THE ACTS OF THE APOSTLES - Chapter 13 - Verse 18

Verse 18. And about the time of forty years. They were this time going from Egypt to the land of Canaan, Ex 16:35; Nu 33:38.

Suffered he their manners. This passage has been very variously rendered. See the margin. Syriac, "He nourished them," etc. Arabic, He blessed them, and nourished them," etc. The word is not elsewhere used in the New Testament. The word properly means, to tolerate, or endure the conduct of any one, implying that that conduct is evil, and tends to provoke to punishment. This is doubtless its meaning here. Probably Paul referred to the passage in De 1:31: "The Lord thy God bare thee." But instead of this word, etropoforhsen, many Mss. read etrofoforhsen, he sustained or nourished. This reading was followed by the Syriac, Arabic, and has been admitted by Griesbach into the text. This is also found in the Septuagint, in De 1:31, which place Paul doubtless referred to. This would well suit the connexion of the passage; and a change of a single letter might easily have occurred in a Ms. It adds to the probability that this is the true reading, that it accords with De 1:31; Nu 11:12; De 32:10.

It is furthermore not probable that Paul would have commenced a discourse by reminding them of the obstinacy and wickedness of the nation. Such a course would rather tend to exasperate than to conciliate; but by reminding them of the mercies of God to them, and slowing them that God had been their protector, he was better fitting them for his main purpose—that of showing them the kindness of the God of their fathers in sending to them a Saviour.

In the wilderness. The desert through which they passed in going from Egypt to Canaan.

{d} "forty years" Ex 13:14,16 {1} "suffered he their manners" "etropoforhsen, perhaps for

etrofoforhsen, bore or

fed them, as a nurse beareth or feedeth her child, De 1:31

according to the Seventy; and so Chrysostam.