What Does Acts 16:39 Mean?
And they came and urged them, and led them out, and asked them to go out of the city.
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
And they came and besought them, and brought them out, and desired them to depart out of the city.THE KEY
The Greek repeats one appeal before and after the escort, so the release comes with continued pressure to leave.
THE MEANING
The authorities come in person, bring you out, and continue urging you to leave the city. The verse holds release and pressure together: you are no longer confined, yet you are still being pressed to depart.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
Being let out does not mean being welcomed to stay; the verse keeps release and the demand to leave side by side.
THE ROOT
παρακαλέω
parakaleō
GROWS FROM
καλέω
Call, summon; παρακαλέω means to urge or make an appeal.
“urged” in this verse is parakaleō. The Greek repeats παρακαλέω: the officials first appeal to them, then keep urging them after bringing them out. The KJV renders the same word as “besought” and “desired,” hiding one continuous appeal that accompanies the exit.
ALSO GROWS
paraklēsis: appeal, encouragement, consolation
παράκλησις
This related word holds an appeal together with the encouragement or comfort it can carry.
paraklētos: advocate, helper
παράκλητος
This related word shows the same call-root in the role of one who speaks or acts in support.
ἐξάγω
exagō
GROWS FROM
ἄγω
Lead, bring; ἐξάγω means to lead out.
“led them out” in this verse is exagō. “Brought them out” carries the sense of being led outward, and the same verb appears in the previous verse when Paul demands that the officials come and fetch them out. The root makes their escort the exact response to that demand.
ALSO GROWS
agō: lead, bring
ἄγω
This is the base verb beneath the officials’ act of leading them out.
agōgē: conduct, manner of life
ἀγωγή
The related word extends leading into the course or way a life is led.
THE PATTERN
Confinement gives way when the captive is led outward into open space.
Bring my living soul out of the enclosure, that I may extend my hands to your nature. Aligned ones encircle me, for you ripen me.That you may say to the bound ones, Come out, and to those in the darkness, Uncover yourselves. They shall graze along the roads, and their pasture shall be on every bare height.When they had gone past the first and the second guard, they came to the iron gate that carries into the city, which swung open for them by itself. They went out and passed through one street, and at once the messenger went away from him.THE THREAD
But Paul said to them, They have beaten us in the open, unjudged, being Romans, and have thrown us into prison, and now are they casting us out in hiding? No indeed! Let them come themselves and lead us out.Paul demands that the officials come and “fetch us out”; verse 39 uses the same Greek verb, ἐξάγω (exagō), when they bring them out. The repeated root makes the escort the direct fulfillment of his demand.
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