Acts 4:10

Be it known unto you all, and to all the people of Israel, that by the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, whom ye crucified, whom God raised from the dead, even by him doth this man stand here before you whole.

EXPOSITORY (ENGLISH BIBLE)

Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers

(10) By the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, whom ye crucified.—The boldness of the declaration was startling. He does not shrink now from confessing the Nazarene as the Messiah. He presses home the fact that, though Pilate had given the formal sentence, it was they who had crucified their King. He proclaims that He has been raised from the dead, and is still as a Power working to heal as when on earth.

Matthew Henry's Concise Commentary

4:5-14 Peter being filled with the Holy Ghost, would have all to understand, that the miracle had been wrought by the name, or power, of Jesus of Nazareth, the Messiah, whom they had crucified; and this confirmed their testimony to his resurrection from the dead, which proved him to be the Messiah. These rulers must either be saved by that Jesus whom they had crucified, or they must perish for ever. The name of Jesus is given to men of every age and nation, as that whereby alone believers are saved from the wrath to come. But when covetousness, pride, or any corrupt passion, rules within, men shut their eyes, and close their hearts, in enmity against the light; considering all as ignorant and unlearned, who desire to know nothing in comparison with Christ crucified. And the followers of Christ should act so that all who converse with them, may take knowledge that they have been with Jesus. That makes them holy, heavenly, spiritual, and cheerful, and raises them above this world.

Barnes' Notes on the Bible

Be it known ... - Peter might have evaded the question, or he might have resorted to many excuses and subterfuges (Calvin), if he had been desirous of avoiding this inquiry. But it was a noble opportunity for vindicating the honor of his Lord and Master. It was a noble opportunity also for repairing the evil which he had done by his guilty denial of his Lord. Although, therefore, this frank and open avowal was attended with danger, and although it was in the presence of the great and the mighty, yet he chose to state fully and clearly his conviction of the truth. Never was there an instance of greater boldness, and never could there be a more striking illustration of the fitness of the name which the Lord Jesus gave him, that of a rock, John 1:42; Matthew 16:17-18. The timid, trembling, yielding, and vacillating Simon; he who just before was terrified by a servant-girl, and who on the lake was afraid of sinking, is now transformed into the manly, decided, and firm Cephas, fearless before the Great Council of the nation, and in an unwavering tone asserting the authority of him whom he had just before denied, and whom they had just before put to death. It is not possible to account for this change except on the supposition that this religion is true. Peter had no worldly motive to actuate him. He had no prospect of wealth or fame by this. Even the hopes of honor and preferment which the apostles had cherished before the death of Jesus, and which might have been supposed to influence them then, were now abandoned by them. Their Master had died, and all their hopes of human honor and power had been buried in his grave. Nothing but the conviction of the truth could have made this change, and transformed this timid disciple to a bold and uncompromising apostle.

By the name - By the authority or power, Acts 3:6.

Of Jesus Christ - The union of these two names would be particularly offensive to the Sanhedrin. They denied that Jesus was the Christ, or the Messiah; Peter, by the use of the word "Christ," affirmed that he was. In the language then used, it would be, "By the name of Jesus, the Messiah."

Of Nazareth - Lest there should be any mistake about his meaning, he specified that he referred to the despised Nazarene; to him who had just been put to death, as they supposed, covered with infamy. Christians little regard the epithets of opprobrium which may be affixed to themselves or to their religion.

Whom ye crucified - There is emphasis in all the expressions that Peter uses. He had before charged the people with the crime of having put him to death, Acts 2:23; Acts 3:14-15. But he now had the opportunity, contrary to all expectation, of urging the charge with still greater force on the rulers themselves, on the very council which had condemned him and delivered him to Pilate. It was a remarkable providence that an opportunity was thus afforded of urging this charge in the presence of the Sanhedrin, and of proclaiming to them the necessity of repentance. Little did they imagine, when they condemned the Lord Jesus, that this charge would be so soon urged. This is one of the instances in which God takes the wise in their own craftiness, Job 5:13. They had arraigned the apostles; they demanded their authority for what they had done; and thus they had directly opened the way, and invited them to the serious and solemn charge which Peter here urges against them.

Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary

10. Be it known unto you … and to all the people of Israel—as if emitting a formal judicial testimony to the entire nation through its rulers now convened.

by the name of Jesus, &c.—(See on [1948]Ac 3:13, &c.).

even by him doth this man stand before you whole—for from Ac 4:14 it appears that the healed man was at that moment before their eyes.

Matthew Poole's Commentary

Be it known unto you all, and to all the people of Israel; the apostles are not dismayed, but make their boldness, spoken of Acts 4:13, to appear; they preach Christ to all of them, and wish they could make him known to all others.

Jesus Christ of Nazareth: see Acts 2:22.

Whom God raised; i.e. God the Father: our Surety was discharged by God himself, who had laid him in the prison of the grave for our debts.

This man stand here before you whole; the lame man that was made whole being present, and an ocular demonstration of the miracle wrought upon him.

Gill's Exposition of the Entire Bible

Be it known unto you all,.... The members of the sanhedrim:

and to all the people of Israel; who might hear of this affair; for the apostle was not ashamed of what he had done, nor of the person in whose name he had done it:

that by the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth; by calling, on that name, and by making use of it, and by the power and authority of Jesus Christ, who by way of contempt was called the

Nazarene: whom ye crucified; for though Pilate delivered him to be crucified, and the Roman soldiers did crucify him, yet this was at the request and instigation of the chief priests, Scribes, and elders; and therefore it is ascribed to them, who were bent upon his death; and no other would satisfy them, but the shameful and painful death of the cross:

whom God raised from the dead; of which the apostles were witnesses, having seen him and conversed with him after his resurrection; and this was the doctrine they were sent to publish, and for which they were apprehended and detained in custody; but this did not deter them from preaching it, no, not before the sanhedrim; which was an instance of great courage and faithfulness: and this is the rather mentioned; to show, that it was not by the name of one that was dead, but of one that was alive, that this cure was performed; as well as to observe to them, that their efforts against Christ were vain and fruitless:

even by him doth this man stand here before you whole; from whence it appears, as well as from Acts 4:18 that the man that was healed, was now present: and either he was laid hold on, and detained in custody with the apostles, in hope to discover fraud if they could; or hearing that the apostles were before the sanhedrim, and examining on his account, might come of himself, in order to attest and prove the matter of fact, and to vindicate them.

Geneva Study Bible

{4} Be it known unto you all, and to all the people of Israel, that by the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, whom ye crucified, whom God raised from the dead, even by him doth this man stand here before you whole.

(4) He is indeed a true shepherd that teaches his sheep to rest upon Christ alone as upon one that is not dead, but has conquered death, and has all rule in his own hands.

EXEGETICAL (ORIGINAL LANGUAGES)

Expositor's Greek Testament

Acts 4:10. St. Peter does not hesitate to refer his judges to the same passage of Scripture which a few short weeks before Jesus of Nazareth had quoted to a deputation of the Sanhedrim. In that case too the question put to Jesus had been as to the authority by which He acted, Matthew 21:42, Mark 12:10, Luke 21:17. It is possible that the words from Psalm 118:22 were already regarded as Messianic, from the fact that the people had welcomed Jesus at His public entry into Jerusalem with part of a verse of the same Psalm, Acts 4:26, Edersheim, Jesus the Messiah, ii., 368. Moreover, the passage, Isaiah 28:16, which forms the connecting link between the Psalm and St. Peter’s words, both here and in his First Epistle (1 Peter 2:7, cf. Romans 9:33; Romans 10:11), was interpreted as Messianic, apparently by the Targums, and undoubtedly by Rashi in his Commentary, cf. also Wetstein on Matthew 21:42; Edersheim, u. s., ii., 725. In the original meaning of the Psalm Israel is the stone rejected by the builders, i.e., by the heathen, the builders of this world’s empires, or the expression may refer to those in Israel who despised the small beginnings of a dawning new era (Delitzsch); but however this may be, in the N.T. the builders are the heads and representatives of Israel, as is evident from our Lord’s use of the verse, and also by St. Peter’s words here, “you the builders,” R.V. But that which the Psalmist had spoken of the second Temple, that which was a parable of the history of Israel, had its complete and ideal fulfilment in Him Who, despised and rejected of men, had become the chief corner-stone of a spiritual Temple, in whom both Jew and Gentile were made one (1 Corinthians 3:11, Ephesians 2:20).—ἐσταυρώσατε: mentioned not merely to remind them of their fault, cf. Acts 2:36, but perhaps also that they might understand how vain it was to fight against God (Calvin).—ἐν τούτῳ: “in him,” or “in this name” R. V. margin. For the former Wendt decides, although in the previous verse he takes ἐν τίνι as neuter; so too Page and Holtzmann. On the other hand Rendall (so De Wette, Weiss) adopts the latter rendering, while admitting that the reference to Jesus Himself is quite possible, as in Acts 4:12.—ἐνώπ. ὑμῶν: Hebraism, characteristic of St. Luke in his Gospel and in the Acts. The expression is never used in Matthew and Mark, and only once in John, John 20:30, but thirty-one times in the Hebraistic Apocalypse—frequent in LXX, but not found in classical or Hellenistic Greek, although τὰ ἐνώπια in Homer, Blass, in loco, and Grammatik des N. G., p. 125. The word is also found on papyri twice, so Deissmann, Neue Bibelstudien, p. 40.

Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges

10. by the name of Jesus] Read in the name, as before.

whom ye crucified] i.e. by the Roman soldiers. So (2 Samuel 12:9) David is said to have killed Uriah, though it is added “by the sword of the children of Ammon.”

even by him] The Greek seems rather to refer back to the former clause of the verse, and to be better rendered even in this (name).

Bengel's Gnomen

Acts 4:10. Γνωστὸν, known) This Peter, as a great herald (preacher), spoke with his voice raised. He expresses the whole in a brief compass.—ὑμῖν, unto you) rulers.

Pulpit Commentary

Verse 10. - In (the name) for by, A.V., and again, in (him) for by, A.V.; but if ἐν τίνι is rightly rendered by what means, ἐν τῷ ὀνόματι and ἐν τούτῳ ought to be rendered as in the A.V., by. Be it known unto you all, etc. St. Peter skillfully excuses himself from any presumption in preaching to the rulers by making his words the direct and necessary answer to their inquiry. Jesus Christ of Nazareth (see Acts 3:6, note). Whom ye crucified, whom God raised. With what wonderful conciseness and force are the great doctrines of the gospel condensed into a few words! The human nature, the mediatorial glory, the humiliating but atoning death, the glorious resurrection (a cardinal point in all the apostolic preaching), and the present might of Christ to save his people on earth, are all set out in hail a dozen pregnant words. Even in him. The apostle thus passes from the Name to him whose Name it was. Before you. How could they deny what was actually before their eyes? Acts 4:10