Acts 3:17

Acts 3:17

The Western text (D E it^{h, p} cop^G67) introduces several changes: it (a) expands avdelfoi, into the more usual expression a;ndrej avdelfoi,, (b) accommodates the verb to the plural (evpista,meqa for oi=da) in harmony with the preceding h`mei/j (ver. Acts 3:15), and (c) adds ponhro,n after evpra,xate in order to express the idea that, though the Jews’ part in bringing about Jesus’ death was done in ignorance, it was nevertheless a crime. By inserting me,n in ver. Acts 3:17 a sharper contrast is afforded between the act of the Jews over against the purpose of God, expressed in ver. Acts 3:18. The heightened emphasis in the D-text is apparent: “We know that you, on the one hand, did a wicked thing in ignorance …, but, on the other hand, God…fulfilled [his purpose].” ¹¹⁰

¹¹⁰ For anti-Judaistic tendencies in codex D, see P. H. Menoud in the Bulletin of the Studiorum Novi Testamenti Societas, II (1951), p. 24, and Eldon Jay Epp, The Theological Tendency of Codex Bezae Cantabrigiensis in Acts (Cambridge, 1966), pp. 41 ff.