Acts 16:21 - Coke's Commentary on the Holy Bible

And teach customs which are not lawful, &c.— Tertullian and Eusebius assert, that the Romans had an ancient law, which forbad the worship of new deities without the permission of the senate; and it is plain from Livy, that, as often as it was violated, it was publicly vindicated by the authority of the state. It is remarkable, that Tully, in his "Book of Laws," gives us the very law in question: The sense of it is to this effect: "No man shall worship the gods clandestinely, or have them separately to himself; nor shall any new and foreign god be worshipped by individuals, till such god hath been legally approved of, and tolerated by the magistrates." If the plea of these Gentiles be founded upon this law, as undoubtedly it was, the inferences they drew from it were generally acknowledged. The comment which the great author just quoted has given us on this law, not only supports this assertion, but seems to be the same: "For each man to have his gods (says he) in peculiar, whether new or stranger-gods, without public allowance, tends to defeat and confound religion:" and what was that, but the same as the miserable plea of their troubling the city exceedingly? But the letter of Mecaenas to Augustus, in Dion Cassius, sets this matter in a stronger light. According to him, "The introducing a new religion, or a new god, if indulged, would indispose men toward the magistrate, and make them less fond of the civil and religious constitutions of their country; from whence factions and confederacies against the state would arise." The apostle's enemies seem to lay great stress upon their being Romans; and the reason of their doing so, appears, from what we have observed, that the Romans were remarkable for not introducing into their public or established worship any new rites, though the Grecians did. This difference was founded on the different genius and origin of the two people; for Rome rising on her own foundation, independent on, and unrelated to any other state, and highly possessed with the enthusiasm of distinction and empire, would naturally esteem her tutelary idol gods as her own peculiar deities, and therefore would reject all foreign mixtures. On the contrary, the Grecian states, related to, and dependent on each other, would more easily admit of an association of their national idol deities; yet we must not hence conclude, that the introduction of a new public worship was allowed even in the Grecian states: it was permitted, but not without the licence of the civil magistrates. Plato has recorded the same law as we quoted from Cicero; and it is further remarkable, that the crime for which Socrates was brought to his trial, and capitally condemned, was the introducing of new deities. But the apostles went further; theycarried the pretensions of the Christian religion so high, that they claimed the title of the only true one for it; and, not stopping here, they urged a necessity for all men to forsake their national religions, and embrace the gospel. What true fortitude did they display through grace! and how exactly similar is the plea of persecutors in all ages! A Socrates must die on this ground in the Heathen world; and an infinitely greater than Socrates must be crucified as a slave on the same plea! Let the faithful confessors of Christ glory when honoured with the same treatment on the same plea, whether from Heathens, Papists, or Protestants.