Acts 7:40

Act 7:40. Ποίησον—οὗτος, ὃς—αὐτῷ) Exo 32:1, LXX., ἀνάστηθι καὶ ποίησον—οὗτος ὁ ἀνὴρ (Al. ἄνθρωπος), ὃς—αὐτῷ.—ποίησον θεοὺς, make gods) By the verb used the notion in the very noun was refuted: for made gods are not Gods.—οἱ προπορεύσονται, who shall go before) They thought it irksome, by reason of their longing regrets after Egypt, to sit inactive and wait so long.—τί γέγονεν αὐτῷ, what has become of him) whether he is about to return to us, or what he is about to bring with him, and at what time.

Bengel's Gnomon of the New Testament — English translation (T&T Clark, Edinburgh, 1860) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Act 7:40 . προπορεύσονται (Exo 16:3 , Num 11:4-5 ), only elsewhere in N.T., in Luk 1:76 , with which cf. Deu 31:3 . The words in Acts are taken from Exo 32:1 ; Exo 32:23 ; frequent in LXX, 1Ma 9:11 (but see H. and R.), and also in Xen. and Polyb. οὗτος , iste, cf. Act 6:14 , the same anacoluthon as in LXX, Exo 32:23 , so in the Heb., “who brought us up”: no mention of God they ascribed all to Moses (Chrysostom); see Viteau, Le Grec du N. T. , p. 135 (1896).

The Expositor's Greek Testament, edited by W. Robertson Nicoll (1897–1910) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

40. Make us. Though the Jews be turned back divers ways, yet Stephen maketh choice of one notable example above all the rest, of their filthy and detestable treachery, to wit, when they made themselves a calf, that they might worship it instead of God. For there can no more filthy thing be invented than this their unthankfulness. They confess that they were delivered out of Egypt; neither do they deny that this was done by the grace of God and the ministry of Moses; yet, notwithstanding, they reject the author of so great goodness, together with the minister. And under what color? They pretend they cannot tell what is become of Moses. But they know full well that he is in the mount. They saw him with their eyes when he went up thither, until such time as the Lord took him unto himself, by compassing him about with a cloud. Again, they know that Moses is absent for their health’s sake, who had promised that he would return, and bring unto them the law which God should give. He bade them only be quiet a while. They raise mad uproars suddenly within a small time, and without any cause; yet to the end they may cover their madness with the color of some reason, they will have gods present with them, as if God had showed unto them no token of his presence hitherto; but his glory did appear daily in the cloud and pillar of fire. Therefore we see what haste they make to commit idolatry through wicked contempt of God, that I may, in the mean season, omit to declare how filthy and wicked their unthankfulness was, in that they had so soon forgotten those miracles which they ought to have remembered even until the end of the world. Therefore, by this one backsliding, it appeareth sufficiently what a stubborn and rebellious people they were.

Moreover, it was more expedient for the cause which Stephen had in hand, to recite this history of their rebellion than the other. For the people doth quite overthrow the worship of God; they refuse the doctrine of the law; they bring in a strange and profane religion. And this is a notable place, because it pointeth out the fountain from which all manner of superstitions did flow since the beginning, and especially what was the first beginning of making idols; to wit, because man, which is carnal, will, notwithstanding, have God present with him, according to the capacity of his flesh. This is the cause why men were so bold in all ages to make idols. And God doth, indeed, apply himself to our rudeness thus far, that he showeth himself visible, after a sort, under figures; for there were many signs under the law to testify his presence, And he cometh down unto us, even at this day, by baptism and the supper, and also by the external preaching of the word. But men offend two manner of ways in this; for, first, being not content with the means which God hath appointed, they boldly get to themselves new means. This is no small fault, because their fingers itch always to have new inventions without keeping any mean, and so they are not afraid to pass the bounds which God hath appointed them. But there can be no true image of God, save that which he appointed. Therefore, what images soever are reigned and invented by man besides his word, they are false and corrupt.

There is also another vice no less intolerable, that as man’s mind conceiveth nothing of God but that which is gross and earthly, so it translateth all tokens of God’s presence unto the same grossness. Neither doth man delight in those idols only which he himself hath made, but also doth corrupt whatsoever God hath ordained, by wresting it unto a contrary end. God cometh down unto us, indeed, as I have already said, but to this end, that he may lift us up into heaven with him. But we, because we are wholly set upon the earth, will, in like sort, have him in the earth. By this means is his heavenly glory deformed, and that fulfilled altogether which the Israelites say here, Make us gods. For whosoever he be that doth not worship God spiritually, he maketh unto himself a new god; and yet if ye thoroughly weigh all things, the Israelites will not have a god made of set purpose by them, but they think rather that they have the true and eternal God under the shape of the golden calf. For they are ready to offer the appointed sacrifice, and they approve that with their consent which Aaron saith, that those are the gods by whom they were brought out of Egypt. But God pusseth not for those frivolous imaginations; but he complaineth that men put strange gods in his place, so soon as they depart even a very little from his word.

John Calvin's Commentaries (1540-1563) — public domain. Text from the Calvin Translation Society English edition (1840s-50s) via the Christian Classics Ethereal Library (ccel.org). Calvin's coverage is partial (roughly two-thirds of the Bible); uncommented books and verses are honest gaps, never fabricated. The 19th-century editor's footnotes and remarks are omitted so the notes are faithfully Calvin's own voice.

(40) Make us gods.—The speech follows the LXX. and the English version of Exo_32:4 in giving the plural, but it is probable that the Hebrew, Elohim, was used in its ordinary sense as singular in meaning, though plural in form, and that the sin of the Golden Calf was thus a transgression of the Second, and not of the First Commandment.

A Bible Commentary for English Readers, edited by Charles John Ellicott (1878–1897) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

40. saying unto Aaron, Make us gods to go before us] Lit. which shall go before us. The passage is almost word for word the report given in Exo_32:1.

The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges (gen. ed. J. J. S. Perowne; Cambridge University Press, 1878–1918) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Saying unto Aaron, make us gods to go before us,.... This is a proof of their disobedience to the law of Moses, and of their rejection of him, and of the inclination of their hearts to the idolatry of the Egyptians; which shows the gross stupidity, as well as ingratitude of this people, to think that gods could be made; and that those that are made could go before them, be guides unto them, and protectors of them; when they have eyes, but see not, and hands, but handle not, and feet, but walk not:

for as for this Moses; whom they speak of with great contempt, and in a very irreverent way:

which brought us out of the land of Egypt; which they mention not with gratitude, but as reflecting upon him for doing it:

we wot not what is become of him; they thought he was dead, according to the Targum of Jonathan on Exo 32:1 they concluded he was consumed with fire on the mount which flamed with fire. (b) The following story is told by the Jews;

"when Moses went up on high, he said to the Israelites, at the end of forty days, at the beginning of the sixth hour I will come; at the end of forty days came Satan, and disturbed the world; he said to them, where is Moses your master? they answered him, he is gone up on high: he said to them, the sixth hour is come; they took no notice of him; he is dead (says he); they had no regard to him; he showed them the likeness of his bier; then they said to Aaron, "as for this man Moses", &c.''

(b) T. Bab. Sabbat, fol. 89. 1. Vid. Jarchi & Baal Hatturim in Exod. xxxii. 1.

John Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible (1746–1763) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.

40 Saying unto Aaron, Make us gods to go before us: for as for this Moses, which brought us out of the land of Egypt, we wot not what is become of him.

Ver. 40. Make us gods] That is, an image, or representation of God. This was not to keep their promise, Exo 19:8.

John Trapp, A Commentary or Exposition upon All the Books of the Old and New Testament (1647–1656) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Saying unto Aaron - Exo 32:1.

Make us gods - That is, idols.

Albert Barnes' Notes on the Bible (1834–1885) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.

Saying to Aaron, make us gods: forcing him, in a manner, to make them the golden calf, while Moses was receiving the law from God. (Witham)

George Leo Haydock (1774–1849), Haydock's Catholic Family Bible and Commentary, 1859 edition — public domain. Excludes Psalms (Douay-Rheims chapter numbering differs from Protestant) and Deuterocanonical books (Catholic canon only).

Make us gods; according to the Egyptians, who held that there were many gods, and divers degrees of gods; they therefore speak in the plural number.

This Moses: though they confess the great deliverance wrought by Moses’s means, yet how contemptibly do they speak of him!

We wot not what is become of him: they could not but know that Moses was gone up into the mount unto God, at his command, and had not forgotten them, but had left Aaron and Hur to govern them; yet they soon forgot both God and Moses, notwithstanding the large and late experience they had of his wonders: this is left upon record against them, Psa 106:13,21.

Matthew Poole's English Annotations on the Holy Bible (1683–1685) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.

40. This Moses—A phrase of contempt, standing in striking contrast to Stephen’s own, this is that Moses.

Wot—Know.

40. Azotus—The Ashdod of the Old Testament. It stands on the summit of a grassy hill, near the Mediterranean shore, about eighteen miles north of Gaza. It was one of the powerful cities of the old Philistines, made wealthy by being the medium of trade between Asia and Europe across the Mediterranean. This marine town worshipped the fish-god Dagon. It was one of the border towns in the great wars between Syria and Egypt, and hence, being strongly fortified, it was an important objective point. It stood a siege, the longest on record, against Psammetichus. The ancient war between these Philistine coast towns and Judah was in more modern times obliterated, first, by the incoming of Alexander the Great, and, finally, by the overwhelming power of the Romans. Azotus is described as now a small village, with few traces of ancient magnificence.

All the cities—The rapid Philip, skirting along the shore, evangelized (such is the Greek word transferred to English) the cities in line; such as Jamnia, Joppa, Apollonia, Antipatris, etc. This beautiful maritime strip of plain, lying between the sea and the Israelite high lands, dotted with towns, and checkered with gardens and grain-fields, was, in the olden time, the land of the PHILISTINES. These were descendants from Ham (as the Israelites were from Shem) through Mizraim, and so related to the Egyptians. From these Philistines, the Greeks and Romans, unacquainted with Israel in the interior, called the whole country, even to the Jordan and Dead Sea, PALESTINA. The Philistines had possession when Israel departed from Egypt, and Israel marched by a roundabout circuit to the Promised Land to avoid fighting with them. (Exo_13:17.) While the Gospel was limited to Israel, this region is unmentioned in the New Testament. When Christianity began to feel the full force of its Gentile mission, among its earliest incursions, as we here see, was this visit to this beautiful margin of the Mediterranean, followed by numerous others; “as if Christianity,” says Stanley, “already felt its European destiny.”

This Philistine strip extended northward to the Tyrian Ladder; and then commences the similar sea-shore strip of the ancient Canaanites. These were also sons of Ham, through his younger son, Canaan. But the Greeks and Romans called their country PHENICIA, or Palm land, from its plentiful growth of that picturesque tree. Their early cities were Tyre and Sidon. They were celebrated as the inventors of letters, as the boldest of navigators, the richest of manufacturers; but condemned for the grossness of their sensuality and the cruelty of their idolatry, (Moloch worship,) even to human sacrifices. With the Philistines, Israel was ever at war; with the more distant Canaanites or Phenicians, usually at peace.

Cesarea—The Roman capital of Palestine.—A few years before the birth of Christ, almost the entire coast of Palestine, without the indentations that form good harbours, had a point called Strato’s Tower for an insecure landing place. Herod the Great, who was a prince in architecture, a munificent builder of palaces and a founder of cities, resolved to supply the maritime want by placing a great capital at this point. He laid it out in long rectangular streets, lined with structures of white stone, adorned at intervals with stately palaces, and crowned at its summits with splendid temples and royal statues. Josephus pronounced it “a city of palaces!” But noblest of all the works was the harbour. Herod extended a long semicircular wall, like an arm, into the sea, open at the north, to embrace the commerce of the Mediterranean within its sheltering haven. This marine wall was composed of stone, fifty feet long, into a sea sixty feet deep, and the surface of the wall presented a level two hundred feet broad. In honour of his royal master, the Emperor Augustus Cesar, Herod named this city CESAREA. He made it his own royal residence, and the political capital of his realm. The successive Roman procurators of Judea, Pilate, Felix, and Festus, held their residence and courts in Cesarea, under the authority of the great Prefect of all Syria residing at Antioch. Here Paul was two years imprisoned: and here, some years hence, Philip, with his four prophetic daughters, is found by Paul, still true to the cause of Christ. Cesarea afterward became an episcopate, of which Eusebius, the father of Church History, was, in the fourth century, bishop. The Church, though founded by the humble deacon, became renowned in ages of persecution for its confessors and martyrs. It is now a desolation, inhabited by lizards and jackals.

Near the time that Paul was imprisoned at Cesarea, there occurred the tragical event which opened the fatal war which closed with Jerusalem’s destruction. It was a standing strife—Was Cesarea a Jewish or a Greek city? “It is Jewish,” said the Jews, “for it was built by Judaic Herod.” “Those pagan temples,” replied the Greeks, “prove it Gentile.” At length the quarrel grew so fierce that the Greeks, aided by Felix, opened an indiscriminate massacre upon the twenty thousand Jews, and in a few hours not a single Jew remained to question the pure Gentilism of Cesarea.

Daniel D. Whedon (gen. ed.), Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1874–1909) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Which shall go for to go, A.V.; led us forth for brought us, A.V.

The Pulpit Commentary (1880–1919), ed. H.D.M. Spence-Jones & Joseph S. Exell — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Make us gods to go before us - Back into Egypt. Exod. xxxii, 1.

John Wesley, Explanatory Notes Upon the Whole Bible (1754–1765) — public domain. Text via the GEBible commentary corpus.

IDOLATRY IN THE WILDERNESS

40-43. While Moses tarries forty days on the summit of Sinai, complimented as no other man with the very audience of Jehovah, revealing to him the wonderful truth which he wrote in the Bible, the apostatizing myriads of Israel, their faith faltering, turned back to the gods of Egypt, whom they had served in the days of their bondage, constraining Aaron to go back to his former lucrative mechanism and manufacture for them a small golden image of the Egyptian Apis, i. e., the sacred ox, copiously worshipped in Egypt as the representative of the divine attribute of power. This fact of Egyptian idolatry, I saw in the museum in Cairo in the many magnificent statues of the colossal ox.

William B. Godbey, Commentary on the New Testament (1896–1900) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

See notes on verse 38

J. W. McGarvey (with Philip Y. Pendleton), Commentaries on the New Testament (The Fourfold Gospel, 1914; Acts; and the epistles) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.

40 ἐγένετο for γέγονεν with אABC.

40. θεοὺς οἳ προπορεύσονται, gods which shall go before us. The verse is almost exactly in the words of the LXX. of Exo 32:1.

Cambridge Greek Testament for Schools and Colleges (Cambridge University Press, 1896; 21 vols, various authors incl. Carr, Maclear, Plummer, Farrar, Lumby, Moule, M. R. James, Simcox) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

40. προπορ.] As God had done in the pillar of the cloud and fire. The plural is not (as Kuin.) put for θεόν, but is used categorically: not perhaps without implying also, that the only two religions were, the worship of Jehovah, and that of idols, a multitude. The plural is used by Aaron, see above.

In the οὗτος may be implied, as Meyer suggests, ‘who was the strong opponent of idolatry.’

Henry Alford, The Greek Testament (1849–1861) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Shall go before us. As symbols to be born before them on the march. Compare Neh 9:18.

Marvin R. Vincent, Word Studies in the New Testament (1887–1900) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.