What Does Acts 14:4 Mean?
But the multitude of the city was split, and some held with the Jews, and some with the sent ones.
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 multitude of the city was divided: and part held with the Jews, and part with the apostles.THE KEY
The Greek says the city’s crowd was cleaved, making its fracture of allegiance visible.
THE MEANING
One public message meets different responses: some stand with the Jews, and some with the apostles. The city shares one place, but its multitude does not hold one position.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
The verse undoes the belief that shared surroundings mean shared allegiance: one city can contain a crowd split over what it hears.
THE ROOT
ἐσχίσθη
eschisthē
GROWS FROM
σχίζω
schizō
To split, cleave, or tear apart.
The verb pictures the crowd being split open, so its division is more than a tally of opposing sides: the fracture becomes visible within the multitude. The related word σχίσμα (schisma) names this same kind of split elsewhere.
ALSO GROWS
schizō: To split or tear apart.
σχίζω
This is the verb’s lexical form; here the crowd undergoes the action of being cleaved.
schisma: A split or division.
σχίσμα
This related noun names the fracture between people, linking the scene to other passages that describe a crowd divided.
THE PATTERN
A public encounter with a claim about God makes different allegiances visible among those who hear it.
And Elijah came to all the people, and said, How long will you limp on two branches? If the LORD is God, walk after him, but if Baal, then walk after him. And the people answered him not a word.So a split arose among the crowd because of him.THE THREAD
So a split arose among the crowd because of him.Acts uses ἐσχίσθη, from σχίζω (schizō), for the crowd being split; John uses σχίσμα (schisma) for a division among the people because of Jesus. The shared root makes the fracture itself the link between the passages.
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