The Acts of the Apostles

160 THE ACTS OF THE APOSTLES
though here and there a story has been worked up.^
It is a remarkable fact that (apart from the Ascension)
rnily the miracUs of the Lame Man, of the Death of
Ananias and Sapphira, and of the Release of St. Peter
from prison, are related in connection with Jerusalem
itself^ This self-restraint vouches well for the rela-
tive trustworthiness of the Jerusalem accounts ; but
we may also say, in regard to all the miracles narrated
in the Acts, that measured by the miracles of the
Acta Pauli or of the Acta Johannis and later apocry-
phal Acts of Apostles they appear scarcely miracles
at all. The miracles of the we-sections are almost
all miracles of the first degree ; the miracles in chaps.
i.—XV. are partly of the same degree, partly, however,
miracles of the second degree. The miracles of the
so-called apocryphal Acts are miracles of the second
or third degree. By miracles of the third degree I
* I have not as yet dealt with the four realistic appearances of
angels. The first (i. 10/.) is insignificant ; the two " men " at the
Ascension as angeli interpretes are almost necessary embellishments
of such narratives (c/. the appearance of angels at the sepulchre).
The two narratives, v. 19 and xii. 7-11 (the angel unlocking the
prison) are evidently doublets (on this vid^ infra). The more
ancient form here is that St. Peter (not '* the Apostles ") was miraculously
{i.e. by an angel) released from prison (chap. xii.). We
may suppose that such a wonderful [i.e. entirely unexpected)
release really occurred ; the details of the story vouch for this. It
was the general belief that every child of God, and especially
St. Peter (xii. 15), had his own guardian angel. This at once
afforded a means for explaining the manner of the deliverance, and
even if we cannot suppose that St. Peter himself told the story as
we read it in chap, xii., still it could have been so told by his friends,
Laslty, the speaking of the angel to St. Philip (viii. 26) is as a
"miracle" insignificant.
* The remaining miracles are connected with Damascus, Lydda,
Joppa, Cyprus, and Lystra.