Acts 18:6
And when they opposed themselves, and blasphemed, he shook his raiment, and said unto them, Your blood be upon your own heads; I am clean: from henceforth I will go unto the Gentiles.
Study Note
Study Note
Paul's dramatic gesture of shaking out his garments and declaring 'your blood be upon your own heads; I am clean; from henceforth I will go unto the Gentiles' invokes the prophetic tradition of symbolic action and oath-of-disavowal (Ezekiel 3:18–19; 33:4–6: the watchman's responsibility ends with warning). The phrase 'your blood be upon your own heads' transfers legal-moral responsibility for the consequences of rejection from Paul to his audience, mirroring the moral accounting of Matthew 27:25 but in a missionary rather than legal context. The turn to the Gentiles in Corinth parallels the pattern established in Pisidian Antioch (13:46) and anticipates Rome (28:28), creating a structural pattern in Acts of Jewish rejection → Gentile mission that Luke deploys to explain the shape of early Christian expansion. The verse is important for understanding how Acts theologizes the relationship between Jewish unresponsiveness and Gentile receptivity.
Other Translations
And when they opposed themselves and blasphemed, he shook out his raiment and said unto them, Your blood be upon your own heads; I am clean: from henceforth I will go unto the Gentiles.
and on their resisting and speaking evil, having shaken <FI>his<Fi> garments, he said unto them, `Your blood <FI>is<Fi> upon your head--I am clean; henceforth to the nations I will go on.'
And when they put themselves against him, and said evil words, he said, shaking his clothing, Your blood be on your heads, I am clean: from now I will go to the Gentiles.
Cross References
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