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The Holy Bible, Berean Study Bible
Acts 7:51
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"You boneheaded people! Y'all have the hearts of heathens and deaf ears to the truth. Y'all sit right here on your comfy seats and deny the power of the Holy Spirit. But y'all weren't the only ones to do it. Your ancestors did it, too.
"You men who are stiff-necked and uncircumcised in heart and ears are always resisting the Holy Spirit; you are doing just as your fathers did.
"You men—stiff-necked and uncircumcised in heart and ears—are always resisting the Holy Spirit. As your fathers did, so do you.
You whose hearts are hard and whose ears are shut to me; you are ever working against the Holy Spirit; as your fathers did, so do you.
O stiffnecked and uncircumcised in heart and ears, *ye* do always resist the Holy Spirit; as your fathers, *ye* also.
"You stiff-necked and uncircumcised in heart and ears! You always resist the Holy Spirit; as your fathers did, so do you.
"You stiff-necked people with uncircumcised hearts and ears! You are always resisting the Holy Spirit; as your ancestors did, so do you.
"You stiff-necked and uncircumcised in heart and ears, you always resist the Holy Spirit! As your fathers did, so you do.
as your fathers, so do ye.
"O stiff-necked men, uncircumcised in heart and ears, you also are continually at strife with the Holy Spirit--just as your forefathers were.
Ye stifnecked and vncircumcised in heart, and eares, ye doe alwayes resist the holy Ghost? as your fathers did, so doe ye.
Oh stiffnecked and uncircumcised in heart and in the ears! You always fell against the Holy Spirit. As your fathers did , you also did .
Ye styffnecked & of vncircumcysed hertes and eares, ye allwaye resiste the holy goost: Eue as yor fathers dyd, so do ye also.
stubborn people, whose hearts and ears like the uncircumcised, are always averse to the holy spirit: as your fathers did, so do ye.
"And you continue, so bullheaded! Calluses on your hearts, flaps on your ears! Deliberately ignoring the Holy Spirit, you're just like your ancestors. Was there ever a prophet who didn't get the same treatment? Your ancestors killed anyone who dared talk about the coming of the Just One. And you've kept up the family tradition—traitors and murderers, all of you. You had God's Law handed to you by angels—gift-wrapped!—and you squandered it!"
"You stiff-necked and stubborn people, uncircumcised in heart and ears, you are always actively resisting the Holy Spirit. You are doing just as your fathers did.
Ye stiffnecked and uncircumcised in heart and ears, ye do always resist the Holy Spirit: as your fathers did, so do ye.
"You stiff-necked people, uncircumcised in heart and ears, you always resist the Holy Spirit. As your fathers did, so do you.
Ye stiffenecked and of vncircumcised hertes and eares: ye have all wayes resisted the holy goost: as youre fathers dyd so do ye.
You stiff-necked and uncircumcised in heart and ears, you always resist the Holy Spirit: as your fathers did, so do you.
Ye stiff-necked, and uncircumcised in heart and ears, ye do always resist the Holy Spirit: as your fathers [did], so [do] ye.
`Ye stiff-necked and uncircumcised in heart and in ears! ye do always the Holy Spirit resist; as your fathers -- also ye;
Stephen continued speaking: "You stubborn people! You have not given your hearts to God, nor will you listen to him! You are always against what the Holy Spirit is trying to tell you, just as your ancestors were.
"You stubborn people, with uncircumcised hearts and ears! You are always resisting the Holy Spirit, like your ancestors did!
You stubborn and hardheaded people! You are always fighting against the Holy Spirit, just as your ancestors did.
" Stiffnecked people , with uncircumcised hearts and ears! You continually oppose the Ruach HaKodesh! You do the same things your fathers did!
"You stiff-necked people, uncircumcised in heart and ears, you always resist the Holy Spirit. As your fathers did, so do you.
Ye stiffenecked and of vncircumcised heartes and eares, ye haue alwayes resisted the holy Ghost: as your fathers did, so do you.
O you stubborn and insincere in heart and hearing, you always resist the Holy Spirit: as your fathers did, so do you.
"You stiff-necked and uncircumcised in heart and ears, you always resist the Ruach HaKodesh! As your fathers did, so you do.
"You stubborn people with uncircumcised hearts and ears! You are always opposing the Holy Spirit, just as your ancestors used to do.Exodus 32:9; 33:3; Leviticus 26:41; Deuteronomy 10:16; Isaiah 48:4; Jeremiah 4:4; 6:10; 9:26; Ezekiel 44:9;">[xr]
O, hardened of neck and uncircumcised in your hearts and in your hearing, you at all times against the Spirit of Holiness stand up; as your fathers, so you also.
O ye stiff of neck, and uncircumcised in their heart, and in their hearing; ye do always set yourselves against the Holy Spirit; as your fathers, so also ye.
"You stubborn people! You are heathen at heart and deaf to the truth. Must you forever resist the Holy Spirit? That's what your ancestors did, and so do you!
"You have hard hearts and ears that will not listen to me! You are always working against the Holy Spirit. Your early fathers did. You do too.
Ye stiffnecked and uncircumcised in heart and ears, ye do always resist the Holy Ghost: as your fathers did, so do ye.
"You stiff-necked people, uncircumcised in heart and ears, you are forever opposing the Holy Spirit, just as your ancestors used to do.
Ye stiff-necked and uncircumcised in hearts and in ears, ye, always, against the Holy Spirit, do strive! As your fathers, ye also:
You stiffnecked and uncircumcised in heart and ears, you always resist the Holy Ghost. As your fathers did, so do you also.
Ye stiffnecked and uncircumcised in heart and ears, ye do always resist the Holy Ghost: as your fathers did, so do ye.
"You stiff-necked people and uncircumcised in hearts and in your ears! You constantly resist the Holy Spirit! As your fathers did, so also do you!
Ye styfnecked and of vncircumcised heartes and eares, ye haue alwayes resisted the holy ghost: as your fathers dyd, so do ye.
Then Stephen said, "You stubborn Jewish leaders! You refuse to give your hearts to God or even listen to him. You are always against what the Holy Spirit wants you to do. That's how your ancestors were, and you are just like them!
"You men who are stiff-necked and uncircumcised in heart and ears are always resisting the Holy Spirit; you are doing just as your fathers did.
"How stubborn you are!" Stephen went on to say. "How heathen your hearts, how deaf you are to God's message! You are just like your ancestors: you too have always resisted the Holy Spirit!
With hard nol, and vncircumcidid hertis and eris ye withstoden eueremore the Hooli Goost; and as youre fadris, so ye.
Contextual Overview
Bible Verse Review
from Treasury of Scripure Knowledge
stiffnecked: Exodus 32:9, Exodus 33:3, Exodus 33:5, Exodus 34:9, Deuteronomy 9:6, Deuteronomy 9:13, Deuteronomy 31:27, 2 Chronicles 30:8, Nehemiah 9:16, Psalms 75:5, Psalms 78:8, Isaiah 48:4, Jeremiah 17:23, Ezekiel 2:4, Zechariah 7:11, Zechariah 7:12
uncircumcised: Leviticus 26:41, Deuteronomy 10:16, Deuteronomy 30:6, Jeremiah 4:4, Jeremiah 6:10, Jeremiah 9:25, Jeremiah 9:26, Ezekiel 44:7, Ezekiel 44:9, Romans 2:25, Romans 2:28, Romans 2:29, Philippians 3:3, Colossians 2:11
resist: Acts 6:10, Nehemiah 9:30, Isaiah 63:10, Ephesians 4:30
as: Acts 7:9, Acts 7:27, Acts 7:35, Acts 7:39, Matthew 23:31-33
Reciprocal: Genesis 6:3 - My Exodus 6:12 - am Leviticus 19:23 - uncircumcised Numbers 16:3 - gathered Numbers 32:14 - an increase Deuteronomy 1:26 - General Deuteronomy 1:43 - but rebelled Deuteronomy 9:14 - Let me Deuteronomy 9:24 - General Deuteronomy 32:5 - a perverse 1 Samuel 8:8 - General 1 Samuel 10:27 - children 2 Kings 19:28 - thy rage 2 Kings 21:20 - as his father 2 Chronicles 33:10 - General Ezra 9:7 - Since the days Psalms 55:11 - Wickedness Psalms 106:6 - General Proverbs 1:29 - that Ecclesiastes 1:10 - it hath Isaiah 1:4 - Ah sinful Isaiah 5:4 - General Isaiah 7:13 - will ye Isaiah 30:1 - the rebellious Isaiah 30:9 - this is Isaiah 43:27 - first father Isaiah 46:12 - ye stouthearted Isaiah 58:1 - spare Isaiah 65:2 - a rebellious Jeremiah 7:26 - but Jeremiah 11:10 - iniquities Jeremiah 11:21 - thou Jeremiah 13:10 - imagination Jeremiah 19:15 - because Jeremiah 22:22 - thy pastors Jeremiah 25:4 - ye Jeremiah 32:30 - children Ezekiel 2:3 - rebelled Ezekiel 3:8 - General Ezekiel 12:2 - thou Ezekiel 16:43 - but hast Ezekiel 20:4 - cause Ezekiel 20:18 - the statutes Ezekiel 20:30 - Are ye Ezekiel 23:36 - declare Ezekiel 24:3 - the rebellious Ezekiel 28:10 - the deaths Ezekiel 32:25 - all of them Daniel 9:6 - have we Hosea 2:2 - Plead with Hosea 11:2 - they called Amos 2:11 - and Amos 6:12 - for Micah 2:6 - Prophesy ye Micah 3:2 - hate Micah 3:8 - to declare Zechariah 1:4 - unto Malachi 3:7 - from the Matthew 5:12 - for so Matthew 12:31 - but Matthew 13:57 - A prophet Matthew 22:6 - the remnant Matthew 23:34 - ye Matthew 23:37 - thou Mark 8:31 - rejected Mark 10:5 - For Mark 11:28 - General Luke 6:23 - for in Luke 11:29 - This is Luke 11:47 - for Luke 19:14 - General Luke 20:2 - who John 1:11 - and John 7:7 - because John 8:43 - ye cannot John 14:26 - Holy Ghost John 16:9 - General Acts 5:39 - to fight Acts 13:46 - seeing Acts 19:9 - divers Romans 10:21 - a disobedient 1 Thessalonians 5:19 - the Spirit Hebrews 9:8 - Holy Ghost Hebrews 10:29 - and hath 1 Peter 1:18 - received
Gill's Notes on the Bible
Ye stiffnecked,.... Or "hard necked", the same with
קשה עורף, which is a character frequently given of this people, Exodus 32:9 and elsewhere, and is expressive of their obstinacy, stubbornness and refractoriness; who would not submit their necks to the yoke of God's law, and be obedient to his commands:
and uncircumcised in heart and ears; for though they had the mark of circumcision in their flesh, of which they boasted; yet they had not the true circumcision of the heart; their hearts were not circumcised to fear and love the Lord, nor their ears to hear the word of the Lord and the Gospel of Christ; so that notwithstanding their confidence in carnal privileges, they were uncircumcised persons:
ye do always resist the Holy Ghost; the resistance made by these persons was not to the Spirit of God in them, of which they were destitute, but to the Spirit of God in his ministers, in his apostles, and particularly in Stephen; nor to any internal operation of his grace, but to the external ministry of the word, and to all that objective light, knowledge, evidence, and conviction that it gave of Jesus's being the Messiah: and such who resist Christ's ministers, resist him, and such who resist him, may be said to resist his Holy Spirit; and the word here used signifies a rushing against, and falling upon, in a rude and hostile way, and fitly expresses their ill treatment of Christ and his ministers, by falling upon them and putting them to death: which is the resistance here designed, as appears by the following verse: so that this passage is no proof of the resistance of the Holy Spirit, and the operations of his grace in conversion, when he is in men, and acts with a purpose and will to convert them; since it does not appear that he was in these persons, and was acting in them, with a design to convert them; and if he was, it wilt be difficult to prove that they so resisted, and continued to resist, as that they were not hereafter converted; since it is certain that one of them, Saul, was really and truly converted, and how many more we know not. Though it will be allowed, that the Holy Ghost in the operations of his grace upon the heart in conversion may be resisted, that is, opposed; but not so as to be overcome or be hindered in, or be obliged to cease from, the work of conversion, insomuch that may come to nothing:
as your fathers did, so do ye; or as "your fathers were, so are ye"; as they were stiffnecked, self-willed, obstinate, and inflexible, so are ye; as they were uncircumcised in heart and ears, so are ye; and as they resisted the Spirit of God in his prophets, so do ye resist him in the apostles and ministers of the Gospel.
Barnes' Notes on the Bible
Ye stiff-necked - The discourse of Stephen has every appearance of having been interrupted by the clamors and opposition of the Sanhedrin. This verse has no immediate connection with what precedes, and appears to have been spoken in the midst of opposition and clamor. If we may conjecture in this case, it would seem that the Jews saw the drift of his argument; that they interrupted him; and that when the tumult had somewhat subsided, he addressed them in the language of this verse, showing them that they sustained a character precisely similar to their rebellious fathers. The word “stiff-necked” is often used in the Old Testament, Exodus 32:9; Exodus 33:3, Exodus 33:5; Exodus 34:9; Deuteronomy 9:6, Deuteronomy 9:13; Deuteronomy 10:16, etc. It is a figurative expression taken from oxen that are refractory, and that will not submit to be yoked. Applied to people, it means that they are stubborn, contumacious, and unwilling to submit to the restraints of Law.
Uncircumcised in heart - Circumcision was a sign of being a Jew - of acknowledging the authority of the laws of Moses. It was also emblematic of purity, and of submission to the Law of God. The expression “uncircumcised in heart” denotes those who were not willing to acknowledge that Law, and submit to it. They had hearts filled with vicious and unsubdued affections and desires.
And ears - That is, who are unwilling to “hear” what God says. Compare Leviticus 26:41; Jeremiah 9:26. See the notes on Romans 2:28-29.
Resist the Holy Ghost - You oppose the message which is brought to you by the authority of God and the inspiration of his Spirit. The message brought by Moses; by the prophets; by the Saviour; and by the apostles - all by the infallible direction of the Holy Spirit - they and their fathers opposed.
As your fathers did ... - As he had specified in Acts 7:27, Acts 7:35, Acts 7:39-43.
Clarke's Notes on the Bible
Verse 51. Ye stiff-necked — σκληροτραχηλοι. A metaphor taken from untoward oxen, who cannot be broken into the yoke; and whose strong necks cannot be bended to the right or the left.
Uncircumcised in heart and ears — This was a Jewish mode of speech, often used by the prophets. Circumcision was instituted, not only as a sign and seal of the covenant into which the Israelites entered with their Maker, but also as a type of that purity and holiness which the law of God requires; hence there was an excision of what was deemed not only superfluous but also injurious; and by this cutting off, the propensity to that crime which ruins the body, debases the mind, and was generally the forerunner of idolatry, was happily lessened. It would be easy to prove this, were not the subject too delicate. Where the spirit of disobedience was found, where the heart was prone to iniquity, and the ears impatient of reproof and counsel, the person is represented as uncircumcised in those parts, because devoted to iniquity, impatient of reproof, and refusing to obey. In Pirkey Eliezer, chap. 29, "Rabbi Seira said, There are five species of uncircumcision in the world; four in man, and one in trees. Those in man are the following:-
"1. Uncircumcision of the EAR. Behold, their EAR is uncircumcised, and they cannot hearken, Jeremiah 6:10.
"2. The uncircumcision of the LIPS. How shall Pharaoh hear me, who am of uncircumcised LIPS? Exodus 6:12.
"3. Uncircumcision of HEART. If then their uncircumcised HEARTS be humbled, Leviticus 26:41.
Circumcise therefore the FORESKIN of your HEART, Deuteronomy 10:16; Jeremiah 4:4.
For all the house of Israel are uncircumcised in the HEART, Jeremiah 9:26.
"4. The uncircumcision of the FLESH. Ye shall circumcise the FLESH of your FORESKIN, c., Genesis 17:11."
Ye do always resist the Holy Ghost —
1. Because they were uncircumcised in heart, they always resisted the influences of the Holy Spirit, bringing light and conviction to their minds in consequence of which they became hardened through the deceitfulness of sin, and neither repented at the preaching of John, nor credited the glad tidings told them by Christ and the apostles.
2. Because they were uncircumcised in ears, they would neither hear nor obey Moses, the prophets, Christ, nor the apostles.
As your fathers did, so do ye. — They were disobedient children, of disobedient parents: in all their generations they had been disobedient and perverse. This whole people, as well as this text, are fearful proofs that the Holy Spirit, the almighty energy of the living God, may be resisted and rendered of none effect. This Spirit is not sent to stocks, stones, or machines, but to human beings endued with rational souls; therefore it is not to work on them with that irresistible energy which it must exert on inert matter, in order to conquer the vis inertiae or disposition to abide eternally in a motionless state, which is the state of all inanimate beings; but it works upon understanding, will, judgment, conscience, c., in order to enlighten, convince, and persuade. If, after all, the understanding, the eye of the mind, refuses to behold the light the will determines to remain obstinate; the judgment purposes to draw false inferences; and the conscience hardens itself against every check and remonstrance, (and all this is possible to a rational soul, which must be dealt with in a rational way,) then the Spirit of God, being thus resisted, is grieved, and the sinner is left to reap the fruit of his doings. To force the man to see, feel, repent, believe, and be saved, would be to alter the essential principles of his creation and the nature of mind, and reduce him into the state of a machine, the vis inertiae of which was to be overcome and conducted by a certain quantum of physical force, superior to that resistance which would be the natural effect of the certain quantum of the vis inertiae possessed by the subject on and by which this agent was to operate. Now, man cannot be operated on in this way, because it is contrary to the laws of his creation and nature; nor can the Holy Ghost work on that as a machine which himself has made a free agent. Man therefore may, and generally does, resist the Holy Ghost; and the whole revelation of God bears unequivocal testimony to this most dreadful possibility, and most awful truth. It is trifling with the sacred text to say that resisting the Holy Ghost here means resisting the laws of Moses, the exhortations, threatenings, and promises of the prophets, c. These, it is true, the uncircumcised ear may resist but the uncircumcised heart is that alone to which the Spirit that gave the laws, exhortations, promises, c, speaks; and, as matter resists matter, so spirit resists spirit. These were not only uncircumcised in ear, but uncircumcised also in heart; and therefore they resisted the Holy Ghost, not only in his declarations and institutions, but also in his actual energetic operations upon their minds.
