16 Brethren, it was necessary that the scripture should have been fulfilled, which the Holy Spirit spoke before, by the mouth of David, concerning Judas, who became guide to those who took Jesus;
Yea, mine own familiar friend, in whom I confided, who did eat of my bread, hath lifted up [his] heel against me.
I speak not of you all. I know those whom I have chosen; but that the scripture might be fulfilled, He that eats bread with me has lifted up his heel against me.
For it is not an enemy that hath reproached me -- then could I have borne it; neither is it he that hateth me that hath magnified [himself] against me -- then would I have hidden myself from him; But it was thou, a man mine equal, mine intimate, my familiar friend. ... We who held sweet intercourse together. To the house of God we walked amid the throng. Let death seize upon them, let them go down alive into Sheol. For wickedness is in their dwellings, in their midst.
that the word of the prophet Esaias which he said might be fulfilled, Lord, who has believed our report? and to whom has the arm of the Lord been revealed? On this account they could not believe, because Esaias said again, He has blinded their eyes and hardened their heart, that they may not see with their eyes, and understand with their heart and be converted, and I should heal them.
And while he was yet speaking, behold, Judas, one of the twelve, came, and with him a great crowd with swords and sticks from the chief priests and elders of the people.
Wherefore, even as says the Holy Spirit, To-day if ye will hear his voice, harden not your hearts, as in the provocation, in the day of temptation in the wilderness;
And he said, Brethren and fathers, hearken. The God of glory appeared to our father Abraham when he was in Mesopotamia, before he dwelt in Charran,
who hast said by the mouth of thy servant David, Why have [the] nations raged haughtily and [the] peoples meditated vain things? The kings of the earth were there, and the rulers were gathered together against the Lord and against his Christ. For in truth against thy holy servant Jesus, whom thou hadst anointed, both Herod and Pontius Pilate, with [the] nations, and peoples of Israel, have been gathered together in this city to do whatever thy hand and thy counsel had determined before should come to pass.
And after the reading of the law and the prophets, the rulers of the synagogue sent to them, saying, Brethren, if ye have any word of exhortation to the people, speak.
Brethren, sons of Abraham's race, and those who among you fear God, to you has the word of this salvation been sent: for those who dwell in Jerusalem, and their rulers, not having known him, have fulfilled also the voices of the prophets which are read on every sabbath, [by] judging [him]. And having found no cause of death [in him], they begged of Pilate that he might be slain. And when they had fulfilled all things written concerning him, they took him down from the cross and put him in a sepulchre;
And much discussion having taken place, Peter, standing up, said to them, Brethren, *ye* know that from the earliest days God amongst you chose that the nations by my mouth should hear the word of the glad tidings and believe.
Brethren and fathers, hear my defence which I now make to you.
But Paul, knowing that the one part [of them] were of the Sadducees and the other of the Pharisees, cried out in the council, Brethren, *I* am a Pharisee, son of Pharisees: *I* am judged concerning the hope and resurrection of [the] dead.
And it came to pass after three days, that he called together those who were the chief of the Jews; and when they had come together he said to them, Brethren, *I* having done nothing against the people or the customs of our forefathers, have been delivered a prisoner from Jerusalem into the hands of the Romans,
And having heard [it] they were pricked in heart, and said to Peter and the other apostles, What shall we do, brethren?
Brethren, let it be allowed to speak with freedom to you concerning the patriarch David, that he has both died and been buried, and his monument is amongst us unto this day. Being therefore a prophet, and knowing that God had sworn to him with an oath, of the fruit of his loins to set upon his throne; he, seeing [it] before, spoke concerning the resurrection of the Christ, that neither has he been left in hades nor his flesh seen corruption.
For it is written in [the] book of Psalms, Let his homestead become desolate, and let there be no dweller in it; and, Let another take his overseership.
For these things took place that the scripture might be fulfilled, Not a bone of him shall be broken.
After this, Jesus, knowing that all things were now finished, that the scripture might be fulfilled, says, I thirst. There was a vessel therefore there full of vinegar, and having filled a sponge with vinegar, and putting hyssop round it, they put it up to his mouth. When therefore Jesus had received the vinegar, he said, It is finished; and having bowed his head, he delivered up his spirit.
And Judas also, who delivered him up, knew the place, because Jesus was often there, in company with his disciples. Judas therefore, having got the band, and officers of the chief priests and Pharisees, comes there with lanterns and torches and weapons. Jesus therefore, knowing all things that were coming upon him, went forth and said to them, Whom seek ye? They answered him, Jesus the Nazaraean. Jesus says to them, I am [he]. And Judas also, who delivered him up, stood with them. When therefore he said to them, I am [he], they went away backward and fell to the ground. He demanded of them therefore again, Whom seek ye? And they said, Jesus the Nazaraean. Jesus answered, I told you that I am [he]: if therefore ye seek me, let these go away;
If he called *them* gods to whom the word of God came (and the scripture cannot be broken),
[for] David himself said [speaking] in the Holy Spirit, The Lord said to my Lord, Sit on my right hand until I put thine enemies [as] footstool of thy feet.
But all this is come to pass that the scriptures of the prophets may be fulfilled. Then all the disciples left him and fled.
The Spirit of Jehovah spoke by me, And his word was on my tongue.
As he was yet speaking, behold, a crowd, and he that was called Judas, one of the twelve, went on before them, and drew near to Jesus to kiss him.
Worthy.Bible » Commentaries » Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible » Commentary on Acts 1
Commentary on Acts 1 Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible
CHAPTER 1
Ac 1:1-11. Introduction—Last Days of Our Lord upon Earth—His Ascension.
1, 2. former treatise—Luke's Gospel.
Theophilus—(See on Lu 1:3).
began to do and teach—a very important statement, dividing the work of Christ into two great branches: the one embracing His work on earth, the other His subsequent work from heaven; the one in His own Person, the other by His Spirit; the one the "beginning," the other the continuance of the same work; the one complete when He sat down at the right hand of the Majesty on high, the other to continue till His second appearing; the one recorded in "The Gospels," the beginnings only of the other related in this book of "The Acts." "Hence the grand history of what Jesus did and taught does not conclude with His departure to the Father; but Luke now begins it in a higher strain; for all the subsequent labors of the apostles are just an exhibition of the ministry of the glorified Redeemer Himself because they were acting under His authority, and He was the principle that operated in them all" [Olshausen].
2. after that he, through the Holy Ghost, had given commandments, &c.—referring to the charge recorded in Mt 28:18-20; Mr 16:15-18; Lu 24:44-49. It is worthy of notice that nowhere else are such communications of the risen Redeemer said to have been given "through the Holy Ghost." In general, this might have been said of all He uttered and all He did in His official character; for it was for this very end that God "gave not the Spirit by measure unto Him" (Joh 3:34). But after His resurrection, as if to signify the new relation in which He now stood to the Church, He signalized His first meeting with the assembled disciples by breathing on them (immediately after dispensing to them His peace) and saying, "Receive ye the Holy Ghost" (Joh 20:22) thus anticipating the donation of the Spirit from His hands (see on Joh 20:21, 22); and on the same principle His parting charges are here said to have been given "through the Holy Ghost," as if to mark that He was now all redolent with the Spirit; that what had been husbanded, during His suffering work, for His own necessary uses, had now been set free, was already overflowing from Himself to His disciples, and needed but His ascension and glorification to flow all forth. (See on Joh 7:39.)
3-5. showed himself alive—As the author is about to tell us that "the resurrection of the Lord Jesus" was the great burden of apostolic preaching, so the subject is here filly introduced by an allusion to the primary evidence on which that great fact rests, the repeated and undeniable manifestations of Himself in the body to the assembled disciples, who, instead of being predisposed to believe it, had to be overpowered by the resistless evidence of their own senses, and were slow of yielding even to this (Mr 16:14).
after his passion—or, suffering. This primary sense of the word "passion" has fallen into disuse; but it is nobly consecrated in the phraseology of the Church to express the Redeemer's final endurances.
seen of them forty days—This important specification of time occurs here only.
speaking of—rather "speaking."
the things pertaining to the kingdom of God—till now only in germ, but soon to take visible form; the earliest and the latest burden of His teaching on earth.
4. should not depart from Jerusalem—because the Spirit was to glorify the existing economy, by descending on the disciples at its metropolitan seat, and at the next of its great festivals after the ascension of the Church's Head; in order that "out of Zion might go forth the law, and the word of the Lord from Jerusalem" (Isa 2:3; and compare Lu 24:49).
5. ye shall be baptized with the Holy Ghost not many days hence—ten days hence, as appears from Le 23:15, 16; but it was expressed thus indefinitely to exercise their faith.
6-8. wilt thou at this time restore the kingdom to Israel?—Doubtless their carnal views of Messiah's kingdom had by this time been modified, though how far it is impossible to say. But, as they plainly looked for some restoration of the kingdom to Israel, so they are neither rebuked nor contradicted on this point.
7. It is not for you to know the times, &c.—implying not only that this was not the time, but that the question was irrelevant to their present business and future work.
8. receive power—See Lu 24:49.
and ye shall be witnesses unto me … in Jerusalem … in all Judea … and unto the uttermost part of the earth—This order of apostolic preaching and success supplies the proper key to the plan of the Acts, which relates first the progress of the Gospel "in Jerusalem, and all Judea and Samaria" (the first through ninth chapters), and then "unto the uttermost part of the earth" (the tenth through twenty-eighth chapters).
9-11. while they beheld, he was taken up—See on Lu 24:50-53. Lest it should be thought He had disappeared when they were looking in some other direction, and so was only concluded to have gone up to heaven, it is here expressly said that "while they were looking He was taken up, and a cloud received Him out of their sight." So Elijah, "If thou see me when I am taken from thee" (2Ki 2:10); "And Elisha saw it" (Ac 1:12). (See on Lu 9:32.)
10. while they looked steadfastly toward heaven—following Him with their eager eyes, in rapt amazement. Not, however, as a mere fact is this recorded, but as a part of that resistless evidence of their senses on which their whole subsequent testimony was to be borne.
two men in white apparel—angels in human form, as in Lu 24:4.
11. Ye men of Galilee, why stand ye gazing up into heaven, &c.—"as if your now glorified Head were gone from you never to return: He is coming again; not another, but 'this same Jesus'; and 'as ye have seen Him go, in the like manner shall He come'—as personally, as visibly, as gloriously; and let the joyful expectation of this coming swallow up the sorrow of that departure."
Ac 1:12-26. Return of the Eleven to Jerusalem—Proceedings in the Upper Room till Pentecost.
12-14. a sabbath day's journey—about two thousand cubits.
13. went up into an upper room—perhaps the same "large upper room" where with their Lord they had celebrated the last Passover and the first Supper (Lu 22:12).
where abode—not lodged, but had for their place of rendezvous.
Peter, &c.—(See on Mt 10:2-4).
14. continued with one accord—knit by a bond stronger than death.
in prayer and supplication—for the promised baptism, the need of which in their orphan state would be increasingly felt.
and Mary the mother of Jesus—distinguished from the other "women," but "so as to exclude the idea of her having any pre-eminence over the disciples. We find her with the rest in prayer to her glorified Son" [Webster and Wilkinson]. This is the last mention of her in the New Testament. The fable of the Assumption of the Virgin has no foundation even in tradition [Alford].
with his brethren—(See on Joh 7:3).
15-26. in those days—of expectant prayer, and probably towards the close of them, when the nature of their future work began more clearly to dawn upon them, and the Holy Ghost, already "breathed" on the Eleven (Joh 20:22), was stirring in Peter, who was to be the leading spirit of the infant community (Mt 16:19).
the number … about an hundred and twenty—Many, therefore, of the "five hundred brethren" who saw their risen Lord "at once" (1Co 15:6), must have remained in Galilee.
18. falling headlong, &c.—This information supplements, but by no means contradicts, what is said in Mt 27:5.
20. his bishopric—or "charge." The words are a combination of Ps 69:25 and Ps 109:8; in which the apostle discerns a greater than David, and a worse than Ahithophel and his fellow conspirators against David.
21. all the time the Lord Jesus went in and out among us—in the close intimacies of a three years' public life.
22. Beginning from the baptism of John—by whom our Lord was not only Himself baptized, but first officially announced and introduced to his own disciples.
unto that same day when he was taken up from us, must one be ordained to be a witness with us of his resurrection—How clearly is the primary office of the apostles here expressed: (1) to testify, from personal observation, to the one great fact of "the resurrection of the Lord Jesus"; (2) to show how this glorified His whole previous life, of which they were constant observers, and established His divine claims.
23. they appointed—"put up" in nomination; meaning not the Eleven but the whole company, of whom Peter was the spokesman.
two—The choice would lie between a very few.
24. prayed and said, Thou, Lord, &c.—"The word 'Lord,' placed absolutely, denotes in the New Testament almost universally THE SON; and the words, 'Show whom Thou hast chosen,' are decisive. The apostles are just Christ's messengers: It is He that sends them, and of Him they bear witness. Here, therefore, we have the first example of a prayer offered to the exalted Redeemer; furnishing indirectly the strongest proof of His divinity" [Olshausen].
which knowest the hearts of all men—See Joh 2:24, 25; 21:15-17; Re 2:23.
25. that he might go to his own place—A euphemistic or softened expression of the awful future of the traitor, implying not only destined habitation but congenial element.
26. was numbered—"voted in" by general suffrage.
with the eleven apostles—completing the broken Twelve.