Page:Lives of the apostles of Jesus Christ (1836).djvu/168

 seemed to be indued with the power of calling down the vengeance of God at will, and appeared to be persons too high and awful for common men to be familiar with. Yet the number of the church members, both men and women, continued to enlarge, and the attendance of the people to increase, so that there was no place which would accommodate the vast crowd of hearers and beholders, except the great porch of Solomon, already described, where the apostles daily met the church and the people, to teach and strengthen them, and to work the cures which their Master had so often wrought. So high was the reputation of the apostles, and so numerous were those who came to solicit the favor of their healing power, for themselves or friends, that all could not get access to them even in the vast court of the temple which they occupied, insomuch that they brought the sick into the streets, and laid them on beds and couches, along the path which the apostles were expected to pass, that at least the shadow of Peter, passing by, might overshadow some of them. Nor was this wonderful fame and admiration confined to Jerusalem; for as the news was spread abroad by the pilgrims returning from the pentecost, there came also a multitude out of the cities round about Jerusalem, bringing sick folks and those who were affected by evil spirits, and they were healed, every one.

Mingle familiarly with them.—Com. trans., "join himself to them," which conveys a totally erroneous idea, since all their efforts were given to this end, of making as many as possible "join themselves to them." The context (verse 14,) shows that their numbers were largely increased by such additions. "Yet no one of the common members ([Greek: hoi loipoi]) dared mingle familiarly ([Greek: kollasthai]) with them; but the people held them in great reverence." Acts v. 13.

Met the church and people.—This distinction may not seem very obvious in a common reading of the Acts, but in v. 11, it is very clearly drawn. "Great fear was upon the whole church and on all the hearers of these things." And throughout the chapter, a nice discrimination is made between [Greek: ho laos], (ho laos,) "the people," or "the congregation," and [Greek: hê ekklêsia], (he ekklesia,) "the church." See Kuinoel in v. 13, 14.

The shadow of Peter.—This is one of a vast number of passages which show that high and perfectly commanding pre-eminence of this apostolic chief. The people evidently considered Peter as concentrating all the divine and miraculous power in his own person, and had no idea at all of obtaining benefit from anything that the minor apostles could do. In him, alone, they saw the manifestations of divine power and authority;—he spoke and preached and healed, and judged and doomed, while the rest had nothing to do but assent and aid. Peter, then, was great pastor of the church, and it is every way desirable that over-zealous Protestants would find some better reason for opposing so palpable a fact, than simply that Papists support it.

THEIR SECOND SEIZURE AND TRIAL.

The triumphant progress of the new sect, however, was not unnoticed by those who had already taken so decided a stand against it. The Sadducees, who had so lately come out against them,