Acts 2:9

Acts 2:9. Parthians, Medes, Elamites. In the Persian kingdom. It was among these peoples that Shalmaneser, king of Assyria, settled the captive ten tribes.

Mesopotamia. The country lying between the river Tigris and the river Euphrates. Here the Jewish captives were left by Nebuchadnezzar.

Judea. The occurrence of this name has occasioned some difficulty. Various emendations have been suggested, but they are purely conjectural, the MS. authority for ‘Judea' being decisive. Idumæa, India, Bithynia, have been proposed. Tertullian and Augustine read ‘Armenia.' But after all, there is no real difficulty. ‘Judea' appears in the catalogue of nations as the representative of ‘Aramaic,' because St. Luke desired to enumerate all the languages spoken that day by the disciples on whom the Spirit had fallen.

Cappadocia. Then a Roman province.

Pontus, on the Euxine, became a Roman province soon afterwards, in the reign of Nero. It was, when Luke wrote, governed by chiefs dependent on the empire.

Asia ‘includes the whole west coast provinces of Asia Minor, Curia, Lydia, Mysia' (Meyer). It was one of the richest of the Roman provinces; its capital was Ephesus.