10. E.g., Evans, Wycliffe , 155, 226.

10. E.g., Evans, Wycliffe , 155, 226.

I treated various material in Acts 1–2 in much more cursory fashion in Keener, Spirit, 190–213.

The signs and wonders, with the consequent spreading of the word (and mention of corporate prayer and economically sacrificial lifestyle) are dramatically exemplified in Acts 3:1–4:4.

Others also note that the eschatological emphasis allows Luke to highlight the present availability of the Spirit and incipient salvation (e.g., Kilgallen, Commentary, 18; see further discussion below). For the continual repeatability of (a prominent dimension of) the Pentecost experience (based on its repetition elsewhere in Acts’ narrative), see Kim, “Mission,” 49–74, esp. 53–62 (for other narratives in Acts, 63–74).

Luke’s Scripture already suggested this ideal democratization, esp. in Num 11:29 (cf. 11:16–17, 25) and, above all, Joel 2:28–29, which Luke cites (see further discussion below).

Some scholars have objected to this portrait on theological grounds or argued on such grounds that Luke would not expect prophetic phenomena that he associated with the Spirit to continue after his own day; his view of the eschatological character of the present interim time, however, renders such theological considerations suspect. At one time, many Christians believed that Matt 28:18–20 was limited to the Twelve; few hold this today, because most recognize that Matthew’s work is meant to function prescriptively as well as descriptively (see, e.g., Keener, “Matthew’s Missiology”). Analogously, some hold that the commission to witness (though given directly to the apostles in Acts 1:8) remains valid today, yet they appear less enthusiastic to affirm the empowerment on which it is predicated in 1:8, even though it is more explicitly for the entire church (2:38–39) than is the call to witness in 1:8 and even though Jesus forbade his followers to begin their mission without it (1:4–5). This approach appears to me dependent on a modern theological system rather than on Lukan theology.

See fuller discussion at Acts 1:4–5, 8. Luke reserves the term “anointed,” however, for Jesus, probably because he alone is the Christ, i.e., the “anointed” (king). (Contrast 2 Cor 1:21; 1 John 2:20, 27.)

Jesus’s teaching about their empowerment in advance also echoes the servant mission of Isaiah; see comment on .

For sample applications in various contexts, see, e.g., Chempakassery, “Jerusalem Pentecost”; Bediako, “African Culture,” 120; Forrester, “Pentecost” (addressing, e.g., castes); on Acts 2:17–21, Prema, “Paradigm”; Lloyd-Jones, Christianity; nonviolent direct action in Alexander, “Action.” Note also artistic appropriations of Pentecost from the sixth through the sixteenth centuries, in Hornik and Parsons, “Perspectives.”

For lack of better terminology, I borrow “revival” from the discipline of U.S. religious history and contemporary studies of global Christianity (cf., e.g., Blumhofer and Balmer, Revivals; McClymond, Encyclopedia of Revivals; Harrell, Possible; Robeck, Mission; Burgess, Revolution; Roberts, Revival; Dermawan, “Study”; Lee, “Korean Pentecost”; Longkumer, “Study”; McGee, “Revivals in India”; Shaw, Awakening; Wiyono, “Timor Revival”; York, “Indigenous Missionaries”). I employ it in the sense of a religious renaissance or awakening, not in the more specific sense of the North American form that came to be called revival meetings. Others (e.g., Dunn, Jesus and Spirit, 192) have offered sociological comparisons with such movements; see further discussion below.

E.g., Evans, Wycliffe, 155, 226.

Some such events may parallel Pentecost without deliberately echoing it. For example, in November 1994, an unexpected “experience of the Spirit” during prayer in Nieuw Nickerie, Suriname, excited and united the small number of believers there across all denominational lines. In the resultant enthusiasm, several hundred residents—reportedly more than the entire number of local conversions over the previous century—were converted the same day, and a mass people movement began (Norwood, “Colloquium,” 24–26; also confirmed by Dr. Douglass Norwood, interview by author, Philadelphia, June 6, 2006; Norwood was an eyewitness and participant). Cf. also early twentieth-century children’s experiences in the Adullam orphanage in China (Baker, Visions [12th ed.], esp. 9–14) and those in Pandita Ramabai’s home for orphan brides in India.

On Luke’s outpourings indicating the church’s prophetic empowerment, see, e.g., Boxall, “History and Spirit.”

See, e.g., Keener, “Pentecost,” 360.

Ezekiel 37:1–14 applies to individual resurrection in the end time at least as early as 4Q385–386 (see Dimant, “Resurrection”). Ruthven’s argument for Isa 59:19 here (in view of 59:21; “Covenant,” 36–38) would also fit an eschatological/restoration context; his insightful connections with the rare βίαιος and (contextually) the Spirit might suggest that Isa 59 also informs Acts 2:2.

E.g., Ridderbos, “Speeches of Peter,” 12; Barclay, “Acts ii.14–40,” 198–99; Cadbury, “Eschatology,” 300; Bruce, History, 206; Ladd, Young Church, esp. 34–52; Heuthorst, “Apologetic Aspect.” Cf. further Hunter, Gospel according to Paul, 36; Cullmann, Worship, 21; Hernando, “Function,” 251. But Grässer, “Parusieerwartung,” 119–22, regards it as more “churchly” than eschatological (cf. idem, Forschungen, 312–15). The eschatology here must be “realized” eschatology, in any case.

Sleeper, “Pentecost and Resurrection,” 390.

See rightly Turner, Power, 346–47, 353, on this point (he correctly differs from Dunn, who underestimates disciples’ faith in Luke’s first volume; 329–30).

E.g., 1 En. 71:15; 4 Ezra 6:9; 7:50, 113; 8:1–2; 2 Bar. 15:8; Gr. Ezra 1:24; see further Ferch, “Aeons”; cf. Novello, “Nature.” After judgment would come an era of worldwide peace, even in Sib. Or. 3.367–80 (see discussion of backgrounds in Collins, “Sibylline Oracles,” 320, 358–59); for the end of this age or the beginning of the next, cf. 1 En. 16:1; 4 Ezra 4:26–27, 36; 6:20; 7:31, 47, 112–13; 8:52; 2 Bar. 59:8; 69:4; 73:1; 83:7; 85:14.

See 1QS IV, 16–17; 4Q215a 1 II; Pryke, “Eschatology,” 48–49. On the evil of the present era, see, e.g., CD VI, 10, 14; XII, 23; XV, 7, 10; 4Q215a 1 II, 4; 4Q266 3 I, 6; 3 II, 20; 4Q270 7 II, 13; 4Q271 2 12; 4Q301 3 8; 4Q509 205 2; 4Q510 1 6–7; on its approaching end, e.g., CD IV, 8–12; 4Q266 3 I, 2–4.

E.g., m. ʾAb. 4:17; t. Ber. 6:21; Sipre Deut. 31.4.1; 34.4.3; 48.7.1; Pesiq. Rab Kah. 4:1; y. Ḥag. 2:1, §16; Gen. Rab. 1:10; 53:12; 59:6; 66:2; 90:6; Lev. Rab. 2:2; 3:1; Deut. Rab. 2:31; 3:4; Song Rab. 2:2, §6; Pesiq. Rab. 21:1; Tg. Ps.-J. on Gen 25:32.

E.g., b. Taʿan. 3:14; Sipre Num. 115.5.7; Sipre Deut. 32.5.10; Pesiq. Rab Kah. 6:2; 9:1; b. Yoma 87a; Gen. Rab. 95 MSV; Exod. Rab. 30:19; Lev. Rab. 36:2; Deut. Rab. 1:20; Eccl. Rab. 4:6, §1; Pesiq. Rab. 16:6; cf. ʾAbot R. Nat. 22, §46 B; for Moses, in Sipre Deut. 29.2.3; Exod. Rab. 47:3 (Moses enters it at death in ʾAbot R. Nat. 12 A); for others, b. Peʾah 1:2–3; Sipre Deut. 307.3.2–3; ʾAbot R. Nat. 39 A; 44, §123 B; b. Šabb. 30b; Ḥag. 12b; Gen. Rab. 66:4; Lam. Rab. 1:5, §31; 3:3, §1; 3:18, §6; 3:22, §8; Pesiq. Rab. 25:2.

The conception is basically the same as in 2 Bar. 15:8.

Schiffman, “Crossroads,” 140 (citing b. Sanh. 90a, bar.); cf. L.A.E. 51:2.

Cf., e.g., Gen. Rab. 59:6; 90:6; Buchanan, Consequences, 138–39; see fuller comment on Acts 13:46.

Witherington, Acts, 128–29 (which I have modified for use here); cf. Rackham, Acts, xlvii; Goulder, Type and History, 61 (suggesting that the parallels emphasize that Christ continues to live in his church).

Men. Rhet. 1.3, 365.30–366.1; subjects for epideictic consideration include the object of the festival’s honor (often divine; 366.6) but also matters such as the location and the distance from which pilgrims come (366.8–10), which Luke does treat.

See Grappe, “Récit de la Pentecôte” (depending on, e.g., Jub. 6:15–22; 1QH^a XIV, 8–22; 1Q34).

Noack, “Pentecost in Jubilees,” 90–91 (though weighing too much on the date).

See esp. Potin, Fête de la Pentecôte; idem, “Fête de la Pentecôte.”

E.g., Kremer, Pfingstbericht, 238–53; Jervell, Apostelgeschichte, 133, 138; Pervo, Acts, 61; more extensively, Wenk, Power, 246–51. Wenk fits this perspective into his view of the Spirit as involving covenant renewal and not just prophetic empowerment (252–53), though (as noted below) Jewish people of this period linked Pentecost with covenant renewal even when they did not link it with Sinai. He also argues that this anticipates a new exodus (254). Estrada, Followers, 192–96, treats covenant renewal more generally, then (196–200) treats evidence for influence from Sinai traditions. Others regard the echoes as merely probable (e.g., Arrington, Acts, 20) and sometimes note (6–7) that Luke’s explicit text (Joel in Acts 2:17–28) addresses prophetic empowerment rather than inward renewal (e.g., not citing Ezek 36–37). Although the explicit text suggests Luke’s emphasis, however, these options are not mutually exclusive.

Cf. Neh 9:12. One might also biblically link the Spirit’s coming with renewal in the Torah (Ezek 36:14), a context fruitfully mined by Luke’s hero Paul (2 Cor 3:6–8), though biblical associations with the Spirit’s coming are many and only the wind (Acts 2:2; Ezek 37:9–10) points to this specific context.

Fitzmyer, Acts, 234; cf. O’Hagan, “Pentecost.”

Kremer, Pfingstbericht, 241–46 (for Philo; 240–41 for Josephus; 246–48 for Targumim; 248–51 for rabbis); Potin, “Fête de la Pentecôte”; Lövestam, “Apostlagärningarnas arende”; Delcor, “Bundesfest und Pfingstfest”; Talbert, Acts, 25, 229. See further comment below. Menzies, Empowered, 193–98, thinks that commonalities with Philo reflect merely common theophany traditions.

E.g., Wedderburn, “Redaction in Acts 2.1–13”; Chmiel, “‘Sociophonie’ de la fête”; Berends, “Celebrate at Pentecost?” (citing also Sinai-Pentecost connections in Ps 68); R. Williams, Acts, 40; Witherington, Acts, 131; Turner, Power, 267, 279–89, esp. 282–85 (linking it to a prophet-like-Moses Christology); Hamm, Acts, 18; Wright, Acts, 22. Some compare the use of Ps 68 in Eph 4:7–8 (e.g., Weiser, Apostelgeschichte, 78). Cf. the eschatological Torah of Isa 2:3; but the warning in Keener, John, 358–59.

Christian interpreters of Acts have linked Pentecost and the giving of Torah at least as early as Augustine (so Gaventa, Acts, 74).

Jub. 6:32–38. Cf. Wintermute, “Introduction,” 39, on the Sinai era in Jubilees (though the figures of Testuz on which he depends may be questioned); Patte, Hermeneutic, 149. Luke is naturally interested in covenant renewal (cf. Luke 22:20; Talbert, Acts, 27).

Scholars frequently cite the alleged connection between Pentecost and Sinai (e.g., Goulder, Type and History, 150; Bruce, Commentary, 54), usually citing b. Pesaḥ. 68b; Tanḥ. 26c; cf. also Exod. Rab. 31:16.

Le Cornu, Acts, 59, cites t. Meg. 4[3]:5; y. Meg. 26a; b. Meg. 31a; Pesaḥ. 68b (and for earlier hints, 2 Chr 15:10ff.; Pss 50:2f.; 81:3f.; 99:7; Jub. 14:20; 1QS I, 16ff.; II, 1ff.; 4Q280; 4Q86; 4Q287).

Cf. also L.A.B. 11:1; Pesiq. Rab Kah. 12:20.

See Dupont, Salvation, 36; cf. 2 Chr 15:10–14.

Jacquin, “Worte in der Erziehung.” Pentecost and Yom Kippur are the only two festivals whose prayers explicitly appear among the fragments of festival prayers at Qumran (4Q507–509; Abegg, “Liturgy: Qumran,” 649).

Foakes-Jackson, Acts, 10; Goulder, Type and History, 151; Hull, Spirit in Acts, 53–55; Cocchini, “Evoluzione della festa”; Le Déaut, “Savu‘ot”; Weinfeld, “Giving of Law”; Harrelson, Cult, 25; Dunn, Baptism, 48; Zehnle, Pentecost Discourse, 62; Fitzmyer, Acts, 233–34; Giesen, “Verheissungen” (for covenant renewal).

Carter and Earle, Acts, 28; Sleeper, “Pentecost and Resurrection,” 390; Isaacs, Spirit, 130–31 (though she does think that the new Sinai is in view; cf. comment on Acts 2:2–3); Barrett, Acts, 111; Schreiber, “Aktualisierung”; Menzies, Empowered, 190–93.

Cf. Charnov, “Shavuot.”

Cf. sources cited in Dunn, Baptism, 48 (they argue that the reading predates the first century, which is more questionable; cf. Zehnle, Pentecost Discourse, 116–18).

Cocchini, “Evoluzione della festa” (citing b. Pesaḥ. 68b; cf. t. Meg. 4:5), suggesting that Luke drew on the earlier covenant renewal image.

Barrett, Acts, 111.

Commonly noted; e.g., Fritsch, Community, 70; Marcus, “Scrolls,” 12. Qumran need not have composed Jubilees, but it found it congenial (Noack, “Qumran and Jubilees,” 196–98); conservatives may have preferred this older solar calendar as against the newer lunar calendar imposed by the Seleucid hellenizers or the Hasmoneans (VanderKam, Studies in Jubilees, 283–84; cf. Rivkin, “Pseudepigraph,” who argues that the Pharisaic movement established the new calendar; and Zeitlin, “‘Jubilees’ and Pentateuch,” 224, and idem, “Jubilees, Character,” 8–16, who thinks that the lunar calendar was established by the Hasmonean period). Scholars have debated an additional twenty-eight-days-per-month tradition supposedly preserved in Jubilees (suggested by Rook, “Tradition”; opposed by Baumgarten, “Problems”). Questionably early dating of rabbinic tradition has driven some of the discussion.

See Flusser, Judaism, 48; Noack, “Pentecost in Jubilees,” 89; Black, Scrolls, 92; Harrelson, Cult, 25; Bruce, History, 208; see esp. VanderKam, “Covenant.” For additional support, see Vermes, Scrolls, 205; possibly 2 Chr 15:10–12; Turner, Power, 281–82, adds 4Q266 17–18.

See Schultz, “Views of Patriarchs,” 45. The culpability of some behavior, however, is reduced because the law was not yet revealed (Jub. 33:15–16).

In favor of this tradition’s antiquity, see, e.g., Weinfeld, “Giving of Law”; Parker, “Apokatastasis,” 58–61.

Safrai, “Temple,” 893; cf. also idem, “Religion,” 810; Menzies, Empowered, 190–93.

Cf. O’Toole, “Davidic Covenant of Pentecost” (emphasizing 2 Sam 7:12–16 instead); Menzies, Development, 229–44; Strauss, Messiah, 145–47; Bock, Acts, 131–32. Estrada, Followers, 200–203, interacts with Menzies’s argument but ultimately doubts that one should use differences to ignore what he views as compelling similarities (203–4, following Max Turner in finding an evocation of Sinai, despite differences because the event is a different one).

Cf. Hull, Spirit in Acts, 51 (who sees the term as already implicit in the festival). Not surprisingly, Romans also prayed during a “harvest of the first-fruits” (primitias pomorum, Pliny E. N.H. 28.5.23).

Cf. Wilson, Gentile Mission, 126–27; Barrett, Acts, 111 (citing also Calvin); Gaventa, Acts, 74 (also mentioning Calvin on the crowds). Menzies, Empowered, 193–98, doubts any Sinai connections in Acts 2, attributing commonalities with various sources to common theophany traditions. Against those who appeal to a Sinai connection with Ps 68:19 (67:19 LXX), he argues (198–201) that it lies behind Eph 4:8 but not Acts 2:33–34.

E.g., Knox, Acts, 62. While acknowledging Luke’s thorough compositional activity in the narrative, some find clear “memory of the theophany on Mount Sinai and traces of Jewish traditions connected with that theophany” (Dupont, Salvation, 35).

See esp. White, “Pentecost Event.”

Lüdemann, Acts, 54, is skeptical because Peter’s speech quotes the LXX rather than Hebrew, but if this is a problem (despite Peter’s presumable knowledge of Greek), it would only show that Luke exercises a historian’s liberty to compose a speech or part of a speech (perhaps in conjunction with Luke’s linguistic limitations), nothing about the event to which the speech is attached.

Witherington, Acts, 129.

See Twelftree, People, 65–83.

Although I think that Luke may wish an implicit comparison between Peter’s Pentecost speech here and Paul’s in Acts 22, his mere hints of Pentecost in the latter case (explicit only at 20:16) suggest that he does not invent Pentecost information where he does not have it.

Dunn, Acts, 22–23; see, at greater length, idem, Jesus and Spirit, 135–56.

Also Hull, Spirit in Acts, 52. Though cf. also the resurrection, 1 Cor 15:20, 23. Still, the connection is interesting, especially since Luke himself makes little of the Pentecost connection (perhaps less than his sources).

The Q material about Spirit baptism (Matt 3:11//Luke 3:16) also fits the church’s pervasive experience of the Spirit. The traditional identification of water baptism and Spirit baptism (e.g., Richardson, Theology, 352) goes too far for Luke (cf. Acts 10:47–48; nevertheless, they may be ideally simultaneous [cf. discussion at Acts 2:38], and the former probably signifies the latter).

Especially given his failure to exploit allusions to the festival (some of which may be presupposed in his source), unless he simply needed a festival and picked the next one after Passover.

Forbes, Prophecy, 72–74, thinks Paul’s language for “tongues” a shorthand for the clearer and more original “other tongues” found in Acts 2:4. Still, “other” here is typically Lukan (eight times in Matthew; once in Mark 16:12; once in John; though twenty-seven times in Paul; forty-eight times in Luke-Acts).

E.g., Dodd, Preaching, 58; cf. the comparison with “cross-cultural manifestations of . . .  glossolalia” in Levine, Misunderstood Jew, 53–54. For examples of ecstatic physical phenomena in revival movements, see, e.g., Dunn, Jesus and Spirit, 192; Wolffe, Expansion, 57–59; Vidler, Revolution, 238; emotional arousal in millenarian movements, cf. also Gager, Kingdom, 21. See, e.g., among seventeenth-century Huguenots, in Spittler, “Glossolalia,” 339; Rosen, “Psychopathology,” 235–37; ecstasy in various U.S. revivalist movements (Rosen, “Psychopathology,” 239–41). One may also compare phenomena of religious emotion as widely as the trembling of many early Friends (Cross and Livingstone, Dictionary of Church, s.v. “Quaker,” 1363; Moore, “Quakerism,” 338 [noting its rapid decline]; a small number of more unusual phenomena in Hudson, Religion, 45; Rosen, “Psychopathology,” 232–34) and the celebratory worship of the Latino (e.g., Maynard-Reid, Worship, 180–81) and the African-American (66–68, also noting its African roots) religious experience.

Cf., e.g., Gibbs, “Launching of Mission,” 21 (based on experiences with the Pentecostal Methodist Church in Chile); Tarr, “Power,” 9–10 (based on his experience in Burkina Faso).

E.g., Conzelmann, Theology, 37–38. Cf. Knox, Acts, 62: “there is no reason to doubt” the occurrence of glossolalia and “a new stage in the life of the Church” on Pentecost; cf. van Halsema, “Betrouwbaarheid” (despite the reasons).

Knox, Acts, 82.

Harnack, Acts, 179.

Wedderburn, “Redaction in Acts 2:1–13”; Lincoln, “Interpretation of Luke’s Pentecost.”

The accounts are not strictly susceptible to harmonization (Barrett, Acts, 74), at least as a single event.

See Turner, Gifts, 90–92; Keener, John, 1204–5; Haenchen, John, 2:211; Sanders, John, 433; Dunn, “Spirit,” 703; Ellis, Genius, 293; Wojciechowski, “Don”; O’Day, “John,” 846; Cook, “Exegesis,” 8. Like Acts 2:2, it may also echo Ezek 37, but this connection (probably implied in John 3:8) is less clear here.

Robinson, Studies, 166. For the theological link between the Spirit and Jesus’s resurrection, see, e.g., Giesen, “Verheissungen.”

E.g., Alvarez Valdés, “Espírito Santo.”

Although John is even more interested in some festivals than Luke is, John often employs festivals in his narrative in a very different way than Luke does (as I suggested in Keener, “Festivals”).

Keener, John, 1196–1200.

The question of John’s knowledge of the Synoptics is controversial in current Johannine scholarship (see, e.g., Smith, John among Gospels); my own view (in summary form) is that John wrote independently of other Gospels, except in his passion narrative, yet could not have helped but have known of them (especially Mark).

Jub. 6:17; Noack, “Pentecost in Jubilees,” 89; Le Déaut, “Savu‘ot.”

E.g., Williams, Acts, 40.

See comments in Keener, Spirit, 193.

E.g., Holwerda, Spirit, 133 (who sees this as a distinctly apostolic gift, voiding the narrative of its prescriptive function); Carson, John, 648–55; Rossum, “Pentecost.” The verb for Jesus’s breathing on the disciples means more than mere exhalation (Turner, Gifts, 90–92), but whether John might use Jesus’s breathing symbolically is a different question from whether Jesus is portrayed as acting merely symbolically in the narrative world.

With Turner, “Concept”; see also others, including Keener, Giver, 137–69.

See Aug. Tract. Jn. 74.2.2–3 (Martin, Acts, 24); Chrys. Hom. Jn. 86; Origen Cels. 7.51; Menoud, “Pentecôte”; Horton, Spirit, 127–33; cf. Ladd, Theology, 297. On the symbolic view, see Burge, Community, 117–18, who notes, however, that it does not work on the level of Johannine theology. Barrett, Acts, 74, objects to Origen’s distinction of the two events in terms of quantity (Cels. 7.51) by noting that the Spirit is personal; but this may read later trinitarian theology (or even John’s Paraclete) into passages that are more functional than ontological in description. The Spirit’s functional empowerment in various ways may be distinguished (cf. Keener, Spirit, passim, esp. 214–16).

Turner, “Concept,” 28–34, esp. 34.

John can assume that those familiar with his discourses will expect the fulfillment of all long-range promises related to the Paraclete’s activity, based on short-range fulfillments implied in the text, the same way readers of Mark can anticipate resurrection appearances even if none are narrated in that Gospel itself.

See Bartlett, “Coming,” 73; Beare, “Spirit,” 96; cf. de Jonge, Jesus, 174. By contrast, Menzies, “John’s Place,” distinguishes the regenerative and prophetic strands of the Spirit’s coming (the latter focusing on the Paraclete passages) in John’s Gospel (esp. 43–50). My own dissertation independently identified both of these strands in John (Keener, “Pneumatology,” passim; see esp. 324–25, in the conclusion), but I believe that this passage fulfills (at least proleptically) both the regenerative (John 20:22, echoing Gen 2:7) and prophetic (John 20:21; cf. 20:23) strands.

Cf., e.g., Beare, “Spirit,” 96; Lightfoot, Gospel, 335.

Hatina, “Context,” also employs Tg. Onq. on Gen 2:7 and Tg. Neof. on Gen 2:7 to argue for genuine rather than merely symbolic eschatological fulfillment here.

The Spirit is available after Jesus’s glorification (John 7:39), especially his death and resurrection. Because I doubt that the ascension-glorification is, in fact, complete in 20:25 (cf. 20:17; this is a primary objection of Turner, Gifts, 94), the text allows a subsequent impartation, but I do not believe that it requires it; Jesus has already “gone away” and returned (14:18–20; 16:7, 16–22).

With Ashton, Understanding, 425.

E.g., Chevallier, “Pentecôtes.”

Turner, Gifts, 94–97; he summarizes (92–94) Brown’s and other arguments for identifying the two.

One could also note that the disciples, by abandoning Jesus, have not yet met the condition of John 14:15; but one could respond that their remaining together (20:19) fulfilled part of the command (cf. 13:34; 1 John 2:19; Acts 2:1).

Keener, John, 1193–95.

The language of “sending” deliberately parallels the Father’s sending the Son, without necessary reference to distinction in location; it simply involves delegated authority and mission (as in John 20:21, 23).

We might expect overlap even more in John, for whom the cross and exaltation are theologically a single event, than in Luke, whose scheme of salvation history is more chronological.

Turner, Gifts, 100–102, thinks that John sees the Spirit as a single “gift” that arrived in “two chronological stages,” yet denies that these need be paradigmatic for subsequent Christian experience. I see the possibility of subsequent experiences in Acts (esp. Acts 8:14–17; treated in Keener, Gift, 157–68) but also doubt that John speaks to the question directly.

I am among those who argue for John 21 as an integral part of the Fourth Gospel (Keener, John, 1219–22; see also Brant, John, 278).

Cf. Swetnam, “Bestowal.”

Cf., e.g., Strachan, Gospel, 228; Bultmann, John, 692; Michaels, John, 335; Brant, John, 276 (“John’s streamlining of events achieves a unity of action”). See more fully the evidence in Burge, Community, 123–31.

E.g., Dunn, “Spirit,” 704.

Burge, Community, 148.

E.g., Jesus gives Judas the sop (John 13:26; contrast Mark 14:20); he appears to be executed on Passover (John 18:28; contrast Mark 14:14); he carries his own cross (John 19:17; contrast Mark 15:21).

Referring here of course to traditional usage in NT scholarship, not to what became the Roman Catholic Church.

Hays, Moral Vision, 135. Fee, Paul, Spirit, and People, 95, thinks that the Spirit was much more an experiential matter for Pauline Christians than for most second- and third-generation Christians today. For an emphasis on the likely pervasiveness of tongues in early Christianity, see, e.g., Jewett, Romans, 73 (following, among others, Smith, “Glossolalia”).

Richard, “Pentecost.” (Johnson, Acts, 14, lists the same five accounts of the Spirit’s “outpouring.”)

This is not to suggest that he expects glossolalia on every occasion (see comment on Acts 8:15–17) or that he is concerned only with “initial experiences” (see 4:8, 31; 13:9).

Estrada, Followers, 204–8, goes so far as to limit it to the Twelve, viewing them as the primary subject of Acts 1–2. The apostles (1:2) do receive the promise (1:8), but others join them in prayer (1:14), with still more remaining with them at least on some occasions (1:15). Since the promise is ultimately for all (2:38–39) and since people are sometimes filled with the Spirit after prayer elsewhere in Acts (4:31; cf. 9:11, 17; 10:30; Luke 11:13), one should infer that at least those continuing in prayer with the apostles (Acts 1:14) also received. (On other occasions of prayer, Spirit-filled persons could pray for others rather than for themselves [as in 8:15], but those who needed the Spirit themselves prayed and received themselves.)

Dupont, Salvation, 37.

Ibid., 38; Lake and Cadbury, Commentary, 17.

Dupont, Salvation, 37. Estrada, Followers, 206–7, acknowledges that the gift is for all believers but contends that it could have come to the apostles first. Yet Acts 1:14 mentions more persons than the apostles, even if we ruled out the 120 in 1:15, and so Luke does not clearly portray the gift as initially coming to the apostles exclusively. Cf. also “those with them” in Luke 24:33.

See, e.g., Menzies, Development, 208n4. Contrast Dupont, Salvation, 37 (as noted above, because “all” echoes Acts 1:14). Estrada, Followers, 207, counters plausibly that the apostles need not have each spoken only one language over the course of their speaking (he regards it [208n66] as a “hearing” miracle anyway). Estrada’s objection is viable if (as he contends) we have other reason to limit the sense of “all” here; otherwise, however, the multiple languages tend to support more speakers.

Thus Acts 1:15–26 is a deliberately bracketed digression, not an interpolation.

Estrada, Followers, 205–6, objects that it refers to the same place, not the same people. But why would the number of people gathered in the place be lower (indeed, down to only the apostles) on Pentecost?

Acts 4:26 is a quote of Ps 2:2 LXX; elsewhere in the NT, the expression appears only at Matt 22:34; 1 Cor 7:5; 11:20; 14:23, but it occurs fifty-one times in the LXX (e.g., Neh 4:8; 6:2, 7).

The word ὁμοῦ appears nowhere else in Luke-Acts or in the NT outside John (but means “together” there: John 4:36; 20:4; 21:2); in the LXX, it appears mainly in the Maccabean literature (2 Macc 8:14; 10:15; 11:7, 9; 13:12; 3 Macc 3:26; 4:13; 5:5, 21; 4 Macc 8:29; 13:13; 15:12), except for Wis 7:11; Sir 22:23.

E.g., Iambl. V.P. 7.34; 9.45; see further Keener, John, 1061–62; for the theme as a rhetorical topos, see comment on Acts 15:25.

E.g., Dion. Hal. Ant. rom. 7.53.1; Livy 2.33.1; 5.7.10; 24.22.1, 13, 17; Sen. Y. Ep. Lucil. 94.46; Mus. Ruf. 8, p. 64.13; Max. Tyre 16.3; Men. Rhet. 2.3, 384.23–25; some thinkers even applied this globally (cf. Whitacre, John, 417; Keener, Revelation, 341). In early Christianity, cf. 1 Cor 1:10; 11:18–19; Phil 2:1–2; 4:2.

Babr. 85.

Val. Max. 2.6.8.

E.g., Hom. Il. 1.255–58; Livy 2.60.4; 3.66.4; Sall. Jug. 73.5; Hdn. 8.8.5; Babr. 44.7–8; 47.

E.g., Hom. Od. 1.369–71; Iambl. V.P. 7.34; 9.45.

They could become occasions of unity or of discord (Dio Chrys. Or. 40.26–27), though presumably designed for the former purpose.

It also evokes the mythic unity that later tradition attributed to Israel in the wilderness (Mek. Bah. 1.108–12 [Lauterbach, 2:200]). Those who emphasize Sinai echoes in the Pentecost narrative often draw attention to Israel’s unanimity at Sinai in Tannaitic tradition (Dupont, Salvation, 38–39).

E.g., Bruce, Commentary, 56; Hengel, “Geography of Palestine,” 37.

Dunn, Acts, 24; cf. Spencer, Acts, 32 (who sees a deliberate contrast with the temple here); Witherington, Acts, 131. Bishop, Apostles, 32–33, suggests that 9:00 a.m. was too early to be in the temple courts; but the temple opened for sacrifices and prayers much earlier than this (see comment on Acts 3:1).

The phrase does not specify which house; Luke speaks of the “whole household” in Acts 7:10; 18:8 (cf. Titus 1:11; Heb 3:2, 5, the Hebrews texts alluding to Num 12:7; “whole household” also appears in 1 Sam 22:15; 1 Kgs 16:11; 2 Kgs 9:8). “Whole house” can refer to the temple (1 Kgs 6:10, 22; Ezek 41:19) or other buildings (1 Kgs 7:1; 2 Kgs 20:13).

See Barrett, Acts, 113–14.

Jeffers, World, 77.

See Blue, “Influence,” 483.

Blue, ibid., is among those who suggest this change in venue.

E.g., Lucian Peregr. 1.

Cf. Jeremias, Theology, 78; Hill, Prophecy, 52; Stauffer, Jesus and Story, 209; m. Sanh. 11:4.

E.g., Dio Chrys. Or. 27.5; for athletic competitions and theatrical performances, see Rives, Religion, 113. Jewish people also sought relaxation during festivals (Le Cornu, Acts, 716).

For the “festivity” of ancient festivals, see, e.g., Apoll. K. Tyre 39; Diog. Laert. 2.68; Libanius Descr. 5 (esp. 5.1, 6); 29 (esp. 29.1–2, 7–9, 12); for Sukkoth, m. Sukkah 5:1; b. Sukkah 51ab, 53a; in earlier times, cf. Murray, Splendor, 184; Heidel, Genesis, 71. Gentile cities expected all their citizens to participate in cultic festivals (Rives, Religion, 56).

Olson, “Pentecost,” cites Tob 2:1; 2 Macc 12:31–32; Jos. Ant. 3.252; War 1.253.

E.g., Jos. War 1.253; 2.42 (though anger fueled the gatherings in this instance); Ant. 17.254; cf. 3.252–54; 13.252. On pilgrimage for festivals, see Safrai, “Temple,” 898–904 (guessing [898] tens of thousands). Josephus’s numbers are internally consistent (i.e., proportionate), and some allow more than a million (Byatt, “Population Numbers”; cf. also Foakes-Jackson and Lake, “Background of Jewish History,” 1), but 2,700,000 Passover pilgrims (Jos. War 6.425) is clearly exaggerated (Avi-Yonah, “Geography,” 109).

Some texts (t. Pisha 4:15; Lam. Rab. 1:1, §2) claim more than six million Jewish visitors for every Passover.

Cf. Jochim, Religions, 152, on an annual festal season when Peikang, Taiwan, receives five hundred thousand to a million visitors, that is, up to 5 percent of Taiwan’s population.

E.g., Xen. Eph. Anthia 1.2. Sometimes large numbers at festivals unexpectedly overtaxed available resources (see Lucian Peregr. 19). On Greek pilgrimage, see Corvisier, “Pèlerinages.”

Spawforth, “Tourism.”

Pliny E. N.H. 5.15.70 (LCL, 2:273, 275). He refers to its former state, writing after its destruction (5.15.73; hence perhaps to glorify the Roman conquest).

A tradition also preserved in later rabbinic literature (Eccl. Rab. 1:7, §8); for the tradition of crowds at such festivals (and miraculous space to prostrate themselves), see, e.g., b. Yoma 21a.

Sanders, Judaism, 130 (suggesting that “it is doubtful that many came more than once in their lifetime”); Safrai, “Relations,” 191; idem, “Pilgrimage to Jerusalem,” 12–21.

Hull, Spirit in Acts, 55–56; also Song Rab. 7:2, §2. (Others think Pentecost less popular because it was shorter, Parker, “Apokatastasis,” 58–61; available evidence is quite limited, Noack, “Pentecost in Jubilees,” 92.) Many Diaspora Jews, however, would have celebrated the festival locally (CIJ 2:36, §777, Pentecost in Hierapolis); there is no Diaspora emphasis, however, in the temple scene following Acts 20:16.

E.g., Jub. 6:32–38; 22:1–9 (though Zeitlin, “Jubilees, Character,” 5–7, emphasizes Jubilees’ alteration of Genesis). Some think that the rabbis may deliberately play down Pentecost because of Essene and Christian emphasis (Noack, “Pentecost in Jubilees,” 88–89).

See, e.g., Jub. 6:32–38 (emphasizing the right calendar); for the Sadducees, see Belkin, Philo, 217 (citing b. Menaḥ. 10:3; b. Roš Haš. 1:15; b. Menaḥ. 65a); Dupont, Salvation, 36; Fitzmyer, Acts, 233; cf. m. Ḥag. 2:4; Megillat Taanit 1.

Belkin, Philo, 217–18 (citing Philo Spec. Laws 2.162, 176).

The specific term appears nowhere in the LXX, though the cognate noun συμίλήρωσις appears in 1 Esd 1:55 [ET 1:58] and 2 Chr 36:21 for the fulfillment of the divine promise, and the cognate verb πληρόω can function in this manner (e.g., Jer 36:10 LXX = Jer 29:10; cf. again 2 Chr 36:21); cf. also συντελεῖσθαι in Acts 21:27.

Cf. Dupont, Salvation, 36; Haenchen, Acts, 167n2 (comparing Gen 25:24 with Luke 1:57; 2:6; 2:21–22; and Lev 8:33 with Luke 9:51); Bruce, Acts¹, 81; Knowling, “Acts,” 71 (citing Exod 7:25; Jer 29:10); Aubert, Motif, 55; cf. the thought in Gal 4:4.

Early Pentecostals probably associated it with the upper room (given the application to the upstairs room at Azusa Street; in Menzies, Anointed, 52; also the Upper Room Mission, 75–76; Robeck, Mission, 94–95, 202–4, 315–18 and passim).

Lake and Cadbury, Commentary, 17. Haenchen, Acts, 168n1, does note, however, that Luke’s preferred term for the temple is ἱερόν (twenty-two times); Jos. Ant. 8.65 uses οἶκος for the temple and its chambers, but Josephus usually uses ναός.

The “women” and “brothers” of Acts 1:14 would provide household imagery only if we took “women” as “wives” (which I have argued is unlikely) or accepted the unlikely textual variant there.

The “house” might provide a paradigm for Christian experiences in homes/familial settings, like the outpouring in Acts 10:44 (10:22, Cornelius’s house). But Luke does not emphasize that as the mandatory setting; it is not specified in Acts 8 or 19.

See Hull, Spirit in Acts, 57; Spencer, Acts, 32; Beale, “Descent.” Dupont, Salvation, 41, compares also Exod 19:18.

Whether Luke might also allude to a spiritual temple/house (Eph 2:20–22; 1 Pet 2:5; Rev 3:12) is uncertain, though he seems aware of this image (Luke 19:40, 44–47). For a plausible and well-articulated case for the descent of the eschatological temple here, see Beale, “Descent” (idem, “Temple,” arguing for the temple contexts of texts often used to illumine this passage).

Witherington, Acts, 132. This paucity of description militates against this passage’s being a good illustration of ekphrasis (pace Parsons, Acts, 37–38; Escobedo, “Lens,” 134–38, despite insights).

Cf. also Keener, Miracles, 87–96.

Hull, Spirit in Acts, 58–59 (comparing Philo Flight 32; Nemesius De Natura hominis 30, 40). On the Stoics, see Long, Philosophy, 155–58, 171; Chevallier, Ancien Testament, 41–42; Büchsel, Geist, 45–49, esp. 47. Philo’s Jewish background prevented complete assimilation to Stoic conceptions here (Scott, Spirit, 58–59; Isaacs, Spirit, 19), but the blending of Jewish and Stoic sources is evident even in Wisdom of Solomon (Chevallier, “Souffle,” 43–46, esp. 45–46).

See, e.g., Keener, Spirit, 7–8, 10–13, with the emphasis on the prophetic Spirit in Luke-Acts (e.g., Acts 2:17–18); see our introduction, , , and esp. the excursus there on the background for Luke’s conception of the Spirit.

Hull, Spirit in Acts, 59; Johnson, Acts, 42.

For further empirical observation and related speculation about the winds, see, e.g., Sen. Y. Nat. Q. 5.16.1–5.18.2; Vitruv. Arch. 8.2.5–6. Williams, “Winds,” suggests moralizing applications in Seneca’s discussion of winds.

Pliny E. N.H. 2.45.116; see further 2.44.114–15.

Personifying them or viewing them as under the gods (e.g., Virg. Aen. 1.56–59; Val. Flacc. 8.322–27; Plut. Bride 12, Mor. 139DE; cf. Käppel, “Notos”; Rives, Religion, 16; ancient Near Eastern weather deities in Schwemer, “Weather gods”) or under the true God’s dominion (e.g., 1 En. 4:3; 18:1–5; 34:2–3; 76:4; Rev 7:1; Jos. Asen. 12:2; Sib. Or. 1.195; Gen. Rab. 24:4; Lev. Rab. 15:1; Tg. Jon. on 1 Kgs 19:11–12).

Van der Horst, “Parallels to Acts,” 49–50, citing Hom. Il. 18.225–27; Eurip. Bacch. 757–58; Cic. Div. 1.53.121; Ovid Fasti 6.634–36; Virg. Aen. 2.680–84; 8.680–81; Iambl. Myst. 3.2.3.6; Livy 1.39.2; 25.39.16; Pliny E. N.H. 2.241; Apul. De deo Socr. 7 (and several more). For some analogous modern claims, see below.

Philost. Hrk. 3.2–5; 10.2; 11.3 (see Maclean and Aitken, Heroikos, xxvii).

Max. Tyre 4.8; and comments in Trapp, Maximus, 39 (who contrasts earlier sources, Chrysippus in Cic. Nat. d. 1.40 and Diogenes of Babylon frg. 33).

The term πνοή appears elsewhere in the NT only at Acts 17:25, where it refers to human “breath” as a gift of God (and alludes directly to Gen 2:7); in the LXX (twenty-four times), it refers especially to the breath of life. For the Gen 2:7 allusion in John 20:22, see Turner, Gift, 90–92; Keener, John, 1204–5. Later Targumim interpreted God’s breath into Adam as endowment with speech (Tg. Ps.-J. on Gen 2:7; Tg. Neof. on Gen 2:7; probably analogous to the Spirit of prophecy’s frequent effects). The comparison with the divine wind or Spirit at creation (Gen 1:2; Walaskay, Acts, 34) seems less convincing.

Cf. Dupont, Salvation, 40; Longenecker, Acts, 66; Dunn, Acts, 24–25; Fitzmyer, Acts, 235. For wind as πνεῦμα, see, e.g., Philost. Hrk. 31.9.

See Keener, “Spirit,” 484–87.

On which see Rhet. Her. 4.21.29–22.32; Quint. Inst. 8.3.11–12; 9.3.66–67; Rowe, “Style,” 132; Anderson, Glossary, 93, 127; idem, Rhetorical Theory, 283–85; cf. Blass, Debrunner, and Funk, Grammar, §488; for “Spirit” and “wind,” see Keener, John, 555–57 passim. As noted above, writers could use the wind to illustrate unpredictability (Catull. Carm. 70.4; John 3:8; cf. as something difficult to trace in Pesiq. Rab. 23:8). Some diverse cultures link “spirit” with “wind” (Kaplan and Johnson, “Navajo Psychopathology,” 205; Egyptian language in Görg, “Wehen”) or “wind” with the divine (Mbiti, Religions, 70).

Theorists advised its sparing use, mainly for lightening speech (Anderson, Rhetorical Theory, 283–84, cites Cic. Part. or. 72; Quint. Inst. 8.3.11–12; Rhet. Her. 4.29–32).

Recalling Gen 2:7 but possibly implying Ezek 37 as well in the light of John 3:8; see more fully Keener, John, 555–58, 1204–5.

Exodus 14:21 LXX uses the most common term for wind but adds βιαίῳ. Cf. ἄφνω (in the NT, solely Lukan, found in Acts 16:26; 28:6) in Prov 1:27; and βία or βίαιος with πνεῦμα in Ps 48:7; Isa 11:15; Wis 5:11; 7:20 (cf. 13:2; 17:17, where wind is linked with violent waters). For fire and storm, Conzelmann, Acts, 13, adds 4 Ezra 13:10.

Bishop, Apostles, 31. The rainy season was over by Pentecost, but such winds could bring heat and sand (31–32); winds could be violent whether at sea (e.g., Acts 27:4–15) or in the desert (e.g., Sall. Jug. 79.6; Jer 13:24; Hos 13:15).

So Bruce, “Matthew,” 84; Flowers, “En pneumati”; cf. Dunn, “Spirit,” 695; Isa 4:4; Mal 3:2. Barnard, “Matt. III.11,” 107, suggests the image of a fiery stream (which appears in many Jewish texts).

See Keener, Matthew, 127n157.

In early Jewish sources, also Jub. 1:3; L.A.E. 25:3; 4 Ezra 3:19; cf. 13:27; at the law-giving at Sinai, L.A.B. 11:5; 23:10; 32:7; God’s greatness over these elements in 4 Ezra 4:5, 9; 2 Bar. 48:4; m. ʾAb. 5:8.

Some in the first century C.E. thought of a fiery pillar as a type of whirlwind (Pliny E. N.H. 2.50.133–34).

E.g., Knowling, “Acts,” 72; C. Williams, Acts, 62; O’Hagan, “Pentecost”; Stronstad, Charismatic Theology, 58; Barrett, Acts, 113; Spencer, Acts, 32 (focusing on Isa 6); Gaventa, Acts, 74; Escobedo, “Lens,” 140 (fire in Exodus as God’s presence). The Isaiah connection fits the context of mission (Rigato, “Evento”).

Cf. Abri, “Meaning of Pentecost”; O’Hagan, “Pentecost”; Boismard and Lamouille, Actes, 2:101.

Gen. Rab. 14:8; Grassi, “Ezekiel xxxvii.1–14,” 164; a link between “breathe” in Gen 2:7 and Ezek 37:9 is also logical on midrashic hermeneutical assumptions. On the relevance of Gen 2:7, see .

See 4Q386; 4Q388; 4Q385 frg. 2 (for wind, see lines 7–8); also see Diaspora frescoes at Dura-Europos (Philonenko, “Ossements desséchés”); for Ezek 37 and the hope of the Spirit’s raising the dead, e.g., Sipre Deut. 306.28.3; y. Šeqal. 3:3; Gen. Rab. 96:5; Exod. Rab. 48:4.

E.g., Grassi, “Ezekiel xxxvii.1–14,” 164; Bruce, Commentary, 54; Longenecker, Acts, 66; Gibbs, “Launching of Mission,” 21.

Applicable to storms or waves, as in Acts 2:2–3 (cf. Luke 21:25; Pss 65:7; 77:16; Jer 51:16, 42; Sir 46:17), or praises or musical instruments (Pss 42:4; 150:3; Amos 5:23; Dan 3:7, 10, 15; Wis 19:18; Sir 50:18).

Dupont, Salvation, 39 (noting also Philo Decal. 33, and φωνή in Acts 2:6; Philo Decal. 46; Exod 20:18); Johnson, Acts, 42; cf. Jos. Ant. 3.81.

Also Dupont, Salvation, 39. It is revelatory in the later Herm. 22.4.

Cf. the sound reviving the dead at Sinai in Tg. Ps.-J. on Exod 20:15/18. Earlier and more relevant, cf. the tradition of a noise on a later Pentecost in Jos. War 6.299, but there it signifies the Lord’s withdrawal from the temple.

Cf. Dupont, Salvation, 40.

E.g., Dan 4:26; 3 Macc 4:21; 1 En. 6:2; 1QM XII, 5; Rom 1:18; Luke 15:18; m. ʾAb. 1:3; t. B. Qam. 7:5; Sipra Behuq. pq. 6. 267.2.1; 79.1.1; b. Taʿan. 14b; Pesaḥ. 66b; ʿAbod. Zar. 18a, bar.; Moʾed Qaṭ. 17a; B. Qam. 76a.

Fronto Eloq. 1.3 warns against waiting for eloquence to fall, like the Palladium, de caelo, “from heaven.”

On various translations of γλῶσσαι here, see Steyn, “Γλῶσσαι.”

Hull, Spirit in Acts, 58; Haenchen, Acts, 168n2; Conzelmann, Acts, 13 (citing Isa 5:24 MT; 1 En. 14:9–10, 15; 71:5; 1Q22; 1Q29 1 3; 2 3; 4Q375–376); cf. Gen. Rab. 59:4. Menzies, “Occurrences,” notes that these occurrences became most common in the Merkabah tradition, appropriate for heavenly revelation in Acts 2:4.

Cf., e.g., LXX Isa 10:17; 26:11; 30:27; Jer 21:14; also cf. Heb 10:27; Jas 5:3; even more often the cognate in Lev 9:24; 10:2; Num 11:1; 16:35; 21:28; 26:10; and passim in the LXX; Rev 11:5. To some extent the metaphor may have lost its figurative force, but the image apparently remained.

E.g., 1Q29 1 3; 2 2; 4Q376 1 II, 1.

Cf., e.g., Dupont, Salvation, 41; Fitzmyer, Acts, 238; Chance, Acts, 48. Rhetoric welcomed continuity of metaphors; see the later Hermog. Inv. 4.10.200 on Demosth. Or. 4.49. Levison, Filled, 329–30, connects fire with inspiration in Greek sources (cf. also Jer 20:9).

Not referring to fire (Luke 11:17–18; 12:52–53; 22:17; 23:34); elsewhere in the NT, only for the dividing of Jesus’s garments (Matt 27:35; Mark 15:24; John 19:24; as in Luke 23:34).

In Sipra Sh. M.D. 99.5.7, for judgment. Some scholars cite God’s voice dividing into seven and then seventy at Sinai, in third-century rabbinic tradition (Dupont, Salvation, 42), but the parallel might be too distant, despite possible Sinai allusions in the context.

Here, see, e.g., Rackham, Acts, 18 (citing Exod 3:2–4; Virg. Aen. 2.682–84); Hull, Spirit in Acts, 58; Johnson, Acts, 42. Fire was sacred to the Persians (Quint. Curt. 3.3.10; 4.13.12; cf. later among Zoroastrians, Yamauchi, Persia, 447) and viewed as divine (Hdt. 1.131; Lucian Z. Rants 42; Max. Tyre 2.4). Some Stoics viewed God as the primal fire (Sen. Y. Ben. 4.8.1; Hippol. Ref. 1.3); Jews recognized God as consuming fire (Deut 4:24; 9:3; Isa 30:27, 30; Heb 12:29; Exod. Rab. 30:19; Pesiq. Rab. 11:7), and Torah could be associated with it (Song Rab. 5:11, §6; cf. Song Rab. 1:10, §2).

Dupont, Salvation, 41; Johnson, Acts, 46; Conzelmann, Acts, 13. For an earlier, personal theophanic revelation to Moses at Sinai, see Luke 20:37; Acts 7:30. Like subsequent Lukan reports of outpourings of the Spirit, most modern popular revival reports that include tongues and other Pentecost-type phenomena omit the tongues of fire, but reports of fire or fire-like phenomena do appear; e.g., Wacker, Heaven, 93 (citing W. W. Hall’s claim in 1924); Sung, Diaries, 109 (while others were seeing or hearing angels; March 27, 1937), 140–41 (secondhand but leading to many conversions; January 1935); Synan, Voices, 137–38 (June 20, 1905, in the Indian revival at Pandita Ramabai’s home for orphan brides, also noted in Ma, “Mission,” 24; Jones, “Fire,” 214; McGee, People of Spirit, 74; idem, “Regions Beyond,” 84; cf. also Bartleman, Azusa Street, 35); Liardon, Generals, 400; cf. also the globe of fire above the head of St. Martin of Tours (Gardner, Healing Miracles, 72), and the visible cloud of glory in Clark, Impartation, 213; the bright light from heaven seen by many during the 1939 Presbyterian revival in the Hebrides (Peckham, Sounds, 107); the rushing wind in an early American Methodist revival noted in Wigger, Saint, 301 (if the witness intends the expression literally); “an audible wind” in the 1930s Shandong revival (with Southern Baptist participation; Bays, “Revival,” 173); another on Aug. 27, 1970, in the Solomon Islands revival (Koch, Gifts, 22; idem, Zulus, 50); on Sept. 26, 1965, a rushing wind and visible fire at the beginning of the Timor revival in Indonesia (Tari, Wind, 24–25; idem, Breeze, 6).

E.g., b. Ḥag. 14b; y. Ḥag. 2:1, §9; cf. the child expositor of mysteries consumed by fire in b. Ḥag. 13a.

E.g., Isaacs, Spirit, 131; Zehnle, Pentecost Discourse, 117; Conzelmann, Acts, 13; Boring, Berger, and Colpe, Commentary, 311; Le Cornu, Acts, 59–60 (citing also Mek. Bah. 9; Exod. Rab. 5:9; 34:1); Neudecker, “Volk”; cf. Klauck, Magic, 8; Chance, Acts, 48.

The LXX ἑώρα (Exod 20:18; cf. Deut 4:12; perhaps 5:24) is the third singular imperfect active indicative of ὁράω, not the verb to be expected with φωνήν (but one that fits the other objects).

For judgments, see, e.g., Isa 26:11; 66:15–16, 24; CD II, 4–6; 1 En. 103:8; Sib. Or. 4.43, 161, 176–78; 2 Thess 1:6–7; Exod. Rab. 15:27; see further Davies and Allison, Matthew, 1:310; Keener, Matthew, 128–29.

Johnson, Acts, 42; Barrett, Acts, 114. Cf. Boismard and Lamouille, Actes, 2:101, who connect it with division in Luke 12:49–53; but for 12:49–50 as Jesus’s baptism of fire (experiencing judgment for others), cf. comment below. Some have identified the Spirit and fire (Pelagius Comm. Rom. on 6:3 [de Bruyn, 96; Bray, Romans, 154]), but while they are one eschatological gift, the repentant “wheat,” in the context in Q, receive the Spirit, and the “chaff” the fire (Matt 3:10–12; Luke 3:9, 16–17).

See, e.g., Keener, Spirit, 127; Menzies, Development, 137–44.

On judgment in Acts 2:3–4, see Charette, “Tongues as of Fire”; cf. Isa 28:11 (a judgment passage) in 1 Cor 14:21.

Likely judgment (cf., e.g., Tannehill, Luke, 251, though he does not see it as necessarily final judgment; for the graphic language here, cf. idem, Sword, 145), perhaps on Israel (cf. Witherington, Christology of Jesus, 121–22).

I read Luke 12:49–50 with Luke 3:16; see Robinson, Studies, 161; Dunn, Baptism, 42. Cf. also Mark 10:38 (on which cf. Robinson, Studies, 160–61; Lampe, Seal, 39; Lane, Mark, 380–81).

Cf. Davies and Allison, Matthew, 1:316, who cite Dan 7:10; 1QH^a XI, 29–36; 1 En. 67:13; Sib. Or. 2.196–205, 252–54 (probably a Christian interpolation); 3.54 (against Rome), 84–87; 4 Ezra 13:10–11. See also 4Q385 4 11; 4Q405 15 II, 2–3; 20 II, 10; 1 En. 14:19; 17:4–5; 67:7; 71:1–2, 6; 3 En. 33:4; Lam. Rab. 3:23, §8; Pesiq. Rab. 20:4; for the lake of fire, e.g., 1 En. 14:22; Rev 19:20; 20:10, 14–15; cf. Pesiq. Rab Kah. 5:3 (though these are literally just “realms” of fire).

E.g., Virg. Aen. 6.735–42. It can depict torment in Tartarus, as in, e.g., Virg. Aen. 6.551; Lucian Dial. D. 450 (24/30, Minos and Sostratus 1); Sil. It. 13.836, 871; 14.61–62.

Cf. Dunn, Acts, 25; Miller, Convinced, 170–71. Johnson, Acts, 45, emphasizes αὐτοῖς, hence to “the disciples, not the crowd”; but this argument begs the question as to who was gathered in the “house” at that moment. Historians and others reported as true a special solar phenomenon at one of Augustus’s entries into Rome (in 44 B.C.E.; Vell. Paterc. 2.59.6; Sen. Nat. Q. 1.2.1; Suet. Aug. 95), though this report is explicable in terms of a natural phenomenon interpreted as a portent. For halo or halo-like claims, see, e.g., Pliny E. N.H. 36.70.204; a glorious deity (Mithras) in PGM 4.696–99; but Jewish portraits of angels and others may be more relevant (e.g., 4 Ezra 10:25; 2 En. 1:5; 19:1; 22:4; 26:2–7; 3 En. 14:5; 18:25; 22:5; 26:7; Rev 10:1).

In Mark 1:10, Jesus saw the heavens opened and the Spirit descending; Luke leaves this ambiguous (Luke 3:21), even more than Matt 3:16 (though Matthew’s voice sounds more public, 3:17).

Keener, Miracles.

For the image of being “seized” by a spirit in inspiration in another language, cf. the descriptions of the Pythia in comment on Acts 16:16.

Cf. Philost. Hrk. 7.3 (μαντικῆς σοφίας ἐμφοροῦνται). Because these examples stem from the third or early fourth century, the possibility exists that some of their religious language reflects the influence of Christian vocabulary (note especially προφῆτιν, though the “mantic” language is not used for Christian prophecy in any extant first-century sources.

Eunapius is late enough that it could potentially (though need not) reflect Christian influence.

Thus the Pentecost experience stands in continuity with earlier biblical experience (cf. Fuller, Gospel, 173–74; Haya-Prats, Believers, 5–6n6). ʾAbot R. Nat. 43 B links a few of these texts midrashically (Le Cornu, Acts, 63).

In Test. Job 41:5 (OTP 1:861)/41:7 (Kraft, 74), one could speak evil because “filled [ἐμίλησθείς] by Satan” (cf. Acts 5:3); cf. a nonhuman filling with an “evil spirit” in Test. Ash. 1:9.

Whoever seeks the law will be filled with it (Sir 2:16; 35:15 [32:15]). A successor being filled with the Spirit through his predecessor also appears in Deut 34:9, mentioned above.

Hull, Spirit in Acts, 69, suggests that the fillings in Luke 1 were temporary but prefigured Pentecost (a likely premise, given the fillings’ relative locations at the beginnings of the respective books). Herm. 43.9 associates being filled with the prophetic spirit with an angel, different from most early Christian usage (though cf. Rev 1:1; some would add 1 Cor 14:32); contrast being filled with the devil’s spirit in Herm. 43.3.

Its clearest non-Lukan, early Christian usage applies to inspired worship (Eph 5:18–20), perhaps in contrast to the Mysteries, or at least to drunken banquet songs (see Keener, Paul, 259–63).

Witherington, Acts, 133; Keener, Gift, 157–68.

With Faw, Acts, 51 (who less convincingly connects the scoffers of Acts 2:13 with Joshua’s “opposition” in Num 11:28). For Num 11 in Acts 2, cf. also Cotton, “Significance,” esp. 3; Leeper, “Gift,” esp. 25, 28–29, 36–37; Williams, “Old Testament Pentecost”; Menzies, “Sending,” 98–99; Stronstad, “Baptized,” 171–72, noting significant parallels (esp. the transfer and dissemination of the Spirit); note also Edward Barber in 1648 (in Barr, Leonard, Parsons, and Weaver, Acts, 110).

Lake and Cadbury, Commentary, 22 (citing Midr. Pss. 14:6).

Tannehill, Acts, 32–33.

See Menzies, Power, 169. He notes (166) the frequent LXX idiom “πλήρης + subjective genitive of quality.” Calderón, “Llenura,” similarly suggests “filling” for inspired speech and “full” for virtue.

Cf. esp. Mills, Glossolalia: Bibliography, with more than 1,150 entries already in 1985.

Even in 1 Cor 12–14, some scholars associate tongues with realized eschatology (Snyder, Corinthians, 180).

See Keener, “Tongues,” 177–78, 180–81; idem, “Holy Spirit,” 171; earlier, Gift, 180. For a survey of various understandings of the theological implications that Luke finds in tongues, see Choi, “Personality,” 158–60.

Cf. Dupont, Salvation, 51. Knowling, “Acts,” 72–73, cites LXX usage for prophetic speech (1 Chr 25:1; Ezek 13:9, 19; Mic 5:12; Zech 10:2; but contrast Ps 59:7 [58:8 LXX]); also Palma, “Ἀίοφθέγγομαι.” Cf. Philo Heir 259; Jos. 117; Mos. 1.175–76; 2.253, 263; (using a cognate) mental inspiration in Porph. Marc. 26.417–18; magical gibberish in Semitic languages in Lucian Alex. 13.

Forbes, Prophecy, 163; e.g., Test. Dan 5:2 (cognate); Porph. Marc. 15.255–56 (cognate); probably the cognate in Acts 4:18. For speaking in angelic dialects, Test. Job 48:3; for wisdom as figurative prophecy, Diogenes Ep. 21; for speaking divine mysteries, Eunapius Lives 469; for uttering an apothegm, Diog. Laert. 1.88.

The term refers to the crying out, not to the prophetic aspect (covered by μαντικήν).

This cognate generally means simply “utter” (e.g., Test. Dan 5:2, speaking truth; Test. Job 18:4 [OTP 1:846]/18:5 [Kraft, 40]).

E.g., Ovid Metam. 6.159–62; Max. Tyre 9.1 (on δαίμονες); Aune, Prophecy, 47; see the excursus on prophecy at Acts 2:17–18. Cf. Jer 1:9 (though this may simply represent a Hebrew expression for telling another what to say; 2 Sam 14:3, 19); cf. also Luke 1:70; Acts 1:16; 3:18, 21; 4:25 (perhaps 15:7, though indirectly); 2 Chr 36:21–22; Ezra 1:1; 1 Esd 1:57; 2:1; Athenag. Plea 7.

The imperfect ἐδίδου presumably means that the Spirit was supplying the utterance progressively as they were speaking it. But it is probably also causative in function (see here Parsons and Culy, Acts, 25, on this use of δίδωμι). Cf. God’s “giving” speech in association with the Spirit in Isa 59:21 (Ruthven, “Covenant,” 40–41).

E.g., Bruce, Acts¹, 82.

See one survey of proposed backgrounds (both Jewish and pagan) in Klauck, “Von Kassandra.”

E.g., Moule, Messengers, 24; Bruce, Commentary, 59–60; Weiser, Apostelgeschichte, 84; Crowe, Acts, 9–10; Witherington, Acts, 131; D. Williams, Acts, 45; Talbert, Acts, 26. See also Exod. Rab. 5:9; Tg. Ps.-J. on Exod 20:15/18 (and the numerous sources cited in M. Maher’s translation, 219, including Mek. on Exod 20:18, 2.267; on 19:16, 2.218; and Philo Decal. 33, 46).

The tradition is late (Barrett, Acts, 111) and is not explicitly connected with Pentecost (Conzelmann, Acts, 16).

For Sabbath worship, see, e.g., 4Q400–407; 4Q504 1–2 VII, 4–6; 11Q17; for humans participating, see 1QS XI, 8; Lincoln, Paradise, 149; Vermes, Religion, 128; Newsom, “Songs,” 1138. For humans among angels (or vice versa) in sacred matters, cf. 1QS XI, 7–8; 1QSb III, 25–27; IV, 24–26; 1QM VII, 4–6; XII, 1–2, 8–9; 4Q181 1 3–4; elsewhere, Jub. 30:18; 31:14; Test. Job 33:2–3. Others also celebrated angelic worship (e.g., Pr Man 15; L.A.B. 19:16; 2 En. 19:1–3; Tg. Ps.-J. on Exod 14:24) and its connection with Israel’s worship (Sipre Deut. 306.31.1; cf. Lincoln, Paradise, 112).

Some view the problem in Col 2:16–18 as Judaizing angel-worshipers (Hengel, Acts and History, 121; Schweizer, Colossians, 159; Kraabel, “Judaism in Asia Minor,” 145), since angel veneration is known (Smith, Magician, 69), as are claims of angel mediation (e.g., 1 En. 99:3; 104:1; 2 En. 33:10; cf. Le Déaut, “Intercession”) or revelations (e.g., Rev 1:1; b. Ber. 51a; Ned. 20ab). Angels could well invite invocations (e.g., later, PGM 7.1012–13; 35.1–42; CIJ 2:91, §850; cf. Cohen, Maccabees, 84) or requests for revelation (e.g., Lesses, “Speaking with Angels”). By the fourth century, councils opposed Christians’ worshiping angels in Anatolia (Kraabel, “Judaism in Asia Minor,” 144–45). (The issue here could simply be pride in visions of angels; Yates, “Worship.”) Others have argued plausibly that the problem is the Colossian believers’ supposed involvement in the angelic liturgy (Francis, “Humility,” 178–80; Carr, Angels, 70), but one wonders why this would appear problematic. It probably appears in Rev 4–5; later, cf. Robinson, “Testament.”

For the song of the living creatures and/or the Trisagion, see also 4Q405 20 II, 7–11; 1 En. 39:12; 2 En. 21:1; 3 En. 1:12; 20:2; 22B:7; 27:3; 34:2; 35:5; 38:1; 39:1; 40:1–3; Apoc. Ab. 18:3–5; Exod. Rab. 29:9; for a survey of sources, cf. Böttrich, “Liturgie”; Hayward, “Chant” (regardless of conclusions about temple worship); Aune, Revelation, 303–7; Oesterley, Liturgy, 67–68; cf. also 4QSam^a (Warren, “Trisagion”); Test. Ab. 3:3; 20:12 A; Num. Rab. 4:20; 4 Bar. 9:3; Incant. Text 33.5; 1 Clem. 34.6; Test. Adam 1:4; 4:8; Origen’s interpretation in Pritz, Nazarene Christianity, 22. Walker, “Thrice-Holy,” 133; idem, “Disagion,” 171, improbably favors a disagion in the earliest MSS of Rev 4:8. Later Christian forms seem to follow Jewish patterns (e.g., Oesterley, Liturgy, 142–47; Flusser, “Roots”).

See 4Q403 1 I, 1–3, 5–6.

4Q403 1 I, 1, 21, 26, 31; 1 II, 11, 20, 24.

E.g., Deut 32:8 LXX; Jub. 15:31–32; 35:17; Mek. Shir. 2.112ff. (Lauterbach, 2:20); Sipre Deut. 315.2.1; Pesiq. Rab Kah. 23:2; probably Sir 17:17; for further detail, see discussion of Acts 16:9.

4Q403 1 II, 19–20 (reconstructed), 22, 24 (but apparently 1 I, 23 in Hebrew reads “prince” rather than “priest”); also 4Q400 1 I, 19–20; 4Q511 35 2–5; on worship in the heavenly sanctuary, see also Heb 8:1–6; 9:23–24; Pesiq. Rab Kah. 1:3; Pesiq. Rab. 20:4; cf. Davila, “Macrocosmic Temple”; for heavenly archetype temples, see Buchanan, Hebrews, 134–35; in Judaism, Lane, Hebrews, 205 (following Cody, Sanctuary); Wilcox, “Pattern.”

E.g., Boring, Berger, and Colpe, Commentary, 310; U. B. Müller (as cited in Aune, Prophecy, 414n237). Many view Testament of Job as the most plausible of proposed backgrounds (e.g., Talbert, Corinthians, 90). Some patristic sources understand glossolalia as angelic languages (Parmentier, “Zungenreden”; Talbert, Corinthians, 90, citing Asc. Is. 8).

The text may also add “glorified” (ἐδοξολόγησαν).

Horsley, Corinthians, 181, compares with Paul’s tongues inspired vocal sounds in Philo (citing Spec. Laws 4.49), but while the mind is displaced, the “revelation” (δήλωσιν [4.49]) is probably intelligible. Philo’s understanding of ecstasy and displacement of the mind probably is relevant to 1 Cor 14:14 (see Pearson, Terminology, 43; Horsley, Corinthians, 181).

Spittler, “Introduction,” 834 argues that Test. Job 46–53 (and perhaps Test. Job 33) was added to an earlier Jewish work by Montanist redactors seeking earlier precedent for glossolalia. This proposal seems speculative (especially if we lack data for Montanist glossolalia), but so are other proposals. Some date the entire work to the first century B.C.E. (McNamara, Judaism, 91); Jacobs, “Motifs,” also thinks it pre-Christian, and Rahnenführer, “Testament des Hiob,” explains the parallels with the NT from the LXX. Certainty, however, remains elusive.

See Forbes, Prophecy, 45–47, 182–87. The work appears in a sixth-century list of apocryphal Christian works, the Decretum Gelasianum de libris recipiendis et non recipiendis (Schneemelcher, “Introduction,” 46–49, esp. 48).

E.g., Fee, Corinthians, 598, 630; Conzelmann, Corinthians, 221n27; Hill, Prophecy, 136; Hengel, Jesus and Paul, 94; Wicker, “Defectu,” 148. Witherington, Acts, 135, thinks that Acts 10:46 and 1 Cor 14, in contrast to Acts 2, are angelic tongues (cf. Storms, “View,” 220–21). From Test. Job 52, Spittler surmises that Paul’s “languages of angels” is not a wholly new idea (“Testament of Job,” 1191), but see .

With Horsley, Corinthians, 176 (noting that Paul often uses angels hyperbolically; 1 Cor 4:9; Gal 1:8; 4:14); Keener, Corinthians, 108; cf. Forbes, Prophecy, 61. Many thought that angels spoke Hebrew anyway (see, e.g., Yahalom, “Angels”). The idea of worship in heavenly languages (such as angelic languages used in magic, Reitzenstein, Religions, 31) is probably later and not relevant here (Forbes, Prophecy, 154–56). Given the angels-of-nations concept, “tongues of angels” could even refer to humanity’s languages (cf. Severian of Gabala in Pauluskommentare 265, in Bray, Corinthians, 130–31).

This inspired worship probably generated many of the psalms in the Psalter (2 Chr 29:30); in the priestly perspective of the Chronicler, national revivals normally included revivals of cultic worship (1 Chr 6:31–32; 15:16, 28–29; 16:4–6, 41–42; 23:30; 2 Chr 8:14; 20:18–22, 28; 29:25; 30:27; 31:2; 35:2–5; Ezra 3:10–11; Neh 12:24, 27–47).

For the renewal and intensification of this in early Christianity, see John 4:23–24; Phil 3:3; further discussion in Keener, John, 616–17.

Also Test. Job 51:4 (OTP)/51:3 (Kraft); 52:12/52:6; Mek. on Exod 14:31 and 15:1 (cited in Smith, Parallels, 64); later, b. Soṭah 5:4, §1; Pesiq. Rab. 9:2; Tg. Jon. on 1 Sam 2:1; 19:23–24; on 2 Sam 22:1; 23:1; cf. Sib. Or. 3.306; Did. 10.7. Turner, Power, 357, is correct that Jewish texts emphasized charismatic prophecy more than praise.

E.g., L.A.B. 32:14; Pesiq. Rab. 9:2; Max. Tyre 38.2; Philost. Hrk. 7.5–6; 54.3, 12–13; Iambl. Myst. 3.9; prophesying in song, Dion. Hal. Ant. rom. 1.31.1; Sib. Or. 3.489–91; cf. Pindar frg. 150 (from Eustath. Com. Il. 1.1); Ovid Her. 21.232; Fasti 6.8; Philost. Hrk. 25.8; Guthrie, Orpheus, 36. Apollo was also linked with music (e.g., PGM 2.81–87). For music and inspiration generally, see Pilch, Flights, 83–86.

Men. Rhet. 2.17, 437.25–26 (cf. esp. δύναμιν, line 26); 437.31–438.1 (though these are much like requests to the Muse or Apollo, who is invoked here, for other kinds of inspiration).

The assumption that all such corporate speech (albeit likely ecstatic in the broader sense; see 19:6) involves babbling (e.g., Neil, Thessalonians, 129; though apparently differently in Neil, Acts, 73) apparently reads some later phenomena into earlier texts. For prophetic groups outside Israel, see, e.g., Huffmon, “Prophecy,” 107; Paul, “Prophets,” 1160; in Israel, Gordon, Near East, 214; Paul, “Prophets,” 1155–56.

Most scholars (e.g., Schnabel, Mission, 400) do not think that tongues per se occurred in early Judaism.

In Vit. Apoll. 1.20, Philostratus claims that Arabs purport to understand birds’ language and omens.

Frankfurter, Religion in Egypt, 254; cf. Engels, Roman Corinth, 105 (on Apul. Metam. 11).

Frankfurter, Religion in Egypt, 255–56. On the problem of diglossia among Greeks, see Browning, “Greek Diglossia.”

Boring, Berger, and Colpe, Commentary, 310; also in Grant, Religions, 96; cf. similarly Xen. Eph. Anthia 1.5; the Magus in Lucian Men. 9. Forbes, Prophecy, 162–64, also shows that this example fits the broader magical usage (comparing Lucian Men. 7–9; see esp. Men. 9).

Alexander, “Introduction,” 234 (citing mystics’ speech during trances as in Hekalot Rabbati 18:4); cf. Scholem, Gnosticism, 33.

Reitzenstein, Religions, p. 300; Moffatt, First Corinthians, 208, 214; Mills, “Utterances and Glossolalia”; van Halsema, “Betrouwbaarheid”; Johnson, Acts, 42 (citing Cic. Div. 1.32.70–71; Plut. Obsol. 14 and 40, Mor. 417C, 432CF; Apul. Metam. 8.27); cf. Aune, Prophecy, 199; Klauck, Context, 230; discussion in Frenschkowski, “Zauberworte”; Pliny E. N.H. 28.4.20.

E.g., Moffatt, First Corinthians, 208; Spittler, Corinthian Correspondence, 68; Ruble, “Tongues,” 16; cf. Héring, First Corinthians, 128; Dormeyer and Galindo, Apostelgeschichte, 42.

Forbes, Prophecy, 103–19, esp. 104–6 for terminology and 107–19 for the phenomena; Aune, Prophecy, 31; Fontenrose, Delphic Oracle; Sourvinou-Inwood, “Delphic oracle,” 445; Witherington, Corinthians, 54–55; cf. Maurizio, “Pythia’s Role.”

Aune, “Magic,” 1551.

See Forbes, Prophecy, 124–48; Ruble, “Tongues,” 15.

Williams, “Glossolalia as Phenomenon”; cf. Smith, “Pauline Worship.”

Forbes, Prophecy, 153–54; Aune, “Magic,” 1550–51. On these voces magicae, see, e.g., Aune, “Amulets,” 114; Rives, Religion, 163 (on 164 noting that some also contained “garbled forms of genuine Egyptian or Hebrew words”).

E.g., Wire, Prophets, 141–42 (tentatively comparing Allogenes 53.36; Zost. 52.17; 118.18–21; 127.1–5).

As are some modern parallels (to modern glossolalia) offered, some of which are closer than others (e.g., Couture, “Glossolalie et mantra,” compares Hindu mantras, though noting differences); cf. apparently analogous possession phenomena today in non-Christian religions (Martinez and Wetli, “Santeria”).

The few examples of heavenly languages in later Gnosticism are not applied to people (Forbes, Prophecy, 156–60), and no ancient source associates tongues with Montanism (160–62). The primary analogy with Montanism involves its prophetic character (see, e.g., Kim, “Montanism,” who argues that its detractors misrepresented it).

Forbes, Prophecy, 103–65 passim; Aune, “Magic,” 1549–51; Winter, Left Corinth, 181; Turner, “Experience,” 30–31.

E.g., Ovid Metam. 2.640. See further Otto, Dionysus, 94, 97, 144.

Ael. Arist. Def. Or. 34–35, §11D; see further Graf, “Ecstasy,” 800; Aune, Prophecy, 47; See comment on Acts 26:24.

E.g., Pearson, Terminology, 43. See further discussion of ecstasy in the excursus on prophecy at Acts 2:17–18.

See, e.g., Sib. Or. 12.295–96 (third century C.E.); on L.A.B., see Piñero, “Mediterranean View.” But even the rabbis denied that prophecy was from one’s own mind (e.g., Num. Rab. 18:12), just as Philo did (e.g., Spec. Laws 1.65; 4.49).

See, e.g., Horsley, Corinthians, 181 (comparing Plato Phaedr. 243E–245C with Philo Heir 259, 264–65; QG 3.9; Mos. 2.188–91); Martin, Body, 97–100; Garland, 1 Corinthians, 638–39. This fits Philo’s Hellenistic anthropology (Dillon, Middle Platonists, 174); though some doubt that Philo embraced the mantic view fully (Burkhardt, “Inspiration der Schrift”; but Philo may have believed in various forms, Winston, “Types of Prophecy”; Levison, “Types of Prophecy”); Philo often uses it as an analogy for experience of the sublime (e.g., Creation 71; Drunkenness 146).

See also Turner, “Experience,” 31–32.

Isaacs, Spirit, 75, compares this with Hellenistic ecstasy.

With, e.g., Collins, Corinthians, 501. Some knew and approved of “controlled” inspiration (e.g., Dio Chrys. Or. 1.56), and some later Christian leaders expected this (Chrys. Hom. 1 Cor. 29.2; Severian of Gabala in Pauluskommentare 262 [Bray, Corinthians, 118]).

The phenomenon in both Luke and Paul (with Turner, “Experience,” 32).

Cf. Bruner, Theology, 164 (though applying this prescriptively, which may not be Luke’s intent; cf. 1 Cor 12:31; 14:1, 5).

And perhaps Mark 16:17 if it refers to glossolalia (as it may) rather than to restoration of mutes’ speech (Isa 32:4; 35:6) and if the tradition behind this later addition to Mark’s Gospel stems from the first century. (Farmer, Verses, even offers a skillful argument that the passage might be Markan, but few scholars have followed him.)

Barrett, Acts, 116. Others in addition to Barrett (e.g., Downing, Cynics, 220–21) infer that it was widespread in his churches, noting other gifts (e.g., Gal 3:5; 1 Thess 5:19–20). Spirit-inspired prayer also appears elsewhere in early Christianity (Jude 20), where it is self-edifying as in 1 Cor 14:4, although even for Paul Spirit-inspired prayer cannot be restricted to tongues (14:13–19, 26).

Without the Corinthians’ abuse, our knowledge of early Christian practice of the Lord’s Supper would be likewise severely curtailed (e.g., Richardson, Theology, p. 364).

Forbes, Prophecy, 75–84. Some also link it with the later practice of jubilatio (Parmentier, “Zungenreden”).

Forbes, Prophecy, 76–77. That is, as noted above, unless this tradition refers to mute tongues miraculously speaking in the eschatological time (Isa 35:6; cf. use of the context for Jesus’s messianic ministry, Luke 7:22).

Forbes, Prophecy, 78–79. Cf. also Palma, “Glossolalia,” 42; Ruble, “Tongues,” 18; contrast Rogers, “Tongues” (scholarly but polemical).

Forbes, Prophecy, 77–78. For continuing prophecy in Justin, see Dial. 82; exorcism, Dial. 85; miracles, Dial. 35.8 (on which see Williams, Justin Martyr, 71n3).

Contrast Justin’s almost complete silence on the Fourth Gospel (excepting perhaps 1 Apol. 61) with other sources that are not much later (Keener, John, 93; cf. Braun, Jean, 136–44; Osborn, Justin, 137; Barnard, Justin Martyr, 60–62).

Forbes, Prophecy, 79–80 (also expressing doubt that Montanists, as a rule, spoke in tongues). For exorcism, cf. Tert. Spect. 26. Cf. also Origen in Robeck, “Charismata,” 120.

Forbes, Prophecy, 80–84. For the long duration of Christian tongues speaking in late antiquity, see, e.g., Ruble, “Tongues,” 17–25; Carson, Showing Spirit, 165–68; cf. Wimber, Power Evangelism, 157–74.

E.g., Goulder, Type and History, 77.

Forbes, Prophecy, 50n14. As Bovon, Theologian, 237, notes, the Spirit’s early activity was remembered (with Dunn) but continued to function in Luke’s own day (with Schulz).

See, e.g., Turner, Gifts, 182–302, esp. 262–67; Schatzmann, Charismata, passim, esp. 1–13; Fee, Presence, 146–261, but esp. 32–35, 886–95; Carson, Showing Spirit, passim; Keener, “Gifts.”

E.g., Polhill, Acts, 99.

E.g., Harnack, Acts, 153–54; C. Williams, Acts, 63; Faw, Acts, 319–20; Robeck, “Tongues,” 943; possibly (on Luke’s source before he adapted it), Stagg, “Glossolalia,” 41. Most patristic authors identified the two (Kovacs, Corinthians, 229n1).

Given its portrait in Acts, supplemented by 1 Corinthians, it was probably common in early Christianity (with, e.g., Neil, Acts, 73), though best attested in the sphere of the Pauline mission.

See, e.g., Forbes, Prophecy, 52–53 (though rightly noting that the different emphasis is not a contradiction in substance).

Wolff, “Λαλεῖν γλώσσαις,” 190–91.

Ibid., 195–99; but Wolff’s conclusion that Luke therefore no longer was acquainted with tongues (199) infers too much from the differences. Paul is defining prophecy more narrowly than Luke but nevertheless accepts tongues as a form of inspired speech.

Cf. perhaps eschatological worship (e.g., 1 En. 39:7; Sib. Or. 3.715, 726; t. Pisha 8:22; b. Taʿan. 31a; Sanh. 91b; Eccl. Rab. 1:11, §1) if realized eschatology is in view. For the connection between praise and the Spirit in Luke-Acts, see, e.g., Cullen, “Euphoria”; Shelton, Mighty in Deed, 85–101 (note esp. 87–92 on Luke 10:21).

See esp. Bornkamm, Experience, 38–39 (though he also rightly underlines the contrast in 1 Cor 14).

With, e.g., Ramsay, Teaching, 338; Pearson, Terminology, 45; Caird, Apostolic Age, 61; Spittler, “Limits,” 260–61n12; Stendahl, Paul, 113; Dunn, Jesus and Spirit, 245; Martin, Worship, 181; Hays, First Corinthians, 234; MacDonald, “Glossolalia”; Richardson, “Order and Glossolalia”; it is difficult to see how one could speak of a bad χάρισμα from God. For more negative appraisals, see, e.g., Fuller, “Tongues”; Fabbro, “Prospettive”; cf. Horn, “Speaking in Tongues”; Van Elderen, “Glossolalia.”

Self-edification is not negative for Paul, simply not the primary goal of corporate worship, with Carson, Showing Spirit, 102n89; Fee, Corinthians, 653; in contrast to Bruner, Theology, 298.

On filling with the Spirit in Luke-Acts and in Pauline literature (Eph 5:18), see, e.g., Holman, “Spirit-Filled.”

E.g., Hill, Prophecy, 97; cf. Foakes-Jackson, Acts, 11. Many distinguish Acts 2 from Paul and from Acts 10 and 19, though with various views of the later events; e.g., Hull, Spirit in Acts, 60–65; Turner, Gifts, 226; idem, Power, 357; Fitzmyer, Acts, 239; Witherington, Acts, 134. In my view, however, it is only the absence of those who know the languages that clearly distinguishes the later occurrences in Acts from 2:4.

Williams, “Ecstaticism,” urges that even studies of ancient ecstatic prophecy should take into account modern tongues speaking; cf. Dunn, “Reconstructions,” 302; Horrell and Adams, “Introduction,” 42.

Thus, e.g., some anthropologists have compared their observations of West African apostolic “Holy Spirit” sects with Acts (see Field, “Possession,” 10). Ma, “Manifestations,” compares the Pentecostal experience of a traditional people in northern Luzon, Philippines. Likewise, Miller and Yamamori, Pentecostalism, 218, compare modern Pentecostal experience with Acts 2 and activity during the U.S. Great Awakenings.

Abbott, Acts, 37, suggesting only the possibility of the Irvingite use of tongues in 1831–33, which might, he thought, be due to “a mere nervous affection.”

Anderson, Pentecostalism, 19–37, esp. 24–25, 36–37; for pre-Pentecostal tongues elsewhere, e.g., Hunter, “Portrait,” 83–84; Blumhofer, “Portrait,” 96; Cavaness, “Women,” 26; Hinson, “History of Glossolalia,” 57–66; Satyavrata, “Perspectives,” 205 (the Indian revival of 1860); Jacobsen, Thinking in Spirit, 16; McGee, Mission, 91; Ma, “Mission,” 24, 31–32 (in Asia); Cragg, Reason, 195 (Catholic Jansenists); Mullin, Miracles, 70–71 (incidents known to Horace Bushnell); negatively, among some early Anabaptists, Williams, Radical Reformation, 133. Cf. possibly even Charles Finney when he “bellowed out the unutterable gushings of [his] heart” (Finney, Memoirs, 20; for another person, 305), although this experience may be construed differently.

See Spittler, “Glossolalia,” 336–37.

See, e.g., Tippett, “Possession,” 145, 151, 162; Shorter, Witchdoctor, 177 (though noting that these are known and simply secondary languages); idem, “Spirit Possession,” 112 (“meaningless gibberish, or words of a foreign language” they know), 118 (similarly, noting that one who knew the supposed language verified instead that it was unintelligible); Gray, “Cult,” 181–82; Bourguignon, “Self,” 50; Freston, “Transnationalisation,” 211; Naipaul, Masque, 121. The case of spirit possession in Abdalla, “Friend,” 38, includes foreign intonation.

E.g., Tippett, “Possession,” 162. Others also report dramatic changes during trance states: e.g., Oesterreich, Possession, 19–22; Ising, Blumhardt, 104–5, 168, 169, 171–72, 174–75, 178, 183; Shorter, Witchdoctor, 177; Greenfield, Spirits, 83; Grof, “Potential,” 144; Wilson, “Miracle Events,” 275.

See, e.g., Goodman, Speaking in Tongues, 8, 58–86, 153–54.

E.g., nineteenth-century Chinese reports in Nevius, Demon Possession, 58, also cited in Tippett, “Possession,” 153–54; cf. a case in 1902 Tanzania, difficult to otherwise explain, in Shorter, Witchdoctor, 183 (his “parapsychology” classification is not an explanation); a possessed person who knew no English speaking English in York, Missions, 185 (himself the eyewitness); alleged strange tongues in some nuns’ possession ca. 1611 (Rosen, “Psychopathology,” 231); the illiterate George Lukyns speaking Latin during possession (exorcised by Methodists in 1788; Rack, “Healing,” 148); the possessed speaking what hearers took to be Italian or French in Ising, Blumhardt, 181; other reports, sometimes naturally explicable, in Kreiser, “Devils,” 63–64; Krings, “History,” 55–58; Wilson, “Miracle Events,” 275; Oesterreich, Possession, 208; Hickson, Heal, 65 (in 1921); Koch, Zulus, 55; cf. perhaps the secret language of some shamans’ spirits in Eliade, Shamanism, 347, 440; Scherberger, “Shaman,” 60, 62.

Horton, “Possession,” 29, noting that it often includes Kalabari words with substituted syllables or lengthened forms.

Horton, “Possession,” 29. Cf. also the “Water Doctor” spirit, speaking Ibo (Horton, “Possession,” 30); regional languages allegedly not known to the speaker in Southall, “Possession,” 242.

Lee, “Possession,” 132 (following Sundkler, Bantu Prophets, 23). Lee notes (“Possession,” 133) that “English” and “Indian” tongues are now supplanting the older “foreign” tongues.

Griffiths, “Xenoglossy,” 141–42 (on a séance on February 27, 1924, that convinced Welsh writer Caradoc Evans); alleged Greek expressions from a deceased person who had known Greek through some mediums who claimed not to know it (McClenon, Events, 194–95; cf. archaic English style in 195–96).

Griffiths, “Xenoglossy,” 142–48.

Ibid., 147 (an instance of the Latin’s being borrowed from a novel); somewhat less convincingly, 148, attributed to “cryptomnesic recitative xenoglossy, in which a subconscious and latent memory of words in a foreign language becomes activated.”

Ibid., 148–65, esp. 152–63, noting irregular syntax (151, 155, 162–63), mixing with other languages (157), mixing different phases of the language (159; this might suit a spirit that lived through the entire period rather than an individual reincarnation), and improvement with better coaches (164–65).

Goodman, Speaking in Tongues, 8, 58–86, 153–54 (cf. idem, “Glossolalia,” 238). Many charismatics would, however, strongly differentiate themselves from many of the groups she studied, such as modalist Pentecostals. Cf. also allegedly “neurotic” associations with spirit possession in some groups, Ward and Beaubrun, “Possession” (albeit with a very small sample size); cf. also Preus, “Tongues” (polemically). More subjectively, many claim an experience of spiritual reality in the forms of glossolalia best known to them (e.g., Wink, “Write,” 5).

Cf. also similar reservations (from others with significant exposure to the experience) in Turner, “Experience,” 32; Malony, “Debunking,” 109; Tarr, Foolishness, 360–61, 368, 410 (though he affirms the nonrational character of prayer in tongues).

Goodman, “Glossolalia,” 237–38. She notes that the intonation rises in intensity, peaks, then recedes quickly; I have heard public utterances like this in some Pentecostal circles, but the pattern does not fit most of the glossolalia I hear used by individuals in private prayer.

Wilkerson, Cross, 154–68 (regarding Teen Challenge, the success rate of which has been supported by other studies); and, regarding Jackie Pullinger’s work in Hong Kong, Storms, Guide, 145–46; Pullinger, Dragon, 83, 149, 158–60, 166, 169, 173, and esp. 174; external corroboration in sociologists Miller and Yamamori, Pentecostalism, 99–105, esp. 104, 109 (against any supposition of their starting with favorable bias, see 99, 147). Testimonies of deliverance from addiction also appear elsewhere (e.g., Wacker, Heaven, 65; Khai, “Pentecostalism,” 269). I myself have observed glossolalia’s utility in dealing with severe pain in one instance. Apart from mention of tongues, religion can also facilitate addiction recovery; cf., e.g., Flynn et al., “Dependence”; Mohr et al., “Integration”; Benda, “Factors”; Walsh et al., “Transcendence” (gambling addiction); Winkelman, “Spirituality” (altered states of consciousness induced by shamanic drumming). For whatever reasons, studies suggest that religious disinterest correlates significantly with substance abuse (see Schoeneberger et al., “Abuse”), and both religiosity (Wills, Yaeger, and Sandy, “Effect”) and particular religious values (Kendler and Liu, “Dimensions”) correlate with lower substance abuse (cf. also lower alcohol consumption among religious Israeli youth, Schiff, “Shadow”).

Carson, Showing Spirit, 84–86 (adapting Poythress, “Analyses of Modern Tongues-Speaking,” 369, 375–76). Coding might function as a way to preserve the privacy of the experience (cf. 2 Cor 12:4), whether because of God’s ineffability (cf. Shibata, “Ineffable”), because of the sacred character of the revelation, as with secrets in the Mysteries (e.g., Paus. 1.14.3; Lucian Fisherman 33; Men. 2; Callim. Aetia 3.75.8–9), indescribably sublime heavenly experience (Plut. Isis 78, Mor. 383A), or other sacred secrets (e.g., Philost. Vit. Apoll. 6.11; Hrk. 2.10–11; 44.2–4), or because of other factors.

Williams, Renewal Theology, 2:215–16, 221–22. Cf. the Anglican thinker C. S. Lewis, Transposition, 9–19, who is cited as affirming that the phenomenon could be babbling, but useful when energized by the Spirit.

Hilborn, “Glossolalia,” 111.

Ibid., 112; Wacker, Heaven, 52. Hilborn, “Glossolalia,” 112–13n6, notes one study where a speaker’s structures belonged not to a language the speaker knew but to some other known languages.

Hilborn, “Glossolalia,” 114, 128–29; for “decoding,” cf. 131. If the speech is to God, as in 1 Cor 14:2 (113), partial implicatures could symbolize a larger communication. Hilborn, 132–45, goes beyond the code model of language to relevance theory’s contention that evidence of speaker intention is paramount (cf. also the summary in Cartledge, “Tongues-Speech,” 217–18). Hilborn seems to lay more emphasis on the act than on the phonological content, and I am not convinced that this is quite right; the sounds might communicate through inference the way musical rhythm, keys, etc., can communicate, in some (neurophysiological) ways cross-culturally but in most ways within the framework of particular cultural expectations (not necessarily the speaker’s own). Following Goodman, Malina and Pilch, Acts, 28, emphasize tongues “not as language but as communication” (see also idem, Letters, 119–20).

Lüdemann, Christianity, 41; cf. Hull, Spirit in Acts, 60–65; Hanson, Acts, 63–64; Griffiths, “Xenoglossy,” 142 (following Williams, Tongues, 25–45); Klauck, Magic, 7–8; Stagg, “Glossolalia,” 41; Conzelmann, Acts, 15 (who also supposes, p. 160 on 19:6, that Luke “no longer has any exact knowledge of what speaking in tongues really was”; see the sound critique of this view in Pervo, Acts, 63); Marguerat, Actes, 69; allowing the possibility, Levison, Filled, 323. Barrett, Acts, 115, thinks that Acts 2:4–12 sounds like languages yet 2:13 “suggests something more like Pauline glossolalia.”

See rightly, e.g., Garland, 1 Corinthians, 584; Palma, Spirit, 146–47; Calderón, “Lenguas.”

Some interpret “tongues of angels” literally, whether from Paul’s or from the Corinthians’ perspective (e.g., Fee, Corinthians, 598; Witherington, Acts, 135), but the phrase is probably hyperbolic (cf. 1 Cor 13:1–3; Horsley, Corinthians, 176; Keener, Corinthians, 108).

Caird, Apostolic Age, 54.

E.g., psychoanalytic, Godin, “Moi perdu”; role theory, Holm, “Role Theory.”

Cf. Dor, “Bobon.” Pathological approaches are much less common today than in the early twentieth century; e.g., Klausner, Jesus to Paul, 274–75, viewed tongues in psychopathological terms.

Godin, “Moi perdu.”

Samarin, “Variation.”

Cf. Pattison, “Research on Glossolalia,” 84.

Oates, “Study” (allowing that it can be useful); cf. Theissen, Erleben, 200.

Thiselton, Corinthians, 970–88, esp. 984–85, 988 (favoring Theissen’s approach perhaps too much).

Cf. Thrall, Letters, 98; for tongues as positive emotional expression, see also Wright, Acts, 24. Miller and Yamamori, Pentecostalism, 147, positively compare healthy nonrational “forms of expression and communication that bubble up out of the inner depths,” such as “laughing, crying, or dreaming.” They treat prayer in tongues as presaging postmodern holistic sensibilities by drawing body and emotion into worship (142).

Goodman, “Style of Discourse.” Cf. parallels with Tourette’s syndrome, associated with evil, in Womack, “Coprolalia”; cf. temporary changes in the temporal lobe in Persinger, “EEG profiles.”

Samarin, “Explanations.”

Samarin, “Making Sense”; for a positive social role, cf., e.g., Griffith, Young, and Smith, “Elements.” Some tests suggest the ability to emulate tongues as learned behavior (Spanos et al., “Learned Behavior”; cf. “glossolalic training,” used to improve nonverbal sensitivity, Gutierrez and Wallbrown, “Sensitivity”).

Poloma, “Glossolalia,” esp. 172.

Smith, “Resistance Discourse” (suggesting [on 110] that it is thus ideally suited for Pentecostals as “the religion of the urban poor”); idem, Thinking, 123–50. Cartledge, “Tongues-Speech,” 233–34, suggests the utility of this insight for modern middle-class glossolalists. Hine, “Glossolalia,” 221–22, considers it learned behavior associated with personal changes (noting that it is more characteristic of those converted to it than of those raised with it).

Though I have witnessed clear distinctions (e.g., between possession and nonpossession phenomena). See further Turner, “Experience,” 32, who complains that those who view it as ecstatic often draw this conclusion from “ecstatic glossolalia today, without paying attention to the far greater stream of modern tongues-speech which is definitely non-ecstatic” (cf. 1 Cor 14:28).

See Kay, “Glossolalia,” 204: “Early research on glossolalia was almost uniformly hostile, though with honourable exceptions, and this must reflect the value systems inherent within early psychology. . . .  More recent investigation has been friendly, theologically informed and deliberately interdisciplinary.”

So ibid., 178–80. It may be relevant that in contrast with most approaches today, a number of earlier social scientists were expressly hostile to religion more generally (Smith, “Secularizing Education,” 111–53; cf. Marsden, Soul of University, 163).

Kay, “Glossolalia,” 180–85. Hine, “Glossolalia,” 212–14, 217–18, shows that the earlier pathological view does not fit the fuller data available by the 1960s; she argues (218) against attributing it to suggestibility or hypnosis and (219) against attributing it to deprivation. Goodman, “Glossolalia,” 238, even cites “an extensive study” (Vivier, “Glossolalic”) showing “that the glossolalist is of significantly better mental health” than a socially analogous nonglossolalist as a result of helpful “after-effects” of dissociation.

See esp. Kay, “Glossolalia,” 204–5; for a nonpathological reading, see also Malony, “Debunking,” 104–8. Wacker, Heaven, 293n50, also notes that many or most recent studies do not view the practice as pathological (citing Williams, Tongues, 129; Malony and Lovekin, Glossolalia, ch. 5, esp. 93); cf. also Huber and Huber, “Psychology,” 134–37.

See discussion above.

Following Goodman, Speaking in Tongues, some seem firm in identifying ancient and modern tongues (cf. Meeks, Urban Christians, 119, 232n27), which may be correct (certainly, we lack closer analogies). Yet there may have been different kinds of (and understandings concerning) glossolalia then as today (Barrett, Acts, 116).

See, e.g., the views reported in Hollenweger, Pentecostals, 342.

Dunn, Jesus and Spirit, 151 (who thinks that some on Pentecost did think that they recognized “words and phrases spoken by the disciples in their ecstasy”), 243 (on Paul).

For some similar conclusions on tongues being understood as languages, cf. Forbes, Prophecy, 50, 56–72; Gundry, “Ecstatic Utterance?”; Cartledge, “Glossolalia.”

Forbes, Prophecy, 72–74. The use of “other” (ἕτερος) at 1 Cor 12:10, however, simply substitutes for the ἄλλος in front of other gifts in the verse as a stylistic preference (cf. 12:9), distinguishing recipients of gifts.

Dupont, Salvation, 50.

“Another tongue” appears also in Sir prol. 20, in explaining the need for a translation.

Zerhusen, “Judean diglossia in Acts 2?” (cf. also idem, “Tongues in 1 Cor 14”); Crystal, “Applied Sociolinguistics.” (See further refutation of Zerhusen in Garland, 1 Corinthians, 584n12.) Some also claim that “tongues” meant simply “archaic language”; see the refutation in Forbes, Prophecy, 60–61.

See, e.g., Horsley, Galilee, 247–49; more extensive discussion at Acts 21:40.

The change from Mark’s ἐλωΐ to ἠλί in Matt 27:46 could reflect such concerns (though the latter had also come into Aramaic) or be included to explain (probably correctly, pace, e.g., Cope, Scribe, 104) how listeners thought they heard “Elijah” (Eliyahu; Jeremias, Theology, 5n2; cf. Anderson, Mark, 346; Keener, Matthew, 682).

Cf., e.g., Sibylline Oracles; or in Judea, Josephus’s claims for his own; or the Aramaic portions of Daniel.

One can hardly aver that most of the gathering (Acts 10:24) was Jewish (see 11:1, 3, 18). As for the cases being parallel, Peter says so explicitly (10:47; 11:15–16), and it is hardly plausible to assign a wholly new meaning to “tongues” in the context of the Spirit’s outpouring in Acts 10, a meaning different from what an ordinary reader would expect from the last usage, also in the context of the Spirit’s outpouring, in Acts 2.

For this critique, see also, e.g., Witherington, Acts, 133.

Knox, Jerusalem, 33. Abbott, Acts, 37, thus thought (in 1876) of different dialects of Greek but further apart than French and German; the subsequently published papyri refute the possibility of such divergent dialects of Greek spoken over this geographic range in the Koine period. Earlier Greek dialects would cause trouble for Greek interpreters (see Forbes and Browning, “Glossa”) but were not as different as, for example, German is from French or other Romance languages (early Greeks thought of these Greek dialects as a common language), and by the late Hellenistic period, a universal Koine emerged (with Attic eventually emerging as a literary language; see Davies, “Greek language,” 653–54). Luke’s omission of the Greek mainland from the languages in Acts 2:9–11 also confirms that in his view the disciples are not simply speaking various forms of Greek.

Leon, Jews of Rome, 75–77; Lung-Kwong, Purpose, 105–6; Noy, “Writing.” Most Jewish papyri from Egypt are in Greek (or, in the earlier Elephantine papyri, Aramaic), but this was common in the Ptolemaic and Roman periods in cities or Hellenistic nomes.

In view of the other evidence, I take the mention of “their own dialects” Acts (2:6) and “dialects in which they were born” (2:8) as a loosely worded reference to local dialects of the locations in which they were born rather than to their own mother tongues; such loose wording is neither uncommon nor uncharacteristic of Luke. (Similarly, “Simon of Cyrene” probably employs a geographic designation, though he was Jewish and his own language probably Greek.)

E.g., Bede Comm. Acts 2.6. We might compare divinely altered perception of a person (Luke 24:16), but in that case the reality is temporarily obscured, whereas here the focus of the miracle is cross-cultural empowerment (cf. Acts 1:8). Young, “Miracles in History,” 119, reports a modern hearing miracle, as does Anna Gulick (interview, March 11, 2011: she understood a sermon in Gaelic despite complete unfamiliarity with it). Reports of these are infrequent, however, and much less frequent than claims of speaking miracles.

The purported evidence for a hearing or speech miracle in Hom. Hymns 3.156–64 (to Delian Apollo) (e.g., Burkert, Religion, 110; Ruble, “Tongues,” 15, citing Martin, Glossolalia, 78) is not even clearly miraculous but probably refers to “singing in dialect” (Forbes, Prophecy, 119–23; van der Horst, “Parallels to Acts,” 52–53, following Allen, Halliday, and Sikes, Hymns, 225), though ancients would have understood selective revelation (3 Macc 6:18; cf. John 14:22; Acts 10:41) and hearing one sound in various languages (scholars cite Tanḥ. 26c, whose tradition is of uncertain date).

Note, e.g., objections in Haenchen, Acts, 168n5 (pace Wendt, Apostelgeschichte; Wikenhauser, Apostelgeschichte, 34); Hull, Spirit in Acts, 61; Bock, Acts, 97.

Faw, Acts, 319. It is clear in Acts 10:46 that Luke intends the same phenomenon as on Pentecost, in view of 10:47; 11:15 and especially with the γάρ providing 10:46 as the explanation for their recognition in 10:45. Witherington, Acts, 134, emphasizes that in 2:6, “in his language” modifies speaking, not hearing.

One might propose Acts 5:32 and 7:51, but even these texts could refer to the Spirit’s working through agents.

Turner, Gifts, 222–23.

Keener, Questions, 69; idem, Gift, 180; idem, “Tongues,” 177–78, 180–81, 183–84; cf. Wrede, Secret, 232; Lenski, Acts, 62–63; Wikenhauser, Apostelgeschichte, 38; Hanson, Acts, 63–64; Fitzmyer, Acts, 239; Watson, Gentiles, 68–69; York, Missions, 80, 185–86 (for a missiological perspective; following Richardson, Eternity, 156–57); and esp. Ladd, Young Church, 56; Dupont, Salvation, 52, 59; Stendahl, Paul, 118–19; Kilgallen, Commentary, 16; Kim, “Mission,” 37–40.

Barrett, Acts, 2:lxxxiv, also claiming that although Luke accepted the Spirit’s activity in moral renewal, he emphasized instead “showier” phenomena (which Barrett considers “shallower,” but which certainly make for a livelier narrative, an important consideration for one writing a narrative work).

Bruce, Commentary, 56.

Cf. Spencer, Acts, 32–33.

Goulder, Type and History, 77.

Forbes, Prophecy, 75–84. I have dated Acts only about a decade earlier than Goulder, but even the later dating would render tongues speaking within memory of many Christians even if (and this is unlikely) the practice never extended into the 60s. This conclusion invalidates any attempt to extrapolate Luke’s knowledge (and hence context) from his allegedly “rare” notice about tongues.

For a more nuanced and cautious discussion of the figures, see Anderson, Pentecostalism, 11.D. Barrett defines “charismatic” much more broadly than I do; by his definition, he estimated more than 600 million by 2000, or nearly 30 percent of world Christianity (“Statistics,” 813); statisticians have estimated 614 million for 2010 (Johnson, Barrett, and Crossing, “Christianity 2010,” 36; cf. Johnson and Ross, Atlas, 102); Sanneh estimates almost 590 million for 2005 (and a projected nearly 800 million by 2025; Disciples, 275); in 1994, Harvey Cox already accepted an estimate of 410 million (Cox, Fire, xv). For Pentecostalism in the Majority World, see, e.g., Yong, Spirit Poured, 33–80; for its growth in much of Asia, see, e.g., Ma, “Challenges,” 195–96; idem, “Theology”; Yung, “Pentecostalism”; Anderson, “Face”; in Africa, e.g., Maxwell, African Gifts, 6–7. For the rapid expansion of Pentecostal missionaries from the Majority World, see, e.g., Pate, “Missions,” 244–46; for one perspective on the movement’s growth, see Wagner, “Perspective,” 266–68.

See Johnson, Barrett, and Crossing, “Christianity 2010,” 36; Cox, “Foreword,” xxi (a quarter); Hanciles, Beyond Christendom, 121 (at 27.4 percent); Barrett, Johnson, and Crossing, “Missiometrics 2007,” 32 (29 percent of church attenders); cf. Tomkins, History, 245. Historian Robert Bruce Mullin observes that already by the end of the twentieth century there were “more Pentecostals worldwide” than mainline Protestants (Mullin, History, 211).

See Tomkins, History, 220: “the fastest-growing form of Christianity ever”; see likewise Sweeney, Story, 153. Sociologist Peter Berger contends that Pentecostalism “accounts for something like 80 percent of its [evangelical Protestantism’s] worldwide growth” (Berger, “Faces,” 425, also viewing it as a major force in cultural globalization).

Some scholars (e.g., Dunn, Baptism; Menzies, Development; Parsons, Acts, 49–50) explicitly do engage the claims of the Pentecostal tradition (whether agreeing or disagreeing), but the discipline of church history has understandably been much quicker to acknowledge the significance of, and sometimes profit from, discussion with Pentecostalism (with considerable attention from Walter Hollenweger, Grant Wacker, Edith Blumhofer, and a large number of others) than has biblical studies. For some sociological reasons for the academy’s slowness to attend to global Pentecostalism until recent decades, see Maxwell, African Gifts, 10–11.

As Hollenweger, “Dialogue,” 207, notes, “so far the theological contributions of Third World Pentecostals have been largely ignored,” partly for linguistic and cultural reasons and partly because the majority of adherents are poor and their theologies are not contained in official documents. Nevertheless, Pentecostal scholarship has been coming into its own (with numerous publishing scholars and multiple mainstream scholarly journals). Acts 2 is naturally foundational for Pentecostal theology; see, e.g., Leeper, “Gift.” For a Pentecostal (vs. cessationist) approach to interpreting Acts, see, e.g., Elbert, “Themes.”

In addition to the usual studies of such movements, Summers, “Approach,” uses sociology and anthropology to compare modern charismatic phenomena with those reported in Paul. Cf. also Miller and Yamamori, Pentecostalism, 218.

Sometimes they derive from models in Acts (a derivation that, however, at least reveals that some find such models workable); charismatic and Pentecostal theologies are also diverse (most mainline and academic Pentecostals, e.g., reject the obviously non-Lukan “prosperity” theology common in some popular charismatic circles and also some culturally shaped ecstatic behaviors found in some earlier Pentecostal circles, such as appear in, e.g., Wacker, Heaven, 53, 100–102) but concur on the centrality of the Spirit’s activity and the continuing value of spiritual gifts, including prayer in tongues.

I use the modern definition of “Pentecostal”; late nineteenth-century Holiness movements applied the title to the Spirit’s activity before widespread use gave the title a new sense in the early twentieth century (cf., e.g., Bebbington, Dominance, 210). Some of these groups offered the most vigorous opposition to the new movement in the early period (see, e.g., Walsh, “Signs”).

Robeck, “Seymour,” 81–89; McGee, “Hermeneutics,” 108–10; idem, Miracles, 135 (Abrams); Wacker, Heaven, 41; Opp, Lord for Body, 152 (on Bosworth); Williams, “Acts,” 219 (on Seymour); Alexander, Fire, 130–31 (Seymour); cf. Robeck, Mission, 178; Jacobsen, Thinking in Spirit, 10; Kalu, African Pentecostalism, 20 (on Abrams). Seymour may have played down the role of tongues rather than denied their inclusion in Spirit baptism (Jacobsen, Thinking in Spirit, 78; Tarr, Foolishness, 379–80); in keeping with his Holiness background, he connected tongues more closely to ethics (see Brathwaite, “Tongues”).

In the early period, note esp. Pandita Ramabai (Burgess, “Evidence,” 33–34; McGee, “Hermeneutics,” 107–8; Hudson, “Strange Words,” 67; Burgess, “Pandita Ramabai,” 195) as well as Minnie Abrams, mentioned above. Many Pentecostal movements in Europe and Latin America are less insistent on tongues than are many other traditional Pentecostals (Spittler, “Glossolalia,” 339).

Blumhofer, Sister, 208–14. In fact, many Pentecostal leaders and scholars have emphasized from the beginning that the focus should not be tongues but empowerment (Wyckoff, “Baptism,” 450, and sources he cites; Jacobsen, Thinking in Spirit, 75–80 [esp. on Seymour], 190–91, 287, 289, 354).

See, e.g., Jacobsen, Thinking in Spirit, 62, 84, 95–98, 288–90; Johns, “New Directions”; Horton, Spirit, 157, 216–19, 259–60. This view was pioneered by Charles Parham (Jacobsen, Thinking in Spirit, 19, 48–49) and provided a definite social marker distinguishing Pentecostals from their Holiness kin (288; cf. this function of the early restorationist rhetoric, Nienkirchen, “Visions”), though preoccupation with such “evidence” may reflect modernist epistemological assumptions (Smith, Thinking, 124n1). It has been estimated that perhaps 35 percent of Pentecostals have prayed in tongues (Lederle, “Evidence,” 136; cf. McGee, “Hermeneutics,” 107; though the more recent and extensive figures in Landscape Survey, 55, are closer to 50 percent), statistics probably comparable to first-generation Pentecostals as well (Wacker, Heaven, 41). For various current Pentecostal and other perspectives on the doctrine (not all the traditional versions), see, e.g., the various articles in Asian Journal of Pentecostal Studies 1 (1998) (Menzies, “Tongues”; Cruz, “Response”; Macchia, “Groans”; Ling, “Response”; Hunter, “Aspects”; Clark, “Evidence”; Lim, “Critique”; Turner, “Tongues”) and 2 (1999) (Ma, “Sign”; Gladstone, “Sign Language”; Chan, “Glossolalia”; Plüss, “Evidence”; Lim, “Reflection”; Dionson, “Doctrine”; Menzies, “Issue”; Chan, “Response”; Menzies, “Universality”; Turner, “Responses”; and esp. bibliography in Flokstra, “Sources”).

See McGee, “Hermeneutics,” 107–10; Jacobsen, Thinking in Spirit, 293, 314–15, 395n4. Doctrinal freedom on issues secondary to the gospel characterized early Pentecostalism (see Lederle, Treasures, 29–31, esp. 29; see also Hollenweger, Pentecostals, 32, 331–36).

Lederle, “Evidence,” 131ff.

E.g., Anderson, Pentecostalism, 24–25, 36–37; Hinson, “History of Glossolalia,” 57–66.

Some interpreters of recent centuries may have also emphasized baptism in the Spirit more than previously on account of their movements’ emphases; see comment on .

Dorries, “Irving and Spirit Baptism” (Irving viewed speaking in tongues as a prominent sign of Spirit baptism; see also Strachan, Theology of Irving; cf. Synan, Voices, 85–87); for a very brief survey of the movement, see Bundy, “Irving,” and the many sources cited there. That glossolalia occurred in the movement is widely acknowledged (see Wacker, Heaven, 51). The movement’s final “apostle” died in 1901, the year that Charles Parham began preaching tongues as the “Bible evidence” of Spirit baptism (albeit with little known likelihood of direct contact).

Severus of Antioch, in Cat. Act. 10.44 (Martin, Acts, 140), doubted that miracles and such evidences remained necessary in his own day, but he contended that in apostolic times, “those who received holy baptism both spoke with tongues and prophesied in order to prove that they had received the Holy Spirit.” Cf. Aug. Retract. 1.13.7 (PL 32:604–5, cited in Kelsey, Healing, 185); McDonnell and Montague, Initiation, 314 (cited in McGee, “Miracles and Mission”).

Menzies, Empowered, 254. From this he further infers that those who receive the gift of the Spirit “should expect to manifest tongues” (255). Stronstad, “Baptized,” 188, noting signs accompanying Spirit empowerment earlier in salvation history, argues that tongues are the distinctive sign for baptism in the Spirit.

Dunn, Jesus and Spirit, 189.

Ibid., 189–90. Cf. Catholic scholar Haya-Prats, Believers, 120: “Luke presents glossolalia as the typical manifestation of the Spirit.”

The logical distinction between premise a necessarily leading to conclusion b and the reverse (b leading to conclusion a) would not have been lost on ancient thinkers (e.g., Hermog. Issues 51.16–22; 52.1–4; Porph. Ar. Cat. 90.12–91.12; cf. another sort of distinction in Epict. Diatr. 1.8.14).

Dunn, Jesus and Spirit, 190–91; cf. similarly Turner, Power, 446–47 (who is also skeptical that early Jewish sources expected any particular “initial evidence,” 448–49); Talbert, Acts, 33, 99; Twelftree, People, 98–99 (any ecstatic or supernatural manifestations). Cf. Nigerian Baptist scholar Caleb Olapido, who notes that when Yoruba Christians are filled with the Spirit, “ecstatic utterances are common” (Development, 108, 112–13, in Barr, Leonard, Parsons, and Weaver, Acts, 133).

Of course, prophetic empowerment should presumably lead at least to prophetic witness, and cross-cultural empowerment should lead to participation in cross-cultural witness. Luke does often report prophetic evidences of this empowerment at the time of the experience, and classical Pentecostals would infer that this narrative pattern suggests a pattern for individual Christian experience. Whether it is normative for each individual, however, remains open to debate, views varying depending on what we make of the incidents where Luke does not report any charismatic phenomena at the moment of reception. (That no other documents from the Pauline circle treat tongues as evidence or address a subsequent experience for prophetic empowerment may also invite the question as to how strongly Luke could have insisted on this paradigm in his circle of churches. Pentecostal scholars could, however, respond by emphasizing Luke’s distinctive theological contribution; genre; and that this objection argues from silence.) Each side, in a sense, argues what to make of certain cases of silence, but if tongues (and other prophetic speech) are used to explicate the nature of the experience, they could maintain their function without our inferring that they occur on every occasion when an individual receives the experience. It is possible that charismatic phenomena at the point of experience represent for Luke an ideal pattern; but Luke does not impose his ideal patterns strictly (compare, e.g., Acts 2:38 with 10:44–48).

See Keener, “Tongues.” Although no NT writer makes the connection, it is possible that some would have found texts such as Zeph 3:9 useful: God would ultimately purify their lips (from deception, 3:13) so that all peoples could call on YHWH’s name.

E.g., Anderson, Pentecostalism, 33–34; McGee, Miracles, 61–76; and some sources in the following note on early Pentecostal views of xenoglossy.

See McGee, “Hermeneutics,” 102; idem, “Strategy,” 52–53; Goff, “Theology of Parham,” 64–65; Jacobsen, Thinking in Spirit, 25, 49–50, 74, 76, 97; Robeck, Mission, 41–42, 236–37, 243, 252; see esp. McGee, “Shortcut”; idem, “Logic”; Anderson, “Signs,” 195–99. Before Pentecostalism, some evangelical missions advocates, such as A. B. Simpson, the early Christian and Missionary Alliance, and three members of the famous “Cambridge Seven,” sought missionary tongues, apparently in most cases without success (McGee, “Radical Strategy,” 77–78, 80–83).

See esp. Parmentier, “Zungenreden”; Talbert, Corinthians, 90 (citing Iren. Her. 5.6.1; Chrys. Hom. 1 Cor. 29, on 12:1–11; though noting that this is less common than the glossolalia interpretation, Iren. Her. 5.6.1; Tert. Marc. 5.8).

Dr. Derek J. Morphew, interview, November 12, 2007, Corona, California, stated that in ca. 1975 an elder in the church that he pastored came up wide-eyed after Derek’s wife, Karin, gave an utterance in tongues in the church. The elder, who had grown up in Italy and whom they knew well and for a long time, recognized the Portuguese dialect and told her what she had said (very similar to the interpretation). Pastor David Workman, interview, April 30, 2008, Wynnewood, Pennsylvania, stated that his mother, without much formal education or any exposure to French, was understood to be praising God in an old dialect of French. He also noted that about fifteen years before our conversation a friend of his had prayed for someone in Mexico who apparently knew no English and the person began praising God in glossolalia—in this case, fluent English. My wife tells of a well-known Congolese minister when she was young, Daniel Ndoundou (on whom see Keener, “Ndoundou,” but not including this oral claim), who was said to have preached in Swedish in Sweden without knowing the language. My student Leah Macinskas-Le (interview, April 25, 2010) reported that her mother, who is Jewish, many years ago became a believer in Jesus through glossolalia that she recognized as fluent Hebrew. Most “firsthand,” my friend Leo Bawa, from Nigeria, tells me of his own temporary ability to understand and speak some local tribal languages (Aug. 10, 2009).

E.g., Tarr, Foolishness, 401–3 (about ten cases, some with considerable supporting evidence, especially cases where Tarr, a linguist, was one of the eyewitnesses); Mansfield, Pentecost, 50 (another’s prayer in perfect French, attested by the author, a French major); Warner, Evangelist, 256–57, noting a woman who, according to Romanians present, spoke Romanian for twenty-five minutes (267n13 offers the source in an interview with the woman’s son; also noted in Liardon, Generals, 69); Prather, Miracles, 166–71 (esp. 168; the speaker was as surprised as the hearer [169], whose life was permanently changed [171]; Prather, a journalist, knows the persons involved); Gardner, Healing Miracles, 142–43 (a Pentecostal tongues utterance in a Western church that proved a dramatic message in Sinhalese to visiting missionaries); Yeomans, Healing, 119 (understood “a little” by the author); Woodworth-Etter, Miracles, 110; see also some possibly relevant examples in McGee, “Shortcut” (some after minimal acquaintance with a language; citing, e.g., “Tarry”; “Gift of Tongues”; Goforth, Goforth, 87–88); McGee, “Radical Strategy,” 78–79, 84–85 (including pre-Pentecostal missionary claims in the 1880s and 1890s); Sithole, Voice, 53, 90, 103; cf. 137, 183. In many instances in early Pentecostalism and subsequently, it was believed that genuine xenoglossy was recognized in prayer (see, e.g., McGee, People of Spirit, 24, 46–47, 57, 61, 64, 75; Robeck, Mission, 268–69; Lindsay, Lake, 25, 27; Blumhofer, “Portrait,” 96, 99; Sherrill, Tongues, 19, 20, 42–43, 45, 90–91, 93, 94, 95, 96–97, 99–100; Synan, Voices, 60, 76–77, 84, 101–2; Alexander, Fire, 126–27; Gardner, Healing Miracles, 38; most extensively, about twenty-five cases in Harris, Acts Today, 108–30 [on 7 he refers to his earlier book with seventy-five cases]); earlier, cf. the view of Margaret Macdonald in 1830 (Gardner, Healing Miracles, 97). Others have reported its occurrence today (e.g., Stibbe, Prophetic Evangelism, 75; Olson, Bruchko, 152), sometimes after very minimal acquaintance with a language (Wagner, Wave, 102–4 [cited in McGee, “Shortcut,” 123]; Rutz, Megashift, 38, 90–91; Synan, Voices, 147; analogously, learning how to read by inspiration, Rutz, Megashift, 88–89; cf. Rumph, Signs, 124–28, though after exposure to words]). For a reported case of independent yet identical “interpretations” of tongues in two different languages, see Pullinger, Dragon, 69–70 (the second interpreter did not know the first’s language).

Hilborn, “Glossolalia,” 115–16, on some tested incidents; Wacker, Heaven, 47–48. Hudson, “Strange Words,” 61, suggests that most accounts are based on snippets here and there recognized by hearers (which could be random) or the sorts of sounds speakers could have heard before and unconsciously verbalized (one so inclined could offer the same proposal regarding the Diaspora hearers’ perception at Pentecost). Griffiths, “Xenoglossy,” 147, dismisses modern Pentecostal claims for xenolalia but offers the discussion only two paragraphs (the article’s focus being mediums).

E.g., Wacker, Heaven, 47–51; McGee, People of Spirit, 77–78; Hudson, “Strange Words,” 61–63; Anderson, “Points,” 167; Ma, “Eschatology,” 100 (noting Goff, Fields, 16). Noted leader G. B. Cashwell apparently left the movement in part because xenolalia failed in mission (Alexander, Fire, 141). Note especially the shift in the Indian mission context, after which Garr emphasized that the point was not tongues themselves but how they symbolized baptism in the Spirit (McGee, “Calcutta Revival,” 138–39). The xenolalia interpretation “was already waning by 1906,” shortly after the movement’s beginning (McGee, “Strategies,” 204).

Anderson, Pentecostalism, 190.

McGee, Miracles, 102, notes that this emphasis continued. Global mission has remained a central issue in Pentecostal theology (with Ma, “Studies,” 62–63); this emphasis has undoubtedly spurred Pentecostalism’s massive growth over the course of the twentieth century.

Cf. at greater length Keener, Questions, 66–76, esp. 69; and esp. idem, Gift, 177–85, esp. 180; and idem, “Tongues.”

Chrys. Hom. 1 Cor. 35.1 (Bray, Corinthians, 138); on the Corinthians exalting it as the first gift, see also Theodoret Comm. 1 Cor. 251. Theodoret (Comm. 1 Cor. 240) believes that these gifts were common in former days and reproves the Corinthians for abusing the gifts by showing off instead of edifying the church.

Bede Comm. Acts 2.3A (Martin, Acts, 22). Cf. Aug. Hom. 1 John 6.10; Leo the Great Sermons 75.2 (Martin, Acts, 23): in Acts 2:4, “the particular voices of each distinct people become familiar in the mouth of the church.” Origen Comm. Rom. on Rom 1:14 (CER 1:128, 130; Bray, Romans, 28) concludes that Paul received all peoples’ languages (1 Cor 14:18). Cf. Wesley on tongues at Pentecost as a foretaste of peoples of all languages worshiping God (Wesley, Notes, 396, cited in McGee, Miracles, 61). Much more recently, see, e.g., Packer, Acts, 27: “The gift of tongues (glossolalia) was symbolic of the world-wide work they were to do (1:8).”

See more fully Keener, “Tongues.” Although I have had significant exposure to Pentecostal (as well as non-Pentecostal) arguments over the years, which, in addition to my experience, stimulated my interest in the subject, my church and teaching affiliations are not Pentecostal. I mention this only to observe that no institutional constraints demand my conclusions (they might in fact prefer different ones if any); my conclusions have developed over nearly three decades of grappling with arguments on both sides. Both sides have read the passages in light of their corporate experience and interpretive traditions, but it appears to me that Pentecostals and many charismatics have noted a phenomenon genuinely rooted in the text.

It is difficult, in any case, to demonstrate from the text that Luke believed that it must occur in every case, since he did not make (but could have made) any point of it by indicating the pattern on every occasion. It would be less difficult to make a case that he regarded it as a normal and common mark of the experience. Some classical Pentecostals understandably counter that Luke does not report baptism on all occasions, leaving readers to infer it from other occasions where it is reported; but Acts 2:38 creates a strong expectation of baptism (which explicitly occurs at 2:41; 8:12, 38; 9:18; 10:48; 16:15, 33; 18:8; 19:5) whereas the expectation formed by Luke’s pattern with tongues is weaker, the pattern, though genuine, appearing explicitly in just three instances.

Cf. this function for minor characters in Malbon, “Importance of Minor Characters.”

Dunn, Acts, 26.

E.g., Aristoph. Frogs 419, 1085–86; Isoc. Ad Nic. 48; Xen. Hell. 2.3.27, 47; Arist. Pol. 3.6.4–13, 1281a–1282b; 4.4.4–7, 1292a; 5.4.1–5, 1304b–1305b; 6.2.10–12, 1319b; Rhet. 2.20.5, 1393b; Diog. Laert. 6.42; Polyb. 6.3–4; Diod. Sic. 10.7.3; 15.58.3; Dion. Hal. Ant. rom. 7.8.1; 7.31.1; 7.56.2; 8.31.4; 9.32.4; 10.18.3; Livy 3.71.5; 6.11.7; 22.34.2; Appian Hist. rom. 2.9; 3.7.1; 7.3.18; 11.7.40; Bell. civ. 1.5.34; Phaedrus 1.14.10–13; Plut. Cic. 33.1, 3–4; Cam. 31.2; Praising 16, Mor. 545C; Statecraft 5, Mor. 802DE; Max. Tyre 6.5; 27.6; Ael. Arist. Def. Or. 189, §57D; 201–2, §§61D–62D; Philo Creation 171; Jos. Ant. 4.223; 6.36. On Dio Chrysostom’s mistrust of the mob, see Barry, “Aristocrats.”

E.g., Epict. Diatr. 1.18.10; 1.2.18; 1.3.4; 1.18.4; 2.1.22; 4.8.27; Sen. Y. Ep. Lucil. 66.31; 108.7; Marc. Aur. 11.23; Mus. Ruf. frg. 41, p. 136.22–26; Max. Tyre 1.7–8; 33.1; Iambl. V.P. 31.200, 213; Porph. Marc. 17.291–92; 30.475; Diogenes the Cynic in Diog. Laert. 6 passim.

Aristoph. Acharn. 371–73.

The “crowds” play a less hostile role in Jesus’s crucifixion in Luke (Luke 23:4, 48) than in Mark 15:11, 15. Luke’s term in Acts 2:6 refers to God’s people more often than the other Greek term (Acts 4:36; 6:5; 15:12, 30).

Van der Horst, “Parallels to Acts,” 54, cites Hdt. 8.135 as a parallel for astonishment when hearing an unexpected language. When recounting this narrative, an ancient reader would probably dramatize the amazement by (Shiell, Reading Acts, 172) turning his “hand upward,” bringing his “fingers into the palm one by one, beginning with the little finger, and then” opening the “palm in reverse order (Quint. Inst. 11.3.100).”

Except in Acts 8:9, 11 (where it applies to Simon’s acts), it always applies to God’s acts, such as miracles (Luke 8:56), the resurrection (24:22), Saul’s conversion (Acts 9:21), the Spirit on the Gentiles (10:45), and Peter’s deliverance (12:16).

Emotions of various kinds feature prominently in Acts; Pauw, “Influence of Emotions,” provides more than a hundred examples. The LXX, earlier than Luke, uses θαυμάζω fifty-seven times, but often for horror.

The verb so applies to groups of people, typically hostile, in Acts 9:22; 19:32; 21:27, 31 (together constituting 100 percent of NT uses). Of four uses of the cognate noun in the LXX (the other three in 1 Samuel), the first is Gen 11:9—the Babel passage (the only NT use being Acts 19:29).

E.g., 1 En. 26:6; Sib. Or. 1.32; Test. Ab. 3:12; 6:8; 7:10 A.

Cf. Dupont, Salvation, 53.

The demonstrative pronoun by itself would not need to carry so much weight if the context did not support it (it occurs in 1,262 verses of the NT corpus, 425 in Luke-Acts, and twenty-six times in the first two chapters of Acts), but the context does support it (and ancient interpreters could find it significant at times, e.g., y. Meg. 1:5, §3).

For exalting God’s “great deeds” (μεγαλεῖα), see also Ps 70:19 LXX (Ps 71:19 ET); Sir 18:4 (cf. also Tob 13:6); for God displaying these works, see Deut 11:2; Sir 17:8; 33:8; 43:15; 2 Macc 3:34; 7:17.

See God’s “great” or “mighty acts” (τὰ μεγαλεῖα) in, e.g., Deut 11:2; Sir 17:10; 18:4; 36:7 [36:10]; 42:21; 3 Macc 7:22. Cf. “the mighty one” as a divine title (Gen 49:24; Josh 22:22; Pss 50:1; 132:2, 5; Isa 10:34; 49:26; 60:16; Sir 46:5; 4 Ezra 6:32; 9:45; 10:24; 2 Bar. 21:3, 4; 25:4; 32:1, 6; 34:1; 44:3, 6; 46:1, 4; 47:1; 48:1, 38; 54:1, 11; 55:6; 56:2–3); the “mighty one” does “great things” in Luke 1:49.

With also Turner, Gifts, 223; idem, Power, 271–72 (citing also songs about mighty acts in Exod 15:1–18, 21; Judg 5:2–31; Luke 1:46–55, 68–79); idem, “Experience,” 32; for various possible uses of tongues, cf. Forbes, Prophecy, 91–99. The same expression, μεγαλεῖα τοῦ θεοῦ, appears in Test. Job 51:4 (OTP 1:867)/51:3 (Kraft), though it could depend on Acts (but cf. also Tob 12:22); there it involves inspired worship; cf. also Ael. Arist. Or. 40.12 and 37.27 (of Greek deities; van der Horst, “Parallels to Acts,” 54).

See deSilva, Honor, 142.

With Hengel and Schwemer, Between Damascus and Antioch, 20.

Cf. Dupont, Salvation, 55.

E.g., Knowling, “Acts,” 73; Dupont, Salvation, 55; Johnson, Acts, 43 (though contrast his apparently opposite position on 381); Witherington, Acts, 135; Dunn, Acts, 26; Klauck, Magic, 9; Judge, First Christians, 444.

See Luke 11:26 (taking up residence); Acts 1:20; 7:2, 4, 48; 17:24, 26; for those “living in Jerusalem” (at the time of the event depicted but presumably normally long-term), see Luke 13:4; Acts 1:19; 4:16; 13:27; in Judea, Acts 11:29; in Damascus, 9:22; 22:12; in Lydda, 9:35; in Asia, 19:10; in Ephesus, 19:17. Still, 7:2, 4, may suggest temporary (though lengthy) residence as aliens.

Luke’s usage could be distinctive; κατοικέω appears four times in Matthew, never in Mark, three times in Pauline literature (Eph 3:17; Col 1:19; 2:9), ten times in Revelation (the largest number outside Luke-Acts in the NT), and, as noted above, twenty-one times in Luke-Acts.

Reinhardt, “Population Size,” 259; cf. Noack, “Pentecost in Jubilees,” 91. They may be long-term residents of Mesopotamia, but the point is that they cannot be both long-term residents of Mesopotamia in 2:9 and long-term residents of Judea in 2:5.

Witherington, Acts, 135; cf. Safrai, “Relations,” 194–95.

Johnson, Acts, 44; Dunn, Acts, 26.

Hanson, Acts, 64; Judge, Pattern, 55.

The cognates εὐλάβεια and εὐλαβέομαι appear only in Heb 5:7; 11:7; 12:28 (like Luke, this author is skilled in good Hellenistic Greek).

With Bruce, Acts¹, 83; idem, Commentary, 60–61.

E.g., Shenk and Stutzman, Communities, 19. This is true even though the speech proper is addressed to Israel (Acts 2:14, 36; cf. Tannehill, Acts, 27).

Balch, “ΜΕΤΑΒΟΛΗ ΠΟΛΙΤΕΙΩΝ,” 167 (citing Dion. Hal. Ant. rom. 1.60.1–3; 1.64.2; 1.89.3–4; 2.30.2; and noting the frequent rejection of intermarriage, 168–70). On intermarriage, see comments on Acts 16:1–3.

Ibid., 173.

Le Cornu, Acts, 66.

The mixed multitude in Exodus probably should be understood as turning out badly (Num 11:4); cf. Keil and Delitzsch, Exodus, 30. On the mixed multitude, see also comment on Acts 7:41.

E.g., Bediako, “African Culture,” 120 (for translation in the vernacular); González, Months, 18; Solivan, Spirit, 112–18; Míguez-Bonino, “Acts 2,” 163–64; cf. Keener, “Acts 2:1–21,” 526–27; idem, “Diversity”; Marguerat, Actes, 81; at length, cf. Harms, Paradigms. This application was also important in the early twentieth-century Azusa Street Revival’s application of Acts (e.g., Robeck, Mission, 88, 137–38; testimony in Horton, Corinthians, 66n29; cf. Synan, Movement, 80, 109–11, 165–69, 172, 178–79, 182–83, 221; idem, “Seymour,” 778–81; idem, “Legacies,” 148–49; Lovett, “Holiness-Pentecostalism,” 83; Daniels, “Differences”; Jacobsen, Thinking in Spirit, 63, 260–62). Ethnic and class reconciliation is a natural application of the passage (e.g., Yong, Spirit Poured, 94, 169–73; Park, Healing, 130–32; Keener, “Acts 2:1–21,” 526–27; Williams, “Acts,” 219–20 [noting also failures]) and was so applied at Azusa Street (Yong, Spirit Poured, 183; cf. Bartleman, Azusa Street, 54: “The ‘color line’ was washed away in the blood”); though the racial status quo quickly reasserted itself (see Alexander, Fire, 110–58, esp. 137–40), and violent response from Jim Crow segregationists motivated some changes (cf. Bosworth, “Beating”). The emphasis was likewise natural in early Indian Pentecostalism, although again the ethnic or caste status quo often quickly reasserted itself (Yong, Spirit Poured, 56–57); for ethnic reconciliation in a different renewal setting in India in 1921, see Hickson, Heal, 62, 64, 66. In South Africa, see LaPoorta, “Unity,” cited in Tarr, Foolishness, 379–80.

On hyperbole, see, e.g., Rhet. Alex. 11, 1430b.16–19; Rhet. Her. 4.33.44 (but cf. 2.20.32); Cic. Or. Brut. 40.139; Anderson, Glossary, 122–24; Rowe, “Style,” 128; Porter, “Paul and Letters,” 579; Watson, “Speech,” 203; e.g., Luke 18:25; Matt 23:24; Fronto Ad M. Caes. 2.3.3.

“Under heaven” (ὑίὸ τὸν οὐρανόν) reiterates the emphasis on all nations (the phrase appears in Acts 4:12; Col 1:23; in a different sense, in Luke 17:24) and would be familiar to Luke’s ideal audience (see Exod 17:14; Deut 4:17; 25:19; 29:19; Eccl 1:13; 3:1; Dan 7:27; 9:12; 2 Macc 2:18; worded slightly differently, Gen 6:17; 2 Kgs 14:27); see esp. Deut 2:25; 4:19; Dan 7:27.

On lists in general, see Anderson, Glossary, 111–12 (s.v. συναθροισμός); also comment on Acts 1:13. Although Luke does not use copulatives for the entire list, he uses many (cf. Anderson, Glossary, 103, s.v. πολυσύνδετον); he probably omits a few simply for stylistic variation (cf. Acts 1:13; 15:20).

Ps.-Callisth. Alex. 1.2 (Dowden, 655). This novelist, writing about events half a millennium earlier, adapts much more freely than I suggest of Luke; he in fact omits the nation that Alexander did face historically on the occasion.

Also Dunn, Acts, 27; cf. Bruce, Acts¹, 84. Meyers and Strange, Archaeology, 168, suggest also urban snobbery toward rural Galileans; see discussion of urban-rural social boundaries in our introduction, , , and brief discussion of Galilee at Acts 9:31.

Dibelius, Jesus, 40; cf. Talbert, Acts, 25–26 (citing b. ʿErub. 53ab; Meg. 24b).

See Dunn, Acts, 26; cf. Marguerat, Actes, 78–79.

Bauckham, “James,” 419–20. Gaventa, Acts, 75, largely follows Bauckham, “James,” 417–27.

Bauckham, “James,” 419.

Ibid. (citing also 4Q448 II, 3–6; Pss. Sol. 11:2–3); Bauckham suggests (423) that as Luke 2:1 focuses on Rome, Acts 2:9–11 makes Jerusalem the center. For Jerusalem as the center, see comment on ; Keener, John, 729–30.

Knox, Jerusalem, 32.

Dibelius, Studies in Acts, 1:15.

E.g., Fitzmyer, Acts, 240.

Knox, Jerusalem, 32.

E.g., Conzelmann, Acts, 15.

Fitting rhetorical convention; see Keener, Corinthians, 188; Cic. Sest. 1.1; Val. Max. 7.1.1; Max. Tyre 3.2.

Metzger, “Astrological Geography,” 132.

Luke may also have wished to draw attention to Crete (Acts 27:7, 12–13, 21) and perhaps even Arabs (cf. 9:20–22, though Luke omits Paul’s Arabian excursions there, known to us from Gal 1:17); but then why not include “Asia” and “Phrygia” here (2:9–10)?

E.g., Conzelmann, Acts, 15; Hill, Prophecy, 95; Grant, “Christian and Roman History,” 15.

See Hübner, “Ptolemaic View.”

This excursus serves not only the present passage but other comments on astrology in the work, e.g., at Acts 13:6–7. On the zodiac historically, see Hübner, “Zodiac” (esp. 939–42).

Koester, Introduction, 1:377–78.

See, e.g., Diod. Sic. 2.29.1–2.31.9 (in Grant, Religions, 60); Avi-Yonah, Hellenism, 39; Rochberg-Halton, “New Evidence”; idem, “Elements”; for pre-Christian works on cometary theory, see Keyser, “Cometary Theory.” Astrology did exist earlier among Greeks in more general fashion (Hom. Il. 22.26–31), but organized Babylonian interest in stars may predate even this (see, e.g., “Temple Program,” ANET 333).

E.g., Val. Max. 1.3.3. But cf. even Cic. Cat. 3.8.18; Varro L.L. 7.2.14; Hor. Odes 2.17.17–25; Ovid Fasti 2.79; 3.711–12; 5.417–19; 6.788.

Its dominance in later centuries naturally affected Gnosticism (e.g., Burkitt, Church and Gnosis, 30–33) and eventually Mandaism (Drower, Mandaeans, 73–99) as well.

E.g., Sext. Emp. Math. 5 (because of Skepticism); Pliny E. N.H. 2.5.22; 2.6.28–30 (though he allows that stars can injure people, 2.41.108); Tac. Hist. 1.22; Aul Gel. 14.1; Lucian Astr. (if genuinely from Lucian); cf. at least selective disapproval in Xen. Mem. 1.1.11–14; Petron. Sat. 76; Pliny Ep. 2.6.28–30; 2.20.3, 5; Soranus Gynec. 1.10.41; naturalistic explanations in Sen. Y. Nat. Q. 1.1.5. Epicurus rejected the stars’ power (Long, Philosophy, 41–42); Stoic views about cosmic sympathy (Murray, Stages, 178) and order in the universe (cf. Sen. Y. Dial. 1.1.2), however, disposed Stoics more favorably toward astrology than some; on Stoic interest, see Mastrocinque, “Choices,” 381.

E.g., Tac. Ann. 2.32; 3.22; 4.58; 12.52; 16.14–15, 30–31; Suet. Tib. 36; Nero 36; cf. MacMullen, Enemies, 128–62.

E.g., Mart. Epigr. 9.82.1; Juv. Sat. 6.579; see further Klauck, Context, 231–49. E.g., comets predicted the future (Ptolemy Tetrab. 2.9.90–91).

E.g., Aratus Phaen. passim, esp. 1140–41, 1153–54.

E.g., Sen. Y. Ep. Lucil. 88.14–15; Suet. Tib. 69; Vett. Val. 5.9.2 (in Grant, Religions, 60–62); Test. Sol. 8:3; cf. Nilsson, Piety, 110–15; Murray, Stages, 124–27; Koester, Introduction, 1:156–59, esp. 159. Those supporting free will in late antiquity had to argue against causative astrology (e.g., Plot. Enn. 2.3; 3.1; though he allows for predictive astrology, 3.3.6).

E.g., Ptolemy Tetrab. 3.1.106; Ps.-Callisth. Alex 1.12.

E.g., P.Oslo 6; P.Oxy. 1476; PGM 4.651; 62.52–75; PDM Sup. 183–84; another in Sherk, Empire, §159, p. 202; cf. Lewis, “Horoscope.”

For more than thirty Babylonian horoscopes from the first three centuries B.C.E., see Rochberg-Halton, “Horoscopes.”

See, e.g., Pliny E. N.H. 2.112.247; Krafft et al., “Astronomy.” Astrologers’ astronomy was not always accurate; e.g., Mars is red because its proximity to the sun makes it hot (Ptolemy Tetrab. 1.4.18). Some viewed the earth as cylindrical (Plut. frg. 179 [Euseb. P.E. 1.7.16]) or spherical (Diog. Laert. 7.1.144; 9.9.57), but spheres were considered perfect shapes.

E.g., Polyb. 9.15.7; see further comment on Acts 27:20.

E.g., Virg. Ecl. 3.41–42; Georg. 1.204–58; Pliny E. N.H. 18.54.200; 18.57.207–18.58.219; Tr. Shem passim; disapproved in Sipra Qed. pq. 6.203.2.1; Sipre Deut. 171.4.1. Not only storms, etc. (Pliny E. N.H. 18.69.278–79), but particular celestial bodies can damage crops (18.69.280–83; cf. 2.40.107); Pliny the Elder believed that stars could cause paralysis (2.41.108), and some rabbis believed that constellations could ripen fruits (Gen. Rab. 10:6).

E.g., Men. Rhet. 1.3, 360.18–19. Ptolemy treats it as self-evidently a science (Tetrab. 1.1.1).

See one survey in Charlesworth, “Astrology.” For other kinds of signs in the heavens, see, e.g., 1 En. 80:2–5; further comment on Acts 2:20; Keener, Matthew, 100–102, 568.

E.g., Ps.-Eup. in Euseb. P.E. 9.17.9; Philo Creation 112–13; Jos. Ant. 1.69; Ness, “Astrology.” The naming of constellations and other celestial bodies or patterns (Job 38:32; Sib. Or. 5.207–9, 517–27; CIJ 2:90–91, §849), however, need not imply the acceptance of astrology (as is clear in Sib. Or. 13.69–71; cf. 3.221–22, 227–28, 713).

Ps.-Eup. in Euseb. P.E. 9.17.8–9. Also in Palestinian Judaism (Jub. 4:17; Milik, “Écrits préesséniens,” 93–94).

For Tiberius’s dependence on an astrologer, see Tac. Ann. 6.21.

Like Stoics, Philo also allowed sympathy in nature (Creation 117).

Abram did not know God as an astrologer (Philo Abr. 77).

Knox, Gentiles, 64. Like Josephus (Ant. 1.156), he recognized that God controlled the irregular movements in the heavens.

See Carroll, “Analysis,” with a preliminary dating before 200 C.E.

See, e.g., Greenfield and Sokoloff, “Omen Texts.” See comments on the zodiac in Palestinian Judaism at . Later Babylonian Amoraim even suggested that all substances were linked to constellations (Gen. Rab. 10:6).

See, e.g., VanderKam, “Wisdom.” Some have connected astrological material at Qumran with Enochic astronomy (esp. 1 En. 72–82; cf. Böttrich, “Astrologie”; cf. 2 En. 11–16; 3 En. 17). For Qumran astrology, cf., e.g., 4Q186; 4Q416 frg. 1; 4Q561; Wise, “4Q318”; Greenfield and Sokoloff, “Astrological Text”; Schmidt, “Astrologie”; Lehmann, “Light on Astrology” (though he views rabbinic opposition to astrology as normative, against 4Q186); Toepel, “Planetary Demons”; Allegro, “Cryptic Document.”

Astrology influenced rabbinic thought especially in the third through fifth centuries, particularly in Babylonia (Wächter, “Astrologie”). Still later, see, e.g., Goldstein and Pingree, “Almanacs.”

E.g., Gen. Rab. 63:2; Exod. Rab. 20:8; Lev. Rab. 36:4 (on horoscopes); Deut. Rab. 4:5; Eccl. Rab. 1:14, §1; Pesiq. Rab. 43:1.

E.g., y. Ber. 9:2, 2; b. Šabb. 156a (R. Hanina, at length); cf. Stieglitz, “Names.” Mars was said to rule at particular times of the week (b. Šabb. 129b).

E.g., Pesiq. Rab Kah. 23:8; Pesiq. Rab. 20:1–2; 27/28:1; 40:7; perhaps b. Šabb. 146a. The constellations were assumed to be a matter of simple astronomy (e.g., b. Ber. 58b–59a; Gen. Rab. 100:9), following the science of the era. For the lampstand (as earlier in Philo and Josephus, e.g., Jos. Ant. 3.182, 186), see, e.g., Tg. Ps.-J. on Exod 39:37; 40:4. But for problems in Jewish calendation and astronomy, see Amadon, “Calendation.”

E.g., Mek. Pisha 2.44ff. (Lauterbach, 1:19); Pesiq. Rab Kah. 4:3; b. Ber. 63b; y. ʿAbod. Zar. 2:2, §5; Roš Haš. 3:8, §§1–2; Eccl. Rab. 7:23, §1; Pesiq. Rab. 14:8; see also Cohen, “Structural Analysis.” The planets were inactive during the flood (Gen. Rab. 25:2); the stars had to prostrate themselves before God before shining (Exod. Rab. 45:2); God created the signs of the zodiac (Pesiq. Rab. 53:2); and God controlled stars’ movements (Lev. Rab. 23:8).

E.g., Pesiq. Rab. 20:2 (mostly); Montefiore and Loewe, Anthology, 113–14, §§297–98.

E.g., b. Ned. 32a; Šabb. 156ab; Gen. Rab. 44:10, 12; Exod. Rab. 38:6 (recalling an exaltation that appears earlier but without astrological connections, as in Apoc. Ab. 20:2–5 or Test. Ab. 9:8–15:2 A); on Abraham and astrology, see also b. Yoma 28b; Gen. Rab. 43:3. In earlier sources, too, Abram was once an astrologer and rejected astrology (Jub. 12:17; 13:16–18; Ps.-Eup. in Euseb. P.E. 9.17.8; Philo Abr. 77; t. Qidd. 5:17; see Mayer, “Abrahambildes,” 123–25), but later pagan texts, undoubtedly influenced by assimilated Jews, appreciate Abraham’s astrology (Siker, “Abraham”; Gager, Anti-Semitism, 110; Stern, Authors, 2:173).

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