Acts 12:1

"Now about that time" "Perhaps the time referred to is the time of the famine, predicted by Agabus. Perhaps the time is the time Paul and Barnabas went to Jerusalem. It is near the year 44 A.D." (Reese p. 426). "Herod the king" This is Herod Agrippa I. He appears only here in Acts 12:1 in pages of the New Testament. He was born around 10 B.C., the son of Aristobulus and Bernice, and thus he was the grandson of Herod the Great and. brother of the Herodias who asked for John the Baptist's head. When the emperor Caligula died, Herod Agrippa. supported the claims of Claudius to be the next emperor, and when Claudius become emperor he repaid Agrippa by confirming him in his kingdom. Claudius became emperor early in 41 A.D., and added Judea and Samaria to the lands that Agrippa. already ruled. This appointment and confirmation made Agrippa. an independent sovereign as far as any Roman provincial governor was concerned. "When Agrippa, newly confirmed as king of Judea, arrived in Judea, he presented himself to the Jewish people as. devout worshipper, almost Pharisaic in his piety. He gained the favor of his new subjects by attaching himself to the companies of Nazarites when they came to the Temple to offer sacrifices on the completion of their vows" (Reese p. 427). "The king" Luke accurately uses the title that the emperor had given him.

Acts 12:1 "Laid hands" The same expression is used in Acts 4:3 and Acts 5:18 and indicates an arrest in which the prisoner is roughly handled. "On some who belonged to the church" Early in the book of Acts the persecutions have come from the Jewish religious leaders, but this time persecution is encouraged by. civil ruler. From this point in Acts, it has been some eight years since Stephen was murdered and the persecution of Acts 8:1 ff. In view of Herod's character and what is said in the rest of this section, it would appear that Herod started this persecution so he would win political favor with the Jews. Such. move would make him popular with both the Sadducees and Pharisees. "He must have been well informed about Jesus and His followers, for his uncle Antipas had known and tried Jesus (Luke 23:7 ff; Acts 4:27). He is also known to have been anxious to preserve the Roman peace in Palestine and therefore to have disliked minorities which threatened to disrupt it" (Stott p. 207).