Acts 14:11

11 So he sprang up and began to walk about. Then the crowds, seeing what Paul had done, rent the air with their shouts in the Lycaonian language, saying, "The gods have assumed human form and have come down to us."

Acts 14:11 Meaning and Commentary

Acts 14:11

And when the people saw what Paul had done
In curing the lame man in so marvellous a manner, and concluding it to be a divine work, and what a mere creature could never perform:

they lift up their voices;
not in indignation and wrath, but as persons astonished:

saying in the speech of Lycaonia;
by which it should seem that Lystra was a city of Lycaonia, since the Lycaonian language was spoken in it; the Arabic version reads, "in their own tongue"; and the Syriac version, "in the dialect of the country"; very likely a dialect of the Greek tongue;

the gods are come down to us in the likeness of men;
they had a notion of deity, though a very wrong one; they thought there were more gods than one, and they imagined heaven to be the habitation of the gods; and that they sometimes descended on earth in human shape, as they supposed they now did.

Acts 14:11 In-Context

9 After this man had listened to one of Paul's sermons, the Apostle, looking steadily at him and perceiving that he had faith to be cured,

10 said in a loud voice, "Stand upright upon your feet!"

11 So he sprang up and began to walk about. Then the crowds, seeing what Paul had done, rent the air with their shouts in the Lycaonian language, saying, "The gods have assumed human form and have come down to us."

12 They called Barnabas `Zeus,' and Paul, as being the principal speaker, `Hermes.'

13 And the priest of Zeus--the temple of Zeus being at the entrance to the city--brought bullocks and garlands to the gates, and in company with the crowd was intending to offer sacrifices to them.