Acts 2:10

Acts 2:10. Phrygia lay on the east of ‘Asia,' but the greater part of it was then reckoned in that great province.

Pamphylia, a small division extending along the coast of the Mediterranean Sea, was a tributary district. From these five provinces of Asia Minor St. Luke passes to the south.

Egypt. The vast numbers of Jewish residents in Egypt had necessitated the translation of the Hebrew Scriptures into a language they could understand. The Greek Version prepared for them was known as the Septuagint. Owing to the numbers who used it, it acquired a peculiar authority, and was reverenced as almost an inspired translation. Two-fifths of the population of the great city Alexandria were said to have been Jews. They had an ethnarch of their own.

The prate of Libya about Cyrene. Libya lay to the west of Egypt. Cyrene was a large city of Libya, where the Jews, says Strabo (in Josephus), amounted to a fourth part of the whole population. The Jews of Cyrene were so numerous in Jerusalem that they had a special synagogue of their own (Acts 6:9). Simon, who bore the Saviour's cross at Golgotha, was a Cyrenian.

Strangers from Borne. Roman Jews who had made their home at Jerusalem, some as pilgrims, some as permanent residents. These were, no doubt, a Latin-speaking people. Tacit us speaks of the great number of Jews dwelling in Rome as exciting the jealousy of the government.

Jews and proselytes. This has reference not merely to the Romans last named, but to all the countries contained in the catalogue. It divides the various foreign hearers of the disciples inspired words into two classes Jews by birth, and proselyte converts from heathenism.