Does the King James Version wrongly translate Acts 5:30?
By Jeffrey T. Riddle
Dr Jeffrey T Riddle, Pastor of Christ Reformed Baptist Church, Louisa, Virginia.
“The God of our fathers raised up Jesus, whom ye slew and hanged on a tree” (Acts 5:30 King James Version).
“The God of our fathers raised up Jesus, whom you put to death by hanging Him on a tree” (Acts 5:30 Legacy Standard Bible).
Introduction
The King James (or Authorised) Version (KJV) of the Bible first appeared in print in 1611. It followed in the classic Tyndale-Geneva-Protestant tradition of English Bible translation, and quickly become the standard among English-speaking people. It has since been universally acknowledged as a literary and spiritual classic. Beginning in the late nineteenth century and extending up to the present, however, a concerted effort has been made to undermine and overthrow this classic version. It has been claimed, first, that the translation is not based on the most up-to-date modern critical text. In addition, it has been suggested that many of its translation decisions need to be updated and “improved.” A deluge of supposedly new and improved modern English translations has saturated the market and yet the venerable King James Version continues to stand firm in the esteem and use of many Christian readers.
A charge that the KJV wrongly translates Acts 5:30
In this article I want to examine a recent specific criticism that was publicly lodged against the KJV’s translation of Acts 5:30. This charge was made on February 18, 2023 by internet apologist and modern critical text defender James White of Phoenix, Arizona USA during a moderated debate with independent Baptist Pastor Thomas Ross. The topic of the debate was “The Legacy Standard Bible is superior to the King James Version,” with White defending this thesis and Ross opposing it. Note: The Legacy Standard Bible (LSB) was produced in 2021 and has been promoted by well-known American pastor John MacArthur. It is a revision of the New American Standard Bible (NASB).
During his opening argument in this debate, White claimed that the LSB was “translationally superior” to the KJV. He offered Acts 5:30 as a supposed key example to illustrate this point. White explained his argument as follows:
One simple error in translation that is easily recognized, but very hard to explain is Acts 5:30:
The God of our fathers raised up Jesus, whom ye slew and hanged on a tree (KJV). Think about what that is actually saying. Look at the LSB: The God of our fathers raised up Jesus, whom you put to death by hanging Him on a tree (LSB). (κρεμασαντες). The participle there (κρεμασαντες) is the means by which he was slain, by being hung on a tree.
White then added:
They didn’t kill him and then hang his body on a tree. The KJV simply misses the translation of the participle. And so you have to be able to admit, yes, they missed this translation. The LSB is superior here.
One should note that White’s challenge is not about the KJV’s text of Acts 5:30 but its translation. Indeed, if one were to compare the Greek text of Acts 5:30 in the modern critical text with the text in the Textus Receptus he would find it is the same. This is a translation issue, not a text issue.
According to White the problem is found in the final phrase in the Greek original and especially the proper translation of the participle (bold added): ον υμεις διεχειρισασθε κρεμασαντες επι ξυλου [hon humeis diercheirisasthe kremantes epi xulou]. Grammatically speaking, this phrase consists of a main finite verb, διεχειρισασθε [diercheirisasthe], followed by an adverbial participle, κρεμασαντες [kremantes]. On one hand, the KJV renders this final phrase in English with two finite verbs having the same subject (“ye”) connected by the conjunction “and” (participle in bold): “whom ye slew and hanged on a tree.” The LSB, on the other hand, translates the final phrase with a finite verb and a participle expressing means or instrument, adding the word “by” (participle in bold): “whom you put to death by hanging Him on a tree.”
According to White, the KJV’s translation of Acts 5:30 is a grammatical error. He also suggests it will cause confusion in the mind of the reader who might think that the body of the Lord Jesus was only hung on the tree (cross) after he had been put to death by some unexplained means. Such a person would supposedly not understand that Christ was put to death by means of hanging on a tree (i.e., by crucifixion).
The Classic Protestant English Bible Translation Tradition of Acts 5:30
To examine the validity of White’s charge, we begin by noting that the translation of Acts 5:30 in the KJV is not an innovation unique to it, but that it follows what might be called “The Classic Protestant English Bible Translation Tradition” of this verse. In other words, the KJV translators were simply following the translation tradition that had been established in previous English Protestant Bibles, stretching back to Tyndale. Here are a few examples (bold added):
- Tyndale NT (1534; from the Daniell modern spelling ed.): The God of our fathers raised up Jesus whom ye slew and hanged on [a] tree.
- Geneva (1560/1599; from the Tolle Lege ed.): The God of our fathers hath raised up Jesus whom ye slew, and hanged on a tree.
- Bishops’ Bible (1568; accessed from textusreceptusbibles.com): The God of our fathers raysed vp Iesus, whom ye slewe, & hanged on [a] tree.
- KJV (1611): The God of our fathers raised up Jesus, whom ye slew and hanged on a tree.
The previous English Protestant Bibles uniformly rendered the participle as a finite verb “and [ye] hanged on a tree.” White, then, is not merely charging the KJV of Acts 5:30 with error but the entire early English Protestant translation tradition.
The Modern English Bible Translation Tradition of Acts 5:30
We turn next to examine modern English translations of Acts 5:30. Here we likewise discover that the LSB is also not presenting anything novel in its translation of Acts 5:30. By translating the participle not as a finite verb but as a participle of means, it is simply following what one might call “The Modern English Bible Translation Tradition.”
Signs of departure from the classic approach appear in the English Revised Version (ERV) of 1881 and its American counterpart, the American Standard Version (ASV) of 1901 (bold added):
- ERV (1881): The God of our fathers raised up Jesus, whom ye slew, hanging him on a tree.
- ASV (1901): The God of our fathers raised up Jesus, whom ye slew, hanging him on a tree.
In both the ERV and ASV the participle is simply rendered with an “-ing” ending, as “hanging,” though without supplying the word “by” which would make explicit an emphasis on means or instrument.
Later modern English translations began adding “by,” offering a more overt interpretation of the participle as expressing means (“by hanging”). Compare these translations of Acts 5:30 in several modern version (bold added):
- RSV (1952): The God of our fathers raised Jesus whom you killed by hanging him on a tree.
- NIV (1984, 2011): The God of our ancestors raised Jesus from the dead—whom you killed by hanging him on a cross.
ESV (2001): The God of our fathers raised Jesus, whom you killed by hanging him on a tree.
- NASB (2020): The God of our fathers raised up Jesus, whom you put to death by hanging Him on a cross.
This is even true of the New King James Version (NKJV) and Modern English Version (MEV), both of which generally follow the Received Text in the New Testament. Again, the issue with Acts 5:30 is not text but translation. Compare:
NKJV (1982): The God of our fathers raised up Jesus whom you murdered by hanging on a tree.
MEV (2014): The God of our fathers raised Jesus, whom you killed by hanging on a tree.
The LSB’s rendering of Acts 5:30, therefore, is not presenting something new or innovative but simply following this “Modern English Bible Translation Tradition.”
Does the King James Version wrongly translate Acts 5:30?
The question remains whether the KJV translation is an error which modern translations are properly correcting. In his 2023 debate James White declared with confidence that that the KJV “misses” the proper translation of the participle in Acts 5:30 and risks causing confusion in the mind of the reader. In a series of Twitter/X posts following the White/Ross debate, Timothy Decker, a Greek teacher at an online seminary, voiced his agreement with White that, “the LSB is a superior translation to the KJV at Acts 5:30.” Decker later added regarding the KJV translation of Acts 5:30, “Syntactically, that is NOT viable. It would be special pleading at best to take that participle as an independent participle. No Greek speaker would ever hear it that way.”
Are the claims of White and Decker valid? In order to evaluate their assertions, it will be helpful to consult a reliable published work on the syntax of Biblical Greek. One such well respected work is James A. Brooks and Carlton L. Winbery’s Syntax of New Testament Greek, known by many students simply as “Brooks and Winbery.” This volume includes an extended discussion of the “adverbial participle” (when a participle is used alongside a main finite verb, as in Acts 5:30). The authors note that adverbial participles in the New Testament are “frequent and complicated,” offering ten possible subdivisions for understanding “the thought expressed” when this construction is used. The ten subdivisions (bold added):
- 1. temporal
- 2. telic
- 3. causal
- 4. conditional
- 5. concessive
- 6. instrumental
- 7. modal
- 8. complementary
- 9. circumstantial
- 10. imperatival
It is their discussion of the instrumental and circumstantial subdivisions that will be most relevant for our inquiry.
First, regarding the instrumental participle, Brooks and Winbery observe:
The participle indicates the means (or agent) by which (or by whom) the action of the main verb is carried out. The word “by” will ordinarily be found in the translation.
According to the authors, “by (verb)ing” is a grammatically possible interpretation of an adverbial participle. This is precisely the interpretation of the participle which appears in the “Modern English Bible Translation Tradition” of Acts 5:30. The final phrase in the LSB, following in this train, thus reads, “by hanging Him on a tree.” The instrumental participle is not, however, the only translational possibility offered by Brooks and Winbery.
Second, regarding the circumstantial participle, Brooks and Winbery observe:
A participle may be used to indicate an action which accompanies the action of the main verb. The actions indicated by the participle constitutes a rather loose addition to that of the main verb. The participle indicates something else that happened, an additional fact or thought, an incidental fact. There is no certain parallel in English, and it is difficult to translate literally. The best procedure is to translate the participle as though it were a finite verb and to connect it to the main verb by supplying the word “and.”
This describes precisely, in fact, the way in which the participle is interpreted in the classic “Protestant English Bible Translation Tradition” of Acts 5:30, including in the KJV. According to Brooks and Winbery, and contrary to White and Decker, this is a perfectly acceptable and grammatically fitting translation for an adverbial participle.
What about White’s further suggestion that the King James Version’s rendering of Acts 5:30 might confuse the reader causing him to think that the Lord Jesus was only hung on a tree (cross) after he had died? Such confusion hardly seems likely when one considers that any reader with even the most general familiarity with the Christian tradition concerning the life of Jesus would understand that he had been put to death by crucifixion and that his body was not merely placed on the tree (cross) after his death.
More Light From Acts 2:23
More light can also be shed on the translation of Acts 5:30 by comparing the translation of Acts 2:23. In Acts 2:23, in his Pentecost sermon, Peter declared, “Him, being delivered by the determinate counsel and foreknowledge of God, ye have taken, and by wicked hands have crucified and slain” (Acts 2:23 KJV bold added). The final phrase here is another example of a Greek construction that involves an adverbial participle and a main finite verb, “ye… have crucified and slain (προσπηξαντες ανειλετε [prospēxantes aneilete]),” though, in this case, the participle precedes the verb. It consists of an aorist particle προσπηξαντες [prospēxantes] from the verb meaning “to fasten to” (which refers to Christ being fastened or nailed to the cross), and the main finite verb ανειλετε [aneilete], a second aorist verb in the second person plural meaning, “ye slew.” As in Acts 5:30, the KJV of Acts 2:23 translates the adverbial participle circumstantially as a finite verb (“crucified”) with the conjunction “and” and the finite verb (“slain”): “ye… have crucified and slain.”
Of further interest for our investigation is the LSB’s translation of Acts 2:23, which reads (bold added), “this Man, delivered over by the predetermined plan and foreknowledge of God, you nailed to a cross by the hands of lawless men and put Him to death.” At Acts 2:23 the LSB does not, in fact, translate the adverbial participle as instrumental, as in Acts 5:30, but as circumstantial. It renders the participle as a finite verb (“you nailed to a cross”) with the conjunction “and” and the finite verb (“and put Him to death”): “you nailed to a cross… and put Him to death.” This demonstrates that the LSB also sometimes renders adverbial participles as circumstantial, rather than instrumental. For an example of a modern translation which renders the participle in Acts 2:23 as instrumental, rather than circumstantial, one may consult the Contemporary English Bible (CEB) which translates the final phrase (bold added), “You… had Jesus killed by nailing him to a cross.”
Conclusion
This brief examination has demonstrated that any claim that the KJV translation of Acts 5:30 “misses” a proper rendering or is somehow grammatically inaccurate is completely false. The KJV translation of Acts 5:30, in fact, reflects the classic Protestant English Bible Translation Tradition. According to contemporary experts in the syntax of New Testament Greek, like Brooks and Winbery, its translation of the adverbal participle as circumstantial is perfectly appropriate. Even the LSB renders a participle in a similar manner in Acts 2:23. It is my hope that this brief study might remind us to give careful scrutiny to contemporary claims made against the accuracy of the KJV’s translation decisions before accepting them at face value. As Solomon said, “He that is first in his own causes seemeth just; but his neighbour cometh and searcheth him” (Proverbs 18:17).