Acts 2:42

The growth of the Church not merely in numbers but in the increase of faith and charity. In R.V. by the omission of καὶ before τῇ κλάσει two pairs of particulars are apparently enumerated the first referring to the close adherence of believers to the Apostles in teaching and fellowship, the second expressing their outward acts of worship; or the first pair may be taken as expressing rather their relation to man, the second their relation to God (Nösgen). Dr. Hort, while pointing out that the first term τῇ διδαχῇ τῶν ἀποστόλων (“the teaching,” R.V., following Wycliffe; cf. Matthew 7:28, “doctrine,” A.V., which would refer rather to a definite system, unless taken in the sense of the Latin doctrina, teaching) was obviously Christian, so that the disciples might well be called scribes to the kingdom, bringing out of their treasures things new and old, the facts of the life of Jesus and the glory which followed, facts interpreted in the light of the Law and the Prophets, takes the next words τῇ κοινωνίᾳ as separated altogether from τῶν ἀποστόλων, “and with the communion”: κοινωνία, in Dr. Hort's view by parallelism with the other terms, expresses something more external and concrete than a spirit of communion; it refers to the help given to the destitute of the community, not apparently in money, but in public meals, such as from another point of view are called “the daily ministration” (cf. Acts 6:2, τραπέζαις). There are undoubtedly instances of the employment of the word κοινωνία in this concrete sense, Romans 15:26 2 Corinthians 8:4; 2 Corinthians 9:13; Hebrews 13:16, but in each of these cases its meaning is determined by the context (and Zöckler, amongst recent commentators, would so restrict its meaning here). But, on the other hand, there are equally undoubted instances of κοινωνία referring to spiritual fellowship and concord, a fellowship in the spirit; cf. 2Co 6:4; 2 Corinthians 13:14; Philippians 2:1; Galatians 2:9; 1 John 1:3; 1 John 1:6-7; cf. also in classical writers, Arist., Ethic., viii., 9, 12, ἐν κοινωνίᾳ ἡ φιλία ἐστί. Here, if the word can be separated from ἀπος., it may be taken to include the inward fellowship and its outward manifestation, Acts 2:44. May not a good parallel to this signification of the word be found in Philippians 1:5, where κοινωνία, whilst it signifies co-operation in the widest sense, including fellowship in sympathy, suffering and toil, also indicates the special and tangible manifestation of this fellowship in the ready almsgiving and contributions of the Philippian Church; see Lightfoot, Philippians, in loco. The word naturally suggests the community of goods, as Weizsäcker points out, but as it stands here without any precise definition we cannot so limit it, and in his view Galatians 2:9 gives the key to its meaning in the passage before us the bond which united the μαθηταί was the consciousness of their belief in Christ, and in the name ἀδελφοί the relationship thus constituted gained its complete expression. τῇ κλάσει τοῦ ἄρτου : no interpretation is satisfactory which forgets (as both Weizsäcker and Holtzmann point out) that the author of Acts had behind him Pauline language and doctrine, and that we are justified in adducing the language of St. Paul in order to explain the words before us, cf. 1 Corinthians 10:16; 1 Corinthians 11:24; Acts 20:7 (and Acts 27:35, Weizsäcker). But if we admit this, we cannot consistently explain the expression of a mere common meal. It may be true that every such meal in the early days of the Church's first love had a religious significance, that it became a type and evidence of the kingdom of God amongst the believers, but St. Paul's habitual reference of the words before us to the Lord's Supper leads us to see in them here a reference to the commemoration of the Lord's death, although we may admit that it is altogether indisputable that this commemoration at first followed a common meal. That St. Paul's teaching as to the deep religious significance of the breaking of the bread carries us back to a very early date is evident from the fact that he speaks to the Corinthians of a custom long established; cf. “Abendmahl I.” in Hauck's Real-Encyklopädie, heft i. (1896), p. 23 ff., on the evidential value of this testimony as against Jülicher's and Spitta's attempt to show that the celebration of the Lord's Supper in the early Church rested upon no positive command of Jesus. Weizsäcker's words are most emphatic: “Every assumption of its having originated in the Church from the recollection of intercourse with Him at table, and the necessity felt for recalling His death is precluded the celebration must rather have been generally observed from the beginning” Apostolic Age, ii., p. 279, E.T., and cf. Das apostol. Zeitalter, p. 594, second edition (1892), Beyschlag, Neutestamentliche Theol., i., p. 155. Against any attempt to interpret the words under discussion of mere benevolence towards the poor (Isaiah 58:7) Wendt regards Acts 20:6-7 (and also Acts 27:35) as decisive. Weiss refers to Luke 24:30 for an illustration of the words, but the act, probably the habitual act of Jesus, which they express there, does not exhaust their meaning here. Spitta takes Acts 6:2, διακονεῖν τραπέζαις as = κλάσις ἄρτου, an arbitrary interpretation, see also below. The Vulgate connects τῇ κλάσει τοῦ ἄρτου with the preceding κοινωνία, and renders in communicatione fractionis panis, a rendering justified in so far as the κοινωνία has otherwise no definite meaning, and by the fact that the brotherly intercourse of Christians specially revealed itself in the fractio panis, cf. 1 Corinthians 10:16, and Blass, in loco, and also [129] where he reads καὶ τῇ κοινωνίᾳ τῆς κλάσεως τοῦ ἄρτου. But whilst Felten refers to the evidence of the Vulgate, and also to that of the Peshitto, which renders the words before us “in the breaking of the Eucharist” (so too in Acts 20:7), it is worthy of note that he refuses to follow the usual Roman interpretation, viz., that the words point to a communion in one kind only, Apostelgeschichte, p. 94. It is possible that the introduction of the article before at least one of the words τῇ κλάσει (cf. R.V.) emphasises here the Lord's Supper as distinct from the social meal with which it was connected, whilst Acts 2:46 may point to the social as well as to the devotional bearing of the expression (cf. Zöckler, note in loco), and this possibility is increased if we regard the words τῶν ἀποστόλων as characterising the whole sentence in Acts 2:42. But unless in both verses some deeper meaning was attached to the phrases τῇ κλάσει τοῦ ἄρτου κλῶντες ἄρτον, it seems superfluous, as Schöttgen remarked, to introduce the mention of common food at the time of a community of goods. No doubt St. Chrysostom (so Oecum., Theophyl.) and Bengel interpret the words as simply = victus frugalis, but elsewhere St. Chrysostom speaks of them, or at least when joined with κοινωνία, as referring to the Holy Communion (see Alford's note in loco), and Bengel's comment on Acts 2:42 must be compared with what he says on Acts 2:46. καὶ ταῖς προσευχαῖς, “and [in] the prayers” R.V. Dr. Hort suggests that the prayers may well have been Christian prayers at stated hours, answering to Jewish prayers, and perhaps replacing the synagogue prayers (not recognised in the Law), as the Apostles' “teaching” had replaced that of the scribes (Judaistic Christianity, p. 44, and Ecclesia, p. 45). But the words may also be taken to include prayers both new and old, cf. Acts 4:24; James 5:13 (Ephesians 2:19; Colossians 3:16), and also Acts 3:1, where Peter and John go up to the Temple “at the hour of prayer,” cf. Wendt, Die Lehre Jesu, ii., p. 159.

[129] R(omana), in Blass, a first rough copy of St. Luke.