Acts 5:34

2. Speech of Gamaliel Peaceful results, Acts 5:34-42 .

34. Gamaliel ”Gamaliel Hazzaken,” says Dr. Etherbridge in his “Hebrew Literature,” is “deservedly regarded by the Jews as one of the most illustrious of their princely teachers. He is held to have been the thirty-fifth receiver of the traditions from Mount Sinai, and he added to all the amplitude of Hebrew lore a large acquaintance with Gentile literature, the study of Greek being connived at, in his case, by his rabbinical brethren on the plea of his having need of that language in diplomatic transactions with the secular government. A master also in the astronomy of that day, he could test, it is said, the witnesses for the new moon by a chart of the lunar motions he had constructed for the purpose. His astronomical skill was employed also in the rectification of the Jewish calendar. It is recorded that he delighted much in the study of nature, and in the beautiful in all its manifestations. In short, Gamaliel appears to have been a man of an enlarged and refined mind, and no very stringent Pharisee though connected with the sect. Casual notices of him in the Talmud make this evident. Thus, he had a figure engraved upon his seal, a thing of which no strict Pharisee could approve. Nor could such an one have permitted himself to enter a public bath in which was a statue of Aphrodite. But this Gamaliel is reported to have done at Ptolemais, justifying himself by the argument that the bath had been built before the statue was there; that the building had been erected not as a temple, but as a bath, and as such he used it; and, moreover, that if it were not lawful for him to be except where idolatry had not held its rites, he should not be able to find a place to remain in upon the face of the earth. The attitude assumed by Gamaliel toward the Christians has induced others to surmise that this distinguished rabbin was at heart a believer in the Messiahship of Jesus. That he was a more enlightened and liberal man than his colleagues we see no reason to doubt; but the degree in which he approached the truth as it is in Jesus we have no sufficient data to ascertain. Neander has observed that ‘the great respect in which Gamaliel has been held by the Jews is a sufficient proof that they never doubted the soundness of his creed, or thought he could be accused of any suspicions connection with the Nazarenes.’ Some time after his elevation to the presidency, Gamaliel, pressed by the distresses of the times, transferred the locality of the sanhedrial schools from Jerusalem to Jamnia or Jophna, a town on the coast, not far from Joppa. He there completed the labours of his life, and died some fifteen years before the final ruin of his country. At his decrease men said that the kabod hat-torah, ‘the glory of the law,’ had departed, and on the solemnization of his funeral obsequies his favourite disciple Onkelos expended eighty talents of money in perfumes.”

A Pharisee As a leading Pharisee, and a believer with the apostles and against the Sadducees in the resurrection of the dead, Gamaliel was inspired with a moment of sympathy with the apostles.

Had in reputation A diffuse phrase for honoured. Gamaliel’s popularity among all the people, who generally favoured the Pharisees, furnished to the Sanhedrin some assurance that a ground might be taken by which the present hostile feeling of the people against them might be neutralized. Sensible that they had gone too far, they were inclined to accept a compromise which he should propose.

To put the apostles forth In order that the consultation might be in their absence. They are recalled at Acts 5:40. They did not, therefore, hear the discussion, nor the speech of Gamaliel, which was its principal feature.

A little space Of time.