International Bible Lessons. FIRST QUARTER: STUDIES IN THE BOOK OF THE ACTS. LESSON V. The First Persecution. [Feb. 2. GOLDEN TEXT. There is none other name under heaven given among men, whereby we must be saved. AUTHORIZED VERSION. [Study also Acts 4. 13-22 Read Acts 4. 1-31.] Acts 4. 1-12. [Commit to memory verses 8-10.] 1 And as they spake unto the people, the priests, and the captain of the temple, and the Sad'du-cees, came upon them, 2 Being grieved that they taught the people, and preached through Je'sus the resurrection from the dead. 3 And they laid hands on them, and put them in hold unto the next day: for it was now eventide. 4 Howbeit many of them which heard, the word believed; and the number of the men was about five thousand. 5 And it came to pass on the morrow, that their rulers, and elders, and scribes, 6 And An'nas the high priest, and Ca'iaphas, and John, and Al-ex-an'der, and as many as were of the kindred of the high priest, were gathered together at Je-ru'sa-lem. 7 And when they had set them in the midst, they asked, By what power, or by what name, have ye done this? 8 Then Pe'ter, filled with the Holy Ghost, said unto them, Ye rulers of the people, and elders of Is'ra-el, 9 If we this day be examined of the good deed done to the impotent man, by what means he is made whole; 10 Be it known unto you all, and to all the people of Is'ra-el, that by the name of Je'sus Christ of Naz'a-reth. whom ye crucified, whom God raised from the dead, cren by him doth this man stand here before you whole. 11 This is the stone which was set at nought of you builders, which is become the head of the corner. 12 Neither is there salvation in any other: for there is none other name under heaven given among men, whereby we must be saved. 1 5 Acts 4. 12. REVISED VERSION. And as they spake unto the people, the priests and the captain of the temple and 2 the Sadducees came upon them, being sore troubled because they taught the people, and proclaimed in Jesus the resurrection from 3 the dead. And they laid hands on them, and put them in ward unto the morrow for it 4 was now eventide. But many of them that heard the word believed; and the number of the men came to be about five thousand. And it came to pass on the morrow, that their rulers and elders and scribes were gath 6 ered together in Jerusalem; and Annas the high priest was there, and Caiaphas, and John, and Alexander, and as many as were 7 of the kindred of the high priest. And when they had set them in the midst, they inquired, By what power, or in what name, 8 have ye done this? Then Peter, filled with the Holy Ghost, said unto them, Ye rulers 9 of the people, and elders, if we this day are examined concerning a good deed done to an impotent man, by what means this man is 10 made whole; be it known unto you all, and to all the people of Israel, that in the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, whom ye crucified, whom God raised from the dead, eren in him doth this man stand here before you 11 whole. He is the stone which was set at nought of you the builders, which was made 12 the head of the corner. And in none other is there salvation: for neither is there any other name under heaven, that is given' among men, wherein we must be saved. Jesus! the name to sinners dear, Happy, if with my latest breath Questions for Senior Scholars. 1. The Arrest of Peter and John. What was the motive of the priests and Sadducees? How long were the disciples under arrest? What was the result of Peter's second discourse? Before whom were the disciples brought? 2. Peter's Impeachment of the Council. What did he propose to prove in his defense? By whose power did he declare the impotent man was healed? With what did he charge the Sanhedrin? What is meant in the reference to the rejected stone? Questions for Intermediate Scholars. 1. First Night in Prison (verses 1-4). Which sect of the Jews were deniers of the resurrection? Why did the priests oppose? What great things in Bible times were done in prisons? 2. First Preaching to the Rulers (verses 5-11). What opportunity did this arrest give the aposties? What facts about Jesus did Peter relate to the rulers? How explain their hardness of heart? What change in the president of the Sanhedrin since Christ was tried? By what power did Peter heal? By what power did he preach? 3. Obeying God Rather than Man (verses 12-16). Can you believe these rulers acted conscientiously? Can we deception? measure the possibility of self Can we be safe unless we avoid the first act of deliberate rejection of Christ? Did Peter and John promise to obey the command of the rulers? Questions for Younger Scholars. Where did Peter preach his first sermon? In Jerusalem, standing on the street. Where did he preach the second? In the temple. Who listened to it? The people, the priests, and the elders. What did they do to the apostles? They put them in prison. Before whom were they brought the next day? Before the Jewish council. What was it called? The Sanhedrin. Who belonged to it? priests and rulers. Seventy of the chief Who was high priest at this time? Caiaphas. Why is Annas also called the high priest? Because he had once held that office and still had great influence. How did Peter speak before the council? Boldly, for he was filled with the Holy Spirit. What did the apostles say about the only name? (GOLDEN TEXT.) The Lesson Catechism. (For the entire school.) 1. How many people now believed in Jesus? About five thousand. 2. Where did the rulers bring Peter and John? Before the council. 3. How did the apostles say that the lame man had been healed? Through the name of Jesus. 4. What did they declare Jesus to be? The only Saviour. 5. How may we be saved? GOLDEN TEXT: "There is none other name," etc. The Church Catechism. 13. Are there more Gods than one? "There is none other God but onc." 1 Cor. 8. 4. 14. Are there more persons in the Godhead than one? There are three persons in the Godhead: the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost; and these three are one. 1 John 5. 7. 15. Is the Father God? "To us there is but one God, the Father." 1 Cor. 8. 6. THE LESSON OUTLINE. I. THEY INSTRUCTED ALL WHO WOULD LISTEN. Stand in the gate of the Lord's house, and The poor have the Gospel preached to them. Go ye into all the world, and preach the II. THEY PRESENTED JESUS AS THE SOURCE OF They preached through Jesus the resurrec- In Christ shall all be made alive. 1 Cor. 15. 22. He that raised up Christ from the dead III THEY PRESENTED JESUS AS THE SOURCE By the name of Jesus Christ. v. 10. Whatsoever ye shall ask the Father in my name, he will give it you. John 16. 23. Lord, even the devils are subject unto us through thy name. Luke 10. 17. IV. THEY PRESENTED JESUS AS THE SOURCE Neither is there salvation in any other, v. 12. Other foundation can no man lay than Je- V. THEY WERE PERSECUTED. They laid hands on them. v. 3. These also resist the truth. 2 Tim. 3. 8. VI. THEY DEPENDED ON THE HOLY GHOST. The Holy Ghost shall teach you what ye It is the Spirit of your Father which EXPLANATORY I suffer bonds, but the word of God is not bound. 2 Tim. 2. 9. So mightily grew the word of the Lord and prevailed. Acts 19. 20. NOTES. BY ROBERT R. DOHERTY, PH.D. In a time of political agitation and suspicion a sudden crowd in Solomon's Porch was portentous, no man could tell of what. So, very naturally, the events of this lesson follow those of the last. The sudden popularity of the apostles, their arrest, and their arraignment before the Sanhedrin are dwelt upon in the notes that follow; but the teacher should master the entire chapter; indeed, our story is not complete without verses 13-31. The eloquence of Peter and John, "unlearned men," made the Sanhedrin "marvel," and caused the recognition that they were followers of Jesus. The prosecution was thwarted by the manifest restoration of the lame beggar; and in private conference the leaders decided to exercise their utmost power of command and threat against further Christian teaching, while for prudential reasons refraining from punishment of the preachers. With unparalleled boldness Peter and John defied them: “Whether it be right in the sight of God to hearken unto you more than unto God, judge ye," they said: "for we cannot but speak the things which we have seen and heard." Following the account of the release of the apostles comes a prayer of thanksgiving (verses 24-30), which, as being one of the earliest of Christian documents, has peculiar historic value. When the apostles had prayed the place of meeting was shaken and all were filled with the Holy Ghost. This completes the story of the miraculous cure of the lame man, and the writer proceeds, in the closing verses of the chapter, to tell of the intense brotherly love which led the Church in Jerusalem to hold all worldly goods in common. I. THE ARREST. Verses 1, 2. The first scene of our lesson is a rude interruption of the apostles' sermon by representatives of the Sanhedrin, whose members were filled with vexation because the apostles were "able to produce an instance destructive of their theory that there was no resurrection." The words that the apostles spake unto the people are given in the last chapter (verses 12-26). Came upon them. Literally, "stood there;" implying suddenness. The priests (probably) were the chief priest and his associates, the controlling group of the hierarchy, or (possibly) the common priests whose turn it was that day to take charge of the temple services. Soon after this (Acts 6. 7) "a great company of the priests" became "obedient to the faith." The captain of the temple (called in the Old Testament "the ruler of the house of God") superintended the priests and Levites who kept watch in and around the sacred edifice, and would be held responsible for any disorder. We are not to wonder at the importance attached to the crowd which had gathered about Peter and John. Jerusalem, like most great ancient cities, was repeatedly at the mercy of a mob, and mobs at Jerusalem naturally formed in the temple courts. The chief characteristics of the sect of Sadducees in our Lord's time, so far as we can distinguish them, were "a disbelief of angels and spiritual creatures and the denial of the resurrection and a future state." The priests, the captain, and the Sadducees represent three classes, but they were classes closely interwoven, for the leading priestly families were Sadducean, and the captain of the temple would seem, from an allusion in Josephus, to have been, in one case, at least, the son of the high priest. In verse 2 the emphasis falls on four phrases-they, the people, through Jesus, and the resurrection. That they, "unlearned men," should assume the functions of doctors of the law; that the people, who had all their lives carried without murmur burdens grievous to be borne, independently should consider novel propositions in theology; that the offensive doctrine of the resurrection from the dead should be taught in the temple of which practically the Sadducees were owners; and, worst of all, that the force back of all this was the detested Jesus, the carpenter-rabbi whom they had killed-all this greatly grieved the hierarchy (Revised Version; "they were sore troubled;" literally, "they were thoroughly pained"). 3. It was now eventide (the old English word "tide" meant "time"), and too late to call a meeting of the Sanhedrin to try the prisoners; so they were put in hold (or, in modern phraseology, "locked up") unto the next day. This was simply a commitment for trial; imprisonment as a punishment was not usual with the Jews. The "day" ended about six o'clock (with the twelfth hour), and it was already three (the ninth hour) when the cripple asked Peter for alms. 4. Howbeit. "But." In spite of the chronic opposition of the authorities, and in spite of this sudden arrest. Many of them which heard the word believed. Professor Seeley suggests that nearly all the moral worth in Jerusalem now went into the Christian Church. The number of the men was ["came to be"] about five thousand. In the earlier enumerations women apparently were included; not so here. The great increase from one hundred and twenty (at the time of the ascension, Acts 1. 15) and three thousand (at Pentecost, Acts 2. 41) is not more remarkable than the careful organization implied by this registry of membership. II. THE TRIAL. 5, 6. Their rulers, and elders, and scribes. The Sanhedrin was made up of representatives of three classes-the priestly, the wealthy, and the learned. The elders seem to have had magisterial duties apart from those of the council. The scribes were "doctors of the law," professional students. Annas was called the high priest (perhaps only by courtesy) and seems to have discharged functions which we would suppose belonged to that office, although he had been deposed and his son-in-law Caiaphas was now the titular high priest. The characteristics of both these men were displayed at the trial of our Lord. They were narrow ecclesiastics with skeptical hearts and corrupt political methods. John and Alexander are not elsewhere spoken of in the Scriptures, and they cannot certainly be identified with men mentioned in other histories. The kindred of the high priest. The high-priestly families. The officials enumerated, who when gathered together seem to have formed the Sanhedrin, met at Jerusalem, a phrase that strikes us oddly at first, for (according to our use of words) all the events we have been studying were there. But the phrase seems here to have the sense of in the city, as distinct from the temple courts. The Revised Version, however, places the words "were come together in Jerusalem” at the end of verse 5, instead of at the end of verse 6, and so indicates that some of the rulers, elders, and scribes lived in the suburbs. It was now the most beautiful part of summer, and they may have had summer homes. 7. The words when they had set them in the mtidst suggest the semicircle in which the members of the Sanhedrin always sat, the accused being compelled to stand facing the president, who was in the middle of the curved line of seats. By what power, or by what name, have ye done this? "What kind of power is at your command?" The cure itself they do not deny; the power that wrought it they assume to be evil. "Power" and "name" stood for mystic forces which sorcerers and exorcists were supposed to exert. The questioners knew well the apostles' use of the name of Jesus, but could not admit that his name could work such a cure. Their emphasis on "ye" gives the phrase in Greek something of the meaning that "you fellows" would have in English. They were preparing to accuse the apostles either of her |