What Does Acts 17:31 Mean?
Because he has set a day in which he will judge the settled world in alignment, by the man whom he has marked out, giving all people trust through raising him up from among the dead.
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
Because he hath appointed a day, in the which he will judge the world in righteousness by that man whom he hath ordained; whereof he hath given assurance unto all men, in that he hath raised him from the dead.THE KEY
The Greek word family that sets the day also raises the man, making resurrection the hinge between judgment and assurance.
THE MEANING
Your world stands under an appointed day of judgment, measured in alignment through the man God raises from among the dead. His resurrection is offered as assurance to all, joining the world’s judgment to a human life that death does not hold.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
The verse undoes the belief that the world’s judgment is arbitrary or unknowable: it names a set day, an aligned standard, and a risen human as assurance.
THE ROOT
ἔστησεν
estēsen
GROWS FROM
στη-/στα- (stē-/sta-), from ἵστημι (histēmi)
To stand or set in place.
“has set” in this verse is estēsen. The word translated “appointed” carries the sense of setting something in place. In the same verse, “raised” comes from this word family too: the day is set, and the man is raised.
ALSO GROWS
estēsen: set, established
ἔστησεν
God sets the day on which the world is judged.
anastēsas: having raised, having stood up
ἀναστήσας
This same word family describes God raising the man from the dead.
anastasis: resurrection, a standing up
ἀνάστασις
The familiar word for resurrection preserves the image of standing up from death.
δικαιοσύνῃ
dikaiosynē
GROWS FROM
δικ-
dik-
Rightness, justice, alignment.
“in alignment” in this verse is dikaiosynē. The judgment of the world is described through alignment: it is not a verdict detached from what is right. Related words name both what is aligned and the act of declaring someone right.
ALSO GROWS
dikē: justice, what is right
δίκη
This root family ties the verse’s judgment to justice.
dikaios: right, just, aligned
δίκαιος
It describes the quality that the verse names as the measure of judgment.
dikaioō: to set or declare right
δικαιόω
This branch connects alignment with the act of judgment itself.
πίστιν
pistin
GROWS FROM
πιστ-/πειθ- (pist-/peith-), from πείθω (peithō)
Trust, persuasion, being persuaded.
The word translated “assurance” is from the family of trust. The resurrection is presented as the ground offered to all for trust in what this verse says about judgment.
ALSO GROWS
pistis: trust, confidence
πίστις
This is the noun used in the verse for the assurance given to all.
pistos: trustworthy, firm
πιστός
This branch shows how trust is joined to what can be relied on.
peithō: persuade, bring to trust
πείθω
It connects assurance with being persuaded by what is presented as evidence.
THE PATTERN
God’s judgment reaches the whole world and proceeds in righteousness.
And he judges the world in alignment; he pleads the case of the peoples in straightness.Before the face of the LORD, for he comes, for he comes to judge the earth; he judges the world in alignment, and the peoples in his steadiness.In the day when God judges the covered things of humans, according to my good news, through Jesus the Anointed One.THE THREAD
And has given him authority to do judgment also, because he is the Son of Man.Acts uses κρίνειν (krinein, to judge); John uses κρίσιν (krisin, judgment), forms from the same Greek word family. John makes explicit what Acts holds in “by that man”: judgment is entrusted to a human figure, and Acts names resurrection as assurance.
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