Acts 7

¹ So the chief priest said: Does he have these [things] thusly? ² So he spoke: Men brothers and fathers, hear [me]. The God of glory was seen by our father Abraham while he was in Mesopotamia before which he [was] dwelling in Charran. ³ And he said to him: Go out from your land and your relatives, and come to the land which I will show you. ⁴ Then having gone out from the land of [the] Chaldeans he dwelt in Charran. And from there after the death of his father he resettled him in this land in which you now dwell, ⁵ and he did not give him [the] inheritance in it, not [even a] foot step [in it], and he promised to give to him possession of it and to his seed after him, while there was no child to him. ⁶ So God spoke thusly, that his seed will be strangers in another's land, and they will enslave it and treat-it-evil-ly for four hundred years, ⁷ and the nation by which they are enslaved I will judge, said God, and after these [things] they will come out and will serve me in this place. ⁸ And he gave to them [the] contract of circumcision; and thus he begat Isaac and circumcised him on the eighth day, and Isaac [begat] Jacob, and Jacob the twelve patriarchs. ⁹ And the patriarchs having been jealous of Joseph sold him to Egypt, and God was with him, ¹⁰ and took him out of all his distresses, and gave to him grace and wisdom before Pharaoh king of Egypt, and appointed him ruler over Egypt and his whole house. ¹¹ So [a] famine came upon all Egypt and Canaan, and [a] great distress, and our fathers were not finding food. ¹² So Jacob having heard [there] is food in Egypt, he first sent out our fathers. ¹³ And in the second [time] Joseph was made known to his brothers, and Joseph's people became manifest to Pharaoh. ¹⁴ So Joseph having sent [them], he summoned Jacob his father and all his relatives, seventy five psyche-lives¹ . ¹⁵ And Jacob went down into Egypt, and he came to [his] end, and [also] our fathers, ¹⁶ and they were moved to Suchem and placed in the tomb which Abraham bought for the price of [a] field beside the sons of Emmor in Suchem. ¹⁷ And just as the time of the promise drew near which God professed to Abraham, the people increased, and multiplied in Egypt, ¹⁸ until another king arose in Egypt, who knew not Joseph. ¹⁹ This [one] having gotten the better² of our people, treated-evil-ly the fathers by doing the abandonment of their infants so as not to preserve [them] zoe-alive³ . ²⁰ In the opportune-time⁴ Moses was born, and he was acceptable to God, who was reared for three months in the house of his father. ²¹ But when he exposed him, Pharaoh's daughter took him up and reared him for herself for [a] son. ²² And Moses was educated in all the wisdom of Egypt, and he was powerful in his words and deeds. ²³ Now as forty years time was fulfilled to him, it rose up upon his heart to visit his brothers the sons of Israel. ²⁴ And seeing [one] doing injustice, he retaliated, and did vengeance for the oppressed, having struck down the Egyptian. ²⁵ Now he thought his brothers understood that God would give them salvation through his hand, but they did not understand. ²⁶ And on the next day it was seen them fighting, and he reconciled them to peace saying: Men, you are brothers. Why do you do injustice to each other? ²⁷ But the [one] doing injustice to his neighbor refused him saying: Who appointed you ruler and judge over us? ²⁸ You don't want to kill me as you yesterday killed the Egyptian, [do you]? ²⁹ So Moses fled in this word, and became [a] dweller in the land Madiam, where he begat two sons. ³⁰ And when forty years were fulfilled, there was seen by him in the wilderness of the mount Sinai [an] angel in [the] flame of [a] firey bush. ³¹ So when Moses saw he marveled at the sight, so when he came to examine, [the] voice of the Lord came to pass: ³² I am the God [of your] fathers, the God [of] Abraham and Isaac and Jacob. Now Moses having become trembling, he did not dare to examine [it]. ³³ So the Lord said to him: Loose the sandals [of your] feet, for the place upon which you stand is holy ground⁵ . ³⁴ Having seen, I have seen the oppression of my people in Egypt and have heard their groaning, and have come down to take them out, and now come [and] I will send you to Egypt. ³⁵ This Moses, whom they denied saying: Who appointed you ruler and judge? God sent this [one] both ruler and deliverer with [the] hand of [the] angel seen to him in the bush. ³⁶ This [man] brought them out having done wonders and signs in [the] land of Egypt and in the Red Sea and in the wilderness forty years. ³⁷ This is the Moses having said to the sons of Israel: God will raise to you [a] prophet like me from your brothers. ³⁸ This is the [one] having come to be in the assembly⁶ in the wilderness with the angel who spoke to him in the mount Sinai and of our fathers, who showed [him] zoe-living³ oracles to give you, ³⁹ to whom our fathers did not wish to become obedient, but they rejected [him] and turned in their hearts to Egypt, ⁴⁰ saying to Aaron: Make for us gods which will go before us. For this Moses, who brought us out of the land of Egypt, we do not know what has come to pass to him. ⁴¹ And they made [a] calf in those days and offered sacrifices to the idol, and were cheered by the works of their hands. ⁴² But God turned and delivered them to be ministering to the host of heaven, just as it is written in [the] scroll of [the] prophets:

Offerings and sacrifices you did not offer me
Forty years in the wilderness, house of Israel.
⁴³ And you took the tent of Molech
And the star of the god Rompha,
The image which you made to be worshipping them
And I will move you beyond Babylon.

⁴⁴ The tent of the testimony was to our fathers in the wilderness, just as the [one] speaking commanded Moses to make it according to the image which he say, ⁴⁵ which our fathers who came after brought in with Joshua into the possession of the nations, whom God expelled from the face of our fathers, until the days of David, ⁴⁶ who found grace before God and requested⁷ to be finding [a] tabernacle for the house⁸ of Jacob. ⁴⁷ Now Solomon built to him [a] house. ⁴⁸ But the highest [one] does not dwell in what is made with hands. For just as the prophets says:

⁴⁹ Heaven is my throne
And the land [a] footstool for my feet.
What sort of house will you build me, says [the] Lord,
Or what place of rest for me?
⁵⁰ Did not my hand make all these [things]

⁵¹ Stiff-necked and uncircumcised in hearts and ears, you always resisted the Holy Spirit: as your fathers, you also. ⁵² Which of the prophets did your fathers not persecute? And they killed those announcing beforehand concerning the coming of justice, of which you are now become traitors and murderers, ⁵³ who received the law to the ordinance of angels, and you do not keep it.

⁵⁴ Now having heard these [things] they were infuriated in their hearts and gnashed their teeth upon him. ⁵⁵ But being full of [the] Holy Spirit, having looked intently into heaven he saw [the] glory of God and Jesus standing at the right [hand] of God. ⁵⁷ But having cried out with [a] great voice, they stopped their ears, and rushed with one purpose upon him, ⁵⁸ and having thrown him out of the city, they were stoning [him]. And the witnesses laid down their garments beside the feet of [a] young man being called Saul. ⁵⁹ And they were stoning Stephen, who [was] calling out and saying: Lord Jesus, receive my spirit. ⁶⁰ And having knelt he cried out with [a] great voice: Lord do not place to them this sin. And having said this he fell asleep.

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¹from PSYCHE (ψυχη): an individual manifestation of life/consciousness. Animals have PSYCHEs as well as humans. Contrast ZOE (ζωη)—Life 'collectively', interdependent, interconnected.

²or "taken advantage of by trickery"

³from ZOE "ZOH-ay" (ζωη)—Life 'collectively', interdependent, interconnected. Although it means 'life' in the conventional sense (for example: Matt.9:18, Matt.27:63, Luke.2:36, Acts.25:24, Rom.7:2, 2Cor.1:8, 1Thes.4:17, 1Tim.5:10, Rev.19:20), Jesus uses ZOE exclusively of 'life eternal' (with the possible exceptions of Luke.15:13, Luke.16:25). The other N.T. writers use ZOE in both senses—temporal and eternal, generally clear from the context. The Father is the 'zoe-living God' (see Matt.16:16). The Septuagint (LXX) in Gen.2:7 has "...[God] breathed into his nostrils the breath of zoe-life, and the man became a zoe-living psyche-life" (and see 1Cor.15:45); and Gen.3:20 (LXX) "And Adam called his wife's name ZOE, because she was the mother of all zoe-living." Contrast PSYCHE (ψυχη): an individual manifestation of life/consciousness. See John.12:25 where both ZOE and PSYCHE occur. Greek also has the word BIOS (βιoς ) for 'life' in the sense of biological processes.

⁴KAIROS (καιρoς ) `opportune time', `proper time', `season'

⁵GE "GAY" (γη) "earth", "land" (remember that they didn't understand about the Earth being a planet floating in space yet), sometimes "ground" or "dirt".

⁶EKKLESIA (εκκλησια) from "called out". Appears 114 times in the N.T., but only in two places in the Gospels ( Matt.16:18 (twice) and Matt.18:17 (twice)). It's worth noting that when Jesus uses the term EKKLESIA, Christian community as we know it didn't yet exist—there were only the disciples. EKKLESIA is apparently different from 'synagogue' (SYNAGOGE (συναγωγη) which occurs 56 times in the N.T.) EKKLESIA is used in secular Greek literature of a popular assembly 'called to assemble', and also of those 'called' to a cult. EKKLESIA is used frequently in the N.T. outside of the Gospels to refer to Christian communities, but in Acts.7:38 it is used of the people of Israel led through the desert by Moses, and in Acts.19:32 ff. of a secular assembly. Thus, all told, the common translation of EKKLESIA as 'church' doesn't really reflect 1st century usage—it seems to mean more like 'a group of people assembled for some specific purpose'.

⁷AITEO "ay-TEH-oh" (αιτεω) "request", "demand", "beg" something for oneself. Far from humbly requesting—it's more like 'demanding'. Jesus uses AITEO only of the prayer of others, not of His own (cf. John.16:26)—and not requesting things for Himself, only for others. AITEO seems to suppose a lesser degree of intimacy than EROTAO (ερωταω), hence AITEO is used of the requests of the disciples to God, but EROTAO of the requests of the disciples to Jesus, and of those of Jesus to the Father ( John.14:16). AITEO is demanding/begging/pleading, EROTAO is polite and friendlier. Both AITEO and EROTAO occur in John.16:26.

⁸"house" p⁷⁴ℵBD; "God" K vg