Acts 8:10

10 All the people -- the least important and the most important -- paid attention to Simon, saying, "This man has the power of God, called 'the Great Power'!"

Acts 8:10 Meaning and Commentary

Acts 8:10

To whom they all gave heed
Were not only attentive to the strange things he did, and to the wonderful things he gave out concerning himself; but they believed what he said and did as real things, and were obedient to him: and that

from the least to the greatest;
which does not so much respect age, though the Ethiopic version renders it, "from the younger of them to the eldest of them", as state and condition; persons of every rank and quality, high and low, rich and poor, magistrates and subjects, from the meanest to the greatest of them; and so the Syriac version renders it, "both great", or "noble, and mean"; he drew the attention, and commanded the regard, both of princes and peasants, of the learned and unlearned, of the great men, and of the common people, who one and all wondered at him, and applauded him:

saying, this man is the great power of God;
or as the Alexandrian copy and some others, and the Vulgate Latin version read, "this is the power of God which is called great"; they took him for the supreme Deity, or as Justin Martyr ^F8 expresses it, they accounted him the first, or chief God, or they looked upon him to be the Messiah, "the great power of God": as the Syriac version renders it; and who should be great, and called the Son of the Highest, ( Luke 1:32 ) .

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FOOTNOTES:

F8 Ut supra. (Apolg. 2. p. 69.)

Acts 8:10 In-Context

8 So the people in that city were very happy.

9 But there was a man named Simon in that city. Before Philip came there, Simon had practiced magic and amazed all the people of Samaria. He bragged and called himself a great man.

10 All the people -- the least important and the most important -- paid attention to Simon, saying, "This man has the power of God, called 'the Great Power'!"

11 Simon had amazed them with his magic so long that the people became his followers.

12 But when Philip told them the Good News about the kingdom of God and the power of Jesus Christ, men and women believed Philip and were baptized.