Cornelius a Lapide
Table of Contents
Introduction
Three things must be set forth here at the outset: first, concerning the argument of the book; second, concerning its end and scope; third, concerning its author.
On the Argument of the Book
As to the first: The argument is clear from the title. For this book is inscribed by the Greeks Πράξεις (Praxeis), by the Latins Actus, by the Syrian Historia Apostolorum (History of the Apostles), because it narrates their deeds — not all, but the principal and more illustrious ones — concerning the promulgation and propagation of the Gospel. Wherefore St. Chrysostom names it the Book of the Doctrines concerning the Holy Spirit, and Œcumenius, the Gospel of the Holy Spirit (just as the Italians call Pentecost the Pasch of the Holy Spirit: for the prior Pasch is that of Christ rising); for, as he says, just as the four Evangelists write the Gospel and Acts of Christ, so Luke here describes the Gospel and Acts of the Holy Spirit, namely those things which He Himself wrought in the Apostles and through the Apostles. For just as the Son of God, descending from the heavens out of love for us, was incarnate, that He might teach us with His own mouth the way of virtue and salvation, and the secrets of the Father hidden from the foundation of the world; so after Christ the Holy Spirit willed visibly to descend to us, and as it were a rival of Christ, in some way to be incarnate in fiery tongues, that with these He might imbue the Apostles and the first faithful. Because, as St. Gregory Nazianzen and his interpreter Nicetas, oration 44, say: "Since the Son had had familiar conversation with us in a sensible and visible body, it was fitting that the Spirit also should appear corporeally; as He even appeared first in the form of a dove, now in the form of fiery tongues. And when Christ had returned to those things befitting God, and had been restored to His glory, it was necessary that the Spirit descend to us after Christ," that He might bear witness to Christ and complete what He had begun. For this reason He performed more and more illustrious things than Christ Himself did. For it was fitting for Christ in the humility of His flesh and passion to accomplish our redemption: which having been accomplished, it was fitting that the Holy Spirit should celebrate and glorify Him through miracles, the preaching of the Gospel, the conversion and subjection of all nations throughout the whole world, according to that which the Apostle says, Philippians 2:8: "He humbled Himself, becoming obedient unto death, even the death of the cross, etc. For which cause God also exalted Him, and gave Him a name which is above every name, that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, of those in heaven, on earth, and in hell."
Therefore the Holy Spirit, promised by Christ to the Apostles, and after His ascension into heaven sent to them at Pentecost, as it were another Christ, no longer mortal but immortal and glorious, filled them with wisdom, strength, zeal, the power of miracles, and every heavenly charism, with which they themselves, as if armed in panoply from head to heel, conquered idols, demons, philosophers, orators, kings, and princes, and triumphing subdued the whole world to Christ. For this work was not of a few rude men, but of the Holy Spirit. "You will behold here," says Chrysostom, "the Apostles, or birds, traversing land and sea, and those once timid and rude men suddenly turned into other men, becoming superior to the pride of riches, glory, anger, concupiscence, in a word to all things;" indeed by no other power than that of the Holy Spirit acting upon and impelling them. "The Apostles," says St. Hilary on Matthew chapter 5, verse 13, "are preachers of heavenly things and as it were salters of eternity, conferring immortality on all bodies upon which their word has been sprinkled." From the Acts therefore we learn how great is the virtue and sanctity of Christ and of Christianity, and how among few that primeval holiness has remained.
Valla here disputes, and others, whether this book ought rather to be called Actus or Acta. But let us leave this trifling dispute about syllables to be settled by the grammarians. The Romans and other learned men point to Actus, which word almost corresponds to the Greek Πράξεις, as Valla and others admit. That these Acts are Canonical Scripture is of faith, as the Church of all ages has held and as all modern heretics agree. This history therefore is most certain, most pleasant, most useful, most august. For it narrates the deeds not so much of the Apostles, who were the princes of the Church, as of the Holy Spirit Himself acting through the Apostles.
Thus in this book is described the infancy of the Christian Church and the customs of the primitive Christians, the fervor and sanctity inspired by the Holy Spirit through the preaching of the Apostles, especially of St. Paul, whose inseparable companion and eyewitness, indeed cooperator, was St. Luke, whom the Greek inscription, the Complutensians, and all agree to be the author of this book. Hear St. Jerome, On Ecclesiastical Writers, on Luke: "He also published another excellent volume, which is titled Πράξεις Ἀποστόλων (Praxeis Apostolon, Acts of the Apostles), whose history extends to the two years of Paul's stay at Rome, that is, to the fourth year of Nero: from which we understand that the book was composed in the same city." The same is found in the marble inscription, which I have seen at Rome in the Church of St. Mary in Via Lata, which was the dwelling-place of St. Paul and Luke during his first imprisonment. For Paul was seized by the Jews at Jerusalem, and appealing to Caesar, was sent by the governor Festus to Rome to Nero in the second year of the latter, and there he remained for two years: where St. Luke ends this his history, and concludes saying, last chapter, last verse: "And he (Paul) remained two whole years in his own hired lodging; and he received all who came in to him, preaching the kingdom of God, and teaching the things concerning the Lord Jesus with all confidence, without prohibition." Hence it follows that this book embraces the deeds of about 27 years. For so many flowed from the ascension of Christ into heaven, which happened in His 34th year, from which Luke begins, until the 4th year of Nero, where he ends, which falls in the year of Christ 60: thus St. Jerome. Although Baronius assigns this two-year period (namely the end of the two years) of St. Paul's imprisonment to the 3rd year of Nero, which was the year of Christ 61, so that the history here woven is of 28 years, as many as the chapters of the book are. Whence it follows that in the same year of Christ 60 or 61, this book was written by Luke, or completed and finished.
There are two principal parts of the book. In the former, from chapter 1 to the tenth, the foundation of the faith and Church in Judea and Samaria is recounted, according to the precept of Christ, Acts 1:8. In the latter, from chapter 10 to the end, the propagation of the Gospel through Syria, Lycaonia, Pamphylia, Greece, and other nations is narrated, accomplished by the work of the Apostles, especially of St. Paul. Where Irenaeus notes, book III, chapter 14, that Luke did not see all the deeds of Christ, but saw some and heard some. Whence St. Gregory, in the place already cited, holds that Luke was the companion of Cleophas, and that Christ revealed Himself to both at Emmaus by the breaking of bread, Luke 24:23 and following.
The style is plain; wherefore in explaining it I shall be measured in my delay, but brief: he who desires more things and varied erudition, let him read our Lorinus, than whom no one has commented more fully or more learnedly. My purpose is to consult the reader's interests in every direction and to oblige him, and therefore those things which by others have been said diffusely, or confusedly, or involutedly and obscurely, I strive briefly, methodically, openly, and clearly to say and embrace; but those things which by others have been passed over in silence or omitted, I add. For I pursue brevity, method, clarity, completeness, and abundance: whether I attain it, let the reader judge. I ask God, that what I accomplish less, He Himself may more fully accomplish; and that He may second, grant, and complete these my prayers of serving fully and plainly the one glory of Himself and the public good. Amen.
Besides the Commentaries of St. Chrysostom, Œcumenius, and others, Arator the Deacon, in the time of the Emperor Justinian, around the year of the Lord 530, translated and explained the Acts of the Apostles in beautiful verse.
On the End and Scope
As to the second: The end and fruit of this book is, that gazing upon the golden age of the primitive Church in it, we may see how much we have fallen away from it, and with all zeal endeavor to return to the same. Indeed when we behold the ancient and primitive customs of the Christians, so holy, and their admirable life and heroic deeds, it behooves us to be ashamed and to groan, and with Jeremiah in Lamentations, chapter 4:1, to exclaim: "How is the gold become dim, the most excellent color is changed, the stones of the sanctuary are scattered at the head of every street? All the beauty of the daughter of Sion is gone forth from her. The illustrious sons of Sion, clothed with the finest gold, how are they esteemed as earthen vessels, the work of the hands of the potter?" O ancient house, by how unlike a master art thou ruled! The first Christians, almost all, were silver and gold by holiness and wisdom; now many through cupidity are earthen, indeed bronze and iron. Whence this so great change of things? Those first ones bore this premeditated and fixed in mind, which St. Hilarion learned from them and taught, as St. Jerome witnesses in his Life: "that the figure of this world passes away, and that this is the true life which is bought by the inconvenience of the present life." They had heard from Paul, 1 Corinthians 7:29: "This therefore I say, brethren: The time is short: it remaineth, that they also that have wives, be as if they had none; and they that weep, as though they wept not; and they that rejoice, as though they rejoiced not; and they that buy, as though they possessed not; and they that use this world, as if they used it not. For the figure of this world passes away."
Truly this world has not the truth of things, but only a shadow and figure; its riches, pomps, and joys are shadowy, feigned and painted, not true and solid. This the first faithful knew, this they ruminated upon, and therefore they spurned the earth and earthly things, and pursued heaven and heavenly things, and said with St. Jerome: "Earth I was, heaven I have been made" through baptism and Christianity. Otherwise now do many, who as it were gape at the earth like asps, and therefore in earthly things see sharply as lynxes, but in heavenly things are blind as owls. St. Chrysostom asserts, on the title of Psalm 50: "That the prophets are as it were painters of the virtue and warfare by which we contend against sins and the devil." Thus indeed Abraham as a painter, in himself and in his life with vivid colors, painted for us faith, Isaac obedience, Joseph chastity, Job patience, Abel innocence, Moses meekness, David psalmody, Elias zeal: painters of Christ were the Evangelists, the painter of the Apostles and of the Christian and Pauline life is St. Luke. He himself painted with his brush images of the Virgin Mother of God, and of the Incarnate Word, indeed even as an infant, which we even now at Rome behold and venerate with great veneration: but far more excellently in these Acts he painted the idea of the Christian life, perfect and Apostolic, that he might propose it to all posterity as a mirror and exemplar to be emulated, and inflame them to pursue it by the example of the first Christians. For who is not inflamed to contempt of earthly things, to love of heavenly things, to charity, to zeal, to martyrdom, when he reads of the first faithful, as it were heavenly men and a kind of earthly angels, having trampled riches, sighed for heaven, continually devoted themselves to prayer and the Eucharist; not fled but sought prisons, deaths, and martyrdoms for the love of Christ? Who is not enflamed to struggle bravely with the flesh, the world, and the devil, to a generous victory over himself and his passions and lusts, to the gain of souls, to propagating the kingdom of Christ, when he hears the trumpet-call of Luke?
Wherefore truly and aptly St. Jerome to Paulinus: "The Acts of the Apostles," he says, "do indeed seem to sound forth a bare history, and to weave the infancy of the rising Church; but if we have known the writer of them to be Luke a physician, whose praise is in the Gospel, we shall observe likewise that all his words are medicine for the languishing soul;" especially because everywhere he inculcates Christ's resurrection and our own and eternal life, which is the relief of all sorrows and the stimulus to all things difficult either to be done or to be tolerated. Whence St. Augustine, on Psalm 109: "The hope," he says, "of immortal life is the life of mortal life." Wherefore truly St. Chrysostom: "What this book most especially does," he says, "is the declaration of the resurrection: which if it be believed, the way is also opened to the rest." These Acts therefore teach that in the cross and death of Christ His school (as the Jews wished and supposed) and Church were not extinguished and buried, but rather that then His kingdom and glory began through the resurrection of Christ and of His faithful, and that it would endure for eternity, as He promised through the Prophets and through the angel, Luke 1:32. Therefore Πράξεις Ἀποστόλων (the Acts of the Apostles) teach the practice of the Gospel and of the doctrine of Christ: for this the Apostles reduced into practice and brought to deeds. Whence rightly St. Chrysostom grieves, in the argument to the Epistle to Philemon, that very many of their deeds, even the most minute, have perished: "Would that," he says, "there had not been wanting one who would most diligently hand on to us the history of the Apostles, not only what they wrote, or what they spoke, but how they bore themselves throughout their whole life, what and when they ate, when they sat, where they went, what they did on each day, and in what parts they lived, what house they entered, where they sailed, where they put in to land, and would diligently expound all things, since all their things are filled with extraordinary usefulness! For if when we behold only the places where they sat, or were bound, places I say lifeless, we often direct our mind thither and behold their virtues, and are awakened, and become more ready, far more would this assuredly happen, if it had been possible to hear their words and remaining deeds. Certainly about a friend everyone most willingly asks, where does he live? what does he do? where does he go? was it not far more worthy that this be done about the common masters of the world?"
"All were filled with the Holy Spirit, and began to speak in various tongues as the Holy Spirit gave them to speak. The multitude of believers had one heart and one soul: nor did anyone say that any of those things which he possessed was his own, but all things were common to them. Daily continuing in the temple, and breaking bread from house to house, they took their food with exultation and simplicity of heart, praising God together and having favor with all the people. As many (not priests, but laymen and married men) as were possessors of fields or houses, sold them and brought the prices of those things which they sold, and laid them before the feet of the Apostles. And distribution was made to every one as he had need. They went rejoicing from the presence of the Council, because they were accounted worthy to suffer reproach for the name of Jesus. We must obey God rather than men. Behold I see the heavens opened, and the Son of Man standing at the right hand of God;" and very many such things through every chapter.
On the Author
As to the third. The author of this book is St. Luke, a physician of Antioch, among all the Evangelists most learned in the Greek language, says St. Jerome, epistle 145 to Damasus, who in his native idiom, namely Greek, elegantly wrote first the Gospel, then the Acts, just as his fellow citizen and follower St. John of Antioch (Chrysostom) preached and wrote in Greek; who from the eminent eloquence of the Greek language was surnamed Chrysostom, that is golden mouth. For Antioch, since it had been founded and governed by Greeks, namely by the Antiochi, the successors of Alexander the Great, took up their Greek idiom, even though it had its own language, namely Syrian, since it was the metropolis of Syria.
You will ask, what sort of man was St. Luke? I answer: First, he was an Evangelist, for he wrote the Gospel, in which beyond others he narrates the teachings of Christ pertaining to morals and perfection. He was therefore a Cherub, as I shall presently show, namely one of the four Cherubim whom Ezekiel saw, chapter 1, and St. John, Apocalypse 4:7. Therefore Luke from being a physician of bodies became a physician of souls.
Secondly, he was a virgin or celibate: for he never took a wife. Thus St. Jerome on Luke.
Thirdly, St. Epiphanius, heresy 51; St. Gregory, Preface on Job, chapter 1; Dorotheus, in the Life of St. Luke; Mariana and others hold that he was one of Christ's 72 disciples: but the opposite is hinted by Luke himself at the beginning of the Gospel, where he says that he writes it not from sight but from hearing. Therefore he was a disciple not of Christ, but of the Apostles, namely of St. Paul. Thus Irenaeus, book I, chapter 20; Tertullian, book IV Against Marcion, chapter 2; Theodoret, in the Preface to the Life of the Holy Fathers; St. Jerome, on chapter 65 of Isaiah; Baronius and others.
Fourthly, that Luke is to be called an Apostle, both because he was companion and cooperator of the apostolate, labors, and dangers of Paul, and that by the votes and election of the Churches, as the Apostle seems to assert, 2 Corinthians 8:19; whence it is clear that he was full of the Spirit of God beyond others and outstanding: the same "is clear from the miracles which are now wrought through him," says St. Chrysostom; and because, after he departed from Rome, says Œcumenius in his preface on Luke, he returned to the East, and again sought Libya, and instructed the Thebans in the Christian religion, and, as Epiphanius says, heresy 51, he preached first in Dalmatia and Gaul, and in Italy and Macedonia. Therefore he sustained many labors, hardships, and persecutions in this his apostolate for Christ until his 84th year, according to St. Jerome's testimony. Wherefore the Church gives him this eulogy: "Who continually bore the mortification of the cross in his body for the honor of Your name." Therefore aptly among the four Cherubic animals, Ezekiel 1:10, and Apocalypse 4:7, just as the eagle is assigned to St. John, the man to St. Matthew, the lion to St. Mark, so the ox to St. Luke: for the ox is patient of labors, and is assiduously exercised in the field by its master at sowing and harvest. Hence some learned men have opined that Luke aptly signified ox in the ancient Latin language, deceived by the words of Pliny saying, book VIII, chapter 6: "Italy first saw elephants in the war of King Pyrrhus, and called them Lucanian oxen (boves lucas), seen in Lucania in the year of the City 472." For these words seem to signify that oxen were called lucas by the Italians: but the meaning of Pliny is far other, namely that the Italians, who had not seen elephants before Pyrrhus, on account of the magnitude of those monsters, called them Lucanian oxen, that is Lucanians, because they were first seen by them in Lucania in the army of Pyrrhus: for they called ox the largest animal, such as the elephant, but with the cognomen luca, because first seen in Lucania. Thus Varro, book VI On the Latin Language, expressly asserts that the elephant is called the Lucanian ox, not so much from Lucania, as Pliny holds, but, he says, "because they shone forth from afar on account of the gilded royal shields with which their towers were then adorned." St. Luke therefore is a shining ox: ox, because he is a victim of labor, mortification, and martyrdom; shining, through doctrine and the Gospel. The same is the Lucanian ox, namely the elephant, because just as the elephant among animals is the wisest and most nearly approaches to the reason of man, so also St. Luke excels in wisdom, and beyond the other evangelists narrates the wisdom of the Incarnate Word and what is said of His wisdom, dogmas and practical counsels, and things suited to forming morals.
Luke therefore, if you examine the Latin etymology and use, is an elephant; if Hebrew, Luke is a teacher, who hands down to posterity the knowledge or history received from his elders, from the root לקח (laqah, to take/receive) erhach, that is, doctrine received and handed on: for the Hebrew chet liquefies in Greek and Latin into s, as from Maschiach is made Messias. If you regard the Greek etymology, Luke is a washer, namely of sins, from λούω (louō), that is, I wash, says Pagninus in his Hebrew Names, who also adds that Luke in Hebrew is the same as תקום (tequm), that is, his resurrection, which befits him on account of his labors and passions: or that Luke is the same as Lucius, which is a Latin name said from light, as it were shining, which also Origen sensed in the Epistle to the Romans, at the end, and our Sanchez here. For he who by the Greeks is called Lucas ἀπὸ τῆς λουκῆς, that is from light, the same likewise seems to be called Lucius by the Latins from light; nay even Varro, book VI, calls elephants boves lucas, that is shining. Luke therefore seems to be a name having a Greek and Latin etymology, but a Syriac termination, since he was in Syria. Excellently St. Augustine, book II On Christian Doctrine, chapter 16, notes that foreign names, such as "Hebrew, have no small force and aid for solving the enigmas of Scripture, if anyone can interpret them." For, as the same author says chapter 6, book On Genesis to the Letter (Imperfect), "a name (nomen) is so called as if a noting (notamen), because it notes a thing." Whence Sanchez infers that Luke was a kinsman of St. Paul: for he himself was the Lucius whom Paul numbers among his kinsmen, Romans 16:21; for he gave to Luke the Latin name Lucius, because he was writing to the Romans, and therefore perhaps was Paul's inseparable companion.
Fifthly, that St. Luke ended his life by martyrdom and was crowned with the laurel, St. Nazianzen indicates, oration 1 against Julian, when he says: "Did you not revere the victims slain for Christ? did you not fear the great wrestlers; that John, Peter, Paul, James, Stephen, Luke, Andrew, Thecla, those who both after them and before them at the peril of their head protected the truth: who with fire and sword, and beasts, and tyrants, and present and threatened evils, with eager spirit, as it were in others' bodies, indeed as if without bodies, contended?" Paulinus of Nola likewise in these verses names him a Martyr:
Hic pater Andreas, et magno nomine Lucas
Martyr, et illustris sanguine Nazarius.
(Here is father Andrew, and Luke of great name a Martyr, and Nazarius illustrious by blood.)
Again Gaudentius, Bishop of Brescia, who flourished in the same century as Ambrose, has these words: "Of these four we have at present the relics; who, preaching the kingdom of God and justice, were slain by unbelievers and the impious, and are shown by the powers of their works to be ever living to God: John is reported to have been consummated at Sebaste in Palestine, Thomas among the Indians, Andrew and Luke at Patras a city of Achaia." Thus he himself, sermon on the Dedication of the Church.
Concerning him Nicephorus, book II, chapter 43, embracing his life in few words: "Luke, born at Antioch, which is in Coelesyria, both a physician and an outstanding painter, came to Paul at Thebes; and there having sent away the message of his ancestral error, he came to Christ, and from being a healer of bodies became a healer of souls. He wrote his Gospel by Paul's command, and likewise the Acts of the Apostles. And when he had been with Paul at Rome, he returned into Greece, and illumined very many there with the light of divine doctrine and knowledge; and at length, hung by the despisers of the divine word from a fruitful olive tree, because there was not abundance of dry wood from which a cross might be made, he commended his spirit to God, when he was, as is said, eighty years old."
Nicephorus then continues to narrate the miracles wont to be performed at his sepulchre, and concerning the images of Christ, the Mother of God, Peter and Paul painted by him. The same things about the martyrdom accomplished on the olive tree Glycas has, book III of his Annals, and adds that medicinal liquor gushed forth from the relics, and by this sign they were found. The same things Cedrenus has in his Compendium of History.
Finally in Luke and through Luke that saying of the Psalmist was fulfilled, Psalm 18:5: "Their sound went out into all the earth, and their words to the ends of the world;" so that you may rightly attribute to him what Albertus Magnus said of Thomas Aquinas (whom his fellow disciples on account of his constant silence used to call the dumb ox): "The dumb ox shall utter such a voice that the whole world shall hear." Finally St. Gregory, when he was apocrisiarius at Constantinople, brought the head of St. Luke to Rome, where even now in the basilica of St. Peter it is visited and venerated.