The Pulpit Commentary — Acts — Volume 1 — Section 54

EXPOSITION. apostles, may be demonstrated. For not CHAPTER IL ouly must the aU of ver. 1 refer to the same Ver. I.-Wasnoo,come for VJa1fuily COfl'le, company as was described in the priiceding A. V. ; aU together for with one =rd, A. V. chapter (vers. 15-26), but it is quite clear and 'I'.R. When the da.y of :Penteoost wa.s in vcr. 15 of this chapter that Petet 11.ncl now oome ; litera.lly, wke1& the day of Pente- the eleven (ver. 14), standing up separate cost-i.e. of the fiftieth dav--was in the from the body of the disciples, say of them, course of being compleud. '.l'he fiftieth day "These are not drunken, as ye suppose; " (reckoned from the end of the 16th of which is a demonstration that those of Nisan. on which Jesus was crucified} WB8 whom they thus spoke had been speaking actually come, but was not ended (oomp. with tongues (see also eh. :i::. 44). St, Luke i:i::. 11 ). All together ; /Jµ.oi, for Augustine, too, says tha.t the hundred and /Jl-'o6uµ.al,&v: but oµ.o6uJ.ta~&,· - a favourite tweuty all received the Holy Spirit. To word in the Acts (eh. h-. 2-l, note)-seems the same effect Meyer, Worclaworth, Alford preferable to l!J.tov, which occurs only in (who adds, " Not the hundred and twenty St. John. In one pln.oe (see eh. i. 15, note). only, but all the believers in Christ then The purpose, doubtless, of their coming congregated at Jerusalem;" so also Lange). together wus for prayer, as in eh. i. H; and Farrar well remarlts, "It was the consecra- the third hour (9 a.m., ver. 15), the hour of tion or a whole Church, . . . to be all of offering the morning se.c.ri.fice, was close at them a chosen generation, a royal priest- hand (comp. eh. iii. l a.nd Luke i. 10). hood, a holy nation, a peculiar people" Ver. 2.-From J1ea11en a sound for a (' Life of St. Paul,' eh. v.). Lange says, MUnd from heaven, A.. V.; as of the rushing "Not only the apostles, but all the disciples, of a for os of a roshing, A.. V. All the were filled with the Holy Ghost. . . . 'fhere houae ; showing tha.t it was in a private is a uni verso.I priesthood of o.11 believers, dwelling, not in the temple (as in eh. iiL 1) and the Holy Ghost is the anointing which that they were assembled (see eh. iL 46). consecrates and qualifies for this priest- Perha.pe the word "church" (/J ,cvpuuchs hood" (' On the Acts,' Clark's edit., p. 67). o1rcos) derives its use from these ea.rly meet- Ver. 4.-Bpirit for Ghost, A.V. Other ings of the disciples in a 1"t.-0use, as dis- tongue& (1 Cor. :i::iv. 21 ; Isa. xxvili. 11); tinguished from the temple (-rh i•phv). the so.me as the "new tongues" of Mark xvi. Ver. 3.-Tongua parting asunder for 17. St. Paul speaks of them as "the tongues cun,en tongua, A.. V. ; each one for each, of men and of angels" (1 Cor. :xiii 1), and A. V. There appeared. They had heard a.a "kinds of tongues " (1 Cor. xiL 10). the sound, now they see the tongues of fire, His habitnal phrase is " speaking in [ or and then they feel the Spirit working with] a tongue [or tongues]" (1 Cor. xiv. 2, in them (see -rer. 34). Tongue& parting 4--6, etc.), and the verb is ahmye Aa.A<w, &Sllllder. The idea of the clot,en tongue, i.e. as here. What these tongues were on this a tongue parted into two, which is thought occasion we are explicitly informed in vers. to l:a'l'e been the origin of the mitre, is 6, 8, and 11. They were the tonl!,'ues of the not suggested either by the Greek or by varioue nationalities present at the feast- the circumstances, o.nd is clearly a mistaken Po.rthio.ns, Jl:ledes, Ela.mites, Mesopotamians, one. Ll.taJ.t•p•(OJ.t<Va.1 means dutributing th.em- Egyptians, Phryl!,'io.ns, ArabiJJ.ns, eto. This &l,;es or being dutriwted. From the central is so clearly o.nd so distinctly stated thn.t it appa.rition. or rather place of sonnd, they is astonishing that any one should deny aaw issuing forth m.aDY several tongues, look- it who accepts St. Luke's account as his- ing like small fie.mes of fire, and one such torical. The only room for doubt is whether t.oni;ue ,sat upon each one of tlie brethren or the speakers spoke in these divers languages disciples present. Each one. That Chrysos- or the hearers heard in them though th~ tom is right (' Hom.' iv.) in interpreting Ppeakors spoke in only one tongue. But the roch one of this 'l'erse of the hundred not to mention that this is far more diffi- and twenty, and not of the twelve, and the cult to imagine, o.nd transfers the miracle all in ver. 4 of all present beside, tile (~om t~o~ ".fho had the Ho~~ Spir,i,t ~ OH, ll, 1- -47.] THE ACTS OF THE APOSTLES.