Acts 17:3

διανοίγων, sc., αὐτάς, a favourite word with St. Luke, cf. Luke 16:14; here, as in Luke 24:32; Luke 24:45, he alone uses it of making plain to the understanding the meaning of the Scriptures, “opening their meaning”. καὶ παρατιθ. “and quoting to prove” (Ramsay), i.e., bringing forward in proof passages of Scripture; so often amongst profane writers in a similar way, instances in Wetstein; lit [304], the word means “to set forth,” and this was the older English meaning of allege; in middle voice, to set forth from oneself, to explain; to quote in one's own favour, as evidence, or as authority, “Non other auctour allegge I,” Chaucer, Hours of Fame, 314. τὸν Χ. ἔδει παθεῖν : “that it behoved the Christ to suffer,” R.V., cf. Luke 24:25; Luke 24:46; now as ever “to the Jews a stumbling-block,” see above on p. 113, and cf. Acts 26:23; so also in writing to the Thessalonian Church the Apostle insists on the same fundamental facts of Christian belief, 1 Thessalonians 4:14. καὶ ὅτι οὗτος κ. τ. λ.: “and that this Jesus whom, said he, I proclaim unto you is the Christ,” R.V. adds ὁ before Ἰ. The words said he are inserted because of the change of construction, cf. Acts 1:4; Acts 23:22; Luke 5:14, specially frequent in Luke. On St. Paul's preaching that “Jesus was the Christ,” and what it involved, see Witness of the Epistles, p. 307 ff.

[304] literal, literally.