The Life of the Empowered Community (2:41–47)

The Life of the Empowered Community (2:41–47)

The goal of the Pentecost experience, with its empowerment for mission, includes a community modeling the ideal, proleptically eschatological lifestyle of the kingdom (cf. comment on Acts 1:3–8; 2:1–4). The community is now much larger than the earlier united nucleus in Acts 1:12–14: the Holy Spirit’s activity has brought about church growth. The ideal church offers a pivotal climax and goal of Luke’s larger story, though, for Luke, this ideal church cannot be complete until it includes representatives of all nations (1:8).

In this summary section, the Jerusalem community of disciples begins to fulfill Jesus’s teachings and model in the Gospel on various points: prayer, continuing signs, eating together, and sharing of possessions (cf. Luke 12:33). Both here and in the Gospel, through explicit quotations and implicit allusions, Luke also grounds this lifestyle in the ideals of community for Israel and the example of its prophets (e.g., Deut 15:7–8; 2 Kgs 4:38–44); he also effectively employs Hellenistic language for the ideal community. Luke himself recognizes that the Jerusalem church experienced conflicts at times (Acts 5:3–4; 6:1), but affirms that the new life of the Spirit experienced as a norm by the earliest Jesus movement epitomizes God’s plan. Presumably, he also intends it as a model for Spirit-filled communities of his own day where not restricted by historical particulars (such as meeting in the temple, characteristic of, and possible only for, the Jerusalem church).

Modern movements have noted that conversions without integration into the life of a community are sometimes difficult to sustain; ancient movements were no different in this regard. Ancient sources often report such integration following conversion. Merely “receiving the word” (2:41) did not guarantee perseverance (Luke 8:13; cf. Acts 8:14, 20–23). But just as proselyte baptism meant initiation into the full (or nearly full) life of the community of Israel, so those baptized in Acts 2:41 were initiated into the life of the new community in 2:42–47.

Scholars often are unduly creative in locating chiastic structures, and I do not find many signs of deliberate chiasmus in Acts. Nevertheless, Luke’s elaborate chiasmus at 2:22–36 suggests that he is not averse to them at least in his introductory section, and it is possible that we should think of one here:

A Effective evangelism (through preaching, 2:41)

B Shared worship and meals (2:42)

C Shared possessions (2:44–45)

Bʹ Shared worship and meals (2:46)

Aʹ Effective evangelism (through lifestyle, 2:47)

If so, the sharing of possessions is a central (perhaps because so distinctive) feature of Luke’s vision of the early Christian community formed by the Spirit, leading to a wide impact on the society around them.

Dibelius suggests that historical tradition normally dealt with individual accounts and incidents whereas the larger perspective afforded by summaries belonged to the composers of histories. Witherington suggests that “the use of such summary material, including linking summary remarks, is rather typical of ancient historiographical works that were based on research and the use of sources, which were by nature episodic in character.” Like Luke, ethnographic historians use summaries to generalize and comment on their descriptions after they describe religious or philosophic sects (such as Egyptian priests or Essenes).

Luke’s summary statements trace the spread of the message about Jesus in Acts (6:7; 9:31; 12:24; 19:20; 28:31; cf. 13:49; 19:10, 17), as he does, albeit less frequently (perhaps because of more material), for Jesus’s ministry in the Gospel (Luke 4:14, 37; 5:15; 7:17). Given Acts’ emphasis on spreading the gospel (Acts 1:8) and its conclusion before the task is complete, these summaries invite Luke’s audience to participate in the mission. In addition to this narrative function of keeping the focus on the central issue, they may also serve another literary function. In these generalizations, Luke condenses an undoubtedly wider collection of information than he can afford space to narrate. Writers such as Josephus exercised more freedom in their summary statements (see comment on Acts 6:7), and the same is likely the case for Luke, who exercises more creative freedom in introducing or concluding material that he takes over from Mark than in that material’s content.

Summary passages, by contrast, are more complete than mere summary statements and may depict the regular life of the Christian community. Still, writers could express considerable freedom in composing summary passages (where selectivity shaped perspective). They appear especially in the earlier chapters of Acts, covering a period where Luke has less access to concrete information. They may thus help make up for limited specific examples while underlining Luke’s sense of the whole story. Both summary statements and summary passages appear elsewhere in ancient literature. Speakers sometimes concluded a section by saying, “This is what happened in connection with these events.” But often they recapitulated their preceding arguments. Additional summaries were probably more common especially when writers needed to “expand” their material. Occasionally ancient prose writers (and often poets) included some sort of refrain, a recurring line that kept the reader focused on the main point. Though not a refrain in any poetic sense, Luke’s repetition of his historical interest in the spread of the message and its movement emphasizes his point analogously.

This first summary section also emphasizes Luke’s main point, continued with the next summary in 4:32–35, pausing in between to flesh out the summary with a detailed, dramatic, and, for the life of the community (4:4 implies), significant example. The major summaries of the earliest Jerusalem church (2:42–47; 4:32–35; 5:12–16) thus emphasize the theme of empowered witness as applied to the Jerusalem mission (see 1:8). The summaries of the earliest Christian community (2:41–47 or 2:42–47; 4:32–35; 5:12–16) also serve an apologetic function by emphasizing the community’s virtue.

Unless the event was more organized than we are imagining it above, it may have been difficult to make a precise count of the converts on that day. Ancient writers might cite such dramatic conversion reports to indicate the success of their protagonist’s preaching; such reports are known about Pythagoras. We should note, however, that Luke does not provide simply conversion reports in Acts. After each evangelistic sermon in Acts, Luke also reports people’s acceptance or rejection (2:41; 4:4; 5:33; 7:54; 8:6, 36; 10:44; 13:44, 48–50; 17:32; 22:22; 28:24, 29).

Many scholars doubt that all three thousand could have been baptized in a single day. Barrett, for example, notes, “Mass baptisms would have been easy at a river . . . , but there were no natural large-scale supplies of water in the city.” Although one could wonder about the precision of Luke’s information source here, Barrett’s argument against it is ill-founded, as we shall see below in view of Jerusalem’s water resources. Luke’s “in that day” could be hyperbole, but in this case Luke and his sources probably knew the available resources of the Temple Mount better than do most of his modern critics.

To accommodate the thousands of worshipers the temple hosted daily, the Temple Mount must have afforded plenty of baptismal pools. Despite lack of complete excavations, it appears that some, apparently many, mikvaot on the Temple Mount were used before entering the temple area. A number of mikvaot appear in what may be a bath complex for ritual bathing south of the temple. Even the Roman historian Tacitus was familiar with the claim that the temple held many pools as well as cisterns for rainwater (Hist. 5.12). (When flowing water was unavailable, mikvaot normally depended on rainwater. For further discussion of mikvaot, see the excursus at Acts 2:38.)

Nor should we suppose that such use would risk exhausting the water supply for mikvaot, even if (and this is not the case) many people’s use depleted the pools significantly more than disuse would have. Archaeologists have excavated thirty-four cisterns near the Temple Mount; “the capacity of some of these is as much as 8,000–12,000 cubic metres.” If one includes pools such as Bethesda and Siloam (and tradition designated at least Siloam as already useful for ritual immersion), the amount of water available for baptism is among the least problems to the narrative’s plausibility. With a total of 150 known immersion pools in Jerusalem, the immersion of three thousand persons in the span of a few hours would not have been difficult.

Likewise, against those who doubt that the 120 disciples of 1:15 could baptize three thousand people, these baptisms would not have been formal ceremonies analogous to modern baptisms (baptismal records, family gatherings, and so forth) or even individual ancient proselyte baptisms. “Baptizing” in this period involved mainly supervision while the people coming for purification immersed themselves; the disciples could, like John, supervise mass baptisms without individual attention (Luke 3:3, 7, 12, 16, 21). Even if only the apostles and a few of their colleagues, a total of perhaps thirty, “performed” the baptisms in thirty mikvaot, they could finish their task in a few hours. Indeed, this view of matters probably assumes more organization than actually occurred in the excited atmosphere of mass conversions; once verbal instructions were issued, mass immersions in response to Peter’s command could have occurred with very little supervision at all (though, by analogy with John’s baptism and various passages claiming that the apostles “baptized” people, supervision probably remained the norm; Luke 3:7; 7:29–30; Acts 1:5; 8:38; 10:48; 11:16; 19:4).

It was common to exaggerate the numbers of, for instance, enemies slain in battle (Xen. Hiero 2.16; Livy 3.8.10), or one might exaggerate enemy numbers to mitigate the shame of one’s own defeat (Tac. Hist. 3.61). Pliny the Younger, who otherwise emphasizes historians’ high standards for facts, jests that one correspondent boasts, like historians, of numbers too great to count (Ep. 9.16.1). Lucian complains that one particularly ridiculous historian so reduces Roman casualties, and inflates those of the enemy, that no one will take him seriously (Hist. 20). Thus Dunn, commenting on this passage in Acts, remarks, “Numbers in ancient historians tended to be more impressionistic (or propagandistic) rather than to provide what we today would regard as an accurate accounting.” Some ancient figures would be more concrete (such as reckonings based on the number of men lost if a Roman legion were destroyed), but many were estimates. On the whole, historians were not careless, but even the best of them often had only approximations. Sometimes numbers that historians cited did not fit other known data, in which case later historians might critique them (Polyb. 12.17.1–12.22.7) or prefer to blame the scribe rather than the historian (12.4.4–6). Thucydides also complains that he could not provide the numbers for one battle because one side would not reveal them and the other side clearly exaggerated its numbers (Thucyd. 5.68.2).

At the same time, strikingly large numbers do appear frequently in documented historical times; in the most costly war of which Polybius knew (Polyb. 1.63.4, 8), the Romans lost about seven hundred quinqueremes and the Carthaginians about five hundred (1.63.6). No less dramatically, Polybius estimates that about seventy thousand Romans died in the battle at Cannae (3.117.4). Lest anyone question his accuracy, Polybius emphasizes that he is not (like some historians) merely interested in numbers that are simply “plausible”; he discovered an actual list from Hannibal on a bronze tablet (3.33.17–18). We may choose to think that Polybius invented the tablet or, much likelier, that his Carthaginian source did. But given the stakes in the war, these numbers likely bear some semblance to what took place.

Josephus’s estimates are inflated; where we can test him most clearly, he is not averse to inflating numbers in the biblical text. He estimates that more than one million in Jerusalem died during the war (War 6.420), though he concedes that most were Jews from elsewhere trapped inside (6.421). Although he attributes the information to a census of the high priests in the time of Nero, few take literally his claim that 2,700,000 people showed up for Passovers (6.423–25); increasing the numbers was to Josephus’s advantage. Some scholars, however, adjust the figures too far in the opposite direction; Josephus is at least internally consistent. Pliny the Elder, after all, calls Jerusalem the East’s “most illustrious city.” Where we can compare their estimates on concrete points, Josephus’s estimates appear higher than Luke’s (See comment on Acts 21:38).

Most scholars reject Luke’s figures because the scholars depend on Joachim Jeremias’s now outdated estimates for Jerusalem’s population (25,000–30,000) instead of newer estimates that range much higher. Jerusalem had expanded beyond its walls in this period, but Jeremias’s biggest mistake was his underestimation of population density, which was much greater than the early nineteenth-century Palestinian settlements on which Jeremias based his estimate. Magen Broshi has noted that Roman Jerusalem enclosed about 450 acres, and he estimates about eighty thousand inhabitants. More recent density and area estimates also usually estimate eighty thousand or higher. Herod so increased the city’s water supply that the city could have doubled its population and supported at least seventy thousand (though some think that the temple complex consumed so much water that the population remained around forty thousand).

At feast times such as Pentecost, Jerusalem might swell to as many as half a million people, with an estimated thirty thousand from the Diaspora. The Temple Mount was large enough to hold tens of thousands at one time; estimates run as high as two hundred thousand and four hundred thousand. Modern Western interpreters, underestimating population density, tend to dismiss high numbers, but checks exist on our skepticism today. For example, the Sacred Mosque at Mecca, which is 180,000 square meters (i.e., just 36,000 sq. m. more than Jerusalem’s Temple Mount), holds five hundred thousand in prayer. Mecca hosted only about 108,000 pilgrims annually before the First World War but with modern transportation now hosts more than two million; and Mecca is smaller and less accessible than was Jerusalem.

Given such estimates, thousands of hearers and a rapid mass movement of three thousand conversions are not at all implausible. Although religious movements can start small, their history demonstrates that some can also multiply at a tremendous rate after a major corporate spiritual experience such as the one suggested in Acts 2. For example, some scholars estimate that early U.S. Methodists grew roughly a thousand times over in four decades; one recent revival movement in India grew 3,000 percent in a two-year period; a revival movement in Suriname led to the conversion of perhaps a third of one people group over the course of a decade; and so on. Larger mass conversions occur in various biblically saturated parts of the world today, often with less clear incidents to prompt them than what Luke reports in this narrative.

Such observations do not constitute proof that Luke’s report is accurate, but they do challenge the grounds on which many commentators tend to dismiss them. Granted, it is unlikely in the revival atmosphere described in Acts 2 that the apostles and their colleagues made an exact count; numbers rounded to the thousands belong to the realm of estimates, and Luke’s sources are more likely to have estimated high than low. But if we accept the description in the narrative that follows (2:42–47), the earliest Christians seem to have had a sense of their enormous numbers, which suggests that the estimate is not only realistic but in the general range.

Still, if the figures are realistic, they imply an extraordinary explosion in the church’s membership on Pentecost. To offer a sense of proportion, Josephus, never known to play down numbers, reckons the Essenes at “over 4,000” (Ant. 18.20). Although the Jerusalem elite prove hostile to the apostles, Jerusalem’s common people respond to them far more favorably in this period (Acts 4:4; 5:13; 6:7), just as the elite opposed Jesus while many of the people followed him. Although this situation apparently changes after the Hellenist reaction against supposed rejection of the law (6:11–14; 8:1) and the increasing conservatism under Agrippa I (12:3), Luke presents the Jerusalem church as again well accepted in Jerusalem in the decade just before the city’s destruction, so long as it did not associate too closely with Gentiles or their allies (21:20).

To speak of the converts as three thousand ψυχαί does not invite us to read Middle Platonism or later Christian soteriology into the narrative. The term ψυχή (traditionally translated “soul”) has a wide semantic range in Luke-Acts, but in the immediate context, the term applies to people (Acts 2:43); when attached to numbers, it simply provides a count of “people” (7:14; 27:37). That the multitude “welcomed his word” may reflect the language of moral exhortation but certainly also reflects what was, by Luke’s day, conventional language of early Christians. Although NT writers nowhere else employ the word ἀίοδέχομαι as here, they do use both δέχομαι (Luke 8:13; Acts 8:14; 11:1; 17:11; 1 Thess 1:6; 2:13; Jas 1:21; cf. 2 Cor 11:4) and λαμβάνω (Matt 13:20; Mark 4:16; John 12:48; 17:8) for this activity.

More significant is Luke’s expression “the word,” which is frequent throughout the Gospel (e.g., Luke 1:2; 3:2; 5:1; 8:11–15) and Acts (e.g., Acts 4:31; 6:2, 4, 7; 8:4, 14, 25; 11:1, 19; 12:24). Jewish people accepted the divinely inspired law as God’s word (e.g., Ps 119:9, 11, 16–17, 25, 28, 67, 140), as also the prophetic message (e.g., 1 Sam 3:7, 21; 15:10, 23, 26). Early Christians, empowered by the Spirit of prophecy (Acts 2:17–18), might, not surprisingly, speak this divine “word” like the prophets of old (cf. 1 Thess 2:13; 1 Pet 1:10–12). Luke’s language was by now standard in early Christianity, but he may have still thought of Septuagintal usage. If one passage influenced his usage more than any other, it might be Isa 40:8 (used also in 1 Pet 1:25), the end of a passage whose earlier part is important to Luke (Luke 3:4–6).

Luke emphasizes that the church was continuing or persevering in the life depicted here; the various elements are each developed further in Acts 2:43–47. The church’s unity in these verses also builds on the earlier reversal of Babel (See comment on Acts 2:6–11); Diaspora Jews are included in this unity (2:9–11). Although it remains debated how many of these Diaspora Jews were festal visitors (cf. comment on Acts 2:6), at least a number probably remained in the Jerusalem church, forming the nucleus of the growing group of “Hellenists” in 6:1.

As comparisons of evangelistic claims and church growth reports reveal today, it is possible to have many “converts” in meetings yet a lack of social reinforcement for, and perseverance in, their new faith afterward. Luke underlines the point that the outpouring of the Spirit produced not simply short-term numbers but long-term results.

Most scholars recognize four elements in the community life (the apostles’ teaching, fellowship, breaking bread, and prayers); some see two elements (with breaking bread and prayer together as part of the fellowship); grammatically, one could also divide it into three elements (perhaps each separated by καί, which appears twice, taking fellowship and breaking bread together; contrast Luke’s different syntax in the outline in 1:8).

Some scholars suggest that 2:42 indicates an early pattern for corporate worship, providing the contents (though not a fixed sequence) of a service. Certainly, Christian gatherings were incorporating these elements by the middle of the second century. Thus Justin Martyr speaks of the standard order of service on a Sunday (1 Apol. 67):

1. All gather to one place.

2. The writings of the apostles and prophets are read (“as long as time permits”).

3. The person presiding instructs and exhorts everyone to imitate these things.

4. All rise to pray.

5. The Lord’s Supper

a. The president offers prayers and thanksgivings.

b. People assent with “Amen.”

c. The Lord’s Supper is distributed and all partake.

d. Deacons send it to those who are absent.

6. Those who have money and are willing “give what each thinks fit.”

7. They leave the collection with the president, who then helps orphans and widows and anyone else in need (the sick, prisoners, travelers, etc.).

Pagans could worship in temples or privately but did not meet together for corporate worship; Christians’ models would thus arise from the synagogue and from whatever was distinctive in Christian experience.

But this reconstruction may read too much of later Christians’ formal worship experience back into the earliest church (cf. 1 Cor 14:26). Although some of these activities (such as the apostles’ teaching and perhaps much of the prayer) may have involved hundreds meeting together in the temple courts (Acts 2:46), many, such as the breaking of bread, would have been practiced in house meetings (2:46), which could afford more informality.

The sharing developed in 2:44–45 may have included apostolic oversight (4:35, 37; 5:2; 6:2), but it would have been an administrative matter (or a personal one when people shared directly, perhaps especially at first) rather than part of a formal worship “service.” Prayers together probably continued in both the larger (cf. 2:42; 2:46–3:1; perhaps 4:23–24) and smaller (cf. 12:12) meetings. When meeting in homes, individual Christians probably offered both fixed prayers learned from the synagogue (though not formalized as much as in a later period) and personal (perhaps usually spontaneous) prayers, practiced by other Jews but especially important in the charismatic worship of the early Christians (1 Cor 14:14–16, 26).

Luke may provide examples of the apostles’ teaching in Acts 3:11–26; 4:8–12; and 5:29–32, though these messages are directed toward outsiders. He can safely assume in the apostles’ teaching the teachings of Jesus already included in his Gospel. Because the apostles’ teaching provided the historic link to Jesus’s ministry (1:21–22), it is essential for Luke in emphasizing the continuity between the mission of Jesus and his church.

For Luke’s audience, moral “teaching” may have resembled lectures in a philosophic school (cf. 19:9; 1 Cor 14:34–35); for the apostles within his narrative world, it probably most resembled the sort of midrashic exposition with which they would have been most familiar in the synagogues. Some scholars distinguish teaching here from proclamation, which in Acts tends to be especially deliberative (seeking converts), but it is possible that the apostles also “proclaimed” to believers (Acts 20:25). In a synagogue context, even evangelistic preaching would include Scripture exposition (cf. 7:2–53; 13:16–47). The content of “teaching” (διδαχή) could sometimes be evangelistic (5:28; 13:12; 17:19); the cognate verb (διδάσκω) is evangelistic in 4:2, 18; 5:21, 25, 28, but it refers to instruction in 18:25, probably refers to instruction in 11:26; 15:1, 35; 18:11; 20:20; 21:21, includes instruction in 1:1, and is unclear in 5:42; 21:28; and 28:31. By contrast, “proclaiming” (κηρύσσω) was usually evangelistic (8:5; 9:20; 10:37, 42; 19:13; probably 28:31) but represents instruction in 15:21 and possibly in 20:25 (where either meaning is possible but teaching is easier). Their semantic ranges overlap, but like the familiar OT coupling of opposites to indicate a whole, their appearance together (Luke 20:1; Acts 5:42; 28:31) probably implies the full range of activities.

The appearance of the believers’ continual learning from the apostles is undoubtedly deliberate and would probably elicit respect in Luke’s circle. A first-century Stoic opined that students of philosophy, unlike students in other disciplines, needed more intensive and lengthy training because they had spent their previous lives learning the opposite of the truth.

Jewish hearers might think more specifically of learning God’s message in Scripture. Learning Torah was a pervasive element of Palestinian Jewish life, pursued whenever possible. Some scholars have compared the division of devotion here to the more formal and temporal division in 1QS VI, 1–8 (with study, prayer, and meals).

The term κοινωνία, or partnership, can refer to the sort of harmony created by shared purpose (Mus. Ruf. 13B, p. 90.7, 13–16, 19–20) and working together (14, p. 92.21–28). Partnership included sharing profit, and early Christians sometimes used the term κοινωνία to refer to sharing with others (Rom 15:26; 2 Cor 8:4; 9:13; Heb 13:16), as also the cognate verb (κοινωνέω, Rom 12:13; 15:27; Gal 6:6; Phil 4:15). Thus the sacrificial sharing described in Acts 2:44–45 (note κοινά, 2:44) expands further on the meaning of the term here; although it may represent only a concrete manifestation of their “fellowship,” the community’s “fellowship” was accomplished by sharing their possessions (see comment there).

In light of early Christian teaching, this is not a surprising fruit of Pentecost. Though Luke emphasizes the Spirit’s empowerment especially for verbal proclamation, the community effectively evangelizes here through its lifestyle (2:47). The Pauline circle of Christianity emphasized the Spirit’s involvement in κοινωνία (2 Cor 13:14; Phil 2:1) and in love (Rom 15:30; Gal 5:22; Col 1:8; 2 Tim 1:7; cf. Rom 5:5; 1 Cor 4:21; 2 Cor 6:6; Gal 5:5–6; 6:1).

Because “breaking bread” is so closely connected grammatically with “fellowship” here, it seems likely that part of the disciples’ sharing of possessions included common meals at the expense of those who could afford the food. It was a daily (Acts 2:46) practice that involved shared use of property in, presumably, especially the more ample homes.

Perhaps it happened most often at the main meal later in the day (which, like other Jewish meals, would start with breaking and blessing bread, as well as wine); otherwise “breaking bread” might refer literally to simply taking bread together, because other meals were simpler and the one food necessary to be able to offer to a guest was bread (Luke 11:5). Probably, however, “bread” functions as a metonymy for a meal, however simple it may have been (see further discussion below). As the most basic staple, “bread” could easily stand for food in general (4:3–4; 7:33; 9:3; 11:3, 5; 14:1, 15; 15:17).

On a literary level, the breaking of bread here very likely alludes to and includes the Lord’s Supper (Luke 22:19; cf. 24:30). If, for Luke, the Lord’s Supper represented a meal believers shared together in memory of what Jesus had done for them (22:19), then ideally all early Christian meals together may have represented the Lord’s Supper or at least been taken in the same spirit (cf. Acts 2:46; 20:7, 11). Meals together appear throughout Jesus’s ministry (e.g., Luke 9:17), including with religious (7:36; 14:1) and notoriously sinful (5:30, 33) persons, climaxing in the final meal together (22:14–20), which established the grid through which all common meals afterward (after the resurrection; see 24:41, 43; Acts 1:4a; 2:42, 46; 10:41; 20:7; cf. 16:34; 27:35–36) should be understood. Such meals foreshadowed the eschatological banquet (Luke 14:15), as the Lord’s Supper could more explicitly (22:16, 30; cf. Mark 14:25; 1 Cor 11:26).

Many scholars distinguish the breaking of bread in the Lord’s Supper from the early Christian agapē, or love feast, though most believe that at the earliest stage they occurred together. But given the model for the original Lord’s Supper in the Passover meal, where bread and wine (Luke 22:19–20) were simply (as at other meals) notable elements of a meal with far more components, it seems more likely that the earliest version of the Lord’s Supper involved eating a meal together (1 Cor 11:20–21, 34) of which the most basic and always present elements (as at any Jewish meal; cf. Luke 7:33) were bread and wine.

Common meals as part of a religious bond would not be surprising for disciples who embraced one another as members of the same spiritual extended family (Luke 8:21; 18:29–30). Synagogues were not only places for religious assembly but also community centers that often included a dining hall and facilities for travelers. Some Diaspora synagogues (Ostia, Delos) provide evidence that local Jews shared common meals, as Josephus also suggests (Ant. 14.214–15), though perhaps these reflected the celebration of feasts for the majority who could not afford to make pilgrimage to Jerusalem each year.

Common meals were well known in Greco-Roman society, and not only by those invited to wealthy patrons’ banquets. Many urbanites of lower social status “enfranchised” themselves by joining voluntary associations (often trade guilds), which characteristically shared common meals. (This feature does not mean that they breached hierarchical boundaries; patrons of such associations probably acted like other patrons.) Dedicated to patron deities, their meetings were always “marked by festivity rather than solemnity,” and their “regulations stipulate the equitable sharing of the meal and give rules for good behavior at the banquets.” Early Pythagoreans, stories of whom figured in the utopias (writings featuring utopias, mentioned in the comment on Acts 2:44–45 below), practiced communal meals, probably of a very frugal sort. The Platonic Academy also shared relatively simple banquets (συμίόσια), which Plato considered essential to proper education.

A host who shared a meal with guests was thought to have formed a bond of relationship that never should be taken lightly. Providing food and partaking of what was provided were social obligations; failure on either part could be taken as disrespectful. Symposia strove to reconcile members, making them friends rather than enemies. In Greek etiquette at least, meals involving friends required equality; even in larger banquets, fellow banqueters ought not to speak against one another or otherwise act in disunity at a meal. Luke’s mention of κοινωνία in a banquet context is not surprising; symposium ethics included κοινωνία, a common sharing not only of food from a common platter and wine but of conversation.

Luke articulates his vision of early Christian unity carefully, in terms meant to exceed the expectations of his contemporaries. Grounding the meal in the same κοινωνία that produced the sharing of possessions in common (as opposed to merely patronal benevolence) contrasts starkly with the usual purpose of meals in the rest of the urban Mediterranean world. Granted, all meals established a relationship among those who partook, a relationship that made betrayal in such a context all the more heinous (cf. Luke 22:21). Those who had shared meals were not to even gossip against each other.

But the nature of the relationship was defined by the respective societal positions of the different parties at table. Thus most common meals were shared by members of the same general segment of society; in a romanized setting, a patron might invite clients of lower station, but their seating and meal depended on their status, only those with sufficient status were invited, and the patron reclined apart with the patron’s own peers. Jesus specifically challenged this hierarchical notion of shared meals, demanding that those with resources invite those who cannot repay them even in honor (Luke 14:1–14). Once transplanted to the Diaspora, however, this original transcending of social boundaries might fail (and in fact did fail in Corinth, 1 Cor 11:21).

Given the informal household setting, entire families would be present, though perhaps not seated together as families. In traditional Greek banquets, women either were excluded or sat rather than reclined; among Romans by this period, women of status often reclined with men, and even some Greek customs were in flux. The transition was not complete, however, and continued to face resistance. But early Christians may have had to adapt some customs due to space available in the homes in which they met; although they had some well-to-do homes in upper-city Jerusalem (see comment on Acts 12:12–13), they would need many homes to accommodate the burgeoning church. Even Greeks had some meals, especially on festive occasions, where the entire family would be present, and when women were full members of clubs, they would have participated in these banquets. Early Christians’ dining together in Jerusalem with both men and women from different families would not have been unique, but it would have been noticeable.

That shared meals could appear in Luke’s portrait of the early Jerusalem church should not surprise us. Some scholars have compared the Lord’s Supper to pagan cult meals or even suggested that the Hellenistic sacramental meals were read back into the Jewish Last Supper tradition. More relevant is that Greek associations of various sorts regularly met for common meals, normally dedicated to the association’s patron deity but celebrated with attention on the banquet itself. Some associations gathered for specifically religious purposes, and cultic meals were also standard in pagan festivals.

Greek meal practice did affect contemporary Jewish banquets, including Passover customs, and hence did indirectly influence some customs at the Last Supper; in some respects, the Hellenistic church also assimilated the Lord’s Supper to, and interpreted it in the light of, Hellenistic meals. These do not provide the most immediate parallels for the earliest form of the Lord’s Supper tradition, however, even for those who view the Lord’s Supper as sacramental (rather than simply a common meal) at an early period. Most scholars also recognize that before the spread of Christianity, Hellenistic meals were not sacramental and did not communicate mystical elements of the deity.

But we need not look so far afield from the church’s Palestinian Jewish origins. Among these, Qumran provides common meals as well, although it should be noted at the outset that these probably represent one sort among many Jewish common meals and not the decisive background of the early Christian practice. Some have compared to the Lord’s Supper these Qumran meals, which may themselves evince some Hellenistic influence. Some think that these meals followed rules for sacerdotal purity, were sacrificial sacred meals, were annual and sacramental, or foreshadowed eschatological meals. But the sacral character may be no more than in most Jewish meals, and the eschatological interpretation also remains unclear: 1QSa’s messianic banquet could simply evoke the common practice of the community rather than the latter evoking the former.

The specific proposed parallels between the Qumran meals and the Lord’s Supper are not strong. The leader presiding over the meal and blessing bread and wine fits all Jewish meals, as do most other characteristics of the meal. Certainly, special rules obtained in the Qumran order (1QS VI, 4–5, 20–21), but its meals merely show that a concept related to the sacred meal was already present in Palestinian Judaism and that one need not appeal to geographically distant parallels to explain the Lord’s Supper. One may also compare the sacred communal meals of the Therapeutae (Philo Contempl. 82).

Some scholars think that the Lord’s Supper more closely resembles the regular weekly gatherings of the haburoth, whose Pharisaic purity rules, some think, may have bound them to eating especially among themselves. Among schools of sages in Palestine, study companions often ate together as well (ʾAbot R. Nat 18, §40 B), though perhaps partly to save time (14, §34B). But again, are meals of associates or students of the sages distinctive enough as meals to warrant special attention in connection with the Last Supper? Palestinian Jewish families probably celebrated the more common weekly Sabbath kiddush very early; one could also share Sabbath meals in common with other families. Diaspora Jews also apparently assembled for communal meals at times. Luke’s Gospel, like the rest of the gospel tradition, indicates that meals together were a standard part of Jesus’s lifestyle, undoubtedly carried on in the primitive church. Insofar as those welcomed must have included the poor (Luke 14:13), such table fellowship probably also figured into the sharing of goods (Acts 2:44–45).

Jeremias contends that Essene meals are more different than similar and that haburoth meals are undocumented, preferring a Passover background for the Last Supper (and hence the Lord’s Supper). Many of the features of the Last Supper that are distinguishable from regular Jewish meals parallel the Passover meal, a correspondence not surprising in view of the night on which Jesus was betrayed. That Jesus followed the more common practices regarding Passover cannot be proved, but it is likely, especially in view of the correspondences on points that can be tested.

If any more Hellenistic elements appear in the meals, they may fit the environment of urban Jerusalem. Luke’s “symposium” section (Luke 14:1–24), however, suggests that he recognized Hellenistic-style banquet customs throughout Palestine, which probably accurately reflects the degree of hellenization by the first century.

Greeks and Romans who could afford it had three courses in their banquets: appetizers, the meal proper (δεῖίνον), and finally the “drinking party” (συμίόσιον; Latin convivium). Greek-speaking Jews were familiar with this language; Luke uses δεῖίνον (Luke 14:12, 16–17, 24; 20:46).

For dinners (at home or outside), wealthy people in this period apparently wore special clothes that were less formal than day clothes. Some of the poor in the Jerusalem church may have lacked this option, but many probably had a clean garment not soiled by work (cf. Luke 3:11; Matt 22:11–12). Did church members “dress up” for these meals? Perhaps those of lower social station would have done so if invited to banquets among those of higher social station (more plausible in the more spacious homes of the upper city), but for small gatherings among neighbors and peers, the issue seems less likely to have arisen.

Because Jewish people had adopted Hellenistic banquet customs, the ideal setting would be about three reclining couches for up to twelve people, with diners leaning on their left elbows and eating with their right hands. The massive numbers in the Jerusalem church, however, could not have been accommodated only in such settings; they would sometimes meet in poorer homes, and even the larger ones, class issues aside, might not limit their guests to the number that could be reclined comfortably on couches.

Apostolic teaching (Acts 2:42) may have occurred in conjunction with the meal, perhaps after the main course. Greco-Roman banquets (or sometimes the more intimate drinking party that followed) usually included some form of entertainment, whether music, flute girls, pantomimes, dancers, or, for more refined tastes, lectures, readings and recitations, or topics for discussion (philosophic or otherwise). Among Jewish people, the standard topic of discussion was Torah. Just as all events at a banquet normally occurred in the dining hall, it is likely that prayer (2:42) and other elements occurred in the same room where believers shared their meal.

Prayer proved to be not only a prelude to Pentecost (1:14) but a continuing part of the community’s life. Prayer is one of Luke’s primary emphases, but this emphasis also presents an accurate reflection of early Christian life (e.g., Rom 1:9–10; Eph 6:18; Phil 2:3–4; Col 4:2–4, 12; 1 Thess 3:10; 5:17, 25; 2 Thess 3:1; 1 Tim 2:1–2; 5:5; Jas 5:13–18; 1 Pet 4:7).

The corporate prayer meetings in which the largest number of the community’s members gathered were probably in the temple (Acts 2:46), the courts of which were expansive enough to house large groups of people, especially in the less crowded intervals between festivals (Luke 24:53; Acts 2:46; 3:1; 5:12). Continual prayer presumably means gathering for regular times of prayer (as illustrated concretely in the following narrative, Acts 3:1), though they may have also maintained a spirit of prayer through the day as in some traditional cultures. Regular prayer times in the temple might best explain Luke’s use of the plural here.

This verse is one of a number of miracle summaries in Acts (e.g., 5:12; 8:7; 19:11–12; 28:9). The imperfect tense for fear’s “falling” suggests that it continued over a long period of time instead of ending immediately. This event is paralleled with fear following a sign of judgment after the next outpouring of the Spirit in 4:32–35 (5:5, 11), in the summary statement lauding the church’s growth in 9:31, and after dramatic events in Paul’s ministry (19:17). In each case, the fear suggests that God was glorified and the crowds were now paying attention to the Lord’s work through his apostolic agents. Luke uses this description the same way in his Gospel (Luke 1:65; 5:26; 7:16; 8:27; though also for angelic revelations in 1:12; 2:9; and eschatological signs in 21:26).

This response to signs is not surprising, nor that it might prove one contributing factor to the church’s continued growth (2:47), as modern parallels from most regions of the modern world suggest. That signs usually produce church growth is a thesis argued extensively by Christiaan De Wet, who complains, “My research has turned up so much material on signs and wonders that are happening and churches that are growing, that it is impossible to use all of it.” Ancient Christian missionary accounts offer the same connection between signs and church growth, for example, in stories of Columba. (See further discussion on signs in the introduction, ; , .)

That God performed signs and wonders through the apostles is attested from an early period outside Acts (2 Cor 12:12; Heb 2:3–4); see our introduction, , especially section 2. Luke informs his audience that many signs were taking place, although he will report only one (a public sign yielding many new believers) in Acts 3:1–10.

A central part of Luke’s portrayal of the ideal church is its sharing of possessions. This is the center of the possible chiasm in 2:41–47; more important, the characteristic recurs more elaborately at the next corporate outpouring of the Spirit in 4:32–35, and fulfills Jesus’s example and teaching regarding possessions (Luke 3:11; 9:58; 12:33; 14:33). Luke describes “all those who were believing” in Acts 2:44, the bulk of whom would have joined the movement on Pentecost (2:41; cf. 1:15) or afterward (2:47). Their commitment was radical, fitting Jesus’s demand for disciples in the Gospel (Luke 12:33; 14:33).

Peter had answered the question about how the hearers should respond to Peter’s deliberative message by inviting repentance (Acts 2:37–38). Luke’s ideal audience will recognize that equivalent answers to the question entail giving all one’s goods to the poor (Luke 3:10–11; 18:18, 22) and (though a first-time hearer would not yet recognize this point) faith in Jesus (Acts 16:30–31). Because Luke describes these people as “believing” and sharing their possessions, he clarifies (without needlessly repeating himself) that they have followed the appropriate pattern for repentance outlined in his larger work.

Arlandson estimates that 15 percent of typical urban populations in antiquity were “expendables,” those for whom the rest of society had no use, such as beggars (see comment on Acts 3:2), widows without families, and orphans. Others estimate that the 2 percent at the top of agrarian empires typically controlled half to two-thirds of an empire’s wealth; 10 percent at the bottom continually lived in mortal danger; most of the empire fell into the 70 percent category of peasant farmers. Aristocrats and the 5–7 percent retainer class beneath them tended to concentrate in cities, but cities were still full of poor people. The Gospel’s emphasis on caring for the poor climaxes in this depiction of the ideal community. (On urban poverty, see also the discussion at Acts 3:2.)

Certainly, those who joined the early Christian community went far beyond the normal entry dues for guilds or associations. In a Dionysiac association, payment of dues was the central requirement of membership, an obligation due the deity; expenses included entrance fees, monthly fees for wine, regular fees for festivals, and fines for inappropriate behavior at banquets. (Associations often voted on prospective members’ worthiness, one factor likely being their ability to pay the requisite dues.) But these were mandatory fees to belong to a group, whereas the Jerusalem believers shared their wealth more fully and voluntarily.

Luke portrays the church’s ideal beginnings in glowing terms that would have been easily recognized by his contemporaries. Christians undoubtedly did help one another, as the residents of Qumran apparently did, but Luke’s description of Jesus’s followers, like the description of the Essenes in Philo and Josephus, provides Greek utopian allusions. “The writer of Acts seems to have seen the nascent Christian community as fulfilling the hopes, the promises, and the ideals, not only of Deuteronomy, but also of that same Greek Utopianism.”

Johnson cites Plato’s depiction of earliest Athens (Plato Critias 110CD) and notes, “A Hellenistic reader would recognize in Luke’s description the sort of ‘foundation story’ that was rather widespread in Hellenistic literature.” Plato’s ideal state in the Republic was particularly widely known (much more than his more practical Laws), and some scholars find here allusions to Plato’s utopian ideal in addition to other elements of background.

Ancients who described ideal communities typically shared a common, often idealized language. It included expressions such as μία ψυχή and πάντα κοινά (cf., very closely, Acts 4:32). One could parallel many “examples from late antiquity of idealizing descriptions of religious brotherhoods like the Essenes, Therapeutae, Brahmans, Gymnosophists, Egyptian priests, Pythagorean communities, etc.” Epicureans sought to demonstrate communal sharing.

Some scholars suggest that Acts’ depiction of the primitive church may reflect the image of the primeval, utopian golden age in pagan writers. Many ancients believed that people held property in common during that golden age; it might make sense to expect the same in the church’s golden age as well. Writers praised the few philosophers whose lives of simplicity recovered the shared life of the primeval golden age (Max. Tyre 36, passim). Because Jewish visions of eschatological blessing often recycled primeval ideas of paradise (see comment on Acts 3:21), this tradition might be relevant for Luke’s Hellenistic audience reading about the eschatological community (See comment on Acts 2:17–18).

But even ideas of past simplicity would not necessarily recall the golden age alone. Many have compared Luke’s description of the early Christian community with others’ descriptions of the Pythagoreans. Pythagoreans were known for sharing things in common among themselves (Iambl. V.P. 35.257). Their ideal was equality based on their desire to be of “one body and one soul” and calling “that which is mine and that which belongs to another by the same name.” Thus they sought to banish what is private and increase what is common, “for all things were common and the same for all, and no one possessed anything privately.” Some of this language is almost identical to Acts 4:32; though it should be admitted immediately that these particular quotations derive from an era when NT accounts were in popular circulation, the general portrait of early Pythagoreanism is earlier.

Pythagoras allegedly authored the eventually popular statement that “friends share everything in common [κοινά]” and that “friendship is equality” (φιλίαν ἰσότητα); his disciples reportedly practiced this (Diog. Laert. 8.1.10). Disciples devoted all their resources to the sect once they joined it, and many observers found this model virtuous (Aul. Gel. 1.9.12). Yet even in stories about Pythagoras’s followers, holding goods in common was either “short-lived or applied only to the innermost group.” The same might have been true for the Jerusalem community or even Luke’s interpretation of it (Acts 5:4), but written sources about the earliest Pythagoreans are generally so much later than the events they describe that we can compare only the ideal descriptions of both communities.

Ancient literature often mentions the ideal of common property. Virgil praises bees for their supposed practice of this ideal (Virg. Georg. 4.155–57). In some ideals of romance, the couple shared everything in common. To some degree, groups in the Lipari Islands, Crete, and Sparta had practiced forms of common ownership of goods without citing explicit philosophic underpinnings. Although not in a radical way, country folk were known for sharing their resources with one another because of friendship or love (φιλαλλήλους, Alciph. Farm. 29 [Comarchides to Euchaetes], 3.73 ¶2). Some portrayed “noble barbarians” who lacked private possessions and claimed instead to own all the earth (Anacharsis Ep. 9, to Croesus).

Educated Hellenistic readers, however, might think most immediately of philosophic schools. Rules of hospitality required the well-to-do to share their resources with guests of equal status, considering this to be treating one’s resources as if they were the others’, though this was a more or less fictitious (or at least temporary) measure of generosity. (See further discussion on hospitality at Acts 16:15.) Their gifts directly to the poor, however, represented a minimal proportion of their benevolence.

Sharing property could also depict the ideal state (though no real ones that the ancients knew of in recent history). Although Plato’s ideal community did not require all members to share everything in common, its guardians did (Plato Rep. 6.499CD). Others also understood him as approving a state with minimal selfishness (where “mine” and “not mine” were mentioned infrequently), where people would treat truly significant things as held in common (κοινοῖς, Plut. Bride 20, Mor. 140DE).

Cynics lived as simply as possible, sometimes offering a positive model of simplicity to non-Cynics. Essenes went beyond most ideal Greek sects and practiced complete community of goods (see comment on the Essenes more fully below). An early Christian writer concluded that those who share God in common should also share all other things in common (Sent. Sextus 228).

Ancient literature often mentions the ideal of common property, but it was usually regarded as fulfilled “only in primeval times, in the Golden Age . . .  or in Utopias,” or in a very select number of groups, especially in legends about the Pythagoreans at their founding and the Essenes. Cynics, Stoics, Pythagoreans, and others regarded sharing all possessions as an ideal for society, though they did not believe that, given human frailty, all of society would practice it.

Early Stoics in principle affirmed sharing all things in common, but while they rejected private property in an ideal society, they seem to have allowed it in their own. The principle of the value of sharing all things in common remained as an ideal of concord; only the wise could practice this form of concord and friendship, which recognized “knowledge of common goods.” Stoics in this period viewed wealth as a positive indifferent, since it could be used to support that which is intrinsically valuable. Seneca, a first-century Stoic, suggests, “Let us possess things in common [habeamus in commune], for birth is ours in common [nati sumus]” (Sen. Y. Ep. Lucil. 95.53 [LCL]). Seneca was personally rich, but his theory, at least, appeared noble. The Pythagorean Apollonius allegedly taught the Ephesians that they should share goods in common (Philost. Vit. Apoll. 4.2).

Some other philosophers doubted the wisdom of holding property in common; against holding everything in common [κοινωνεῖν] in a city (Arist. Pol. 2.1.2, 1260b), Aristotle warned that people cared for their private property most and so property held in common would be the least cared for (2.1.10, 1261b). Epicurus, who shared his goods, reportedly rejected Pythagoras’s maxim about sharing goods, claiming that true friendship required trust, and trust did not require common ownership (Diog. Laert. 10.1.11). A comic poet might use the radical proposal of community of goods in Athens for farce (Aristoph. Ec. 728–29). In practice, most people with ample resources did not share even the most basic philosophic ideals: “Classical literature is filled with upper-class sneers, unrelieved by any sense of compassion, at the disgusting laziness and squalor and servility of the poor.” Such attitudes later translated into charges that Jesus’s teachings on possessions reflect merely the wishful ideas of poor people desiring to strip the rich of their property.

Other scholars see the ancient language of friendship here. The adage that “friends share all things in common” was widespread, and the idea even more so. This apparently extended even to the sort of “friendship” reflected in military alliances; one could speak (in this case, falsely) of armies belonging to a “friend” through his “partnership” (κοινωνία, Hdn. 3.6.1–2).

Epicurus welcomed all his “friends” (this was how Epicureans viewed each other) to his garden, where they lived together (Diog. Laert. 10.1.10). He believed that friendship was prompted by self-interest but was mutually beneficial, sustained by sharing (κοινωνίαν) in pleasures (10.120).

Stoics claimed that “friendship is a partnership in life” and that the best fellowship stemmed from “equality in partnership.” One could help friends most effectively by providing help in their time of need, even before they would request it (Isoc. Demon. 25). When an inferior could not repay a superior in kind, the latter became the former’s benefactor and should receive some other kind of return. Greco-Roman literature commonly refers to such unequal patronage as “friendship.” (Greeks and Romans also provided benefactions for the poor, with an even wider social gap, but Judaism’s emphasis on charity was much greater; see comment on Acts 3:2.)

While such patronage was “friendship,” Greeks particularly valued another kind of friendship, in which a friend was “another self,” one’s equal. In contrast to Aristotle, whose “equality” was merely proportionate, Stoics used equality language for arithmetic equality; early Stoics thus critiqued social inequality, though more recent Stoics had adapted to the political norms of the empire. Equality could characterize an ideal city. Even among equals, friendship involved reciprocity; thus, in a time of need, a fisherman might remind his fellow that he had sent him fish but now needed new oars, basing his request on friends’ sharing all things (Alciph. Fish. 7 [Thalassus to Pontius], 1.7). Luke thus presents the primitive church as fulfilling the highest Greek aspirations of friendship.

Alan Mitchell finds a great deal of friendship imagery in Luke-Acts, especially in Acts 2:44–47, which he believes challenges ancient friendship ideals of reciprocity. For this reason, he doubts that Greco-Roman utopian ideals affect this passage, since those ideals required abolishing private property (a practice Luke does not advocate here). (Even the claim that early disciples despised possessions and shared all of them in common could be used in polemic against them as well as in apologetic on their behalf.) Rather, Luke shares the views of some anti-utopian writers of his day who advocated sharing without abolishing private property. Certainly, Luke goes well beyond the traditions of Greek culture; he summons higher-status members to serve others with their possessions without expecting reciprocation, very unlike their contemporaries (Luke 6:34–35; 14:12–14). Mitchell may dismiss too readily the value of the utopian model; if “utopian” models in the strictest sense do not fit the entire church, they certainly fit the ideal call to discipleship (3:11; 12:33; 14:33; 18:22). Nevertheless, he probably rightly highlights the friendship model.

Luke may draw on various models, including models of the ideal community. The “friendship” model would have been the most widely known and recognizable, though Luke stretches this beyond its most common framework. Luke’s vision of the earliest church may also have apologetic value; it resembles Josephus’s Essenes, who “pose no political threat.” Noting similar language in Josephus’s apologetic portrayal of Israel’s “constitution,” some scholars even argue that Luke portrays the Christian movement in Acts as an ideal politeia equal or superior to the best Greek and Roman models.

Whereas sharing in common was merely an ideal for most Greek sects, some Essenes (assuming the dominant but disputed view of the identity of Qumran’s community) practiced it quite literally, as commentators both on the Qumran scrolls and on Acts regularly observe. (Complete community of property may have been practiced only by the Essenes who lived there, with lesser forms elsewhere.) The sources suggest that the Essene example was widely known, even if infrequently encountered. Their simple life was thought to attract converts (Pliny E. N.H. 5.15.73), a point perhaps relevant for comparison here (cf. Acts 2:47). If their view that they lived on the verge of the end time played a critical role in their sharing of possessions, as some scholars argue, this point of comparison also would be relevant for Luke’s narrative and the traditions behind it (See comment on Acts 2:17).

Ideal portrayals of the Essenes emphasized their complete sharing of possessions. Philo elaborates at greater length: They are the Jewish equivalent of other exotic sages, such as Persian magi and Indian gymnosophists (Good Person 75). They do not care for wealth or land but only for what is necessary to live (Good Person 76); they cooperate with neighbors and share (76), and remain poor by choice (77). Their dwelling is shared in common (Good Person 85–86). They share the same treasury, earnings, and clothes, and they share meals together (Good Person 86). Josephus also remarks (War 2.122 [LCL, 3:368–69]),

Riches they despise, and their community of goods is truly admirable; you will not find one among them distinguished by greater opulence than another. They have a law that new members on admission to the sect shall confiscate their property to the order, with the result that you will nowhere see either abject poverty or inordinate wealth; the individual’s possessions join the common stock and all, like brothers, enjoy a single patrimony.

In Qumran texts, a person’s property enters the community with him (1QS VI, 22–23). They may have regarded wealth negatively (4Q183 1 II, 4–5). Even outside Qumran, covenanters would care for the poor, presumably in the community (CD VI, 21). Although most people were undoubtedly uncomfortable with those preaching universal abandonment of possessions, they probably often respected those who, like the Essenes, abandoned their own.

Josephus saw parallels between Pythagoras and the Essenes on sharing (Ant. 15.371), and some scholars have suggested even direct influence of Pythagorean ideas on the Essenes. Since the discovery of the Qumran scrolls, however, scholars are more apt to think that Josephus exaggerated the Pythagorean comparison and that the similarities reflect more general influence from the milieu. (Some even think that the founders of the Essenes were influenced by the Hellenistic utopias at a number of points. Other Jewish writers may also have adapted the utopian model.) Luke was probably influenced by the language of ideal communities, and if he knew of specific descriptions of Jewish groups such as the Essenes and Therapeutae, he may have regarded them as the closest analogues to his description of the early Christians.

There are, of course, significant differences between the model in Acts, which functioned voluntarily in urban society, and a monastic wilderness community. Both Christians and Qumranites surrendered their property, but it was obligatory on members of the Qumran sect as soon as they entered. Further, Christians continued to use their property until needs arose, requiring them to sell it (Acts 2:45; 4:34–35). Their resources do not become community property but are designated for the poor.

Most Jews would have regarded both groups as extreme; thus a Jewish tradition could complain that only someone ignorant would claim that there was no difference between “mine” and “yours” (m. ʾab. 5:10). Likewise, while helping a neighbor who is poor, one should take heed to avoid falling into the same situation (Sir 29:20, in a context of the dangers of sureties). Nevertheless, Jewish sages acknowledged that one should give what was necessary to meet a person’s genuine needs (Sipre Deut. 116.5.1–3), and Judaism respected caring for the needy (e.g., Tob 2:14).

For Luke, Jesus’s example in the Gospel lies in the immediate foreground, with Hellenistic friendship and ideal communities in the immediate background. For the earliest Christian community in Acts, Jesus’s teaching again would have contributed the nearest model, with reports about wilderness sectarians (see on Qumran, below) providing some likely background as well. But biblically thoughtful readers among Luke’s ideal audience, as well as members of the earliest community itself, undoubtedly contemplated models in their Scriptures as well. Although the language and ideal of koinōnia fits Hellenistic models, it is also congruent with ideals in biblical law.

Israelites had a different tradition of ancient equality than Greeks, whether in Egypt (Jub. 46:1) or, more plainly, in the wilderness (Exod 16:17–18), a tradition some Greek-speaking Jews applied as an example of equality. Greek-speaking Jews readily adopted Greek language of equality as compatible with their own faith. Diodorus Siculus, misunderstanding the Jubilee legislation, claims that Moses divided the land equally (ἴσους) among all its citizens. Although Israel’s laws, like other ancient Near Eastern regulations, sought only to restrain and not to abolish selfishness, such equality was also the ideal to which they pointed (Deut 15:4). As Wenk points out, “the renewed prophetic community of Acts” ultimately expressed itself “in terms of a renewed society as anticipated in Joel.”

To understand fully the church’s sacrificial behavior in Acts, we must understand Jesus’s teaching on possessions in the Gospel. The discipleship that the Gospel emphasizes requires using one’s resources to serve the poor. Real disciples must forsake their possessions (Luke 14:33), give them to the poor (3:11; 12:33; 18:22), and practically demonstrate that they value other people’s welfare more than they value their own resources (16:9–13, 21, 25). Jesus’s example likewise teaches such sacrifice, a sacrifice the disciples necessarily shared as they periodically left their families and traveled with him (5:11; 18:28–29; cf. 9:58–62). Whereas the Qumran scrolls reveal their community’s “economic communism,” Luke’s Jesus (and probably the historical Jesus) was more demanding: at least on the ideal level, he sought disciples ready to endure “almost absolute poverty.” In practice, his emphasis on charity suggests that disciples might still hold some resources, but Jesus advocated a voluntary renunciation of wealth to demonstrate greater allegiance to God’s kingdom (12:33–34; 14:33; 18:22–30; cf. 3:11).

In Jesus’s teaching, care for the poor is rooted in the model that fellow Christians belong to one’s family (e.g., Luke 8:21; 22:32; see comment on Acts 9:17) and one must act accordingly—even at the risk of alienating one’s natural kin (Luke 8:20–21; 14:12, 26; 18:29; cf. 21:16). Those who abandoned worldly connections and advantages would have spiritual kin and their resources to help in time of need (18:30). In contrast to the usual Roman pattern of patrons supplying and clients groveling or praising them, Christians even in a Roman colony would praise God as their patron who provided through other Christians (2 Cor 9:12).

The sharing of goods in Acts (cf. also sharing in Acts 9:36, 39; 11:28–30; 20:33–35; 24:17) thus may fulfill on a literal level what Jesus demanded in an ideal and hyperbolic manner. Because those with resources would share, everyone would have enough, even in the present age (Luke 18:29–30). Similarly, one philosopher opines that he has ample possessions though owning little, because his friends share with him (Socratics Ep. 22, to Simmias and Cebes). Others observed that κοινωνία yielded shared resources (Hdn. 3.6.2).

Radically sacrificial disciples demonstrated the effectiveness of their teacher; a later story declared that when Crates gave his property to the citizen body (ἐκκλησία), the rest of the citizens marveled at his teacher Diogenes, who formed people like this (Diogenes Ep. 9, to Crates). Jesus certainly called for radical disciples (Luke 5:11; 9:23, 58–62; 14:26–34; 18:22–30). Although Paul is less rhetorically demanding for a different setting, he retains a heavy concern for the poor (Rom 15:26–27; 2 Cor 8–9; Gal 2:10), even at potential risk to himself (cf. Rom 15:30–31), perhaps reflecting the continuing ethos of Jesus’s teachings in the early Jesus movement, suggested also in Acts 2:44–45.

Although Luke does not inveigh against possessions here, he elsewhere makes them (like everything else, Luke 14:26–27) worthless compared with the kingdom (12:31–34) and hence readily sacrificed for the needs of one’s family in Christ (18:29–30). Although Luke probably addresses a fairly comfortable urban audience (see introduction, ; cf. , ), he appears to offer good news for the poor but bad news for the rich (6:20–21, 24–25). His approach to possessions invites brief comparison with some philosophic and other ideal views of possessions (in contrast with the dominant cultural ethos, which was, of course, to acquire as much wealth as possible).

Greek and Roman sages often claimed that wealth was neutral and could be used positively, but many praised the moral blessing of poverty and condemned the danger of wealth. The love of money is folly; wealth is worthless compared to knowledge or virtue, and Stoics regarded only the wise as genuinely wealthy in what mattered. Most philosophers and moralists stressed the virtue of contentment and valued self-sufficiency. One should avoid pride if wealthy. A first-century Stoic philosopher declared that philosophy teaches not to fear poverty or to seek wealth as if they mattered (Mus. Ruf. 1, p. 34.31–33). After all, one could not take one’s wealth in death; the pursuit of wealth itself could, indeed, lead to destruction. Wisdom means having nothing to lose, for fear of loss is as bad as grief of loss, and hence possessions generate anxiety.

In general, Greeks and Romans seem to have preserved respect for the old-fashioned virtues of military discipline and rustic simplicity, both among philosophers and among others. Thus, for example, Cicero warned that Capua’s luxury corrupted even rugged Hannibal (Cic. Agr. 1.7.20). Moralists often condemned extravagance, squandering, greed, and stinginess and praised generosity. Still, some of wealth’s ancient critics (such as Philo and Seneca) apparently ignored their own possession of it.

Like Greek views, Jewish views on wealth varied, usually depending on how people used wealth. Some could regard wealth positively, as a sign of blessing, yet many also acknowledged the spiritual dangers of wealth and “love of gain” (a vice also in Greek and Roman tradition), likewise condemning greed. One should love God rather than wealth; sometimes Jewish writers also oppose the uselessness of worldly wealth with the true treasure of the world to come. True wealth could thus include contentment, and poverty could be a blessing. Wisdom was true wealth (e.g., Prov 3:14).

Although the rabbis, like mainstream Judaism in general, never advocated community of goods, first-century Pharisees (though typically economically well-off enough to devote time to study) were known for seeking to live simply, and both Pharisees and their rabbinic successors advocated caring for the poor. Rabbis could praise a sage who sold everything to devote himself entirely to study of the Torah. Josephus claimed that many Gentiles admired and wished to imitate Jewish charity practices (Ag. Ap. 2.283). Although Judean society prospered in the period depicted here, most individuals had modest lives.

Luke does not portray possessions as evil in a gnostic sort of way, only as worthless compared with needs within the believers’ new family. Thus believers divested themselves of property only as needs arose (which was apparently quite often). The noun κτήματα may refer to fixed property (as in Acts 5:1); ὕίαρξις is rare (elsewhere in the NT only at Heb 10:34) but probably refers to all possessions (cf. the cognate verb in Luke 12:33, 44; 14:33; 16:1; 19:8).

The imperfect tense (“were selling”) suggests that members periodically sold their goods when needs arose, rather than immediately on entering the community (this aspect is less demanding than in the Qumran scrolls). Thus they did not all (cf. Acts 5:4) divest themselves of all possessions at conversion but, rather, disavowed their personal ownership of their possessions, along with their lives (Luke 14:26, 33), so as to sacrifice them when “any had need” (Acts 2:45; 4:35). As historian and ethicist Ronald Sider notes, “the text does not suggest that the community decided to abolish all private property and everyone instantly sold everything. Rather it suggests that over a period of time, whenever there was need, believers regularly sold lands and houses to aid the needy.”

Despite occasional scholarly speculation that the passage lacks historical basis, the history of movements suggests that it is more likely that the church would move away from radical ideals on possessions as it incorporated more members than that it would have invented ideals it never practiced. Some suggest that 2:44–45 and 4:32–35 are doublets of the same source, but current narrative criticism is more apt to see “doublets” as repetition for effect, and it seems likely that Luke is emphasizing a repeated effect of the Spirit’s outpouring, perhaps increasing the previous level of commitment. The practice in 2:44–45 continues to be presupposed in 6:1–6, comports with the view of caring for the poor in the Letter of James, and may also help explain a continuing emphasis on sharing suggested in Paul’s collection(s) and some second-century Christianity.

Although Luke used his rhetorical skill to stylize the events of 2:44–45 in a way pleasing for his Hellenistic readers, in content the Qumran parallels remain closer. The obvious Hellenistic topos in Philo’s and Josephus’s descriptions of Essenes led W. Bauer in 1924 to doubt that the Essenes really shared possessions; the discovery of Qumran’s Manual of Discipline, however, laid such skepticism to rest. Some have even suggested that Essenes who settled in Jerusalem a few decades before (yet maintained contact with wilderness Essenes) may have directly influenced the early Christian practice. Yet even without such direct mediation, early Christians would have known of wilderness ascetics (there were others; cf. Bannus in Jos. Life 11) and a life of sacrifice through the example of John the Baptist (Luke 1:80). Parallels with Qumran’s communal life probably go back through Jesus’s disciples who traveled, ate together, and shared a common purse.

Some also find Semitic idioms in Luke’s description, comparing his expression for “together” (ἐίὶ τὸ αὐτό) to an analogous Hebrew term that in the Qumran scrolls means “the community” (cf. 1QS I, 1; III, 7). This argument is more questionable; Luke probably depends on oral rather than written sources here and probably uses his own vocabulary (though in all his writings the phrase admittedly appears only in Luke 17:35; Acts 1:15; 2:1, 44, 47; 4:26; elsewhere in the NT, only Matt 22:34; 1 Cor 7:5; 11:20; 14:23). But other elements may reinforce the idea of pre-Lukan tradition, especially if the primitive Christians’ sharing reflected, in part, their probable expectation of Christ’s almost immediate return.

Despite Luke’s idealized language, he does not create the kind of complete community of goods suggested for Pythagoreans or Qumran Essenes; people sold their goods when their economic resources were needed. Given his apologetic Tendenz, Luke certainly would not have invented the conflict of Acts 6:1, yet it presupposes a concerted program of sharing such as Luke describes earlier.

Although Luke’s description of the early community may be idealized, another idealized (and apologetic) portrait of the churches in the mid-second century suggests that the ideal was not Luke’s alone but continued in the life of the church. Justin claims that former pagans, converted to Christianity, continue to share their resources in common and with the needy (Justin 1 Apol. 14). In the late second century, Tertullian remarks wittily that Christians readily share everything in common except their wives—the one thing, he complains, pagans were most willing to share (Tert. Apol. 39.11–12). In antithetical contrast to the apologists’ idealized portraits, Lucian ridicules worshipers of “the crucified sophist” as despising “all things indiscriminately” and reckoning everything as “common property,” hence easily cheated. Celsus critiqued Christians for their effective appeal to “the socially objectionable classes” as well as to “the unhappy and sinful.” Other sources also attest to Christians’ continuing commitment to share their resources in the second century and beyond.

Finally, activity such as is described here is not unrealistic in times of fervent religious commitment. Reception history reveals various attempts to evade the text’s demands, domesticating them to fit one’s context. Yet various renewal movements in history have successfully emulated the radical model of Acts 2:44–45. The behavior is not implausible for such movements, and hence there is no reason to deny an authentic Palestinian tradition behind Luke’s report. Insofar as our interest is Luke’s application to his audience, however, the Hellenistic parallels remain important.

The daily meeting in the temple follows Jesus’s example when he taught there daily (Luke 19:47; 22:53), and the daily breaking of bread (See comment on Acts 2:42) perhaps follows Jesus’s teaching that his followers should pray daily for their bread (Luke 11:3); discipleship also entailed daily acts of sacrifice (Luke 9:23), and the Jerusalem church fed the poor daily (Acts 6:1). Likewise, and perhaps consequently, the number of believers was growing daily (2:47; 16:5). That believers would meet daily, as here, seems the ideal pattern (cf. Heb 3:13; 10:25; Did. 4.2), though we cannot be certain that all members met daily or how often this proved feasible in the later Diaspora churches.

The term ἀφελότης is rare (it appears nowhere else in the NT or LXX), but where it does occur, it can be equivalent to ἁίλότης. Given the context, emphasizing both worship and activity together, perhaps it could imply singleness of heart to the Lord as well as being in unity. Greek texts often emphasize being of one mind (e.g., μιᾷ γνώμῃ in Lysias Or. 2.24, §192), as did the early Christians (Rom 15:5; Phil 1:27; 2:2–3). True friendship involves unity of mind (ὁμόνοιαν; Dio Chrys. Or. 4.42); this was also the ideal for families (ὁμοφροσύνη; 38.15). Political analogies are also relevant for early Christians; a city should have “singleness of purpose” (ὁμοφρονούσης; 39.3), and a favorite theme of oratory was the ὁμόνοια (homonoia) speech, exhorting hearers to concord (see comment on Acts 15:25). If two rival cities were to reconcile, each would share the prosperity of the other (Dio Chrys. Or. 38.47–49; See comment on Acts 2:44–45).

Luke presents the early church as holding the virtue of acting ὁμοθυμαδόν, in unity, a consistent theme (Acts 1:14; 2:46; 4:24; 5:12); when members of the church are later divided, the Spirit leads them through dialogue back to this sharing of the same mind (15:25). It is a preferred term of Luke’s (though never used in the Gospel); outside Acts, it appears in the NT only at Rom 15:6 (though it occurs thirty-six times in the LXX, especially in Job and the works originally composed in Greek). When the wicked act in concert in this way, they do so to oppress the righteous (Acts 7:57; 18:12; 19:29); the unity of crowds hearing the gospel (8:6) also underlines the effectiveness of Philip’s ministry, though the term also applies to a crowd’s desperate attempts to seek Agrippa’s favor (12:20).

The Greco-Roman world had a wide vocabulary for unity, and exhortations to unity constituted a major topos for speeches and the essays of moralists alike. Paul’s letters often repeat this exhortation to early Christians, suggesting that they, like everyone else, needed to be called to unity (Rom 15:5–6; 1 Cor 1:10–12; Phil 2:1–5). It often appears in narratives, therefore, in a paradigmatic way, as an ideal inviting imitation. Early Jewish traditions about the exodus emphasize this ideal unity. It also characterized the ideal Pythagorean communities.

Some scholars suggest that early Christians used public meeting places to evangelize in seeking converts, but houses to disciple the converts (cf. Acts 5:42; 20:20). The meetings from house to house follow Jesus’s instructions for expansion (Luke 10:5–7) and form the basis for the later house churches, which became the dominant meeting places for early Christians. Meetings in homes in the Gospel may foreshadow this pattern (5:29; 7:36–37; 8:51; 9:4; 10:5–7; 14:1; 19:5, 9; 22:11), though the idea, in any case, would have seemed less novel to them than to us: apart from community centers (such as synagogues), temple courts, or gathering outdoors, where else would disciples meet? In a familial setting, ancient Israel also used homes for worship and instruction. Crates the philosopher reportedly entered one house after another to admonish those within (Diog. Laert. 6.5.86). In particular, the early Christians practiced their teaching (Acts 2:42) especially in believers’ homes.

As basic observation of group dynamics confirms, smaller groups tend to invite more interaction. Meals together of voluntary associations were widely known in antiquity (See comment on Acts 2:42); a Palestinian Jewish form was the haburah, probably practiced by Pharisees. Open courtyards amid homes could hold larger numbers of people, but apart from some extraordinarily large homes (cf. 1:13), even the larger homes probably rarely held more than fifty people, although there were likely some exceptions. Even those with wealthy homes tended to host smaller banquets in the dining room; ten or fifteen may have been a common number.

House meetings naturally created an environment of family, especially for Luke’s audience in places like Philippi, who were familiar with clients and freedpersons who formed an extended household and often ate at their patron’s banquets. Such relationships were so central that some ancients presented household relationships as paradigmatic or foundational for the state (cf. 1 Tim 3:4).

Like meetings in the temple, the house meetings undoubtedly reflect authentic tradition from the earliest period (even though house meetings also undoubtedly remained the norm in Luke’s day). The house church model preceded Paul’s church-planting ministry; the Roman church, which he did not found, used it; synagogues often started in homes; and there was no other practical place to meet in difficult times. It is also reasonable to believe that this part of the Jesus tradition is authentic, attested in both Markan (Mark 6:10; Luke 9:4) and Q (Luke 10:5–7; Matt 10:12–14) forms (though Mark might depend here on Q).

Unlike the house meetings, a continuing model for Luke’s own day, the temple meetings directly reflect only the past (on a post-70 dating of Luke-Acts). Other meetings in the temple must also have been common; it provided the largest available open space in Jerusalem and a natural place for teaching. The massive Jerusalem temple—easily one of the largest in the empire—could host vast crowds in its courts and surrounding areas (e.g., the gallery in Jos. War 2.344). The Temple Mount comprised 1,527,920 square feet, that is, about 35 acres. Ancient cities typically had an acropolis or other prominent area containing public buildings (such as temples and administrative buildings) as well as palaces and homes of the elite; Jerusalem had its upper city and Temple Mount. People congregated especially in a city’s public space, including temples; in Jerusalem, this public space would have been the Temple Mount.

Jewish traditions suggest that sages often taught in the temple, and Jesus had set a precedent for the disciples there (Luke 21:37). Temple courts were public locations used by various ancient lecturers, and people typically associated there. Pythagoreans, who may have provided part of Luke’s utopian model for sharing (See comment on Acts 2:44–45), spent time together especially in temples in the afternoon (Iambl. V.P. 21.96).

Although Qumran sectarians felt that an earlier temple establishment had banished them, Pharisees, Sadducees, and most other Jews, despite their differences, shared the temple courts by the first century. Such an image would not be unfamiliar to Diaspora readers; whereas only wealthier associations owned their own buildings, “small associations met in an area of a public temple, in a rented hall or in a private house. Corner cafes might serve as informal clubs for the poorer groups.”

Although Jesus may have regarded the temple as facing judgment (Luke 21:5–6), he and the disciples regarded it as an appropriate place for worship and teaching (19:47; 20:1; 21:5, 37–38; 22:53; Mark 12:35; 13:1; 14:49). Some scholars regard this feature as indicating primitive tradition; certainly, it is pre-Lukan, but it does not characterize only the earliest years of the church. Even from Luke’s perspective, the members of the Jerusalem church continued to worship in the temple until they fled the city (cf. Acts 21:20, 26). This continued practice (in a period that Luke knows more clearly) must, however, reflect the “primitive” practice; they undoubtedly continued an unbroken tradition from the earliest Jerusalem church instead of representing a departure from a less orthodox prior tradition. Although this tradition is pre-Lukan, it fits Luke’s perspective of salvation history. His Gospel begins and ends with scenes in Jerusalem and worship in the temple (Luke 1:9–22; 24:52–53); Acts moves from heritage to mission (Acts 1:8; see our introduction, , ) but without despising that heritage in which Luke has so carefully grounded it.

That the temple would be judged (Luke 19:45–48) but also renewed (cf. 20:17–18; discussion below) allows for the temple to be superseded after 70, yet this could (if the establishment’s neglect or rejection of appropriate worship there was among the reasons for its judgment) encourage worship in the temple while it remained. Some scholars suggest that in dominating discourse in the temple in Acts 3 and by challenging the temple authorities in Acts 4–5, the apostles even imply that they, as the leaders for Israel appointed by the Messiah (Luke 22:30), should rule there rather than the politically compromised priestly aristocrats (cf. Acts 4:11; 5:30, 32). If such a proposal overstates the apostles’ claims—it is by no means clear that the apostles advocated disrespect or resistance, and even less clear that they expected the leaders to hand over their position willingly (cf. 4:8; 5:41; 23:5)—it nevertheless illustrates how the authorities could have heard the claims the apostles did make. Certainly, by charging the leaders with rejecting and killing God’s Messiah, the apostles regarded the “builders” (4:11) as unfit for further leadership (cf. Luke 20:16–18).

The temple at this point serves a positive function, which may reflect the religious fervor of the earliest church; times of rapid expansion can produce optimism about reclaiming lost ground. Mostly tragic stories could have happy endings, and so a “den of robbers” destined for judgment (Luke 19:46; 21:6) might yet be saved. Presumably, Luke’s audience knows otherwise, but the primitive Christians’ devotion to the temple makes sense in the story world, adds pathos to the ultimate rejection of Paul in the temple and (beyond the narrated story) its promised destruction, and strengthens Luke’s perception (and likely the historical reality) of the earliest Jerusalem Christians’ fidelity to their biblical heritage.

The revival of spiritual temple worship here would evoke for Luke’s biblically informed audience grand precedents. Throughout the priestly work of the Chronicler, renewal of temple (or tabernacle) worship accompanied revivals in Israel’s history. This worship could involve the prophetic Spirit (1 Chr 25:1–6), and it generated the psalms that became standard in later temple liturgy (2 Chr 29:30). The early Christians thus had good reason to expect (and experience) a renewal of temple worship, whether or not the authorities saw fit to cooperate with their agenda.

Many Jewish people expected a new or renewed temple in this period. This hope naturally stirred more prominently after 70 C.E. but is abundantly attested before that period, especially in the Qumran scrolls. The restoration of the vessels, the ark, and perhaps its manna also imply a renewed, eschatological temple of some sort. Many emphasized a new or renewed temple because they viewed the current priesthood as impure. These expectations support the plausibility of the earliest Jesus movement sharing some contemporaries’ expectations that Jerusalem and the temple would play a central part in God’s end-time plan.

Many early Christians valued worship by the Spirit in direct contrast to dependence on the temple liturgy (John 4:20–24) or other Jewish tradition (Phil 3:3; cf. Jude 20). The teaching of a new temple is even more pervasive in early Christianity (Eph 2:18–22; 1 Pet 2:5; Rev 3:12; cf. John 4:23–24) and hence is undoubtedly early. This does not mean, however, that they entirely rejected the current one. Many early Jewish sources that expected destruction of the present temple regarded it as impure and unsuitable for worship, but the image of a present spiritual temple or of spiritual sacrifices was not necessarily incompatible with the literal practice. Unlike sectarians who withdrew from the temple, the earliest Christians met there; like many Jewish sects, however, they resented the abuse of authority they felt the temple authorities practiced. They challenged the leaders without rejecting the validity of the temple institution itself.

This seems also true for the picture in Luke-Acts. In the context of the temple establishment’s hostility (Luke 20:1–2), Jesus taught that stones (not in the temple) could cry out in worship to him (19:37–40) whereas Jerusalem’s stones would be hurled down (19:41–44). The temple would be judged (19:45–48), but it would be given a new foundation with Jesus himself as the cornerstone (20:17–18; cf. Mark 12:10; Eph 2:20; 1 Pet 2:6–7).

That the disciples were persisting (προσκαρτεροῦντες) in the temple probably indicates not prayer without pausing (cf. Acts 6:4; Rom 12:12; Col 4:2) but “observance of the regular hours of prayer” (see also comment on Acts 1:14; 2:42). These meetings apparently occur more frequently here than later in Acts and in other early Christian sources (cf. Acts 20:7; 1 Cor 16:2; Heb 10:25), perhaps in part because it was difficult for working Christians scattered throughout a city to gather several times (or even once) a day. Rome, ever wary of potential sedition, prohibited associations from meeting more frequently than once a month; it made an exception for synagogues. Because Christians followed the synagogue pattern, they might initially be able to claim exemption on such grounds even in Rome, and because they met in homes, potential accusers (delatores) would probably not recognize or be able to complain about the frequency of their meetings; in a later period, however, their regular meetings (not to mention their title as an ἐκκλησία, which to Greeks often signified a “town meeting”) could carry subversive political connotations. For whatever reasons, later Christians seem to have met less frequently than here, but they preserved the memory of religious intensity of the earliest, ideal community.

Although Luke associates “gladness” here especially with food (i.e., especially the home meetings, discussed above), it may also have some relevance for the public meetings. In the psalms, “gladness” could describe celebratory worship of the Lord, often corporate worship in the temple. Many Greek and Roman thinkers argued that wisdom and virtue, rather than bodily pleasure, yielded happiness. Jewish people often connected it with God’s commandments and also with prayer (Tob 13:1) and worship (Jub. 36:6; Jos. Asen. 3:4). The picture of joyful hearts corresponds with the promise of life in Acts 2:26 (cf. comment there) and resolves the picture of stricken “hearts” in 2:37. The picture of the “guilelessness” (ἀφελότητι) of their hearts evokes a virtue.

Given the emphasis on honor in the ancient Mediterranean world, “praise” was very important in worshiping deities. More important is that biblical tradition spoke of “praising” the Lord. Early Judaism often emphasized the praise of God, even among superhuman beings. The particular term here, αἰνέω, is characteristically Lukan (Luke 2:13, 20; 19:37), soon to recur in response to a dramatic healing (Acts 3:8–9).

An emphasis on daily (2:46) praise also appears in some Greek texts, suggesting the great worthiness of the deity being praised. In the Jerusalem church, such praise could include all individuals offering their own prayers simultaneously, as was frequent in much ancient worship, but probably at least included some corporate singing, as typically in the psalms. Qumran provides many contemporary examples of Judean thanksgiving hymns; Levites sang in the temple, and choruses of priests sang in other temples. (On religious singing, see discussion at Acts 16:25.) That later Gentile churches sang (1 Cor 14:15; Eph 5:19; Col 3:16) and the singing included the specifically Jewish category of “psalms” renders it likely that they continued the practice of the earlier Jerusalem church.

The term for praise here, αἰνέω, is particularly favored by Luke among NT writers, though it is not common even there, but it appears more than a hundred times in the LXX, most prominently in the priestly writings of the Chronicler (nearly twenty times), the psalms (about forty times), and Sirach (sixteen times, though only about two-thirds of the references apply to God himself). Nearly all the texts in Chronicles associate this praise with the house of the Lord (1 Chr 16:4, 7, 10, 35–36, 41; 23:5, 30; 29:13; 2 Chr 5:13; 6:26; 7:3; 8:14; 31:2; cf. 2 Chr 23:12; Ezra 3:10–11; Neh 12:24, 36) or at least the Levites (2 Chr 20:19–21); psalms were used in the temple, and some psalms allude to the temple as an important setting for praise (e.g., Pss 35:18 [34:18 LXX]; 84:4 [83:5]; 100:4 [99:4]; 135:1–3 [134:1–3]; cf. 150:1). It also appears in the prelude to the Spirit’s outpouring in Joel (Joel 2:26).

Probably much of the worship of the early Jesus movement was corporate, in the temple, a place of prayer (Luke 2:36–38; 18:10; 19:46; 24:53); this public devotion brought them more favor. That this element is important for Luke, emphasizing the movement’s continuity with its Jerusalem heritage, is clear from the repetition of information offered in Luke 24:53; this is the final element of the Gospel’s conclusion reiterated in Acts and the only one reiterated after Acts 1:2–12. By reading the psalms or later Jewish liturgy (which reflected earlier patterns of worship), we may reconstruct some of the sorts of praise they would have used. Shaye Cohen emphasizes,

The most common element in Jewish prayer is praise. In the temple the recitation of the Ten Commandments and the Shema was preceded and followed by benedictions (or blessings, in Hebrew berakhot; sing. berakha). Praise of the deity is universal, but benedictions are a quintessentially Jewish mode of worship, which was adopted by Christianity (see the Benedictus; Luke 1:68–79; cf. 2 Cor. 1:3; Eph. 1:3; 1 Peter 1:3) and Islam.

Given the church’s experience with tongues on Pentecost (Acts 2:4), some of the early Christians’ worship, at least in home settings, may have included inspired praise in unknown languages (1 Cor 14:15), though it is likely that at some point already at an early period they may have also sought interpretations (cf. 14:13–16). But orderly liturgical worship could also be charismatic and prophetic (1 Chr 25:1–3), and Luke does not give us much specific insight into the community’s worship except by reproducing their use of psalms (e.g., Acts 4:25–26) and other biblical language (e.g., Luke 1:46–55) in prayer.

God had given “favor” (χάρις) before others to the patriarchs, such as Joseph (Acts 7:10; Gen 39:4, 21; 50:4), and to Israel before the Egyptians (Exod 3:21; 11:3; 12:36)—relevant to the eschatological remnant among a larger people. That the early church had favor with its contemporaries at the close of Acts’ introductory section parallels Jesus’s favor with God and people at the end of Luke’s infancy narrative (Luke 2:52), as also (using different language) in his ministry even in Jerusalem (19:48). Reading the Gospel and Acts together, the apostolic church was able to build on the foundation that Jesus laid in his popularity in Jerusalem (20:1, 19, 26, 45; 21:38; 22:2, 6; 24:18–19), now that they proclaimed that his resurrection had vindicated him.

Reporting such favor was appropriate to epideictic depictions of ideal communities. Thus the simple life of the Essenes was thought to attract converts sufficient to replenish their numbers without sexual reproduction (Pliny E. N.H. 5.15.73). Historians also reported positively the rapid growth of new colonies. Even Stoics accepted favor; it was ultimately a matter of indifference, but a positive one. “Favor” was not a permanent gift, as Jesus’s mission reveals (e.g., Luke 4:22, 28; cf. 19:37–38; 23:13, 18; Mark 2:2; 15:11); ancient literature (especially with its aristocratic bias) testifies to how quickly the sentiments of “the masses” changed (cf., e.g., Acts 12:3). (The “people” [λαός] are God’s people; a glance at the LXX, however, warns that this audience does not always guarantee favor for God’s servants [cf. Acts 6:8–14].) Though not permanent, it was a strategic gift to be used wisely while it lasted. Josephus also presents his popularity with the people (despite the enmity of the Jerusalem elite) as positive in his apologetic autobiography (Life 250).

Although the apostles played a strategic role (Acts 2:43), the entire church’s “favor” with the people seems to have contributed to the continuing conversions; whereas the Spirit’s empowerment for preaching had been effective (2:41), the Spirit’s empowerment for eschatological living, though less explicit in the text, also is effective (2:46–47).

The mention of those being “saved” alludes to Joel 2:32, quoted in Acts 2:21 (alluded to also in 2:40), suggesting that the term continues to connote the eschatological remnant of Israel. (The present tense of the participle probably says more about continuing conversions, and hence the community’s evangelistic effectiveness, than about elements of realized eschatology in Luke’s soteriology, though of the latter we find sufficient hints elsewhere.) That the Lord was daily adding these converts to their community indicates the expectation that those being saved were becoming part of the remnant or, in subsequent theological terms, the relevance of soteriology to ecclesiology. Luke makes much use of the term here for “adding” (προστίθημι); of its eighteen occurrences in the NT, thirteen (nearly three-quarters) are in Luke-Acts (for converts also in Acts 2:41; 5:14; 11:24). Luke employs the term both at the beginning (2:41) and conclusion (2:47) of this summary section, underlining the importance of the movement’s growth to his focus. The expression for “community” here, ἐίί τὸ αὐτό (lit. “at the same [place],” i.e., “together”), appears in 1:15; 2:1; and 2:44; the LXX uses it for the Hebrew yahad in a number of texts, a Hebrew term that in the Qumran scrolls refers to the “community” (1QS I, 1, 12; VIII, 1; IX, 2).

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