I. THE GALILEAN APOSTLES. (continued 4)

THE MEETING ON THE LAKE.

After this meeting with him, they saw him again repeatedly, but no incident, relating particularly to the subject of this memoir, occurred on either of these occasions, except at the scene on lake Tiberias, so fully and graphically given by John, in the last chapter of his gospel. It seems that at that time, the disciples had, in accordance with the earliest command of Jesus after his resurrection, gone into Galilee to meet him there. The particular spot where this incident took place was probably near Capernaum and Bethsaida, among their old familiar haunts. Peter at this time residing at his home in Capernaum, it would seem, very naturally, while waiting for the visit which Christ had promised them, sought to pass the time as pleasantly as possible in his old business, from which he had once been called to draw men into the grasp of the gospel. With him at this time, were Thomas, or Didymus, and Nathanael, and the sons of Zebedee, and two other disciples, whether of the eleven or not, is not known. On his telling them that he was going out a fishing, they, allured also by old habits and a desire to amuse themselves in a useful way, declared that they also would go with him. They went forth accordingly, and taking the fishing-boat, pushed off in the evening as usual, the night being altogether the best time for catching the fish, because the lake not then being constantly disturbed by passing vessels, the fish are less disposed to keep themselves in the depths of the waters, but feeling bolder in the stillness, rise to the surface within reach of the watchful fisherman. But on this occasion, from something peculiar in the state of the air or water, the fish did not come within the range of the net; and that night they caught nothing. Having given up the fruitless effort, they were towards morning heavily working in towards the shore, and were about a hundred yards from it, when they noticed some person who stood on the land; but in the gray light of morning his person could not be distinguished. This man called to them in a friendly voice, as soon as they came within hailing distance, crying out in a free and familiar way, “Boys! have you anything to eat?” To which they answered “No.” The unknown friend then called to them in a confident tone, telling them to cast the net on the right side of the ship, and they should find plenty. They cast accordingly, and on closing and drawing the net, were not able to pull it in, for the weight of the fishes taken in it. In a moment flashed on the ready mind of John, the remembrance of the former similar prodigy wrought at the word of Jesus near the same spot, and he immediately recognized in the benevolent stranger, his Lord. Turning to Simon, therefore, who had been too busy tugging at the net to think of the meaning of the miracle, he said to him, “It is the Lord.” Conviction burst on him with equal certainty as on his companion, and giving way to his natural headlong promptitude in action, he leaped at once into the water, after girding his great coat around him, and by partly swimming and partly wading through the shallows, he soon reached the shore, where his loved and long-expected Master was. At the same time, with as little delay as possible, the rest of them, leaving their large vessel probably on account of the shallows along that part of the coast, came ashore in a little skiff, dragging the full net behind them. In this they showed their considerate prudence, for had they all in the first transport of impatience followed Peter, and left boat and net together at that critical moment, the net would have loosened and the fishes have escaped; thus making the kind miracle of no effect by their carelessness. As soon as they were come to land they saw Jesus placed composedly by a fire of coals which he had made, and on which he had designed to cook for their common entertainment, some fish previously caught, dished with some bread. Jesus without ceremony ordered them to come and bring some of the fish they had just caught. Simon Peter now mindful of his late heedless desertion of his comrades in the midst of their worst labor, stepped forward zealously, and, unassisted, dragged the heavy net out of the water; and though on opening it they found one hundred and fifty-three large fishes in it, notwithstanding the weight, the net was not broken. When they had obeyed his command, and supplied the place of the fish already cooked on the fire by fresh ones from the net, Jesus in a kind and hearty tone invited them to come and breakfast with him on what he had prepared. The disciples, notwithstanding the readiness with which they had come ashore to their Master, still seem to have felt somewhat shy; not, however, because they had any solid doubt as to his really being the person they had supposed him, for no man durst say to him “who art thou?” knowing him to be the Lord. Perhaps it was not yet full day-light, which may account for their shyness and want of readiness in accepting his invitation. But Jesus, in order fully to assure them, comes and takes bread, and puts it into their hands, with a share of fish likewise to each. They now took hold heartily, and without scruple sat down around the fire to breakfast with him. So when they had done breakfast, as men are usually best disposed to be social after eating, he on this occasion addressed himself to Peter in words of reproof, warning and commission. He first inquired of him, “Simon, son of Jonah, lovest thou me more than these?” To this Peter readily replied, “Yea, Lord, thou knowest that I love thee.” Jesus then said to him, “Feed my lambs.” Peter had learned some humility by his late fall from truth and courage. Before, he had boldly professed a regard for Christ, altogether surpassing in extent and permanency the affection which the other disciples felt for him, and had, in the fullness of his self-sufficiency, declared that though all the rest should forsake him, yet would he abide by him, and follow him even to prison and to death. But now that high self-confidence had received a sad fall, and the remembrance of his late disgraceful conduct was too fresh in his mind to allow him any more to assume that tone of presumption. He therefore modestly confined his expression of attachment to the simple and humble reference to the all-knowing heart of his Divine Master, to which he solemnly and affectingly appealed as his faithful witness in this assertion of new and entire devotion to him, whom he had once so weakly denied and deserted. No more high-toned boastings――no more arrogant assertion of superior pretensions to fidelity and firmness; but a humble, submissive, beseeching utterance of devoted love, that sought no comparisons to enhance its merit, but in lowly confidence appealed to the searcher of hearts as the undeceivable testifier of his honesty and truth. Nor was his deep and renewed affection, thus expressed, disregarded; but Jesus accepting his purified self-sacrifice, at once in the same words both offered him the consoling pledge of his restoration to grace, and again charged him with the high commission, which, while it proved his Lord’s confidence, gave him the means of showing to all mankind the sincerity and permanency of his change of heart. From the words of the Messiah’s reply, he learned that the solid proof of his deserved restoration should be seen in his devotion to the work which that Messiah had begun; that by guiding, guarding and feeding the young and tender of Christ’s flock, when left again without their Master, he might set forth his new love. Already had Jesus, before that sad trial of their souls, in his parting, warning words to his near and dear ones, told them, “If ye keep my commandments ye shall abide in my love. Ye are my friends if ye do whatsoever I command you. By this shall all men know that ye are my disciples, if ye have love one to another.” And here, in practical comment on that former precept, did he give his restored apostle this test of unchanged love. So harmoniously and beautifully does the sacred record make precept answer and accord with precept. In the minute detail of mere common incident, we may wander and stagger bewildered among insignificant differences and difficulties; but the rule of action, the guide of life, leads steadily and clearly through every maze, uneffaced by the changes of order, time and place.

“Boys.”――The Greek word here (παιδια paidia) has a neuter termination, and is applicable to persons of both sexes, like the English word “children,” which is here given in the common version. But Jerome’s Latin translation (the Vulgate) gives “pueri,” “boys,” as the just meaning in this place, and I have preferred it, as more in accordance with our usual forms of familiar address in such cases, than the one given in the common English version.

Great coat.――This I consider as giving a better idea of the garment called in the Greek επενδυτην, (ependuten,) which is derived from a verb which means “putting on over another garment,” and is of course described with more justice to the original by the English “great-coat,” or “over-coat,” than by “fisher’s coat,” as in the common translation. I suppose it was a rough outer dress designed as a protection against rain and spray, and which he put on in such a way, that he might wade in it without the inconvenience of its hanging about his legs. It must have been a sort of “over all,” that he had pulled off while at work, and put on to wade in the water; for the verb διαζωννυμι (diazonnumi) has also that meaning as well as “gird about,” and his object in thus “putting on his over alls” may have been to keep himself dry, by covering both his legs and body from the water; for it may have come down over the legs like a sort of outside trowsers, and being tied tight, would make a very comfortable protection against cold water. See Poole and Kuinoel on this passage, John xxi. 7.

Luther in his German translation has very queerly expressed this word, “GUERTETE ER DAS HEMDE UM SICH,” “he girt his shirt about him;” being led into this error probably, by taking the following sentence in too strong a sense, concluding that he was perfectly naked. But I have already alluded (note on page 101) to the peculiar force of this word in the Bible, nor can it mean anything but that he was without his outer garments; and it implies no more indecent exposure than in the case of Christ, when laying aside his garments to wash his disciples’ feet. Besides, I have shown that the etymology of επενδυτης (ependutes) will not allow any meaning to it, but that of an “outer garment” worn over other clothes.

A little skiff.――The Greek word here is πλοιαριον, (ploiarion,) and means “a small boat,” and is the diminution of πλοιον, (ploion,) the word used in the third verse of the same chapter, as the name of the larger vessel in which they sailed, and which probably drew too much water to come close to the shore in this part of the lake, where it was probably shallow, so as to make it necessary for them to haul the net ashore with this little skiff, which seems to have been a sort of drag-boat to the larger vessel, kept for landing in such places.

“Come and BREAKFAST.”――This is certainly a vast improvement on the common English version, which here gives the word “dine.” For it must strike an ordinary reader as a very early dinner at that time of the morning, (John xix. 4,) and what settles the question is, that the Greek word here is αριστησατε, (aristesate,) which primarily and almost always was applied only to the eating of the earliest meal, or breakfast, being derived from αριστον, “breakfast,” the first meal in the day, according to Homer and Xenophon.

Many other unrecorded words of wisdom and love must have been spoken at this time, in the course of which Jesus again took occasion to put this meaning and moving question, “Simon, son of Jonah, lovest thou me?” The first answer of Peter had sufficiently shown, that he had no more of that disposition to claim a merit superior to his fellow disciples, and Jesus did not again urge upon him a comparison with them, but merely renewed the inquiry in a simple, absolute form. Again Peter earnestly expressed his love, with the same appeal to Christ’s own knowledge of his heart for the testimony of his loyalty, “Yea, Lord, thou knowest that I love thee.” He saith to him, “Feed my sheep.” If thou lovest me, show that love, by supplying the place of my earthly care, to those whom I love. Love and feed those for whom I have bled and died.――What could be more simple and clear than this question? What more earnest and honest than the answer? What more abiding than the impression made by this charge? Yet did not the far-seeing Savior desist from trying his disciple with these questions. Once more was it solemnly repeated, “Simon, son of Jonah, lovest thou me?” Peter was grieved that he asked him the third time, “lovest thou me?” He saw at last the reproachful meaning of the inquiry. Three times had this same apostle, by his false-hearted denial, renounced all love and interest in his Master, and three times did that injured and forgiving Master call upon him to pledge again his forfeited faith and affection. He thus pointed out the past weakness of Peter, and showed the means of maintaining and insuring future fidelity. Peter again still more movingly avowed his honest attachment, half remonstrating at this repetition of the question by one who must already know the heart of the answerer too fully for words to inform him anew.――“Lord, thou knowest all things; thou knowest that I love thee.” Jesus said to him, “Feed my sheep.” He now passed on to a new prediction of his future fortunes, in the service to which he had in these words devoted him, making known to him the earthly reward which his services would at last receive. “I solemnly say to thee, when thou wast young, thou girdedst thyself and walkedst whither thou wouldest; but when thou shalt be old, thou shalt stretch forth thy hands, and another shall gird thee, and carry thee whither thou wouldest not.” This he said, to signify to him by what sort of death he should glorify God. That is, he in these words plainly foretold to him that he should, through all his toils and dangers in his Master’s service, survive to old age; and he also alludes to the loss of free agency in his own movements; but the circumstances are so darkly alluded to, that the particular mode of his death could never be made to appear clearly from the prediction. The particular meaning of the expressions of this prophecy, can of course be best shown in connection with the circumstances of his death, as far as they are known; and to that part of his history the explanations are deferred.

After this solemn prediction, he said to him, “Follow me.” This command seems not to have any connection, as some have supposed, with the preceding words of Jesus referring to his future destiny, but to be a mere direction to follow him on his return from the lake, either back to Capernaum, or to the mountain appointed for his meeting with the great body of his disciples. From what comes after this in the context, indeed, this would seem to be a fair construction; for it is perfectly plain that as Christ said these words, he turned and walked away; and that not only Peter followed at the direction of Christ, but also John of his own accord,――and it is perfectly natural to suppose that the greater part of the disciples would choose to walk after Jesus, when they had met under such delightful and unexpected circumstances; only leaving somebody to take care of the boats and fish. Peter following his Lord as he was commanded, turned around to see who was next to him, and seeing John, was instantly seized with a desire to know the future fortunes of this apostle, who shared with him the highest confidence of his Master, and was even before him in his personal affections. He accordingly asked, “Lord, and what shall this man do?” or more properly, “What shall become of this man?” But the answer of Jesus was not at all calculated to satisfy his curiosity, though it seemed, in checking his inquiries, to intimate darkly, that this young apostle would outlive him, and be a witness of the events which had been predicted in connection with the destruction of Jerusalem, and the second coming of Christ in judgment on his foes of the Jewish nation. This interesting scene here abruptly closes,――the Savior and his followers passing off this spot to the places where he remained with them during the rest of the few days of his appearance after his resurrection.

The mountain appointed for his meeting, &c.――It would be hard to settle the locality of this mountain with so few data as we have, but a guess or two may be worth offering. Grotius concludes it to have been Mount Tabor, “where,” as he says, “Jesus formerly gave the three a taste of his majesty;” but I have fully shown, on much better authority, that Tabor was not the mount of the transfiguration; nor can we value highly the fact, that “habet veteris famae auctoritatem,” for we have abundant reason to think that in such matters, “the authority of ancient tradition” is not worth much.

There are better reasons, however, for believing Tabor to have been the mountain in Galilee, where Christ met his disciples. These are, the fact that it was near the lake where he seems to have been just before, and was in the direction of some of his former places of resort, and was near the homes of his disciples. None of the objections that I brought against its being the mount of the transfiguration, can bear against this supposition, but on similar grounds I now agree with the common notion.

Paulus suggests Mount Carmel, as a very convenient place for such a meeting of so many persons who wished to assemble unseen, it being full of caverns, in which they might assemble out of view; while Tabor is wholly open (GANZ OFFEN) and exposed to view; for it is evident that all the exhibitions of Christ to his disciples after his resurrection, were very secret. For this reason Rosenmueller remarks, that Jesus probably appointed some mountain which was lonely and destitute of inhabitants, for the meeting. But Tabor is, I should think, sufficiently retired for the privacy which was so desirable, and certainly is capable of accommodating a great number of persons on its top, so that they could not be seen from below. The objection to Carmel is, that it was a great distance off, on the sea coast, and should therefore be rejected for the same reasons which caused us to reject Tabor for the transfiguration.

THE ASCENSION.

The only one of his other interviews with them, to which we can follow them, is the last, when he stood with them at Bethany, on the eastern slope of Mount Olivet, about a mile from Jerusalem, where he passed away from their eyes to the glory now consummated by the complete events of his life and death. Being there with them, he commanded them not to depart from Jerusalem, but to wait for the promised Comforter from the Father, of which he had so often spoken to them. “For John truly baptized with water, but you shall be baptized with the Holy Ghost not many days hence.” Herein he expressed a beautiful figure, powerfully impressive to them, though to most common perceptions perhaps, not so obvious. In the beginning of those bright revelations of the truth which had been made to that age, John, the herald and precursor of a greater preacher, had made a bold, rough outset in the great work of evangelization. The simple, striking truths which he brought forward, were forcibly expressed in the ceremony which he introduced as the sign of conversion; as the defilements of the body were washed away in the water, so were the deeper pollutions of the soul removed by the inward cleansing effected by the change which followed the full knowledge and feeling of the truth. The gross and tangible liquid which he made the sign of conversion, was also an emblem of the rude and palpable character of the truths which he preached; so too, the final token which the apostles of Jesus, when at last perfectly taught and equipped, should receive as the consecrated and regenerated leaders of the gospel host, was revealed in a form and in a substance as uncontrollably and incalculably above the heavy water, as their knowledge, and faith, and hope were greater than the dim foreshadowing given by the baptist, of good things to come. Water is a heavy fluid, capable of being seen, touched, tasted, weighed and poured; it has all the grosser and more palpable properties of matter. But the air is, even to us, and seemed more particularly to the ancients, beyond the apprehension of most of the senses, by which the properties of bodies are made known to man. We cannot see it, or at least are not commonly conscious of its visibility; yet we feel its power to terrify, and to comfort, and see the evidences of its might in the ruins of many of the works of man and of nature, which oppose its movements. The sources of its power too, seem to a common eye, to be within itself, and when it rises in storms and whirlwind, its motions seem like the capricious volitions of a sentient principle within it. But water, whenever it moves, seems only the inanimate mass which other agents put in motion. The awful dash of the cataract is but the continued fall of a heavy body impelled by gravity, and even “when the myriad voices of ocean roar,” the mighty cause of the storm is the unseen power of the air, which shows its superiority in the scale of substances, by setting in terrible and overwhelming motion the boundless deep, that, but for this viewless and resistless agency, would forever rest, a level plain, without a wrinkle on its face. To the hearers of Christ more particularly, the air in its motions, was a most mysterious agency,――a connecting link between powers material and visible, and those too subtle for any thing but pure thought to lay hold of. “The wind blew where it would, and they heard the sound thereof, but could not tell whence it came or whither it went.” They might know that it blew from the north toward the south, or from the east toward the west, or the reverse of these; but the direction from which it came could not point out to them the place where it first arose, in its unseen power, to pass over the earth,――a source of ceaseless wonder, to the learned and unlearned alike. This was the mighty and mysterious agency which Jesus Christ now chose as a fit emblem to represent in language, to his apostles, that power from on high so often promised. Yet clear as was this image, and often as he had warned them of the nature of the duties for which this power was to fit them,――in spite of all the deep humiliation which their proud earthly hopes had lately suffered, there were still in their hearts, deep-rooted longings after the restoration of the ancient dominion of Israel, in which they once firmly expected to share. So their question on hearing this charge and renewed promise of power hitherto unknown, was, “Lord, wilt thou not at this time restore the kingdom to Israel?” Would not this be a satisfactory completion of that triumph just achieved over the grave, to which the vain malice of his foes had sent him? Could his power to do it be now be doubted? Why then, should he hesitate at what all so earnestly and confidently hoped? But Jesus was not to be called down from heaven to earth on such errands, nor detained from higher glories by such prayers. He knew that this last foolish fancy of earthly dominion was to pass away from their minds forever, as soon as they had seen the event for which he had now assembled them. He merely said to them, “It is not for you to know the times or the seasons which the Father has appointed, according to his own judgment.” Jesus knew that, though the minds of his disciples were not then sufficiently prepared to apprehend the nature of his heavenly kingdom, yet they, after his departure, becoming better instructed and illuminated by a clearer light of knowledge, would of their own accord, lay aside that preconceived notion about his earthly reign, and would then become fully impressed with those things of which he had long before warned them, while they were still in the enjoyment of his daily teachings. Being now about to bid them farewell,――lest by entirely cutting off their present hope, he might for a time overwhelm them,――he so moderated his answer, as not to extinguish utterly all hope of the kingdom expected by them, nor yet give them reason to think that such a dominion as they hoped for, was to be established. He therefore, to their inquiries whether he would at that time restore the ancient kingdom of Israel, replied that it was not for them to know the times which the Father had reserved in his own counsels, for the completion of that event. But he went on to inform them of something which was for them to know. “You shall receive power, when the Holy Ghost shall have come upon you; and you shall be witnesses of these things for me, both in Jerusalem, and in all Judea, and in Samaria, and even to the farthest parts of the earth.” And when he had spoken these things, he was taken away from them as they were looking at him, for a cloud received him out of their sight. And while they looked earnestly towards heaven, as he went up, behold, two men stood by them in white apparel, and said, “Ye men of Galilee, why stand ye gazing up into heaven? This same Jesus who is taken up from you into heaven, shall so come in like manner as you have seen him go into heaven.” They now understood that they had parted from their loved Master forever, in earthly form; yet the consolations afforded by this last promise of the attendant spirits, were neither few nor small. To bring about that bright return, in whose glories they were to share, was the great task to which they devoted their lives; and they went back to Jerusalem, sorrowful indeed for the removal of their great guide and friend, but not sorrowing as those who have no hope.

To Bethany.――This place was on the Mount of Olives, probably near its summit, and perhaps within sight of Jerusalem. See notes on pp. 90 and 95.

Here ceased their course of instruction under their Divine Master; laying down their character as Disciples, they now took up the higher dignity, responsibility and labors of Apostles. Here too ceases the record of “Peter’s discipleship;”――no longer a learner and follower of any one on earth, he is exalted to the new duties and dangers of the Apostleship, of which the still more interesting story here begins; and he must henceforth bear the new character and title of “Peter the teacher and leader.”

II. PETER’S APOSTLESHIP; OR PETER THE TEACHER AND LEADER.

THE PENTECOST.

After the ascension, all the apostles seem to have removed their families and business from Galilee, and to have made Jerusalem their permanent abode. From this time no more mention is made of any part of Galilee as the home of Peter or his friends; and even the lake, with its cities, so long hallowed by the presence and the deeds of the son of man, was thenceforth entirely left to the low and vulgar pursuits which the dwellers of that region had formerly followed upon it, without disturbance from the preaching and the miracles of the Nazarene. The apostles finding themselves in Jerusalem the object of odious, or at best of contemptuous notice from the great body of the citizens, being known as Galileans and as followers of the crucified Jesus, therefore settled themselves in such a manner as would best secure their comfortable and social subsistence. When they came back to the city from Galilee, (having parted from their Master on the Olive mount, about a mile off,) they went up into a chamber in a private house, where all the eleven passed the whole time, together with their wives, and the women who had followed Jesus, and with Mary, the mother of Jesus, and his brethren. These all continued with one accord in this place, with prayer and supplication, at the same time no doubt comforting and instructing one another in those things, of which a knowledge would be requisite or convenient for the successful prosecution of their great enterprise, on which they were soon to embark. In the course of these devout and studious pursuits, the circumstances and number of those enrolled by Christ in the apostolic band, became naturally a subject of consideration and discussion, and they were particularly led to notice the gap made among them, by the sad and disgraceful defection of Judas Iscariot. This deficiency the Savior had not thought of sufficient importance to need to be filled by a nomination made by him, during the brief period of his stay among them after his resurrection, when far more weighty matters called his attention. It was their wish however, to complete their number as originally constituted by their Master, and in reference to the immediate execution of this pious and wise purpose, Peter, as their leader, forcibly and eloquently addressed them, when not less than one hundred and twenty were assembled. The details of his speech, and the conclusion of the business, are deferred to the account of the lives of those persons who were the subjects of the transaction. In mentioning it now, it is only worth while to notice, that Peter here stands most distinctly and decidedly forward, as the director of the whole affair, and such was his weight in the management of a matter so important, that his words seem to have had the force of law; for without further discussion, commending the decision to God in prayer, they adopted the action suggested by him, and filled the vacancy with the person apparently designated by God. In the faithful and steady confidence that they were soon to receive, according to the promise of their risen Lord, some new and remarkable gift from above, which was to be to them at once the seal of their divine commission, and their most important equipment for their new duties, the apostles waited in Jerusalem until the great Jewish feast of the pentecost. This feast is so named from a Greek word meaning “fiftieth,” because it always came on the fiftieth day after the day of the passover feast. Jesus had finally disappeared from his disciples about forty days after his resurrection,――that is forty-two days after the great day of the passover, which will leave just one week for the time which passed between the ascension and the day of pentecost. These seven days the apostolic assembly had passed in such pursuits as might form the best preparation for the great event they were expecting. Assembled in their sacred chamber, they occupied themselves in prayer and exhortation. At length the great feast arrived, on which the Jews, according to the special command of Moses, commemorated the day, on which of old God gave the law to their fathers, on Mount Sinai, amid thunder and lightning. On this festal occasion, great numbers of Jews who had settled in different remote parts of the world, were in the habit of coming back to their father-land, and their holy city, to renew their devotion in the one great temple of their ancient faith, there to offer up the sacrifices of gratitude to their fathers’ God, who had prospered them even in strange lands among the heathen. The Jews were then, as now, a wandering, colonizing people wherever they went, yet remained perfectly distinct in manners, dress and religion, never mixing in marriage with the people among whom they dwelt, but every where bringing up a true Israelitish race, to worship the God of Abraham with a pure religion, uncontaminated by the idolatries around them. There was hardly any part of the world, where Roman conquest had planted its golden eagles, to which Jewish mercantile enterprise did not also push its adventurous way, in the steady pursuit of gainful traffic. The three grand divisions of the world swarmed with these faithful followers of the true law of God, and from the remotest regions, each year, gathered a fresh host of pilgrims, who came from afar, many for the first time, to worship the God of their fathers in their fathers’ land. Amid this fast gathering throng, the feeble band of the apostles, unknown and unnoticed, were assembled in their usual place of meeting, and employed in their usual devout occupations. Not merely the twelve, but all the friends of Christ in Jerusalem, to the number of one hundred and twenty, were here awaiting, in prayer, the long promised Comforter from the Father. All of a sudden, the sound of a mighty wind, rushing upon the building, roared around them, and filled the apartments with its appalling noise, rousing them from the religious quiet to which they had given themselves up. Nor were their ears alone made sensible of the approach of some strange event. In the midst of the gathering gloom which the wind-driven clouds naturally spread over all, flashes of light were seen by them, and lambent flames playing around, lighted at last upon them. At once the anxious prayers with which they had awaited the coming of the Comforter, were hushed: they needed no longer to urge the fulfilment of their Master’s word; for in the awful rush of that mighty wind, they recognized the voice they had so long expected, and in that solemn sound, they knew the tone of the promised Spirit. The approach of that feast-day must have raised their expectations of this promised visitation to the highest pitch. They knew that this great national festival was celebrated in commemoration of the giving of the old law on Mount Sinai to their fathers, through Moses, and that no occasion could be more appropriate or impressive for the full revelation of the perfect law which the last restorer of Israel had come to teach and proclaim. The ancient law had been given on Sinai, in storm and thunder and fire; when therefore, they heard the roar of the mighty wind about them, the firm conviction of the approach of their new revelation must have possessed their minds at once. They saw too, the dazzling flash of flame among them, and perceived, with awe, strange masses of light, in the shape of tongues, settling with a tremulous motion on the head of each of them. The tempest and the fire were the symbols of God’s presence on Sinai of old, and from the same signs joined with these new phenomena, they now learned that the aid of God was thus given to equip them with the powers and energies needful for their success in the wider publication of the doctrine of Christ. With these tokens of a divine presence around them, their feelings and thoughts were raised to the highest pitch of joy and exultation; and being conscious of a new impulse working in them, they were seized with a sacred glow of enthusiasm, so that they gave utterance to these new emotions in words as new to them as their sensations, and spoke in different languages, praising God for this glorious fulfilment of his promise, as this holy influence inspired them.

An upper room.――The location of this chamber has been the subject of a vast quantity of learned discussion, a complete view of which would far exceed my limits. The great point mooted has been, whether this place was in a private house or in the temple. The passage in Luke xxiv. 53, where it is said that the apostles “were continually in the temple, praising and blessing God,” has led many to suppose that the same writer, in this continuation of the gospel story, must have had reference to some part of the temple, in speaking of the upper room as the place of their abode. In the Acts ii. 46, also, he has made a similar remark, which I can best explain when that part of the story is given. The learned Krebsius (Observationes in Novvm Testamentvm e Flavio Iosepho, pp. 162‒164) has given a fine argument, most elegantly elaborated with quotations from Josephus, in which he makes it apparently quite certain from the grammatical construction, and from the correspondence of terms with Josephus’s description of the temple, that this upper room must have been there. It is true, that Josephus mentions particularly a division of the inner temple, on the upper side of it, under the name of ὑπερῳον, (hyperoon,) which is the word used by Luke in this passage, but Krebsius in attempting to prove this to be a place in which the disciples might be constantly assembled, has made several errors in the plan of the later temple, which I have not time to point out, since there are other proofs of the impossibility of their meeting there, which will take up all the space I can bestow on the subject. Krebsius has furthermore overlooked entirely the following part of the text in Acts i. 13, where it is said, that when they returned to Jerusalem, “they went up into an upper room where they had been staying,” in Greek, οὑ ησαν καταμενοντες, (hou esan katamenontes,) commonly translated “they abode.” The true force of this use of the present participle with the verb of existence is repeated action, as is frequently true of the imperfect of that verb in such combinations. Kuinoel justly gives it this force,――“ubi commorari sive convenire solebant.” But the decisive proof against the notion that this room was in the temple, is this. In specifying the persons there assembled, it is said, (Acts i. 14,) that the disciples were assembled there with the women of the company. Now it is most distinctly specified in all descriptions of the temple, that the women were always limited to one particular division of the temple, called the “women’s court.” Josephus is very particular in specifying this important fact in the arrangements of the temple. (Jewish War, V. 5. 2.) “A place on this part of the temple specially devoted to the religious use of the women, being entirely separated from the rest by a wall, it was necessary that there should be another entrance to this. * * * There were on the other sides of this place two gates, one on the north and one on the south, through which the court of the women was entered; for women were not allowed to enter through any others.” (Also V. 5, 6.) “But women, even when pure, were not allowed to pass within the limit before mentioned.” This makes it evident beyond all doubt, that women could never be allowed to assemble with men in this upper chamber within the forbidden precincts, to which indeed it was impossible for them to have access, entering the temple through two private doors, and using only one court, which was cut off by an impenetrable wall, from all communication with any other part of the sacred inclosure.

This seems to me an argument abundantly sufficient to upset all that has ever been said in favor of the location of this upper apartment within the temple; and my only wonder is, that so many learned critics should have perplexed themselves and others with various notions about the matter, when this single fact is so perfectly conclusive.

The upper room, then, must have been in some private house, belonging to some wealthy friend of Christ, who gladly received the apostles within his walls. Every Jewish house had in its upper story a large room of this sort, which served as a dining-room, (Mark xiv. 15: Luke xxii. 12,) a parlor, or an oratory for private or social worship. (See Bloomfield’s Annotations, Acts i. 13.) Some have very foolishly supposed this to have been the house of Simon the leper, (Matthew xxvi. 6,) but his house was in Bethany, and therefore by no means answers the description of their entering it after their return to Jerusalem from Bethany. Others, with more probability, the house of Nicodemus, the wealthy Pharisee; but the most reasonable supposition, perhaps, is that of Beza, who concludes this to have been the house of Mary, the mother of John Mark, which we know to have been afterwards used as a place of religious assembly. (Acts xii. 12.) Others have also, with some reason, suggested that this was no doubt the same “upper room furnished,” in which Jesus had eaten the last supper with his disciples. These two last suppositions are not inconsistent with each other.

Tongues of fire.――This is a classic Hebrew expression for “a lambent flame,” and is the same used by Isaiah, (v. 24,) where the Hebrew is לשון אש (leshon esh,) “a tongue of fire;”――commonly translated, simply “fire.” In that passage there seems to be a sort of poetical reference to the tongue, as an organ used in devouring food, (“as the tongue of fire devoureth the stubble,”) but there is abundant reason to believe that the expression was originally deduced from the natural similitude of a rising flame to a tongue, being pointed and flexible, as well as waving in its outlines, and playing about with a motion like that of licking, whence the Latin expression of “a lambent flame,”――from lambo, “lick.” Wetstein aptly observes, that a flame of fire, in the form of a divided tongue, was a sign of the gift of tongues, corresponding to the Latin expression bilinguis, and the Greek διγλωσος, (diglossos,) “two-tongued,” as applied to persons skilled in a plurality of languages. He also with his usual classic richness, gives a splendid series of quotations illustrative of this idea of a lambent flame denoting the presence of divine favor, or inspiration imparted to the person about whom the symbol appeared. Bloomfield copies these quotations, and also draws illustrations in point, from other sources.

My own opinion of the nature of this whole phenomenon is that of Michaelis, Rosenmueller, Paulus and Kuinoel,――that a tremendous tempest actually descended at the time, bringing down clouds highly charged with electricity, which was not discharged in the usual mode, by thunder and lightning, but quietly streamed from the air to the earth, and wherever it passed from the air upon any tolerable conductor, it made itself manifest in the darkness occasioned by the thick clouds, in the form of those pencils of rays, with which every one is familiar who has seen electrical experiments in a dark room; and which are well described by the expression, “cloven tongues of fire.” The temple itself being covered and spiked with gold, the best of all conductors, would quietly draw off a vast quantity of electricity, which, passing through the building, would thus manifest itself on those within the chambers of the temple, if we may suppose the apostles to have been there assembled. These appearances are very common in peculiar electrical conditions of the air, and there are many of my readers, no doubt, who have seen them. At sea, they are often seen at night on the ends of the masts and yards, and are well known to sailors by the name which the Portuguese give them, “corpos santos,”――“holy bodies,”――connecting them with some popish superstitions. A reference to the large quotations given by Wetstein and Bloomfield, will show that this display at the pentecost is not the only occasion on which these electric phenomena were connected with spiritual mysteries. No one would have the slightest hesitation in explaining these passages in other credible historians, by this physical view; and I know no rule in logic or common sense,――no religious doctrine or theological principle, which compels me to explain two precisely similar phenomena of this character, in two totally different ways, because one of them is found in a heathen history, and the other in a sacred and inspired record. The vehicle thus chosen was not unworthy of making the peculiar manifestation of the presence of God, and of the outpouring of his spirit;――nor was it an unprecedented mode of his display. The awful thunder which shook old Sinai, and the lightnings which dazzled the eyes of the amazed Israelites, were real thunder and lightning, nor will an honest and reverent interpretation of the sacred text allow us to pronounce them acoustical and optical delusions. If they were real thunder and lightning, they were electrical discharges, and cannot be conceived of in any other way. Why should we hesitate at the notion that He who “holds the winds in the hollow of his hand,” and “makes a way for the lightning of thunder,” should use these same awful instruments as the symbols of his presence, to strike awe into the hearts of men, making the physical the token of the moral power; and accomplishing the deep prophetic meaning of the solemn words of the Psalmist, “He walks upon the wings of the wind――he makes the winds his messengers――the lightnings his ministers.” For this is the just translation of Psalm civ. 4. See Lowth, Clarke, Whitby, Calmet, Thomson, &c. But Jaspis, Bloomfield, Stuart, &c., support the common version.

Were all assembled, &c.――It has been questioned whether this term, “all,” refers to the one hundred and twenty, or merely to the apostles, who are the persons mentioned in the preceding verse, (Acts i. 26, ii. 1,) and to whom it might be grammatically limited. There is nothing to hinder the supposition that all the brethren were present, and Chrysostom, Jerome, Augustine and other ancient fathers, confirm this view. The place in which they met, need not, of course, be the same where the events of the preceding chapter occurred, but was very likely some one of the thirty apartments, (οικοι, oikoi, Josephus, Antiquities, viii. 3. 2,) which surrounded the inner court of the temple, where the apostles might very properly assemble at the third hour, which was the hour of morning prayer, and which is shown in verse 15, to have been the time of this occurrence. Besides, it is hard to conceive of this vast concourse of persons (verse 41,) as occurring in any other place than the temple, in whose vast and thronged courts it might easily happen, for Josephus says “that the apartments around the courts opened into each other,” ησαν δια αλληλων, “and there were entrances to them on both sides, from the gate of the temple,” thus affording a ready access on any sudden noise attracting attention towards them.

Foreign Jews staying in Jerusalem.――The phrase “dwelling,” (Acts ii. 5,) in the Greek κατοικουντες, (katoikountes,) does not necessarily imply a fixed residence, as Wolf and others try to make it appear, but is used in the LXX. in the sense of temporary residence; and seems here to be applied to foreign Jews, who chose to remain there, from the passover to the pentecost, but whose home was not in Jerusalem; for the context speaks of them as dwellers in Mesopotamia, &c. (verse 9.) A distinction is also made between two sorts of Jews among those who had come from Rome,――the Jews by birth and the proselytes, (verse 10,) showing that the Mosaic faith was flourishing, and making converts from the Gentiles there.

PETER’S SERMON.

This wonderful event took place in the chamber of the temple, which they had used as a place of worship ever since their Lord’s departure. As the whole temple was now constantly thronged with worshipers, who were making their offerings on this great feast day, this room in which the followers of Jesus were devoutly employed, must, as well as all the others, have been visited by new comers: for the mere prior occupation of the room by the disciples, could not entitle them to exclude from a public place of that kind any person who might choose to enter. The multitude of devotees who filled all parts of the temple, soon heard of what was going on in this apartment, and came together to see and hear for themselves. When the inquiring crowds reached the spot, they found the followers of Christ breaking out in loud expressions of praise to God, and of exhortation, each in such a language as best suited his powers of expression, not confining themselves to the Hebrew, which in all places of public worship, and especially in Jerusalem on the great festivals, was the only language of devotion. Among the crowds that thronged to the place of this strange occurrence, were Jews from many distant regions, whose language or dialects were as widely various as the national names which they bore. Parthians, and Medes, and Elamites,――those who dwelt in Mesopotamia, Judea, Cappadocia, Pontus, Asia, Phrygia, Pamphylia, Egypt and Africa, and some even from distant Rome, were all among those who heard the spirit-moving language of the disciples. Some of the more scrupulous among these foreign Jews, were probably, notwithstanding their amazement, somewhat offended at this profanation of worship, in the public use of these heathen languages for the purposes of devotion; and with a mixture of wonder and displeasure they asked, “Are not all these men who are talking in these various languages, Galileans? How then are they able to show such an immense diversity of expression, so that all of us, even those from the most distant countries, hear them in our various languages, setting forth the praises of God?” And they were all surprised and perplexed, and said one to another, “What will this come to?” But to some who were present, the whole proceeding was so little impressive, and had so little appearance of anything miraculous, that they were moved only to expressions of contempt, and said, in a tone of ridicule, “These men are drunk on sweet wine.” This seems to show that to them there was no conclusive evidence of Divine agency in this speaking in various languages; and they, no doubt, supposed that among these Galileans were foreigners also from many other parts of the world, who, mingling with Christ’s disciples, had joined in their devotions, and caught their enthusiasm. Seeing this assembly thus made up, now occupied in speaking violently and confusedly in these various languages, they at once concluded that they were under the influence of some artificial exhilarant, and supposed that during this great festal occasion they had been betrayed into some unseasonable jollity, and were now under the excitement of hard drinking. Such as took this cool view of the matter, therefore, immediately explained the whole by charging the excited speakers with drunkenness. But Peter, on hearing this scandalous charge, rose up, as the leader and defender of these objects of public notice, and repelled the contemptuous suggestion that he and his companions had been abusing the occasion of rational religious enjoyment, to the purposes of intemperate and riotous merriment. Calling on all present for their attention, both foreign Jews and those settled in Jerusalem, he told them that the violent emotions which had excited their surprise could not be caused by wine, as it was then but nine o’clock in the morning, and as they well knew, it was contrary to all common habits of life to suppose that before that early hour, these men could have been exposed to any such temptation. They knew that the universal fashion of the devout Jews was to take no food whatever on the great days of public worship, until after their return from morning prayers in the temple. How then could these men, thus devoutly occupied since rising, have found opportunity to indulge in intoxicating drinks?

Peter then proceeded to refer them for a more just explanation of this strange occurrence, to the long recorded testimonies of the ancient prophets, which most distinctly announced such powerful displays of religious zeal and knowledge, as about to happen in those later days, of which the present moment seemed the beginning. He quoted to them a passage from Joel, which pointedly set forth these and many other wonders with the distinctness of reality, and showed them how all these striking words were connected with the fate of that Jesus whom they had so lately sacrificed. He now, for the first time, publicly declared to them, that this Jesus, whom they had vainly subjected to a disgraceful death, had by the power of God been raised from the grave to a glorious and immortal life. Of this fact he assured them that all the disciples were the witnesses, having seen him with their own eyes after his return to life. He now showed them in what manner the resurrection of Jesus might be explained and illustrated by the words of David, and how the psalm itself might be made to appear in a new light, by interpreting it in accordance with these recent events. He concluded this high-toned and forcible appeal to scripture and to fact, by calling them imperatively to learn and believe. “Let all the house of Israel know, then, that God has made this Jesus, whom you have crucified, both Lord and Christ.” This declaration, thus solemnly made and powerfully supported, in connection with the surprising circumstances which had just occurred, had a most striking and convincing effect on the hearers, and almost the whole multitude giving way to their feelings of awe and compunction, being stung with the remembrance of the share they had had in the murder of Jesus, cried out, as with one voice, “Brethren, what shall we do?” Peter’s instant reply was, “Change your mind, and be each one of you baptized to the name of Jesus Christ, for the remission of your sins; and you shall receive the gift of the Holy Spirit.” That same divine influence, whose in-workings had just been so wonderfully displayed before their eyes, was now promised to them, as the seal of Christ’s acceptance of the offer of themselves in the preliminary sign of baptism. To them and to their children, upon whom, fifty days before, they had solemnly invoked the curse of the murdered Redeemer’s blood, was this benignant promise of pardoning love now made; and not only to them, but to all, however far off in place or in feeling, whom their common Lord and God should call to him. Inspired with the glorious prospect of success now opening to him, and moved to new earnestness by their devout and alarmed attention, Peter zealously went on, and spoke to them many other words, of which the sacred historian has given us only the brief but powerful concluding exhortation,――“Suffer yourselves to be saved from this perverse generation,”――from those who had involved themselves and their race in the evils resulting to them from their wicked rejection of the truth offered by Jesus. The whole Jewish nation stood at that time charged with the guilt of rejecting the Messiah; nor could any individual be cleared from his share of responsibility for the crime, except by coming out and distinctly professing his faith in Christ.

THE CHURCH’S INCREASE.

The success which followed Peter’s first effort in preaching the gospel of his murdered and risen Lord, was most cheering. Those who heard him on this occasion, gladly receiving his words, were baptized, and on that same day converts to the number of three thousand were added to the disciples. How must these glorious results, and all the events of the day, have lifted up the hearts of the apostles, and moved them to new and still bolder efforts in their great cause! They now knew and felt the true force of their Master’s promise, that they should “be indued with power from on high;” for what less than such power could in one day have wrought such a change in the hearts of the haughty Jews, as to make them submissive hearers of the followers of the lately crucified Nazarene, and bring over such immense numbers of converts to the new faith, as to swell the small and feeble band of disciples to more than twenty times its former size? Nor did the impression made on this multitude prove to be a mere transient excitement; for we are assured that “they held steadily to the doctrine taught by the apostles, and kept company with them in all their daily religious duties and social enjoyments.” So permanent and complete was this change, as to cause universal astonishment among those who had not been made the subjects of it; and the number of those who heard the amazing story, must have been so much the greater at that time, as there was then at Jerusalem so large an assemblage of Jews from almost every part of the civilized world. On this account, it seems to have been most wisely ordered that this first public preaching of the Christian faith, and this great manifestation of its power over the hearts of men, should take place on this festal occasion, when its influence might at once more widely and quickly spread than by any other human means. The foreign Jews then at Jerusalem, being witnesses of these wonderful things, would not fail, on their return home, to give the whole affair a prominent place in their account of their pilgrimage, when they recounted their various adventures and observations to their inquiring friends. Among these visitors, too, were probably some who were themselves on this occasion converted to the new faith, and each one of these would be a sort of missionary, preaching Christ crucified to his countrymen in his distant home, and telling them of a way to God, which their fathers had not known. The many miracles wrought by the apostles, as signs of their authority, served to swell the fame of the Christian cause, and added new incidents to the fast-traveling and far-spreading story, which, wherever it went, prepared the people to hear the apostles with interest and respect, when, in obedience to their Lord’s last charge, they should go forth to distant lands, preaching the gospel.

PETER’S PROMINENCE.

This vast addition to the assembly of the disciples at Jerusalem, made it necessary for the apostles to complete some farther arrangements, to suit their enlarged circumstances; and at this period the first church of Christ in the world seems to have so far perfected its organization as to answer very nearly to the modern idea of a permanent religious community. The church of Jerusalem was an individual worshiping assembly, that at this time met daily for prayer and exhortation, with twelve ministers who officiated as occasion needed, without any order of service, as far as we know, except such as depended on their individual weight of character, their natural abilities or their knowledge of the doctrines of their Lord. Among these, the three most favored by Christ’s private instructions would have a natural pre-eminence, and above all, he who had been especially named as the rock on which the church should be built, and as the keeper of the keys of the kingdom, and had been solemnly and repeatedly commissioned as the pastor and leader of the flock, would now maintain an undisputed pre-eminence, unless he should by some actual misconduct prove himself unworthy of the rank. Such a pre-eminence it is unquestionable that Peter always did maintain among the apostles; and so decidedly too, that on every occasion when any thing was to be said or done by them as a body, Peter invariably stands out alone, as the undisputed representative and head of the whole community. Indeed the whole history of the apostles, after the ascension, gives but a single instance in which the words of any one of the twelve besides Peter are recorded, or where any one of them, except in that single case, is named as having said any thing whatever. On every occasion of this sort, the matters referred to were no more the concern of Peter than of any other of the twelve, yet they all seem to have been perfectly satisfied with quietly giving up the expression of their views to him. One instance, indeed, occurs, in which some persons attempted to blame his conduct when on a private mission, but even then his explanation of his behavior hushed all complaint. Often, when he was publicly engaged in the company of John, the most beloved of Jesus, and his faithful witness, it would seem that if there was any assumption by Peter of more than due importance, this distinguished son of Zebedee or his equally honored brother would have taken such a share in speaking and doing, as would have secured them an equal prominence. But no such low jealousies ever appear to have arisen among the apostles; not one seems to have had a thought about making himself an object of public notice, but their common and unanimous care was to advance their great Master’s cause, without reference to individual distinctions. Peter’s natural force of character and high place in his Master’s confidence, justified the ascendency which he on all public occasions claimed as his indisputable right, in which the rest acquiesced without a murmur.

THE CHRISTIAN COMMUNITY.

In the constitution of the first church of Christ, there seems to have been no other noticeable peculiarity, than the number of its ministers, and even this in reality amounted to nothing; for the decided pre-eminence and superior qualifications of Peter were such as, in effect, to make him the sole pastor and preacher for a long time, while the other apostles do not seem to have performed any duty much higher than that of mere assistants to him, or exhorters, and perhaps teachers. Still, not a day could pass when every one of them would not be required to labor in some way for the gospel; and indeed the sacred historian uniformly speaks of them in the plural number, as laboring together and alike in the common cause. Thus they went on quietly and humbly laboring, with a pure zeal which was as indifferent to fame and earthly honor, as to the acquisition or preservation of earthly wealth. They are said to have held all things common, which is to be understood, however, not as implying literally that the rich renounced all individual right to what they owned, but that they stood ready to provide for the needy to the full extent of their property, and in that sense, all these pecuniary resources were made as common as if they were formally thrown into one public stock, out of which every man drew as suited his own needs. To an ordinary reader, this passage, taken by itself, might seem to convey fully the latter meaning; but a reference to other passages, and to the whole history of the primitive Christians, shows clearly, that a real and literal community of goods was totally unknown to them, but that in the bold and free language of the age and country, they are said to have “had all things in common,” just as among us, a man may say to his friend, “My house is yours;――consider every thing I have as your own property;” and yet no one would ever construe this into a surrender of his individual rights of possession. So the wealthy converts to the Christian faith sold their estates and goods, as occasion required, for the sake of having ready money to relieve the wants of those who had no means of support. Thus provided for, the apostles steadily pursued their great work, passing the greater part of every day in the temple; but taking their food at home, they ate what was so freely and generously provided, with thankful and unanxious hearts, praising God and having favor with all the people. In these happy and useful employments they continued, every day finding new sources of enjoyment and new encouragement, in the accession of redeemed ones to their blessed community.

Taking their food at home.――This is my interpretation of κλωντες κατ’ οἶκον αρτον, (klontes kat’ oikon arton.) Acts ii. 46, commonly translated “breaking bread from house to house,” a version which is still supported by many names of high authority; but the attendant circumstances here seem to justify this variation from them. A reference to the passage will show that the historian is speaking of their regular unanimous attendance in the temple, and says, “they attended every day with one accord in the temple,” that is, during the regular hours of daily worship, but as they would not suffer untimely devotion to interfere with their reasonable conveniences, he adds, “they broke bread,” (a Hebraistic form of expression for simply “taking food,”) “at home, and partook of their food in humility and thankfulness.” This seems to me, to require a sort of opposition in sense between ἱερον, (hieron,) “temple,” and οικος, (oikos,) “house” or “home,” for it seems as if the writer of the Acts wished in these few words, to give a complete account of the manner in which they occupied themselves, devoting all their time to public devotion in the temple except that, as was most seemly, they returned to their houses to take their ♦necessary food, which they did humbly and joyfully. But the distributive force which some wish to put upon κατ’ οἶκον, by translating it “from house to house,” is one which does not seem to be required at all by any thing in the connection, and one which needs a vast deal of speculation and explanation to make it appear why they should go “from house to house,” about so simple a matter of fact as that of eating their victuals, which every man could certainly do to best advantage at one steady boarding-place. That the expression, κατ’ οἶκον, most commonly means “at home,” is abundantly proved by standard common Greek usage, as shown in the best Lexicons. But κατα, in connexion with a singular noun, has the distributive force only when the noun itself is of such a character and connection in the sentence as to require this meaning. Thus κατα μηνα, would hardly ever be suspected of any other meaning than “monthly,” or “every month,” or “from month to month;”――so κατα πολεις means “from city to city,” but the singular κατα πολιν, almost uniformly means “in a city,” without any distributive application, except where the other words in the sentence imply this idea. (Acts xv. 21: xx. 23.) But here the simple common meaning of the preposition κατα, when governing the accusative, (that is, the meaning of “at” or “in” a place,) is not merely allowed, but required by the other words in the connection, in order to give a meaning which requires no other explanation, and which corresponds to the word “temple” in the other clause; for the whole account seems to require an opposition in these words, as describing the two places where the disciples passed their time.

There are great names, however, opposed to this view, which seem enough to overpower almost any testimony that can be brought in defense of an interpretation which they reject. Among these are Kuinoel, Rosenmueller, Ernesti, and Bloomfield, whose very names will perhaps weigh more with many, than the hasty statement of the contrary view which I am able here to give. Yet I am not wholly without the support of high authorities; for De Dieu, Bengel, Heinrichs, Hammond, and Oecumenius, reject the distributive sense here.

THE CURE OF THE CRIPPLE.

In the course of these regular religious observances, about the same time or soon after the events just recorded, Peter and John went up to the temple to pray, at three o’clock in the afternoon, the usual hour for the second public prayers. As they went in at the outer gate of the temple, which being made of polished Corinthian brass, was for its splendor called the Beautiful, their attention was called to one of the objects of pity which were so common on those great days of assembly, about the common places of resort. A man, who, by universal testimony, had been a cripple from his birth, was lying in a helpless attitude at this public entrance, in order to excite the compassion of the crowds who were constantly passing into the temple, and were in that place so much under the influence of religious feeling as to be easily moved by pity to exercise so prominent a religious duty as charity to the distressed. This man seeing Peter and John passing in, asked aims of them in his usual way. They both instantly turned their eyes towards him, and looking earnestly on him, Peter said, “Look on us.” The cripple, supposing from their manner that they were about to give something to him, accordingly yielded them his interested attention. Peter then said to him, “Silver and gold have I none, but I give thee what I have; in the name of Jesus Christ, the Nazarene, rise up and walk.” As he said this, he took hold of the lame man and raised him; and he at once was able to support himself erect. Leaping up in the consciousness of strength, he stood and walked with them into the temple, expressing thankfulness and joy as he went, both by motions and words. The attention of the worshiping assembly in the great courts of the temple was at once directed to this strange circumstance; for all who had passed in at the gate, recognized this vivacious companion of the two apostles, as the man who had all his life been a cripple, without the power of voluntary locomotion, and they were utterly amazed at his present altered condition and actions. As the recovered cripple, leaning on Peter and John, still half doubting his new strength, accompanied them on to the porch of Solomon, the whole multitude ran after them thither, still in the greatest astonishment. All eyes were at once turned to the two wonderful men who had caused this miraculous change, and the astonishment which this deed had inspired must have been mingled with awe and reverence. Here surely was an occasion to test the honesty and sincerity of these followers of Christ, when they saw the whole people thus unhesitatingly giving to them the divine honor of this miraculous cure. What an opportunity for a calculating ambition to secure power, favor, and renown! Yet, with all these golden chances placed temptingly within their reach, they, so lately longing for the honors of an earthly dominion, but now changed by the inworkings of a purer spirit and a holier zeal, turned calmly and firmly to the people, utterly disclaiming the honor and glory of the deed, but rendering all the praise to their crucified Lord. Peter, ever ready with eloquent words, immediately addressed the awe-struck throngs who listened in silence to his inspired language, and distinctly declared the merit of this action to belong not to him and his companion, but to “that same Jesus, whom they, but a short time before, had rejected and put to death as an impostor.” He then went on to charge them boldly with the guilt of this murder, and summing up the evidences and consequences of their crime, he called on them to repent, and yield to this slain and risen Jesus the honors due to the Messiah. It was his name which, through faith in his name, had made this lame man strong, and restored him to all his bodily energies, in the presence of them all. That name, too, would be equally powerful to save them through faith, if they would turn to him, the prophet foretold by Moses, by Samuel, and all the prophets that followed them, as the restorer and leader of Israel, and through whom, as was promised to Abraham, all the families of the earth should be blest. But first of all to them, the favored children of Abraham, did God send his prophet-son, to bless them in turning away every one of them from their iniquities.

The beautiful gate.――The learned Lightfoot has brought much deep research to bear on this point, as to the position of this gate and the true meaning of its name; yet he is obliged to announce the dubious result in the expressive words, “In bivio hic stamus,” (“we here stand at a fork of the road.”) The main difficulty consists in the ambiguous character of the word translated “beautiful,” in Greek, Ὡραιαν, (horaian,) which may have the sense of “splendid,” “beautiful,” or, in better keeping with its root, Ὡρα, (hora,) “time,” it may be made to mean the “gate of time.” Now, what favors the latter derivation and translation, is the fact that there actually was, as appears from the Rabbinical writings, a gate called Hhuldah, (חולדה) probably derived from חלד (hheledh) “age,” “time,” “life,”――from the Arabic root خلد (khaladh) “endure,” “last,” so that it may mean “lasting or permanent.” There were two gates of this name distinguished by the terms greater and smaller, both opening into the court of the Gentiles from the great southern porch or colonnade, called the Royal colonnade. Through these, the common way from Jerusalem and from Zion led into the temple, and through these would be the natural entrance of the apostles into it. This great royal porch, also, where such vast numbers were passing, and which afforded a convenient shelter from the weather, would be a convenient place for a cripple to post himself in.

There was, however, another gate, to which the epithet “beautiful” might with eminent justice be applied. This is thus described by Josephus. (Jewish War. book V. chapter 5, section 3.) “Of the gates, nine were overlaid with gold and silver,――* * * but there was one on the outside of the temple, made of Corinthian brass, which far outshone the plated and gilded ones.” This is the gate to which the passage is commonly supposed to refer, and which I have mentioned as the true one in the text, without feeling at all decided on the subject, however; for I certainly do think the testimony favors the gate Huldah, and the primary sense of the word Ὡραια seems to be best consulted by such a construction.

The porch of Solomon.――Στοα Σολομωνος, (stoa Solomonos.) This was the name commonly applied to the great eastern colonnade of the temple, which ran along on the top of the vast terrace which made the gigantic rampart of Mount Moriah, rising from the depth of six hundred feet out of the valley of the Kedron. (See note on page 94.) The Greek word, στοα, (stoa,) commonly translated “porch,” does not necessarily imply an entrance to a building, as is generally true of our modern porches, but was a general name for a “colonnade,” which is a much better expression for its meaning, and would always convey a correct notion of it; for its primary and universal idea is that of a row of columns running along the side of a building, and leaving a broad open space between them and the wall, often so wide as to make room for a vast assemblage of people beneath the ceiling of the architrave. That this was the case in this STOA, appears from Josephus’ description given in my note on page 95, section 1. The stoa might be so placed as to be perfectly inaccessible from without, and thus lose all claim to the name of porch, with the idea of an entrance-way. This was exactly the situation and construction of Solomon’s stoa, which answers much better to our idea of a gallery, than of a porch. (See Donnegan, sub voc.)

It took the name of Solomon, from the fact that when the great temple of that magnificent king was burned and torn down by the Chaldeans, this eastern terrace, as originally constructed by him, was too vast, and too deeply based, to be easily made the subject of such a destroying visitation, and consequently was by necessity left a lasting monument of the strength and grandeur of the temple which had stood upon it. When the second temple was rebuilt, this vast terrace of course became again the great eastern foundation of the sacred pile, but received important additions to itself, being strengthened by higher and broader walls, and new accessions of mounded earth; while over its long trampled and profaned pavement, now beautified and renewed with splendid Mosaic, rose the mighty range of gigantic snow-white marble columns, which gave it the name and character of a STOA or colonnade, and filled the country for a vast distance with the glory of its pure brightness. (See note on page 95. See also Lightfoot, Disquisit. Chor. cap. vi. § 2.) Josephus further describes it, explaining the very name which Luke uses. “And this was a colonnade of the outer temple, standing over the verge of a deep valley, on walls four hundred cubits in highth, built of hewn stones perfectly white,――the length of each stone being twenty cubits, and the highth six. It was the work of Solomon, who first built the whole temple.” (Josephus, Antiquities, XX. viii. 7.)

THE FIRST SEIZURE OF THE APOSTLES.

While the apostles were thus occupied in speaking words of wisdom to the attentive people, they were suddenly interrupted by the entrance of the guards of the temple, who, under the command of their captain, came up to the apostles, and seizing them in the midst of their discourse, dragged them away to prison, where they were shut up, for examination on the next day, before the civil and ecclesiastical court of the Jews. This act of violence was committed by order of the priests who had the care of the temple, more immediately instigated by the Sadducees, who were present with the priests and guards when the arrest was made. The reason why this sect, in general not active in persecuting Jesus and his followers, were now provoked to this act of unusual hostility, was, that the apostles were now preaching a doctrine directly opposed to the main principles of Sadducism. The assertion that Jesus had actually risen from the dead, so boldly made by the apostles, must, if the people believed it, entirely overthrow their confidence in the Sadducees, who absolutely denied the existence of a spirit, and the possibility of a resurrection of the dead. It was now evening, and the apostles being thus dragged away abruptly, in the midst of their discourse, the people were obliged to disperse for the night, without hearing all that the speakers had intended to say; yet even the fragment of discourse which they had heard, was not without a mighty effect. So convincing and moving were these few words of Peter, and so satisfactory was the evidence of the miracle, that almost the whole multitude of hearers and beholders seems to have come over in a mass to the faith of Christ; for converts to the astonishing number of five thousand are mentioned by the sacred historian, who all professed their belief in Jesus, as the resurrection and the life, and the healing.

The guards of the temple, &c.――This was the same set of men above described, as made up of the Levite porters and watchmen of the temple. See note on page 111. Also Lightfoot Horae Hebraica in Acts iv. 1.――Rosenmueller, ibid. and Kuinoel. But Hammond has made the mistake of supposing this to be a detachment of the Roman garrison.

THEIR FIRST TRIAL.

The next morning the high court of the Jewish nation, having the absolute control of all religious matters, was called together to decide upon the fate of the apostles, and probably also of the lame man whom they had cured. This great court was the same whose members had, by unwearied exertions, succeeded a few weeks before, in bringing about the death of Jesus, and were therefore little disposed to show mercy to any who were trying to perpetuate his name, or the innovations which he had attempted against the high authority of the ecclesiastical rulers of the nation. Of these, the principal were Annas and Caiaphas, the high priests, with John and Alexander, and many others, who were entitled to a place in the council, by relationship to the high priests. Besides these, there were the rulers and elders of the people, and the scribes, who had been so active in the condemnation of Jesus. These all having arrayed themselves for judgment, the apostles and their poor healed cripple were brought in before them, and sternly questioned, by what power and by what name they had done the thing for which they had been summoned before the court. They stood charged with having arrogated to themselves the high character and office of teachers, and what was worse, reformers, of the national religion,――of that religion which had been, of old, received straight from God by the holy prophets, and which the wisdom of long-following ages had secured in sanctity and purity, by entrusting it to the watchful guardianship of the most learned and venerable of a hereditary order of priests and scholars. And who were they that now proposed to take into their hands the religion given by Moses and the prophets, and to offer to the people a new dispensation? Were they deep and critical scholars in the law, the prophets, the history of the faith, or the stored wisdom of the ancient teachers of the law? No; they were a set of rude, ill-taught men, who had left their honest but low employments in their miserable province, and had come down to Jerusalem with their Master, on the likely enterprise of overturning the established order of things in church and state, and erecting in its place an administration which should be managed by the Nazarene and his company of Galileans. In this seditious attempt their Master had been arrested and punished with death, and they whose lives were spared by the mere clemency of their offended lords, were now so little grateful for this mercy, and so little awed by this example of justice, that they had been publicly haranguing the people in the temple, and imposing on them with a show of miracles, all with the view of raising again those disturbances which their Master had before excited, but too successfully, by the same means, until his death. In this light would the two apostles stand before their stern and angry judges, as soon as they were recognized as the followers of Jesus. And how did they maintain their ground before this awful tribunal? Peter had, only a few weeks before, absolutely denied all connection and acquaintance with Jesus, when questioned by the mere menials in attendance on his Master’s trial. And on this solemn occasion, tenfold more appalling, did that once false disciple find in his present circumstances, consolations to raise him above his former weakness? Peter was now changed; and he stood up boldly before his overbearing foes, to meet their tyranny by a dauntless assertion of his rights and of the truth of what he had preached. Freshly indued with a courage from on high, and full of that divine influence so lately shed abroad, he and his modest yet firm companion, replied to the haughty inquiries of his judges, by naming as the source of their power, and as their sanction in their work, the venerated name of their crucified Master. “Princes of the people and elders of Israel, if we to-day are called to account for this good deed which we have done to this poor man, and are to say in whose name this man has been cured; be it known to you all, and to all the people of Israel, that in the name of Jesus Christ, the Nazarene, whom you crucified, and whom God raised from the dead, this man now stands before you, made sound and strong. This crucified Jesus is the stone which, though rejected by you builders, has become the chief corner stone; and in no other name is there salvation, (or healing;) for there is no other name given under heaven, among men, by which any can be saved,” (or healed.) When the judges saw the free-spoken manner of Peter and John, observing that they were unlearned men, of the lower orders, they were surprised; and noticing them more particularly, they recognized them as the immediate personal followers of Jesus, remembering now that they had often seen them in his company. This recognition made them the more desirous to put a stop to their miracles and preaching. Yet there stood the man with them, whom they had healed, and with this palpable evidence before their eyes, how could the members of the Sanhedrim justify themselves to the people, for any act of positive violence against these men? These high dignitaries were a good deal perplexed, and sending the apostles out of the court, they deliberated with one another, and inquired, “What can we do with these men? For there is a general impression that they have done a great miracle, among all who are now in Jerusalem, both citizens and strangers, and we cannot disprove it. Still we cannot let these things go on so, nor suffer this heresy to spread any further among the people; and we will therefore charge them threateningly to use the name of Jesus no more to the people.” Having come to this conclusion, they summoned the prisoners once more into the court, and gave them a strict command, never to teach any more nor utter a word in the name of Jesus. But Peter and John, undismayed by the authority of their great judges, boldly avowed their unshaken resolution to proceed as they had begun. “We appeal to you, to say if it is right in the sight of God to obey you rather than God. For we cannot but speak what we have seen and heard?” The judges being able to bring these stubborn heretics to no terms at all, after having threatened them still further, were obliged to let them go unpunished, not being able to make out any plea against them, that would make it safe to injure them, while the popular voice was so loud in their favor, on account of the miracle. For the man whom they had so suddenly healed, being more than forty years old, and having been lame from his birth, no one could pretend to say that such a lameness could be cured by any sudden impression made on his imagination.

Salvation, (or healing.)――The Greek word here in the original, Σωτηρια, (Soteria,) is entirely dubious in its meaning, conveying one or the other of these two ideas according to the sense of the connection; and here the general meaning of the passage is such, that either meaning is perfectly allowable, and equally appropriate to the context. This ambiguity in the substantive is caused by the same variety of meaning in the verb which is the root, Σαω, (Sao,) whose primary idea admits of its application either to the act of saving from ruin and death, or of relieving any bodily evil, that is, of healing. In this latter sense it is frequently used in the New Testament, as in Matthew ix. 21, 22. commonly translated “made whole.” Also, Mark v. 28, 33: vi. 56: x. 52. In Luke vii. 50, and in viii. 48, the same expression occurs, both passages being exactly alike in Greek; but the common translation has varied the interpretation in the two places, to suit the circumstances,――in the former, “saved thee,” and in the latter, “made thee whole.” In this passage also, Acts iv. 12, the word is exactly the same as that used in verse 9, where the common translation gives “made whole.” The close connection therefore between these two verses would seem to require the same meaning in the word thus used, and hence I should feel justified in preferring this rendering; but the general power of the verb makes it very probable that in this second use of it here, there was a sort of intentional equivoque in the writer and speaker, giving force to the expression, by the play on the meaning afforded by the present peculiar circumstances.

THEIR RENEWED ZEAL.

The apostles, as soon as they were released from this unjust confinement, went directly to their own companions, and reported all that the high priests and elders had said to them. And when the disciples heard of the threats which these tyrannical hierarchs had laid on their persecuted brethren, with one mind they raised a voice to God in a prayer of unequalled beauty and power, in which they called upon the Lord, as the God who had made heaven, and earth, and sea, and all in them, to look down upon them, thus endangered by their devotion to his cause, and to give them all boldness of speech in preaching his word; and to vindicate their authority still further, by stretching out his hand to heal, and by signs and miracles. No sooner had they uttered their prayer than they received new assurance of the help of God, and had new evidence of a divine influence. “The place where they were assembled was shaken, and they were all filled again with the Holy Spirit, and spake the word of God with renewed boldness.” This first attack upon them, by their persecutors, so far from dispiriting or disuniting them, gave them redoubled courage, and bound them together still with the ties of a common danger and a common helper. “All those who believed were of one heart and one soul,” and were so perfectly devoted to each others’ good, that “none of them said that any of the things which he possessed was his own, but held them as the common support of all.” And in spite of the repeated denunciations of the Sadducees and the Sanhedrim, the apostles, with great power and effect, bore witness of the resurrection of their Lord; and the result of their preaching was, that they were all in the highest favor with the people. Neither was any one of them suffered to want any comfort or convenience of life; for many that owned houses and lands at a distance, turned them into ready money by selling them, and brought the money thus obtained, to the apostles, with whom they deposited it in trust, for distribution among the needy, according to their circumstances. This was done more particularly by the foreign Jews, many of whom were converted at the pentecost, when, being gathered from all parts, they heard for the first time of the Messiah, from the mouths of his apostles, and saw their words supported by such wonders. Among these was a native of Cyprus, by name Joseph, a Levite, who so distinguished himself by his labors of love among them, and gave such promise of excellence as a teacher of the new faith which he had adopted, that the apostles honored him with a new name, by which he was ever after known, instead of his previous one. They called him Barnabas, which means “the son of exhortation,” no doubt referring to those talents which he afterwards displayed as an eminent and successful minister of the gospel.

Raised a voice.――This is literal; and can mean nothing more than the common modern expression, “unite in prayer,” with which it is perfectly synonymous. The judicious Bloomfield (Annotations in Acts iv. 24,) observes, “We cannot rationally suppose that this prefatory address was (as some conjecture) not pronounced extempore, but a pre-composed form of prayer, since the words advert to circumstances not known until that very time; as, for instance, the threatenings of the Sanhedrim, (verse 29,) of which they had been but just then informed; and the words ἀκουσαντες ὁμοθυμαδον ῃραν φωνην will not allow us to imagine any interval between the report of Peter and John, and the prayer.” Kuinoel’s view is precisely the same.

Were in the highest favor with the people.――Very different from the common translation, “great grace was upon them all.” But the Greek word, Χαρις, (Kharis,) like the Latin gratia, (in the Vulgate,) means primarily “favor;” and the only question is, whether it refers to the favor of God or of man. Beza, Whitby, Doddridge, &c. prefer the former, but Kuinoel justly argues from a comparison of the parallel passages, (ii. 47, and iv. 34,) that it refers to their increasing influence on the attention and regard of the people, which was indeed the great object of all their preaching and miracles. Grotius, Rosenmueller, Bloomfield and others, also support this view.

Deposited in trust.――This is a free, but just version of ετιθουν παρα τους ποδας, (etithoun para tous podas,) Acts iv. 35, literally and faithfully rendered in the common translation by “laid at the feet;” but this was an expression very common not only in Hebrew, but in Greek and Latin usage, for the idea of “deposit in trust;” as is shown by Rosenmueller’s apt quotations from Cicero, “ante pedes praetoris in foro expensum est auri pondo centum,” Defence of Flaccus, chapter 28; and from Heliodorus, παντα τα εαυτου τιθεναι παρα τους ποδας βασιλεως. But Kuinoel seems not to think of these, and quotes it as a mere Hebraism.

Barnabas, son of exhortation.――This is the translation of this name, which seems best authorized. A fuller account of it will be given in the life of Barnabas.

ANANIAS AND SAPPHIRA.

The great praise and universal gratitude which followed Barnabas, for this noble and self-denying act of pure generosity, was soon after the occasion of a most shameful piece of imposition, ending in an awful expression of divine vengeance. Led by the hope of cheaply winning the same praise and honor which Barnabas had acquired by his simple-minded liberality, a man named Ananias, with the knowledge and aid of his wife Sapphira, having sold a piece of land, brought only a part of the price to the apostles, and deposited it in the general charity-fund, alleging at the same time, that this was the whole amount obtained for the land. But Peter, having reason to believe that this was only a part of the price, immediately questioned Ananias sternly on this point, charging him directly with the crime of lying to God. He remarked to him that the land was certainly his own, and no one could question his right to do just as he pleased with that, or the money obtained for it; since he was under no obligation to give it away to the poor of the church. But since he had of his own accord attempted to get a reputation for generosity, by a base and avaricious act of falsehood, he had incurred the wrath of an insulted God. No sooner had Ananias heard this awful denunciation, than, struck with the vengeance he had brought on himself, he fell lifeless before them, and was carried out to the burial by the attendants. His wife soon after coming in, not having heard of what had happened, boldly maintained her husband’s assertion, and repeated the lie most distinctly to Peter. He then declared his knowledge of her guilt, and made known to her the fate of her husband, which she was doomed to share. The words had hardly left his lips, when they were confirmed by her instant death, and she was at once carried out and laid with her husband. The effect of these shocking events on the minds of the members of the church generally, was very salutary; exhibiting to them the awful consequences of such deliberate and hardened sin.