This sentence constitutes a parenthetical explanation by Luke concerning the activities of people in Athens.

Citizens of Athens may be rendered as “people who belong to the town of Athens” or even, as in some languages, “people who were born in the town of Athens.” The expression the foreigners who lived there is “those who had come to live in Athens.”

The final phrase telling and hearing the latest new thing may need to be somewhat expanded: “telling others the latest new thing they had heard and hearing from others something new.”

Quoted with permission from Newman, Barclay M. and Nida, Eugene A. A Handbook on The Acts of the Apostles. (UBS Handbook Series). New York: UBS, 1972. For this and other handbooks for translators see here .