John Calvin Commentary Acts 10:30

"And Cornelius said, Four days ago, until this hour, I was keeping the ninth hour of prayer in my house; and behold, a man stood before me in bright apparel," — Acts 10:30 (ASV)

Because this answer of Cornelius contains only the bare repetition of the history, I will not need to dwell long on that. In summary, he called Peter at God's command.

I was fasting. Many Greek books have ημην, I sat. The old interpreter omits the word fasting, which I think was done through error or negligence, because it is expressed in all the Greek books. Furthermore, he makes express mention of fasting, partly so that we may know that he did not pray coldly or perfunctorily at that time, and secondly, so that the vision may be less suspected.

For doubtless, the brain of a person who is fasting (when there is moderate sobriety) does not easily admit any strong imaginations, in which images and strange forms appear, by which people are deceived. Therefore, Cornelius’s meaning is that he was earnestly committed to prayer when the angel appeared to him, and that his mind was free from all such hindrances that usually make people subject to fantasies and imaginations. The circumstance of time also tends to the same end: this was done when it was fair daylight, three hours before sunset.

A man stood in shining garment. He calls him a man, whom he knew was an angel of God. But it is a common thing for the name of the visible form in which God or His angels appear to be applied to Him or them; so Moses sometimes calls them angels, and sometimes men, who appeared to Abraham in the shape of men.

The shining garment was a token of heavenly glory and, as it were, a sign of the divine Majesty that appeared in the angel. The evangelists declare that there was such brightness in Christ’s garment when He showed His glory to the three disciples on the mount. They witness the same thing of the angels who were sent to testify to Christ’s resurrection.

For, as the Lord bears with our infirmity to the extent that He commands His angels to descend in the form of our flesh, so He also shines upon them certain beams of His glory, so that the commandments which He has committed to them may be more reverenced and believed.

Here a question arises: whether that was a true and natural body, and whether that was a garment indeed, or if Cornelius only saw such a shape and appearance. Although this is not so necessary to know, and we can scarcely affirm anything with certainty, it still seems to me more probable, conjecturally, that God, to whom it belongs to create all things, gave the angel a true body and clothed it with a most gorgeous garment.

But as soon as the angel had ended his mission, I think he was restored to his own nature, with the body and garment being brought to nothing, and that he was not subject to human limitations as long as he was in the shape of a man.