15--17.
2091
ἐν ὑμῖν παρακλήσεως ] πρὸς τὸν λαὸν λέγετε. 16. ἀναστὰς δὲ Παῦλος, ‘4 / - 1 ΄ ” 3 Cal a c , καὶ κατασείσας τῇ χειρὶ, εἶπεν, Άνδρες Ισραηλῖται, καὶ οἱ φοβούμενοι
τὸν Θεόν, ἀκούσατε.
17. 6 Θεὸς τοῦ λαοῦ τούτου Ισραὴλ ἐξελέξατο τοὺς πατέρας ἡμῶν: καὶ τὸν λαὸν ὕψωσεν ἐν
~
τη
παροικίᾳ ἐν γῇ
Αἰγύπτῳ, καὶ μετὰ βραχίονος ὑψηλοῦ ἐξήναγεν αὐτοὺς ἐξ αὐτῆς:
1D reads λογος σοφιας εν viv παρακλησεως.
ε]. 1. Cor. xu. 8.
and the name was given to those who con- ducted the assemblies for that purpose. They had to guard against anything unfitting taking place in the synagogue (Luke xiii. 14), and to appoint readers and preachers, Schiirer, fewish People, div. ii., vol..ii., p. 65, E.T.; Edersheim, Fewish Social Life, p. 281, and on the present passage, Fesus the Messiah, i., 434, and for the title in inscriptions, Grimm- Thayer, sub v. ; see also below on xiv. 2. ---ἄνδρες ἀδελφοί: courteous address, ii. 37, *‘ Gentlemen, brethren ” (Ramsay). Ver. 16. κατασείσας, see above on xl. πο and οι XIX, 93% απ 40° (XXvi. 1), “‘made a gesture with his hand,” a gesture common to orators, ‘‘nam hoc gestu olim verba facturi pro con- tione silentium exigebant,” and here a graphic touch quite characteristic of Acts. ‘ The speech which follows may well have remained in the memory, or possibly may have found a place in the manuscript diary of one of Paul’s hearers (Ramsay, St. Paul, p. 100), or St. Paul may himself have furnished St. Luke with an outline of it, for the main sections, as Ewald sug- gested, may have formed part of the Apostle’s regular mode of addressing similar audiences; and if not St. Paul himself, yet one of those who are de- scribed as οἱ περὶ Παῦλον, ver. 13 (Z6ck- ler), may have supplied the information. On the other hand it is maintained that the speech in its present form is a free composition of the author of Acts, since it is so similar to the early ad- dresses of St. Peter, or to the defence made by St. Stephen, and that St. Luke wished to illustrate St. Paul’s method of proclaiming the Messianic salvation to Jews. But considering the audience and the occasion, it is difficult to see how St. Paul could have avoided touching upon points similar to those which had claimed the attention of a St. Peter or a St. Stephen: “non poterat multum differre vel a Petri orationibus, vel a defensione Stephani . . . hac igitur non magis in Paulum cadunt quam in quemvis novae salutis praeconem ”’ (Blass), while at the
Blass inserts η before wapak. ;
same time it is quite possible to press this similarity too far and to ignore the points which are confessedly characteristic of St. Paul, c/., ¢.g., vv. 38, 39 (Bethge, Die Paulinischen Reden der Apfostelgeschichte, pp. 19-22; Zockler, Apostelgeschichte, pp. 244, 245; Lechler, Das Afostolische Zeitalter, p. 272; Hilgenfeld, Zeitschrift fur wissenschaft. Theol., i., p. 46 (1596)) ; see further, Farrar, St. Paul, i., p. 369, note, and Alford references for the several Pauline expressions, and the remarkable list of parallels drawn out recently by Ramsay between the speech at Pisidian Antioch and the thoughts and phrases of the Epistle to the Galatians, Exposi- tor, December, 1898 (see below on pp. 295, 297); also Nosgen’s list of Pauline expressions, Apostelgeschichte, p. 53, in this and in other speeches in Acts.— ἄνδρες ]., cf. ii. 22, iii. 12, v. 35, a mode of address fitly chosen as in harmony with the references to the history of Israel which were to follow.—oi φ. Θεόν, cf. κ. 2, xiii. 43, 50, xvi. 14, etc.
Ver. 17. τούτου: this points back to *lop.: an appeal to'the national pride of the people in their theocratic privileges and names, cf. 2 Cor. xi. 22, Rom. ix. 6. ---ἐξελ. so often in LXX of God’s choice of Israel.—tripwoev: “exalted,” A. and R.V. Weiss and Wendt, with Bethge and Blass, restrict its meaning to in- crease in numbers, Gen. xlviii. 19, Acts vii. 17, sO also Overbeck; whilst others refer it to the miraculous events con- nected with their sojourn as well as to their increase in numbers (so St. Chry- sostom), others take it of the exaltation of the people under Joseph. But the word may certainly mean something more than numerical increase, and in- clude increase in strength and power, so Hackett, Page), It is used once by