I.-14. "With the women." Beza renders this-cum uxoribus, with their wives.

I. 18, 19. "Now this man purchased a field with the reward of iniquity," &c. These verses must come in a parenthesis, being the words not of the Apostle, but of the historian, who informs his readers, that the circumstances related are generally known to the inhabitants of Jerusalem.-Valpy's Greek Testament.

I.-26. "And they gave forth their lots." The account which Grotius gives of the manner in which lots were cast, seems very probable and satisfactory. He says, they put their lots into urns, one of which contained the names of Joseph and Matthias, and the other a blank, and the word apostle. In drawing these out of the urns, the blank came up with the name of Joseph, and the lot on which was written the word apostle came up with the name of Matthias. This being in answer to their prayers, they concluded that Matthias was the man whom the Lord had chosen to the apostleship.Burder's Oriental Customs, vol. i. page 340.

11.-1. "The day of Pentecost." So called, because it was kept on the fiftieth day from the passover, or rather from the second day of the festival, or the sixteenth day of the month Nisan. It was also called the feast of weeks, because it was kept a week of weeks, or seven weeks after the first day of unleavened bread.-See Valpy's Greek Testament.

II.-3. "There appeared to them cloven tongues, like as of fire, and it sat upon each of them." The singular it, after the plural tongues, denotes the unity of the spirit, which was here manifested in the form, not of cloven tongues, but severed, or separate and distinct flames, one of which was seen on the head of each disciple. Tongues of fire is a Hebraism for fame, as may be seen in the original of Isaiah v. 24. We say lambent flame by the same metaphor. Ostervald.

11.—15. "Seeing it is but the third hour of the day." The Jews rarely, if ever, ate or drank till after the hour of prayer Acts x. 30. and on sabbath days not till the sixth hour (twelve at noon, Josephus, de vita sua 54;) which circumstance well explains the Apostle Peter's defence of those on whom the Holy Ghost had miraculously descended on the day of Pentecost.-Horne's Introduction, vol. iii. page 162.

II. 19. "Wonders in heaven above," &c. This doubtless refers to the strange prodigies and signs which preceded the destruction of Jerusalem; all of which, by singular providence, are recorded in Josephus, and many of them in Tacitus, book v. chap. 13.-Ostervald.

II. 47. "And the Lord added to the church daily such as should be saved." The Greek is the saved, i. e. those who had attended to the injunction at the 40th verse of this chapter and by faith had embraced the Gospel as the means of salvation.

III.1. "The hour of prayer, being the ninth hour." The Jews had three stated hours for prayer: the 1st, at the third hour of the day, or nine o'clock, at which time they offered their morning sacrifice; the 2nd, at the sixth, i. e. twelve o'clock; and the 3rd, at the ninth, or three in the the afternoon, when they offered the evening sacrifice.Ostervald.

IV.—1. "The captain of the temple." We learn from Josephus, that the tower of Antonia, which overlooked the temple, was always garrisoned by a legion of soldiers; and that, on the side where it joined to the porticos of the temple, there were stairs reaching to each portico, by which a company, band, or detachment descended, and kept guard in those porticos, to prevent any tumult at the great festivals. The commanding officer of this force is in the New Testament termed the captain, the chief captain of the band, and the captain of the temple.-Horne, vol. iii. page 208.

IV.

-4. "About five thousand." Including those who were converted before.-Doddridge.

IV.-13. "And perceived that they were unlearned and ignorant men." The Greek word here rendered ignorant, and by Schleusner unlearned, as it unquestionably is sometimes, as 1 Cor. xiv. 16. and little eloquent, as 2 Cor. xi. 6. seems here to retain its proper sense, of a private person, one of the vulgar, a plebeian. The Apostles were neither men of letters nor scholars, nor in any public rank of life, as the priests and magistrates were.-Valpy's Greek Testament.

IV.-19. "Whether it be right in the sight of God, to hearken unto you more than unto God, judge ye." According to Plato, Socrates replied to his accusers in the following manner :-O ye Athenians, I will obey God rather than

you.

IV.- -25 &c.

"Who by the mouth of thy servant David hast said, Why did the heathen rage," &c. Those who doubt whether the 2nd Psalm does really apply to our Lord, will do well to consider attentively the Apostle's exposition, in the 27th and 28th verses, of the two first verses of the Psalm contained here in the 25th and 26th verses.

IV.—31. “And they were all filled with the Holy Ghost." With the influence of the Spirit: special eminent gifts of the Spirit fell upon all who were there present.-Valpy's Greek Testament.

V.- -36. "For before these days rose up Theudas." Josephus's account of Theudas, Antiq. b. xx. c. v. s. 1. referred to a transaction that occurred seven years after Gamaliel's speech, of which this text is a part. The contradiction is removed by the probability that there might be two impostors of the same name: for there were four persons of the name of Simon within forty years, and three of Judas within ten years, all of whom were leaders of insurrections.-Horne's Introd. vol. i. page 596.

VI.-1.

"There arose a murmuring of the Grecians against the Hebrews." The immediate descendants of Abraham by Isaac and Jacob, whom God, having delivered from their oppressive bondage in Egypt, chose for himself to be his peculiar people, and their direct issue, without any intermixture of Gentile blood or language, are termed by St. Paul, Hebrews of the Hebrews, Phil. iii. 5. as opposed to the Hellenistic Jews, or those who lived among the Greeks, whose language they spoke, and who were called Hellenists, Acts vi. 1. ix. 29. xi. 20. Many of the latter were descended from parents, one of whom only was a Jew. Of this description was Timothy, Acts xvi. 1. Those who were born in Judæa, of parents rightly descended from Abraham, and who received their education in Judæa, spoke the language of their forefathers, and were thoroughly instructed in the learning and literature of the Jews, were reckoned more honourable than the Hellenists; and to mark the excellence of their lineage and language, they were called Hebrews; a name the most antient, and therefore the most honourable of all the names borne by Abraham's descendants; for it was the name given to Abraham himself, by the Canaanites, to signify that he had come from the other side of the Euphrates.-See Horne's Introd. vol. iii. page 254.

"Because their widows were neglected in the daily ministration." A distribution of alms was made every day. This practice obtained among the Jews in common, for they used to collect every day for the poor, and give it daily to them. Maimonides speaks of it in this manner: "They appoint collectors, who receive every day from every court a piece of bread, or any sort of food, or fruit, or money, from whomsoever that offers freely for the time; and they divide that which is collected, in the evening, among the poor, and they give to every poor person of it his daily sustenance : " from hence the Apostles might take up this custom, and

follow it.-Burder's Oriental Customs, vol. ii. page 354.

VI.-5. "They chose Stephen," &c. The names of these seven deacons are all of Greek derivation; hence we may infer, that, very probably, they are all Hellenists, and that, consequently, by their designation, the church was desirous of giving full satisfaction to the complaint of those whose widows were neglected.-Ostervald.

VI.-9. "Libertines." Were Jews born at Rome, whose grandfathers had been in slavery there, and then made free. Their sons were liberti, their grandfathers libertini. The rest of the synagogue were Jews that had been born in the countries respectively named.-Wall.

"Disputing with Stephen." It is essential to the ends of justice, that the proceedings of the courts should be committed to writing, and preserved in archives or registries: Josephus informs us that there was such a repository at Jerusalem, which was burnt by the Romans, and which was furnished with scribes or notaries for recording the proceedings. From this place, probably, St. Luke derived his account of the proceedings against the protomartyr Stephen, related in Acts vi. and vii.-Horne's Introduction, vol. iii. p. 110.

VII.-14. "Then sent Joseph, and called his father Jacob to him, and all his kindred, threescore and fifteen souls." The family of Jacob are differently reckoned at their going into Egypt. In Deut. x. 22. Moses says, that they were threescore and ten, that is to say all who came out of Jacob's loins (Gen. xlvi. 26.) were threescore and six, besides himself, Joseph, and his two sons, who were in Egypt before; which make threescore and ten. But in Acts vii. 14. Stephen adds to these nine of his sons' wives, and thus makes the number threescore and fifteen. The latter, though not

of Jacob's blood, were of his kindred, as Stephen justly expresses it, being allied to him by marriage.-Horne's Introd. vol i. p. 584.