What Does Acts 13:50 Mean?
But the Jews stirred up the reverent women of good bearing and the first men of the city, and roused a pursuit against Paul and Barnabas, and threw them out of their borders.
Key words are shown with the Hebrew or Greek and what each word meant.
Selah Decoded Version The Selah Decoded Version renders what the Hebrew and Greek words meant to the people who first heard them.
King James wording
King James Version
But the Jews stirred up the devout and honourable women, and the chief men of the city, and raised persecution against Paul and Barnabas, and expelled them out of their coasts.THE KEY
Opposition turns the standing of devout, honored people into a vehicle for pursuit and expulsion.
THE MEANING
This verse shows how opposition can borrow the standing of devout and honored people, then become public persecution that pushes its targets beyond a community’s bounds. The movement turns hostility into pursuit and then forced removal from a place.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
It undoes the belief that public respectability guarantees fairness: people described as devout and honorable can be stirred into driving others out.
THE ROOT
διωγμός
diōgmos
GROWS FROM
διωκ-
diōk-
to pursue, chase
The noun διωγμός (diōgmos, pursuit or persecution) comes from the verb διώκω (diōkō, pursue or persecute), so persecution retains the force of active pursuit. The word names hostility that moves after its target, rather than disagreement that stays at the level of speech.
ALSO GROWS
diōkō: pursue, chase; persecute
διώκω
The noun in Acts grows from this verb, keeping the sense of pursuit inside the word persecution.
katadiōkō: pursue closely, hunt down
καταδιώκω
This intensified form makes the root’s physical chase visible, clarifying how persecution can become a force that drives people from a place.
ἐκβάλλω
ekballō
GROWS FROM
βαλλ-
ball-
to throw, cast
“threw them out” in this verse is ekballō. The verb here combines ἐκ- (ek-, out) with βάλλω (ballō, throw), so expulsion carries the force of casting someone outside. The removal is from a defined place: the verse says they are cast beyond the community’s boundaries.
ALSO GROWS
ballō: throw, cast
βάλλω
This base verb gives the force behind the expulsion: someone is cast out, not simply left behind.
ekbolē: a throwing out; jettisoning
ἐκβολή
This related noun can describe cargo thrown overboard, echoing the verse’s forceful image of removal beyond a boundary.
THE PATTERN
When a community treats a voice as threatening, it can enlist respected people and public institutions to turn opposition into exclusion.
And two men, sons of Belial, came in and settled before him, and the men of Belial bore witness against him, even against Naboth, before the people, saying, Naboth blessed God and the king. Then they brought him out of the city, and stoned him with stones, and he died.His parents said these things because they feared the Jews, for the Jews had already agreed that if anyone would say that he was the Anointed One, he would be put out of the gathering.And all who wish to live in reverence, in Jesus the Anointed One, will be pursued.THE THREAD
When they pursue you in this city, flee into another, for truly I say to you, you will not finish the cities of Israel before the Son of Man comes.The persecution noun in Acts and the verb “persecute” in Matthew share the Greek root διωκ- (diōk-, pursue). Matthew’s words show the same pursuit closing one city’s space while another remains ahead.
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