Beckoning with his hand. — The gesture was rather that of one who waves his hand to command silence and attention than what we commonly describe as beckoning. (Comp. Acts 12:17.) The graphic touch of description would seem to indicate, as does the full report of the speech, that they came in the first instance from one who had been present. A like touch is found again in connection with St. Paul in Acts 21:40. It was, probably, like the “fixing of the eye,” in Acts 13:9, just one of the personal characteristics on which the painter-historian loved to dwell. We may assume, as almost certain, that throughout this journey St. Paul used Greek as the common medium of intercourse. The verbal coincidences in Acts 13:17-18, already referred to in the Note on Acts 13:15, make it, in this instance, absolutely certain.
Men of Israel, and ye that fear God. — The latter phrase denotes, as in Acts 10:2; Acts 10:22, those who, though in the synagogue, were of heathen origin, and had not become proselytes in the full sense of the term, but were known as the so-called “proselytes of the gate.”
Give audience. — Literally, hear ye. The English phrase may be noted as an example of the use of the word “audience,” which has since been applied to the persons who hear, in the old abstract sense of the act of hearing.