FEAST OF FIRST FRUITS

PENTECOST

GIVING OF THE LAW

Part Four. 

Acts 1:12-15.

An EASILY UNDERSTOOD  Scripture Study for Christians

FEAST OF FIRST FRUITS / PENTECOST / GIVING OF THE LAW - Part Four.

The Feast of First Fruits is featured in Acts 1 & 2.  Many great studies come from these chapters.  Study Acts 1:12-15.  Let’s learn about the Cast of Characters. 

Play the Triple NAME game.  Draw a line from the first column of traditional English names to each correct name then from the second column to the third - what the name means.  We will learn a lot about the first Nazoreans!

There are a couple of “surnames” mentioned.  These can be what we’d call “nicknames” or they can be titles.

Alphaeus: most English Bibles read “James son of Alphaeus.”  But the text says that James (or ___________ ) WAS an Aphaeus.  What is an Alphaeus?  Here are a couple explanations. 

  (1) It could be a person’s name – highly unlikely.
  (2) It could refer to the number associated with the letter Alpha, Aleph or “A” (in English).  The number is A1!  If this is the case, he would have been known as James the First – the first in the family with the name, the eldest in the family, or the first of a set of twins. 

   We still use these titles today.  I am the second in my family with my name, so I am Jackson II.  I have a nephew with the same name, and he is Jackson III.

   There is also a James Alpha who is quite famous in the Bible history of the early 17^th century. 
                Quiz:  Who was he?               What did he do?             What might he have done to Alphaeus in Acts 1?

   (3)  There is an obscure reference to an Alpha being a sect of Priests.  This James may have been a priest – one of the “poor priests” spoken of later in Acts.  In fact, there is historical evidence that he was a priest.

Bar: Bar means “son of” in a literal or figurative sense.  Bartholomew is correctly written “bar Talmai.”  Talmai means “a heap.”  The fellow named Talmai in the old testament was related to the giants.  Could calling this man in Acts 1 Bartholomew betray physical characteristics?  “Son of the Giant” might betray the possibility that Bartholomew was a very big or tall man.  This might be Nathaniel’s nickname.

Zealot:  To be called a zealot can mean two things in an Acts 1 context.  (1) He can be a member of a political party, the Zealots, who were ultra conservative nationalists fighting for purity of worship and an end to foreign occupation.  (Much like the Shi’ites of Iraq today.)  (2)  More possibly, zealot here means a person who was “zealous for the Torah” – a strict purist in religious, legal and moral ethics.

Of: Most Bibles mistranslate Acts 1:13 to read “Judas son of James.”  The “son of isn’t in the text.  Judas and James were brothers, as were James and John and Peter and Andrew.  This seems like a small thing until a person wants to get his cast list under control, with so many people of the same name.

Stood Up:  The “standing man” in scripture designates a special emissary from heaven.  There are many standing men (and women) in the Bible.  This is the same word that is translated “resurrection” (anastasia).

So these were the first Nazoreans coming together after the ascension of the Master in prayer and preparation for First Fruits.  Look:

A “Nazarene” is a person from Nazareth”
A “Nazorean” is a person who follows the faith of these people above.

A Nazorean is a keeper of valuable things; a watcher over truth.
That’s what you are, just as Paul was – “a leader of the sect of the Nazaraeans…” (Acts 24:5).