Acts 12:1

Acts 12:1. Now about that time. The events related in this twelfth chapter took place in the year 44. Paul and Barnabas were then on their mission, bearing alms from the Christians in Antioch to the Church of Jerusalem and Palestine. The famine alluded to (chap. Acts 11:29-30) happened after the death of Herod.

Herod the king. Herod Agrippa I. was the grandson of Herod the Great, and was brought up at Rome with Drusus and Claudius, but he fell into disgrace with the Emperor Tiberius towards the end of his reign. He was imprisoned, but released by Caligula on his accession. The new emperor treated him with distinguished honour, changing his iron chain for one of gold of equal weight. He bestowed on him the tetrarchies of Philip and Lysanias, with the title of king. To these countries this emperor subsequently added the territories ruled over by Herod Antipas, when the prince with his wife Herodias fell into disgrace with Rome. King Herod Agrippa had the good fortune to render some considerable services to Claudius, who in return, on his accession to the empire, added to the extensive dominions bestowed by his predecessor Caligula, the wealthy provinces of Judea and Samaria; so that, in the year 41, this prince ruled over a kingdom equal in extent to the dominions of the great Herod his grandfather.

The descent of the princes of the Herod family has in all times been the subject of much dispute. One tradition represents Herod I. as the grandson of a slave; another, probably invented by the jealous partisans of the royal house, relates how the Herods were descended from one of the noble Hebrew families which returned from Babylon. It is far more probable, however, that they were of Idumsean descent. These Idumæans had been conquered and brought over to Judaism by John Hyrcanus B.C. 130, and from that time they seem to have been steadily constant to the Hebrew religion, and to have styled themselves Jews.

King Herod Agrippa I. in many particulars adopted a line of policy quite different from that followed by the other princes of his house. His wish was in all things to conciliate and win the heart of the Jewish people.

He appears to have succeeded to a considerable extent, and Josephus describes him as a generous and able monarch. The Jewish historian evidently wrote of this Herod with a strong bias in his favour, and his partial estimate of his character must be received with great caution. A curious legend related by Jost (Geschichte des Judenthums) well illustrates the ruling passion of the king, and the warm feelings of the Jews towards him: ‘Once, when reading in a public service (Deuteronomy 17:15) “one from among thy brethren shalt thou set king over thee: thou mayest not set a stranger over thee, which is not thy brother,” Agrippa burst into tears, whereupon the people cried out, Be not distressed, Agrippa, thou art our brother.

At this time both the ruling parties in Jerusalem were bitterly hostile to the followers of Jesus. The Pharisee who at first, in his hatred to the Sadducee who filled the chief place in the Great Council at the time of the trial and crucifixion of Jesus, was inclined to favour the new sect, had come to dread the rapidly-increasing congregations of the Nazarenes. Pharisee and Sadducee now joined together in a common hatred of a sect whose rapidly-advancing prosperity was dangerous to the very existence of Judaism.

The ‘rest' which the Church enjoyed (Acts 9:31) was in great measure owing to the hostile and insulting policy of Rome in the reign of Caligula. The Jewish rulers were too uneasy and alarmed for themselves and the Temple to have any leisure to devise a special persecution against the followers of Jesus; but now a new era had commenced for Israel. Once more and (though they knew it not) for the last time, the ancient monarchy was united under the sceptre of one sovereign, who, thanks to his private friendship with the emperor, was allowed to rule the ancient people, and who, while still under the protection of the awful name of Rome, was apparently independent: and, as it happened, this sovereign so favoured of Rome was intensely desirous to win for himself popular favour among the Jews. No policy was more likely to secure this, than to persecute and attempt to stamp out that increasing sect which was so hated and dreaded by all the Jewish party rulers. This was the reason why ‘Herod stretched forth his hand to vex certain of the Church.' The persecution of A.D. 44 was the greatest danger to which the Church of Christ was ever exposed. In that year its relentless enemies, the judges of the Sanhedrim, both Pharisee and Sadducee, were united against their common Christian foes. For a brief moment, after centuries of captivity and bitter national misfortune, a Jew was again master in the Holy Land, a favourite of Caesar, and one who intensely longed to be considered a true Jew, was king. It seemed likely that the whole power of the nation, supported by the authority of Rome in the background, would be devotee to the destruction of the Christian sect.

In the year 44 the work was begun in good earnest. As far as men could see, there was no help for the doomed Nazarene. Before the year closed, however, the king from whom the Jews hoped so much was dead; stricken in the height of his power and magnificence by a terrible and mysterious disease, King Herod passed from the scene. The policy of Rome, or the caprice of the Cæsar, gave him no successor; once more the Holy Land was degraded to the rank of a mere province of the great empire. No Jewish sovereign after King Herod's death has reigned over the Jewish people.

The rulers in Jerusalem were never able again to organize a general persecution of the Christians, and after the death of Herod, and the consequent downfall of their hopes, the relations between the Roman and the Jew became each year more hostile. In less than thirty years from this time we read of the awful fate of the sacred city, and the final dispersion of the people.