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Acts 7:1-3. Then said the high-priest — Who was president of the council, and, as such, the mouth of the court; Are these things so? — Are they as these witnesses have deposed? for thou art permitted to speak for thyself, and make thy defence. And he said — Stephen had been accused of blasphemy against Moses, and even against God; and of speaking against the temple and the law, threatening that Jesus would destroy the one and change the other. In answer to this accusation, rehearsing, as it were, the articles of his historical creed, he speaks of God with high reverence, and a grateful sense of a long series of acts of goodness to the Israelites; and of Moses with great respect, on account of his important and honourable employments under God; of the temple with regard, as being built to the honour of God; yet not with such superstition as the Jews; putting them in mind, that no temple could comprehend God. And he was going on, no doubt, when he was interrupted by their clamour, to speak to the last point, the destruction of the temple, and the change of the law by Christ. The sum of his discourse is this: I acknowledge the glory of God revealed to the fathers, Acts 7:2; the calling of Moses, Acts 7:34, &c.; the dignity of the law, Acts 7:8; Acts 7:38; Acts 7:44; the holiness of this place, Acts 7:7; Acts 7:45; Acts 7:47. And, indeed, the law is more ancient than the temple; the promise more ancient than the law. For God showed himself the God of Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and their children, freely, Acts 7:2, &c., 9, &c., 17, &c., 32, 34, 45; and they showed faith and obedience to God, Acts 7:4; Acts 7:20, &c., 23; particularly by their regard for the law, Acts 7:8, and the promised land, Acts 7:16. Meantime God never confined his presence to this one place, or to the observers of the law. For he hath been acceptably worshipped, before the law was given, or the temple built, and out of this land, Acts 7:2; Acts 7:9; Acts 7:33; Acts 7:44. And that our fathers and their posterity were not tied down to this land, their various sojournings, Acts 7:4, &c., 14, 29, 44, and exile, Acts 7:43, show. But you and your fathers have always been evil, Acts 7:9; have withstood Moses, Acts 7:25, &c., 39, &c.; have despised the land, Acts 7:39; forsaken God, Acts 7:40, &c.; superstitiously honoured the temple, Acts 7:48; resisted God and his Spirit, Acts 7:50; killed the prophets, and the Messiah himself, Acts 7:51; and kept not the law, for which ye contend, Acts 7:53. therefore God is not bound to you, much less to you alone. And, truly, this solemn testimony of Stephen is most worthy of his character, as a man full of the Holy Ghost, and of faith, and power: in which, though he does not advance so many regular propositions, contradictory to those of his adversaries, yet he closely and nervously answers them all. Nor can we doubt but he would, from these premises, have drawn inferences touching the destruction of the temple, the abrogation of the Mosaic law, the punishment of that rebellious people, and, above all, touching Jesus of Nazareth, the true Messiah, had not his discourse been interrupted by the clamours of the multitude, stopping their ears and rushing upon him. Men, brethren, and fathers — All who are here present, whether ye are my equals in years, or of more advanced age. The word which, in this and many other places, is rendered men, is a mere expletive. The God of glory — The glorious God; appeared to Abraham before he dwelt in Charran — Therefore Abraham knew God long before he was in this land. And he said, Get thee out of thy country — Depart from this thy native country, which is become idolatrous; and from thy kindred — Who are now alienated from my worship; and come into the land — A remote land; which I shall show thee — And to which, by my extraordinary interposition, I will guide thee; though at present thou dost not know even its situation, much less the way leading to it. See note on Genesis 12:2.

Acts 7:4-5. Then came he out of the land of the Chaldeans — Strange as the command which was given him might seem, he, with all submission, readily obeyed it; and dwelt in Charran — Namely, for several years, having been led thither by the divine conduct, and not immediately receiving a signal to proceed any further. And from thence — After his father died, by another call; he (God) removed him into this land — The land of Canaan. And yet, upon his coming into it, he gave him none inheritance — But he was a stranger and sojourner in it; no, not so much as to set his foot on — Or a piece of land which he might cover with the sole of his foot: for the field mentioned, Acts 7:16, he did not receive by a divine donation, but bought it; yet he promised — At sundry times; that he would give it to him for a possession — Which promise Abraham firmly believed that God would fulfil; and to his seed after him, when as yet he had no child — And, humanly speaking, it was not likely he ever should have one: but his faith triumphed over all these seeming difficulties, and he confidently trusted in the power, and love, and faithfulness of God to make his word good.

Acts 7:6-8. And God spake, that his seed should sojourn in a strange land — When God had brought Abraham into this country, he did not keep him and his posterity here till the time when they were to enter upon the possession of it, in consequence of this divine grant; but, on the contrary, God informed him in a vision that his seed should be strangers in a foreign land, and that they among whom they sojourned should bring them into bondage — Should make them slaves; and entreat them evil — Use them with great cruelty; and that these events, with the circumstances preparatory to them, should extend themselves to the full period of four hundred years. See note on Genesis 15:13. And the nation to whom they shall be in bondage — By which they shall be enslaved; will I judge, said God — I will assuredly punish with righteous and tremendous severity; and after that shall they come forth — Namely, out of that land; and serve me in this place — In this land, erecting a temple for the performance of my worship here. He gave him the covenant of circumcision — See notes on Genesis 17:10-14. And so Abraham begat Isaac — After the covenant was given, of which circumcision was the seal.

Acts 7:9-10. And the patriarchs, moved with envy — The rest of the twelve sons of Jacob, though their relation to such holy ancestors might have taught them a much better lesson; yet, influenced by envy at the superior regard which Jacob showed to his favourite son, most inhumanly sold Joseph — Their brother; into Egypt — Where he became a slave, and suffered a great variety of calamities; but God was with him — In the midst of them, supporting him, though he was not in this land, and rendering that country a scene of very glorious providences toward him: for by these things God was working, in a mysterious and surprising manner, for the accomplishment of the prediction before mentioned. From what Stephen relates of the story of Joseph, it was obvious for the members of the council to infer that the greatest favourites of Heaven might suffer by the envy of those who were called the Israel of God; and might be exalted by him after having been rejected by them: a thought worthy of their consideration with respect to Jesus; but prudence would not allow Stephen, in the beginning of his defence, to say expressly what they could not have borne to hear; for that they could not, appears by the manner in which they resented his application of these premises, when, he was drawing toward a conclusion. And delivered him out of all his afflictions — To which he was exposed in consequence of his integrity and piety; and gave him favour and wisdom — That is, favour on account of his distinguished wisdom; in the sight of Pharaoh, who made him governor over Egypt — Committing all things in the palace, as well as elsewhere, to his direction and management. Thus did God, in the course of his providence, wonderfully exalt this despised Joseph, whom his brethren (then the whole house of Israel) had most outrageously insulted and abused, and even sold for a slave. And thus, Stephen insinuated, hath God exalted Jesus, whom ye treated as a slave, insulted, and abused, scourged, and hanged on a tree.

Acts 7:11. Now there came a dearth — According to the prediction of Joseph, when the seven preceding years of extraordinary plenty were past, which he had also predicted; over all the land of Egypt and Chanaan — A calamity which reduced the latter country to such distress, that, fruitful as it had generally been, our fathers found no sustenance — Or, not what was sufficient to support themselves and their families. But Jacob, hearing that there was corn in Egypt — Ordered his sons to go and fetch a supply from thence; and sent our fathers first — Namely, the ten without Benjamin. And at the second time — That they went, when Benjamin accompanied them; Joseph was made known to his brethren — Of which see on Genesis 44:1-15. And, as the matter was immediately made public, Joseph’s kindred — Greek, το γενος, his descent, or race, was discovered to Pharaoh, of which he had not been informed before. Then sent Joseph, and called his father — With Pharaoh’s full consent; and all his kindred — Now become numerous, amounting in the whole even to threescore and fifteen souls — So the Seventy interpreters, whom Stephen follows: one son and a grandson of Manasseh, and three children of Ephraim, being added to the seventy persons, mentioned Genesis 46:27. So Bengelius.

Acts 7:15-16. Jacob went down into Egypt, and died — After having been supported there about seventeen years, by the filial gratitude and tenderness of his son Joseph; and our fathers — The patriarch’s children also ended their lives in the same country; and were carried over into Sychem — That is, as Jacob was immediately carried, with solemn funeral pomp and procession, to be buried in the cave of Machpelah, with Abraham and Isaac, (Genesis 50:13,) so the patriarchs also, having been embalmed, and put into coffins, in Egypt, (Genesis 50:26,) were, at the return of Israel from thence, carried over to Sychem, and laid in the sepulchre — Made in that field which Jacob bequeathed to Joseph, as a peculiar legacy; he having first, as Abraham had done in a like case, bought it for a sum of money, (that is, for one hundred pieces of silver,) of the sons of Emmor, the father of Sychem — From whom, in particular, the place was named; and the Amorites having afterward seized it, Jacob had by force recovered it out of their hands. See notes on Genesis 48:22; Joshua 24:32. It seems that St. Stephen, rapidly running over so many circumstances of history, had not leisure (nor was it needful, where they were so well known) to recite them all distinctly. Therefore he here contracts into one two different sepulchres, places, and purchases, so as, in the former history, to name the buyer, omitting the seller; in the latter, to name the seller, omitting the buyer. Abraham bought a burying-place of the children of Heth, Genesis 23. There Jacob was buried. Jacob bought a field of the children of Hamor. There Joseph was buried. You see here how St. Stephen contracts these two purchases into one. This concise manner of speaking, strange as it seems to us, was common among the Hebrews: particularly when, in a case notoriously known, the speaker mentioned but part of the story, and left the rest, which would have interrupted the current of his discourse, to be supplied in the mind of the hearer. And laid in the sepulchre that Abraham bought — The first land which these strangers bought was for a sepulchre. They sought for a country in heaven. Perhaps the whole sentence might be rendered thus: So Jacob went down into Egypt and died, he and our fathers, and were carried over into Shechem, and laid by the sons [that is, descendants] of Hamor, the father of Shechem, in the sepulchre that Abraham bought for a sum of money. So Bengelius and Wesley.

Acts 7:17-21. When the time of the promise drew nigh — That is, the time for the accomplishment of the promise; which God had sworn to Abraham — Concerning the multiplication of his seed; see note on Genesis 22:16-17; the people grew, &c. — Became very numerous in Egypt, notwithstanding that they were under great oppression there; till another king arose — Probably of another family; which knew not Joseph — And had no regard to his memory. The same dealt subtly with our kindred — Formed crafty and treacherous designs against them; and evil-entreated our fathers — Used them in a most injurious and barbarous way, lest in time they should become too powerful; so that — In obedience to a most inhuman order, which he published; they cast out their young children — Exposed them to perish by hunger or wild beasts; or cast them into the river Nile; to the end they might not live — That they might be cut off from being a people, and their very race become quite extinct. In which afflictive and persecuting, but seasonable time — When our fathers were reduced to this miserable state; Moses was born — The person intended by God to be the instrument of his people’s deliverance; and was exceeding fair — Greek, αστειος τω Θεω, fair to God, as the margin reads it. The words, being a Hebraism, are only an emphatical expression, to denote Moses’s extraordinary beauty, and might be not unfitly rendered divinely beautiful, the name of God being often introduced to express such things as were extraordinary in their kind. So in the Hebrew, what we translate great wrestlings, (Genesis 30:8,) is wrestlings of God; goodly cedars, (Psalm 80:10,) are cedars of God; great mountains, (Psalm 36:6,) are mountains of God. This then agrees with what is said of Moses, (Exodus 2:2,) that he was a goodly child; and with the account which Josephus gives of him, who says, “that when he was but three years old, his extraordinary beauty was such, that it struck every one that saw him; and as they carried him about, persons would leave their work to look at him.” See Grotius and Whitby. And when he was cast out — Was thus exposed to perish, the providence of God so ordered it, that Pharaoh’s daughter took him up — Being moved with pity at the sight of him; and nourished him — With a purpose of adopting him; for her own son — By which means, being designed for a kingdom, he had all those advantages of education, which he could not have had if he had not been exposed. “All these extraordinary circumstances, relating to the birth, preservation, education, genius, and character of Moses, serve to aggravate the crime of Israel in rejecting him, when he offered himself to them as a deliverer under so many advantages, and when Providence had so wonderfully interested itself in his favour.” — Doddridge.

Acts 7:22. Moses was learned in all the wisdom of the Egyptians — Which was then celebrated in all the world, and for many ages after. Geography, geometry, arithmetic, astronomy, natural history, physic, and hieroglyphics, are all mentioned by ancient writers as branches of Egyptian literature. Several ancient testimonies to the extraordinary learning of Moses may be seen in Philo, Justin Martyr, Origen, and Clemens Alexandrinus. And was mighty in words — Deep, solid, weighty, though not of a ready utterance. “It expresses,” says Doddridge, “such a weight and solidity in his counsels and speeches, as may be very consistent with the want of a flowing elocution;” and in deeds — Referring to the astonishing miracles which God wrought by him. We may observe here, that it must have been a great piece of self-denial, such as none but a lover of learning, and one who has made some progress in it, can understand, for a person of such a genius and education as Moses, in the prime of life, to leave the polite court of Egypt, and live as a retired shepherd in the Arabian desert.