Acts 13:1

τινες omitted with אABD. Unrepresented in Vulg.

1. ἦσαν δὲ ἐν Ἀντιοχείᾳ κατὰ τὴν οὖσαν ἐκκλησίαν, now there were at Antioch in the Church which was there.

We now come to the history of those three great journeys which the Apostle of the Gentiles undertook in his special work. It is fitting that the point of departure should be Antioch, the city in which Gentiles had first in large numbers been joined to the Church, and where as yet there had risen no difficulty about the way in which they were received.

προφῆται καὶ διδάσκαλοι, prophets and teachers. Cf. Acts 2:17. The words of Joel were now to receive a wider fulfilment.

We see from the ‘Teaching of the Twelve Apostles,’ chap. 13 that these two classes of instructors became recognized in the Church, πᾶς δὲ προφήτης�, θέλων καθῆσαι πρὸς ὑμᾶς, ἄξιός ἐστι τῆς τροφῆς αὐτοῦ, ὡς αὔτως διδάσκαλος άληθινός ἐστιν ἄξιος καὶ αὐτός, ὥσπερ ὁ ἐργάης, τῆς τροφῆς αὐτοῦ.

Συμεὼν ὁ καλούμενος Νίγερ, Simeon that was called Niger. The first name points out the man as of Jewish origin, and the second is a Latin adjective = black, which may have been assumed, or given to him, as a name from his dark complexion. Jews were, and are still, in the habit of having another name beside their national one, for use when they mixed among foreign nations.

Λούκιος ὁ Κυρηναῖος, Lucius of Cyrene. This name is Latin, though his birthplace or home may indicate that he was one of the Jews who abounded in Cyrene and other parts of northern Africa. Perhaps he is the person mentioned Romans 16:21.

Μαναήν, Manaen, i.e. Menahem. The name is Jewish, and is found in Josephus (Ant. xv. 10. 5) as the name of an Essene who foretold that Herod the Great would become king. It may well be that the name became, when the prophecy had received its fulfilment, a favourite one among those who were attached to or favoured the rulers of the Herodian family.

Ἡρώδου τοῦ τετράρχου σύντροφος, the foster-brother of Herod the tetrarch. The Vulg. gives ‘collectaneus.’ Herod the tetrarch (Antipas) had a brother Archelaus by the same mother. Manaen would hardly be said to have ‘been brought up with’ (as A.V.) one brother and not with the other.

The various connections and nationalities of the men who are here named are worthy to be noticed when we reflect on the work which was to have its beginning from Antioch. One a Cypriote, another a Cyrenian, another a Jew, but from his double name accustomed to mix among non-Jews, one a connection of the Idumean house of Herod, and Saul, the heaven-appointed Apostle of the Gentiles,—the list may be deemed in some sort typical of ‘all the world,’ into which the Gospel was now to go forth.