countenance from fear and astonishment." And in favor of this explanation the use of ἀφανίζουσι τὰ πρόσωπα in Matthew 6:16 ("they disfigure their faces") is quoted (see Rosenmüller on Habakkuk 1:5). St. Paul took the LXX. as he found it. Perhaps he saw signs in some of that unbelief and perverse opposition which afterwards broke out (ver. 45), and so was led to close his sermon with words of awful warning.

Ellicott's Commentary

Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers(41) Behold, ye despisers.--The quotation is from the LXX. version, the Hebrew giving "Behold, ye among the heathen." So, in the next clause, "wonder, and perish" takes the place of "wonder marvellously." The fact that St. Paul quotes from the prophet (Habakkuk 1:5) whose teaching (Habakkuk 2:4) that "the just by faith shall live" becomes henceforth the axiom of his life, is not without a special interest. The "work" of which the prophet spoke was defined in the following verse as the raising up the Chaldeans, "that bitter and hasty nation," to execute God's judgment. St. Paul may have had in his thoughts the like judgment about to be executed by the Romans, and already known as foretold by Christ (Matthew 24:2-28), or may have thus dimly indicated that which was so closely connected with it--the rejection of Israel, because they, as a nation, had rejected Christ. The sharp tone of warning, as in St. Stephen's speech (see Note on Acts 7:51), suggests the thought that signs of anger and impatience had already begun to show themselves.