What Does Acts 21:40 Mean in the King James?
And when he had given him licence, Paul stood on the stairs, and beckoned with the hand unto the people. And when there was made a great silence, he spake unto them in the Hebrew tongue, saying,
The analysis reads the King James wording.
King James Version The King James Version, first published in 1611. Selah Verse shows the standard text.
THE KEY
The word for beckoning comes from “to shake”: before Paul speaks, a moving hand and a great silence make room for language.
THE MEANING
A voice reaches you through gesture and speech: attention gathers, silence opens, and words arrive in a language the listeners recognize. Listening is more than the absence of noise; it is the space that lets speech meet another person.
THE ROOT
κατέσεισε
katéseise
GROWS FROM
σείω
seíō
To shake or move.
Κατέσεισε comes from σείω, to shake or move; “beckoned” preserves the signal but not its motion-root. The verse places the hand’s movement before the great silence and the spoken word.
ALSO GROWS
seíō: To shake, move.
σείω
This is the motion carried by the hand gesture that precedes Paul’s speech.
seismós: A shaking; an earthquake.
σεισμός
The same root names a much larger shaking, making the small motion of the beckoning hand more vivid.
διαλέκτῳ
dialéktō
GROWS FROM
λέγω
légō
To say or speak.
The Greek word behind “tongue” is διάλεκτος, meaning a language or dialect. It names the shared form of speech through which Paul’s words can meet the people listening.
ALSO GROWS
diálektos: Language, dialect.
διάλεκτος
This is the word used for the Hebrew tongue Paul speaks to the crowd.
diálogos: Conversation, discourse.
διάλογος
It shares the speech family and echoes the movement from crowd noise to a voice that can be heard.
THE PATTERN
Speech becomes hearable when it is made intelligible to the listener.
Now when this was noised abroad, the multitude came together, and were confounded, because that every man heard them speak in his own language.So they read in the book in the law of God distinctly, and gave the sense, and caused them to understand the reading.So likewise ye, except ye utter by the tongue words easy to be understood, how shall it be known what is spoken? for ye shall speak into the air.THE THREAD
(And when they heard that he spake in the Hebrew tongue to them, they kept the more silence: and he saith,)The next verse says the crowd grows quieter when they hear him speaking in Hebrew. The silence is not empty: the language itself opens space for hearing.
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