Cambridge Greek Testament Commentary

Acts 4:11

οἰκοδόμων instead of οἰκοδομούντων with אABD. The Vulg. has a participle.

11. οὖτος, this, viz. Jesus.

ὑφ' ὑμῶν τῶν οἰκοδόμων. Render, of you the builders. The article has its proper force. The council are fitly called the builders, for on them depended the whole religious and civil government of the people. St Peter, with his mind now enlightened to apply the Scriptures, uses the words of the Psalmist (Psalms 118:22) as spoken prophetically of Christ. Christ had already (Matthew 21:42) applied these words to Himself and to the way in which He was being rejected of the Jews, in the close of one of His parables which the Pharisees felt had been spoken against them.

The rendering of the Psalm by the Apostle does not altogether accord with the words of the LXX.

εἰς κεφαλὴν γωνίας, the head of the corner. Christ, now exalted into heaven, is no longer the despised, but is become the most important, stone in the new building of the Christian society, cf. Ephesians 2:20-22. St Peter uses this quotation in his Epistle (1 Peter 2:7), and joins with it a passage (Isaiah 28:16) where the like figure is employed prophetically of the Messiah, ‘the foundation stone laid in Zion.’

For the expression cf. LXX. Jerem. 28:26, λίθος εἰς γωνίαν and Job 38:6 ὁ βαλὼν λίθον γωνιαῖον.

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Cambridge Greek Testament Commentary

Acts 4:11

Old Testament

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