STEPHEN had been accused of blasphemy against God and Moses and the temple by false wit nesses. On these charges he was brought before the Sanhedrim, where "all that sat in the council saw his face as it had been the face of an angel." And he began his defence. The speaker's main object may be considered as twofold: first, to show that the charge against him rested on a false view of the ancient dispensation, not on his part, but on that of his accusers; and secondly, that the Jews, instead of manifesting a true zeal for the temple and the law in their opposition to the gospel, were again acting out the unbelieving, rebellious spirit which led their fathers so often to resist the will of God and reject his greatest favors. It appears to me that the latter was the uppermost idea in Stephen's mind. It may be objected that this view renders the discourse aggressive, criminatory, in an unusual degree; but we are to remember that Stephen (see verse 54) was interrupted, and but for that, in all probability, after having exposed the guilt of his hearers, he would have encouraged them to repent and believe on the Saviour whom they had crucified. Yet both parts of the speech, as so understood, converge to one point, viz. that the speaker was not guilty of maligning the ancient economy: first, because even under that dispensation the divine favor was bestowed independently of the law; and secondly, because the teachers of that economy held up the same view of its spiritual nature and encountered a similar opposition. In the interpretation of the speech I proceed on the principle that most of Stephen's hearers were so well acquainted with his peculiar views, with his arguments in support of them, and his mode of illustration, that they had no occasion to be distinctly reminded of his doctrine at this time. Hence Stephen could assume that the bearing of the different remarks or occurrences brought forward in the address would suggest itself to the minds of his judges; without pausing to tell them this means that, or that means this, he could leave them to draw silently the conclusions which he wished to establish. Hackett. - It is also observable that his defence plainly intimates that he by no means intended to repel the accusation as altogether a falsity, but rather to acknowledge that there was truth mixed up with it; that which he had really spoken, and which was already so obnoxious to the Jews, he had no wish to deny, but only to place what he had stated in its right connection, and to show that it was not open to the charge of blasphemy which had been laid against it. The "blasphemy against Moses," of which he had been accused, was probably found in his assertion that the authority of Moses was inferior to or superseded by that of Christ. "The blasphemy against God" may have been involved in the blasphemy against Moses, inasmuch as God was the great Author of that religion which Moses had taught the Israelites by his command, or it may have lain in his ascribing divinity to one who had lately suffered publicly as a malefactor. "The blasphemy against the holy place and the law" seems to have consisted in a prediction that the temple was to be destroyed and the ritual law of course abolished. Kitto. The judicial question to which the accused was required to plead was put by the president: "Are these things so?" And then Stephen answered, and his clear voice was heard in the silent council-hall, as he went through the history of the chosen people, proving his own deep faith in the sacredness of the Jewish economy, but suggesting here and there that spiritual interpretation of it which had always been the true one, and the truth of which was now to be made manifest to all. He began, with a wise discretion, from the call of Abraham, and travelled historically in his argument through all the great stages of their nationai existence. And so he passed on to the temple, which had so prominent a reference to the charge against him; and while he spoke of it he alluded to the words of Solomon himself and of the prophet Isaiah, who denied that any temple "made with hands" could be the place of God's highest worship. And thus far they listened to him. It was the story of the chosen people, to which every Jew listened with Interest and pride. Howson.

1 Then said the high priest, Are these things so?

2 And he said, Men, brethren, and fathers, hearken: The God of glory appeared unto our father Abraham, when he was in Mesopotamia, before he dwelt in Charran.

3 And said unto him, Get thee out of thy country, and from thy kindred, and come into the land which I shall shew thee.

4 Then3 came he out of the land of the Chaldeans, and dwelt in Charran: and from thence, when his father was dead, he removed him into this land, wherein ye now dwell.

5 And he gave him none inheritance in it, no, not so much as to set his foot on: yet he promised1 that he would give it to him for a possession, and to his seed after him, when as yet he had no child.

PARALLEL PASSAGES. -1Ch. 22:1. 2Gen. 12:1. Gen. 12:5. Gen. 13:15.

1. The high-priest, as president of the council and chief magistrate of the nation, interrogates the prisoner, Are these things so? namely, those alleged by his accusers. Alexander.

2. Men, brethren. The literal meaning of the Greek is, Ye men, who are my brethren and fathers. He calls the scribes and elders "fathers," and the common people "brethren." Bp. Pearce. Mesopotamia, in the midst of rivers. The district lying between the rivers Tigris and Euphrates, and deriving its name from that circumstance. Whitney. - The name is Greek, and the region had also other names before the Greek name was given to it. In Gen. 11:31; 15:7, it is called Ur of the Chaldees. Mesopotamia and Chaldea might not exactly coincide; but it is evident that Stephen meant to say that Ur was in the country afterwards called Mesopotamia. Its precise situation is unknown. Charran. This is the Greek form of the Hebrew word Haran. (Gen. 11:31.) This place was also in Mesopotamia. Barnes. - Like other ancient names of this kind, it is used with considerable latitude. This confusion of terms arose, no doubt, at least in part, from the want of definite boundaries. There is, therefore, no mistake here, either in geography or history, as some have alleged; because, in Gen. 12:1, Abram is said to have been called after his removal to Haran. That the first call is not explicitly recorded in its proper place is not surprising in so brief a history. Alexander. - Charran, Haran. It is also in Mesopotamia, one hundred and fifty miles from Ur, in the northwest. Here Terah died. (Gen. 11:32.) Jacob retired hither when he fled from Esau. (Gen. 27:43.) It is located in a sandy plain among hills and inhabited by a few Arabs for the delicious water. It was called Carræ by the Greeks and Romans, and was famous for the defeat of Crassus by the Parthians.

3. Get thee out, etc. His countrymen and his kindred were idolaters. (Josh. 24:2.) To the land. Literally, " to a land whichever I shall show to thee"; most indefinite, and therefore requiring most implicit faith. So in Heb. 11: 8, it is said, "He went out not knowing whither he went."

4. Land of the Chaldeans. From Ur of the Chaldees. (Gen. 11:31.) When (after) his father was dead. A difficulty has been started here, since Terah died at Haran at the age of two hundred and five. (Gen. 11:32.) Yet if Terah is to be understood as having been only seventy years old at Abram's birth (Gen. 11:26), he must have been only one hundred and forty-five years old when he died, since Abram was seventy-five years old when he left Haran. But it is not said in Gen. 11:26, nor anywhere else, that Terah was only seventy at Abram's birth. But it is said that Terah was seventy years old, and he begat Abram, Nahor, and Haran. That is, he lived seventy years before he begat either of these. And then Abraham is mentioned first, on account of his prominence in the history, though he was the youngest of the three. Abraham (Sarah, IIaran's daughter, was ten years younger than her husband Abraham, so that Haran had children before Abraham was ten years old) was easily sixty years younger than Haran. And Terah would then be one hundred and thirty years old at the birth of Abraham, which would bring him to two hundred and five, the date of his death, when Abraham was seventy-five years old at his departure to Canaan. Jacobus.

5. And he gave to him (during his life) no inheritance in it, no actual possession, but a promise only that his posterity should occupy it at some future period. It is not at variance with this that he subsequently purchased the field of Ephron as a burial-place (Gen. 23:3, sq.); for he acquired no right of settlement by that purchase, but permission merely to bury " his dead." Hackett. - When as yet he had no child. When there was no human probability that he would have any posterity. This is mentioned as a strong instance of his faith, "who against hope believed in hope." (Rom. 4:18.) Barnes. -This world is not the inheritance of the children of God. They have not their portion in it, but are mere sojourners. Quesnell. He to whom God is all in all is rich, even if he does not own so much as a foot-breadth. Starke.

6 And God spake on this wise, That his seed should sojourn in a strange land; and that they should bring them into bondage, and entreat them evil four2 hundred years.

7 And the nation to whom they shall be in bondage will I judge, said God: and, after that shall they come forth, and serves me in this place.

8 And he gave him the covenant of circumcision: and so5 Abraham begat Isaac, and circumcised him the eighth day; and Isaac begat Jacob; and Jacob' begat the twelve patriarchs.

9 And the patriarchs moved with8

envy, sold Joseph into Egypt: but9 God was with him.

10 And delivered him out of all his afflictions, and gave him favour and wisdom in the sight of Pharaoh, king of Egypt; and he1o made him governor over Egypt and all his house.

11 Now11 there came a dearth over all the land of Egypt and Chanaan, and great affliction: and our fathers found no sustenance.

12 But12 when Jacob heard that there was corn in Egypt, he sent out our fathers first.

13 And at the second time Joseph13 was made known to his brethren ;

PARALLEL PASSAGES. -1Gen. 15:13, 16. 2Ex. 12:40, 41. 1-4. Gen. 25:26. Gen. 29: 32, etc. Gen. 37:28. Ps. 105:17. 41:54. 12Gen. 42: 1, 2. 13Gen. 45:4, 16.

Ex. 3:12. 4Gen. 17:9-11. "Gen. 21:
Gen. 39: 2, 21. 10 Gen. 41:40. 11Gen.

6. Four hundred years, in agreement with Gen. 15:13; but both there and here a round number, since in Ex. 12:40 "the sojourning of Israel who dwelt in Egypt" is said to have been four hundred and thirty years. But here arises a chronological question, to which it is necessary to advert. In Gal. 3:17, Paul speaks of the entire period from Abraham's arrival in Canaan until the giving of the law as embracing only four hundred and thirty years, -a calculation which allows but two hundred and fifteen years for the sojourn in Egypt; for Isaac was born twenty-five years after that arrival, was sixty years old at the birth of Jacob, and Jacob was one hundred and thirty years old when he went to reside in Egypt (430- [25+60 +130]=215). The Seventy, in Ex. 12:40, and Josephus, in Antt. 2:15, 2, follow the same computation. There are two solutions of this difficulty. One is, that the Jews had two ways of reckoning this period, which were current at the same time; that it is uncertain which of them is the correct one, and for all practical purposes is wholly unimportant, since, when a speaker or writer, as in this case of Stephen, adopted this mode or that, he was understood not to propound a chronological opinion, but merely to employ a familiar designation for the sake of definiteness. The other solution is, that the four hundred and thirty years in Ex. 12:40 embrace the period from Abraham's immigration into Canaan until the departure out of Egypt, and that the sacred writers call this the period of sojourn or servitude in Egypt a potiori, i. e. from its leading characteristic. They could describe it in this manner with so much the more propriety, because even during the rest of the time the condition of the patriarchs was that of exiles and wanderers. Hackett.

7. And the nation, etc. Referring particularly to the Egyptians. Will I judge. The word "judge" in the Bible often means to execute judgment as well as to pronounce it; that is, to punish. Barnes. And serve me. The redeeming work of Christ imposes solemn obligations on the redeemed to serve him.

Starke.

8. Covenant of circumcision. A covenant of which circumcision was the sign and seal. Covenant, originally disposition or arrangement, is commonly applied in Scripture (except Heb. 9:16, 17) to a mutual arrangement or agreement, binding on both parties. The emphatic word is not "begat" but "circumcised," as if he had said, " All the other patriarchs were born under this covenant of circumcision." This idea is obscured in our translation by repeating the first alone, instead of repeating both (begat and circumcised) or neither, leaving the reader to supply them from the first clause. The recital of these simple and familiar facts is perfectly unmeaning unless intended to establish Stephen's proposition, — that the outward condition of the chosen people had already undergone repeated changes quite as great as those which he was charged with blasphemy for having threatened. Alexander.

9, 13. In this development of the divine and gracious plan, another item is now noted in the history of Joseph. He shows how God develops his church all along by allowing affairs to come to a crisis, and then interposing for deliverance, and so carrying it forward to the purposed advance. He would show thus from all this familiar history of the church, that all along there is progress,—a further unfolding of God's purpose; so that they could reasonably look for a change now in the present state

and Joseph's kindred was made known unto Pharaoh.

14 Then sent Joseph, and called his father Jacob to him, and all1 his kindred, threescore and fifteen souls.

15 So Jacob went down into Egypt, and died, he and our fathers

16 And2 were carried over into Sychem, and laid in the sepulchre that Abraham bought for a sum of money of the sons of Emmor, the father of Sychem.

17 But when the time of the promise drew nigh, which God had sworn to Abraham, the people3 grew and multiplied in Egypt.

18 Till another king arose, which knew not Joseph.

19 The same dealt subtilly with our kindred, and evil-entreated our fathers, so that they cast out their young children, to the end they might not live.

PARALLEL PASSAGES.-1Gen. 46:27. Deut. 10:22. 2Josh. 24:32. 3Ex. 1:7-9. Ex. 1:22. of things, and not insist on it as being immutable. Moved with envy. With this main drift of argument, he carries along the idea of the unfaithfulness and wickedness of the covenant people as instanced in this case of the great majority, all the eleven patriarchs against one. By this he means to hold up the idea of their cruelty and treachery to Jesus, the New Testament Joseph. God was with him, interposed agains this treacherous brethren, as now in the case of Jesus against their successors, the Jewish people. And this presence of God with him was not restricted to the Holy Land, but it was in Egypt. Thus all along, Stephen makes good his points. Our fathers. This expression is used to keep before their minds the fact that it is the continuous progressive history of the covenant people which he narrates, and in whom he with them is interested, and that the plan of that dispensation is such as has an analogy, in the advance through conflict from Judaism to Christianity. Jacobus.

14. Threescore and fifteen souls. The Hebrew text at Gen. 46:27; Deut. 10:22, mentions the number to be seventy; but the Greek translation gives the number in both these texts seventy-five; which number is made up either by including five sons of Ephraim and Manasseh born in Egypt (1 Chron. 7) or by including the wives of the patriarchs, who accompanied them. Whitby.

16. Carried over. It is expressly recorded that the bones of Joseph were carried over from Egypt into Canaan, and buried in Shechem. The place of burial of the rest of the patriarchs is not elsewhere recorded; but we have every reason to suppose that Stephen knew the facts, and that if he had stated incorrectly he would have been contradicted by those who must have known. Jerome asserts that the tombs of the patriarchs were still to be seen at Shechem. Sychem. The Greek form of the Hebrew word Shechem, also called Sychar, and now known as Neapolis, Nablous. Abraham bought. There is a difficulty here. Jacob bought this land (Gen. 33: 19, Josh. 24:32), but Abraham bought the sepulchre at Hebron (Gen. 23:3-20). Both are briefly referred to, and some understand that as the facts were so familiar to those whom he addressed, and must have been perfectly well known to Stephen, he meant to have them supply what was left out. "Jacob was laid in the sepulchre bought by Abraham," and "our fathers" in that bought "of the sons of Emmor," etc. Others hold that as the difficulty lies in a single word, which ought to be read Jacob for Abraham, it is much easier to suppose that it was the mistake of an carly copyist than that Stephen made such a needless mistake, and that there should have been several mistakes in one verse. Jacobus. It appears that Abraham (Gen. 33:20) had built an altar at Sychem, at the place afterwards purchased by Jacob. We may reasonably suppose, therefore, that the piece of ground had been formerly purchased by Abraham while he sojourned in those parts, as a place for the burial of some of his family. Wells.-Joseph a type of Jesus: (1) In his state of humiliation, cach beloved of his father, but hated by his brethren. Sold into the hands of sinners, falsely accused, unjustly condemned. (2) In his state of exaltation. Jesus, like Joseph, crowned with honor after shame and sufferings, the ruler and deliverer of a famishing people, showing grace and mercy to those who had done evil unto him. Gerok.

18. Another king. Another family or dynasty, as we learn from Josephus. Bloomfield.— According to Sir J. G. Wilkinson, this new king was Amosis, first of the eighteenth dynasty, or that of the Diospolitans from Thebes. Some hold that the Hyksos, or shepherd kings, had just been expelled, and that the oppressor of the Hebrews was the first native prince who reigned after that event. Hackett. 19. Dealt subtilly. "To Egyptize" came to be used for "to act cunningly, use wicked devices." Adam Clarke.

167

LESSON II. OCTOBER 8, 1876. STEPHEN'S DEFENCE. ACTS 7:35-50. [A. D. 33.]

35 This Moses whom they refused, saying, Who made thee a ruler and a judge? the same did God send to be a ruler and a deliverer by the hand of the angel which appeared to him in the bush.

36 He brought them out, after2 that he had shewed wonders and

signs in the land of Egypt, and in the Red Sea, and in the wilderness forty3 years.

37 This is that Moses, which said1 unto the children of Israel, A Prophet shall the Lord your God raise up unto you of your brethren, like unto me; him5 shall ye hear.

PARALLEL PASSAGES.-1Ex. 14:19. Numb. 20:16. 2Ex. 7; 11; 14. Ex. 16:35. 4Ch. 3:22. Deut. 18:15, 18. 5Matt. 17: 5.

CONNECTION.

Stephen here reaches a second period in his history of redemption,- the times of Moses (verses 17-45.) Stephen introduces the history of the distress and humiliation of the covenant people, - an exigency which God allowed to come to a crisis, when he interposed and developed his gracious plan in a glorious deliverance. Moses is now to be shown as the man raised up by God to be a deliverer of this oppressed people, and thus a striking type of Jesus.

35. Moses' divine commission as a deliverer, and his rejection by the people, is here stated, to show that the Prophet like unto Moses, who was rejected by them, was likewise commissioned for the covenant people's deliverance. This Moses whom they denied. This very rejected one, whose authority as ruler and judge they disputed. The same. Literally, "this one." The repetition of the demonstrative pronoun here is very emphatic, and is used to call attention to the parallel between Moses and Christ as deliverers of the covenant people, appointed by God and rejected by those whom they came to save. (See ch. 2:23, 24; 3: 13-15.) Deliverer. AUTρwτην. The term here means properly Redeemer, and is used in the Septuagint to express the office of the Göel, or kinsman Redeemer, but only as applied to God. Properly, it is one who redeems a captive by paying a ransom; and the work of ransoming his true covenant people is often applied to Christ in the New Testament. Moses did not pay a ransom, but God by Moses ransomed his people there, bought them out of captivity. (Isa. 45:13, 14.) And this deliverance was typical of Christ's ransoming believers from the bondage and the curse of sin. Angel at the bush, in the wilderness of Mount Sinai, so called, the desert in which Mount Sinai is located, which thus gives its name to the tract of country. The mountain itself is called Sinai, but the range or group is called Horeb, and thus the names seem interchangeable. (See Exod. 3:1.) An angel of the Lord appeared to him, or was seen by him. This was the glorious second person of the blessed Trinity, the Angel of his presence (Isa. 63:9), the Revealer of the Godhead (John 1:18), called in verse 31, Jehovah himself. (Compare Exod. 3:2, 4.) "This second appearing of God to Moses (see verse 2), introduced the legal dispensation, as the first to Abraham introduced the patriarchal.” Jacobus.

36. This verse describes the third great period of forty years in the life of Moses. (In Pharaoh's house forty, and in Midian forty.)

37. This prophecy had been quoted and applied by Peter (ch. 3:22), and to this there may have been an allusion. As if he had said, "This is the author of that prophecy so lately quoted and inter. preted before you." The inference that Jesus was this prophet (John 1:21, 25; 6:14) Stephen leaves the Sanhedrim to draw for themselves, with its necessary consequence that they, not he, dishonored Moses by refusing to acknowledge and obey the Prophet whom he had so solemnly predicted. Alexander. -Moses a type of Jesus: Moses a man through whom God spoke to the fathers; Jesus, he in whom God aas spoken at the last. Moses, a mediator between God and the people; Jesus Christ, the mediator between men and God. Moses, disowned and rejected by his people; Jesus, denied, cast out, and crucified by his people. Moses, highly favored of God, attested by miracles, and sent as the ruler and deliverer of his people; Jesus sent by God, and anointed as the Redeemer, Messiah, and Saviour. It is also true, the law was given by Moses, but grace and truth came by Jesus Christ. Lechler.