What Does Acts 16:11 Mean?
So we put out from Troas and sailed straight to Samothracia, and on the next day to Neapolis.
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
Therefore loosing from Troas, we came with a straight course to Samothracia, and the next day to Neapolis;THE KEY
In Greek, “straight course” is one verb: the path is directness put into motion.
THE MEANING
The verse holds a journey in distinct stages: departure from Troas, a direct passage to Samothrace, and arrival at Neapolis the next day. Movement has a route and a pace; arrival follows one leg at a time.
THE ROOT
εὐθυδρομήσαμεν
euthydromēsamen
GROWS FROM
εὐθύς + δρόμος (compound)
To travel by a straight or direct course.
“sailed straight” in this verse is euthydromēsamen. The English phrase makes directness sound like an added feature of travel; the Greek compresses straightness and course into one verb. That word appears again in Acts 21:1 for another direct sea journey, joining the direction and the movement in a single expression.
ALSO GROWS
euthys: straight, direct
εὐθύς
This element carries the sense of directness inside the verb itself.
dromos: course, running route
δρόμος
This element keeps the traveled route in view: the course is something taken, not just a line imagined.
Νέαν πόλιν
Néan pólin
GROWS FROM
νέος + πόλις (name compound)
New + city; literally, “new city.”
The destination carries a plain name-nature: Neapolis means “new city.” The verse leaves the name geographic while letting the arrival end at a place whose name already describes it.
ALSO GROWS
neos: new, fresh
νέος
This part of the name marks what is new.
polis: city
πόλις
This part names the kind of place reached.
THE PATTERN
A journey becomes concrete through its departure, route, and arrival.
And it happened that after we had been torn away from them, and had put out, we ran a straight course to Coos, and on the next day to Rhodes, and from there to Patara.So Abram went, as the LORD had spoken to him, and Lot went with him. Abram was seventy-five years old when he went out of Haran.Then they are glad, for they are quiet; and he leads them to the harbor of their delight.THE THREAD
And it happened that after we had been torn away from them, and had put out, we ran a straight course to Coos, and on the next day to Rhodes, and from there to Patara.Acts 21:1 uses the same Greek verb, εὐθυδρομέω (euthydromeō), for traveling a straight course by sea. The repeated word reveals a compact image: directness is carried out through the route itself.
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