Acts 2:9

Acts 2:9 VIoudai,an

Although solidly supported by external evidence (by all Greek witnesses, and almost all versional and patristic witnesses, except those mentioned below), the word VIoudai,an has frequently been suspected because (1) it stands in an unusual sequence in the list (between Mesopotamia and Cappadocia); (2) it is properly an adjective and therefore when used as a substantive (as here) it ought to be preceded by the definite article; ⁷⁰ (3) it is absent from the astrological geography of Paulus Alexandrinus, ⁷¹ with which Luke’s list is otherwise in partial agreement; and (4) it involves the curious anomaly that the inhabitants of Judea should be amazed to hear the apostles speak in their own language (ver. Acts 2:6). ⁷²

For these reasons some ancient and many modern writers have proposed the names of other countries. Thus, Tertullian and Augustine (once) substitute Armeniam, Jerome substitutes (habitantes in) Syria, and Chrysostom VIndi,an. Modern scholars have proposed a wide variety of conjectures, including Idumaea (Caspar, Spitta, Lagercranz), Ionia (Cheyne), Bithynia (Hemsterhuis, Valckenaer), Cilicia (Mangey), Lydia (Bentley, Bryant), India ([following Chrysostom] Erasmus, Schmid), Gordyaea (Greve, Burkitt), Yaudi (Gunkel), Adiabene (Eberhard Nestle), and Aramaea (Hatch). ⁷³ Others, including Eusebius, Harnack, and C. S. C. Williams, omit the word altogether, considering it a scribal gloss.

Despite internal difficulties, the Committee was impressed by the overwhelming preponderance of external evidence supporting VIoudai,an, and therefore retained it in the text.

⁷⁰ According to Blass-Debrunner-Funk, “anarthrous VIoudai,an is certainly corrupt,” § 261 (4).

⁷¹ On Paulus Alexandrinus and his geographical list, see Stefan Weinstock, “The Geographical Catalogue in Acts ii:9—11, ” Journal of Roman Studies, XXXVIII (1948), pp. 43—46, and the article by the present writer in the Festschrift in honor of F. F. Bruce (Apostolic History and the Gospel, edited by W. Ward Gasque and Ralph P. Martin [Exeter and Grand Rapids, 1970], pp. 123—133), reprinted in Metzger, New Testament Studies (Leiden, 1980), pp. 46—56.

⁷² It is not sufficient to turn the force of this argument to say, as Denk does, that the dialect of Galileans differed from the dialect used in Judea (Jos. Denk, Zeitschrift für katholische Theologie, XXXIV [1910], p. 606).

⁷³ For discussions of the last two proposals mentioned above, see Eberhard Nestle, Zeitschrift für die neutestamentliche Wissenschaft, IX (1908), pp. 253—254, and W. H. P. Hatch, ibid., pp. 255—256 (the latter lists most of the conjectures that are mentioned above).