CHAPTER V.
THE APPOINTMENT OF SEVEN DEACONS, THE SERMON AND MARTYRDOM OF STEPHEN, AND A GENERAL PERSECUTION.
1 6:1AND in those days the disciples being multiplied, there was a complaint of the Hellenists against the Hebrews, that their widows were neglected in the daily service. 6:2And the twelve calling the multitude of the disciples, said, It is not desirable that we should leave the word of God to serve tables. 6:3Look out therefore, brothers, from among you seven men of good repute, full of the Holy Spirit, and of wisdom, whom we may set over this business; 6:4but we will attend continually to prayer, and the ministry of the word.
2 6:5And the proposition pleased all the multitude, and they elected Stephen, a man full of faith and of the Holy Spirit, and Philip and Prochorus, and Nicanor and Timon, and Parmenas, and Nicolaus a proselyte of Antioch, 6:6and set them before the Apostles; and they having prayed imposed hands on them. 6:7And the word of God increased, and the number of the disciples was greatly multiplied at Jerusalem, and a great multitude of the priests obeyed the faith.
3 6:8And Stephen, full of grace and power, performed prodigies and great miracles among the people. 6:9But some members of the synagogue called that of the Libertines and Cyrenians and Alexandrians and of those from Cilicia and Asia, arose and disputed with Stephen, 6:10and were not able to resist the wisdom and spirit with which he spoke. 6:11Then they bribed men who said, We heard him speak blasphemous words against Moses and God. 6:12And they stirred up both the people, and the elders, and the scribes, and coming suddenly they seized him and led him to the Sanhedrim, 6:13and brought forward false witnesses who said, This man speaks incessantly against this holy place, and the law; 6:14for we have heard him say, that Jesus this Nazoraean will destroy this place and change the customs which Moses gave us. 6:15And all who sat in the Sanhedrin looking steadily at him saw his face like the face of an angel.
4 7:1And the chief priest said, Are these things then so? 7:2And he said, Men, brothers, and fathers, hear. The God of glory appeared to our father Abraham when he was in Mesopotamia, before he lived in Haran, 7:3and said to him, Go out from your country and your kindred, and come to a land which I will show you. 7:4Then going out from the land of the Chaldeans, he lived in Haran. And thence, after the death of his father, he removed into this land in which you now live. 7:5And [God] gave him no inheritance in it, not the breadth of a foot, and promised to give it to him for a possession, and to his posterity after him, when as yet he had no son. 7:6And God said thus; that his posterity should be a stranger in a foreign land, and they shall enslave it and treat it injuriously four hundred years; 7:7and the nation which they shall serve will I judge, said God, and after that they shall come forth and serve me in this place.
5 7:8And he gave him the ordinance of circumcision; and so he begat Isaac and circumcised him on the eighth day, and Isaac, Jacob, and Jacob the twelve patriarchs. 7:9And the patriarchs envying Joseph sold him into Egypt; and God was with him 7:10and delivered him from all his afflictions, and gave him favor and wisdom in the sight of Pharaoh king of Egypt, and [he] made him governor over Egypt and all his house.
6 7:11And there came a famine on all the land of Egypt and Canaan, and great affliction, and our fathers found no provisions. 7:12But Jacob hearing that there was grain in Egypt, sent our fathers the first time; 7:13and the second time Joseph was made known to his brothers, and Joseph's family was made known to Pharaoh. 7:14And Joseph sent and called for his father Jacob, and all the family of seventy-five souls. 7:15And Jacob went down to Egypt, and died, he and our fathers; 7:16and they carried him back to Shechem and buried him in the tomb which Abraham bought for money of the sons of Hamor the father of Shechem.
7 7:17But when the time of the promise which God made with an oath to Abraham was at hand, the people increased and became numerous in Egypt, 7:18till another king arose who knew not Joseph. 7:19This [king] dealt deceitfully with our race, and treated injuriously our fathers, causing their infants to be exposed that they might not be preserved alive.
8 7:20At that time Moses was born, and was beautiful in the sight of God, and was nourished three months in his father's house; 7:21but being exposed, the daughter of Pharaoh took him up and nourished him as her own son. 7:22And Moses was educated in all the wisdom of the Egyptians, and was mighty in his words and works. 7:23And when he was forty years old, it came into his mind to visit his brothers, the children of Israel. 7:24And seeing one injured he defended him, and executed judgment for the oppressed, smiting the Egyptian. 7:25And he thought his brothers would understand that God would give them salvation by his hand; but they understood not.
9 7:26On the following day also he showed himself to them as they contended, and urged them to peace, saying, Men, you are brothers; why do you injure one another? 7:27But he that injured his neighbor repelled him, saying, Who made you a ruler and a judge over us? 7:28Will you kill me as you did the Egyptian, yesterday? 7:29And Moses fled at that saying, and lived a stranger in the land of Midian, where he begat two sons.
10 7:30And forty years being completed there appeared to him in the wilderness of Mount Sinai, an angel in a flame of fire, in a bush. 7:31And Moses seeing it, wondered at the sight; and coming near to look at it, there was a voice of the Lord, 7:32I am the God of your fathers, the God of Abraham, and Isaac, and Jacob. And Moses being afraid dared not look at it. 7:33And the Lord said to him, Put off your shoes from your feet; for the place on which you stand is holy ground. 7:34I have seen the affliction of my people in Egypt, and have heard their groaning, and have come down to deliver them; and now come, I will send you to Egypt.
11 7:35This is the Moses whom they denied, saying, Who made you a ruler and a judge? Him did God send to be a ruler and a redeemer by the hand of the angel that appeared to him in the bush. 7:36This man brought them out, having performed prodigies and miracles in Egypt, and at the Red Sea, and in the wilderness forty years. 7:37This is the Moses who said to the children of Israel, A prophet shall God raise up for you, of your brothers, like me. 7:38This is he that was with the assembly in the wilderness, with the angel who spoke to him on Mount Sinai, and with our fathers, who received the living oracles to give us, 7:39whom our fathers would not obey, but thrust him away and turned back in their hearts to Egypt, 7:40saying to Aaron, Make us gods to go before us; for this Moses who led us up out of Egypt, we know not what has happened to him.
12 7:41And they made a calf in those days, and offered a sacrifice to the idol, and rejoiced in the works of their hands. 7:42And God turned and gave them up to serve the host of heaven, as it is written in the book of the prophets; Did you offer victims and sacrifices to me forty years in the wilderness, house of Israel, 7:43and take up the tabernacle of Moloch, and the star of the god Rephan, figures which you made to worship? I will even remove you beyond Babylon.
13 7:44Our fathers in the wilderness received the tabernacle of the testimony, as he that spoke to Moses charged him to make it according to the pattern which he had seen; 7:45which also our fathers receiving it in succession brought with Joshua into the possession of the nations, whom God expelled before the face of our fathers till the days of David; 7:46who found favor with God and desired to find a dwelling for the God of Jacob. 7:47And Solomon built him a house. 7:48But the Most High dwells not in [temples] made with hands, as the prophet says; 7:49Heaven is my throne, and the earth my footstool; what house will you build me, says the Lord, or what is the place of my rest? 7:50has not my hand made all these things? 7:51Stiff necked, and uncircumcised in heart and ears, you always fight against the Holy Spirit; as your fathers did, you also do. 7:52Which of the prophets did not your fathers persecute? And they killed those who foretold the coming of the Righteous One, of whom you now have become betrayers and murderers, 7:53who have received the law by orders of angels and have not kept it.
14 7:54And when they heard these things they were enraged in their minds and gnashed their teeth upon him. 7:55But he being full of the Holy Spirit, looking steadily to heaven saw the glory of God and Jesus standing on the right hand of God, 7:56and said, Behold, I see the heavens opened and the Son of man standing on the right hand of God. 7:57And crying with a loud voice they stopped their ears and rushed upon him with one accord, 7:58and casting him out of the city, stoned him. And the witnesses laid down their clothes at the feet of a young man called Saul, 7:59and they stoned Stephen, calling and saying, Lord Jesus, receive my spirit. 7:60And kneeling down he cried with a loud voice, Lord, lay not this sin to their charge. And having said this he fell asleep. 8:1And Saul consented to his death.
15 And at that time there was a great persecution of the church at Jerusalem; and they were all scattered abroad through the regions of Judea and Samaria, except the apostles. 8:2And pious men buried Stephen and made a great lamentation for him. 8:3But Saul persecuted the church, and going from house to house, seizing men and women, committed them to prison.