Complete textual-variant dossier
Sections distinguish readings, edition history, evidence, theological consequences, and the Research Center's evaluation. CBGM is an analytical tool; editorial committees—not the software—make textual decisions.
1Passage and issue
Passage
Acts 17:18
Issue
The Greek noun ἀνάστασις is the ordinary word for resurrection and is textually stable here.
Variant class
Substitution or composite variation
2Textus Receptus
Greek reading
he preached unto them Jesus, and the resurrection
Authorized Version
“Then certain philosophers of the Epicureans, and of the Stoicks, encountered him. And some said, What will this babbler say? other some, He seemeth to be a setter forth of strange gods: because he preached unto them Jesus, and the resurrection.” — Acts 17:18
Edition note
The Research Center uses the received Greek text underlying the Authorized Version as its baseline; edition-specific differences are recorded when the variation unit requires them.
3NA28 baseline and critical-text rationale
NA28 baseline reading
he proclaimed Jesus and the resurrection
Translation or explanation
he proclaimed Jesus and the resurrection
Metzger / UBS committee
Metzger reports the UBS4 committee's treatment of 2 variation units within this record's range. The notes ground the relevant decisions in the weight and distribution of external attestation, a proposed mechanism of accidental omission, scribal harmonization to a parallel passage, the likelihood of scribal or liturgical expansion; the printed confidence rating represented here is {B}. This is a controlled synopsis rather than a quotation.
Locator: Bruce M. Metzger, A Textual Commentary on the Greek New Testament, 2nd ed., notes on Acts 17:18, 17:18
ECM / CBGM evidence and editors
No passage-specific ECM/CBGM editorial explanation is attached to this record. Official method sources describe the CBGM as a set of coherence procedures, not a decision-maker: editors define variation units and local stemmata and evaluate pre-genealogical, genealogical, and stemmatic coherence together with transcriptional, intrinsic, and other philological evidence.
4UBS6 and intended NA29 revision
No UBS6 / intended NA29 main-text change is recorded for this passage in the controlled 169-change ledger.
No change row is attached to this passage.
UBS6 is published, and the German Bible Society identifies its Greek main text as identical to the intended NA29 main text. The complete NA29 volume and its apparatus remain forthcoming. Project-ledger rows retain their source and verification statements until they are checked against the published UBS6 text and, when available, the NA29 apparatus.
5Doctrinal and four-point analysis
Effect class
Weakening of explicit biblical testimony
Exact proposition affected
The bodily resurrection of Jesus Christ.
Doctrinal analysis
Passage: Acts 17:18 Received reading: he preached unto them Jesus, and the resurrection Principal competing reading: he proclaimed Jesus and the resurrection Issue class: Interpretation / Agreement Editorial status: Preliminary record accepted for staging; independent review remains pending. other some, He seemeth to be a setter forth of strange gods: because he preached unto them Jesus, and the resurrection.” The Greek noun ἀνάστασις is the ordinary word for resurrection and is textually stable here.
Bahnsen four-point examination
Arbitrariness
At Acts 17:18, the critical choice avoids arbitrariness only to the extent that it states public manuscript, transcriptional, and intrinsic grounds. Passage: Acts 17:18 Received reading: he preached unto them Jesus, and the resurrection Principal competing reading: he proclaimed Jesus and the resurrection Issue class: Interpretation / Agreement Editorial status: Preliminary record accepted for staging; independent review remains pending. Agreement at Acts 17:18 is not filler in a complete survey: it establishes that the focal claim remains available in both governing Greek controls and tests any allegation that modern editions weaken this particular passage; here they do not.
Inconsistency
The criteria used at Acts 17:18 must be applied to comparable readings as well. A principle such as age, difficulty, brevity, or coherence cannot be decisive here and quietly reversed elsewhere merely to escape a historical, grammatical, or theological difficulty.
Consequences
Weakening of explicit biblical testimony: Passage: Acts 17:18 Received reading: he preached unto them Jesus, and the resurrection Principal competing reading: he proclaimed Jesus and the resurrection Issue class: Interpretation / Agreement Editorial status: Preliminary record accepted for staging; independent review remains pending. other some, He seemeth to be a setter forth of strange gods: because he preached unto them Jesus, and the resurrection.” The Greek noun ἀνάστασις is the ordinary word for resurrection and is textually stable here.
Preconditions of intelligibility
The argument presupposes stable authorship, meaningful language, objective logical norms, transmissible evidence, and a coherent account of how Scripture can be received and identified by the church. The analysis tests whether the method can make those conditions intelligible without reducing the text to an indefinitely revisable editorial construct.
This framework examines an argument and its conditions; it does not claim to read an editor's private motives.
6Argument for the received reading
External and historical evidence
— Acts 17:18 Not every difficulty attached to Acts 17:18 is a manuscript difference. Treat the goddess proposal as historical interpretation, not as a manuscript variant; the text says Paul preached Jesus and resurrection. Sources and further reading The Holy Bible, Authorized Version, Acts 17:18.
Internal and transcriptional evidence
A source-level internal and transcriptional synopsis remains open; consult the full essay.
Reception and ecclesiastical use
Scrivener’s received text underlies the reading “he preached unto them Jesus, and the resurrection.”
Providential-preservation analysis
Providential preservation is not used as a substitute for evidence at Acts 17:18. It supplies the confessional context in which manuscript transmission, broad reception, and the church's actual possession of Scripture are evaluated together.
Response to the principal critical argument
Passage: Acts 17:18 Received reading: he preached unto them Jesus, and the resurrection Principal competing reading: he proclaimed Jesus and the resurrection Issue class: Interpretation / Agreement Editorial status: Preliminary record accepted for staging; independent review remains pending. Agreement at Acts 17:18 is not filler in a complete survey: it establishes that the focal claim remains available in both governing Greek controls and tests any allegation that modern editions weaken this particular passage; here they do not.
Conclusion
Read in place, Acts 17:18 stands beside stable narrative statements: Acts 17:17 says, “Therefore disputed he in the synagogue with the Jews, and with the devout persons, and in the market daily with them that met with him.” Acts 17:19 says, “And they took him, and brought him unto Areopagus, saying, May we know what this new doctrine, whereof thou speakest, is?”
Treat the goddess proposal as historical interpretation, not as a manuscript variant; the text says Paul preached Jesus and resurrection.
Read the full research essay and its sources
Passage: Acts 17:18
Received reading: he preached unto them Jesus, and the resurrection
Principal competing reading: he proclaimed Jesus and the resurrection
Issue class: Interpretation / Agreement
Editorial status: Preliminary record accepted for staging; independent review remains pending.
“Then certain philosophers of the Epicureans, and of the Stoicks,
encountered him. And some said, What will this babbler say? other some,
He seemeth to be a setter forth of strange gods: because he preached
unto them Jesus, and the resurrection.” — Acts 17:18
Not every difficulty attached to Acts 17:18 is a manuscript
difference.
The Greek noun ἀνάστασις is the ordinary word for resurrection and is
textually stable here. Some interpreters propose that Athenians mistook
the feminine noun for the name of a goddess paired with Jesus, but Luke
only says that they regarded Paul as proclaiming foreign divinities.
Scrivener’s received text underlies the reading “he preached unto
them Jesus, and the resurrection.” The principal competing form is “he
proclaimed Jesus and the resurrection.”
Agreement at Acts 17:18 is not filler in a complete survey: it
establishes that the focal claim remains available in both governing
Greek controls and tests any allegation that modern editions weaken this
particular passage; here they do not.
Read in place, Acts 17:18 stands beside stable narrative statements:
Acts 17:17 says, “Therefore disputed he in the synagogue with the Jews,
and with the devout persons, and in the market daily with them that met
with him.” Acts 17:19 says, “And they took him, and brought him unto
Areopagus, saying, May we know what this new doctrine, whereof thou
speakest, is?”
Treat the goddess proposal as historical interpretation, not as a
manuscript variant; the text says Paul preached Jesus and
resurrection.
Sources and further reading
- The Holy Bible, Authorized Version, Acts 17:18.
- F. H. A. Scrivener, The New Testament in the Original Greek
according to the Text Followed in the Authorised Version (1894),
Acts 17:18. - Michael W. Holmes, ed., The Greek New Testament: SBL
Edition, Acts 17:18 and apparatus.
7Related materials
Open a group to follow connected articles, books, biographies, media, research notes, variants, or downloads. Research Center relationships use permanent record IDs; external items retain their actual link.
- Record
- VAR-2271
- Status
- Preliminary
- Version
- 1.1-dossier
- Review
- Level B — Editorial synthesis
- Editor
- Chris Thomas
- Reviewer
- Independent reviewer pending assignment
- First date
- 1st century · Date Range
- Last revised
- 2026-07-22
Evidence and editorial controls
- Verification
- Passage, received reading, principal SBLGNT reading, and reported NA28 alignment checked against Scrivener’s received Greek text and the official SBLGNT text and comparison apparatus; exhaustive manuscript collation remains open. Metzger commentary entries were matched by exact passage where present; ECM/CBGM rationale is passage-specific only when an official editorial explanation is cited. Ledger rows are identified as UBS6 / intended NA29 data but retain their row-level verification caveats pending direct collation.
- Rights and access
- Original editorial synthesis. Authorized Version Scripture is public domain in the United States; cited editions and digital witnesses retain their stated rights and access conditions.
- Known limitations
- This staging record summarizes the defined variation unit and representative edition evidence. It is not a fresh collation of every extant manuscript, version, lectionary, patristic citation, or ECM coherence relation.
Links from this record
No public outgoing links are recorded.
Records that cite or connect here
No public backlinks are recorded.
Corrections and evidence submissions
No correction submission is presently attached to this record. Submit evidence or read the correction policy.
Chris Thomas, “Acts 17:18 — “Jesus and the Resurrection”: Did the Athenians Mistake *Anastasis* for a Goddess?,” VAR-2271, Confessional Bibliology Research Center, version 1.0-staging, last revised 2026-07-22.
Revision history
- — Chris Thomas