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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 14 April 2025
This article evaluates a potential angelomorphic tradition in Acts 12.15c. It demonstrates that the most common interpretation of the phrase ὁ ἄγγελός ἐστιν αὐτοῦ (‘it is his angel’, 12.15c) as referring to Peter’s guardian angel fails to account adequately for the evidence. After surveying several different proposals for interpreting the phrase, it argues that angelomorphy/angelisation is the most plausible option available to Luke and his earliest readers. Finally, this article demonstrates how an angelomorphic interpretation of Acts 12.15c is congruent with both the broader concern for angelomorphy/angelisation throughout Luke-Acts, as well as the use of humour and irony in Acts 12.12–15.1
1 I would like to offer my thanks to Drs. Crispin H.T. Fletcher-Louis and Emily Gathergood for reading earlier drafts of this paper and for their comments, which were valuable and instructive.
2 ‘Luke’ is used throughout for convenience to signal the author of Luke-Acts, whomever he may be. I presume that our author is an educated cultural producer, who would have been familiar with the important philosophical theories and trends of the day, at least to a small extent. Finally, on the date of the composition of Luke-Acts, see below.
3 On Rhoda as a comedic figure, see Harrill, J. Albert, ‘The Dramatic Function of the Running Slave Rhoda (Acts 12.13–16): A Piece of Greco-Roman Comedy’, NTS 46 (2000) CrossRefGoogle Scholar.
4 Acts 12.15: οἱ δὲ πρὸς αὐτὴν εἶπαν· μαίνῃ (‘But they said to her: “You’ve lost your mind!”’). In this case, they conclude that she is unreliable in part because of her enslaved status, and slaves, it was thought, were less trustworthy. Compare Electra’s similar response and effect in Sophocles, El. 879–83, and see the bibliography cited in n. 5 below.
5 ἀπήγγειλεν in 12.14c is evidently a pun on ἄγγελος in 12.15c. On comedic elements in this scene, see Kathy Chambers, ‘“Knock, Knock—Who’s There?” Acts 12.6–17 as a Comedy of Errors’, A Feminist Companion to the Acts of the Apostles (ed. Amy-Jill Levine; London: T&T Clark, 2004) 89–97.
6 See Moulton, James H., ‘It Is His Angel’, JTS 3 (1902) Google Scholar; Hermann L. Strack and Paul Billerbeck, Kommentar zum Neuen Testament aus Talmud und Midrasch (6 vols.; Munich: Beck, 1922–1961) 1:781–3; 2:707; Dibelius, Martin, Der Hirt des Hermas (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 1923) Google Scholar; Kirsopp Lake and H. J. Cadbury, The Acts of the Apostles: Translation and Commentary (ed. F. J. Foakes-Jackson and Kirsopp Lake; vol 4 of Beginnings of Christianity Part 1: The Acts of the Apostles; London: Macmillan, 1920–1933) 138; Bruce, F.F., The Acts of the Apostles: The Greek Text with Introduction and Commentary (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1951) Google Scholar; Haenchen, Ernst, The Acts of the Apostles: A Commentary (Philadelphia: Westminster Press, 1971) Google Scholar; Howard Marshall, I., Acts (TNTC; Leicester: InterVarsity Press, 1980) Google Scholar; Pesch, Rudolf, Die Apostelgeschichte (2 vols.; EKKNT; Zurich: Neukirchener Verlag, 1987) 1: Google Scholar; Conzelmann, Hans, A Commentary on Acts of the Apostles (Hermeneia; Philadelphia: Fortress, 1987) Google Scholar (so also with the updated Hermeneia Acts commentary, whose author I choose not to name); Johnson, Luke Timothy, Acts of the Apostles (Sacra Pagina; Collegeville: Liturgical Press, 1992) Google Scholar; Barrett, C. K., The Acts of the Apostles (2 vols.; ICC; Edinburgh: T&T Clark, 1994) 1: Google Scholar; Jervell, Jacob, Die Apostelgeschichte (KEK; Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1998) CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Witherington, Ben III, The Acts of the Apostles: A Socio-Rhetorical Commentary (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1998) Google Scholar; Le Cornu, Hilary and Shulam, Joseph, A Commentary on the Jewish Roots of Acts (2 vols.; Jerusalem: Academon, 2003) Google Scholar; Talbert, Charles H., Reading Acts: A Literary and Theological Commentary (rev. edn; RNT; Macon: Smyth & Helwys, 2005) Google Scholar; Bock, Darrell L., Acts (BECNT; Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2007) Google Scholar; Marguerat, Daniel, Les Actes des Apôtres (2 vols.; CNT 5; Geneva: Labor et Fides, 2007–2015) 1:Google Scholar; Parsons, Mikeal C., Acts (Paideia; Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2008) Google Scholar; Malina, Bruce J. and Pilch, John J., Social-Science Commentary on the Book of Acts (Minneapolis: Fortress, 2008) CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Wall, Robert W., The Acts of the Apostles: Introduction, Commentary and Reflection (NIBC; Nashville: Abingdon, 2015) 9:1–292, here 140Google Scholar; Holladay, Carl R., Acts: A Commentary (NTL; Louisville: Westminster John Knox, 2016) Google Scholar. This being a guardian angel is assumed but not discussed by Roberts Gaventa, Beverly, Acts (ANTC; Nashville: Abingdon, 2003) Google Scholar. Two rare examples of overlooking this peculiar phrase are Cho, Youngmo and Park, Hyung Dae, Acts (2 vols; NCCS; Eugene: Cascade, 2019)Google Scholar – surprising given their interest in the other ‘angels’ in this chapter – and Dunn, James D.G., The Acts of the Apostles (Grand Rapids, Eerdmans, 2016)Google Scholar.
7 Throughout this article, I use ‘angelification’, ‘angelomorphy’, and ‘angelisation’ (and their variants) interchangeably. I am aware that some Jewish texts understand angelomorphic identity might belong to the righteous in this life, so I would like to make clear that I mean specifically post-mortem angelisation, angelomorphy, or angelification.
8 Origen, Comm. Matt. 27–8 (here 28). (ANF trans.) Cf. also Origen, Princ. 1.8.1.
9 My trans. The Greek text (PG 60:211) reads: Οἱ δὲ εἶπον πρὸς αὐτήν· οἱ δὲ εἶπον, ὅτι Ἄγγελος αὐτοῦ ἐστιν. Ἐκ τούτου ἀληθὲς, ὄτι ἕκαστος ἡμῶν ἄγγελον ἔκει. Καὶ πόθεν ἐπῆλθεν αὐτοῖς ἄγγελον εἶναι τότε ὑπονοῆσαι; Ἀπὸ τοῦ καιροῦ τοῦτο ὑπώπτευσαν.
10 ‘That each of us has angels is found in The Book of the Shepherd and in many places in holy scripture. The Lord said of little children, Their angels always behold the face of my father [Matt 18.10]. Also Jacob referring to himself spoke of the angel who saved me from all evils [Gen 48.16]. And here the disciples believed that the apostle Peter’s angel was coming.’ Bede, Venerable, The Commentary on the Acts of the Apostles (trans. Martin, Lawrence T.; Cistercian Studies Series 117; Collegeville: Liturgical Press, 1989) Google Scholar.
11 The following three subheadings are not meant to communicate that Hellenistic, Jewish, and ‘Christian’ texts are three hermetically distinct contexts but simply a heuristic division to promote clarity in this particular discussion. I am also aware that to label this material as ‘Christian’ is anachronistic, hence the consistent use of scare quotes.
12 E.g., Plato, Euthyphr. 3A; Apol. 31C–D, 40A.
13 This and the following quotations of Plutarch come from De Lacy and Einarson, LCL, with slight alterations.
14 According to the Middle Platonists, daimones are airy and invisible (Apuleius, De deo Socr. 6.2–3; 9.2–4; 11.3–4), located mediately between humanity and the divinity (Plato, Apol. 27C–E; Symp. 202D–203A; Apuleius, De deo Socr. 13.1), and perhaps the souls of the deceased (Plato, Apol. 15 [27B–E]; cf. also Pindar, Ol. 13.105; Hesiod, Works and Days 110–27; Euripides, Alc. 1002; Hipp. 141–50; PGM IV.1475–85) or perhaps not (Plutarch, Def. orac. and Apuleius, De deo Socr. 15–16; cf. also Tertullian, An. 57), with varying degrees of nuance. Andrei Timotin, La démonologie platonicienne. Histoire de la notion de daimōn de Platon aux derniers néoplatoniciens (Philosophia Antiqua 128; Leiden: Brill, 2011) is indispensable on this subject. On the Middle Platonists more generally but also with attention to daimonology, see John Dillon, The Middle Platonists (80 b.c.–a.d. 220) (rev. edn; Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1996).
15 Already the Stoics conceived of a universal daimonic guardian, but this was much more akin to a conscience than anything external or independently motivated. See Epictetus, Diss. 1.14.12–14; Seneca, Ep. 94.55. I would also like to note that we actually see developments in an opposite direction by the fourth century. Heliodorus (Aeth. 1.26.4) attests to the concept of a personal, evil daimōn that attends to humans. Even so, not every person possesses such a companion.
16 In agreement with a burgeoning minority of scholars, I take Luke-Acts to be a set of second-century compositions. See, e.g., Shellard, Barbara, New Light on Luke: Its Purpose, Sources, and Literary Context (JSNTSup 215; Sheffield: Sheffield Academic, 2002) Google Scholar; Mason, Steve, Josephus and the New Testament (2nd ed.; Peabody: Hendrickson, 2003) Google Scholar; Tyson, Joseph B., Marcion and Luke-Acts: A Defining Struggle (Columbia: University of South Carolina Press, 2006) 14–15Google Scholar; Nasrallah, Laura, ‘The Acts of the Apostles, Greek Cities, and Hadrian’s Panhellenion’, JBL 127 (2008) Google Scholar; Backhaus, Knut, ‘Zur Datierung der Apostelgeschichte. Ein Ordnungsversuch im chronologischen Chaos’, ZNW 108 (2017) CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Matthews, Shelly, ‘Does Dating Luke-Acts into the Second Century Affect the Q Hypothesis?’, Gospel Interpretation and the Q-Hypothesis (ed. Müller, Mogens and Omerzu, Heike; LNTS 573; London: Bloomsbury T&T Clark, 2018) Google Scholar. But it is difficult to place Acts much later than the 130s ce, since Marcion evidently knew Luke’s Gospel, and certainly no later than 150 ce, since Justin almost certainly knew Acts. If we cannot locate an idea’s genesis sometime before, or in, the early second century, it is methodologically difficult to claim that Luke could have known it, if we are thinking genealogically.
17 On the Socratic parallels, see Alexander, Loveday C. A., ‘Acts and Ancient Intellectual Biography’, The Book of Acts in Its Ancient Literary Setting (ed. Winter, Bruce W. and Clarke, Andrew D.; vol. 1; Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1993) 31–63Google Scholar, here 57–63; Glover, Daniel B., Patterns of Deification in the Acts of the Apostles (WUNT 2/576; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2022) CrossRefGoogle Scholar.
18 This angel-as-overseer idea likely explains Revelation’s angels of the seven churches of God (1.20). See Bailey, Jeremiah N., ‘Spheres and Trajectories: The Angels of the Churches (Revelation 1–3) in Context’, Early Christianity in Pompeian Light: People, Texts, Situations (ed. Longenecker, Bruce W.; Minneapolis: Fortress, 2016) Google Scholar, although Bailey refers to the concept somewhat imprecisely as the ‘guardian angel’ interpretation. Relatedly, see the patron angel concept in the Ps.-Clementine Recognitions 2.42. Of course, the concept of the patron angel who stands in for, and represents, particular nations or communities is well-attested by this time (e.g., Deut 32.8 LXX; Ps 82; Isa 24.21; Dan 10.13; cf. Rev 1–3) and is reflected in the Greek and Roman patron deities.
19 On the Athena/Raphael parallels, see Toloni, Giancarlo, ‘Homeric Echoes in Tobit?’, The Story of Tobit: A Comparative Literary Analysis (trans. Hogan, Patrick; JSJSup 204; Leiden: Brill, 2012) Google Scholar.
20 See D. J. Harrington’s translation in OTP 2:297–377, at 372. Similarly, see also T. Jac. 1.10.
21 For a brief yet informative discussion, see Gleason, Randall C., ‘Angels and the Eschatology of Heb 1–2’, NTS (49) 90–107, esp. 97–107Google Scholar, who cites, among other texts, T.Levi 5.3–7; 1 En. 56.5–6; Jub. 15.31–2.
22 See the major, critical commentaries, which pick up this reference and interpretation from Strack and Billerbeck, Kommentar zum Neuen Testament, 2:707.
23 Bock, Acts, 429. So also Barrett, Acts, 1:585.
24 I cite the numeration and translation of H. Freedman, Midrash Rabbah (2 vols.; London: Soncino, 1939). Quotations of the biblical text have been aligned with the NRSV.
25 Roloff, Jürgen, Die Apostelgeschichte (NTD 5; Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1981) Google Scholar. Cited with approval in Pesch, Apostelgeschichte, 1:366 and Jervell, Apostelgeschichte, 335 n. 331.
26 Freedman, Midrash Rabbah, 2:717 (slightly altered).
27 Freedman, Midrash Rabbah, 2:711.
28 Hannah, Darrell D., ‘Guardian Angels and Angelic National Patrons in Second Temple Judaism and Early Christianity’, Angels: The Concept of Celestial Beings – Origins, Development and Reception (ed. Reiterer, Friedrich et al.; Berlin: De Gruyter, 2007) Google Scholar claims that Christians adopted the concept of the guardian angel ‘with very little variation’ from Jewish precedents. Hannah, however, does not entertain the notion that the two concepts developed in tandem, and he fails to distinguish sufficiently between the guardian and patron angels. A Greek patron deity by no means implies a guardian deity, nor are the ideas necessarily connected. I think the Middle Platonic Socratic daimōn is a more compelling history-of-religions genealogy to both the Jewish and the Christian concept. Ahuvia, Mika, On My Right Michael, On My Left Gabriel: Angels in Ancient Jewish Culture (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2021) 88–98Google Scholar follows Hannah on this score.
29 Freedman, Midrash Rabbah, 2:717–18.
30 As for the אלהים whom Jacob wrestled, we are dealing here with an angel, according to the rabbis. But the face that Jacob sees in Esau is like God’s (and not the angel’s) since it stands in judgement against him.
31 Midrash Tanḥuma expands on this tradition: ‘And there wrestled a man with him [Gen 32.25]. It was Samael, Esau’s guardian angel, who wanted to kill him [Jacob].’ Midrash Tanhuma-Yelammedenu (trans. Samuel A. Berman; Hoboken: Ktav, 1996) 213. See the discussion in Novenson, Matthew V., ‘The Universal Polytheism and the Case of the Jews’, Monotheism and Christology in Greco-Roman Antiquity (ed. Novenson, Matthew; NovTSup 180; Leiden: Brill, 2020) CrossRefGoogle Scholar.
32 My trans. Ὁρᾶτε μὴ καταφρονήσητε ἑνὸς τῶν μικρῶν τούτων· λέγω γὰρ ὑμῖν ὅτι οἱ ἄγγελοι αὐτῶν ἐν οὐρανοῖς διὰ παντὸς βλέπουσιν τὸ πρόσωπον τοῦ πατρός μου τοῦ ἐν οὐρανοῖς.
33 Moulton, ‘It Is His Angel’, 516.
34 Moulton, ‘It Is His Angel’, 514.
35 E.g., Roloff, Die Apostelgeschichte, 190: ‘Vorausgesetzt ist dabei die Vorstellung, daß jeder Mensch einen Schutzengel hat, der ihm als sein himmlischer Doppelgänger auch äußerlich gleich.’ Cited with approval in Pesch, Apostelgeschichte, 1:366 and Jervell, Apostelgeschichte, 335 n. 331; see also Haacker, Klaus, Die Apostelgechichte (ThKNT 5; Stuttgart: Kohlhammer, 2019) CrossRefGoogle Scholar.
36 Apocalypse of Paul 49 is sometimes also invoked as evidence for a celestial double. It reads: ‘Are you Paul, the one who is glorified in heaven and on earth?’, The Apocryphal New Testament (trans. J. K. Elliott; Oxford: Clarendon, 1993). The question is very clearly about Paul’s renown and glorification (a similar idea is present in John 17.1–5) and not at all about a heavenly double.
37 So also Marguerat, Actes, 1:437
38 On polymorphism, see Foster, Paul, ‘Polymorphic Christology: Its Origins and Development in Early Christianity’, JTS 58 (2007) 66–99CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Cartlidge, David R., ‘Transfigurations of Metamorphosis Traditions in the Acts of John, Thomas, and Peter’, Semeia 38 (1986) 53–66Google Scholar, though unfortunately without reference to the Shepherd.
39 For such interpreters, see, e.g., Haenchen, Acts 391; Parsons, Acts, 176; Polhill, John B., Acts (NAC 26; Nashville, Broadman, 1992) n. 155Google Scholar.
40 Marguerat, Les Actes, 1:437 poses it as a question: ‘ou croyaient-ils Pierre mort?’
41 In addition to these, the Greek magical papyri include a spell about binding gods/angels to attend to one’s will (PGM I.164–194), but this is a far cry from the content of Acts 12.15c.
42 See esp. Thompson Prince, Deborah, ‘The “Ghost” of Jesus: Luke 24 in Light of Ancient Narratives of Post-Mortem Apparitions’, JSNT 29 (2007) 287–301Google Scholar. Also indispensable are Ogden, Daniel, Magic, Witchcraft, and Ghosts in the Greek and Roman Worlds: A Sourcebook (2nd ed.; New York: Oxford University Press, 2009)Google Scholar and Felton, Debbie, Haunted Greece and Rome: Ghost Stories from Classical Antiquity (Austin: University of Texas Press, 1999), esp. 22–37Google Scholar. Unfortunately, these scholars’ categories are still somewhat imprecise, since they estimate heroification narratives as ghost stories. While these categories probably meet our expectations for ghost stories suitably, a heroification in antiquity is a quite different thing. In addition, both Felton and Prince distinguish ‘translated mortals’ as a discrete category, but in the ancient Mediterranean theological imaginary, a translated mortal is simply a hero.
43 Cf. also Vergil, Aen. 2.770–5; Phlegon of Tralles, Mir. 2.
44 Everett Ferguson, Backgrounds of Early Christianity (3rd ed.; Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2003) 171.
45 OCD4, s.v.
46 At other times, genius was glossed by τύχη.
47 On daimonification among the Middle Platonists, see David Litwa, M., Posthuman Transformation in Ancient Mediterranean Thought: Becoming Angels and Demons (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2021) 57–72Google Scholar.
48 Dillon, Middle Platonists, 174.
49 For the relevance of the Middle Platonist tradition for understanding the Book of Acts, see esp. Hubbard, Jeffrey M., ‘Paul the Middle Platonist? Exegetical Traditions on Timaeus 28c and the Characterization of Paul in Acts 17.16–31’, HTR 115 (2022) CrossRefGoogle Scholar.
50 The translation is that of Colson and Whitaker, LCL (slightly alt.).
51 Cf. the parallel discussion in Cher. 114 as well as Somn. 1.137–9; QE 2.29, 40. See now Yli-Karjanmaa, Sami, Reincarnation in Philo of Alexandria (SPhiloM; Atlanta: Society of Biblical Literature, 2015) esp. CrossRefGoogle Scholar.
52 My trans.
53 My trans. The Greek text (Colson and Whitaker, LCL) reads: Ψυχὰς οὖν καὶ δαίμονας καὶ ἀγγέλους ὀνόματα μὲν διαφέροντα, ἓν δὲ καὶ ταὐτὸν ὑποκείμενον διανοηθεὶς ἄχθος βαρύτατον ἀποθήσῃ δεισιδαιμονίαν.
54 On angelification in Philo, see Litwa, M. David, ‘The Deification of Moses in Philo of Alexandria’, SPhiloA 26 (2014) Google Scholar; idem, Posthuman Transformation, 73–94.
55 Demons were often visible in other texts, however, even philosophically informed ones. See, e.g., Philostratus, Vit. Apoll. 4.10.2.
56 My trans.
57 Dillon, Middle Platonists, 47.
58 As for instance in the memorial inscription CIL 6.3, which depicts a heroized child returning to comfort his uncle; Ovid, Fast. 2.499–512, which depicts Romulus appearing to Julius Proculus; and Philostratus, Her. 11.1–2, which reports how Protesilaus appears to, speaks with and even touches a vinedresser. Most (though crucially not all) heroizations are preceded by some form of heavenly translation, and we do not find that in Acts 12.15. It is not impossible to imagine, however, that the believers presumed Peter’s heavenly assumption, though the text does not say it explicitly.
59 Smith, Jonathan Z., Drudgery Divine: On the Comparisons of Early Christianities and the Religions of Late Antiquity (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1990) .Google Scholar
60 E.g., Gen 38.8–10; Deut 25.5–10; Ruth 3.9–4.2. See Fletcher-Louis, Crispin H. T., Luke-Acts: Angels, Christology and Soteriology (WUNT 2/94; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 1997) Google Scholar.
61 David Litwa, M., ‘Equal to Angels: The Early Reception History of the Lukan ἰσάγγελοι (Luke 20.36)’, JBL 140 (2021) Google Scholar. His discussion of John Chrysostom is also important (619–20). Here, Wirkungsgeschichte is more helpful than in the case of Peter’s supposed guardian angel above. In that case, there was no evidence that such a guardian angel concept was available to Luke and his earliest readers, whereas angelisation, on the other hand, was a concept both available to and frequently discussed among Luke’s Jewish contemporaries. Because Luke’s very ambiguous (to us) term ἰσάγγελοι was associated with angelisation so early and so uniformly, and because Luke’s Jewish milieu frequently spoke of angelisation, we have good warrant to think that is the interpretation most readily available to Luke and his earliest readers.
62 See e.g., N. T. Wright, The Resurrection of the Son of God (Christian Origins and the Question of God 3; Minneapolis: Fortress, 2003) Google Scholar. In addition, Wright asserts that ‘Few supposed, so far as we know, that human beings would become angels in that future life’ (418, emphasis original). But see M. David Litwa, Posthuman Transformation, esp. 45–114.
63 Early Jewish beliefs about the state or quality of the body in the resurrection varied drastically. See Chilton, Bruce D., Resurrection Logic: How Jesus’ First Followers Believed God Raised Him from the Dead (Waco: Baylor University Press, 2019Google Scholar).
64 On the Enochic literature, see Mach, Michael, Entwicklungsstadien des jüdischen Engelglaubens in vorrabbinisher Zeit (Texts and Studies in Ancient Judaism 34; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 1992) 163–208Google Scholar; Schäfer, Peter, Two Gods in Heaven: Jewish Concepts of God in Antiquity (trans. Brown, Allison; Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2020) esp. 99–133CrossRefGoogle Scholar. On the DSS, see Crispin H.T. Fletcher-Louis, All the Glory of Adam: Liturgical Anthropology in the Dead Sea Scrolls (STDJ 42; Leiden: Brill, 2002). For a more general survey, see Somov, Alexey, Representations of the Afterlife in Luke-Acts (LNTS 556; London: T&T Clark, 2017) Google Scholar.
65 On this passage as presenting Luke’s soteriological vision of theosis, see Kuecker, Aaron J., ‘“You Will Be Children of the Most High”: An Inquiry into Luke’s Narrative Account of Theosis’, JTI 8 (2014) Google Scholar.
66 We could also add Luke’s phrase ‘the sons of light’, whom he contrasts with the ‘sons of this age’ (Luke 16.8), two phrases redolent of the DSS. Light is also a quality Luke associates with angels (e.g., Luke 2.9) and with Jesus (Luke 2.32; 9.31–2; Acts 9.3–4), one of only two other figures named a son of God in Luke-Acts (e.g., Luke 1.35; 4.3–9, 41; 8.28; cf. also Adam in 3.38).
67 In keeping with Luke’s larger interest in realised eschatology, Karlsen Seim, Turid, The Double Message: Patterns of Gender in Luke-Acts (SNTW; London: T&T Clark, 1994) 185–248Google Scholar reads Luke as perceiving the angelic life breaking into the present, akin to the already-not-yet status of God’s kingdom.
68 On such stares in Acts and their significance, see Strelan, Rick, ‘Strange Stares: Atenizein in Acts’, NovT 41 (1999) Google Scholar.
69 Baumbach rightly perceives the connection with death/martyrdom, but he interprets Stephen’s angelic visage only as an indication of his coming demise and not the state achieved thereby. ‘In Apg. 6,15 wird zwar von Stephanus gesagt “sein Angesicht war wie das Antlitz eines Engels,” aber diese Charakterisierung gilt Stephanus als Märtyrer, der als solcher schon auf der Schwelle zum ewigen Leben steht.’ Baumbach, Günther, Das Verständnis des Bösen in der synoptischen Evangelien (Theologische Arbeiten 19; Berlin: Evangelischer Verlagsanstalt, 1963) Google Scholar.
70 The textual authenticity of Jesus’ last words in Luke 24. 34 is disputed. Parsons, Mikeal C. and Whitlark, Jason, ‘The “Seven” Last Words: A Numerical Motivation for the Insertion of Luke 23.34a’, NTS 52 (2006) 188–204Google Scholar argue they are a later scribal insertion for numerological reasons. I am not yet convinced by their argument, however, and most scholars have not followed them in removing them from the reconstructed Ausgangstext.
71 This reading does not necessarily preclude an intertextual one that sees in Stephen’s face an imitation of Moses’ descent from Sinai, but I believe such a reading is less cogent.
72 Fletcher-Louis’ (Luke-Acts, 102–3) reading is not wholly improbable. He argues that Stephen’s claim that ἐλάβετε τὸν νόμον εἰς διαταγὰς ἀγγέλων refers not to the Law’s ordination or command by angels, as scholars typically interpret the phrase. Instead, the ‘primary sense [of διαταγή] is quite clearly that of an “ordered arrangement” which can then be applied to an individual’s lifestyle…The natural sense of Acts 7.53 διαταγὰς ἀγγέλων is therefore “the constitution(s) of angels… In other words the law was given in order to create a community whose lifestyle(s) and order are, or conform to, that of the angels”’. This interpretation does not explain, however, why, on my reading, Stephen’s visage perceptibly changes (εἶδον τὸ πρόσωπον αὐτοῦ ὡσεὶ πρόσωπον ἀγγέλου, Acts 6.15), and Fletcher-Louis notes the absence of history-of-religions parallels to this interpretation (105). I believe something more than a manner of life is in view, though perhaps it is an ontological or physical transformation in consequence of Stephen’s way of life.
73 In addition to the texts discussed here, see also Luke 15.7, 10.
74 Since Luke’s knowledge of the Pauline epistles is disputed, I will not hang anything on this coincidence. Although it is debated, several scholars have persuaded me that Paul sees the resurrected body as pneumatic in the Corinthian correspondence. See Martin, Dale, The Corinthian Body (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1995) Google Scholar; Engberg-Pedersen, Troels, Cosmology and Self in the Apostle Paul: The Material Spirit (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2010) 26–31CrossRefGoogle Scholar; David A. Burnett, ‘A Neglected Deuteronomic Scriptural Matrix for the Nature of the Resurrected Body in 1 Corinthians 15.39–42’, Scripture, Texts, and Tracings in 1 Corinthians (ed. Linda L. Belleville and B.J. Oropeza; Lanham: Lexington Books/Fortress Academic, 2019) 187–211.
75 On the other hand, Luke’s use of τὰ ἀμφότερα (usually meaning ‘both’) may suggest that he views at least two of these three elements – usually ‘angel’ and ‘spirit’ – as coterminous. In such a case, the Sadducees disbelieve two (related) concepts: resurrection and angel/spirit.
76 Luke seems not to believe angels are pure πνεῦμα either since he describes them appearing like men (Luke 24.4, 23; Acts 1.10).
77 Daube, ‘Acts 23’, 493–7 argues that angelification is a frequent characteristic of the interim state between death and resurrection in apocalyptic Judaism. Hence, the denial is not that the Sadducees disbelieve in angels, which populate the Pentateuch, but in the angelification of the righteous dead preceding the resurrection. So also Sullivan, Kevin, Wrestling with Angels: A Study of the Relationship between Angels and Humans in Ancient Jewish Literature and the New Testament (AGJU 55; Leiden: Brill, 2004) CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Segal, Alan F., Life After Death: A History of the Afterlife in Western Religion (New York: Doubleday, 2004) Google Scholar. Finally, see Fletcher-Louis, Luke-Acts, 58–9, who perceptively points out that, in context, Paul’s proclamation of his encounter with Jesus’ resurrection in 22.6–11 and his subsequent epiphany (22.17–21) could provide the basis for the Pharisees’ speculation that a ‘spirit or angel’ may have spoken to him (as Jesus does again in 23.11).
78 We may even have evidence here that Luke imagines a two-stage afterlife: the first consisting of angelisation/spiritualisation and the second of resurrection. On a similar two-stage afterlife in 2 Baruch, see Karlsen Seim, Turid, ‘The Resurrected Body in Luke-Acts: The Significance of Space’, Metamorphoses: Resurrection, Body and Transformative Practices in Early Christianity (eds. Seim, Turid Karlsen and Økland, Jorunn; Berlin: De Gruyter, 2009) 19–39CrossRefGoogle Scholar. This interpretation would bring these passages into greater conformity with Luke’s parable of Lazarus and the rich man (Luke 16.19–31), which refers to some spiritual post-mortem states – Lazarus is ‘carried away by the angels’ (16.22a) while the rich man descends to Hades (16.23a) – as well as resurrection (ἐκ νεκρῶν ἀναστῇ, 16.31). It also makes sense of Luke’s emphasis on isangelisation as well as Jesus’ resurrected flesh and bones, on which, see Matthews, Shelly, ‘Elijah, Ezekiel, and Romulus: Luke’s Flesh and Bones (Luke 24:39) in Light of Ancient Narratives of Ascent, Resurrection, and Apotheosis’, On Prophets, Warriors, and Kings: Former Prophets through the Eyes of Their Interpreters (eds. Brooke, George J. and Feldman, Ariel; BZAW 470; Berlin: De Gruyter, 2016) Google Scholar.
79 There is likely a Dionysian parallel here between Rhoda’s ‘mania’ and Peter’s escape from the jail’s ‘automatic’ gates, but it is beyond the gambit of this essay. See Moles, John, ‘Jesus and Dionysus in “The Acts of the Apostles” and Early Christianity’, Hermathena 180 (2006) 65–104Google Scholar.
80 Daube, ‘Acts 23’, 496.
81 See esp. Mart. Pol. 2.3 (cf. 12.1); cf. Acts Paul 3.3.