Acts 5:17

Second Arrest of the Apostles. They are freed by the Interposition of an Angel, 17-25.

Acts 5:17. Then the high priest rose up. Not from his throne in the council, for the Sanhedrim is not said to have been sitting. ‘Rose up' implies that the high priest, excited and alarmed at the growing power of these followers of the Crucified, determined at once again to try and crush them by violent measures. The high priest is no doubt Annas, as in chap. Acts 4:6, though his son-in-law Caiaphas nominally filled the office.

All they that were with him. These were not his brother judges in the great council, but those who sympathized with him in his bitter hatred of Christ's followers.

Which is the sect of the Sadducees. The fact of the resurrection of Jesus had now been made known beyond the walls of the city, and was believed in by ever-increasing multitudes. The fear and anger of the Sadducees were more than ever stirred up. Very many, as we have said (see note on chap. Acts 4:1), of the most influential of the nation belonged to this sect. Whether Annas himself was a Sadducee is doubtful. We know, however, that his family was friendly to them, and his son one of the prominent members of the sect; and with them, in their bitter hostility to the doctrines of Jesus, Annas heartily joined.