Bible Lecture – Acts

  1. The Acts of the Apostles, the second part of Luke’s two part work, is a history of the early years of the Christian Church, the thirty years following the death of Jesus, ending around the year 60.
  2. According to most biblical scholars Luke probably wrote Acts around 80 AD, after the death of Peter, Paul, and James, but he chose not to extend his narrative to include these events.
  3. It is impossible to know for certain why he did that, but perhaps it is because all three suffered grisly deaths and Luke wanted to end on a positive note, which he does with an account of Paul preaching the gospel from his house in Rome.
  4. Acts begins with an account of the Resurrection, stating that Jesus stays on earth forty days.
  5. When He leaves, His followers gather under the leadership of Peter.
  6. There are 120 of them.
  7. The first task of the Church is to replace Judas.
  8. According to Acts, Judas dies when his stomach bursts and his “bowels gushed out.” (1:18)
  9. Matthew states that Judas hangs himself, (27:5) and this is the account that most people remember.
  10. The eleven disciples choose Judas’s replacement by lot, Matthias defeating Barsabbas.
  11. The second chapter of Acts tells of the miracle at Pentecost, when church members speak in tongues.
  12. Today Pentecost is celebrated seven weeks after Easter.
  13. Pentacostalism, a movement of charismatic Christians, traces its roots to the original Pentecost.
  14. The current movement, which is primarily an American phenomenon, has existed in its present form for little more than a century.
  15. The early Christians (they weren’t called that until later [11:26]—often they were called Nazarenes), under the leadership of Peter, follow the teachings of Jesus about the necessity of poverty for salvation.
  16. The live as communards, eschewing private property: “and sold their possessions and goods, and parted them to all men, as every man had need,” (2:45) a phrase Karl Marx was to echo centuries later.
  17. A couple who violate that precept, Ananias and Sephira, who sell a possession and keep part of the money, fall dead when Peter confronts them. (5:1-11)
  18. The Apostles (in the sense of early Christians), under the leadership of Peter, begin their recruiting at the Temple and its grounds, particularly the part called Solomon’s Porch.
  19. At the beginning all the Apostles consider themselves Jews and continue to follow Jewish law.
  20. As Pauline experts William Orr and James Walther put it in their edition of Paul’s First Epistle to the Corinthians: “They were pious Jews going to pray at the temple daily and observing all the dietary laws and purificatory rites that were binding on other Jews. They were proclaiming the gospel to Jews and urging that they accept the salvation which was being offered to Israel.” (54)
  21. After a short time factions begin to form in the Church. The first fissure is between the Grecians and the Hebrews: that is, between Jews from Judea, and Hellenized Jews from other areas around the Mediterranean. (6:1ff).
  22. In order to minister to the Hellenized Jews the Twelve Disciples instruct the Church to elect seven men.
  23. The people choose Stephen and six followers. (6:5)
  24. Stephen and his group, known as the Seven, were zealous proselytizers among the Jews of the Diaspora who had returned to Jerusalem, to the extent that they attack the Temple and its leaders.
  25. This brings persecution to Stephen, who becomes the first martyr. (7:59) The Twelve, who refrain from attacking the Temple, do not share in the persecution.
  26. Saul, who later becomes Paul, is complicit in the stoning of Stephen. (8:1)
  27. Saul is as zealous in the persecution of Christians (“he made a havoc of the church” [8:3]) as he later becomes in recruiting them.
  28. Chapter 8 tells the story of Simon, the Magus (singular of Magi) or sorcerer.
  29. Simon offers to buy the Holy Ghost from the Twelve, but Peter admonishes him for the temerity of thinking that “the gift of God may be purchased with money.” (8:20)
  30. The sin of simony, buying or selling a church office, takes its name from Simon.
  31. There are accounts of Simon in sources other than the Bible, and in one of them we learn that he claimed to be able to fly.
  32. His nom de vol was “Faust.” The Sixteenth Century German mountebank who served as the model for Marlowe and Goethe’s hero adopted the name Faust when he found it in a book about Simon.
  33. In the pseudepigraphal Acts of Peter, when Simon is flying Peter has God blast him out of the sky.
  34. Chapter 9, in which we learn of Saul’s conversion on the way to Damascus, is one of the most famous passages in the Bible.
  35. A light appears, Saul falls to earth, and hears: “Saul, Saul why persecutest thou me?” (9:4)
  36. Saul remains blind for three days, until he is baptized, and he recovers his sight.
  37. Acts tells us that Paul begins to preach in the synagogues (9:20), but Paul himself relates in Galatians (1:16,17) that he went immediately to Arabia.
  38. Acts relates that at this point Paul had to escape from the Jews of Damascus by being lowered down the city wall in a basket. (9:26)
  39. Paul says in 2 Corinthians that he is escaping from the pagan Syrians. In cases of conflict, scholars generally trust Paul’s accounts of his activities rather than Luke’s.
  40. Chapter 10 contains the important passage about Peter’s dream.
  41. Peter dreams about all sorts of animals, then hears a voice which tells him, “Rise Peter; kill and eat.” (10:13)
  42. This dream is what allows Christians to avoid Jewish dietary laws.
  43. Since Christians (with the exception of the Marcionites) accepted the authority of the Hebrew Bible (Old Testament) the question of which Jewish laws to follow became very important in the early days of the Church.
  44. Acts relates in some detail the debate between Peter and Paul on the one hand, and James, the brother of Jesus, on the other.
  45. Peter and Paul, who were involved in converting Gentiles, wanted a liberal interpretation of Old Testament laws concerning diet and circumcision.
  46. James and his followers in Jerusalem were more conservative. Jesus had said in the Sermon on the Mount that the commandments should be followed; James insisted on enforcing them on Gentile converts to Christianity.
  47. Eventually according to Acts the two sides agreed to the “apostolic decree:” converts could forego circumcision and most of the dietary laws, but they were required to “abstain from pollutions of idols, and from fornication, and from things strangled, and from blood.” (15:20).
  48. Over the years the prohibitions about strangulation and blood have fallen away.
  49. In his letters Paul never indicates that he agreed to the apostolic decree.
  50. Although he favored less stringent laws for converts, Paul reports that he followed all the commandments throughout his life.
  51. With the relaxation of Old Testament commandments the Christians removed a strong impediment to conversion (few adult Greek men were willing to be circumcised), and Christianity took steps to becoming a world religion. (It was limited in its growth until Fourth Century when the Roman Emperor Constantine legalized it, and eventually became a convert himself.)
  52. Paul begins his journeys through Asia (present day Turkey) and Europe, and becomes the Apostle to the Gentiles.
  53. With his traveling companion Barnabas he preaches in the synagogues and establishes churches, frequently being harassed and even stoned. (14:5, 19).
  54. Not all the problems of the missionaries came from without. Paul and Barnabas argue violently over whether to include Mark (author of the Gospel) with them.
  55. Paul resents Mark for leaving them at Pamphylia. Paul and Barnabas split, Barnabas taking Mark with him.
  56. Paul goes to Galatia, but the Holy Ghost prohibits him from preaching the word in Asia.
  57. Galatia, in what is now central Turkey, takes its name from the Gauls, the people who settled France.
  58. Turkey was not yet home to the Turks, who still lived far to the east in what is now western China and former Soviet republics like Turkmenistan.
  59. 16:10 marks a narrative turning point in Acts: Luke switches from the third person “they” in talking of the apostles, to “we.”
  60. He is accompanying Paul and Silas on their trip to Philippi.
  61. In Philippi, Macedonia, Paul and Silas are whipped and put in the stocks.
  62. The Philippians claim that Paul and Silas, whom they identify as Jews, are preaching customs that it is illegal for Roman citizens to follow.
  63. Luke apparently is not imprisoned, perhaps because he isn’t Jewish. There is an earthquake, and the terrified jailers release the prisoners.
  64. When the terrified jailers first come to release Paul, he berates them for beating him because he is a Roman citizen. (16:37)
  65. Later when Paul is imprisoned by Jews he tells them he is a Jew, in fact a Pharisee.
  66. Paul, who was a Greek by culture, a Jew and Christian by religion, and a Roman by citizenship was truly what he told the Corinthians he was, “all things to all men.” (1 Cor 9:22)
  67. Paul travels alone to Athens where he encounters Epicureans and Stoics. (17:18)
  68. Epicureans believed that there was no divine plan for mankind and that whatever happiness could be obtained would be in this life, and would come from pleasures of the body and mind.
  69. Stoics were a grimmer lot who believed that life was more to be endured than enjoyed, and they put great store in self-control in the face of adversity.
  70. Paul preaches the gospel to these and others on the hill called Areopagus, the site of an ancient religious court, which has since become the symbol of free speech, like Speaker’s Corner in London’s Hyde Park.
  71. John Milton calls his defense of free speech Areopagitica because of this tradition.
  72. Paul travels on to Ephesus, center of the cult of Diana.
  73. Like Jesus he effects numerous cures by banishing demons. (19:12)
  74. Paul is so successful that the seven sons of a Jewish priest attempt to exorcise a demon in the name of Jesus and Paul.
  75. The demon says: “Jesus I know, and Paul I know, but who are ye?” (19:15)
  76. Ephesus had a famous amphitheater, still standing, in which Paul attempted to speak, but when the Ephesians “knew that he was a Jew, all with one voice, for about the space of two hours cried out, ‘Great is Diana of the Ephesians.’” (19:34)
  77. In our times rock stars have performed in the amphitheater of Ephesus, but Paul never got the chance to speak.
  78. When Paul gets to Jerusalem, James, the brother of Jesus, who is de facto bishop of Jerusalem, upbraids him for teaching Jews to forsake Moses and their customs.
  79. Paul defends himself, and goes into the Temple with the Jewish Christians to worship.
  80. The Jews in the temple are concerned that Paul has brought Gentiles into the Temple, and set on him.
  81. Paul addresses the group in Hebrew, telling them that he is a Jew of Tarsus, educated by the rabbi Gamaliel, and a zealous practitioner of Jewish law.
  82. Paul is brought before the Jewish authorities, and when he perceives that some of them are Pharisees, and some Sadducees, he declares that he is a Pharisee who believes in the resurrection of the dead.
  83. The Pharisees and Sadducees begin to fight, and the Roman soldiers, fearing for Paul’s life, rescue him. (23:6-11)
  84. After further confrontations the Romans send Paul as a prisoner to Rome.
  85. The ship carrying him wrecks, and he manages to wash up on the island of Melita (Malta). (28:1)
  86. Paul is bitten by a viper, and when he survives the locals (called “barbarians” in Acts) believe he is a god.
  87. Finally Paul makes it to Rome, but instead of putting him in prison the Romans allow him to live by himself with a soldier to watch him.
  88. There Luke leaves him, “preaching the kingdom of God.” (28:31)
  89. Why Luke ends so abruptly is a mystery.
  90. It is possible that he planned a third part to his narrative.
  91. Orr and Walther raise the possibility that Acts was written at the time of Paul’s imprisonment, in the early 60s.
  92. They acknowledge that this presumes either that Luke didn’t write it, or that the Gospel of Luke, and so also its source, Mark, were written much earlier than previously thought.
  93. Scholars believe that Paul was beheaded during Nero’s persecution of Christians around 65 AD.