Open-minded translates a word which originally referred to persons of noble birth (see Revised Standard Version “noble”), but which later came to be used of those qualities which were expected in a person of such birth. In the present context the reference is to the attitude of the Bereans toward the Christian message and is best understood in the sense of “receptive.” In a context such as this, open-minded may be rendered in some languages in a negative fashion—for example, “their minds were not closed” or “their ears were not stopped up.” On the other hand, expressions for open-minded may be positive: “their minds received what he said,” “their ears were opened to hear,” or “they were willing to listen.”

Listened to the message with great eagerness is rendered in some languages as “wanted very much to listen to the message” or “desired very much to hear what Paul said.” The term eagerness is essentially the quality with which the people desired to listen and it is therefore possible to transfer this element of the meaning to a verb such as “to desire” or “to want to.”

To see if what Paul said was really true literally translates “to see if these things were so.” But the meaning, of course, is that the people of Berea studied the Scriptures to see if what Paul taught them was true. The New English Bible at this point is ambiguous, since the final “they” in the expression “whether it was as they said” could be understood in two different ways.

In some languages a translation of true, in referring to some statement or declaration, must be rendered by a verb “to agree with.” Therefore, one may need to restructure this final sentence of verse 11 to read “every day they studied the Scriptures in order see if what Paul had said agreed with what the Scriptures said” or “… to see if what was written in the Scriptures agreed with what Paul had said.”

Quoted with permission from Newman, Barclay M. and Nida, Eugene A. A Handbook on The Acts of the Apostles. (UBS Handbook Series). New York: UBS, 1972. For this and other handbooks for translators see here .