What Does Acts 22:2 Mean in the King James?
(And when they heard that he spake in the Hebrew tongue to them, they kept the more silence: and he saith,)
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 crowd gives more silence when Paul’s speech reaches them in a language they recognize.
THE MEANING
When speech reaches you in a language you recognize, the surrounding noise can fall back and attention gather. Here, the crowd’s greater silence is an active response to hearing, making room for what is about to be said.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
It dissolves the assumption that silence means indifference: here, the greater hush is the crowd’s response to hearing Paul speak in Hebrew.
THE ROOT
ἤκουσαν
ēkousan from akouō
GROWS FROM
ἀκου-
To hear or listen.
The verse begins with hearing, then shows that hearing changing the room: the people become more silent. English can make “heard” seem like a completed sound; here, it opens into a collective response.
ALSO GROWS
akoē: hearing; a report or message heard
ἀκοή
It keeps hearing linked to what is received and carried onward.
hypakouō: to listen to; to obey
ὑπακούω
This compound carries hearing toward response, echoing how the crowd’s reception becomes visible in their silence.
ἡσυχίαν
hēsychian
GROWS FROM
ἡσυχ-
Quiet, stillness, or calm.
“silence” in this verse is hēsychian. The word is not simply empty space: it names a quiet that the crowd provides as Paul’s speech reaches them. The related forms connect this hush with being at rest and undisturbed.
ALSO GROWS
hēsychazō: to be quiet or at rest
ἡσυχάζω
It shows the same quiet as a state of settled rest.
hēsychios: quiet, tranquil
ἡσύχιος
It carries the root’s calm quality into a description of settled quiet.
THE PATTERN
When speech becomes receivable, attention gathers and noise yields.
And the LORD came, and stood, and called as at other times, Samuel, Samuel. Then Samuel answered, Speak; for thy servant heareth.And he read therein before the street that was before the water gate from the morning until midday, before the men and the women, and those that could understand; and the ears of all the people were attentive unto the book of the law.Wherefore, my beloved brethren, let every man be swift to hear, slow to speak, slow to wrath:THE THREAD
Now when this was noised abroad, the multitude came together, and were confounded, because that every man heard them speak in his own language.Acts 22:2 and Acts 2:6 share the Greek root ἀκου- (hear): in both, hearing speech in a recognizable language shifts a crowd’s response. Here each person hears in their own language; there, the crowd’s hush follows Paul’s Hebrew speech.
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