Which when the apostles, Barnabas and Paul, heard of. — They were, we may believe, in the house, within the court-yard, and therefore did not see the sacrificial procession; but they heard the noise of the multitude, perhaps also of some sacrificial hymn, and asked what it meant.
They rent their clothes. — The act is obviously recorded as that of men who are startled and surprised, and is altogether incompatible with the theory that they knew that they had been taken for deities and were expecting such honours. On the act of rending the clothes, see Note on Matthew 26:65. It was the extremest expression of horror, hardly ever used except in deprecation of spoken or acted blasphemy. How far it would be fully understood by the heathen population of Lystra may be a question, but its very strangeness would startle and arrest them.