Acts 5:30 - "slew and hanged"

"The God of our fathers raised up Jesus, whom ye slew and hanged on a tree."

Some scholars object to the phrase, "whom ye slew and hanged on a tree." They argue that the correct rendering is "whom you killed by hanging on a tree" and that the conjunctive and in the KJV misleadingly suggests that the Jews first killed Christ and then hanged his body on the cross.^[1] This suggestion is faulty in that it misconstrues the text of the Authorized Version, making the text say "whom ye slew and THEN hanged on a tree."

In English, the word and does not usually mean a period of time, as is suggested with the addition of the word then. The text is not saying that the Jews murdered Christ and then placed him on the cross. The word and is a conjunction which simply links two thoughts together. As such, it is used as the word further. We understand the text to mean that the Jews were responsible for killing their Messiah. Further, they were responsible for having him placed on the cross. This is a proper use of English. When one assumes that the text is stating that the Jews murdered the Lord and then crucified him, they are reading their own thoughts into the text. The translation "whom ye slew and hanged on a tree" is just as correct as the translation "whom you killed by hanging on the tree."

^[1] White, 225-226.