Just, and desired a murderer to be granted unto you, but the Author of life you killed, whom God hath raised from the dead, of which we are witnesses. The faith which is by Him[1] has given this perfect soundness in the sight of you all. I know that you did it through ignorance[2]. Be penitent, therefore, and be converted[3], that your sins may be blotted out!” Many[4] of those who heard these words were converted.
And while the apostles were yet speaking to the people, the priests and the officers of the Temple came and laid hands on them and cast them into prison, where they remained till the following day.
Then the chief priests and the ancients had the apostles brought before them and asked: “By what power[5] or in whose Name have you done this?” Peter answered: “Be it known to you all, and to all the people of Israel, that in the Name of our Lord Jesus of Nazareth whom you crucified, whom God raised from the dead, even by Him doth this man stand before you whole. This (Jesus) is the stone which was rejected by you the builders[6]: which is become the head of the corner. Neither is
- ↑ By Him. The faith which is from Him and unto Him.
- ↑ Through ignorance. To prevent the Jews from falling into despair on account of what they had done to our Lord, Peter tried to make excuses for their crime. He addressed them lovingly as “brethren”, and told them that it was through ignorance that they had delivered up Jesus to be crucified. Our Blessed Lord Himself while hanging on the Cross had cried out: “Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do”; and St. Paul writes thus (i Cor. 2, 8): “Which none of the princes of this world knew: for if they had known it, they would never have crucified the Lord of glory.” The ignorance of the Jews was, all the same, culpable, for they could have recognised Jesus to be the Messias, had they not been blinded by their own passions.
- ↑ Converted. To faith in Jesus Christ.
- ↑ Many. “The number of men (converted) was made 5,000”. On the Day of Pentecost the Christians numbered 3,000, men, women and children included; while, after the miracle performed on the man born lame, the number of men alone reached 5,000. The Church, therefore, even in those few days had increased by thousands. Now, however, persecution against her broke out, and Peter and John were cast into prison.
- ↑ By what power have you healed the man born lame? The members of the Sanhedrin did not attempt to deny that the man had been cured.
- ↑ You the builders, i. e. you, the leaders of the chosen people, ought to have worked with God in the building up of His new kingdom, but instead of that you rejected Jesus, as if He were a stone unfit for the building, and yet He, by His Passion, Death and Resurrection, has become that one stone which holds together the walls of the building, and on which, therefore, the whole building depends. Then, abandoning this figure of the key-stone, Peter explained his meaning in clear words, declaring that pardon and salvation were to be obtained through Jesus Christ alone, He being the only source of salvation.
