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Except...this one voice...Touching the resurrection, &c.--This would recall to the Pharisees present their own inconsistency, in befriending him then and now accusing him.
because I doubted of such manner of questions--The "I" is emphatic. "I," as a Roman judge, being at a loss how to deal with such matters.
Jacob said, Esau my brother is a hairy man--It is remarkable that his scruples were founded, not on the evil of the act, but on the risk and consequences of deception.
the rest of the acts of Jeroboam--None of the threatenings denounced against this family produced any change in his policy or government.
appear before God--in acts of worship, the terms used in the command for the stated personal appearance of the Jews at the sanctuary.
Contrasted is the lot of the pious who will praise God, and, acting under His direction, will destroy the power of the wicked, and exalt that of the righteous.
vanity--all sorts of sinful acts (Job 11:11; Isa 5:18).
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.
all that believed were together, and had all things common--(See on Ac 4:34-37).
Annas...and Caiaphas--(See on Lu 3:2). John and Alexander--of whom nothing is known.
laid...at the apostles' feet--sitting, it may be, above the rest. But the expression may be merely derived from that practice, and here meant figuratively.
we are his witnesses...and the Holy Ghost--They as competent human witnesses to facts, and the Holy Ghost as attesting them by undeniable miracles.
as...the face of an angel--a play of supernatural radiance attesting to all who beheld his countenance the divine calm of the spirit within.
Then fled Moses, &c.--for "when Pharaoh heard this thing, he sought to slay Moses" (Ex 2:15).
Our fathers had the tabernacle of witness in the wilderness--which aggravated the guilt of that idolatry in which they indulged, with the tokens of the divine presence constantly in the midst of...
and devout men--pious Jews, probably, impressed with admiration for Stephen and secretly inclined to Christianity, but not yet openly declared.
offered them money--Hence the term simony, to denote trafficking in sacred things, but chiefly the purchase of ecclesiastical offices.
While Peter yet spake...the Holy Ghost fell--by visible and audible manifestation (Ac 10:46).
wist not that it was true; but thought he saw a vision--So little did the apostle look for deliverance!
And upon a set day Herod...made an oration unto them--to the Tyrians and Sidonians especially.
forty years suffered he their manners--rather, according to what appears the true reading, "cherished he them" (as a nurse the infant in her bosom).
the apostles and elders came together to consider of this--but in presence, as would seem, of the people (Ac 15:12, 22, 23).
Barnabas determined to take with them John...Mark--his nephew (Col 4:10).
And when Paul had laid his hands upon them...they spake with tongues, &c.--See on Ac 10:44,45.
seven sons of...Sceva...chief of the priests--head, possibly, of one of the twenty-four courts.
we have four men--Christian Jews, no doubt. which have a vow--perhaps kept ready on purpose.
tidings came--literally, "went up," that is, to the fortress of Antonia, where the commandant resided. See on Ac 21:32. This part of the narrative is particularly graphic.
Art not thou that Egyptian, &c.--The form of the question implies that the answer is to be in the negative, and is matter of some surprise: "Thou art not then?" &c.