Punishing them oftentimes in all the synagogues, I strove to make them blaspheme for I punished them oft in every synagogue, and compelled them to blaspheme, A.V.; foreign for strange, A.V. In all the synagogues.
Those in Jerusalem, as the contrast of the foreign cities shows. (For the facts, see Acts 8:1, Acts 8:3.) I strove, etc. The "compelled" of the A.V. is the natural rendering of ἠνάγκαζον (Matthew 14:22; Luke 14:23; Acts 28:19, etc.
); but it does not necessarily follow that the compulsion was successful. It might be in some cases, and not in others. Pliny, in his letter to Trajan, says that those who were accused of being Christians cleared themselves by calling upon the gods, offering to the image of the emperor, and cursing Christ, none of which things, it is said, true Christians ("qui sunt revera Christiani") can be compelled to do ('Epist.
,' 10, 95, quoted by Kuinoel). Mad against them; ἐμμαινόμενος αὐτοῖς, only here; but the adjective ἐμμανής, frantic, is not uncommon in classical writers.