Acts 1:20

20. For Referring to David spake in Acts 1:16. The distance of the reference shows that Acts 1:18-19 are Luke’s parenthesis inserted in Peter’s speech.

Psalms Peter here quoted Psalms 69:25; Psalms 109:8, both of which are considered by biblical scholars as Messianic Psalms. That is, Christ is represented in those Psalms by his great type, the royal David, the psalmist himself. The psalmist’s words are, “Let their habitation be desolate, and let none dwell therein,” where, probably, Ahithophel is really indicated under the plural them, which Peter explains by rendering it his.

So, habitation and tents meaning the same thing, Peter omits the last. In Psalms 108:9, the words in our English translation are, Let another take his office. The word bishopric is here capriciously used by our translators for the Greek of the Septuagint, επισκοπην , overseer-ship. But though the application of these words to Judas is to be admitted by every believing Christian, and served to guide the apostles aright on this occasion, yet this prophecy could not be conclusively used to convince a sceptic. Prophetic passages are divisible into two classes, namely, those which are explicit and demonstrative, and may be used to convince infidels of the divinity of the Scriptures; and those which can be used only within the Church, by her own interpretation, to guide her own belief and action. The clause in the last-quoted psalm, Let another take his office, was proof to the present assembly that a successor was required in Judas’ apostolate. The promise of twelve apostolic thrones was originally made to include Judas; but another was to inherit that promise in his place, just as Gentiles inherit the Abrahamic promises.