The Harmony Chronicle and Order of the New Testament, Part 2 · Acts 1

The Harmony Chronicle and Order of the New Testament · Part 2 · Acts 1

p. 79ACTS CHAP. I.

CHRIST. XXXIII FRom Galilee where Christ had last appeared to his Disciples, he remandeth them back to Ierusalem, and there cometh again to them. Where among other conference, they question him, Whether he would at that time restore the Kingdom to Israel? His summoning them again to that place, the Metropolis, it may be gave them occasion to move that question; they as yet, with the rest of the Nation conceiting the Messias a temporal Deliverer; and possibly not fully understanding what he meant by the promise of the Father. His answer, It is not for you to know the times and seasons, intimates not that ever there should be such a restauration, but it smartly checketh their curiosity, as erroneous and needless; and sets them to look off earthly longings, to minde the businesse they had to do, viz. to preach him through the world. He leadeth them out as farre on mount Olivet, as where it began to be called Bethany, and there, about the place where he had begun his triumphant riding upon an Asse into Ierusalem, he now rides triumphantly into heaven in a cloud.

The Disciples having seen his Ascension, and two Angels, that told them of his coming again in like manner as he went, return to Ierusalem, and there go up into an upper room, and their number is summed up an hundred and twenty. foreign An upper room was ordinarily chosen by the Learned of the Jews for their meeting place to discusse and determine matters of Learning and Religion. Schab. per. 1. halac. 4. These are the articles that the Schooles of Shammai and Hillel discussed foreign in the chamber, or upper room of Chananiah ben Hezekiah, &c. Jerus. Pesachin. fol. 30. col. 2. foreign The upper room of Beth Arum in Lydda, &c.

p. 80An hundred and twenty were not all the present professors in Ierusalem, but these spoken of were they that were of Christs constant retinue, and companied with him all the time that he went in and out among them, ver. 21. and who being constant witnesses of his actions, and auditors of his doctrine, were appo…ed by him for the Ministry. These are they that the story meaneth all along in these passages: Chap. 2.1. They were all together. Chap. 4.21. They went to their company. Chap. 6.3. Look ye out among your selves. Chap. 8. They were all scattered abroad except the Apostles. Chap. 11.19. They which were scattered abroad, preached, &c. The Jews say, Ezras great Synagogue, was of a hundred and twenty men. Avoth R. Nathan per. 4. Juchasin fol. 13. And their Canons allow not the setting up of a Sanhedrin of three and twenty Iudges, in any City; but where there were an hundred and twenty men fit, some for one Office and imployment, some for another. Talm. in Sanhedr. per. 1. and Maymony in his Treatise of the same name, per. 1.

The activity of Peter in the work of the Gospel, mentioned more along this story, then of any of the others, was not only injoyned, but also inlivened, by that saying of his Master, When thou art converted strengthen thy brethren: and he that had fallen so foul, as he had done, had need of all industry to evidence his recovery, and to get ground again.

The Phrase in ver. 25. Iudas is gone to his own place, may properly be compared with the opinion of the nation, about a traytour, He that betrayeth an Israelite, either body or goods, into the hands of the Heathen, hath no portion in the world to come, Maym. in chobel Umazzik per. 8. And with the Glosse of Baal Turim upon these words in Num. 24.25. Balaam went to his own place, They mean, saith he, that he went to hell.

ACTS CHAP. II.

THe expectation of the Nation grounded from Dan. 9. that the Messias should appear about this time, Luke 19.11. had brought multitudes of Iews out of all Nations to see the issue: And Pentecost having brought up also all the Country of Iudea to celebrate that Feast; in this double conflux of people, the holy Ghost is given and cometh down upon the hundred and twenty Disciples, in the likenesse of fiery tongues: At which very time of the year, and in fire, the Law had been given 1447 years ago. The Ierus. Gomarists in Taanith. fol. 65. col. 3. have a saying, That as Ierusalem was destroyed by fire, so should it be rebuilt by fire. And in Iom tobh fol. 61. col. 3. and Chagigah fol. 78. col. 1. they say that David died at the Feast of Pentecost. Both passages regardable at this place.

As the confusion of tongues at Babel had caused the casting off of the Gentiles, by severing them from the participation of the true Religion [which was only professed and known in the Hebrew tongue] so was the gift of tongues, to be a needfull means, to bring them in to Religion again; when every one may hear of the things of God in his own language. The Disciples were doubly indowed by this gift, as to the matter of language; for they were hereby inabled to speak to every Nation in their own tongue; and not that only, but they were inabled to understand the Originals of Scripture, which they understood not before. Their birth and breeding had not allowed them so much learning as to understand any Bible that was then extant, either Hebrew or Greek, but here is the first operation of this gift of the Spirit upon them, that they are first made able to understand the Originals of Scripture, and then able to unlock them to any one in their own tongue. And here should they begin that take on them to expound the Scriptures by the Spirit, namely to unlock the difficulties of the Originall languages, [for therein the mainest difficulty of the Scripture lodgeth] according as was the method of the Spirits operation in the Apostles.

Pentecost was a time of rejoycing, and at all such festivities the Jews had ever good store of wine stirring: so that these men conclude that they had drunk too much and spake as men distract: which Peter confutes by telling them it was not yet the third hour of the day, or nine a clock. For upon their Sabbaths and holidaies they used not to eat or drink till their Synagogue service was done. Maym. in Schab. per. 30. which was not of a good while after nine a clock.

His alleadging of Ioel, In the last daies I will pour out my Spirit, &c. teacheth us how to construe the phrase, The last daies, in exceeding many places both of the Old Testament and the New, as Isa. 2.1. 1 Tim. 4.1. & 2 Tim. 3.1. 1 Pet. 4.7. 1 Ioh. 2.19, &c. p. 81namely for the last daies of Ierusalem and the Jewish State. For to take his words in any other sense [as some do for the last daies of the world] is to make his allegation utterly impertinent and monstrous.

Three thousand converted, are Baptized In the Name of the Lord Iesus, ver. 38. which no whit disagreeth from the command, Baptize in the Name of the Father and of the Son, &c. Matth. 28.19. For the form of Baptism in those first daies of the Gospel, of which the New Testament giveth the story, may be considered under a threefold condition. 1. Iohn the Baptist baptized in the Name of Messias, or Christ that was then ready to come, but that Iesus of Nazareth was he, he himself knew not till he had run a good part of his course, Ioh. 1.31. as was observed before. 2. The Disciples baptizing the Jews, baptized them in the Name of Iesus: upon this reason, because the great point of controversie then in the Nation about Messias was, Whether Iesus of Nazareth were he or no. All the Nation acknowledged a Messias, but the most of them abominated that Iesus of Nazareth should be thought to be he: therefore those that by the preaching of the Gospel came to acknowledge him to be Messias, were baptized into his Name, as the criticall badge of their imbracing the true Messias. But 3. among the Gentiles where that question was not afoot, they baptized in the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the holy Ghost. And so that baptizing in the Name of Iesus, was for a season for the setling of the evidence of his being Messias, and when that was throughly established, then it was used no more, but Baptism was in the Name of the Father, and Son, &c. Of the same cognizance were those extraordinary gifts of the Spirit, evidences of Iesus his being the Messias, and means of conveying the Gospel through the world, and when both these were well established, then those gifts ceased for ever.

All that beleeved were together and had all things common, ver. 46. The children of those that beleeved, must come under the title of Beleevers too, or they must famish. For this community of goods being for the relief of the poor, as we shall shew at the fourth Chapter, the children, babes and infants of beleeving parents that were poor, must be taken in under this expression, All that beleeved, &c. or how did they for support? If the community of goods reacht them as well as their parents, the title must reach them too: When a Master of a family was baptized, his children were they never so young were baptized with him, and hence the mention of baptizing whole housholds, Act. 16.15.33. They that pleading against Infants Baptism, do cavill, that it may be, there were no Infants in those families that are mentioned, bewray that they little understand the manner of administring Baptism in its first use. For the stress of the business lies not in this; whether it can be proved that there were Infants in those families, where it is recorded, that whole housholds were baptized, but the case is this, that in all families whatsoever, were there never so many Infants, they were all baptized, when their parents were baptized. Thus was the constant custom among the Jews for admission of Proselytes, and thence this Canon, That a woman proselyted and baptized when she was great with child, her childe needed not then to be baptized when it was born. Maym. in Issure biah per. 13. For if he had been born before she was baptized, he must have been baptized with her. And the New Testament gives so little evidence of the altering this custom, at those first baptizings under the Gospel, that it plainly on the contrary shews the continuance of it, when it speaketh of the Apostles baptizing whole housholds.

ACTS CHAP. III, IV.

PEntecost Feast lasted eight daies, as well as their other Feasts, Passeover, Tabernacles, and Dedication did. Ierus. in Moed Katon, and Chagigah at large. The occurrences of the very day of Pentecost it self, are related already: Now whether the healing of the Creeple, and the consequences upon that, contained in the third Chapter, befell upon the same day in the afternoon, or on the next day after, which was the day when all the males appeared before the Lord in the Temple, or further in the Feast, is not certain, but that they were within the compasse of the Feast, is more then probable, by the great multitude that was converted at one Sermon.

Peter and Iohn go into the Temple at the ninth hour, the hour of prayer. Talm. in Pesachin. per. 5. The dayly sacrifice of the evening was killed at the eight hour and a half, and offered at the ninth hour and an half. Joseph. Antiq. lib. 14. cap. 8. foreign, &c. Twice a day, nvmely in the morning and about the ninth hour, they offered on the p. 82Altar. There, as they go in, at the East-gate, that led into the Court of the women, they finde and heal a Creeple, which had been so from his birth. The Jews looked upon this miracle, as wrought by their own holinesse, as appears by the Apostles answer to them, ver. 12. For such a conceit walked among the Nation, that extraordinary holinesse might attain to miraculous workings. R. Phinehas ben Iair saith, Industry bringeth to purity, Purity to cleannesse, Cleannesse to holinesse, Holinesse to humblenesse, Humblenesse to fear of sin, Fear of sin to partaking of the holy Ghost. Jerus. Schab. fol. 3. col. 3.

Yet are they imprisoned that night, and the next morning convented before the Councill. Among others which are named of the Councill, which were Priests, Alexander and Iohn, mentioned ver. 6. seem to be Alexander Alabarcha, or his son, and Rabban Iochanan ben Zaccai, the later, Vice-president at this time under Rabban Gamaliel.

They dismissed, come to their own company, and related what had occurred, and upon joynt prayer the place is shaken, and they are again filled with the holy Ghost. Why? What could be added to them they having been so filled with the holy Ghost before? In their prayer they petitioned these two things, That God would give them boldnesse to speak his Word, and that Healings and Signes and Wonders might be done in the Name of Iesus: And the power of both these fals now upon them: and especially, it may be conceived that Wonder of Wonders, upon the twelve, power to bestow the holy Ghost.

The community of goods, with the mention of which the second and the fourth Chapters conclude, may be considered under these two animadversions: 1. That although persecution as yet for the Gospel, had brought none to poverty, yet it is manifest that there were poor amongst them. And some come to the more poverty for the Gospel sake too. For if they were poor before they received the Gospel, then the Synagogue of which they were provided for them: but now they were destitute of that provision, they having forsaken the Synagogue; or at the least the Synagogue them, because of their forsaking of their Judaism. For the Evangelicall Church therefore, that was now begun, to provide for her poor, it had not only the Synagogue for an example, but would have had it for a reproach, if they had neglected so needfull a duty, which that took care for so constantly and tenderly. 2. This having of all things common therefore, was not an extinction of propriety and of meum & tuum, as if one rich man should have as good interest in another rich mans estate as himself, but it was intended mainly for the relief of the poor: Not to bring any that had estates to voluntary poverty, nor to levell estates, but to releeve those which stood in need. Chap. 2.45. & 4.35. Distribution was made to every man as he had need: To them that preached the word for their maintenance, and to the poor for their relief.

ACTS CHAP. V.

ANanias and Sapphira set up as everlasting monuments to all generations of Gods just indignation against the despisers of the Spirit of Christ. foreign The Spirit of Messias was in honourable mention and esteem in the Nation, in their common speech, though they would not know him when he was revealed. Now the sinne of this couple was first coveteousnesse, but especially presuming to play false, and yet thinking to go undiscovered of that Spirit which wrought so powerfully in the Apostles. That cursed opinion that denies the Godhead of the holy Ghost, runs parallel with this sinne of Ananias and Sapphira to a hair.

Peters warrant for this execution we may reade in that passage, Iohn 20.22, 23. He breathed on them and said, Receive ye the holy Ghost, whose sins ye remit they are remitted, and whose sins ye retain they are retained. How? To forgive sins absolutely? this belongs only to God. Was it to forgive them declaratively? This seems too low a construction, and too restrained: It seemeth therefore the most proper meaning of this donation, that he now indued them with power, to avenge what sins the holy Ghost [now received] should direct them, to avenge, with bodily plagues, giving up to Satan, or with death: and again to remit such penalties as they should be directed to remit, and they should be remitted. The holy Ghost whom they had received then with so peculiar a power, Ananias and Saphira do here plainly vilifie, and affront directly; therefore an execution of such power upon them was as proper and direct. But be it whether it will, that Peter took his warrant originally from thence, or had it instantly by some immediate revelation, as the judgement p. 83was fearfull, so his executing of it was remarkable, shewing at once his assurance of the pardon of his own lying against his Master, when he can and dare thus avenge a lye against the holy Ghost: and also his just zeal and activity for the honour of his Master whom he had denied.

It is said in ver. 12. They were all in Solomons porch, which was the East cloister of the mount of the Temple, and in part of it did the Sanhedrin now sit, and the Apostles not afraid to act so near them: But at last they are apprehended and imprisoned, but miraculously inlarged, and preaching in the Temple again: and thereupon convented before the Councill. Gamaliel, Pauls master was now President, and continued in this dignity till within eighteen years of the destruction of the City. He pleadeth here for the Apostles, not out of any love to their persons or doctrine, for he lived and died a down right Pharisee: but partly because he saw the Sadduces at present the chief agents against them, and chiefly because the miracles they wrought were so plain and convincing, that he could move no lesse then what he did. And yet for all the fairnesse of this man at this time, yet did he afterward ordain and publish that prayer called foreign The prayer against Hereticks, meaning Christians; framed indeed by Samuel Katon, but approved and authorized by this man, President of the Sanhedrin [then at Iabuch] and commanded to be used constantly in their Synagogues, in which they prayed against the Gospel and the professors of it▪ Taanith. fol. 65.3. Maym. in Tephil. per. 2.

ACTS CHAP. VI, VII.

THe seven Deacons [as they are commonly called] chosen by occasion of the Hellenists murmuring against the Hebrews about neglect of their widows. The Hebrews were Jews the inhabitants of Iudea, and the Hellenists those Jews that lived in other Countries dispersedly among the Greeks: Not only in Greece, but almost in all other Countries, which the conquests of Alexander, and the continuance of the Syrogrecian Monarchy after him had filled with Greeks, as all Countries also were filled with Jews.

In all the Jews Synagogues there were foreign Parnasin, Deacons, or such as had care of the poor, whose work it was to gather alms for them from the Congregation, and to distribute it to them. foreign There were two that gathered alms for them and one more added to distribute it to them. Maym. in Sanhedr. per. 1. R. Chelbe in the name of R. Ba bar Zabda saith, They appoint not lesse then three Parnasin. For if judgement about pecuniary matters were judged by three, much more this matter which concerneth life is to be managed by three. Jerus. in Peah fol. 21. col. 1. That needfull office is here translated into the Christian Church: and the seven are chosen to this work out of the number of the hundred and twenty that are mentioned, chap. 1.15. and that company only was the choosers of them, and not all the Beleevers in Ierusalem. The reason why the Hebrews neglected the widows of the Hellenists may be supposed, either because they would stick to their old rule, mentioned once before, That a widow was to be maintained by her husbands children. Talm. in che…b. per. 11. Maym. in foreign per. 18. [compare 1 Tim. 5.4.] or because the Hebrews of Iudea had brought in more into the common stock for the poor, by sale of their Goods and Lands, then those that had come from forrain Countries had done, they not having Goods and Lands so ready to sell. All that had been brought in hitherto, had been put into the Apostles hands, and they had been burdened with the care and trouble of the disposall of it: but now they transferre that work and office to the seven, solemnly ordaining them by Imposition of hands into it, and here only, the Imposition of the Apostles hands confers not the holy Ghost, for these men were full of the holy Ghost before.

Stephen an eminent man among them, is quarrelled by certain of the Libertines, and the Hellenists Synagogue. Libertini foreign are exceeding frequently spoken of in the Jews Writings. And the Alexandrian Synagogue [one of the Hellenists] is mentioned in Jerus. in Megillah. fol. 73. col. 4. and Juchas. fol. 26. who tell, that R. Eliezer bar Zadoc took the Synagogue of the Alexandrians that was at Ierusalem, and imployed it to his own use.

When they are notable to overpower him by argument and disputation, they take a ready way to do it, by false accusation, and conventing him before the Sanhedrin: where being accused of vilifying Moses, and speaking of the destruction of that place, he is vindicated, p. 84even miraculously, before he pleadeth his own cause, by his face shining like the face of Moses, and bearing an Angelicall aspect and Majesty; for indeed he spake but what was spoken by the Angel Gabriel, Dan. 9.26, 27.

In his Apology, he speaketh to the heads of his accusation, but somewhat abstrusely; yet so as to them to whom he spake to be well understood, his discourse being according to their own Rhetorick and Logick: To what was laid to his charge, for vilifying Moses, and saying, his customs should be changed, he rehearseth in brief the whole history of Moses, and shews he was Orthodox to him; but yet he driveth all to this, that as the times before Moses were still moving and growing on to settlement in Moses, so when Moses himself had setled all he had to do, yet he pointed them to a Prophet yet to come, to whom they should hearken as the ultimate Oracle, which was this Iesus that he preached to them. And whereas he was accused for speaking of the destruction of the Temple, he first shews, that fixednesse to this or that place, is not so much to be stood upon, as appears by the flitting condition of the Patriachs [whose flittings he giveth the story of at large] and by the moving condition of the Tabernacle before the Temple was built: And when the Temple was built, it was not because God would confine himself to one place, for the most High dwelleth not in Temples made with hands, ver. 48. &c.

He inserteth two or three sharp and true accusations of them, whereas theirs of him had been but false and causelesse. As, that their fathers had persecuted those that foretold of Christ, as they did him for now preaching him, and they followed their fathers steps; nay went further, for they had murdered Christ, whereas their fathers had but murdered his Prophets. And whereas they were so punctuall, about the Ceremonious rites given by Moses, they neglected the morall Law, which was given by the disposition of Angels.

This cuts them to the heart, that they passe a rancourous and furious sentence of death upon him: but he hath a sight of the high bench of heaven, God and Christ at his right hand, their judge and his: A most fit prospect for the first Martyr.

They cast him out of the City and stone him for blasphemy. For these were to be stoned, He that went in to his mother, or to his fathers wife, or to his daughter in Law, or to a male, or to a beast: and he that blasphemed, or that committed Idolatry, &c. And the place of stoning was out from the place of Iudgement, [nay out of the City, as the Gomarists resolve it] because it is said, Bring him that cursed, out of the Camp. And A crier went before him, that was to die, proclaiming his fault. Sanhedr. per. 6. & 7.

When he was come within four cubits of the place of stoning, they stript him naked: only covered his nakednesse before. Ibid.

And being come to the very place, first the witnesses laid their hands upon him, Maym. in Avodah Zarah per. 2. and then stripping off their coats that they might be more expedite for their present work, first one of them dasheth his loins violently against a stone that lay for that purpose: if that killed him not, then the other dasheth a great stone upon his heart, as he lay on his back▪ and if that dispatched him not, then all the people fell upon him with stones. Talm. ubi sup.

Steven in the midst of all this their fury, and his own anguish, gets on his knees and prayes for them: and having so done he fell asleep. The Jews do ordinarily use the word foreign to signifie Dying, which properly signifies sleeping, especially when they speak of a fair and comfortable death: which word Luke translates here. foreign All that were stoned were also hanged up upon a tree. Talm. ubi supr. Whether Steven were so used is uncertain, but it is evident that he had a fair buriall, and not the buriall of a malefactour.

ACTS CHAP. VIII.

CHRIST. XXXIV A Great persecution followeth the death of Steven: in which Saul was a chief agent, scholar of Gamaliel [President of the Sanhedrin] and it may be the busier for that. In Talm. Bab. Sanhedr. fol. 43. col. 1. they say, Iesu had five Disciples, Mathai, Nakai, Netser, Boni and Thodah, and they are urging reasons there, why they should all be put to death, &c.

All the hundred and twenty Ministers mentioned, Chap. 1.15. are scattered abroad [only the twelve stay at Ierusalem as in the furnace to comfort and cherish the Church p. 85there in so sad a time] and they preach all along as they go, and so Satan breaks his own head by his own design, for by persecution by which he had contrived to smother▪ the Gospel, it spreads the more.

The first plantation of it mentioned, is in Samaria, and that according to Christs own direction, and foretelling, Act. 1.8. Ye shall be witnesses to me, both in Ierusalem and in all Iudea, and in Samaria, &c. He had forbidden them before, Go not into the way of the Gentiles, and into any City of the Samaritans do not enter, Matth. 10.5. but now that partition wall that had been between, is to be broken down. Of all Nations and people under heaven the Samaritans were the most odious to the Jews, and a main reason was, because they were Jews Apostates. For though the first peopling of that place, after the Captivity of the ten Tribes, was by Heathens, 2 King. 17. yet upon the building of the Temple on mount Gerizim, such multitudes of Jews continually flocked thither, that generally Samaritanism was but a mongrell Iudaism. They called Iacob their father, expected Messias, had their Temple, Priesthood, Service, Penteteuch, &c. And to spare more, take but this one passage in Talm. Jerus. Pesachin fol. 27.2. The Cuthaeans all the time that they celebrate their unleavened bread feast with Israel, they are to be beleeved concerning their putting away of leaven: If they do not keep their unleavened bread feast with Israel, they are not to be beleeved concerning their putting away of leaven. Rabban Gamaliel saith, All the Ordinances that the Cuthaeans use, they are more punctuall in them then Israel is. It is an unhappy obscurity that the Hebrew Writers have put upon the word Cuthaeans, for though it most properly signifie Samaritans, yet have they so commonly given this name to Christians, as the most odious name they could invent to give them, that in the most places that you meet with it, you cannot tell whether they mean the one or the other. In the place cited, it seemeth indeed most likely that it means the Samaritans, because it speaks of their keeping the feast of unleavened bread, and using the Ordinances of Israel: unlesse it speak of those Jews that had received the Gospel and become Christians, and were fallen to their Judaism again, and joyned that with their Christianity, which very many did, as we shall have occasion to observe hereafter.

Simon Magus taketh upon him to beleeve and is baptized: The naming of him cals to minde the mention of one Simon a Magician that Iosephus speaks of, Antiq. lib. 20. cap. 5. who was a means to intice Drusilla from her former husband to go and marry Felix the Governour of Iudea, this might very well be that man. And it mindes of a passage in Tal. Ierus. in Iebamoth fol. 13. col. 1. foreign I cannot but render it, The Simonians came to Rabbi, and said to him We pray thee give us a man to be our Expositor, Iudge, Minister, Scribe, Traditionary, and to do for us all we need. I know what foreign is in Tal. Bab. in Cholin. fol. 15. But certainly foreign means some people, but whence so named, there is no disputing here.

Philip baptized Samaria, and did great wonders among them, but could not bestow the holy Ghost upon them: that power belonged only to the Apostles; therefore Peter and Iohn are sent thither for that purpose. They laid their hands upon them and they received the holy Ghost: Not upon all, for what needed that? or what reason was there for it? The gifts of the holy Ghost that were received, were these miraculous ones, of Tongues, Prophecy, &c. Acts 10.46. & 19.6. Now of these there were but these two ends, 1. For the confirmation of the doctrine of the Gospel, such miraculous gifts attending it. And 2. for instruction of others: for Tongues were given indeed for a sign, 1 Cor. 14.22. but not only for a sign, but for edification and instruction, as the Apostle also sheweth at large in the same Chapter. Now both these ends were attained, though they that received the holy Ghost were not all, but only a few and set number: nay the later not conceivable of all, for if all were inabled miraculously to be Teachers, who were to be taught? The Imposition therefore of the Apostles hands, mentioned here and elsewhere, and those passages, These signes shall follow those that beleeve, they shall cast out devils, they shall speak with Tongues, &c. Mark 16.17. Repent and be baptized every one of you, and ye shall receive the gift of the holy Ghost, Act. 2.38, &c. were not upon all that beleeved the Gospel, and were baptized: but upon some certain number, whom they were directed by the holy Ghost to lay their hands upon, as those men that God had appointed and determined for Preachers and Ministers to the people, and who by the Imposition of the Apostles hands, receiving the holy Ghost, were by those gifts inabled to understand the language and sense of Scripture, and to be instructers of the people, and to; build them up.

p. 86Candaces Eunuch, having been at Ierusalem to worship, and returning back is converted by Philip. [Of Candace Queen of Meroe in Aethiopia, see Strabo lib. 17.] He met with him in the way that lead from Ierusalem to Gaza the desert. Of this place Strabo again lib. 16. speaketh thus, Then is the haven of the Gazaeans: above which, some seven furlongs, is the City, once glorious, but ruined by Alexander foreign and it remaineth desert. Diodorus Siculus cals it foreign The old Gaza, lib. 19. for another was built at the haven by the sea side, called sometimes Maiuma. Gozom. Eccles. hist. lib. 5. cap. 3. and afterward Constantia, named so by Constantine after the name of his sister: as saith Euseb. de Vit. Constant. lib. 4. cap. 28. or as Sozomon, of his sonne Constantius.

Whether this Eunuch were a Jew or a Proselyte is scarce worth inquiring: his devotion is farre more worth spending thoughts upon, which brought him so long a journey, and imployed him so well in his travail, as in reading the Scripture. He is baptized in the name of Iesus, ver. 37. and [as it may well be conceived] takes ship at Gaza, and is the first, that we finde, that carried the profession of Iesus into Africk. The mention of which, may justly call our thoughts to consider of the Temple built in Egypt by Onias, and the vast numbers of Jews that were in that and the Countries thereabouts, and yet how little intimation there is, in the New Testament Story, by whom or how the Gospel was conveyed into those parts.

Philip is rapt by the Spirit from Gaza to Azotus, which were 270 furlongs, or 34 miles asunder, as Diodor. Sicul. ubi supra, measures.

ACTS CHAP. IX. from the beginning to Ver. 23.

THe conversion of Paul: A monument of mercy, 1 Tim. 1.14.16. A Pharisee, a persecutor, a murderer, yet become a Christian, a Preacher, an Apostle.

He consented to Stevens death: and after that he gets a Commission from the chief Priests, and makes desperate havock in Ierusalem, Act. 8.2. & 22.4. & 26.10.

We finde all along this Book, that the chief Priests are not only the busiest men in persecuting of the Gospel, but in many places it is related so, as if they were the only men and had intire power in their own hands, as a peculiar Court, to give Commissions, to judge, condemn and execute: as it hath been and is the opinion of some, that there was an Ecclesiasticall Sanhedrin distinct from the Civil.

It is true indeed that there was in the Temple a Consistory only of Priests, which sat in the room called Parhedrin, and Liscath Bulente, The Chamber of the Council: but these sate not there, as Magistrates over the people, but only as a Consistory, to take care of the service and affairs of the Temple, that nothing should be wanting, nor nothing slacked that was required about it, or that conduced to the promoting of the service of it, and their power extended not beyond that virge. Any other Concessus or Consistory of Priests alone, then this, I beleeve cannot be shewed in any records of that Nation, and this is far from the power and constitution of a Sanhedrin. The Talmud indeed in Chetuhboth per. 1. Halac. 5. speaketh of a Beth din, or Consistory of the Priests which required 400 zuzims in dower or joynture for a virgin: Which seemeth to assert this as a peculiar Court, invested with distinct power from the other. But the Gomarists, especially the Babylonian do make it plain, that no such thing can be inferred from this action: for they tell us that the Priests determined this businesse of 400 zuzims dower to their own daughters, only for the honour of their Tribe and blood: So that this was not any act of judiciall power binding others, but an act of consent among themselves to keep up the credit of their Function and Families. But here is not time and place to discusse this point [a matter of no small Controversie] further then what may give illustration to the subject before us.

How to understand therefore this judiciall activity of the chief Priests throughout this book, the Evangelist hath given us a rule betime in the story, Chap. 4. ver. 5. Where he shews that the whole Sanhedrin is to be understood, of which the Priests were a great, if not the greatest part, and were in this cause the busiest men. In case of necessity, there might be a Sanhedrin, though never a Priest or Levite was of it, for so is their own Canon, namely if fit men of either rank were not to be found; but in common carriage, and experience they were the greatest and most potent number, as whose profession and Function bespake studiousnesse and pleaded honour. In all the New Testament we meet p. 87but with these men by name, of all the Sanhedrin. Anna…, and Caiaphas and Iohn, and Alexander, Gamaliel, Nicodemus, and Ioseph of Arimathea. And how many of these were not Priests? Gamaliel indeed was of the Tribe of …, and of the Progeny of David, being grandchilde of Hill…l ▪ But as for all the rest, some of them were undoubtedly of the Priesthood, and the others more probably so … then of any other Tribe▪ Of Annas and Caiaphas there is no question▪ And if Iohn, Acts 4.6. be the eminente… Iohn that was then among them, it means Rabban Iochanan ben Zaccai ▪ who was now Vicepresident of the Council, and he was a Priest as Iuchusi… tels us. And if Nicodemus be the same with the eminentest Nicodemus of those time of whom Avoth R Mathan per. 6▪ and Talm. bab. in Cetubbeth fol. 66. make [as we have no cause to think otherwise] then was he by their plain description a Priest likewise. And so was Ioseph of Arimathea, if his stile and title foreign be to be understood according to the common speech of the Nation, as there can be no reason why it should not be so understood. And as for Alexander, of whom is least evidence, it is not worth spending so much time upon as to discusse, since these already mentioned may be witnesse enough.

In all the busie stirring therefore of the Priests in this story of the Acts of Apostles, as chap. 7.1. & 23.2. and about this Commission of Saul, we are not to take them as a distinct and separate power from the Sanhedrin, but as a part of it, and such as whose Function and interest, as they thought, did most of all the other urge them to look to the prevention of this growing evil of the Gospel, as they did, as heartily, as erroniously repute it: and therefore the story doth more especially pitch upon them as the most stirring men. And so Paul himself doth help to interpret Lukes relation▪ For wher…s chap. 9.1, 2. it is said, Saul went to the high Priest and desired of him letters to Damascus … who best could tell how this should be understood, explains it thus, chap. 22.5. Of the High Priest, and of all the estate of the Elders I received letters to the brethren, &c. The words of all the estate of the Elders determine the point we have in hand, and the other words to the brethren, call us to the consideration of another: and that is, how farre the Sanhedrins decrees and injunctions had power and command over the Jews in forrain Lands. By producing the words of one of their Acts we shall better judge of this matter and understand the words to the brethren, both at once.

In Talm. Ierus. Sanhedr. fol. 18. col. 4. they say thus, For the three Countries they intercalated the year for Iudea, and beyond Iordan and Galilee. For two of them together they did it, for one alone they did it not. There is a story of Rabban Gamaliel and the Elders, that they sate at the going up to the Temple, and Iochanan the Scribe sate before them: Rabban Gamaliel saith to him, Write foreign To our Brethren that dwell in the upper South Country foreign And to our Brethren that dwell in the lower South Country, Peace be multiplied to you. We give you to understand that the time of setting forth your tithes is come, &c. foreign And to our Brethren of Galilee the upper, and Galilee the lower, Peace be multiplied unto you. We give you to understand that the time of setting forth your tithes is come, &c. foreign And to our Brethren of the captivity of Babel, of Media, of Greece, and the whole captivity of Israel, Peace be multiplied unto you: We give you to understand, that since the Lambs are yet little, and young Pigeons small, and the time of the first ripe ears is not yet come, that it seemeth good to me and to my fellows to adde thirty daies unto this year. And the very same is related again in Maasar shein fol. 56. col. 3. By which we see that when Luke saith, that Saul had the Sanhedrins letters to the brethren, he speaks but the very language that such letters used to speak in: and by this we see also, that their letters missive to their brethren in forrain Lands, were rather Declarations then Commands: For it was not so much the awe of the Sanhedrins power reaching to those remote places, that kept the whole Nation to obedience of their decrees, as it was their innate and inured ambition to be held and kept a peculiar and distinct and conform people, and their devotednesse to their Law and Worship, the great Oracle of which they held the Sanhedrin to be, in all ages. Such letters may we conceive were these to the Synagogues at Damascus, not imperious, but declarative and perswasive: which before Saul had delivered [who was now foreign Apostolus Synhedrii magni] he is converted and designed for an Apostle of Iesus Christ.

He saw Christ, ver. 17. 1 Cor. 9.1. though he saw him not: for as Israel at Sinai saw the Lord, not in any representation, but only his glory, so did he Christ in his glory, and a voice. And so they that travelled with him heard the voice, ver. 7. in its terrible sound, p. 88but they heard it not, Acts. 22.9. in its articulate utterance, so as to understand it, [the like to that in Ioh. 12.29.]

At three daies end he receiveth his sight, and Baptism, and was filled with the Holy Ghost, ver. 17, 18. but how he received the last is somewhat obscure: whether before his Baptism or upon it, by immediate infusion as they did chap. 10.45. on by imposition of Ananias his hands; which if he did, as it was extraordinary for any besides an Apostle to conferre the Holy Ghost, so could not Ananias do, or think of doing this, without an extraordinary warrant▪ Whether way it was, he is now so compleatly furnished with all accomplishments for his Ministry, that he confers not with flesh and blood, that is, not with any men, nor goes he up to Ierusalem ▪ no not to confer with the Apostles, Gal. 1.16, 17. but hath the full knowledge of the Gospel, and full assurance of his knowledge that it was right: And so he begins to preach in Damascus.

CHRIST. XXXV. XXXVI. These two years Paul spendeth in Damascus and Arabia, and Damascus again▪ Gal. 1.17.

ACTS CHAP. IX. from Ver. 23. to Ver. 32.

CHRIST. XXXVII AFter three years from his Conversion he cometh to Ierusalem, being driven from Damascus by a machination of the Iews, who had wrought with the Governour to apprehend h…m, but he is let over the wall in a basket, 2 Cor. 11.32, 33.

He goeth up … Ierusalem to see Peter, Gal. 1.18. but at his first coming thither, the Disciples are afraid of him, all Barnabas makes way for his intertainment, Act. 9.27. His going to see Peter is to confer with the Minister of the Circumcision, himself being appointed Minister to the Uncircumcised: And how Barnabas who was to be his fellow should come to be acquainted with him before any of the rest, we can hardly finde out any other way to resolve, then by conceiving he had some intimation from God of his own Apostleship among the Gentiles, and Pauls with him.

He staieth at Ierusalem but fifteen daies and seeth none of the Apostles, but Peter and Iames the lesse, Gal. 1.18, 19. He preacheth boldly there, and disputes so vehemently with the Hellenists that they go about to kill him, Act. 9.29. But why him, rather then Peter, Iames, Barnabas, and others that were now at Ierusalem? we may answer, Because he himself was a Hellenist, one once of their own Colledge, and the more zealous he was now against them, the more incensed were they against him, for an Apostate, as they accounted him: and now he that with them had contrived the death of Steven, is forced by them to fly for his own life.

ACTS CHAP. IX. from Ver. 32. to the end. & CHAP. X. all & CHAP. XI. to Ver. 19.

CHRIST. XXXVIII. XXXIX. XL. THe Stories succeeding to ver. 19. of Chap. 11. as they are of a doubtfull date, because neither the Historian here, nor any other part of Scripture hath fixed the determinate time of their occurring, so is not the limiting of them to their year or time so very needfull▪ if only it be secured, that they follow in time to those preceding that we have spoken to; and that we may be assured of their order, though we cannot be of their precise time. And this is easie to resolve upon, without much debate. The last verse of the former Section, informs us of a peace and rest come to all the Churches, and the beginning of this brings in Peter [as in this calm] passing through all quarters preaching and confirming them. And that this could not be but after the times of the stories mentioned hitherto, appeareth by this, that though it is true indeed, that Peter was abroad in Samaria upon the conversion of it, yet he was returned again to Ierusalem, Chap. 8.25. and was there three years after, when Paul comes up thither.

This therefore is a new voyage, in which he doth three great things, healeth Aen…as p. 89of a Palsie at Lydda: raiseth Dorcas from the dead at Ioppa; and openeth the door of the Gospel to the Gentiles in Caesarea.

Aeneas is a name that we finde in the Jewish Writers. foreign R. Samuel the sonne of R. Aeneas, is mentioned in Ierus. Iebamoth fol. 6.2. And Lod or Lydda they speak exceeding frequently of, and produce remarkable stories and memorials of it. And indeed the quarters of Peters present walk, compared with the Hebrews records concerning these places, may well claim some observation. For when he is at Ioppa he is in the middle, as it were, of those places which in a little time after this [nay it may be at this very time] were two of their greatest and eminentest Schools.

At Iabneh on the one hand of Ioppa did the great Sanhedrin sit long: both before the destruction of Ierusalem and after: for when it began to be unsetled and to flit up and down fourty years before the destruction of the City, its first removall from Ierusalem was hither: and here sat Gamaliel, Pauls Master, with his Sanhedrin a good space of time, and for ought can be said to the contrary, it might very well be there at this time when Peter was at Ioppa.

Now as the Jews called that place Iabneh so the Gentiles called it Iamnia, and how neer it was to Ioppa you may guesse from these words of Strabo, lib. 16. This place [speaking of Ioppa] was so populous that out of the neighbour Town Iamnia, and other places thereabout, it was able to raise 40000 men.

At Lydda on the other hand of Ioppa, were most famous Schools, and eminent men as well as at Iabneh. foreign. It was a Town that wanted little of the bignesse of a City. Joseph. Antiq. lib. 20. cap. 5. It lay West of Ierusalem a daies journey off, as the Talmud seats it and measures, in Maasar Sheni per. 5. hal. 2. It was in Iudea: And thereupon four and twenty of the School of Rabbi came thither to intercalate the year, but an evil eye came in upon them, and they died all at one time. Jerus. Sanhedr. fol. 18. col. 3. For they might not intercalate the year but in Iudea, Maym. in Kiddush Hedesh per. 4. but upon this mischance they removed that businesse into Galilee. Here it seems the Sanhedrin sat also sometimes, or at least they had a great Bench of their own, for there is mention of stoning ben Satda at Lydda on the eve of the Passeover, Ibid. fol. 25.4. To reckon the stories and eminent men belonging to this place were endlesse, at the least it is needlesse here.

But the mention and gender of Saron which is also named with Lydda, Act. 9.35. may plead excuse if we alledge one or two Talmudich passages for the clearing of it, Jerus. in Sheviith fol. 38.4. From Bethoron to Emmaus was hilly: from Emmaus to Lydda plain, and from Lydda to the sea vale.

Idem in Sotah fol. 18.4. R. Iochanan and R. Eliezer went from Labneh to Lydda and met with R. Ioshua in foreign Bekiin.

Gittin per. 1. hal. 1. He that bringeth a bill of Divorce from a Heathen Country must be able to say, In my presence it was written and sealed in my presence: Rabban Gamaliel saith, Yea he that brings one from Rekam and Chagra. R. Eleazer saith, Yea he that brings one from Caphar Lodim to Lod. Rabbi Nissim upon the place saith thus: Caphar Lodim was out of the Land, near to Lod, which was within the Land, and it was so called because Lyddans were alwaies found there.

Jerus. in Beracoth fol. 3.1. They brought a chest full of bones from Caphar Tobi and set it openly at the entring in to Lod. Tudrus the Physician came, and all the Physicians with him, &c.

Besides observing, that Tobi is the name of a man [Rabban Gamaliels servant. Beracoth per. 2. hal. 7.] as Tabitha is the name of a woman in the story before us; the word Saron being of the masculine gender, it plainly tels us that it is not the name of a Town, but of the plain or flat where divers Towns stood, and among others it may be these mentioned.

ACTS CHAP. X. all the Chapter.

LIttle inferiour to these places for Learned men, was Caesarea upon the Sea, and beyond them for other eminencies. foreign The Doctors of Caesarea are of exceeding frequent and exceeding renowned mention in both Talmuds: and by name R. Heshaiah the great; R. Achavah, R. Zeira, R. Ada, R. Prigori, R. Vlla, R. Tachalipha and severall others. It was anciently called foreign Stratons tower, but sumptuously p. 90built and beautified by Herod the great, in honour of Caesar, it was called Caesarea· It was mixedly inhabited by Jews and Gentiles, and much of an equal number; and most commonly well fraught with Romane souldiers, because the Governours residence was ordinarily here.

Of some of these Bands was Cornelius a Captain: a man come to an admirable pitch of piety, and it is hard to imagine how he came by it: For that he was not so much as a Proselyte, is apparent, in that they at Ierusalem cavill at Peter for going to him, as to a Heathen. And whether he were foreign A sojourning s…ranger as they called some, is not much materiall, since by their own judgement foreign A sojourning stranger was as a Gentile to all purposes, Jerus. Jebamoth fol. 8. col. 4. Whencesoever he learned faith in Christ, his full knowledge of Christ he learned from Peter: he having a warrant by vision to send for Peter, and he a warrant by vision to go to him.

Here the Keyes of the Kingdom of heaven committed to Peter so long ago, Mat. 16. do their work: opening the door of faith first to the Gentiles, which never was shut since, nor ever will be whilest there is a Church to be upon the earth. Ionah at Ioppa, and Simon bar Iona there, both sent to the Gentiles, compare together.

Upon Peters preaching, the Holy Ghost fals upon those Gentiles that were present, to the amazement of those of the Circumcision that had come with Peter: for they had not only not seen the like before, but had been trained up, while in their Judaism, under a maxime of a clean contrary tenour, which taught them That the Holy Ghost would dwell neither upon any Heathen, nor upon any Iew in a Heathen Country. Caesarea was [as the Jews reputed] foreign between the borders: that is, a place disputable whether to account within the Land or without, or indeed both, Iuchas fol. 74. And so were also other places upon this Western border of the Land, the great sea shore: as A…on or Ptolemais, Ierus. … …ol. 60. col. 2. Ascalon, Idem Sheviith fol. 36.3. and divers others, but all things computed, no fitter place in the Land could have been chosen for the beginning of this great work of bringing Jews and Gentiles together into one bound, then this: not only because this City was both Jew and Gentile, within the Land and without, but also, because here was the Roman Court the chief of the Gentiles: and the mentioning of Cornelius his being of the Italian Band, hinteth such an observation.

The Holy Ghost at this its first bestowing upon the Gentiles, is given in the like manner as it was at its first bestowing upon the Jewish Nation, Act. 2. namely by immediate infusion: at all other times you finde mention of it, you finde mention of Imposition of hands used for it. But here it may be observed withall, that whereas the fruit of this gift of the Holy Ghost was, that they spake with tongues, ver. 46. it confirmeth that which we spake at Chap. 2. viz. that the first fruit of this gift of tongues was, that they that had it, were inabled to speak and understand the Originals of the Scrip…ure: And here it appeareth more plainly then there: And more plainly still in those twelve at Ephesus, Acts 19.6. And those that spake with Tongues in the Church of Corinth, 1 Cor. 14. For to what purpose was it for them to speak there with Tongues where they all understood the same Language? It was not to gibber and talk in strange Language that men might admire but not understand, but it was for edification of others, yea and for edifying of himself that so spake, 1 Cor. 14.4. He that speaketh a tongue edifieth himself: How? what could he speak in any strange Language to his own edification, which he might not as much edifie himself by, had he spoken it in his own native tongue? But only that this is meant, his ability by the gift of tongues, to understand and speak the Originall language of the Scripture, was both for his own edification and the edification of others. Suppose one in the Church of Corinth could speak Persick, Arabick, Ethiopick, &c. and did chatter these Languages among them; he could not possibly speak any thing in those Tongues [though interpreted] that could edifie the people any more, then if he spake it in his mother tongue: But if he spake and understood and uttered the Originall language of Scripture, that if interpreted, would edifie: and he could not speak in his mother tongue, unlesse taken from thence, what he might speak thence.

Peter returning to Ierusalem is taken to task by some of the Circumcision for going in to the Gentiles and eating with them: a thing of unspeakable detestation to the Jews: Hence those allusions: Let him be to thee as a Heathen, Matth. 18. With such a one no not to e…t, 1 Cor. 5. We finde not any such quarrell at Peter and Iohn for going down p. 91to Samaria, though the Samaritans were as odious to the Jewish Nation as people could be, but they were neither uncircumcised, nor Idolaters: both which, especially the later, bred their detestation of the Heathen.

ACTS CHAP. XI. from Ver. 19. to the end of the Chapter.

CHRIST. XLI AS Caesarea the seat of the Roman Governour of Iudea, first seeth the door of faith opened to the Gentiles, so Antioch the feat of the Roman Governour of Syria, first heareth the name Christian. These of the hundred and twenty Ministers [mentioned, Acts 1.…5.] that had sled upon the persecution raised against Steven, went preaching up and down first as farre as the bounds of Iudea extended: then some of them stepped our, as farre as into Phaenice, Cyprus and Syria, but all this while dealing with the Jews only. At last some of them at Antioch foreign spake to the Hellenists, ver. 20. Here the word Hellenists is of doubtfull interpretation: only this is doubtlesse in it, that it means not Iews, as the word doth, Acts 6.1. for it is set in opposition to them, ver. 19. Doth it mean Proselytes then? That it cannot neither, for they were reputed as Jews to all purposes. Means it Heathens? Yes, that is undoubted it doth, both by the scope of the story here, and by the quarrell urging these believers at Antioch to be Circumcised, Chap. 15. But why then should they be called Hellenistae rather then Hellenes? Some conceive, because they were become foreign Proselyte sojournours, meaning that they had forsaken their Idolatry: as Cornelius had done his, though he were not foreign a Proselyte circumcised: But what if these were native Syrians by pedegree and language, could they then for that be called Hellenists or Greeks? The word therefore must mean, that they were such as were Syrogrecians; Antioch it self indeed having been once the head of the Syrogrecian Empire: Hellenes or purely Greeks they could not be called [though it will not be denied they spake that Language] because they were not only no inhabitans of that Country, but not altogether of that blood: but such as were of a mixture of Syrian and Greek; the progeny of the old plantations and infranchisments of the Syrogrecian Monarchy. Whatsoever their title Hellenists includeth, they being undoubtedly Heathens, it sheweth that these Ministers preached to them, understood of the liberty given to preach to the Gentiles, and the passage betwixt Peter and Cornelius, or they durst not have been bold to have gone beyond the partition wall without their warrant: And the readinesse of the Church at Ierusalem to send Barnabas to them, shews that they also were satisfied in this matter, and so this evidenceth that this story was after that about Cornelius.

Their sending Barnabas, and his fetching Saul to the same work with him, giveth some confirmation of that which was touched before, namely that it is very probable that Barnabas knew of his own being designed for a Minister to the uncircumcision, and of Pauls being joyned with him in that work, a great while before they were sent away from Antioch upon it: They now spend a whole year in the Church there, and there the Name Christian is first taken up, and that in a Gentile Church. Antioch of old had been called Hamath, but now it bare the name of one that had been as bloody a persecutor of the Church and truth, as the Church of Israel had ever seen, Antiochus. The very name of the place may raise a meditation.

ACTS CHAP. XII, XIII.

HEre we meet with some scruple in Chronology, and about the precedency of the story in these two Chapters: for though the actions in Chap. 12. be laid first, and that very properly, that the story of Peter may be taken up together, and concluded before the story of Paul come in, which is to be followed to the end of the Book, yet there may be just question whether, the sending of Paul and Barnabas from Antioch to preach among the Gentiles, which is handled in the beginning of Chap. 13. were not before some, if not all those things related in Chap. 12. And the question ariseth from these two scruples. 1. Because it is doubtfull, in what year of Claudius the famine was, that is spoken of Chap. 12.28. And 2. because it is obscure, how long Paul and Barnabas staid at Antioch after their return from Ierusalem, Chap. 12.25. before they were sent p. 92away among the Gentiles. But about this we need not much to trouble our selves: since as to the understanding of the stories themselves, there can be little illustration taken from their time: save only as to this, that the publick Fast in the Church of Antioch, may seem to have some relation to some of the sad stories mentioned before, as coincident with them, or near to them; namely, either the famine through the world, Chap. 11.28. or the Persecution in the Church, Chap. 12. We shall not therefore offer to dislocate the order of the stories, from that wherein they he, the Holy Ghost by the intertexture of them rather teaching us, that some of them were contemporary; then any way incouraging us to invert their order. Only these things cannot passe unmentioned, toward the stating of their time and place, partly of coincidency, and partly of their succeeding one the other, and which may help us better to understand both.

1. That whereas Dion the Roman Historian lib. 60. hath placed a sore famine [at least at Rome] in the time of Claudius, in his second year: Iosephus carries it, Antiq. lib. 12. cap. 2. as if the bitternesse of it at Ierusalem, were in his fourth, which Euseb. in Chron. determines positively; both may be true; for, for famines to last severall years together is no strange thing in History, Divine or Humane, nor in experience in our own age.

2. That Herod Agrippa's murdering of Iames, and imprisoning of Peter could not be before the third year of Claudius: for Iosephus a witnesse impartiall enough in this case, informs us, that Claudius in his second Consulship, which was indeed the second year of his reign, made an Edict in behalf of the Jews, and sent it through the world, and after that sent Agrippa away into his own Kingdom: Now his Consulship beginning the first of Ianuary, it was so next impossible that those things should be done at Rome, and Agrippa provide for his journey and travell it, and come to Ierusalem, and murder Iames and apprehend Peter, and all before the Passeove, unlesse he hasted as it had been for a wager, that he that can believe Peter to have been imprisoned in Claudius his second year of Consulship and reign, must exceedingly straiten the time of these occurrences, to make room for his belief.

3. In the third year of Claudius, therefore, are those stories in Chap. 12. to be reputed; only the last, about Herods death, in the beginning of his fourth, for a Passeover in his fourth Herod lived not to see.

4. It may be observed that Luke hath placed the going up of Paul and Barnabas with the alms of the Church of Antioch to the poor of Iudea, before the murder of Iames, Chap. 11.30. but their return thence, not till after that, and Herods death, Chap. 12.25. not that thereupon we are necessarily to think that they staid there so long, as while all those things in Chap. 12. were acting, but that by that relation the story of Paul and Barnabas is begun again, and we may very well conceive, for all that postscript of Luke after the story of Iames his Martyrdom, Peters imprisonment, and Agrippa's death, their return to Antioch, and going from thence among the Gentiles, Chap. 13. to have been at that time while some of the things in Chap. 12. occurred.

CHRIST. XLII CLAVDIVS. II We will therefore take the Chapters up in the order in which they lye, and only carry along with us in our thoughts, a supposall that some of the stories in either might concurre in time. And because we have found here some need to look after the Years of the Emperour, which we have not had before, and shall have much more, forward, especially when we come up to the times of Nero, it may not be amisse to affix their Years also, as they went along concurrent with the Years of our Saviour.

The famine begun: the Church of Antioch send relief into Iudea.

p. 93ACTS CHAP. XII. from the beginning to Ver. 20.CLAVDIVS. III.

CHRIST. XLIII JAMES beheaded by Herod, for so doth the Jews Pandect help us to understand these words, He slew Iames with the sword. … Sanhedr. per. 7. hal. 3. They that were slain by the sword were beheaded, which also was the custom of the Kingdom; that is, of the Romans.

The ceremonious zeal of Agrippa in the Jewish way, bending it self against the Church, may be construed as a Jewish act, wicked, as upon the score of that Nations wickednesse and guilt.

The underling condition in which they had lain all the time of Caius [he having no good affection to that people] being now got loose and aloft knows no bounds: and being somewhat countenanced by the Edict of Claudius, they cannot be content with their own immunities, unlesse they seek also the suppression of the Christian Church. Though Claudius his Proclamation had this speciall clause and caveat, foreign, that they should not go about to infringe the liberty of other mens Religion. This unbounded incroaching of theirs did within a little time cause the Emperour, who had now made a Decree for them, to make another against them.

Peter designed by the murderer for the like butchery, escapes by miracle: and the Tyrant before that time twelve monethmonth, comes to a miraculous fearfull end.

ACTS CHAP. XIII. from beginning to Ver. 14.

THe Divine Historian having hitherto followed the Story of the Church and Gospel as both of them were dilated among the Jews, and therein pitched more especially upon the Acts of Peter and Iohn the singular Ministers of the Circumcision, more peculiarly Peters: he doth now turn his Pen, to follow the planting and progresse of the Gospel among the Gentiles, and here he insisteth more especially upon the Story of Paul and Barnabas the singular Ministers of the uncircumcision, more peculiarly Pauls.

There were now in the Church of Antioch five men which were both Prophets and Teachers, or which did not only instruct the people and expound the Scriptures, but had also the Prophetick spirit and were partakers of Revelations: For though Prophets and Teachers were indeed of a distinct notion, 1 Cor. 12.28. Ephes. 4.11. and their abilities to teach were accordingly of a distinct originall, namely the former by revelation, and the latter by study, yet foreign, [which phrase may not passe without observation] according to the state of the Church then being, they not only had prophetick Teachers, but there was a kinde of necessity they should have such, till time and study had inabled others to be Teachers, which as yet they could not have attained unto, the Gospel having been so lately brought among them.

Among these five, the names of Barnabas and Saul are no strangers to the Reader, but the other three are more unknown.

1. Simeon who was called Niger: If the word Niger were Latine, it might then fairly be conjectured, that this was Simon of Cyrene, the Moorish complexion of his Country justly giving him the title of Simeon the black; but since the Patrionymick, Cyrenean, is applied only in the singular number to the next man Lucius, and since the word foreign was then used among the Jews in severall significations, as may be seen in Aruch, we shall rather conceive this man a Cypriot from Chap. 11.20. and as Barnabas also was, Chap. 4.36. and his surname Niger whatsoever it signified, used to distinguish him from Simon Peter, and Simon the Canani…e.

2. Lucius of Cyrene: Held by some and that not without some ground to be Luke the Evangelist: which it is like hath been the reason, why antiquity hath so generally held Luke to be an Antiochian: true, in regard of this his first appearing there under this name Lucius though originally a Cyrenian, and educated as it may be supposed in the Cyrenian Colledge or Synagogue in Ierusalem, Chap. 6.9. and there first receiving the Gospel. In p. 94Rom. 16.21. Paul salutes the Roman Church in the name of Lucius, whereas there was none then in Pauls retinue whose name sounded that way but only Luke: as we shall observe there.

3. Manaen, who had been brought up with Herod the Tetrach. Iuchasin fol. 19. mentioneth one Menahem who was once Vicepresident of the Sanhedrin under Hillel, but departed to the service of Herod the great, with fourscore other eminent men with him: of whom we gave some touch before: It may be this was his sonne, and was called Manaen or Menahem after the father, and as the father was a great favourite of Herod the great the father, so this brought up at Court with Herod the Tetrach the sonne.

As these holy men were at the publick ministration with fasting and prayer, the Holy Ghost gives them advertisement of the separating of Paul and Barnabas, for the Ministry among the Gentiles. A mission that might not be granted, but by such a divine warrant; considering how the Gentiles had alwaies lain behind a partition wall to the Jews: For although Peter in the case of Cornelius had opened the door of the Gospel to the Heathen, yet was this a farre greater breaking down of the partition wall, when the Gospel was to be brought into their own Lands and to their own doors: When God saith, Separate them to the work whereunto I have called them, it further confirmeth that it was and had been known before that they should be Ministers of the uncircumcision.

The Romish glossaries would fain strain the Masse out of the word foreign, and the Rhemists think they have done us a courtesie, that they have not translated it to that sense: whereas, besides that the word naturally signifieth any publick ministration, the Holy Ghost by the use of it seemeth to have a speciall aim, namely to intimate to us, that this was a publick fast, as well as another publick ministration. Publick fasts were not ordinary services, and they were not taken up but upon extraordinary occasions, and what the present occasion might be, had been a great deal better worth studying upon, then how to make the Greek word speak the Masse which it never meant.

How publick fastings and daies of humiliation were used by the Jews, and upon what occasions, there is a speciall Treatise in the Talmud upon that subject, called Taanith, and the like in Maymony, that beareth witnesse: and it was no whit unsutable to the Gospel, upon the like exigencies to use the like kinde of service and devotion: And the present famine that was upon all Countries might very well minister occasion to this Church at Antioch at this present for such a work, for we cannot but suppose that the famine was now in being.

Whatsoever the occasion was, the Lord, in the midst of their humiliation, pointeth out Paul and Barnabas, for an imployment of his own, who were but a while ago returned from an imployment of the Churches: And so the other three Simeon, Lucius, and Menaen, understanding what the Lord meant, and having used another solemn day in fasting in prayer, lay their hands upon them and set them apart by Ordination. According as the ordaining of Elders among the Jews was by a Triumvirate, or by three Elders. Sanhedr. per. 1. halac. 3.

This is the second Imposition of hands since the Gospel began, which did not confer the Holy Ghost with it [for these two were full of the Holy Ghost before:] and this is the first Ordination of Elders since the Gospel, that was used out of the Land of Israel. Which rite the Jewish Canons would confine only to that Land. Maym. Sanhedr. per. 4. Which circumstances well considered, with the imployment that these two were to go about, and this manner of their sending forth, no better reason I suppose can be given of this present action, then that the Lord hereby did set down a platform of ordaining Ministers in the Church of the Gentiles to future times.

Paul and Barnabas thus designed by the Lord and ordained and sent forth by this Triumvirate and guided by the Holy Ghost, they first go to Seleucia: most likely Seleucia Pieriae, of which Strabo saith, that it is the first City of Syria from Cilicia, Geogr. lib. 14. to which Pliny assenteth, when he measureth the breadth of Syria, from Seleucia Pieriae to Zeugma upon Euphrates, Nat. hist. lib. 5. cap. 12. The reason of their going thither may be judged to be, that they might take ship for Cyprus, whither they intended, for that this was a Port, appeareth by what follows in Strabo, when he saith, That from Seleucia to Soli is about a thousand furlongs sail: and so it is plain in Lukes text when he saith, they departed unto Seleucin, and from thence they sailed to Cyprus: where let us now follow them.

p. 95Cyprus was a Country so exceeding full of Jews, that it comes in for one in that strange story that Dion Cassius relates in the life of Trajan. The Iews [saith he] that dwelt about Cyrene, choosing one Andrew for their Captain, slew the Greeks and Romans, and ate their flesh, and devoured their inwards, and besmeared themselves with their blood, and wore their …kins. Many they sawed asunder from the head downward: others they cast to wilde beasts: many they made to slay one another, so that there were two hundred and twenty thousand destroyed in this manner. There was the like slaughter made in Aegypt and Cyprus, where there also perished two hundred and fourty thousand. From whence it is that a Iew may not since come into Cyprus: and if any by storms at sea be driven in thither they are slain. But the Iews were subdued by others, but especially by Lucius whom Trajan sent thither. This was the native Country of Barnabas, Act. 4.36.

Although these two Apostles were sent to the Gentiles, yet was it so far from excluding their preaching to the Jews, that they constantly began with them first in all places where they came.

They begin at Salamis, the place next their landing, and there they preached in the Synagogues of the Iews, having Iohn Mark for their Minister.

From thence they travailed preaching up and down in the Iland, till they come to Paphos which was at the very further part of it, toward the Southwest Angle. There they meet with a Magicall Jew called Barjesus, and commonly titled Elymas, which is the same in sense with Magus: Such Jewish deceivers as this went up and down the Countries to oppose the Gospel, and to shew Magicall tricks and wonders, for the stronger confirming of their opposition. Such were the vagabond Iews exorcists, Act. 19.13. and of such our Saviour spake, Matth. 24.24. and o… some such we may give examples out of their own Talmudicall Writers. And here we may take notice of a threefold practice of opposition that the Jews used in these times and forward against the Gospel and the spreading of it, besides open persecution unto blood.

1. Much about these times was made the prayer that hath been mentioned which was called foreign The prayer against Hereticks, which became by injunction one of their daily prayers. Maymony speaketh the matter and intent of it in his Treatise Tephillah, in these words: In the daies of Rabban Gamaliel, Hereticks increased in Israel [by Hereticks he meaneth those that turned from Judaism to Christianity] and they troubled Israel, and perswaded them to turn from their Religion. He seeing this to be a matter of exceeding great consequence, more then any thing else, stood up, he and his Sanhedrin, and appointed a prayer, in which there was a petition to God to destroy those Hereticks: and this he se… among the common prayers, and appointed it to be in every mans mouth, and so their daily prayers became nineteen in number. Pereh 2. So that they daily prayed against Christians and Christianity.

2. The Jews had their emissaries every where abroad, that to the utmost in them cried down the Gospel, preached against it, went about to consute it, and blasphemed it and Christ that gave it: Of this there is testimony abundant in the New Testament: and in the Jews own Writings.

And 3. they were exceeding many of them skilled in Magick, and by that did many strange things, by such false miracles seeking to outface and vilifie the Divine miracles done by Christ and his Apostles: and striving to confirm their own doctrines which opposed the Gospel, by backing them with such strange and wondrous actings. Iuchasin speaks of Abba Chelchiah, and Chamin, and Chamina Ben Dusa, foreign men skilled in miracles, fol. 20. And the Ierus. Talmud speaks of their inchantings, and magicall tricks in Shabb. fol. 8. col. 2. & 3. Sanhedr. fol. 25. col. 4. nay even of their charming in the Name of Iesu. Shabb. fol. 14. col. 4.

Paul miraculously strikes Elymas blind, and inlightens Sergius Paulus with the light of the Gospel. This was at Paphos where old superstition dreamed of the blinde God Cupid. Doting Elymas grope for thy fellow. The first miracle wrought among the Gentiles is striking a perverse Jew blinde, which thing may very well become an Allegory.

From Paphos they go to Perga in Pamphylia, and there Iohn departs from them and returns to Ierusalem: but what was the occasion is hard to conjecture. Whether it were that he heard of Peters trouble and danger that he had been in at Ierusalem, and desired to see him, for that he had some speciall interest and familiarity with Peter, may be collected from 1 Pet 5.14. and in that Peter was so well acquainted at his mothers house, p. 96Act. 12.12, &c. Or whether in regard of this his relation to Peter the Minister of the Circumcision, he made it nice to go among the Gentiles into the thickest of which he saw they were coming every day more then other. For at Paphos where they had last been, was a Temple of Venus, and at Perga, where they now are, was a Temple of Diana. Strab. lib. 14. Pomp. Mela. lib. 1. cap. 14. Or whatsoever the matter was, his departure was so unwarrantable, that it made a breach betwixt him and Paul for the present, nay it occasioned a breach betwixt Paul and Barnabas afterward. And so we leave him in his journey to Ierusalem, whither when he came, he staied there till Paul and Barnabas came thither again.

ACTS CHAP. XII. from Ver. 20. to Ver. 24.

CHRIST. XLIV CLAVDIVS. IV HERODS death was in the beginning of this year, the fourth of Claudius or neer unto it, according as Iosephus helpeth us to compute, who testifieth that the third year of his reign was compleated a little before his death. Vid. Antiq. lib. 19. cap. 7. He left behinde him a sonne of seventeen years old, in regard of whose minority, and thereby unfitnesse to reign, Claudius sent Cuspius Fadus to Govern his Kingdom. His daughters were Berenice sixteen years old, married to Herod King of Chalcis her fathers brother: And Mariam ten years old, and Drusilla, six, who afterward married Felix.

ACTS CHAP. XIII. from Ver. 14. to the end of the Chapter. And CHAP. XIV.

CHRIST. XLV. XLVI. XLVII. XLVIII. XLIX. CLAVDIVS. V. VI. VII. VIII. IX. AT the fifteenth Chapter we have some fastnesse of the time, viz. in what year the Council at Ierusalem, as it is commonly called, did occurre, which certainty we have not of the times of the occurrences henceforward thitherto: so that since we cannot determinately point any passage to its proper year, we must cast them in grosse under this grosse summe of years, and distribute them to their proper seasons by the best conjecture we can.

From Perga in Pamphilia, Paul and Barnabas come to Antioch in Pisidia, and on the Sabbath day going into the Synagogue, are invited by the Rulers of the Synagogue, after the reading of the Law and Prophets to speak a word of exhortation to the people: But how could the Rulers know that they were men fit to teach? It may be answered, By former converse with them in the City, and it is very like that the Rulers themselves had drunk in some affection to the Gospel by converse with them, which made them so ready to urge them to preach: For it is not imaginable that this was the first time that they had seen them: nor that they came to Town that very day, but that they had had some converse before.

Paul preacheth: and the Synagogue broke up, and the Jews gone out, the Gentiles desired that the same words might be preached to them in the week between, foreign: namely on the second and fifth daies of the week following, which were Synagogue daies, on which they met in the Synagogues as on the Sabbath day: And which daies, their traditions said, were appointed for that purpose by Ezra. Talm. in Bava Kamah. per. 7. R. Sol. and Nissim in Chetubboth per. 1. in Alphes. Their preaching on those daies had so wrought, that on the next Sabbath almost all the City was gathered together to hear the word: and many of the Gentiles receive it, but the Jews stirred up some female unbelieving proselytes against them, and some of the chief of the City, so that they drave them out of those coasts, and they shaking off the dust of their feet against p. 97them go to Iconium. This Ceremony injoyned them by their Master, Matth. 10.14. was not so much for any great businesse put in the thing it self, as that even from a tenet of their own, they might shew how they were to be reputed of. It was their own Maxime, That the dust of a Heathen Country or City did defile or make a person unclean. Tosaphta ad Kelim per. 1. hath this saying, In three things Syria was like unto any Heathen Land: The dust of it made a person unclean, as the dust of any other Heathen Country did, &c. So that their shaking off the dust of their feet against them, was to shew that they reputed them and their City as Heathenish.

ACTS CHAP. XIV.

AT Iconium they continue long, and with good effect, but at last they are in danger of stoning, and thereupon they slip away to Lystra and Derbe Cities of Lycaonia, and to the region that lieth round about: That region Strabo describeth lib. 12. where among other particulars he tels that Derbe lay coasting upon Isauria, and in his time was under the dominion of Amyntas. At Lystra or Derbe Paul converteth Lois and Eunice, and Timothy, and as some will tell you, here, or at Iconium he converteth Tecla. For healing a Creeple they are first accounted Gods, but presently by perswasion of some Jews, Paul is stoned, but being reputed dead, recovereth miraculously. From thence they go to Derbe, and return to Lystra, Iconium and Antioch, and ordain Elders in those Churches. foreign, ver. 24. is unproperly rendred here Per suffragia creantes Presbyteros: for so they could not do; there not being a man in all these Churches fit to be chosen a Minister, or qualified with abilities for that Function, unlesse the Apostles by Imposition of hands bestow the holy Ghost upon them, which might inable them: For the Churches being but newly planted, and the people but lately converted, it would be hard to finde any among them so thoroughly completed in the knowledge of the Gospel as to be a Minister: but by the Apostles hands they receive the Holy Ghost, and so are inabled. It is true indeed, the Greek word in the first sense denoteth suffrages, but that is not the only sense. And so doth the word foreign in the proper sense signifie laying on of hands, yet there was foreign ordination that was without it. Maym. in Sanhedr. 4. foreign How is ordination to be for perpetuity? Not that they lay their hands on the head of the Elder, but call him Rabbi, and say, Behold thou art ordained, &c.

ACTS CHAP. XV.

CHRIST. L CLAVDIVS. X WE are now come up to the Council at Hierusalem. The occasion of which was the busie stirring of some, who would have brought the yoke of Mosaick observances upon the neck of the converted Gentiles. Multitudes of the Jews that beleeved, yet were zealous of the Law, Act. 21.20. and it was hard to get them off from those Rites, in which they had been ever trained up, and which had been as it were an inheritance to them from their fathers: This bred this disturbance at the present, and in time an Apostacy from the Gospel of exceeding many. Antiquity hath held that Cerinthus was the chief stickler in this businesse; but whosoever it was that kindled it, it was a spark enough to have fired all had it not been timely prevented.

Paul and Barnabas who had chiefly to deal in the ministration to the Gentiles, are sent from Antioch to Ierusalem to consult the Apostles about this matter. This is the same journey and occasion that is spoken of Gal. 2. Then fourteen years after I went up again to Ierusalem with Barnabas and took Titus with me. And I went up by revelation, &c. Not but that he was sent by the Church as Luke hath asserted here, ver. 2. but that the Church was directed by revelation to take this course for the setling of the question, namely to send up to the Apostles at Ierusalem. And hence we may fix the time of this business, if it be resolved from whence the beginning of these fourteen years is to be dated, namely whether he mean fourteen years after his first conversion, or fourteen after his former journey to Ierusalem, mentioned Gal. 1.18. which he took three years after his conversion. The later is the more undoubted, upon these two observations. 1. It were p. 98exceeding obscure, and is exceeding unagreeable to Scripture accounting, to reckon the later summe of fourteen years from the time of his conversion, and not from the number or time that went next before, which was his being at Ierusalem three years after he was converted. 2. His scope in that his discourse is, not to shew barely what journeys he took to Ierusalem after his conversion, but to shew how long he preached among the Gentiles and abroad out of Iudea time after time, and yet when he came to the Apostles to Ierusalem, they found no fault with him, nor with the course he took in his Ministry. After I was converted I went not to Ierusalem to consult the Apostles, but went into Arabia, and back again to Damascus, and so preached up and down, one utterly unknown by face to the Apostles; yet when after three years thus doing I came up to Peter the Minister of the Circumcision, he was so farre from contrarying the course that I had gone, that he gave me fifteen daies entertainment. And after that time I went through Syria and Cilicia, and abroad among the Gentiles, yet after fourteen years imployment in this kinde, when I went up to Ierusalem again, I found fair respect with the Apostles and they gave me the right hand of fellowship. This drift of the Apostle being observed in that place, which cannot be denied, if his main purpose through the whole Epistle be observed, it evidently stateth the time of this journey to Ierusalem to be seventeen years after his conversion.

When Paul and Barnabas came to Ierusalem, they applied themselves **foreign.singularly to Peter, Iames and Iohn the Ministers of the Circumcision, and imparted to them the doctrine, and manner of dealing that they had used among the Gentiles, Gal. 2.2. And this they did that they might clear themselves of all false rumours, that might be laid to their charge [as if they crossed the doctrine and minde of the Apostles] and that they might have their judgement and concurrence along with them. With Paul there was Titus, who hitherto had been uncircumcised, all along in his attending and accompanying Paul: and even now at Ierusalem, though he were before the Apostles of the Circumcision, yet was he not forced to be circumcised there neither; because there were some false brethren who lay upon the catch to observe and scandall the liberty of the Gospel that the Apostles used, and they were unwilling to give way to them in any such condescension, least they should have wronged the Gospel. For though Paul allowed the Circumcision of Timothy, and though even these Apostles perswaded Paul to use some of the Mosaick ceremonies▪ Act. 21.24. for avoiding offence to the weak, and for the more winning of those that were well satisfied, yet would they not yield an inch in any such thing to these catchpoles that lay upon the lurch, to spy out something if it might have been whereby they might have disgraced the Gospel.

Well: the result of the Apostles conference is, that the three of the Circumsion, neither detracted from what the two of the uncircumsion had done already, nor added any more things to be done by them hereafter: But they agree that Paul and Barnabas should go to the Heathen, and they themselves to the Circumcision: desiring only that though they went among the Gentiles, yet they would remember the poor of the Circumcision, which they consented to, and all was well concluded betwixt them.

But they that urged for the imposition of Moses his yoke would not be so satisfied, but the matter must come to a publick canvasse, and so the Elders also met together with those Apostles to consider of it.

Peter would have none of Moses burdens laid upon the Gentiles, because he himself had seen them to have been partakers of the holy Ghost, in as free and full a measure, as they had been that had been most Mosaicall. Paul and Barnabas affirmed that they had seen the like, and therefore what needed the Gentiles to be troubled with these observances, seeing they were so eminent in gifts of the Spirit as well as they of the Circumcision and what could these adde to them. But Iames findeth out a temper betwixt those that would have all these yokes imposed, and those that would have none, that so the Jews might have the lesse offence, and the Gentiles no burden neither. And that was, that the Gentiles might be required to refrain from eating things offered to Idols, and strangled, and blood, and fornication. The three first were now become things indifferent [however strictly they had been imposed by the Law before] Christ having by his death done down the partition wall, and laid these things aside as uselesse when there was to be no distinction of meats or Nations any more: yet because the Jews were so glewed to these things that the tearing of them away suddenly, would in a manner have fetched up skin p. 99and flesh and all, therefore the whole Councill upon the motion of Iames think it fit that the Gentiles should thus farre Judaize, till time and fuller acquaintance with the Gospel might make both Jews and Gentiles to lay these now needlesse niceties aside.

The Jews about these things had these Canons among many others.

Avodah Zarah. per. 2. These things of Idolatry are forbidden, and their prohibition meaneth the prohibition of their use. Wine and vinegar used in Idolatry which at first was wine, &c. And flesh that was brought in for Idolatry is permitted to be used [viz. before it was offered] but what is brought out is prohibited.

And bottles and cans used in Idolatry, and an Israelites wine put in them are prohibited to be used.

Maymon. in Avoda Zarah per. 7. A beast offered to an Idol is forbidden for any use: yea even his dung, bones, horns, hooss, skin: yea though there were only a hole cut in the beast to take out the heart, and that alone offered. Divers other things used in Idolatry are mentioned and prohibited.

The observing of all which helpeth to clear the distinction of the words used in the text, namely foreign & foreign, for these properly were not one and the same thing, for every foreign was not foreign, but è contra, every foreign was foreign. For divers things were used at an Idolatrous offering, which themselves were not offered, as knives, dishes and the like, which cannot be called foreign, and yet by these traditions were prophane and unclean, and prohibited to be used.

About not eating of blood, they expounded the prohibition of the Law in that point, unto this purpose, He that eats blood to the quantity of an olive, if presumptuously, he is to be cut off, and if ignorantly, he is to bring a sin offering. Talm. in Cherithut… per. 1. & 5. Maym. in Maacaloth Asuroth per. 6.

By things strangled their Canons understood any thing that died of it self, or that was not killed as it ought to be. And he that ate to the quantity of an olive, of the flesh of any cattell that died of it self, or of any beast, or any fowl that died of it self, was to be whipt, as it is said, Ye shall eat no carcaise: and whatsoever was not slain as was fitting, is reputed as if dying of it self. Talm. in Zevachin per. 7. Maym. ubi supr. per. 1. Therefore they had their rules about killing any beast that they were to eat, of which the Talmudick Treatise Cholin discusseth at large.

Now as concerning fornication, it is controverted, first whether it mean bodily or spirituall: and secondly, how it cometh to be ranked among things indifferent [as the other named were] it self being of no such indifferency, whethersoever is meant, the one or the other. The former certainly is not meant, for the words foreign reacheth that the full, and more needed not to be spoken to that point: The later therefore is meant: but why named here with things indifferent? Not because it was indifferent as well as they: Nor because it was so very offensive to the Jews as were the other: for they made but little of fornication themselves, according to the common taking of the word fornication: but fornication here seemeth to translate their word foreign that meaneth with them marriage in degrees prohibited: which the Gentiles made no matter about: and so the Apostles would bring the convert Gentiles under obedience of the Law, Levit. 18.

Before we part from this Councill, as it is commonly called, we may thus farre take notice of the nature of it as to observe, that it was not a convention premeditated, and solemnly summoned, but only occasionall and emergent, and that it was only of those Apostles and Elders that were at Ierusalem, at the instant when the matter from Antioch was brought thither, and the other Apostles that were abroad were not fetched in, nor indeed needed any such thing: for the message from Antioch required not so much the number of voices, as the resolves of those Apostles that had especially to deal with the Circumcision: and whom the Antiochian Church doubted not to finde ready at Ierusalem.

The matter being determined, Letters are dispatched, with the Decrees, unto the Churches by Paul and Barnabas, and Iudas and Silas: they come to Antioch and there abide a while: and at last go their severall waies, Iudas to Ierusalem, and Paul, Barnabas and Silas away among the Gentiles.

It was the agreement between Paul and Barnabas on the one party, and Peter, Iames and Iohn on the other, that those two should go among the Gentiles, and these three p. 100among the Circumcision, Gal. 2.9. Iames abode at Ierusalem as the residentiary Apostle of that Country, Gal. 2.13. Act. 21.18. and there at last he suffered Martyrdom. Peter and Iohn went abroad among the Jews dispersed in forreign parts, so that at last you have Peter at Babylon in the East, and Iohn at Patmos in the West, and by this we may guesse how they parted their imployment between them.

When Paul and Barnabas are to set forth, they disagree about Marks going with them. Barnabas being his uncle, would have had his company, but Paul denied it, because of his departure from them before. Mark it seemeth was at Antioch at this time [and it may be a quaere whether Peter were not there also, Gal. 2.11.] and when the contest twixt Paul and Barnabas was so sharp that they part asunder, Barnabas taketh Mark and Paul Silas, and go their severall waies, and it is questionable whether they ever saw one anothers faces any more. OnelyOnly Paul and Mark were reconciled again and came into very near society, as we shall observe afterward.

ACTS CHAP. XVI.

CHRIST. LI CLAVDIVS. XI PAUL and Silas having travelled through Syria and Cilicia, come to Derbe and Lystra: there he Circumciseth Timothy, whom he intended to take along with him and to breed him for his successor in the Ministry after his death. Timothy was a young man of very choice education, parts and hopes, and some remarkable Prophesies and predictions had been given concerning him, what an instrument he should prove in the Gospel, which made Paul to fix upon him, as one designed for him from heaven.

They set forth and travell Phrygia and Galatia, and when they would have gone into Asia and Bithynia the Spirit forbad them, because the Lord would hasten them into Macedonia unto a new work, and such a one as they had not medled withall till now, and that was to preach to a Roman plantation, for so the text doth intimate that Philippi was, ver. 12. and ver. 21. and so saith Pliny, lib. 4. cap. 11. He had indeed been alwaies in the Roman dominions, but still among other Nations, as Jews, Greeks, Syrians and the like, but we reade not that he was in any City of Romans till here. And his going to preach to that people is so remarkable, that the text seemeth to have set two or three notable badges upon it. For that Nation lieth under so many sad brands in Scripture, and lay under so great an abominating by the Jews, that the Gospels entring among them, hath these three singular circumstances to advertise of it. 1. That the Spirit diverted Paul from Asia and Bithynia to hasten him thither. 2. That he was called thither by a speciall vision, the like invitation to which he had not in all his travels to any other place. 3. The Penman doth not joyn himself in the story till this very time. For hitherto having spoken in the third person, he and they, as He came to Derbe, ver. 1. They went through the Cities, ver. 4. &c. he cometh now to joyn himself, and to use the word We and VsUs. After he had seen the vision immediatly we indeavoured to go into Macedonia, assuredly gathering that the Lord had called us, ver. 10.

Yet was this City mixed also of abundance of Iews living among them, as that people was now dispersed and sowed in the most places of the Empire, from Rome it self Eastward, however it was on this side: On the Sabbath, by a river side where the women it seemed used their bathings for purification, and where was a Synagogue, they preach and convert Lydia a proselytesse, and she is instantly baptized and her houshold before she go home, for ought can be found otherwise in the text: from whence we may observe what beleeving gave admission to Baptism to whole housholds. In this Roman Colony it is observable that the Synagogue is called Prossucha, and that it is out of the Town.

Paul casteth out a spirit of divination, and is therereupon beaten and imprisoned he and Silas, but inlarged by an earthquake, and the Jaylour is converted: and he and his family instantly baptized. After a little while Paul and Silas depart, having laid the foundation of a very eminent Church as it proved afterward: from which Paul in his Epistle thither, acknowledgeth as many tokens of love received, as from any Church that he had planted: and to which he made as many visits afterward. When he departeth he had p. 101ordained no Ministers there for ought can be gathered from the text, and it may be, he did not, till his return thither again, which was the course he had used in other Churches, Acts 14.23. He speaketh of divers fellow-labourers that he had there in the Gospel, both men and women, Philip. 4.3. which cannot be understood of preaching, but that these being converted, they used their best indeavour to perswade others to imbrace the same Religion, &c.

ACTS CHAP. XVII.

PAUL and Silas or Silvanus, and Timothy come to Thessalonica, where they make many converts, but withall finde very much opposition. In three weeks space, or very little more, they convert some Jews, many Proselytes, and not a few of the chief Gentiles: women of the City: which number, considered with the shortnesse of the time in which so many were brought in, and the bitternesse they indured from the unbelieving, made their piety to be exceedingly renowned all abroad, 1 Thessal. 1.6, 7, 8.

Persecution driveth the Apostles to Beraea another Town of Macedonia, Plin. lib. 4. cap. 10. there they found persons better bred and better learned then that rabble mentioned ver. 5. that they had met withall at Thessalonica. The Jews called their learned men foreign filii nobilium: it may be Lukes foreign, ver. 11. translates that: The rabble from Thessalonica brings the persecution hither also, so that Paul is glad to depart to Athens, but Silas and Timothy abide at Beraea still.

At Athens there was a Synagogue of Jews and Proselytes, ver. 17. so that it is undoubted the scholars of the University had heard from them the report of the true God; therefore Paul is not so much cried out upon, for telling them of the true God in opposition to the false, as for preaching of Iesus crucified, risen and glorified, which neither they nor even the Jews Synagogue there, had ever heard of before: for this he is convented before their great Court of Areopagus, where his discourse converts one of that Bench, Dionysius.

ACTS CHAP. XVIII.

FRom Athens, Paul cometh to Corinth. Vrbs olim clara opibus, post clade notior, nunc Romana colonia, saith Pomp. M…la. lib. 2. cap. 3. A little view of the City may not be uselesse. It stood in the Isthmus, or that neck of Land that lay and gave passage betwixt Peloponesus and Attica: upon which Isthmus the sea pointing in, on either hand made Corinth a famous and a wealthy Mart Town, by two Havens that it had at a reasonable distance from it on either side it, the one Iochaeum, at which they took shipping for Italy and those Western parts: and the other Cenchraea, at which they took shipping for Asia: Merchandise arriving at these ports, from those severall parts of the world, were brought to Corinth which lay much in the middle between them, and so this City became the great Exchange for those parts. It lay at the foot of a high promont called Acrocorinthus, or the Pike of Corinth. The compasse of the City was some fourty furlongs or five miles about, being strongly walled. In it was a Temple of Venus, so ample a foundation, that it had above a thousand Nuns [such Nuns as Venus had] to attend upon it. The City was sacked by L. Mummius the Roman Generall, as for some other offence that it had given to that state, so more especially for some abuse shewed to the Roman Embassadors there. But it was repaired again by the Romans and made a Colony. Vid. Strabo lib. 8. Plin. lib. 4. cap. 4.

Paul coming hither findeth Priscilla and Aquila lately come from Italy, because of Claudius his Decree, which had expelled all the Iews from Rome: Of this Decree Suetonius speaketh, as he is generally understood, In Claudio cap. 25. Iudaeos impulsore Christo assiduè tumultuantes Româ expulit. Claudius expelled the Iews out of Rome, who continually tumultuated because of Christ. In some copies it is written Christo, but so generally interpreted by Christians in the sense mentioned, that we shall not at all dispute it. The same quarrell was got to Rome with the Gospel, that did attend it in all parts of the world where it came among the Jews, they still opposing it and contesting against it, and so breeding tumultuousnesse.

The Apostle here, in a strange place, and out of moneys, betaketh himself to work p. 102with his hands for his subsistence, as also he did in other places upon the same exigent. His work was to make Tents of skins such as the Souldiery used to lodge in when they were in the field: Hence the phrase, Esse sub pellibus. This Trade he learned before he set to his studies. It was the custom of the Jewish Nation to set their children to some trade▪ yea though they were to be students. What is commanded a father towards his son? To circumcise him, to redeem him, to teach him the Law, to teach him a Trade, and to take him a wife. R. Iudah saith, He that teacheth not his sonne a trade, does as if he taught him to be a thief. Rabban Gamali…l saith, He that hath a trade in his hand to what is he like? He is like to a Vineyard that is fenced. Tosapht. in Kiddushin per. 1. So some of the great wise men of Israel had been cutters of wood. Maym. in Talm. Torah. per. 1. And not to instance in any others, as might be done in divers, [Rabban Iochanan ben Zaccai that was at this instant Vicepresident of the Sanhedrin, was a Merchant 4 years, and then he fell to study the Law. Iuchasin fol. 21.] Paul had power and warrant to challenge maintenance for preaching, as he intimateth many times over in his Epistles, but there was not yet any Church at Corinth to maintain him, and when there was, he would take nothing of the Gentiles for the greater honour and promotion of the Gospel. See 1 Cor. 9.6, 11, 12.

He frequenteth the Synagogue every Sabbath, and there reasoneth and perswadeth divers both Jews and Greeks. But when Silas and Timotheus were come from Macedonia, he was pressed in spirit and testified to the Iews that Iesus was the Christ, they having brought him tidings of the great proficiency and piety of Macedonian Churches, namely the Philippian and Thessalonian. See Act. 17.14. 1 Thess. 1.8. & 3.6. upon whose example he was the more earnest to bring the Jews of Corinth on; but they oppose and blaspheam: whereupon he and Silas and Timothy set to work to build up the Gentiles there. The converts in this place were Crispus and Gaius, and the houshold of Stephanas, 1 Cor. 1.14, &c. and Epenetus, Rom. 16.5. He is called the first fruits of Achaia, and so is the houshold of Stephanas, 1 Cor. 16.15. converted at his first coming thither. He now sets upon a new task having the Lords incouragement by a vision by night, and so he staieth at Corinth a year and an half.

In the time of this his abode there, he writeth