II. (1) WHEN THE DAY OF PENTECOST WAS FULLY come. — It is natural to assume a purpose in the divine choice of the day on which the disciples were thus to receive the promise of the Father. That choice may have been determined, if one may so speak, either in view of the circumstances of the feast, o... [ Continue Reading ]
Each aspect of the old Feast of Weeks, now known as Pentecost, or the “Fiftieth-day” Feast, presented a symbolic meaning which made it, in greater or less measure, typical of the work now about to be accomplished. It was the “feast of harvest, the feast of the firstfruits;” and so it was meet that i... [ Continue Reading ]
Lastly, the Feast of Pentecost had — traditionally, at least — also a commemorative character. On that day — so it was computed by the later Rabbis, though the Book of Exodus (Exodus 19:1) seems to leave the matter in some uncertainty — the Israelites had encamped round Sinai, and there had been thu... [ Continue Reading ]
AND THEY WERE ALL FILLED WITH THE HOLY GHOST. — The outward portent was but the sign of a greater spiritual wonder. As yet, though they had been taught to pray for the gift of the Holy Spirit (Luke 11:13), and, we must believe, had found the answer to their prayer in secret and sacred influences and... [ Continue Reading ]
THERE WERE DWELLING AT JERUSALEM. — The phrase is one of frequent occurrence in St. Luke’s writings (Luke 13:4; Acts 1:19; Acts 4:16). As a word, it implied a more settled residence than the “sojourning” of Luke 24:18 (see Note), Hebrews 11:9, but was probably sufficiently wide in its range to inclu... [ Continue Reading ]
WHEN THIS WAS NOISED ABROAD.... — Better _When there had been this voice,_ or _utterance._ The word for “voice” is never used for rumour or report in the New Testament; always of some utterance — human (Matthew 3:3; Galatians 4:20), angelic (1 Thessalonians 4:16; Revelation 5:11), or divine (Matthew... [ Continue Reading ]
THEY WERE ALL AMAZED AND MARVELLED. — It will be noted that this is precisely in accordance with what St. Paul describes as the effect of the gift of tongues. They were a “sign” to them that believed not, filling them with wonder, but the work of convincing and converting was left for the gift of pr... [ Continue Reading ]
AND HOW HEAR WE EVERY MAN IN OUR OWN TONGUE? — We have here, it is obvious, a composite utterance, in which the writer embodies the manifold expressions which came from those who represented the several nationalities that are afterwards enumerated.... [ Continue Reading ]
(9-11) PARTHIANS, AND MEDES, AND ELAMITES.... — The list that follows is characteristic of the trained historian — trained, it may be, as in the school of Strabo (see _Introduction to St. Luke_) — who had carefully inquired what nations were represented at that great Pentecost, who had himself been... [ Continue Reading ]
STRANGERS OF ROME... — Better, _the Romans who were sojourning there_ — _i.e.,_ at Jerusalem. The verb is peculiar to St. Luke in the New Testament, and is used by him, as in Acts 17:18, of the strangers and visitors of a city. JEWS AND PROSELYTES. — The words may possibly be applicable to the whole... [ Continue Reading ]
THE WONDERFUL WORKS OF GOD. — Better, _the great things,_ or _the majesty, of God._ The word is the same as in Luke 1:49. The word points, as has been said above, distinctly to words of praise and not of teaching.... [ Continue Reading ]
THEY WERE ALL AMAZED, AND WERE IN DOUBT. — The last word is somewhat stronger in the Greek: “were much perplexed,” as in Luke 24:4. No New Testament writer uses it except St. Luke. WHAT MEANETH THIS? — Better, _What may this mean?_ The same phrase occurs in Acts 17:18.... [ Continue Reading ]
THESE MEN ARE FULL OF NEW WINE. — Literally, _of sweet drink_ — the word “wine” not being used — stronger and more intoxicating than the lighter and thinner wines that were ordinarily drunk. The Greek word was sometimes used, like the Latin _mustum,_ for the unfermented grape-juice. Here, however, t... [ Continue Reading ]
BUT PETER, STANDING UP WITH THE ELEVEN,... — We are struck at once with the marvellous change that has come over the character of the Apostle. Timidity has become boldness; for the few hasty words recorded in the Gospels we have elaborate discourses. There is a method and insight in the way he deals... [ Continue Reading ]
SEEING IT IS BUT THE THIRD HOUR OF THE DAY. — The appeal is made to the common standard of right feeling. Drunkenness belonged to the night (1 Thessalonians 5:7). It was a mark of extremest baseness for men to “rise up early in the morning that they may follow strong drink” (Isaiah 5:11; comp. also... [ Continue Reading ]
IT SHALL COME TO PASS IN THE LAST DAYS. — The prophecy of Joel takes its place, with the exception, perhaps, of Hosea, as the oldest of the prophetic books of the Old Testament. The people were suffering from one of the locust-plagues of the East and its consequent famine. The prophet calls them to... [ Continue Reading ]
AND ON MY SERVANTS AND ON MY HANDMAIDENS... — This was the culminating point of the joyous prediction. Not on priests only, or those who had been trained in the schools of the prophets, but on slaves, male and female, should that gift be poured by Him who was no respecter of persons. The life of Amo... [ Continue Reading ]
AND I WILL SHEW WONDERS IN HEAVEN ABOVE. — St. Peter quotes the words of terror that follow, apparently, for the sake of the promise with which they end in Acts 2:21. But as it was not given to him as yet to know the times and the seasons (Acts 1:7), it may well have been that he looked for the “gre... [ Continue Reading ]
THE SUN SHALL BE TURNED INTO DARKNESS. — Both clauses bring before us the phenomena of an eclipse: the total darkness of the sun, the dusky copper hue of the moon. Signs, of which these were but faint images, had been predicted by our Lord, echoing, as it were, the words of Joel, as among the prelud... [ Continue Reading ]
WHOSOEVER SHALL CALL ON THE NAME OF THE LORD... — Singularly enough, the precise phrase, to “call upon” God, common as it is in the Old Testament, does not occur in the Gospels. With St. Luke and St. Paul it is, as it were, a favourite word (Acts 7:59; Acts 9:14; Romans 10:12; 1 Corinthians 1:2). It... [ Continue Reading ]
JESUS OF NAZARETH. — We hardly estimate, as we read them, the boldness implied in the utterance of that Name. Barely seven weeks had passed since He who bore it had died the death of a slave and of a robber. The speaker himself had denied all knowledge of Him of whom he now spoke. A MAN APPROVED OF... [ Continue Reading ]
BY THE DETERMINATE COUNSEL AND FORE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. — The adjective meets us again in St. Peter’s speech in Acts 10:42; the word for “foreknowledge in his Epistle (1 Peter 1:2), and there only in the New Testament. The coincidence is not without its force as bearing on the genuineness both of the... [ Continue Reading ]
WHOM GOD HATH RAISED UP. — It is probable enough that some rumours of the Resurrection had found their way among the people, and had been met by the counter-statement of which we read in Matthew 28:11; but this was the first public witness, borne by one who was ready to seal his testimony with his b... [ Continue Reading ]
FOR DAVID SPEAKETH CONCERNING HIM. — More accurately, _in reference to Him_ — _i.e.,_ in words which extended to Him. Reading Psalms 16 without this interpretation, it seems as if it spoke only of the confidence of the writer that he would be himself delivered from the grave and death. Some interpre... [ Continue Reading ]
MY TONGUE WAS GLAD. — The Hebrew gives “my glory,” a term which was applied to the mind of man, perhaps also to his faculty of speech (Psalms 57:8; Psalms 62:7), as that by which he excelled all other creatures of God’s hand. The LXX. had paraphrased the word by “tongue,” and St. Peter, or St. Luke... [ Continue Reading ]
THOU WILT NOT LEAVE MY SOUL IN HELL. — Literally, _in Hades._ (See Note on Matthew 11:23.) As interpreted by St. Peter’s words in his Epistle (1 Peter 3:19), the words conveyed to his mind the thought which has been embodied in the article of the “Descent into Hell,” or _Hades,_ in the Apostle’s Cre... [ Continue Reading ]
THOU HAST MADE KNOWN TO ME THE WAYS of life. — The Apostle does not interpret these words, but we can hardly err in thinking that he would have looked on them also as fulfilled in Christ’s humanity, To Him also the ways of life had been made known, and so even in _Hades_ He was filled with joy (bett... [ Continue Reading ]
LET ME FREELY SPEAK. — Better, _it is lawful for me to speak with freedom._ Those to whom the Apostle spoke could not for a moment dream of asserting that the words quoted had been literally and completely fulfilled in him, and it was therefore natural to look for their fulfilment elsewhere. OF THE... [ Continue Reading ]
THEREFORE BEING A PROPHET. — The words “according to the flesh, He would raise up Christ,” are wanting in many of the best MSS. Without them the sentence, though somewhat incomplete, would run thus: “That God had sworn with an oath _that from his loins one should sit upon his throne.”_ The words cla... [ Continue Reading ]
HE SEEING THIS BEFORE.... — In the vision of the future which St. Peter thus ascribes to David, the king had been led, as he interprets the words, not only or chiefly to speak out his own hopes, but to utter that which received its fulfilment in the fact of the resurrection. What was conspicuously n... [ Continue Reading ]
THIS JESUS HATH GOD RAISED UP... — From the first the Apostles take up the position which their Lord had assigned them. They are witnesses, and before and above all else, witnesses of the Resurrection.... [ Continue Reading ]
THEREFORE BEING BY THE RIGHT HAND OF GOD. — The Greek has the dative case without a preposition. The English version takes it, and probably is right in taking it, as the dative of the instrument, the image that underlies the phrase being that the Eternal King stretches forth His hand to raise Him wh... [ Continue Reading ]
THE LORD SAID.... — There is, when we remember what had passed but seven weeks before, something very striking in the reproduction by St. Peter of the very words by which our Lord had brought the scribes to confess their ignorance of the true interpretation of the Psalmist’s mysterious words (Psalms... [ Continue Reading ]
THAT SAME JESUS.... — Better, _this Jesus._ BOTH LORD AND CHRIST. — Some MSS. omit “both.” The word “Lord” is used with special reference to the prophetic utterance of the Psalm thus cited. There is a rhetorical force in the very order of the words which the English can scarcely give: “that both Lo... [ Continue Reading ]
THEY WERE PRICKED IN THEIR HEART. — The verb occurs here only in the New Testament, and expresses the sharp, painful emotion which is indicated in “compunction,” a word of kindred meaning. A noun derived from it, or possibly from another root, is used in Romans 11:8 in the sense of “slumber,” appare... [ Continue Reading ]
REPENT, AND BE BAPTIZED EVERY ONE OF YOU IN THE NAME OF JESUS CHRIST. — The work of the Apostles is, in one sense, a continuation, in another a development, of that of the Baptist. There is the same indispensable condition of “repentance” — _i.e._ a change of heart and will — the same outward rite a... [ Continue Reading ]
THE PROMISE IS UNTO YOU, AND TO YOUR CHILDREN. — The tendency of sects has always been to claim spiritual gifts and powers as an exclusive privilege limited to a few. It is the essence of St. Peter’s appeal that all to whom he speaks can claim the promise as fully as himself. The phrase “those that... [ Continue Reading ]
WITH MANY OTHER WORDS. — The report breaks off, as if St. Luke’s informant had followed closely up to this point and then lost count of the sequence of thought and words. DID HE TESTIFY — i.e., _continued to testify._ SAVE YOURSELVES. — Literally, in the passive, _Be ye saved._ They were invited t... [ Continue Reading ]
THEY THAT GLADLY RECEIVED HIS WORD WERE BAPTIZED. — This was, we must remember, no new emotion. Not four years had passed since there had been a like eagerness to rush to the baptism of John. (See Notes on Matthew 3:5; Matthew 11:12.) THREE THOUSAND SOULS. — The largeness of the number has been urge... [ Continue Reading ]
AND THEY CONTINUED STEADFASTLY. — The one Greek word is expressed by the English verb and adverb. As applied to persons, the New Testament use of the word is characteristic of St. Luke (Acts 2:46; Acts 6:4; Acts 8:13; Acts 10:7), and peculiar to him and St. Paul (Romans 12:12; Romans 13:6; Colossian... [ Continue Reading ]
FEAR CAME UPON EVERY SOUL. — The Greek text shows a careful distinction of tenses. Fear — i.e., reverential awe — came specially at that season; the “signs and wonders” were wrought continually. (See Note on Acts 2:19.)... [ Continue Reading ]
ALL THAT BELIEVED WERE TOGETHER.... — The writer dwells with a manifest delight on this picture of what seemed to him the true ideal of a human society. Here there was a literal fulfilment of his Lord’s words (Luke 12:33), a society founded, not on the law of self-interest and competition, but on sy... [ Continue Reading ]
AND SOLD THEIR POSSESSIONS AND GOODS. — The verbs throughout this description are in the imperfect tense, as expressing the constant recurrence of the act. The Greek words for “possessions” and “goods” both mean “property,” the former as a thing acquired, the latter as that which belongs to a man fo... [ Continue Reading ]
CONTINUING DAILY WITH ONE ACCORD IN THE TEMPLE. — At first it would have seemed natural that the followers of a Teacher whom the priests had condemned to death, who had once nearly been stoned, and once all but seized in the very courts of the Temple (John 8:59; John 10:31; John 7:45), should keep a... [ Continue Reading ]
HAVING FAVOUR WITH ALL THE PEOPLE. — The new life of the Apostles, in part probably their liberal almsgiving, had revived the early popularity of their Master with the common people. The Sadducean priests were, probably, the only section that looked on them with a malignant fear. THE LORD ADDED TO T... [ Continue Reading ]