Acts 9:7

οἱ συνοδεύοντες : probably riding in company with him; not found in classical Greek, but used in the same sense as here in Plutarch not elsewhere in N. T; but see Wis 6:23, and Tob 5:16 ([223] [224] al.), so according to in Zechariah 8:21 ([225] [226] S al.), cf. also Symm. in Genesis 33:12. εἱστήκεισαν ἐννεοί. The form ἐννεός is incorrect, see critical notes: in LXX, cf. Proverbs 17:28; Isaiah 56:10, Epist. of Jeremiah 41 (Symm. in Hosea 9:7); see critical notes. It is frivolous to find a contradiction here with Acts 26:14. No stress is laid upon εἱστήκ., which may be used like εἶναι, and even if there is, it does not preclude a previous falling. We have merely to suppose that the sight and sound had affected Saul's companions in a less degree than Saul, and that they rose from the ground before him, to make the narratives quite consistent (see Felten, p. 193, Hackett, in loco; B.D. 1, iv., “Paul” p. 733). Or it is quite possible, as Weiss points out on Acts 26:14, that here the narrative emphasises the impression made by the hearing of the voice, and in Acts 26:14 the immediate result produced by the light, and that the narrator is quite unconscious of any contradiction in his recital (see notes below on 22, 26). μηδένα δὲ θεωροῦντες : there is no contradiction between this statement and Acts 26:9, where it is said that they saw the light here it is not denied that they saw a light, but only that they saw no person. Holtzmann apparently forgets this, and says that whilst in Acts 22:9 they see the light, in Acts 9:7 they see nothing; but the pronoun is not neuter, but masculine; μηδένα (see critical notes and reading in [227]). The inference is that Saul saw Jesus, but although this is not stated in so many words here, it is also to be inferred from the words of Ananias in Acts 9:17, and Acts 22:14, and from St. Paul's own statement in 1 Corinthians 15:8; 1 Corinthians 9:1. St. Chrysostom refers ἀκούοντες μὲν τῆς φ. to the words of Saul, but this is certainly not natural, for τῆς φ. evidently refers back to ἤκουσα φωνήν in Acts 9:4.

[223] Codex Alexandrinus (sæc. v.), at the British Museum, published in photographic facsimile by Sir E. M. Thompson (1879).

[224] Codex Vaticanus (sæc. iv.), published in photographic facsimile in 1889 under the care of the Abbate Cozza-Luzi.

[225] Codex Alexandrinus (sæc. v.), at the British Museum, published in photographic facsimile by Sir E. M. Thompson (1879).

[226] Codex Vaticanus (sæc. iv.), published in photographic facsimile in 1889 under the care of the Abbate Cozza-Luzi.

[227] R(omana), in Blass, a first rough copy of St. Luke.