Acts 3:26

ὑμῖν πρῶτον ὑμῖν : again emphatic. In the words of St. Peter we may again note his agreement with St. Paul, Acts 13:46; Romans 1:16 (Acts 10:11), although no doubt St. Peter shared the views of his nation in so far that Gentiles could only participate in the blessings of the Messianic kingdom through acceptance of Judaism. ἀναστήσας, cf. Acts 3:22, τὸν παῖδα, “his servant,” R.V., see above on Acts 3:13. ἀπέστειλεν also shows that ἀνασ. here refers not to the Resurrection but to the Incarnation. εὐλογοῦντα : as in the act of blessing, present participle; the present participle expressing that the Christ is still continuing His work of blessing on repentance, but see also Burton, N. T. Moods and Tenses, p. 171. ἐν τῷ : this use of ἐν governing the dative with the infinitive is most commonly temporal, but it is used to express other relations, such as manner, means, as here (cf. Acts 4:30, where the attempt to give a temporal sense is very far-fetched, Hackett, in loco); see Burton, u. s., p. 162, and Blass, Grammatik des N. G., p. 232. This formula of ἐν with the dative of the article and the infinitive is very common in St. Luke, both in his Gospel and in the Acts, and is characteristic of him as compared with the number of times the same formula is used by other writers in the N.T., Friedrich, Das Lucasevangelium, p. 37, and also Zeller, of the Apostles, ii., p. 196,., also in the LXX the same construction is found, cf. Genesis 19:16; Genesis 34:15, etc. ἀποστρέφειν : probably intransitive (Blass, Grimm, and so often in LXX, although the English A. and R.V. may be understood in either sense). Vulgate renders “ut convertat se unusquisque,” but the use of the verb elsewhere in Luke 23:14 (cf. also Romans 11:26; Isaiah 59:20) makes for the transitive sense (so Weiss, in loco). The argument from Acts 3:19 (as Alford points out) does not decide the matter either way (see also Holtzmann). πονηριῶν, cf. Luke 11:39, and adjective πονηρός frequent both in the Gospel and in the Acts; in LXX both words are very common. The word may denote miseries as well as iniquities, as Bengel notes, but the latter sense is demanded by the context. πρῶτον according to Jüngst does not mark the fact that the Jews were to be converted first and the Gentiles afterwards, but as belonging to the whole clause, and as referring to the first and past sending of Jesus in contrast to the second (Acts 3:20) and future sending in glory. But to support this view Jüngst has no hesitation in regarding 25 b as an interpolation, and so nothing is left but a reference to the διαθήκη of God with the fathers, i.e., circumcision, which is quite in place before a Jewish audience.

St. Peter's Discourses. More recent German criticism has departed far from the standpoint of the early Tübrigen school, who could only see in these discourses the free composition of a later age, whilst Dr. McGiffert, in spite of his denial of the Lucan authorship of Acts, inclines to the belief that the discourses in question represent an early type of Christian teaching, derived from primitive documents, and that they breathe the spirit of St. Peter and of primitive Jewish Christianity. Feine sees in the contents of the addresses a proof that we have in them a truthful record of the primitive Apostolic teaching. Just the very points which were of central interest in this early period of the Church's life are those emphasised here, e.g., the proof that Jesus of Nazareth, the Crucified One, is the Messiah, a proof attested by His Resurrection, the appeal to Israel, the chosen people, to repent for the remission of sins in His name. Nor is there anything against the speeches in the fact of their similarity; in their first and early preaching, as Feine urges, the Apostles' thoughts would naturally move in the same circle, they would recur again and again to the same facts, and their addresses could scarcely be otherwise than similar. Moreover we have an appeal to the facts of the life of Jesus as to things well known in the immediate past: “Jesus of Nazareth” had been working in the midst of them, and Peter's hearers were witnesses with him of His signs and wonders, “as ye yourselves know,” Acts 2:23; we become conscious in such words and in their context of all the moral indignation and the deep pain of the Apostles at the crucifixion of their Master, just as in Acts 3:13 we seem to listen to another personal reminiscence of the Passion history (see Beyschlag, Neutest. Theol., i., pp. 304, 305; Scharfe, Die Petrinische Strömung, 2 c., pp. 184, 185).

The fact that no reference is made to, or at all events that no stress is laid upon, the doctrinal significance of the death of Christ, as by St. Paul, is again an intimation that we are dealing with the earliest days of Apostolic teaching the death of the Cross was in itself the fact of all others which was the insuperable offence to the Jew, and it could not help him to proclaim that Christ died for his sins if he had no belief in Jesus as the Christ. The first and necessary step was to prove to the Jew that the suffering of the Messiah was in accordance with the counsels of God and with the voices of the prophets (Lechler, Das Apostolische Zeitalter, pp. 230, 231). But the historical fact accepted, its inner and spiritual significance would be imparted, and there was nothing strange in the fact that disciples who had themselves found it so difficult to overcome their repugnance to the mention of their Master's sufferings, should first direct their main efforts to remove the like prejudice from the minds of their countrymen. But we cannot adduce from this method that the Apostles had never heard such words as those of Christ (Matthew 20:28; Mark 10:45, cf. 1 Peter 1:18) (cf. the striking passage in Beyschlag, u. s., pp. 306, 307), or that they were entirely ignorant of the atoning significance of His Death. St. Paul, 1 Corinthians 15:1-3, speaks of the tradition which he had received, a tradition in which he was at one with the Twelve, Acts 3:11, viz., that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures (Feine, Die vorkanonische Ueberlieferung des Lukas; see p. 230).

When we pass to the consideration of St. Peter's Christology, we again see how he starts from the actual experience of his hearers before him: “Jesus of Nazareth, a man,” etc. plainly and fearlessly St. Peter emphasises the manhood of his Lord the title which is never found in any of the Epistles leads us back to the Passion and the Cross, to the early records of the Saviour's life on earth, Acts 24:9; Acts 22:8. And yet the Crucified Nazarene was by a startling paradox the Prince or Author of Life (see note on ἀρχηγός); by a divine law which the Jews could not discern He could not save Himself and yet another paradox there was no other Name given amongst men whereby they must be saved.

St. Paul could write of Him, Who took upon Him the form of a servant, Who humbled Himself, and became obedient to the death of the Cross, Philippians 2:6; and St. Peter, in one familiar word, which so far as we know St. Paul never used, brings before his hearers the same sublime picture of obedience, humility, death and glory; Jesus is the ideal, the glorified “Servant” of God (see note on Acts 3:13). But almost in the same breath St. Peter speaks of the Servant as the Holy and Righteous One, Acts 3:14; holy, in that He was consecrated to the service of Jehovah (ἅγιος, Acts 4:27; Acts 4:30, see note, and Acts 2:27); righteous, in that He was also the impersonation of righteousness, a righteousness which the Law had proclaimed, and which Prophets and Kings had desired to see, but had not seen (Isaiah 53:11). But whilst we note these titles, steeped each and all of them in O.T. imagery, whilst we may see in them the germs of the later and the deeper theology of St. Paul and St. John (see Dr. Lock, “Christology of the Earlier Chapter s of the Acts,” Expositor, iv. (fourth series), p. 178 ff.), they carry us far beyond the conception of a mere humanitarian Christ. It is not only that Jesus of Nazareth is set before us as “the very soul and end of Jewish Prophecy,” as Himself the Prophet to whom the true Israel would hearken, but that He is associated by St. Peter even in his earliest utterances, as none other is associated, with Jehovah in His Majesty in the work of salvation, Acts 2:34; the salvation which was for all who called upon Jehovah's Name, Acts 2:21, was also for all in the Name, in the power of Jesus Christ, Acts 4:12 (see notes, l. c, and cf. the force of the expression ἐπικαλεῖσθαι τὸ ὄνομα in 1 Corinthians 1:2, Schmid, Biblische Theologie, p. 407); the Spirit which Joel had foretold would be poured forth by Jehovah had been poured forth by Jesus raised to the right hand of God, Acts 2:18; Acts 2:33 (see further notes in chap. Acts 10:36; Acts 10:42-43).

One other matter must be briefly noticed the correspondence in thought and word between the St. Peter of the early Chapter s of the Acts and the St. Peter of the First Epistle which bears his name. A few points may be selected. St. Peter had spoken of Christ as the Prince of Life; quite in harmony with this is the thought expressed in 1 Peter 1:3, of Christians as “begotten again” by the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead. St. Peter had spoken of Christ as the Holy and Righteous One, so in the First Epistle he sets forth this aspect of Christ's peculiar dignity, His sinlessness. As in Acts, so also in 1 Pet. the thought of the sufferings of Christ is prominent, but also that of the glory which should follow, chap. 1, Acts 3:11. As in Acts, so also in 1 Pet. these sufferings are described as undeserved, but also as foreordained by God and in accordance with the voices of the Prophets, 1 Peter 1:11; 1 Peter 2:22-25. As in Acts, so in 1 Pet. it is the special task of the Apostles to be witnesses of the sufferings and also of the resurrection of Christ, chap. Acts 5:1. As in Acts, so in 1 Pet. we have the clearest testimony to the δόξα of Christ, 1Pe 1:21; 1 Peter 4:11. As in Acts stress is laid not only upon the facts of the life of Christ, but also upon His teaching, Acts 10:34 ff., so also in 1 Pet., while allusions are made to the scenes of our Lord's Passion with all the force of an eye-witness, we have stress laid upon the word of Christ, the Gospel or teaching, Acts 1:12; Acts 1:23; Acts 1:25; Acts 2:2; Acts 2:8; Acts 3:19; Acts 4:6. As in Acts, so in 1 Pet. we have a reference to the agency of Christ in the realm of the dead, 1Pe 3:19; 1 Peter 4:6. As in Acts, Acts 10:42, so in 1 Pet. Christ is Himself the judge of quick and dead, Acts 4:6, or in His unity with the Father shares with Him that divine prerogative, cf. Acts 1:17. As in Acts, so in 1 Pet. the communication of the Holy Spirit is specially attributed to the exalted Christ, cf. Acts 2:33; 1 Peter 1:11-12. As in Acts, so in 1 Pet. Christ is the living corner-stone on which God's spiritual house is built, Acts 4:12 and 1 Peter 2:4-10. As in Acts, so in 1 Pet. not only the details but the whole scope of salvation is regarded in the light and as a fulfilment of O.T. prophecy, cf. Acts 3:18-25; 1 Peter 2:22-23; 1 Peter 1:10-12. But this correspondence extends to words, amongst which we may note πρόγνωσις, Acts 2:23; 1 Peter 1:2, a word found nowhere else in the N.T., and used in each passage in the same sense; ἀπροσωπολήμπτως, 1 Peter 1:17, and only here in N.T., but cf. Acts 10:34, οὐκ ἐστιν προσωπολήμπτης. ξύλον twice used by St. Peter in Acts 5:30; Acts 10:39 (once by St. Paul), and again in 1 Peter 2:24; ἀθέμιτος only in the Cornelius history, Acts 10:28, by St. Peter, and in 1 Peter 4:3; μάρτυς with the genitive of that to which testimony is rendered, most frequently in N.T. used by St. Peter, cf. Acts 1:22; Acts 6:13; Acts 10:39, and 1 Peter 5:1; and further, in Acts 4:11 = 1 Peter 2:7; Acts 10:42 = 1 Peter 4:5, the verbal correspondence is very close.

See on the whole subject Nösgen, Apostelgeschichte, p. 48; Lechler, Das Apost. Zeitalter, p. 428 ff.; Scharfe, Die Petrinische Strömung, 2 c., p. 122 ff.; Lumby, Expositor, iv. (first series), pp. 118, 123; and also Schmid, Biblische Theologie, p. 389 ff. On the striking connection between the Didache 1, and the language of St. Peter's sermons, and the phraseology of the early Chapter s of Acts, see Gore, Church and the Ministry, p. 416.