Charles Ellicott Commentary Acts 8

And Saul was consenting to his death.—The word seems carefully chosen to convey the fact that he did not himself take part in the stoning, but contented himself with guiding and directing the murder. He kept the garments of the witnesses who flung the stones (Acts 22:20). The statement came, we can scarcely doubt, from St. Paul’s own lips, and in his use of the same word in the passage just referred to, and in Romans 1:32, we may see an indication that he had learnt to see that his guilt in so doing was greater, and not less, than that of the actual murderers.

There was a great persecution against the church.—It is clear that this involved much suffering: imprisonment , perhaps the plundering of their goods, and being made a gazing stock by reproaches and afflictions (Hebrews 10:33–34). In St. James’s description of the sufferings of the brethren (James 2:6–7), we may see at once the measure of the violence of the persecution, and the prominence in it (though Saul, the Pharisee, was for the time the chief leader) of the priesthood and the rich Sadducean aristocracy.

Throughout the regions of Judea and Samaria.—Jerusalem was naturally the chief scene of the persecution, and the neighbouring towns—Hebron, Gaza, Lydda, and Joppa—became places of refuge. It was probably to this influx of believers in Christ that we may trace the existence of Christian communities in the two latter cities (see Notes on Acts 9:32; Acts 9:36). The choice of Samaria was, perhaps, suggested by the hatred of that people for the Jews.

Those who were fleeing from a persecution instigated by the priests and rulers of Jerusalem were almost ipso facto sure of a welcome in Neapolis and other cities. But the choice of this as a place of refuge indicated that the barriers of the old antipathy were already partly broken down.

What seemed the pressure of circumstances was leading indirectly to the fulfilment of our Lord’s commands that the disciples should be witnesses in Samaria as well as in Judea (Acts 1:8). It seems probable, as already suggested (see Note on Acts 7:16), that there was some point of contact between the Seven, of whom Stephen was the chief, and that region.

Except the apostles.—The sequel of the history suggests two reasons for their remaining:

1. The Twelve had learnt the lesson which their Master had taught them, that the hireling fleeth because he is an hireling (John 10:13), and would not desert their post. A tradition is recorded by Clement of Alexandria (Strom. vi. 5, § 43) and Eusebius (Hist. v. 13), that the Lord had commanded the Apostles to remain for twelve years in Jerusalem lest any should say, “We have not heard,” and after that date to go forth into the world.

2. The persecution which was now raging seems to have been directed specially against those who taught with Stephen that the “customs” on which the Pharisees laid so much stress should pass away.

The Apostles had not yet proclaimed that truth; perhaps they had not yet been led to it. They were conspicuous as worshippers in the Temple, kept themselves from all that was common and unclean (Acts 10:14), and held aloof from fellowship with the Gentiles (Acts 10:28). They may well have been protected by the favour and reverence with which the great body of the people still looked on them, and so have been less exposed than the Seven had been to the violence of the storm. It was probable, in the nature of the case, that the Hellenistic disciples, who had been represented by Stephen, would suffer more than others. It was from them that the next great step in the expansion of the Church in due course came.

And devout men carried Stephen to his burial.—It has sometimes been asserted, for example, by Renan (Les Apôtres, p. 145), that these were proselytes. St. Luke, however, always uses a different word to describe that class (Acts 13:50; Acts 16:14; Acts 17:4; Acts 17:17), and the word used here is applied by him to Simeon (Luke 2:25), to the multitude of Jews present on the day of Pentecost (Acts 2:5), and to Ananias as devout according to the Law (Acts 22:12).

This notion must accordingly be rejected as contrary to the evidence. On the other hand, had they been members of the Church, they would naturally, though perhaps not necessarily, have been described as “brethren” or “disciples.” We are left therefore to the conclusion that they were Jews who had been kindled into admiration and half-conviction by the calm heroism of the martyr, and who, without committing themselves to more than that admiration, acted in his case as Nicodemus and Joseph of Arimathea had acted after the Crucifixion.

They would show honor to the memory of the dead, though they had not had the courage to defend the preacher of the truth while he was yet with them. In the legend or tradition regarding the death of Stephen, reported and accepted by Augustine (De Civ. Dei xvii. 8; Serm. 318, 319; Tract. In Joann. 120), Gamaliel and Nicodemus are named as actually taking part in the entombment, and as having been afterwards laid in the same sepulchre, on which his name appeared in Aramaic characters as Chaliel (= garland), the equivalent in that language of the Greek Stephanos. The translation of the martyr’s relics to Ancona, Minorca, and to Uzalis, and other towns in Africa, made a deep impression on Augustine, and gave occasion to some of his most eloquent sermons. Oratories were dedicated to his memory, and miraculous cures effected by prayers addressed to him. (See Butler’s Lives of the Saints, Aug. 3rd.)

And made great lamentation over him.—The act was in every way significant. Commonly, one who had been stoned to death on the charge of blasphemy would have had no funereal honors. He would have been buried “with the burial of an ass” (Jeremiah 22:19). The public lamentation on the part of men conspicuous for their devout zeal for the Law, was therefore of the nature of a protest, probably on the part of the more moderate section of the Pharisees, such as Joseph, Nicodemus, and Gamaliel, against what would seem to them the unnatural coalition between the Sadducean priesthood and the ultra-zealot section of their own party.

As for Saul, he made havoc of the church.—The tense in the Greek implies continuous action, and so indicates the severity of the persecution. Further details are given by St. Paul himself. He persecuted this way to the death (Acts 22:4). It does not follow, however, that this points to more than the death of Stephen.

Both men and women were imprisoned (in the same place, Acts 22:4). The fact that women were included among the sufferers implies that they had been more or less prominent in the activity of the new society. Such may have been the devout women of Luke 8:2-3.

The victims were punished in every synagogue, most probably with the forty stripes save one (2 Corinthians 11:24), which was the common penalty for minor offences against religious order. They were compelled to blaspheme the worthy name of the Master whom they acknowledged as the Christ (Acts 26:11; James 2:7). They were subject to wanton outrages in addition to judicial severity (1 Timothy 1:13). There was, as the persecutor himself afterwards confessed (Acts 26:11), a kind of insane ferocity in his violence. Even the very word “haling” implies a brutality which might well have been spared.

Those who were scattered abroad.—These, as has been said above, were in all probability Stephen’s Hellenistic fellow-workers and followers. As in later ages, the axiom that “the blood of martyrs is the seed of the Church,” held true from the beginning. The attempt to stamp out the new faith only gave it a wider scope of action, and urged it on to pass the limits within which it might otherwise have been confined for a much longer period.

Preaching the word.—Better, preaching the glad tidings of the word.

Then Philip went down to the city of Samaria.—More accurately, “a city.” The sequence of events implies that it was not the Apostle, but his namesake who had been chosen as one of the Seven. Because he was conspicuous in the work of “preaching the glad tidings of Christ,” he was afterwards known as Philip the Evangelist (Acts 21:8).

It was natural enough that the identity of name would lead writers who were imperfectly informed to confuse the two, as Polycrates, Bishop of Ephesus, seems to have done in the passage quoted by Eusebius (History 3.31).

The “city of Samaria” is described in precisely the same terms as in John 4:5, where it is identified with Sychar, the Sichem of the Old Testament. (See Note on John 4:5.) “Samaria,” throughout the New Testament (for example, in Acts 9:31; Luke 17:11; John 4:4–5), is used for the province, and not for the city to which it had been attached in earlier times. This had been renamed Sebaste (the Greek equivalent of Augusta) by Herod the Great in honor of the Emperor, and this name had more or less superseded the old one (Josephus, Antiquities 15.8.5).

Assuming its identity with Sychar, the narrative in John 4 at once suggests the reason that probably determined Philip’s choice. The seed had already been sown, and the fields were white for harvest (John 4:35). Possibly, as suggested above , there may have been some previous connection with the district, as some in that city had already accepted Jesus as the Christ.

Preached Christ.—The verb is not the same as in Acts 8:4, and is the word used for “preaching” or “proclaiming.” The tense implies continued action, extending, perhaps, over weeks or months. We find in John 4:25 that the expectation of the Messiah was as strong among the Samaritans as among the Jews. Philip’s work, therefore, was to proclaim that the long-expected One had come, and that the Resurrection was the crowning proof that He was the Christ, the Son of God. The readiness with which the proclamation was accepted shows that despite the adverse influence that had come into play since our Lord had taught there, the work done at that time had not been in vain.

Hearing and seeing the miracles which he did.—Better, the signs, as this is closer, here as elsewhere, to the force of the Greek. It is remarkable that they had believed in the first instance without any other sign than the person and the teaching of the Lord Jesus. Miracles came, not as the foundation, but for the strengthening of their faith; perhaps also as a corrective to the adverse influence about which we are soon to hear.