What Does Acts 7:54 Mean?
When they heard these things, they were sawn through in their hearts, and ground their teeth at him.
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
When they heard these things, they were cut to the heart, and they gnashed on him with their teeth.THE KEY
The Greek verb carries the image of being sawn through: here, what reaches the heart becomes rage rather than surrender.
THE MEANING
When a truth reaches you deeply, the impact does not itself mean you are yielding to it; it can become anger toward the voice that exposes you. Here the heart’s agitation shows itself outwardly as teeth grinding against the speaker.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
Being deeply moved by a hard truth does not necessarily mean you are becoming receptive to it.
THE ROOT
διεπρίοντο
diepríonto
GROWS FROM
πρίζω
prízō
to saw
“sawn through in their hearts” in this verse is diepríonto. The sawing image gives “cut to the heart” a forceful, abrasive edge; in Acts 5:33, the same phrase leads into a plot to kill. Here the gnashing teeth show that being struck inwardly can manifest as hostility rather than surrender.
ALSO GROWS
diapriō: to saw through; figuratively, to become enraged
διαπρίω
This is the verb form behind the phrase in Acts 7:54 and Acts 5:33, where the inward impact leads to open hostility.
eprísthēsan: they were sawn asunder
ἐπρίσθησαν
Hebrews 11:37 uses a form from the same root for literal sawing, making the violent force of the image audible beneath “cut.”
THE PATTERN
A word that reaches the heart exposes itself in what follows: the heart may open to change or harden into hostility.
When they heard this, they were pierced in the heart, and said to Peter and to the rest of the sent ones, Men and brothers, what shall we do?The wicked schemes against the aligned one, and grinds his teeth at him.For the word of God is living and working, and sharper than any two-edged sword, reaching through even to the dividing of living soul and breath, of joints and marrow, and it separates the inward movements and thoughts of the heart.THE THREAD
And when they heard this, they were sawn through and wanted to lift them out of the way and put them to death.Acts 5:33 uses the same Greek verb, διαπρίω (diapriō, to saw through; figuratively, to become enraged). There the response is a plan to kill; here it is teeth grinding, so the shared root makes the anger in “cut to the heart” plain.
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