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Act_8:14-17. Οἱ ἐν Ἱεροσ . ἀπόστ .] applies, according to Act_8:1, to all the apostles, to the apostolic college, which commissioned two of its most distinguished members (Gal_2:9).
Σαμάρεια ] here also the name of the country; see Act_8:5; Act_8:9. From the success which the missionary labours of Philip had in that single city, dates the conversion of the country in general, and so the fact: δέδεκται ἡ Σαμάρεια τὸν λόγον τοῦ Θεοῦ .
The design of the mission of Peter and John[223] is certainly, according to the text (in opposition to Schneckenburger), to be considered as that which they actually did after their arrival (ver.15): to pray for the baptized, in order that ( ὅπως ) they might receive the Holy Spirit. Not as if, in general, the communication of the Spirit had been exclusively bound up with the prayer and the imposition of the hands (Act_8:17-18) of an actual apostle; nor yet as if here under the Spirit we should have to conceive something peculiar ( τὸ τῶν σημείων , Chrysostom, comp. Beza, Calvin): but the observation, Act_8:16, makes the baptism of the Samaritans without the reception of the Spirit appear as something extraordinary: the epoch-making advance of Christianity beyond the bounds of Judaea into Samaria was not to be accomplished without the intervention of the direct ministry of the apostles. Comp. Baumgarten, p. 175 ff. Therefore the Spirit was reserved until this apostolic intervention occurred. To explain the matter from the designed omission of prayer for the Holy Spirit on the part of Philip (Hofmann, Schriftbew. II. 2, p. 32), or from the subjectivity of the Samaritans, whose faith had not yet penetrated into the inner life (Neander, p. 80 f., 104), has no justification in the text, the more especially as there is no mention of any further instruction by the apostles, but only of their prayer (and imposition of hands[224]), in the effect of which certainly their greater ἐξουσία , as compared with that of Philip as the mere evangelist, was historically made apparent, because the nascent church of Samaria was not to develope its life otherwise than in living connection with the apostles themselves.[225] The miraculous element of the apostolic influence is to be recognised as connected with the whole position and function of the apostles, and not to he referred to a sphere of view belonging to a later age (Zeller, Holtzmann).
δέδεκται ] has received: see xvii. 7; Winer, p. 246 [E. T. 328]; Valcken. p. 437.
καταβάντες ] namely, to Samaria situated lower.
οὐδέπω γὰρ ἦν ] for as yet not at all, etc.
μόνον δὲ βεβαπτισμένοι κ . τ . λ .] but they found themselves only in the condition of baptized ones (not at the same time also furnished with the Spirit).
[223] Which Baur (I. p. 47, ed. 2) derives from the interest of Judaism to place the new churches in a position of dependence on Jerusalem, and to prevent too free a development of the Hellenistic principle. See, on the other hand, Schneckenburger in the Stud. u. Krit. 1855, p. 542 ff., who, however, likewise gratuitously imports the opinion that the conversion of the Samaritans appeared suspicious and required a more exact examination.
[224] Act_8:15, comp. with Act_8:17-18, shows clearly the relation of prayer to the imposition of hands. The prayer obtained from God the communication of the Spirit, but the imposition of hands, after the Spirit had been prayed for, became the vehicle of the communication. It was certainly of a symbolical nature, yet not a bare and ineffective symbol, but the effective conductor of the gifts prayed for. Comp. on Act_6:6. In Act_19:5 also it is applied after baptism, and with the result of the communication of the Spirit. On the other hand, at Act_10:48, it would have come too late. If it is not specially mentioned in cases of ordinary baptism, where the operation of the Spirit was not bound up with the apostolic imposition of hands as here (see 1Co_1:14-17; 1Co_12:13; Tit_3:5), it is to be considered as obvious of itself (Heb_6:2).
[225] Surely this entirely peculiar state of matters should have withheld the Catholics from grounding the doctrine of confirmation on our passage (as even Beelen does).