Acts 1:12

τότε : frequent in Acts and in St. Luke's Gospel, but most frequent in St. Matthew; on its use see Grimm-Thayer, and Blass, Gramm. des N. G., p. 270. ὑπέστρεψαν : a word characteristic of Luke both in his Gospel and in Acts, occurring in the former over twenty times, in the latter ten or eleven times. Only in three places elsewhere, not at all in the Gospels, but see Mark 14:40 (Moulton and Geden, sub v.); Friedrich, ubi supra, p. 8. On the Ascension see additional note at end of chapter. τοῦ καλ. Ἐλαιῶνος : ubi captus et vinctus fuerat. Wetstein. Although St. Matthew and St. Mark both speak of the Mount of Olives they do not say τοῦ καλ. (neither is the formula found in John 8:1). It is therefore probable that St. Luke speaks as he does as one who was a stranger to Jerusalem, or, as writing to one who was so. Blass, ubi supra, pp. 32, 84, contends that Ἐλαιῶνος ought to give place to ἐλαιῶν, which he also reads in Luke 19:29; Luke 21:37 (W.H [102] Ἐλαιῶν, and in Luke 19:37; Luke 22:39, τῶν Ἐλαιῶν, in each case as genitive of ἐλαία), the former word being found only here and in Josephus, Ant., vii., 9, 2. But it is found in all the MSS. in this passage, although falso. cum cæt., says Blass. Blass would thus get rid of the difficulty of regarding Ἐλαιών as if used in Luke 19:29; Luke 21:37 as an indeclinable noun, whilst here he would exchange its genitive for ἐλαιῶν. Deisstmann, however, is not inclined to set aside the consensus of authoritities for Ἐλαιῶνος, and he regards ἐλαιών in the two passages above as a lax use of the nominative case. As the genitive of ἐλαιών it would correspond to the Latin Olivetum (so Vulgate), an olive-orchard; cf. ἄμπελος and ἀμπελών in N.T., the termination ών in derivative nouns indicating a place set with trees of the kind designated by the primitive. for instances cf. Grimm-Thayer, sub Ἐλαιών, but see on the other hand Deissmann, Neue Bibelstudien, p. 36 ff. With regard to the parallel between our verse and Josephus, Ant., vii., 9, 2, it is evident that even if St. Luke had read Josephus he was not dependent upon him, for he says here τοῦ καλ. just as in his Gospel he had written τὸ καλ., probably giving one or more popular names by which the place was known; Gloël, Galaterbrief, p. 65 (see also on the word W.H [103], ii., Appendix, p. 165; Plummer, St. Luke, p. 445; and Winer-Schmiedel, p. 93). σαββάτου ἔχον ὁδόν, not ἀπέχον : the distance is represented as something which the mountain has, Meyer-Wendt; cf. Luke 24:13. There is no real discrepancy between this and the statement of St. Luke's Gospel that our Lord led His disciples ἕως πρὸς Βηθανίαν, Luke 24:50, a village which was more than double a sabbath day's journey, fifteen furlongs from Jerusalem. But if the words in St. Luke, l. c., mean “over against Bethany,” ἕως πρός (so Feine, Eine vorkanonische Uberlieferung des Lucas, p. 79, and Nösgen, Apostelgeschichte, p. 80; see also Rendall, Acts, p. 171 Blass omits ἕως and reads only πρός and remarks neque vero πρός est εἰς; cf. also Belser, Theologische Quartalschrift, i., 79 (1895)), the difficulty is surmounted, for St. Luke does not fix the exact spot of the Ascension, and he elsewhere uses the Mount of Olives, Luke 21:37, as the equivalent of the Bethany of Matthew (Acts 21:17) and Mark (Acts 11:1). Nor is it likely that our Lord would lead His disciples into a village for the event of His Ascension. It should be remembered that Lightfoot, Hor. Heb., says that “the Ascension was from the place where that tract of the Mount of Olives ceased to be called Bethphage and began to be called Bethany”. The recent attempt of Rud. Hoffmann to refer the Ascension to a “Galilee” in the Mount of Olives rests upon a tradition which cannot be regarded as reliable (see Galilæa auf dem Oelberg, Leipzig, 1896), although he can quote Resch as in agreement with him, p. 14. On Hoffmann's pamphlet see also Expositor (5th series), p. 119 (1897), and Theologisches Literaturblatt, No. 27 (1897). This mention of the distance is quite characteristic of St. Luke; it may also have been introduced here for the benefit of his Gentile readers; Page, Acts, in loco, and cf. Ramsay's remarks, Was Christ born at Bethlehem? pp. 55, 56.

[102] Westcott and Hort's The New Testament in Greek: Critical Text and Notes.

[103] Westcott and Hort's The New Testament in Greek: Critical Text and Notes.