Acts 14:16-17

ὃς : God working not only in creation, but in history, not only the source of life but the personal living Guide and Ruler of man, even in His tolerance far removed from the easy indifference of the gods of Olympus. The three present participles ἀγαθ.… διδ.… ἐμπ.… mark the continuous activity and goodness of God, and are all three epexegetical of ἀμάρτυρον; whilst the second participle is generally regarded as specifying a mode of the first, and the third as expressing a consequence of the second. οὐρανόθεν : only again in Acts 26:13 in N.T., see 4Ma 4:10; so in Hom. and Hes., old genitive of οὐρανός. ὑετοὺς διδοὺς καὶ καιροὺς καρπ.: the Apostle's appeal becomes more significant when we remember that Zeus was spoken of as ὑέτιος, ἐπικάρπιος (Bethge); the rain was regarded in the East as a special sign of divine favour, and here, as in the O.T., God's goodness and power in this gift are asserted as against the impotence of the gods of the heathen, see especially Jeremiah 14:22, and cf. 1 Kings 18:1 and 1 Samuel 12:17 where this same phrase ὑετ. διδόναι is used of God. καρπ.: here only in N.T., cf. LXX, Jeremiah 2:21; Psalms 106:34, and also classical; cf. for the whole passage Cicero, De Nat. Deorum, ii., 53. ἐμπιπλῶν (ἐμπιπλάω), cf. Luke 1:53; Luke 6:25; Romans 15:24; John 6:12, frequent in LXX, e.g., Psalms 106:9; Isaiah 29:19; Jeremiah 38:14, Sir 4:12; see also below on εὐφροσ. καρδίας : Blass compares Luke 21:34, where the heart is spoken of as overcharged with surfeiting, as here it is spoken of as filled with food. But the word may be used not merely as = ὑμᾶς, or in a merely material sense, but as including the idea of enjoyment, cf. LXX, Psalms 103:15; Winer-Moulton, Acts 23:1, and Alford on James 5:5. εὐφροσύνης : in its ordinary Greek use might simply mean “good cheer,” although we need not limit it here with Grotius to wine as in Sir 31:28; very frequently used in LXX (only here and in Acts 2:28 in N.T.), sometimes of mere festive joy, Genesis 31:27, sometimes of religious gladness, Deuteronomy 28:47. Although St. Paul could not have used it here as it is employed in Acts 2:28, yet he might perhaps have used it as a kind of transition word to lead his hearers on to a deeper gladness of heart, a richer gift of God than corn and wine, cf. Psalms 4:7, and for the phrase ἐμπ. εὐφροσ. Isaiah 29:19, Sir 4:12. It may well be that whilst we have in this address the germ of the thoughts afterwards developed in Romans 1:18; Romans 1:23, etc., St. Paul did not press his argument on this occasion as in his Epistle, but took the first step to arrest the attention of his hearers by an appeal to the goodness, not to the severity, of God the goodness which leadeth to repentance. It has been thought that the words οὐρ. ἡμῖν διδούς κ. τ. λ. are rhythmical, and may have been some familiar fragment of a song, or a citation from a Greek poet, in which the Apostle expressed his thoughts; others have maintained that they may have formed part of the hymn sung in the procession for the sacrifice, and that St. Paul made the words his text; see Humphry, in loco; Farrar, St. Paul, i., p. 384; Felten, in loco; but it may be fairly said that the O.T. language was in itself quite sufficient to suggest the Apostle's words. On the remarkable parallels between this speech and the sayings of Pseudo-Heracleitus in his letters see Gore, Ephesians, p. 253 ff., but see also Bernays, Die Heraklitischen Briefe, p. 29. πάντα τὰ ἔθνη : “all the Gentiles,” R.V., the words divided mankind into two classes, but there was the same Lord over all, Romans 3:29. ἐν ταῖς παρῳχ. γενεαῖς : “in the generations gone by,” R.V. παρῳχ.: not in LXX or Apocrypha, but classical, and used also by Josephus. εἴασε (cf. Acts 17:30; Romans 3:25-26) … πορεύ. ταῖς ὁδοῖς αὐτῶν, i.e., without summoning them as now to repent, cf. for the combination Acts 9:31, and for the expression 2 Corinthians 12:18; Jude 1:11; James 5:20 (in classical Greek cf. Thuc., iii., 64, ἄδικον ὁδὸν ἰέναι), cf. also the contrast between God's ways and the wilfulness of Israel in the past, Psalms 81:13 and previous verses, expressed in the same phraseology.