Paragraph 4:21–22
4:21a
After further threats: The Greek word that the Berean Standard Bible translates as further threats is the same basic word translated “warn” in 4:17b. Here it indicates that the leaders again warned the two apostles to stop telling others about Jesus. It probably also indicates that they told them that they would punish them if they did not stop. Here are some other ways to translate this phrase:
After they warned/threatened them again/further
they let them go: The leaders allowed Peter and John to leave.
they: The pronoun they refers to the Jewish leaders here.
them: The pronoun them refers to the Peter and John here.
4:21b
They could not find a way to punish them: This clause in Greek is literally “finding nothing how they might punish them.” The crowd knew the lame man and had heard about the miracle. So the leaders could not think of any way to punish the two apostles without causing many people to become angry. Here are some other ways to translate this clause:
finding no way to punish them (English Standard Version)
-or-
they could not think of any way to punish them (New Jerusalem Bible)
4:21c
because: The Greek conjunction that the Berean Standard Bible translates as because introduces the reason that the Jewish leaders could not decide how to punish Peter and John.
all the people were glorifying God for what had happened: This clause indicates that they were praising God about the miracle that healed the lame man.
The phrase what had happened is explained in 4:22, so most languages do not need to explain it here. But some languages may need to make the meaning clear here. For example:
all the people were praising God for that miracle
were glorifying God: The Greek word that the Berean Standard Bible translates as glorifying refers to saying how wonderful and excellent someone or something is.
Some languages do not have a word like “glorify” or “praise.” If that is true in your language, you may need to express the meaning in a quote. For example:
they were saying, “God is so good!”
This phrase indicates that the people continued to praise God for some time.
© 2001, 2021 by SIL International®
Made available under the terms of a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License (CC BY-SA) creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0.
All Scripture quotations in this publication, unless otherwise indicated, are from The Holy Bible, Berean Standard Bible.
BSB is produced in cooperation with Bible Hub, Discovery Bible, OpenBible.com, and the Berean Bible Translation Committee.