Tertullian — Commentary on Scripture

Acts 6:1

A brother heretic emerged in Nicolaus. He was one of the seven deacons who were appointed in the Acts of the Apostles. He affirms that Darkness was seized with a concupiscence-and, indeed, a foul and obscene one-after Light: out of this permixture it is a shame to say what fetid and unclean (combinations arose).

Pseudo-Tertullian Against All Heresies

Acts 6:15

But he was Moses still, even when he was not visible. So also Stephen had already put on the appearance of an angel, although they were none other than his human knees which bent beneath the stoning.

On the Resurrection of the Flesh

Acts 7:2

The exuberance of the Scythians fertilizes the Persians; the Phoenicians gush out into Africa; the Phrygians give birth to the Romans; the seed of the Chaldeans is led out into Egypt; subsequently, when transferred thence, it becomes the Jewish race. So, too, the posterity of Hercules, in like wise, proceed to occupy the Peloponnesus for the behoof of Temenus.

On the Pallium

Acts 7:6

For whence was Noah "found righteous," if in his case the righteousness of a natural law had not preceded? Whence was Abraham accounted "a friend of God," if not on the ground of equity and righteousness, (in the observance) of a natural law? Whence was Melchizedek named "priest of the most high God," if, before the priesthood of the Levitical law, there were not levites who were wont to offer sacrifices to God? For thus, after the above-mentioned patriarchs, was the Law given to Moses, at that (well-known) time after their exode from Egypt, after the interval and spaces of four hundred years. In fact, it was after Abraham's "four hundred and thirty years" that the Law was given.

An Answer to the Jews

Acts 7:38

" This was, indeed, the Creator's customary region. It was proper that the Word should there appear in body, where He had aforetime, wrought in a cloud.

Against Marcion Book IV

Acts 7:38

" And when the gold out of the necklaces of the women and the rings of the men had been wholly smelted by fire, and there had come forth a calf-like head, to this figment Israel with one consent (abandoning God) gave honour, saying, "These are the gods who brought us from the land of Egypt." For thus, in the later times in which kings were governing them, did they again, in conjunction with Jeroboam, worship golden kine, and groves, and enslave themselves to Baal.

An Answer to the Jews

Acts 7:39

How, therefore, can such a hydra of delinquencies fail to offend the Lord, the Disapprover of evils? Is it not manifest that it was through impatience that Israel himself also always failed in his duty toward God, from that time when, forgetful of the heavenly arm whereby he had been drawn out of his Egyptian affliction, he demands from Aaron "gods as his guides; "when he pours down for an idol the contributions of his gold: for the so necessary delays of Moses, while he met with God, he had borne with impatience.

Of Patience

Acts 7:39

For, withal, according to the memorial records of the divine Scriptures, the people of the Jews-that is, the more ancient-quite forsook God, and did degrading service to idols, and, abandoning the Divinity, was surrendered to images; while "the people" said to Aaron, "Make us gods to go before us." And when the gold out of the necklaces of the women and the rings of the men had been wholly smelted by fire, and there had come forth a calf-like head, to this figment Israel with one consent (abandoning God) gave honour, saying, "These are the gods who brought us from the land of Egypt.

An Answer to the Jews

Acts 7:51

What is more manifest than the mystery of this "wood,"-that the obduracy of this world had been sunk in the profundity of error, and is freed in baptism by the "wood" of Christ, that is, of His passion; in order that what had formerly perished through the "tree" in Adam, should be restored through the "tree" in Christ? while we, of course, who have succeeded to, and occupy, the room of the prophets, at the present day sustain in the world that treatment which the prophets always suffered on account of divine religion: for some they stoned, some they banished; more, however, they delivered to mortal slaughter, -a fact which they cannot deny.

An Answer to the Jews

Acts 7:53

For he, too, says that the world was originated by those angels; and sets forth Christ as born of the seed of Joseph, contending that He was merely human, without divinity; affirming also that the Law was given by angels; representing the God of the Jews as not the Lord, but an angel.

Pseudo-Tertullian Against All Heresies

Acts 7:55

He is seen by Stephen, at his martyrdom by stoning, still sitting at the right hand of God [Acts 7:55] where He will continue to sit, until the Father shall make His enemies His footstool. [Hebrews 10:12-13] He will come again on the clouds of heaven, just as He appeared when He ascended into heaven. [Acts 1:11]

Against Praxeas, Chapter 30

Acts 7:55

"He sitteth at the Father's right hand " -not the Father at His own. He is seen by Stephen, at his martyrdom by stoning, still sitting at the right hand of God where He will continue to sit, until the Father shall make His enemies His footstool.

Against Praxeas

Acts 7:59

So also Stephen had already put on the appearance of an angel, although they were none other than his human knees which bent beneath the stoning.

On the Resurrection of the Flesh

Acts 7:59

With this strength of patience, Esaias is cut asunder, and ceases not to speak concerning the Lord; Stephen is stoned, and prays for pardon to his foes. Oh, happy also he who met all the violence of the devil by the exertion of every species of patience! -whom neither the driving away of his cattle nor those riches of his in sheep, nor the sweeping away of his children in one swoop of ruin, nor, finally, the agony of his own body in (one universal) wound, estranged from the patience and the faith which he had plighted to the Lord; whom the devil smote with all his might in vain.

Of Patience

Acts 7:59

Now, then, the epistles of the apostles also are well known. And do we, (you say), in all respects guileless souls and doves merely, love to go astray? I should think from eagerness to live. But let it be so, that meaning departs from their epistles. And yet, that the apostles endured such sufferings, we know: the teaching is clear. This only I perceive in running through the Acts. I am not at all on the search. The prisons there, and the bonds, and the scourges, and the big stones, and the swords, and the onsets by the Jews, and the assemblies of the heathen, and the indictments by tribunes, and the hearing of causes by kings, and the judgment-seats of proconsuls and the name of Caesar, do not need an interpreter. That Peter is struck, that Stephen is overwhelmed by stones, that James is slain as is a victim at the altar, that Paul is beheaded has been written in their own blood. And if a heretic wishes his confidence to rest upon a public record, the archives of the empire will speak, as would the stones of Jerusalem. We read the lives of the Caesars: At Rome Nero was the first who…

Now, then, the epistles of the apostles also are well known. And do we, (you say), in all respects guileless souls and doves merely, love to go astray? I should think from eagerness to live. But let it be so, that meaning departs from their epistles. And yet, that the apostles endured such sufferings, we know: the teaching is clear. This only I perceive in running through the Acts. I am not at all on the search. The prisons there, and the bonds, and the scourges, and the big stones, and the swords, and the onsets by the Jews, and the assemblies of the heathen, and the indictments by tribunes, and the hearing of causes by kings, and the judgment-seats of proconsuls and the name of Caesar, do not need an interpreter. That Peter is struck, that Stephen is overwhelmed by stones, that James is slain as is a victim at the altar, that Paul is beheaded has been written in their own blood. And if a heretic wishes his confidence to rest upon a public record, the archives of the empire will speak, as would the stones of Jerusalem. We read the lives of the Caesars: At Rome Nero was the first who stained with blood the rising faith.

Scorpiace

Acts 8:9

Many attempts were also wrought against the apostles by the sorcerers Simon and Elymas, but the blindness which struck (them) was no enchanter's trick.

A Treatise on the Soul

Acts 8:9

Of these the first of all is Simon Magus, who in the Acts of the Apostles earned a condign and just sentence from the Apostle Peter. He had the hardihood to call himself the Supreme Virtue, that is, the Supreme God; and moreover, (to assert) that the universe had been originated by his angels; that he had descended in quest of an erring dµmon, which was Wisdom; that, in a phantasmal semblance of God, he had not suffered among the Jews, but was as if he had suffered.

Pseudo-Tertullian Against All Heresies

Acts 8:9

For thenceforward Simon Magus, just turned believer, (since he was still thinking somewhat of his juggling sect; to wit, that among the miracles of his profession he might buy even the gift of the Holy Spirit through imposition of hands) was cursed by the apostles, and ejected from the faith. Both he and that other magician, who was with Sergius Paulus, (since he began opposing himself to the same apostles) was mulcted with loss of eyes.

On Idolatry

Acts 8:18

There is the (infamous) Simon of Samaria in the Acts of the Apostles, who chaffered for the Holy Ghost: after his condemnation by Him, and a vain remorse that he and his money must perish together, he applied his energies to the destruction of the truth, as if to console himself with revenge.

A Treatise on the Soul

Acts 8:20

Therefore this man also, who in buying himself has bought the Spirit of Christ, will hear that word, "Your money perish with you, since you have thought that the grace of God is to be had at a price!" Yet who will despise him for being (what he is), a denier? For what says that extorter? Give me money: assuredly that he may not deliver him up, since he tries to sell you nothing else than that which he is going to give you for money.

On Flight in Persecution