In Greek this verse is a relative clause, without an adversative conjunction or particle. However, the rendering but God raised him is fully justified since there is a very definite contrast between the men who killed Jesus (v. 23) and God who raised him from the dead (v. 24).

The implied causative in raised him from the dead may need to be semantically recast as “caused him to rise from the dead” or “caused him to live again.”

He set him free from the pains of death in the Greek is a subordinate clause dependent upon the main verb raised, and prior in time to the action of the main verb. Pains of death is a phrase which comes from the Greek text of the Old Testament and which literally means “birth pangs of death”; so the meaning of the phrase is that of “bringing the pangs to an end” or “doing away with the pain.” The Hebrew text has “bonds of death,” but Luke quotes the Greek, and it is this text which must be translated.

The phrase “birth pangs of death” (compare the Greek) is an extremely difficult expression to translate. Some scholars have insisted that the interpretation of “birth pains” implies that death is suffering these birth pains. “God released him from death, which as it were was suffering birth pains” (that is, in the sense of restoring such a person to life again). It may be necessary to introduce some such expression as “as it were” or “like” in order to indicate that this is a strictly figurative expression and that birth pains are not normally attributable to such an event as death. One should, however, be cautioned against reading too much into the meaning of “birth pains.” Some scholars interpret “birth pains” as being the subject or agent of the act of dying or death, and they translate as “from the pain that death was causing” or possibly “from the anguish that he was suffering in dying.”

A special difficulty exists in languages in which there is no noun for “death,” and therefore no way in which death can be regarded as doing anything, either “having pain” or holding him prisoner (as in the last clause of this verse). When there is no such noun for “death” the closest equivalent is “the place where the dead are,” since in some languages this may be regarded as being capable of such “pain.” It is interesting to note that just such a change did take place in the textual tradition, for “Hades” as the place of the dead was substituted in some manuscripts for “death.”

The expression it was impossible that … can be restructured simply as “death could not keep him a prisoner” or “death could not cause him to remain a prisoner.” This figurative sense of prisoner may, however, need to be made more specific, for example, “he could not be kept a prisoner of death” or even “a prisoner in the place of the dead,” for those languages in which “death” has to be related more specifically to some location.

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 .