Acts 12:10Meaning & Commentary from the Church Fathers

Where are the heretics now? Let them tell us: how did he pass through? But they could not say. What happened inside was more wondrous, while what followed was more ordinary. When there was no longer any obstacle, the angel was no longer with him. Peter would not have passed through so many obstacles alone. This was astonishing, truly astonishing. “They came,” the writer says, “to the iron gate.” See how strong they were. “When they had passed,” he says, “the first and second guard, they came to the iron gate.” And why, someone will say, is this not done through the apostles themselves? Why? Because God honors them also by delivering them through angels. Why, then, did it not happen so with Paul? There the purpose was that the jailer might believe. Here only one apostle had to be delivered. On the other hand, it was also because God orders everything in varied ways. There Paul was singing praises, while here Peter was sleeping (Acts 16:25).

What is the meaning of what is said about Peter in Acts: “When they had passed the first and second guard, they came to the iron gate”? The faithful and active intellect, when seized like Peter by Herod, or by the “leathern law,” is seized by the mind of the flesh. For Herod is interpreted as “leathern.” It is shut up under two guards and behind one iron door, undergoing battle from the active manifestation of the passions and from the will’s conscious inclination toward passion. Passing these, as guards or outposts, through the teaching of practical philosophy, as by the help of an Angel, it comes to the iron gate leading into the city. This gate is the firm, harsh, and irresistible attachment of the senses to sensible things. The teaching of natural contemplation in the Spirit opens it. Of itself and without fear, it sends the intellect, freed from Herod’s madness, toward the kindred noetic being.

The iron gate leading into the city (Acts 12:10) is a hardened heart. For one who suffers affliction and is contrite, it will open "of its own accord," as it did for Peter. This does not mean an unmerciful heart, but a heart generally turned to stone and suffering from insensibility. Here the opening of the locked gates before holy Peter is interpreted spiritually. Affliction is self-abasement through outward deprivation. Contrition is a grinding down, the noetic beating of the heart by representations of truths that bring compunction. These two roll the stone away from the heart.

In the year 44 a new persecution arose in Jerusalem against the Church, namely from the ruler of Judea, Herod Agrippa. Desiring to please the people, he had already put to death one of the first apostles, James the son of Zebedee, the brother of John.

He also wished to put Peter to death and had already shut him in prison. But on the very night before death awaited him, God freed him from prison through His angel, and soon afterward struck down the persecutor as well.

Perhaps from this very time one should begin the activity beyond Palestine, among Jews and Gentiles, of the apostles themselves, the twelve, or more exactly, after James's death, the eleven. Their number was soon completed by their most zealous fellow-worker, Paul.

But the time had not yet come for Peter to glorify the Lord by his martyr’s death. The Lord therefore freed him from prison miraculously. While he was there, one night an angel of the Lord stood before him, and light shone in the prison. Peter, entrusting his life to the will of God, was sleeping peacefully. Then the angel struck him on the side, woke him, and commanded him to dress and follow him. The chains fell miraculously from his hands, and he followed the angel. The suddenness and extraordinary character of the event brought Peter into such a state of soul that, although he did everything the angel commanded, he did not think it was an actual event rather than a vision. Meanwhile, following the angel, he first passed calmly by the first guard.

Peter was in this state when, guided by the angel, he left the section of the prison where he had been confined. He passed the two soldiers guarding the doors of that section. Then he passed the second and third guard, that is, the soldiers guarding the first door from the section where Peter was confined, and the second door. Each of these was also probably guarded by more than one soldier. Finally, they approached the iron gate leading into the city, that is, the exit doors from the whole prison building, which opened onto the streets or square of the city. These too were probably guarded by soldiers. This gate, or these doors, opened to them by itself. The doors at the first and second guard were probably opened by the angel. They found themselves free and went along the city street. “The angel suddenly departed from him”: the angel appeared suddenly in the prison and suddenly disappeared in the street.

The Apostle Peter became fully convinced of his deliverance only when he and the Angel had passed the prison guard and the iron prison gate. Then they passed along one city street, and the Angel left him. How is this divided state of Peter’s soul to be explained? He believed what was happening and yet did not understand the event, though he participated in it as fully as possible. He understood it immediately when its action ceased in its supernatural part. Clearly, the realm in which actions occur with the participation of heavenly powers is generally hard to understand. It is especially incomprehensible at the moment it occurs, when the one acting cannot be a fuller spectator and interpreter of what is taking place.