Acts 4:13Meaning & Commentary from the Church Fathers

Now they were astonished at their extraordinary boldness. The apostles showed that they cared nothing for being judged over such matters, or for the extreme danger threatening them.

They showed this not only by words, but by appearance, voice, look, and everything else. Before the people they displayed boldness while they spoke.

The priests perhaps marveled because the apostles were unlearned and simple men. A man may be unlearned and yet not simple, or simple and yet not unlearned.

By this the writer shows that both qualities were united in the apostles. "They marveled," it says. At what? At what they said.

Peter speaks few words, but by the very expression and composition of the speech he shows boldness. The priests would have accused the apostles if this man, the lame man, had not been with them.

"They recognized them," it says, "that they had been with Jesus." From this they came to the conviction that they had learned this from Jesus, and that they did everything as His disciples.

The miracle and sign itself uttered a voice no less loud than the apostles' voice. It was precisely this that most of all stopped their mouths.

This very thing, the unexpected change, especially struck them. For the man who then could not endure the look of a questioning maidservant now comes into the midst of the chief priests themselves and into the Sanhedrin, and speaks with boldness.

The Greek word λόγος has many meanings. It means word, reason, reckoning, and the cause of anything through which something comes to be. All this we truly see in Christ.

Learned Plato did not know this. Eloquent Demosthenes did not understand this. "I will destroy," Scripture says, "the wisdom of the wise, and the understanding of the prudent I will reject" (1 Cor 1:19).

True wisdom will destroy false wisdom. And although in the teaching of the Cross there is the foolishness of preaching, yet the Apostle Paul says, "We speak wisdom among the perfect.

Yet not the wisdom of this age, nor of the rulers of this age, who are passing away. But we speak the wisdom of God, hidden in a mystery, which God ordained before the ages" (1 Cor 2:7).

The wisdom of God is Christ. Christ is the power of God and the wisdom of God (1 Cor 1:24). This wisdom was hidden in a mystery.

Therefore the superscription of the ninth psalm says, "Concerning the mysteries of the Son." In Him all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge are hidden. He Himself was hidden in mystery, ordained before the ages.

He was also prefigured and foreshadowed by the law and the prophets. Therefore the prophets are called seers, because they saw Him Whom others did not see.

Abraham saw His day and rejoiced (Jn 8:56). For Ezekiel the heavens are opened, though they were closed to the sinful people.

"Open my eyes," says David, "and I shall understand the wonders of Thy law" (Ps 118:18). For the law is spiritual, and revelation is needed so that we may understand it and behold the glory of God with unveiled face.

There sat the same Annas and Caiaphas who had also judged Jesus. The apostles were asked, "By what power, or by whose name, have you done this?" Perhaps they did not expect them to dare speak before the Sanhedrin as openly as before the common people.

Yet the apostles declared without hesitation that the lame man who had lain at the temple had been raised up by them in the name of Jesus. He had been crucified by them, that is, according to the Sanhedrin's decree.

They added that this Jesus, as He Himself had declared to them, is truly the stone rejected by the builders, yet become the head of the corner.

They recognized them. John was known to one of the chief priests. Their boldness amazed the members of the Sanhedrin. Yet the miracle could not be denied. The people were on their side, since they were not disposed toward the Sadducees.

Therefore they resolved only to forbid them to preach any more to anyone "in this name." Peter and John answered that they must obey God rather than men. They were only threatened and released with the same command.

But the healed man, who was there with the apostles, stood as a silent and irrefutable confirmation of the truth of apostolic testimony.

Then, after sending the accused out, they took counsel about what to do. Christ's opponents openly admitted to themselves that the truth was on the side of the accused.

Nevertheless, after calling the apostles back, they strictly forbade them to speak and teach in the name of Jesus. But the apostles answered: "Judge whether it is right before God to listen to you rather than to God.

We cannot but speak of what we have seen and heard" (vv. 19-20). The apostles had received directly from Christ Himself the appointment to be His witnesses in all the world, and first of all in Jerusalem.

Yet Christ Himself once said, "The scribes and Pharisees sit on Moses' seat. Therefore whatever they tell you to observe, observe and do" (Mt 23:2-3).

Thus, not only in the name of their former purely Jewish notions and beliefs, but also on the basis of this teaching of the Lord, the apostles owed obedience to the Sanhedrin.

For the Lord had taught that the Old Testament order of things would continue for a time, even at the opening of the New Testament. The Sanhedrin was the guardian of this order.

Thus the apostles were required to fulfill two duties at the same time. These duties stood in such relation that by fulfilling one, they would violate the other.

The apostles, however, did not hesitate over how to escape this difficulty. Calmly and firmly they declared that in this case they could not obey.

They had to fulfill the higher command, the command of God Himself. On the other hand, their own conscience did not allow them to keep silent, or to hide the truth about that of which they were firmly and undoubtedly convinced by experience.

The members of the Sanhedrin could easily notice the apostles' lack of rabbinic schooling from their simple and guileless speech. Rabbinic education taught artificiality and intricate weaving in speech.

"Simple" (ἰδιώται) means men from the common people, who were always considered dark and ignorant.

"It is possible to be unlettered and not simple, and simple yet not unlettered. But here both coincided. Therefore the members of the Sanhedrin marveled when Peter and John spoke and discoursed" (Theophylact).

"They recognized them," and so forth: the Lord and His disciples often visited the temple in Jerusalem. There the members of the Sanhedrin, at least some of them, could have seen them.

Now, looking closely at them, they truly recognized in them Jesus' disciples. By this they became certain that these men truly continued their Teacher's work.

That work was so hateful to the whole Sanhedrin, especially to its chief members, who had delivered the Lord to death.

Their amazement would probably have resulted in an accusation of the Lord's disciples for a religious and political crime. Yet the presence of the healed lame man together with the apostles sealed their lips with silence.

They could say nothing against the explanation of this miracle offered by the apostle, namely, that the miracle had been done in the name of Jesus the Messiah.

How did the healed man come into the Sanhedrin? Probably by order of the authorities themselves. They hoped somehow to force from him a denial of the miraculous character of his healing.

They had done the same with the man born blind, whom the Lord healed (Jn 9). But now, as then, the members of the Sanhedrin not only erred in their calculations.

The presence of those healed served to their own harm.

The apostles' simplicity and commonness were visible in their clothing and general condition. Their lack of learning was evident in their speech, for Galileans differed from educated Jerusalemites, who tried to speak ornately and in scribal fashion.

All this together cast the judges into perplexity. What were they to do with the accused, in whom there was no guilt, and who bore themselves so boldly and confessed Christ so convincingly and powerfully?

Following the previous example, they might crucify the innocent. But now no one had been prepared for this. On the contrary, the people were visibly on the apostles' side.

This was proved especially clearly by the five thousand who had been converted to Christ the day before.