Acts 5:38-41 sits inside this longer paragraph.
33But they, when they heard this, were cut to the heart, and were determined to kill them. 34But one stood up in the council, a Pharisee named Gamaliel, a teacher of the law, honored by all the people, and commanded to put the apostles out for a little while. 35He said to them, “You men of Israel, be careful concerning these men, what you are about to do. 36For before these days Theudas rose up, making himself out to be somebody; to whom a number of men, about four hundred, joined themselves. He was slain; and all, as many as obeyed him, were dispersed, and came to nothing. 37After this man, Judas of Galilee rose up in the days of the enrollment, and drew away some people after him. He also perished, and all, as many as obeyed him, were scattered abroad. 38Now I tell you, withdraw from these men, and leave them alone. For if this counsel or this work is of men, it will be overthrown. 39But if it is of God, you will not be able to overthrow it, and you would be found even to be fighting against God!”
40They agreed with him. Summoning the apostles, they beat them and commanded them not to speak in the name of Jesus, and let them go. 41They therefore departed from the presence of the council, rejoicing that they were counted worthy to suffer dishonor for Jesus’ name.
John Calvin 1540 · Public Domain On vv40–41 40. Having beaten them, they commanded. He saith that…
40. Having beaten them, they commanded. He saith that Gamaliel’s counsel was allowed; yet the apostles are beaten, and forbidden to preach. Hereby we gather how great the rage of the enemies was, who being now pacified, or at least mitigated, do yet, notwithstanding, rage immoderately. And it appeareth also what evil success those doubtful counsels have, wherein men alone are respected, and the truth of God set aside. Gamaliel obtaineth thus much, that the lives of the apostles may be saved; but, in the mean season, the Son of God is blasphemed and slandered in their person; the truth of the gospel is buried in eternal silence, so much as in the enemies lieth, God surely doth by this means wonderfully spread abroad his word; yet that counsel ceaseth not to be evil. Which we must note for this cause, because most men at this day do think, that they do not a little obey God, if they save the lives of those men which come in hazard for the doctrine of the gospel, or somewhat appease the enemies who are otherwise bloody. In the mean season, they are not afraid to drive them unto the wicked denial of Christ, the confessing of whom is far more precious in the sight of God than the life of all men. But what could they do who, casting away all care of godliness, go about to redeem God’s favor with the duty of courtesy?
John Calvin's Commentaries (1540-1563) — public domain. Text from the Calvin Translation Society English edition (1840s-50s) via the Christian Classics Ethereal Library (ccel.org). Calvin's coverage is partial (roughly two-thirds of the Bible); uncommented books and verses are honest gaps, never fabricated. The 19th-century editor's footnotes and remarks are omitted so the notes are faithfully Calvin's own voice.
Geneva Bible translators 1599 · Public Domain On vv38, 41 He dissuadeth his fellows from murdering the Apostles, neither…
He dissuadeth his fellows from murdering the Apostles, neither doth he think it good to refer the matter to the Roman Magistrate, for the Jews could abide nothing worse, than to have the tyranny of the Romans confirmed.
If it be counterfeit and devised.
Geneva Bible (1599) marginal notes — public domain.
John Trapp 1656 · Public Domain On vv38–41 38 And now I say unto you, Refrain from…
38 And now I say unto you, Refrain from these men, and let them alone: for if this counsel or this work be of men, it will come to nought:
Ver. 38. Let them alone, for if, &c.] Perilous counsel, but profitable to the Church; God so ordering it, as he doth all, for the best to his.
John Trapp, A Commentary or Exposition upon All the Books of the Old and New Testament (1647–1656) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Matthew Poole 1685 · Public Domain On vv38–41 And now I say unto you; he undertakes to…
And now I say unto you; he undertakes to advise them what they should do in the present case.
Refrain from these men; have nothing to do with them, as Pilate’s wife advised him concerning our Saviour, Mat 27:19. Gamaliel interposes, partly out of his moderate and mild disposition; partly out of fear, lest if they slew the apostles they might incense the Romans, who were very jealous of their authority, and had taken away the power of capital punishments from the Jews.
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For if this counsel or this work be of men, it will come to nought; this argument, or dilemma, which Gamaliel uses for the sparing of the apostles, is of force either way; as that question our Saviour propounds concerning the baptism of John, Mat 21:25. This first part is evident, for that building must needs fall which is built upon the sand, Mat 7:27.
Matthew Poole's English Annotations on the Holy Bible (1683–1685) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
John Gill 1763 · Public Domain On vv38–41 But if it be of God,.... If it is…
But if it be of God,.... If it is according to the counsel of his will; if it is a scheme of his forming, and a work to which he has called these men, and they proceed in it on good principles, and with a view to the honour and glory of God:
ye cannot overthrow it; it will proceed and get ground, and stand, maugre all the opposition of hell and earth; therefore do nothing to them, or hinder them from going on. Some copies read, "ye cannot overthrow them"; and add, "neither you, nor kings, nor tyrants; wherefore refrain from these men"; so Beza's Cambridge copy.
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Lest haply ye be found even to fight against God; which to do is downright madness, and which no man in his senses can expect to succeed in. There are some sayings of the Jewish doctors which seem to agree with these reasonings of Gamaliel (p).
"Says R. Jochanan the shoemaker, every congregation, which is for the name of heaven (or God) at length shall be established, but that which is not for the glory of God shall not be established in the end.''
Which one of the commentators (q) interprets in words still nearer to Gamaliel's language, thus:
"it shall be that that counsel which is for God shall stand and prosper, but that which is not for God shall cease.''
And in another place it is said (r),
"all contention (or dispute) which is for God, at length shall be established, but that which is not for God shall not in the end be established: what is contention that is for God? the contention of Hillell and Shammai, (two famous doctors among the Jews,) but that which is not for God is the contention of Korah, and his whole company.''
Some have thought from this advice of Gamaliel, that he was a Christian, or greatly inclined to Christianity; but when it is considered what respect was shown him at his death by the Jews, before observed on Act 5:34 it will appear that he died a Pharisee; and especially it cannot be thought he had any favourable sentiments of the Christians, since a little before his death he ordered a prayer to be made against them. Maimonides says (s), that
"in the days of Rabban Gamaliel, the Epicureans (so the Amsterdam edition reads, but former editions read "heretics", by whom are meant Christians) increased in Israel; and they distressed the Israelites, and seduced them to turn aside from God; and when he saw that this was greater than all the necessities of the children of men, he stood up, and his council or sanhedrim, and composed another prayer, in which there was a request to God to destroy the Epicureans,''
or heretics, meaning the Christians: and though this prayer is sometimes ascribed to Samuel the little, yet it was composed by him at the hint and instigation of Gamaliel; for so it is said (t), R. Gamaliel said to the wise men,
"is there no man that knows how to compose a prayer for the Sadducees? (R. Asher reads "heretics";) Samuel the little stood up and composed one.''
And it is also said (u), that
"Samuel the little composed, , "the prayer for the heretics", before, or in the presence of Gamaliel the elder.''
He made it when he was present, assisting, dictating, directing, and approving. The prayer was this (w),
"let there be no hope for apostates, and may all heretics perish in a moment, and all the enemies of thy people be quickly cut off: root out the kingdom of pride, and break, destroy, and subdue them in haste in our days.''
In some forms it is added,
"blessed art thou, O Lord, that breakest the wicked in pieces, and humblest the proud.''
Upon the whole, Gamaliel does not seem to have been a Christian, or to have favoured the Christian religion; but he was, as he is said, Act 5:34 to be, a Pharisee: and this council, or sanhedrim, were, for the greater part of them, Sadducees, as seems from Act 5:17 who, as the Jews say, were wicked and base men, men of very ill manners, whereas the Pharisees were "merciful men" (x); and such an one was Gamaliel: he was a religious man in his way; a man of humanity, a mild and moderate man, that had compassion and pity for his fellow creatures; and could not give in to any schemes of cruelty and persecution, which the Sadducees were forward to; and upon these principles he acted, and upon these he gave this advice.
(p) Pirke Abot, c. 4 sect 11. (q) Jarchi in ib. (r) Pirke Abot, c. 5. sect. 17. (s) Hilchot Tephilla, c. 2. sect. 1. (t) T. Bab. Beracot, fol. 28. 2. (u) Juchasin, fol. 21. 1. Ganz Tzemach David, par. 1. fol. 25. 2. (w) Apud Buxtorf. Lex. Talmud. col. 2442. & Alting Shilo, l. 4. c. 26. p. 325. (x) Juchasin, fol. 139. 1.
John Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible (1746–1763) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
John Wesley 1765 · Public Domain On vv38, 41 Let them alone - In a cause which is…
Let them alone - In a cause which is manifestly good, we should immediately join. In a cause, on the other hand, which is manifestly evil, we should immediately oppose. But in a sudden, new, doubtful occurrence, this advice is eminently useful. If this counsel or this work - He seems to correct himself, as if it were some sudden work, rather than a counsel or design. And so it was. For the apostles had no counsel, plan, or design of their own; but were mere instruments in the hand of God, working just as he led them from day to day.
John Wesley, Explanatory Notes Upon the Whole Bible (1754–1765) — public domain. Text via the GEBible commentary corpus.
Adam Clarke 1810 · Public Domain On vv38–41 Verse 38. Refrain from these men] Do not molest…
Verse 38. Refrain from these men] Do not molest them, leave them to God; for if this counsel and work be of man it will come to nought, like the rebellion of Theudas, and that of Judas of Galilee: for whatever pretends to be done in the name of God, but is not of him, will have his curse and not his blessing. He whose name is prostituted by it will vindicate his injured honour, and avenge himself.
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Joseph Benson 1811 · Public Domain On vv38, 40, 41 Act 5:38-39. And now I say unto you —…
Act 5:38-39. And now I say unto you — I, therefore, with regard to the present affair, give it as my most serious and deliberate advice; Refrain from these men, and let them alone — In a cause which is manifestly good, we should immediately join. In a cause, on the other hand, which is manifestly evil, we should immediately oppose. But in a sudden, new, doubtful occurrence, this advice of Gamaliel is proper and eminently useful. For if this counsel or this work — He seems to correct himself, as if it were some sudden work, rather than a counsel, or design. And so it was. For the apostles had no counsel, plan, or design of their own; but were mere instruments in the hand of God, working just as he led them from day to day. If it be of men — If it be a merely human contrivance, and matter of deceit; it will come to naught — It will soon sink, and come to nothing of itself; some incident will arise to discredit it, and the whole interest of this Jesus will moulder away, as that of Theudas and of Judas did, both which seem to have been much more strongly supported by human power. But if it be of God — If it be really his cause, which does not appear to me impossible, ye cannot overthrow it, whatever power or policy you use; for though even these particular instruments should be taken off, he will, undoubtedly, raise up others: lest haply ye be found even to fight against God — Against his almighty power, and infinitely wise and ever watchful providence; an undertaking which must prove dreadfully fatal to all who are so rash and unhappy as to engage in it.
Joseph Benson's Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1811–1818) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Albert Barnes 1834 · Public Domain On vv38–41 Refrain from these men - Cease to oppose them…
Refrain from these men - Cease to oppose them or to threaten them. The “reason” why he advised this he immediately adds, that if it were of human origin, it would come to nothing; if of God, they could not overthrow it.
This counsel or this work be of men - This plan or purpose. If the apostles had originated it for the purposes of imposture.
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It will come to nought - Gamaliel “inferred” that from the two instances which he specified. They had been suppressed without the interference of the Sanhedrin; and he inferred that “this” would also die away if it was a human device. It will be remembered that this is the mere advice of Gamaliel, who was not inspired, and that this opinion should not be adduced to guide us, except as it was an instance of great shrewdness and prudence. It is doubtless right to oppose error in the proper way and with the proper temper, not with arms, or vituperation, or with the civil power, but with argument and kind entreaty. But the sentiment of Gamaliel is full of wisdom in regard to error. For:
(1) The very way to exalt error into notice, and to confirm people in it, is to oppose it in a harsh, authoritative, and unkind manner.
(2) Error, if left alone, will often die away itself. The interest of people in it will often cease as soon as it ceases to be opposed; and, having nothing to fan the flame, it will expire. It is not so with truth.
(3) In this respect the remark may be applied to the Christian religion. It has stood too long, and in too many circumstances of prosperity and adversity, to be of human origin. It has been subjected to all trials from its pretended friends and real foes; and it still lives as vigorous and flourishing as ever. Kingdoms have changed; empires have risen and fallen since Gamaliel spoke this; systems of opinion and belief have had their day, and expired; but the preservation of the Christian religion, unchanged through so many revolutions, and in so many fiery trials, shows that it is not of men, but of God. The argument for the divine origin of the Christian religion from its perpetuity is one that can be applied to no other system that has been, or that now exists. For Christianity has been opposed in every form. It confers no temporal conquests, and appeals to no base and strong native passions. The Muslim faith is supported by the sword and the state; paganism relies on the arm of the civil power and the terrors of superstition, and is sustained by all the corrupt passions of people; atheism and infidelity have been short-lived, varying in their forms, dying today, and tomorrow starting up in a new form; never organized, consolidated, or pure; and never tending to promote the peace or happiness of people. Christianity, without arms or human power, has lived, keeping on its steady and triumphant movement among people, regardless alike of the opposition of its foes, and of the treachery of its pretended friends. If the opinion of Gamaliel was just, it is from God; and the Jews particularly should regard as important an argument derived from the opinion of one of the wisest of their ancient rabbis.
Albert Barnes' Notes on the Bible (1834–1885) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Haydock's Catholic Bible Commentary 1859 · Public Domain On vv39, 41 Time, and the evident success of Christ’s Church, prove…
Time, and the evident success of Christ’s Church, prove it to be of God. No violence of the Jews, no persecution of heathen princes, no attempts of domestic adversaries, heretics, schismatics, or evil livers, have been able to prevail against it. Men of superior abilities have made violent attacks against it; their memory, and that of their disciples, has either been buried and forgotten, or liveth only in malediction and infamy. Let, then no Catholic be dispirited, because modern heresies continue; Arian and other heresies have continued much longer, have been more powerfully supported by temporal power, and yet have come to nothing. The Catholic religion was the first, and it will be the last religion.
George Leo Haydock (1774–1849), Haydock's Catholic Family Bible and Commentary, 1859 edition — public domain. Excludes Psalms (Douay-Rheims chapter numbering differs from Protestant) and Deuterocanonical books (Catholic canon only).
Robert Jamieson, A. R. Fausset & David Brown 1871 · Public Domain On vv38, 40, 41 if . . . of men, it will come…
if . . . of men, it will come to naught--This neutral policy was true wisdom, in the then temper of the council. But individual neutrality is hostility to Christ, as He Himself teaches (Luk 11:23).
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown — Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
Daniel D. Whedon 1874 · Public Domain On vv38–41 38. And now—As the inference from these narratives. There…
38. And now—As the inference from these narratives. There is in Gamaliel’s counsel the non-committalism of a politician rather than the decision of a sage or a saint. Not so did Gamaliel’s great pupil wait to see how things would turn out before he made his moral decision.
Daniel D. Whedon (gen. ed.), Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1874–1909) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges 1878 · Public Domain On vv38–41 38. it will come to nought] As the verb…
38. it will come to nought] As the verb is the same as that in the following verse it is better to render, it will be overthrown.
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges (gen. ed. J. J. S. Perowne; Cambridge University Press, 1878–1918) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers 1878 · Public Domain On vv38–41 (38) Refrain from these men.—The advice implies something like…
(38) Refrain from these men.—The advice implies something like a suppressed conviction not bold enough to utter itself. Gamaliel takes his place in the class, at all times numerous, of waiters upon Providence, who are neutral till a cause is successful, and then come forward with a tardy sympathy, but who, above all, shrink from committing themselves while there seems any possibility of failure. In 1Th_2:13, St. Paul seems almost to contrast the readiness of his disciples in receiving his gospel, not as “of man,” but as “of God,” with the timid caution of his Master. As a prudential dilemma, the argument was forcible enough. Resistance was either needless or it was hopeless. If needless, it was a waste of energy; if hopeless, it involved a fatal risk besides that of mere failure. We may legitimately think of the fiery disciple as listening impatiently to this temporising counsel, and as stirred by it to greater vehemence.
It will come to nought.—Better, it will be overthrown, so as to preserve the emphasis of the repetition of the same verb in the next clause of the dilemma.
A Bible Commentary for English Readers, edited by Charles John Ellicott (1878–1897) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Pulpit Commentary 1880 · Public Domain On vv38–41 Be overthrown for come to nought, A.V.
Be overthrown for come to nought, A.V.
Vers. 38, 39. A study of Jewish character: Gamaliel.
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"And now I say unto you," etc.
I REGARD IT AS THE PRODUCT OF JEWISH EDUCATION.
1. Reverence for the Word and will of God in truth and in providence. The Jews, possessed in their Scriptures a good philosophy of history. Taught that God must triumph.
2. Sense of humanity and righteousness deeply pervading all the Jewish system. "Refrain from these men.
3. Yet evidence of the corrupt and formal state of the Jewish teachers temporizing policy, weakness of conviction, unwillingness to face truth, the ecclesiastical spirit in its mildest form.
II CONSIDER IT IN ITS RELATION TO CHRISTIANITY.
1. The influence of Gamaliel on Saul of Tarsus (see Conybeare and Howson; Farrar) and so on the history of the gospel.
2. The contrast between Gamaliel and his fellow-counselors in the Sanhedrim. They agreed to him then, but how about their former action and what followed? The Gamaliel character was then exceptional.
3. The contrast between Gamaliel and the apostles. He was prudent, they were earnest. Consider the necessity of following conviction. Sweetness and light are not means but ends; they have to be fought for, not rested in, before they are fully obtained.
4. The great appeal: "Lest haply ye be found fighting against God." All must acknowledge it. How easily ignored! The position of the soul is here indicated; it is either fighting with God or against God. Though Gamaliel did not see it, there is no middle position. "A fearful thing to fall into his hands. R.
The Pulpit Commentary (1880–1919), ed. H.D.M. Spence-Jones & Joseph S. Exell — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Biblical Illustrator 1887 · Public Domain On vv38, 41 And now I say unto you, Refrain from these…
Act_5:38-39
And now I say unto you, Refrain from these men, and let them alone.
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The witness of history to Christianity
1. Christianity was on trial before the Jewish Sanhedrin. It had then no history. Now it has an history of more than eighteen hundred years. Wisely spake that wisest of Jewish Rabbis: Let us wait awhile and see. If it be of men, no blow is needed. If it be of God, no smiting will do it any harm. Leave it to history. Such was the appeal. We are ready now for the verdict. If Gamaliel were here I would be willing to leave it all to his candid judgment. Is Christianity a success or a failure?
2. This argument from history requires discrimination. Mere age makes out nothing decisive for a religion. Religions in general are apt to be long-lived; longer-lived than civil politics.
(1) Those of Egypt, of Mesopotamia, of Phoenicia, of Greece and Rome, all lasted many centuries; and, while they lasted, might have made an argument of their longevity. But they are all dead now, and nobody names either of them as a rival of Christianity.
(2) Brahmanism and Buddhism vary the problem for us. Here are very old religions. What is to be said of them? This; that they are like the old dead religions in having a limited domain. Not one of them has had much strength or currency outside of its own native land. They might as well be dead. They fight no battles, win no victories.
(3) Mohammedanism makes the problem a still nicer one. Here is a religion, not merely of great age, but of great expansiveness and versatility. There is truth in it, these two great truths: that God is, and rules. In less than a hundred years from its origin men were praying towards Mecca over a wider territory than the Roman eagles had shadowed in nearly a thousand years. Why was it? Partly because they had been persuaded to do so. The argument for one God was better than the argument for many gods. And so idolaters were vanquished. Then the worship was simple, and the degenerate, sacerdotal, tawdry, idolatrous Christianity of the Orient went to the wall. But had no sword been drawn, Islamism must have stayed in Arabia, or have gone but little beyond it. For idolaters the alternative was Islam or the sword. For Jews and Christians Islam or tribute. And so the crescent shot along the sky. Christianity has had no such history. Its symbol has always been a wooden cross. Now and then it has drawn the sword, as Peter drew it in the garden; but only to be rebuked, as Peter was. Its beginning dates significantly from the gift of tongues. Not sword, but sermon was to hew its way for it. It must spill no blood but its own. Nor might cunning serve it. Wolves are fierce and cunning both. The disciples of the Man of Nazareth were sent forth like sheep and doves. Such was Christianity; the Christianity of Gamaliels time. Let us see now what came of it.
I. Its first conflict was with Judaism, with which it should have had no conflict at all. Judaism, then fifteen centuries old, was not human, but Divine. And Christianity had come out of it, as an apple comes out of its bud and blossom. But madness ruled the hour. They hanged their Prophet on a tree, hissing that awful prayer which God has been answering ever since: His blood be on us and on our children. Many Jews, as we know, passed over into the Christian Church, in all, perhaps some ten or twelve thousand within the first six years. Then their most learned and ablest Rabbi, Saul of Tarsus, went over to the new religion. And his voice rang all along the northern shore of the Mediterranean, from Damascus to Spain, in countless synagogues, entreating his countrymen to follow him. It was their golden opportunity. And they lost it. Judaism, they shouted, is final. Not Judaism, answered the pupil of Gamaliel, but Christianity. This was the point at issue. In their madness the people thought they could tear the Roman eagles from their battlements and reestablish the fallen throne of David. They tried, and failed. Judaism was shattered when, as foretold by Daniel, the oblation ceased. Since then no smoke of sacrifice has ascended from Mount Moriah. Since then the story of our Christian sacrifice has gone round the globe. And almost everywhere it finds the forsaken and scattered remnants of that ancient people, over whose city the Redeemer wept.
II. The second conflict of Christianity was with the Graeco-Roman civilisation. The whole theatre of ancient history, the whole garden of ancient letters, art, and social refinement, now acknowledged the supremacy of Rome. Christianity she greeted with contempt and scorn.
1. In this lay the safety of the new religion. It thus had chance to grow. All over the Roman Empire its roots went down into the soil unnoticed. After a hundred years its branches were in all the air. There were at least two or three millions of Christians. They were a people by themselves, sifted out of society, organised, drilled, and handled by their leaders, as no other religious body ever had been. They could no longer be ignored. And then the leaven had been working upwards, as well as downwards, among the people. The commercial middle class furnished many converts. By and by philosophers and scholars began to come over, who boldly proclaimed the new faith as the final philosophy. Christianity could no longer be despised. Books had been written in its defence, and these books must be replied to. Then there came out on the heathen side such champions as Fronto, Lucian, and Celsus, learned and witty men, attacking Christianity with every known weapon of argument, abuse, and raillery. By and by, persecution began in terrible earnest. It was, however, chiefly the work of mobs, stirred up and hounded on by men whose interests were imperilled. Of the emperors, only Nero and Domitian, and they for reasons of their own, had dipped their hands willingly in Christian blood. Now, soon after the middle of the second century, persecution began to be a part of the imperial policy. It was assumed that the old Roman religion was essential to the welfare of the Roman State. It was seen that Christianity was getting the better of that old Roman religion. Bad emperors, like Commodus and Heliogabalus, who cared nothing for the welfare of the State, let the new religion alone. Able, patriotic, high-toned emperors, like Marcus Aurelius, Decius, and Diocletian, could not let it alone. Those were times of awful agony when the powerful Roman Empire, shutting the gates of the ampitheatre, leaped into the arena face to face with the Christian Church. When those gates were opened, the victorious Church went forth, with the baptism of blood on her saintly brow, bearing a new Christian Empire in her fair, white arms. It only remained for heathen frenzy to contest this verdict of Providence, as Jewish frenzy had contested the verdict of Providence in Palestine. Philosophers had been for some time at work, elaborating what we call the New Platonism, a strange conglomerate, which taught one God in the lecture-room and many gods in the market-place; which discoursed loftily of union with God; and stooped to magical arts. This was the informing spirit of that notable reaction and revival of heathenism which found a fit champion in Julian, who, burning with zeal for the old religion, resolved to put the new religion down. Did he do it? In less than two years after mounting the throne of the Caesars, he, pierced by a Persian arrow, confessed Thou hast conquered, O Galilean. But Christianity, you tell me, did not save the life of the Roman Empire. No, it came too late for that. But Christianity prolonged that life; by a century or two in the Occident, by six or eight centuries in the Orient.
III. The third conflict was with the Teutonic barbarians. In German forests Christian captives were the first evangelists. They had to learn a new language which had then no alphabet. The men that spoke it had no culture. In a hundred years those rude barbarians were reading their Gothic Bibles. From tribe to tribe the sacred message ran till, in another hundred years, the barbarian conquest of Rome was essentially a Christian conquest. From generation to generation the missionary work went on, till at last the whole Teutonic race in Europe, now numbering well-nigh eighty millions, took on a Christian civilisation, higher, stronger, more radiant than that of Greece and Rome. The Kelts, now numbering about nine millions, were also evangelised; the Slaves, now numbering nearly eighty millions, came later; then the Scandinavians, one of the finest races in history, now numbering some eight millions, whose old mythology is richer and grander than that of ancient Greece, and whom it took two centuries to conquer. And not one of the nobler historic peoples, once evangelised, has ever let go its hold of the gospel. The decayed churches of the Orient are only decayed, not dead, while the tide that went over them is evidently going out.
IV. The fourth great conflict is with a lower type of heathenism at home and abroad, and is now in progress. There is, indeed, a conflict with science which is sharp enough just now, and many good people are needlessly alarmed about it. There are tidal waves in all human affairs, and scepticism, like everything else, comes and goes on its endless round. But every time Christianity sails through it all like an ironclad. The great mass of Christians have never troubled themselves about it. Augustine made an end of Manicheism. The great schoolmen of the thirteenth century silenced the sceptics of the twelfth. And out of the scepticism of the fifteenth century came the reaction that culminated in the Protestant Reformation. Christianity, the mother of universities, the nurse and patron of all high study, has no fear of science. No. The real strain and conflict of our day are more practical. Christianity has conquered all the best races in history thus far. Now, can it conquer to the bottom as it has already conquered to the top? Can it bring the whole human family, its lowest peoples with its highest, into one common fold? Can it evangelise the Chinese, Japanese, Polynesians, Africans, North American Indians? Can it evangelise its own cities, going down into the cellars, up into the garrets of its own heathens here at home? Hard as the task may be, Christianity stands squarely committed to it. If Christianity fails in this its supreme endeavour, it is not of God. But it will not fail. What it can do may be known from what it has done. We have carried the gospel into the huts of the bushmen, we shall yet carry it into every cellar and every garret of every Christian city. Let us be of good courage. It is not long we shall have to wait. (R. D. Hitchcock, D. D.)
Gamaliel and his advice; or the policy of caution and neutrality
Broadly speaking, men divide themselves into three classes in relation to Christianity. First, there are the open enemies, who never miss an opportunity of offering unto it the most energetic and violent opposition. Secondly, there are the earnest advocates and the zealous propagators of Christianity. Thirdly, but coming midway between these two classes, there is another, which we might term the cautious, timid, and perhaps temporising, neutral class. Speech after speech was delivered in favour of physical violence. At length Gamaliel arose. His speech was what we might call a moderate speech. It counselled caution, refrain, take heed. Do not lay rash and violent hands on these men. Do not endeavour to stamp out this new religion or irreligion by rash and violent methods.
I. The favourable aspect of this policy. Let us point out what there is that is commendable in this policy of awaiting the test of time.
1. Time certainly is a most searching and accurate test. It is very difficult to judge a movement that is in its infancy. By their fruits movements too are known. But then you must allow time for the fruit to appear and to mature.
2. Certainly this policy is opposed to that objectionable method of procedure which is characterised by zeal without knowledge. There are those whose zeal in itself is really commendable; and they rush on rashly, never taking time to consider the bearing of present action on future events; they will run and risk their life to rescue a child in danger, but, perhaps, they will knock down half-a-dozen children on their way and do them serious harm. They will spend their best energies to advance a principle which they hold dear, but, perhaps, they will trample on many other principles which are equally true and Divine. Zeal without knowledge. Their warm hearts are not under the direction of wise heads. Their action, while enthusiastic, is ill-directed. Well, Gamaliel and his friends are not guilty of this fault. They are never led into anything rash. If they err, they err on the safe side. They do not do much harm if they do no good. They will not hinder a good movement, though they may not help it. They will not further a bad cause, though they may do nothing to hinder it. Their policy is to refrain, to take heed, to take no action until time makes it quite clear whether the cause be human or Divine.
3. There is some amount of wise, cautious humility and devoutness also about this policy of Gamaliel and his friends. They greatly fear lest they should be found fighting against God, opposing His will and purpose. They knew that that would not only he fruitless, but sinful and blasphemous. It is a sad thing to find even a portion of ones life fruitless. Moral fruitlessness is a terrible calamity. To fight against God then is fruitless, for He must conquer in the end and our work come to nought. But it s also sinful, and even blasphemous. Blasphemy, properly so called, is speaking against God, but there is also a blasphemy which consists in acting against Him, in using those faculties with which He Himself has endowed us, to frustrate His will and purpose, and to further the ends and intents of the devil. Well, Gamaliel and his friends strove to steer clear of this evil. They are cautiously humble and devout. They would not for the world be found fighting against God. Hence their policy is to take heed, to refrain, to wait until time proves whether God be in the movement or not.
II. The unfavourable aspects of this policy.
1. It makes this mistake, it regards the external results of a movement as the unfailing test of its character. Or to put it in this way: It says, this movement succeeds--it is Divine; this movement fails--it is human. Success or failure is taken as the test. But is it a true test? Some of the most successful movements have had the least of God in them, and some of the least successful have had the most of God in them. The followers of Buddha are more numerous than all other religionists. Is Buddhism more Divine because of that? It is evident then that external success is not an absolute test of the spirituality and Divinity of a religion, or of the character of a movement. Results I results! That is the great cry of the day. And it is almost thought that spiritual results can be got to order just like material results. You send your boy to the tailor for a suit of clothes; he gets it, you are satisfied. Do you send him in the same spirit to the master of the grammar school, saying, I want a good education for my boy, so much time, so much money? The master would reply, Education is not to be had to order; there are other matters to be taken into consideration: has your son the ability, the application to learn? Without that I can do nothing with him. If it is so with intellectual results, how much more so with moral and spiritual results. We cannot get true conversions to order; we may get spurious ones. Nor is it possible to count true converts. Men can count heads; but it takes God Himself to count hearts. Therefore the test of external results is not an absolutely safe test. Are we, therefore, not to aim for success? By all means. All the success that we can get; as many hearers, as many converts, as many Christian workers as possible. Only do not rely on external results as furnishing an unfailing test of the character of any work. This the policy of Gamaliel is guilty of.
2. Moreover this policy is productive of culpable inactivity and moral cowardice. Now the most critical period of any movement, or of any new religion, is its infancy. Then does it bear the severest brunt of prejudice and hostility. The severest period in the history of Christianity was the apostolic age and the ages immediately following. We ought to thank God that there were men brave enough and strong enough to overcome the first opposition. After a while it makes itself felt in the world; it proves itself to be a power for good. Now Gamaliel and his friends will join it. We are glad to see you even now, you Gamalielites; but you did not lend us a helping hand when the waves of opposition nearly swamped our ship; we and our cause would have perished for you; you looked out on us with timid, cautious, neutral eyes. But now that we have got to shore, and established our character and power, you seek to join our ranks. Come in; even at this hour we are glad to see you; only we must tell you that you have been guilty of culpable inactivity and of moral cowardice. Gamaliel and his friends will only join a successful cause, but a flagging interest they will refrain from touching. On the other hand, take a movement directly the reverse of that to which we have alluded, not only not Divine, but sinful and calculated to do a terrible amount of mischief. In its earlier years its destructive features are not written in large letters, still they are written in such letters as the keen observer can read. What do Gamaliel and his friends do? They refrain from taking any action. They allow the evil, the mischievous movement to grow, to establish itself. They might nip it in the bud, were they to take prompt, decisive action. You cautiously timid, inactive Gamalielites, you are anxious not to be found fighting against God; wherefore are ye not equally desirous to fight for Him? You do not further His will when you allow evil to grow unchallenged and unopposed. There are many of whom it may be said, They have done no evil. But what evil have they opposed, what good have they done? Nothing! Then is their poor, harmless inactivity culpable in the sight of God.
3. Then there is that further error in this policy of neutrality and delay, viz., that it presumes too much on Divine power and relies too little on human instrumentality. It says, If that work or counsel be of God, He will make it successful; if it be sinful, then He will bring it to nought. Now, how does God promote His purposes? Through good men. How does He baffle and bring to nought evil doings? Through good men. The old excuse for inactivity is, God will see to it. No! He will not, unless you place yourself humbly in His hand and say, Send me, send me! What was the excuse of our ancestors who were opposed to modern missions: If God means to convert the world He will see to that. But He would never convert the world unless the men came forward and severally said, Send me, send me! We can never rely too much on Divine power; we can never rely too much on human co-operation. Are we allowing Him to use us for that grand purpose? Or are we endeavouring to cover our culpable inactivity by the old excuse: The work is His, and He will see to it. What is the conclusion of the whole matter? Every movement, social, political, religious, let us try to understand. Let us bring to bear upon it the faculties which God has given us, without prejudice and with prayer. Should it remain a mystery, let us wait, not listlessly, but with faces wistfully upturned towards heaven, solicitous to know the will of God. When light is given from heaven let us act accordingly, whether in favour or in opposition, act sincerely, with heart and soul. By doing the will of God, as far as it is revealed, we shall know more of the doctrine. (Henry Harries, M. A.)
Gamaliel
Gamaliels feeling was this--God is the supreme ruler, truth comes from Him, and He will take care of it. What is not true has in it the seeds of its own destruction, and will sooner or later come to nothing. Men are very poor judges of what is true or false. God is the judge, time the test.
1. This conviction is the foundation of all true tolerance, liberality of mind, and of charity and candour in judging. For want of it we are often falsely liberal, or foolishly bigoted.
2. I need hardly say how this principle and conviction bears upon our daily life, or point out how much calmness, wisdom, and peace it would, if recognised, pour upon the distractions which surround us. We live in the midst of new things. In our religious, social and political life new and startling opinions meet us. Like Gamaliel we see old faiths and old institutions in Church and State, and old habits, relations, and customs in society crumbling away or threatened.
(1) In religion, men have arisen who call upon us to go back to the beliefs and practices of bygone centuries. We may safely leave them in Gods hands, who will make them work out His purposes, and establish whatever is in accordance with His will, and wither up what is false and foolish in their teaching.
(2) The same thing may be said with respect to another department of human thought in which great activity prevails. Men of inquiring mind will examine, speculate, and try to solve the riddle of human life. And what is called science in our day claims to have made very startling discoveries, which have shaken, and will enevitably destroy, many an old belief. And why not? God makes men of inquiring minds, and He gives them light to discover new facts and truths. The agitation of the so-called Christian world, its hostility to our men of science, and its senseless alarm at their discoveries, when viewed in the light of Gamaliels calmness and candour, are simply a proof how little Christianity exists amongst us, and what low and miserable ideas we have of God and His truth.
(3) So again in those sad disputes between class and class which distract and disturb us. It must needs be that these things come in the course of this worlds progress, and much sorrow, sin, and suffering will follow in their wake; and to the eye of the faithless, the future may, for a time, look dark. But how much comfort, too, the thought affords, that in this respect also God rules--is working out here, too, His purpose and plan--and how much calmness and wisdom is the example of Gamaliel capable of imparting, whilst it warns us to refrain from anything like the spirit of violence or hasty judgment, and to wait patiently to see how much of the counsel and work we deplore is of God and cannot be overthrown, and how much is merely of men and therefore destined to perish; and to rest assured that God has not forsaken us, or let the reins of government fall from His hands.
(4) When tried by misfortune or sorrow, when harassed by the tempers or injustice of others, when suffering in pain or sickness, amid the sundry and manifold cares and perplexities which entangle us all, what an untold gain it would be to us if we would refrain from a hasty or sinful judgment, and keep in our feelings, tongue, and temper from the conviction that God was overruling even in the midst of these seemingly evil things; that a truth and a purpose underlie them all, and would wait and watch how much in them there is which is from God, how much from our own perversity, and how much from that source of evil from which all comes that opposes and seeks to thwart His Divine intention, and abide in the faith that nothing but what is true and good for us will endure, while all that is false and foolish will soon be swept away.
3. And if it should seem that an example such as that of Gamaliel is too much insisted on, that the preacher who again and again enforces largeness of mind, charity in judging, patience and gentleness in thought and action, together with the rest of the Christian graces and tempers, shows himself unmindful of his special work, and of his duty to teach the way of salvation for the souls of men; then I would submit that, in enforcing these things, we are setting forth mans salvation; for the soul which lives in the feeling and conviction that God our Father is constantly present, and overrules all things; that He will take care of the truth and of us when we stand upon it; the soul that tries to catch the Spirit of Christ, and to let it penetrate thought, temper, and action; the soul that waits to see what God will establish and what He will overthrow, that soul lives in the light of the truth; and he who lives in the truth, lives in the love of God; and where Gods truth and love are, there is salvation, strength, and peace. (John Congreve, M. A.)
The success of Christianity an argument for its Divine origin
I. The argument from the success of the gospel of Christ. It may be regarded, like all other evidences, as an argument from miracles. Here are certain undoubted facts. They cannot be accounted for without the immediate hand of God. Note, then, that this success has been--
1. Wide and extensive. In the early ages this excited universal attention both among friends and foes. About thirty years after our Lords death, Tacitus tells us that an immense multitude of Christians were either crucified or burned alive in Rome during the Neronian persecution, whence we may have some idea of the number of Christians in that capital. Forty years later, Pliny, in his letter to Trajan, states that in Bithynia the heathen temples had been deserted, and the victims used in sacrifice had ceased to be purchased. By the end of the second century Tertullian exclaimed, We are but of yesterday, and we have filled up every place: towns, islands, castles, boroughs, councils, camps, tribes, wards, palace, senate, forum; we have left you nothing but your temples. In little more than three centuries the Roman empire became professedly Christian under Constantine; and all the efforts of his successor Julian could not avert the total downfall of Paganism. The wide diffusion of the gospel, though in a corrupt form, did not cease. It was extended from Britain to China, and the foundation was laid of the present Christian nations of Europe, which have never since abjured the religion of the Cross. It has become the religion of the New World, and the efforts of missions have, in recent times, given it a footing in parts of the earth the most remote from one another, and renewed its early triumphs. The spread and hold of the gospel is thus a truly wonderful fact, when we consider its scanty beginnings and forlorn prospects. Even an unbeliever who looks calmly at this astonishing fact may well feel something of the misgiving of Gamaliel.
2. Inward and radical. All experience shows how hard a thing it is to make men converts even to the mere outward forms of a new religion; and the attempt to convert men from one sanctuary to another--from the synagogue, for example, to the Church, or from Popish to Protestant temples--is still more arduous. We can judge of this matter from the widest experience; for we see what frightful sufferings have been in all ages endured, what wars have been waged, what mutinies have been stirred up, from mens reluctance to change their religion. Had the gospel only brought heathen nations into the same state that Christian nations are in at this day, though not a single person had been regenerated, it would have been something not easy to explain without calling in the power of God. But the true miracle begins with making man a new creature in Christ Jesus, and when we see this done everywhere among the polished Greeks and the wandering Scythians, among masters and slaves, among Jews, Samaritans, and Gentiles--we are constrained to exclaim, This is the finger of God! In this sense the age of miracles is not past, and never will be. What is the turning of water into wine to the turning of a sinner into a saint? Compare heathenism, even in its brightest scenes and noblest passages, with Christianity, the martyrdom of Socrates with that of Stephen, the life of Plato with that of Paul or John, the return of Regulus to die at Carthage in his countrys cause with the advance of Luther to Worms to testify for Christs truth. Where was there a Howard among the heathen? Where a Wilberforce? Where a Francis Xavier? Where anything corresponding to the honourable women who have laboured much in the Lord, and who, from the beginning, have been last at the Cross and first at the sepulchre? These are all facts to be accounted for, and with them the whole moral and spiritual influence of the gospel in life and in death; and so long as Christianity can produce them we feel that it is in a great measure independent of other signs and wonders. It bears upon its front the very seal of heaven.
3. Prolonged and renewed. When Gamaliel compared the gospel to the movements in the days of Theudas, or of Judas of Galilee, he was quite in order. Had the cause of Christ been no more Divine than theirs, it would, after some noise and commotion, have as speedily died away. There is something very impressive in the vitality of genuine Christianity. Persecution drove it from Jerusalem; but it returned and dwelt there when its Jewish persecutors were scattered and overthrown. The Roman Caesars arrayed against it the brute force of forty legions, but the empire with all its forces became subject to the Cross. There is a plant called the rose of Jericho, one of a class which, when withered by the scorching heats, rolls up its leaves into the form of a ball, and suffers itself to be drawn from the ground, and borne on the wings of the wind to a great distance, till, meeting with moisture, its roots again strike down, its leaves spread, and its rose-like colour returns in all its beauty. Thus did Christianity roll over the arid wastes of the Middle Ages, till, in the Reformation period, it reasserted its living power, and all but equalled its ancient glory: and since then the same sign has been repeated; for as it rolled harmlessly over the great desert of Popery, so has it, not less uninjured, crossed the dreary sands of infidelity which have spread out to intercept it, and expanded in our own days at home and abroad with all its primitive loveliness. Everywhere it puts forth the same flowers--zeal for God, love to Christ, pity for men. The self-renewing power of the gospel exceeds all fable. The converts of Polynesia, Ceylon, Burmah, Madagascar, speak all one tongue, and exalt one name which is above every name. Christianity has returned to the old seats of revelation, to Ur of the Chaldees, to Shechem, to Nazareth, to Bethlehem. It converts the house of Voltaire into a Bible depository, and the palace of Frederick the Great into a meeting-place of Christian union.
II. Some objections to its force, which, however, one and all, turn out in its favour, and strengthen its validity. It is objected--
1. That false religions have had great success in the world. Not to mention the various systems of idolatry, there is the delusion of the Arabian prophet which spread over a very wide circle with great rapidity, and even expelled Christianity from its ancient territories. But we may use here the tests already employed.
(1) The spread of Mohammedanism, though extensive, has been far more limited than that of Christianity. With the instinct of some oriental beast or plant, it keeps to its own habitat, without going into all the world.
(2) It has had no inward or radical success. Let it be granted that it set up the unity of God, and maintained some excellent moral lessons, it had in its bosom no doctrine of regeneration, no strict and unworldly discipline, no heaven of purity and spiritual blessedness; and, therefore, its success is as little parallel to that of Christianity as the success of a man who could mould pieces of tough clay into different human shapes would be parallel to that of a man who could endow these shapes with true life.
(3) Its success has not been prolonged and renewed. It did not take long to reach its limit; and since then it has never been revived. It lies at this day effete and helpless, not only unable to heal the sickness of the nations that embrace it, but itself their true disease, which they must shake off before they can have any promise either for the life that now is, or for that which is to come.
(4) All this would have been true, and, I think, unanswerable, even had this false system, like the gospel of Christ, been introduced on its own merits, and supported by persuasion and argument. But, as we all know, it was propagated at the point of the sword.
2. That it has not been universal. Many are staggered by the slow progress of the gospel, and by the fact that it is not yet the religion of the majority of the human race. This difficulty admits of a complete answer. Consider how it limits the power of God. Upon this supposition He cannot reveal Himself to one or many without revealing Himself to all. Even one true conversion is a superhuman result, and much more a multitude of such conversions; and all that we are warranted to infer from the partial nature of the result is, that the Divine Author of the gospel has, for reasons known to Himself, not chosen everywhere to exert the same power. To hold that God must work at the full stretch of Omnipotence before we can know that it is God, is the same absurdity as to hold that a man must speak at the full pitch of his voice before he can be recognised. We must plainly know what Gods intentions were before we find fault with the partial success of the gospel.
(1) If He meant to punish the wilful rejection of His own gift this will sufficiently explain the non-conversion of the Jews.
(2) If He meant to leave room for human co-operation, this will explain the slow progress of the gospel in professedly Christian nations.
(3) If He judged it better to proceed by degrees, than at one sweeping stroke, this will obviate a host of difficulties connected with the gradual and interrupted march of Christianity. When are we to be satisfied? Suppose that the whole world was converted but one man, this objection would still hold good; nay, that solitary unbeliever could stand up and make the whole truth of God of none effect! It is enough that we see a power at work which has converted many, and which is able to convert all.
3. That this success has been less with those who profess to be influenced by the gospel, than might have been expected from a Divine religion. What evils have been associated with the Christian name, what scandals, what inconsistencies! But we must first of all separate between nominal and genuine Christians. The distinction exists among Christians alone; for no other religion is spiritual enough to allow of this division. Is the true Church, then, to blame for its nominal adherents and their evils? Nay, is not the tribute to its own light and truth and goodness all the greater that men seek to cloak even their vices under its venerable sanction? It is among true Christians that the true effects of Christianity are to be seen, and here we fearlessly join issue with objectors. And is there not in Christian lands a general purpose, somewhere deep down in the heart of the worldling, to become himself a Christian? Let me die the death of the righteous, and let my last end be like his.
III. Some inferences which follow. The success of Christianity is--
1. A tribute to the glory of the Saviour. Every onward movement is like a step in some solemn piece of martial music which sounds His praise. Every conversion is a trophy to His invincibility. Every land added to His sway is another crown placed upon His head. And the final conquest of the world will awake the final peal of the anthem to His glory. It is delightful to a Christian heart to identify the success of the gospel with the personal efforts and sympathies of the Redeemer.
2. A source of confidence to the Church. Christianity can never be in such danger again, as it has already triumphed over. Had it been of man, it had long ago come to nought. Its enemies have assailed it with every possible weapon, and searched every rivet of its armour. And therefore it moves a smile of pity when this hero or the other comes forth against the gospel, forgetful of the hosts that have sunk already in the attempt, like insects rushing against the flame, or birds of night glaring defiance at the sun.
3. A motive of conversion to the unbeliever. There is nothing so mournful as to be at once on the wrong, and on the losing side. To perish in a good cause surrounds the name with glory; but where is the wisdom, the magnanimity, the honour of dying a martyr to error, to folly, to sin and wickedness? This is not to be a hero, but a traitor; not to be a sacrifice, but a suicide! (J. Cairns, D. D.)
Moral truths inextinguishable
MKenzie, in his North American tour, speaking of the country bordering on the Slave Lake, says: It is covered with large trees of spruce pine and white birch; when these are destroyed poplars succeed, though none were before to be seen. Evelyn notices a fact very similar to this, which is observed in England, in Nova Scotia, and in the United States of America, that where fires have destroyed the original wood the new saplings which spring up are generally different species of trees. All these phenomena indicate the inextinguishableness or vegetable vitality; and on this point they may be employed to typify the inextinguishableness of moral truths in our world. No fires of insurrection, no deluges of persecution, no changes in the forms of human society by kings, or priests, or mobs have ever had the effect of obliterating moral ideas. They are inextinguishable, and spring up unaccountably in perennial beauty despite all social conflagrations and convulsions. (Scientific Illustrations.)
The fate of antagonists to Christianity
Gibbon, Voltaire, Chesterfield, Hume, and Paine, said an unbeliever, are the champions of infidelity. Their works completely overthrow Christianity. What! said a Christian; overthrow Christianity! Are you aware of the way in which the Most High God has thwarted their designs and overruled their evil purposes? Let me tell you that in Gibbons hotel at Lake Leman is a room where Bibles are sold. The printing-press from which Voltaires infidel works were issued has been used to print the Word of God. Chesterfields parlour, once an infidel club-room, is now a vestry, where Christians meet for prayer anti praise. Hume predicted the death of Christianity in twenty years, but he has gone to his grave, and the first meeting of the Bible Society in Edinburgh was held in the room where the prince of sceptics died. Paine, on landing at New York, was foolish enough to prophesy that in five years not a Bible would be found in the United States. But it is a fact that there are more Bible Societies to-day in America than in any other country in the world. The unbeliever was silenced. (J. L. Nye.)
The Biblical Illustrator, edited by Joseph S. Exell (c. 1880s–1900s) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Expositor's Bible 1887 · Public Domain On v38 Chapter 12
Chapter 12
GAMALIEL AND HIS PRUDENT ADVICE.
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Act_5:38-40
WE have set forth in these verses an incident in the second appearance before the council of the Apostle Peter and the other Apostles, conspicuous among whom must have been James the brother of John. It is almost certain that James the son of Zebedee was at this time very prominent in the public work of the Church, for we are told in the opening of the twelfth chapter that when Herod would vex and harass and specially weaken the Church, it was neither Peter nor John he first arrested, but he laid hands on James, and placed on him the honour of being the earliest martyr from amongst the sacred band of the Apostles. Peter we may, however, be sure was the centre of Sadducean hate at this period, and one of the most conspicuous members of the Church. We should at the same time beware of exaggeration, and strive to estimate the events of these earliest days of the Church, not as we behold them now, but as they must have then appeared unto the members of the Sanhedrin. The deaths of Ananias and Sapphira seem now to us extraordinary and awe-inspiring, and sufficient to strike terror into the hearts of all unbelievers; but probably the story of them had never reached the ears of the authorities. Human life was but little accounted of among the Romans who ruled Palestine. A Roman master might slay or torture his slaves just as he pleased; and the Romans, scorning the Jews as a conquered race, would trouble themselves but little concerning quarrels or deaths among them, so long as public order and the stated business of society were not interfered with. The public miracles which St. Peter wrought, these were the things which brought matters to a crisis, and called afresh the attention of the Sanhedrin, charged as they were with all religious authority, as the miracle of healing wrought upon the impotent man had led to the arrest of the Apostles on a previous occasion. It is a mistake often made, in studying the history of the past, to imagine that events which we now see to have been important and epoch-making must have been so regarded by persons living at the time when they happened. Men are never worse judges of the true value of current history than when they are placed in the midst of it. It is always the on-lookers who see most of the play. Our minds are so limited, our thoughts are so completely filled up with the present, that it is not till we have got away from the events, and can view them in their due proportion and symmetry, surrounded with all their circumstances, that we can hope to form a just appreciation of their relative importance. I have often seen a hill of a few hundred feet in height occupying a far more commanding position in mens eyes than a really lofty mountain, simply because the one was near, the other far off. The deaths of Ananias and Sapphira are recorded therefore at full length, because they bring eternal lessons of justice, judgment, and truth along with them. The numerous public miracles wrought by Peter when "multitudes came together from the cities round about Jerusalem, bringing sick folk and them that were vexed with unclean spirits, and they were healed every one," seemed to the Sanhedrin and the religious public of Jerusalem the all-important topics, though they are passed wholly over in the Scriptures as matters of no spiritual interest. If it requires a vast exercise of patience and wisdom to estimate events aright in their mere worldly aspect, it requires the operation and guidance of the Holy Ghost to form a sound judgment upon the relative spiritual value of events falling within the sphere of Church history; and there indeed it is most true that matters which seem all-important and striking to man are judged by God as insignificant and unworthy of notice. So contradictory are ofttimes the ways of God and the opinions of man.
The public miracles wrought by St. Peter had this effect, - the only one noted at length by the sacred writer: they led to the fresh arrest of Peter and the other Apostles by the High Priest and the sect of the Sadducees, and to their incarceration in the public prison attached to the temple. Thence they were delivered by an angel and sent to speak publicly in the temple, where their adversaries officially assembled; just as on a later occasion Peter, when imprisoned by himself, was released by angelic interference. Men looking back upon the history of the primitive Church, and judging of it as if it were the history of an ordinary time and age, have objected to the angelic interventions narrated here and in a few other places in the New Testament. They object because they do not realise the circumstances of the time. Dr. Jortin was a shrewd writer of the last century, now too much neglected. He remarked in one place that, suppose we admit that a special revelation of the good powers of the heavenly world was made in Christ, it was natural and fair that a special manifestation of the powers of evil should have been permitted at the time of Christs Incarnation, in order that the triumph of good might be the greater; and thus we would account for the diabolical possessions which play such an important part in the New Testament. The principle thus laid down extends much farther indeed. The great miracle of the Incarnation, the great manifestation of God in Christ, naturally brought with it lesser heavenly manifestations in its train. The Incarnation raises for a believer the whole level of the age when it occurred, and makes it an exceptional time. The eternal gates were for a moment lifted up, and angels went in and out for a little; and therefore we accept without endeavouring to explain the words of the narrative which tells us that an angel opened the prison doors for the Apostles, bidding them go and speak in the temple all the words of this life. And then from the temple, where they were teaching early in the morning, about daybreak of the day following their arrest, they are led by the officers before the Sanhedrin which was sitting in the city. Here let us pause to note the marvellous accuracy of detail in St. Lukes narrative. The Sanhedrin used to sit in the temple, but, a few years before the period at which we have arrived, four or five at most, they removed from the temple into the city, a fact which is just hinted at in the fifth verse of the fourth chapter, where we are told that the rulers, and elders, and scribes were gathered together in Jerusalem, that is, in the city, not in the temple; while again in this passage we read that when the High Priest came and convened the council and all the senate of the children of Israel, they sent their officers to bring the prisoners before them. These officers after a while returned with the information that the Apostles were preaching in the temple. If the Sanhedrin were meeting in the temple, they would doubtless have learned this fact as soon as they assembled, especially as they did not sit till after the morning sacrifice, several hours after the Apostles appeared in the temple. When brought before the council the Apostles boldly proclaimed their intention to disregard all human threats, and persevere in preaching the death and resurrection of Christ. The majority would then have proceeded to extreme measures against the Apostles, and in doing so would only have acted after their usual manner.
The greater part of the Sanhedrin were Sadducees, and they, as Josephus tells us, were men of a bloodthirsty character, ever ready to proceed to punish in the most cruel manner. The simple fact is this, the Sadducees were materialists. They looked upon man as a mere animated machine, and therefore, like the pagans of the same period, they were utterly regardless of human sufferings, or of the value of human life. We little recognise, reared up as we have been in an atmosphere saturated with Christian principles, how much of our merciful spirit, of our tender care for human suffering, of our reverent respect for human life, is owing to the spiritual ideas of the New Testament, teaching as it does the awful importance of time, the sanctity of the body, and the tremendous issues which depend upon life. Sadducees and pagans knew nothing of these things, because they knew nothing of the inestimable treasure lodged in every human form. Life and time would have been very different for mankind had not the spiritual principles inculcated by Pharisee and by Christian alike triumphed over the cold stern creed which strove on this occasion to stifle the religion of the Cross in its very infancy. When the Sadducees would have adopted extreme measures, the words of one man restrained them and saved the Apostles, and that one man was Gamaliel, whose name and career will again come before us. Now let us apply ourselves to the consideration of his address to the Sanhedrim. Gamaliel saw that the large public gathering to whom he was speaking were thoroughly excited and full of cruel purposes. He therefore, like a true orator, adopts the historical method as the fittest one for dealing with them. He points out how other pretenders had arisen, trading on the Messianic expectations which then existed all over Palestine, and specially in Galilee, and how they had been all destroyed without any action on the part of the Sanhedrim. He instances two cases: Judas, who lived in the days of Cyrenius and the taxing under Augustus Caesar; and Theudas, who some time previous to that event had arisen, working upon the religious and national hopes of the Jews, as the persons now accused before them seemed also to be doing. He points to the fate of the pretenders he had mentioned, and advises the Sanhedrin to leave the Apostles to the same test of Divine Providence, confident that if mere impostors, like the others, they will meet with the same death at the hands of the Romans, without any interference on their part.
It is evident that Gamaliel must have had some special reason for selecting the risings of Theudas and Judas, beyond the fact that they were rebels against established authority. The closing years of the kingdom of Herod the Great were times when numberless rebellions took place. Josephus gives us the names of several leaders who took part in them, but, as he tells us ("Antiqq." 17, 10:4), there were then "ten thousand other disorders," into the details of which he did not enter. All these risings had, however, these distinguishing features, they were all unsuccessful, and they were all quenched in blood. Gamaliel must have seen some feature common to the Christian movement and to those headed by Theudas and Judas some thirty years earlier, leading him to adduce these examples. That common feature was their Messianic character. They all alike proclaimed new hopes for Israel, and appealed to the religious expectations which then excited the people, and still are embodied in works like the book of Enoch, produced about that period; while all the other attempts were animated by a mere spirit of plunder or of personal ambition. But here we are met with a difficulty. The rationalistic commentators of Germany have urged that St. Luke composed a fancy speech and put it into the mouth of Gamaliel, and in doing so made a great historic mistake. They appeal to Josephus as their authority. He states that a Theudas arose about A.D. 44, some ten years later than this meeting of the Sanhedrin, and drew a large number of adherents after him, but was defeated by the Roman governor. On the other hand, the words of Gamaliel refer to the case of a Theudas who lived half a century earlier, and preceded Judas the Galilean. To put the matter plainly, St. Luke is accused of having composed a speech for Gamaliel, and, when doing so, of having committed a great blunder, representing Gamaliel as appealing to an incident which did not happen till ten years later.
This circumstance has long attracted the notice of commentators, and has been explained in different ways. Some maintain that there was an older Theudas, who headed an abortive Messianic rebellion previous to the time of Cyrenius and the days of the taxing. This is a very possible explanation, and the identity of names constitutes no valid objection. The same names often occur in connection with the same movements, political or religious. In the third century, for instance, the Novatian heresy arose at Carthage, and thence was transferred to Rome. It was headed by two men, Novatus and Novatian, the former a Carthaginian, the latter a Roman presbyter. What a fine subject for a mythical theory, were not the facts too indisputably historical! How a German critic would revel in depicting the impossibility of two men with names so like holding precisely the same office and supporting exactly the same views in two cities so widely separated as Rome and Carthage! Or let us take two modern instances. The Tractarian movement is not yet quite sixty years old. It has not therefore yet passed out of the sphere of personal experience. It started in Oxford during the thirties, and there in Oxford we find at that very period two divines named William Palmer, both favouring the Tractarian views, both eminent writers and scholars, but yet tending finally in different directions, for one William Palmer became a Roman Catholic, while the other remained a devoted son of the Reformation. Or to come to still more modern times. There was an Irish movement in 1848 which numbered amongst its most prominent leaders a William Smith OBrien, and there is now an Irish movement of the same character, and it also numbers a William OBrien amongst its most prominent leaders. A Parnell leads a movement for the repeal of the Union in 1890. Ninety years earlier, a Parnell resigned high office sooner than consent to the consummation of the same legislative union of Great Britain and Ireland. We might indeed produce parallel cases without number from the range of history, specially of English history, showing how political and religious tendencies run in families, and reproduce exactly the same names, and that at no distant intervals. But the very passage before us, the speech of Gamaliel and its historic argument, affords a sufficient instance. Gamaliel adduced the case of Judas the Galilean as an illustration of an unsuccessful religious movement. Every one admits that here at least Josephus and the Acts of the Apostles are at one. Judas the Gaulonite, as Josephus styles him in one place, or the Galilean as he calls him in another place, was the founder of the sect of Zealots, who "have an inviolable attachment to liberty, and say that God is to be their only ruler and Lord" (Josephus, "Antiqq.," 18, 1:6). Judas was defeated at the time of the taxing under Cyrenius, and yet more than forty-five years later we find his sons Simon and James suffering crucifixion under the Romans because they were following their fathers example.
Another explanation has also been offered. It has been suggested that Theudas was simply another name for one of the many rebels whom Josephus mentions, -for Simon, for instance, who had been a slave of Herod the Great, and had upon his death headed a revolt against authority. Either explanation is quite tenable, as opposed to the view which represents St. Luke as committing a gross historical error. And we are the more justified in offering these suggestions when we reflect upon the numberless instances where modern research has confirmed, and is every year confirming the minute accuracy of this writer, who doubtless derived his information concerning what passed in the Sanhedrin, on this occasion, from St. Paul, who either as a member of the council or a favourite pupil of Gamaliel may have been present listening to the debates, or even sharing in the final decisions.
Let us now turn from the purely historical side of Gamaliels speech, and view it from a spiritual standpoint.
The address of Gamaliel was so favourable to the Apostles that it has helped to surround his name and memory with much legendary lore. It was the tradition of the ancient Greek Church from the fifth century that he was converted to Christianity and baptised, along with his son Abibus and Nicodemus, by St. Peter and St. John. The story of Gamaliels secret adherence to Christianity goes even much farther back. There is a curious Christian novel or romance, which dates back to close upon the year 200, called the "Clementine Recognitions." We find the same tradition in the sixty-fifth chapter of the first book of these "Recognitions." But the sacred narrative itself gives us no hint of all this, contenting itself with setting forth the prudent advice which Gamaliel gave to the assembled council. It was wise advice, and well would it have been for the world if influential religious and political teachers in all ages had given similar counsel. Gamaliel was a man of large scholarship, combined with a wide mind, but he had learned that time is a great solvent, and the greatest of tests. Beneath its influence the most pretentious schemes, the most promising of structures, fade away if built upon the sand of human wisdom, while opposition only tends to consolidate and develop those that are built upon the foundation of Divine strength and power. The policy of patience recommended by Gamaliel is a wise one, either for the Church or for the state, in things spiritual and things secular alike. And yet it is one from which the natural man recoils with an instinctive repugnance. It speaks well for the Jewish Sanhedrin that on this occasion they yielded accord to the advice of their president. We are glad to recognise this spirit in these men, where we so often have to find matter for blame. Well would it have been for the Church and for the credit of Christianity had the spirit which moved even the Sadducean majority in the Jewish council been allowed to prevail; and yet how little have the men of tolerant mind been regarded in moments of temporary triumph such as the Sanhedrin just then enjoyed. Gamaliels advice, "Refrain from these men and let them alone. If the work be of man it will be overthrown; if of God, ye will not be able to overthrow them," strikes a blow at the policy of persecution, which is essentially a policy of impatience. The intolerant man is an impatient man, not willing to imitate the Divine gentleness and long-suffering, which waits, endures, and bears with the sins and ignorance of the children of men. And the Church of Christ, when she became intolerant, as she did as soon as ever Constantine placed within her reach the sword of human power, forgot the lesson of the Divine patience, and reaped within herself, in a shallow religion, in a poorer life, in a restrained intellectual and spiritual grasp, the due reward of those who had fallen away from an imitation of the Divine example to a mere human level. It is sad to see, for instance, in the case of a man so thoroughly spiritual as St. Augustine was, how easily he fell into this human infirmity, how quickly he became intolerant when the secular arm was ranged on the side of his own opinions. The Church in his own boyhood, during the days of Julian, had to strive against the intolerance of the pagans; the orthodox, who upheld the Catholic view of the nature of the Godhead and the scriptural doctrine of the Holy Trinity, had to struggle against the intolerance of the Arians. Yet as soon as power was placed in St. Augustines own hand he thought it right to exercise compulsion against those who differed from him.
It was exactly the same in later days. Men may take up commentators of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, Protestant and Roman Catholic alike. There they will find many remarks, acute, devout, heart-searching, but very few of them will be found to have arrived at the mental fairness and balance involved in those words, "Refrain from these men, and let them alone." Cornelius a Lapide was a Jesuit commentator of those times. He wrote many valuable expositions of Holy Scripture, including one dealing with this book of the Acts, filled with thoughts suggesting and stimulating. It is, however, almost ludicrous to notice how he strives to evade the force of Gamaliels words, and to escape the application of them to his own Protestant opponents. The Sanhedrin were quite right, he thinks, in adopting Gamaliels advice, and in showing themselves tolerant of the apostolic preaching because the Apostles worked miracles; and so, though they were unconvinced, still they had just reason to suspend their judgment. But as for the Protestants of his time, they were heretics; they were the opponents of the Church, the bride of Christ, and therefore Gamaliels words had no application to them; as if the very question that was raised by the Protestants was not this-whether Cornelius a Lapide himself and his Jesuit brethren did not represent Antichrist, and whether the Protestants were not the true Church of God, who therefore on his own principles were quite justified in persecuting their Romish opponents. It is very difficult to get men to acknowledge their own fallibility. Every party, when triumphant, believes that it has a monopoly of truth, and has a Divine right of persecution; and every party when downcast and m adversity sees and admires the beauties of toleration. Verily, societies, churches, families, as well as individuals, have good right diligently to pray, "In all time of our wealth, good Lord, deliver us," for never are men in greater spiritual danger than when prosperity leads them to vote themselves infallible, and to practise intolerance towards their fellow-men on account of their intellectual or religious opinions.
The sentiment of Gamaliel on this occasion may, however, be pushed to a mischievous extreme. He advised the Sanhedrin to exercise patience and self-control, but he did not apparently go any farther. He did not recommend them to adopt the noblest course, which would have been unprejudiced examination into the claims put forward by the Christian teachers. Gamaliels advice was good, it was perhaps the best he could have given, or at least which could have been expected under the circumstances, but it was not the highest or noblest conceivable. It was the kind of advice always given by men who do not wish to commit themselves untimely, but who are waiters upon Providence, postponing their decision as to which side they shall join until they first see which side will win. Opportunists, the French call them; men who are sitting upon the fence, we in homelier phrase designate them. It is well to be prudent in our actions, because true prudence is only Christian wisdom, and such wisdom will always lead us to take the most effectual ways of doing good. But then prudence may be pushed to the extreme of moral cowardice, or at least the name of prudence may be used as a cloak for a contemptible desire to stand well with all parties, and thereby advance our own selfish interests. Prudence should be united with moral courage; it should be ready to take the unpopular side, and to champion truth and righteousness even when in a depressed and lowly condition. It was easy enough to side with Christ when the multitude cried, "Hosanna in the Highest." But the test of deepest love and unfailing devotion was-when the women stood by the cross, and when the Magdalen sought out the grave in the garden that she might anoint the dead body of her loved Lord.
Finally, let us just notice the conduct of the Apostles under those circumstances. The Apostles were freed from the pressing danger of death, but they did not entirely escape. The Sanhedrin were logically inconsistent. They refrained from putting the Apostles to death, as Gamaliel advised, but they flogged them as Roman laws permitted; and a Jewish disciplinary flogging, when forty stripes save one were inflicted, was. so severe that death sometimes resulted from it. Man is a curiously inconsistent being, and the Sanhedrin showed on this occasion that they had their own share of this weakness. Gamaliel advised not to kill the Apostles, but let time work out the Divine purposes either of success or failure. They adopt the first part of his advice, but are not willing to allow Providence to develop His designs without their interference, and so by their stripes endeavour to secure that failure shall attend the apostolic efforts. But it was all in vain. The Apostles were living under a realised sense of heavenly things. The love of Christ, and communion with Christ and the Spirit of Christ, so raised them above all earthly surroundings that what things seemed toss and shame and grief to others were by them counted highest joy, because they looked at them from the side of God and eternity. Human threats availed nothing with men animated by such a spirit, -nay, rather as proofs of the opposition of the evil one, they only quickened their zeal, so that "every day, in the temple and at home, they ceased not to teach and to preach Jesus as the Christ." How wondrously, life would be transformed for us all did we view its changes and chances, its sorrows and its pains, as the Apostles regarded them. Poverty and disgrace, undeserved loss and suffering, all alike would be transfigured into surpassing glory when endured for Christs sake, while our powers of labour and work, and our active zeal in the holiest of causes, would be quickened, because, like them, we should walk and live and toil in the loved presence of One who is invisible.
William Robertson Nicoll, ed., The Expositor's Bible (London: Hodder & Stoughton, 1887–1910) — public domain. 65 of 66 books (1 Corinthians is not separately keyed, as that volume carries no machine-parseable verse references); section-level commentary keyed to the opening verse. Introductory and overview sections not keyed to a specific passage are excluded.
B. W. Johnson 1891 · Public Domain On vv40–41 40. To him they agreed. He carried the Sanhedrim…
40. To him they agreed. He carried the Sanhedrim with him. Called the apostles, and beaten them. While rejecting the punishment of death, they decided to scourge them for disobedience. Scourging was often inflicted even by the rulers of the synagogues. The scourging was on the bare back, and bloody and cruel.
B. W. Johnson's The People's New Testament with Notes (1889–1891) — public domain. Electronic text from the Christian Classics Ethereal Library (CCEL) ThML edition.
William B. Godbey 1900 · Public Domain On v41 41, 42. This chapter winds up Luke’s diurnal history…
APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION
41, 42. This chapter winds up Luke’s diurnal history of the Pentecostal revival, graphically describing the wonderful events of the first three days and two nights. Here you see clearly and unequivocally a solution of that vexed question among the warring sects, called Apostolical Succession.
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The last fifteen hundred years since the great Constantinian apostasy, as the centuries roll by we see the robed priests and plug-hatted clergy of all ages and denominations crossing swords and fighting over the Apostolical Succession, like dogs over a bone, each one claiming it, and anathematizing all of his competitors; all ridiculously stultifying themselves and advertising to the world the egregious folly and silly nonsense characteristic of human ecclesiasticisms. Reader, look here at the inspired record and see, once for all, the fac simile of Apostolical Succession. It certainly means to succeed the apostles, doctrinally, experimentally and practically. The way is open to all who will enter: Get a sky-blue regeneration, assuring you that your name is written in Heaven. Then get sanctified with the baptism of the Holy Ghost and fire, as all the apostles did on the day of Pentecost. Then preach the gospel with the Holy Ghost sent down from heaven, on the streets, and from house to house, like the apostles, who had no church edifices. Preach and testify, without fear of men or devils, amid roaring mobs, rocks, mud, clubs, eggs, et cetera, spending the night in jail. When they cruelly thrash you like dogs, in presence of the mocking multitude, go away with bleeding backs and roaring shouts, transported with delight, because you are counted worthy to suffer for Christ’s sake. Then you will be in the regular Apostolical Succession. It is free. All who want it can have it. What about the clerical aspirants, going puffing tobacco-smoke and disputing over Apostolical Succession? Not one of them will touch it with a forty foot pole. Luke again here puts to record the facts so prominent in the Apostolic ministry, of preaching from house to house. This is the way to convert the heathen millions and evangelize the slums and the jungles. The Holy Ghost is calling for a round million to volunteer on this primitive Apostolic line of street and household preaching. Who will respond?
William B. Godbey, Commentary on the New Testament (1896–1900) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Alexander MacLaren 1905 · Public Domain On v38 Act 5:38 - Act 5:39.
Acts
GAMALIEL’S COUNSEL
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Act 5:38 - Act 5:39.
The little that is known of Gamaliel seems to indicate just such a man as would be likely to have given the advice in the text. His was a character which, on its good side and by its admirers, would be described as prudent, wise, cautious and calm, tolerant, opposed to fanaticism and violence. His position as president of the Sanhedrin, his long experience, his Rabbinical training, his old age, and his knowledge that the national liberty depended on keeping things quiet, would be very likely to exaggerate such tendencies into what his enemies would describe as worldly shrewdness without a trace of enthusiasm, indifference to truth, and the like.
It is, of course, possible that he bases his counsel of letting the followers of Jesus alone, on the grounds which he adduces, because he knew that reasons more favourable to Christians would have had no weight with the Sanhedrin. Old Church traditions make him out to have been a Christian, and the earliest Christian romance, a very singular book, of which the main object was to blacken the Apostle Paul, roundly asserts that at the date of this advice he was ‘secretly our brother,’ and that he remained in the Sanhedrin to further Christian views. But there seems not the slightest reason to suppose that. He lived and died a Jew, spared the sight of the destruction of Jerusalem which, according to his own canon in the text, would have proved that the system to which he had given his life was not of God; and the only relic of his wisdom is a prayer against Christian heretics.
It is remarkable that he should have given this advice; but two things occur to account for it. Thus far Christianity had been very emphatically the preaching of the Resurrection, a truth which the Pharisees believed and held as especially theirs in opposition to the Sadducees, and Gamaliel was old and worldly-wise enough to count all as his friends who were the enemies of his enemies. He was not very particular where he looked for allies, and rather shrank from helping Sadducees to punish men whose crime was that they ‘preached through Jesus a resurrection from the dead.’
Then the Jewish rulers had a very ticklish part to play. They were afraid of any popular shout which might bring down the avalanche of Roman power on them, and they were nervously anxious to keep things quiet. So Gamaliel did not wish to have any fuss made about ‘these men,’ lest it should be supposed that another popular revolt was on foot; and he thought that to let them alone was the best way to reduce their importance. Perhaps, too, there was a secret hope in the old man’s mind, which he scarcely ventured to look at and dared not speak, that here might be the beginning of a rising which had more promise in it than that abortive one under Theudas. He could not venture to say this, but perhaps it made him chary of voting for repression. He had no objection to let these poor Galileans fling away their lives in storming against the barrier of Rome. If they fail, it is but one more failure. If they succeed, he and his like will say that they have done well. But while the enterprise is too perilous for him to approve or be mixed up in it, he would let it have its chance.
Note that Gamaliel regards the whole movement as the probable germ of an uprising against Rome, as is seen from the parallels that he quotes. It is not as a religious teaching which is true or false, but as a political agitation, that he looks at Christianity.
It is to his credit that he stood calm and curbed the howling of the fanatics round him, and that he was the first and only Jewish authority who counselled abstinence from persecution.
It is interesting to compare him with Gallio, who had a glimpse of the true relation of the civil magistrate to religious opinion. Gamaliel has a glimpse of the truth of the impotence of material force against truth, how it is of a quick and spiritual essence, which cannot be cleaved in pieces with a sword, but lives on in spite of all. But while all this may be true, the advice on the whole is a low and bad one. It rests on false principles; it takes a false view of a man’s duty; it is not wholly sincere; and it is one impossible to be carried out. It is singularly in accordance with many of the tendencies of this age, and with modes of thought and counsels of action which are in active operation amongst us to-day, and we may therefore criticise it now.
I. Here is disbelief professing to be ‘honest doubt.’
Gamaliel professes not to have materials for judging. ‘If-if’; was it a time for ‘ifs’? What was that Sanhedrin there for, but to try precisely such cases as these?
They had had the works of Christ; miracles which they had investigated and could not disprove; a life which was its own witness; prophecies fulfilled; His own presence before their bar; the Resurrection and the Pentecost.
I am not saying whether these facts were enough to have convinced them, nor even whether the alleged miracles were true. All that I am concerned with is that, so far as we know, neither Gamaliel nor any of his tribe had ever made the slightest attempt to inquire into them, but had, without examination, complacently treated them as lies. All that body of evidence had been absolutely ignored. And now he is, with his ‘ifs,’ posing as very calm and dispassionate.
So to-day it is fashionable to doubt, to hang up most of the Christian truths in the category of uncertainties.
{a} When that is the fashion, we need to be on our guard.
{b} If you doubt, have you ever taken the pains to examine?
{c} If you doubt, you are bound to go further, and either reach belief or rejection. Doubt is not the permanent condition for a man. The central truth of Christianity is either to be received or rejected.
II. Here is disbelief masquerading as suspension of judgment.
Gamaliel talked as if he did not know, or had not decided in his own mind, whether the disciples’ claims for their Master were just or not. But the attitude of impartiality and hesitation was the cover of rooted unbelief. He speaks as if the alternative was that either this ‘counsel and work’ was ‘of man’ or ‘of God.’ But he would have been nearer the truth if he had stated the antithesis-God or devil; a glorious truth or a hell-born lie. If Christ’s work was not a revelation from above, it was certainly an emanation from beneath.
We sometimes hear disbelief, in our own days, talking in much the same fashion. Have we never listened to teachers who first of all prove to their own satisfaction that Jesus is a myth, that all the gospel story is unreliable, and all the gospel message a dream, and then turn round and overflow in praise of Him and in admiration of it? Browning’s professor in Christmas Day first of all reduces ‘the pearl of price’ to dust and ashes, and then ‘Bids us, when we least expect it, Take back our faith-if it be not just whole, Yet a pearl indeed, as his tests affect it.’
And that is very much the tone of not a few very superior persons to-day. But let us have one thing or the other-a Christ who was what He claimed to be, the Incarnate Word of God, who died for our sins and rose again for our justification; or a Galilean peasant who was either a visionary or an impostor, like Judas of Galilee and Theudas.
III. Here is success turned into a criterion of truth.
It is such, no doubt, in the long run, but not till then, and so till the end it is utterly false to argue that a thing is true because multitudes think it to be so. The very opposite is more nearly true. It in usually minorities who have been right.
Gamaliel laid down an immoral principle, which is only too popular to-day, in relation to religion and to much else.
IV. Here is a selfish neutrality pretending to be judicial calmness.
Even if it were true that success is a criterion, we have to help God to ensure the success of His truth. No doubt, taking sides is very inconvenient to a cool, tolerant man of the world. And it is difficult to be in a party without becoming a partisan. We know all the beauty of mild, tolerant wisdom, and that truth is usually shared between combatants, but the dangers of extremes and exaggeration must be faced, and perhaps these are better than the cool indifference of the eclectic, sitting apart, holding no form of creed, but contemplating all. It is not good for a man to stand aloof when his brethren are fighting.
In every age some great causes which are God’s are pressing for decision. In many of them we may be disqualified for taking sides. But feel that you are bound to cast your influence on the side which conscience approves, and bound to settle which side that is, Deborah’s fierce curse against Meroz because its people came not up to the help of the Lord against the mighty was deserved.
But the region in which such judicial calmness, which shrinks from taking its side, is most fatal and sadly common, is in regard to our own individual relation to Jesus, and in regard to the establishment of His kingdom among men.
‘He that is not with Me is against Me.’ Neutrality is opposition. Not to gather with Him is to scatter. Not to choose Him is to reject Him.
Gamaliel had a strange notion of what constituted ‘refraining from these men and letting them alone,’ and he betrayed his real position and opposition by his final counsel to scourge them, before letting them go. That is what the world’s neutrality comes to.
How poor a figure this politic ecclesiastic, mostly anxious not to commit himself, ready to let whoever would risk a struggle with Rome, so that he kept out of the fray and survived to profit by it, cuts beside the disciples, who had chosen their side, had done with ‘ifs,’ and went away from the Council rejoicing ‘that they were counted worthy to suffer shame for His Name’! Who would not rather be Peter or John with their bleeding backs than Gamaliel, sitting soft in his presidential chair, and too cautious to commit himself to an opinion whether the name of Jesus was that of a prophet or a pretender?
Alexander MacLaren, Expositions of Holy Scripture (1904–1910) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
J. W. McGarvey 1914 · Public Domain On vv38–41 See notes on verse 34
See notes on verse 34
J. W. McGarvey (with Philip Y. Pendleton), Commentaries on the New Testament (The Fourfold Gospel, 1914; Acts; and the epistles) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Paul E. Kretzmann 1924 · Public Domain On v38 Gamaliel’s suggestion and the result:
Gamaliel’s suggestion and the result:
v. 38. And now I say unto you, Refrain from these men and let them alone; for if this counsel or this work be of men, it will come to naught;
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v. 39. but if it be of God, ye cannot overthrow it, lest haply ye be found even to fight against God.
v. 40. And to him they agreed; and when they had called the apostles and beaten them, they commanded that they should not speak in the name of Jesus, and let them go.
v. 41. And they departed from the presence of the Council, rejoicing that they were counted worthy to suffer shame for His name.
v. 42. And daily in the Temple and in every house they ceased not to teach and preach Jesus Christ.
Whether Gamaliel secretly favored the cause of Christ, but for various reasons did not join the congregation, or whether he spoke his opinion out of a natural sense of expediency and justice, cannot be decided from the Biblical account. But his purpose in adducing the examples to which he refers, the point that he wishes to make, is this, that the movement which the Sanhedrin was combating must not be suppressed with violence; in fact, there was some doubt as to the wisdom of opposing it at all. His proposition, as he stated it very clearly and emphatically, was that they should stand back from these men, the apostles, and leave them alone. And here Gamaliel adds a proverbial saying or axiom which has not lost its force to this day: If of men this counsel or this work is, it will be utterly destroyed; but if it be of God, ye can destroy neither. "If man’s it be, ’tis bound to die; if God’s it be, it cannot die. " Rightly understood, this rule finds its application at all times. It is true indeed that many a Christian congregation and national Church, which had been planted by God, as the Church of Asia Minor, has been destroyed, and that, on the other hand, many a citadel of Satan, as the kingdom of Antichrist, has continued to this day. But such conditions and circumstances are due to man’s hardness of heart, and the fact that God permits their existing is His punishment upon a stiff-necked people that will not accept the truth. Gamaliel’s advice was accepted as sound and good by all the judges, and they passed a resolution to that effect. The apostles were thereupon brought back into the council chamber, to receive, first of all, a scourging for having transgressed the former command of the Council. See Deu 25:1-3; 2Co 11:24; 2Co 12:10. Before they were released, they were then once more sternly bidden not to speak in the name of Jesus. Note: Those that refuse to accept the Gospel for the salvation of their souls are only embittered and hardened ever more and more with each proclamation of God’s mercy; for the Word of the Gospel becomes for them a savor of death unto death. Instead, however, of intimidating the apostles with this harsh treatment, the judges caused them to give a grand exhibition of faith and trust. Having received their scourging. the disciples left the council-chamber full of joy that they had been found worthy of bearing the reproach of Christ’s name, of having some of the same shame and disgrace heaped upon them that had been laid upon their Lord. And just as openly they carried cut their intention not to obey the Sanhedrin in the matter of denying their Master. They ceased not, every day, in the Temple, as well as in the houses, both publicly and privately, to teach and to preach the name of Christ Jesus, the Savior. The public proclamation of the Word was supplemented by individual instruction, just as it should be in our days. Note: The Word of God cannot be hindered without God’s permission. He holds His sheltering hands over the Christians that proclaim to the world the Word of Life.
Summary.The hypocrites Ananias and Sapphira are struck by the judgment of God, after which the apostles are imprisoned by the Sadducees, delivered by the angel of the Lord, &fend themselves before the Sanhedrin, and are released after a scourging.
Paul E. Kretzmann, Popular Commentary of the Bible (1921–1924) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
unfoldingWord translationNotes 2017 · CC BY-SA 4.0 On vv38, 40 Connecting Statement:
Connecting Statement:
Gamaliel finishes addressing the council members. Though they beat the apostles, command them not to teach about Jesus, and let them go, the disciples continue to teach and preach.
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keep away from these men and let them alone
Gamaliel is telling the Jewish leaders no to punish the apostles any more or to put them back in jail. (See: Assumed Knowledge and Implicit Information)
if this plan or work is of men
"if men have devised this plan or are doing this work"
it will be overthrown
This can be stated in active form. AT: "someone will overthrow it" (See: Active or Passive)
if it is of God
Here the word "it" refers to "this plan or work." AT: "if God has devised this plan or commanded these men to do this work" (See: Ellipsis)
So they were persuaded
This can be stated in active form. AT: "So Gamaliel persuaded them" (See: Active or Passive)
translationWords
works
God
unfoldingWord translationNotes — © Distant Shores Media and the Door43 World Missions Community, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Source: git.door43.org/Door43/en_tn.