Act 2:22-28 | Clarke | e4.org | Verse 22. A man approved of God ] αποδεδειγμενον, celebrated, famous . The sense of the verse seems to be this: Jesus of Nazareth, a man sent of God, and celebrated among you by miracles, wonders, and signs ; and all these done in such profusion as had never been done by the best of your most accredited prophets. And these signs, &c., were such as demonstrated his Divine mission.

‏ Acts 2:22-28

Verse 22. A man approved of God] αποδεδειγμενον, celebrated, famous. The sense of the verse seems to be this: Jesus of Nazareth, a man sent of God, and celebrated among you by miracles, wonders, and signs; and all these done in such profusion as had never been done by the best of your most accredited prophets. And these signs, &c., were such as demonstrated his Divine mission.

Verse 23. Him, being delivered by the determinate counsel] Bp. Pearce paraphrases the words thus: Him having been given forth; i.e. sent into the world, and manifested by being made flesh, and dwelling among you, as it is said in Joh 1:14; see also Ac 4:28.

Kypke contends that εκδοτον, delivered, does not refer to GOD, but to Judas the traitor "the Jews received Jesus, delivered up to them by Judas; the immutable counsel of God so permitting."

By the determinate counsel, ωρισμενηβουλη; that counsel of God which defined the time, place, and circumstance, according (προγνωσει) to his foreknowledge, which always saw what was the most proper time and place for the manifestation and crucifixion of his Son; so that there was nothing casual in these things, God having determined that the salvation of a lost world should be brought about in this way; and neither the Jews nor Romans had any power here, but what was given to them from above. It was necessary to show the Jews that it was not through Christ's weakness or inability to defend himself that he was taken; nor was it through their malice merely that he was slain; for God had determined long before, from the foundation of the world, Re 13:8, to give his Son a sacrifice for sin; and the treachery of Judas, and the malice of the Jews were only the incidental means by which the great counsel of God was fulfilled: the counsel of God intending the sacrifice, but never ordering that it should be brought about by such wretched means. This was permitted; the other was decreed. See the observations at the end of this chapter. See Clarke on Ac 2:47.

By wicked hands have crucified and slain] I think this refers to the Romans, and not to the Jews; the former being the agents, to execute the evil purposes of the latter. It is well known that the Jews acknowledged that they had no power to put our Lord to death, Joh 18:31, and it is as well known that the punishment of the cross was not a Jewish, but a Roman, punishment: hence we may infer that by διαχειρωνανομων, by the hands of the wicked, the Romans are meant, being called ανομοι, without law, because they had no revelation from God; whereas the others had what was emphatically termed ονομοςτουθεου, the law of God, by which they professed to regulate their worship and their conduct. It was the Jews, therefore, who caused our Lord to be crucified by the hands of the heathen Romans.

Verse 24. Whom God hath raised up] For, as God alone gave him up to death, so God alone raised him up from death.

Having loosed the pains of death] It is generally supposed that this expression means, the dissolving of those bonds or obligations by which those who enter into the region of the dead are detained there till the day of the resurrection; and this is supposed to be the meaning of chebley maveth, in Ps 116:3, or chebley sheol, in Ps 18:5, and in 2Sa 22:6, to which, as a parallel, this place has been referred. But Kypke has sufficiently proved that λυεινταςωδιναςθανατου, signifies rather to REMOVE the pains or sufferings of death. So Lucian, De Conscr. Hist., says, "a copious sweat to some, ελυσετονπυρετον, REMOVES or carries off the fever." So STRABO, speaking of the balm of Jericho, says, λυειδεκεφαλαλγιαςθαυμαστως-it wonderfully REMOVES the headache, &c. That Christ did suffer the pains and sorrows of death in his passion is sufficiently evident; but that these were all removed, previously to his crucifixion, is fully seen in that calm manner in which he met it, with all its attendant terrors. If we take the words as commonly understood, they mean that it was impossible for the Prince of Life to be left in the empire of death: his resurrection, therefore, was a necessary consequence of his own Divine power.

Instead of θανατου, of death, the Codex Bezae, Syriac, Coptic, and Vulgate, have αιδου, of hell, or the place of separate spirits; and perhaps it was on no better authority than this various reading, supported but by slender evidence, that, He descended into hell, became an article in what is called the apostles' creed. And on this article many a popish legend has been builded, to the discredit of sober sense and true religion.

Verse 25. For David speaketh concerning him] The quotation here is made from Ps 16:8-11, which contains a most remarkable prophecy concerning Christ, every word of which applies to him, and to him exclusively. See the notes there.

Verse 26. And my tongue was glad] In the Hebrew it is vaiyagel kebodi, "And my glory was glad:" but the evangelist follows the Septuagint, in reading καιηγαλλιασατοηγλωσσαμον, what all the other Greek interpreters in the Hexapla translate δοξαμον, my glory. And what is to be understood by glory here! Why the soul, certainly, and not the tongue; and so some of the best critics interpret the place.

Verse 27. Thou wilt not leave my soul in hell] ειςαιδου, in hades, that is, the state of separate spirits, or the state of the dead. Hades was a general term among the Greek writers, by which they expressed this state; and this HADES was Tartarus to the wicked, and Elysium to the good. See the explanation of the word in the notes, See Clarke on Mt 11:23.

To see corruption.] Dust thou art, and unto dust thou shalt return, was a sentence pronounced on man after the fall: therefore this sentence could be executed on none but those who were fallen; but Jesus, being conceived without sin, neither partook of human corruption, nor was involved in the condemnation of fallen human nature; consequently, it was impossible for his body to see corruption; and it could not have undergone the temporary death, to which it was not naturally liable, had it not been for the purpose of making an atonement. It was therefore impossible that the human nature of our Lord could be subject to corruption: for though it was possible that the soul and it might be separated for a time, yet, as it had not sinned, it was not liable to dissolution; and its immortality was the necessary consequence of its being pure from transgression.

Verse 28. Thou hast made known to me the ways of life] That is, the way from the region of death, or state of the dead and separate spirits; so that I shall resume the same body, and live the same kind of life, as I had before I gave up my life for the sin of the world.