Acts 4:7Meaning & Commentary from the Church Fathers

But they already knew this, because, as it says, they were vexed that the Apostles preached the Resurrection in Jesus. For this very reason they detained them. Why, then, do they ask? They expected that the Apostles, fearing the multitude, would deny Him, and they thought that by this they would set everything right. And they say, "By what name have you done this?" Why do you not name that name, but conceal it? "By what name have you done this?"

Why, then, do they question them? They expected that the Apostles, frightened by the court and by the multitude, would deny their words. They thought to correct the whole matter by this. See how craftily they ask: "By what name," it says, "have you done this?" Yes, they would rather have the Apostles proclaim the healing as their own work than as the work of Christ's power. But see what difficulty they placed the Apostles in. They did not even wish the word "healing of the lame man" to be uttered. Why do they not say, "What exactly?" Instead they say, "Have you done this."

Thus the community of believers, which also had members in other parts of Palestine, in Samaria and Galilee (Acts 9:31), increased daily in Jerusalem. Soon even the Jewish priests began to pass over into it (Acts 6:7).

The Sanhedrin no longer wished to leave the matter of Christianity without attention. Peter and John had healed the lame man at the temple. Afterward they preached to the people about Christ crucified and risen, by Whose power they had performed the healing.

Then the priests, together with the followers of the Sadducean sect, took them into custody. They intended to present them to the Sanhedrin in the morning. The next day they were indeed brought before the Sanhedrin, together with the man who had been healed.

The arrest of the Apostles took place already in the evening (v. 3). Therefore their trial was postponed until morning. On the next day the members of the Sanhedrin assembled.

Everything indicates that this was an extraordinary meeting. Consequently, the Apostles' preaching about Christ produced strong agitation among the murderers of Jesus.

The question they first considered it necessary to put to the Apostles concerned precisely the Person, the Name, by whom they had performed the healing and whom they preached.

They wanted to conduct a detailed interrogation of the Apostles. Therefore they begin not with their teaching in the temple, but with an investigation of the miracle of healing that preceded it.

"Having set them in the midst," as accused men, according to custom (cf. Jn 8:3). "They asked." The question concerned not their teaching, which had drawn so many people to Christ, but the miracle upon the lame man.

This miracle had served as the occasion for the apostolic speech. The question was posed thus: By what power, or by what name, that is, through the invocation of what name, have you done this miracle of healing the lame man?

The members of the Sanhedrin, of course, knew that the Apostles had done this in the name of Jesus Christ (Acts 3:6). But they had in mind to found an accusation upon the Apostles' own confession.

Caiaphas conducted the interrogation of the Apostles. "Tell us," he said, addressing them, "by what power or by what name have you done this?"

Caiaphas says nothing about what exactly they had done. He acts like a cunning politician, not inferior to his equally famous contemporary Herod, whom Christ called a fox (cf. Lk 13:32).

Concerning the power and name by which the miracle of healing the lame man had been performed, the questioner had of course heard. Yet he wanted to discover something in the Apostles' answer that could serve to accuse them of stirring up the people.

This had been done also with respect to Jesus Christ (cf. Lk 23:2). Some interpreters even suppose that the members of the Sanhedrin thought to frighten the Apostles.