Intertextuality Pair

Acts 4:12 → Psalms 146:3

Allusion

Later text

Acts 4:12BSB

Salvation exists in no one else, for there is no other name under heaven given to men by which we must be saved.”

Earlier text

Psalms 146:3BSB

Put not your trust in princes, in mortal man, who cannot save.

Significance

Peter's declaration "Salvation exists in no one else, for there is no other name under heaven given to men by which we must be saved" (Acts 4:12) stands in contrast to and fulfillment of Ps 146:3's warning: "Do not put your trust in princes, in mortal man, who cannot save [ein bo teshu'ah]." The verbal parallel is explicit — both texts turn on the question of who can save (yeshua'/sōtēria): Ps 146:3 denies that human rulers can save, directing trust instead to Yahweh who "executes justice for the oppressed" (146:7) and "sets prisoners free" (146:7). Acts 4:12 resolves the Psalm's tension by locating the saving name not in Yahweh abstractly but in the specific person of Jesus — the name "given among men" by which salvation comes. The immediately preceding citation of Ps 118:22 (Acts 4:11) confirms the apostolic practice of reading the psalms as a Christological whole.

Found via
Treasury of Scripture Knowledge
Reference Type
Allusion
Connection Method(s)
Contrast + Redemptive-Historical Progression

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