tten copies. Books of that kind were very expensive, so a copy was maintained at the synagogue and not in their homes, as the Bible is usually found today. There had to be at least 10 adult, Jewish, male members to have a synagogue. The worship in the synagogue consisted of reading from the Law, i.e. the Old Testament, preaching and prayer. The synagogue leaders were usually some of the most informed Jews around. This was the sect of the Pharisees, they prided themselves on knowing and keeping the law to the letter. They were steeped in tradition and customs. Jesus told them.
Thus have ye made the commandment of God of none effect by your tradition. (Matthew 15:6)
There must have been many synagogues in and around Jerusalem. It was one of these synagogues, operated by the Grecian Jews (take note!!!) where Stephen was teaching and debating. It was most likely, his home synagogue, i.e. the place where he had assembled and worshiped in the Jews religion before he was converted to Christ. The word "Libertines" in the King James Version is translated "Freedmen" in some other translations. Those of this synagogue were apparently, former slaves, i.e. freed men. The Living Bible is a paraphrase, not a translation, but I would like to read v. 9 from it.
"But one day some of the men from the Jewish cult of the "The Freedmen" started an argument with him, and they were soon joined by Jews from Cyrene, Alexandria in Egypt, and the Turkish provinces of Cilicia and Asia." I trust you get the picture, Stephen was likely a foreign Jew by birth, this synagogue where Stephen was disputing was made up of similar people, knowledgeable foreign Jews, except of course, the were NOT converted to Christ, as Stephen was. Naturally, Stephen was trying to teach them and convert them. That's what all the disputing was about. We have already read in v. 10, how Stephen was getting their goat. Have you notices how some people will go as far as they can on logic and then they get mad, when they start losing ground. They are not the good soil, they are not the good and honest heart Jesus talked about in the parable of the sower. In other words, when they get new and better information they won't accept it. They like what they have and they don't want to adjust their position. They don't want to adjust their position so they must depart from logic and use that one-sided thinking that we have talked about before. It's like killing the mailman because he brought you a message you don't like. Let's read verses 11 and 12.
Then they suborned men, which said, we have heard him speak blasphemous words against Moses, and against God. And they stirred up the people, and the elders, and the scribes, and came upon him, and caught him, and brought him to the council.
Did you get the last statement? They brought Stephen before the council. Here we go again. It was the apostles before, but now it's a deacon, Stephen. Wouldn't you hate to face that prejudice court? The word 'suborned' in v. 11 is probably a word you are not familiar with. It means literally to secretly equip or to give false testimony. Thus you see, they secretly equipped some men to give false testimony against Stephen. That's another way of saying they lied or distorted the facts. The quotation in v. 11 is the distorted testimony they gave. Incidentally, I trust that you are aware, the King James Version translators did not use quotation marks, as we do today. Instead, it was the custom in those days, the early 1600's to capitalize the first word in the quotation and no convention was used at the end. Notice, in v. 11 the word 'We' is capitalized, thus the beginning of a quotation. It's a little confusing to those who are not familiar with it. Now, the quotation given of the false testimony of these suborned men was:
We have heard him speak blasphemous words again Moses, and against God.
The phrase 'blasphemous words' means to curse. Thus, their testimony was that they heard Stephen curse God and Moses. Now that's a little ridiculous. But, I trust you're aware blasphemy against God was an offense puni