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Act_2:44-45. But ( δέ , continuative) as regards the development of the church-life, which took place amidst that φόβος without and this miracle-working of the apostles, all were ἐπὶ τὸ αὐτό . This, as in Act_1:15, Act_2:1, is to be understood as having a local reference, and not with Theophylact, Kypke, Heinrichs, and Kuinoel: de animorum consensu, which is foreign to N. T. usage. They were accustomed all to be together. This is not strange, when we bear in mind the very natural consideration that after the feast many of the three thousand—of whom, doubtless, a considerable number consisted of pilgrims to the feast—returned to their native countries; so that the youthful church at Jerusalem does not by any means seem too large to assemble in one place.
καὶ εἶχον ἅπαντα κοινά ] they possessed all things in common, i.e. all things belonged to all, were a common good. According to the more particular explanation which Luke himself gives ( καὶ τὰ κτήματα … εἶχε , comp. Act_4:32), we are to assume not merely in general a distinguished beneficence, liberality, and mutual rendering of help,[139] or “a prevailing willingness to place private property at the disposal of the church” (de Wette, comp. Neander, Baum garten, Lechler, p. 320 ff., also Lange, apost. Zeitalt. I. p. 90, and already Mosheim, Diss, ad hist. eccl. pertin. II. p. 1 ff., Kuinoel, and others); but a real community of goods in the early church at Jerusalem, according to which the possessors were wont to dispose of their lands and their goods generally, and applied the money sometimes themselves (Act_2:44 f., Act_4:32), and sometimes by handing it to the apostles (Act_5:2), for the relief of the wants of their fellow-Christians. See already Chrysostom. But for the correct understanding of this community of goods and its historical character (denied by Baur and Zeller), it is to be observed: (1) It took place only in Jerusalem. For there is no trace of it in any other church; on the contrary, elsewhere the rich and the poor continued to live side by side, and Paul in his letters had often to inculcate beneficence in opposition to selfishness and πλεονεξία . Comp. also Jam_5:1 ff.; 1Jn_3:17. And this community of goods at Jerusalem helps to explain the great and general poverty of the church in that city, whose possessions naturally—certainly also in the hope of the Parousia speedily occurring—were soon consumed. As the arrangement is found in no other church, it is very probable that the apostles were prevented by the very experience acquired in Jerusalem from counselling or at all introducing it elsewhere. (2) This community of goods was not ordained as a legal necessity, but was left to the free will of the owners. This is evident, from Act_5:4; Act_12:12. Nevertheless, (3) in the yet fresh vigour of brotherly love (Bengel on Act_4:34 aptly says: “non nisi summo fidei et amoris flori convenit”), it was, in point of fact, general in the church of Jerusalem, as is proved from this passage and from the express assurance at Act_4:32; Act_4:34 f., in connection with which the conduct of Barnabas, brought forward in Act_4:36, is simply a concrete instance of the general practice. (4) It was not an institution borrowed from the Essenes[140] (in opposition to Grotius, Heinrichs, Ammon, Schneckenburger). For it could not have arisen without the guidance of the apostles; and to attribute to them any sort of imitation of Essenism, would be devoid alike of internal probability and of any trace in history, as, indeed, the first fresh form assumed by the life of the church must necessarily be conceived as a development from within under the impulse of the Spirit. (5) On the contrary, the relation arose very naturally, and that from within, as a continuation and extension of that community of goods which subsisted in the case of Jesus Himself and His disciples, the wants of all being defrayed from a common purse. It was the extension of this relation to the whole church, and thereby, doubtless, the putting into practice of the command Luk_12:33, but in a definite form. That Luke here and in Act_4:32; Act_4:34 expresses himself too strongly (de Wette), is an arbitrary assertion. Schneckenburger, in the Stud. u. Krit. 1855, p. 514 ff., and Ewald have correctly apprehended the matter as an actual community of goods. Comp. Ritschl, altkath. Kirche, p. 232.
τὰ κτήματα ] the landed possessions (belonging to him). See v. 1; Xen. Oec. 20. 23; Eustath. ad Il. vi. p. 685. ὑπάρξεις : possessions in general, Polyb. ii. 17. 11; Heb_10:34, and Bleek in loc.
αὐτα ] it, namely, the proceeds. The reference is involved in the preceding verb ( ἐπίπρασκον ). Comp. Luk_18:22; Joh_12:5. See generally, Winer, p. 138 [E. T. 181 f.].
καθότι ἄ τις χρείαν εἶχε ] just as any one had need, ἄν with the indicative denotes: “accidisse aliquid non certo quodam tempore, sed quotiescunque occasio ita ferret.” Herm. ad Viger. p. 820. Comp. Act_4:35; Mar_6:56; Krüger, Anab. i. 5. 2; Kühner, ad Mem. i. 1. 16; and see on 1Co_12:2.
[139] Comp. also Hundeshagen in Herzog’s Encykl. III. p. 26. In this view the Pythagorean τὰ τῶν φίλων κοινά might be compared with it (Rittersh. ad Porphyr. Vit. Pyth. p. 46).
[140] See Joseph. Bell. Jud. ii. 8. 3 f. The Pythagoreans also had a community of goods. See Jamblich. Vita Pyth. 168. 72; Zeller, p. 504. See, in opposition to the derivation from Essenism, von Wegnern in the Zeitschr. f. histor. Theol. XI. 2, p. 1 ff., Ewald and Ritschl.