Until the day in which he was taken up, after that he through the Holy Ghost had given commandments unto the apostles whom he had chosen:
Until the day in which he was taken up, х aneleemfthee (G353)] - where, our historian says not, it being too familiarly known to need mention. His being taken up, or His 'Assumption' х analeempsis (G354)] - already used by this same writer in his Gospel (Acts 9:51), and by Mark (Mark 16:19), for which Luke elsewhere (Luke 24:51) uses the equally expressive word "carried," or 'borne up,' х anefereto (G399)] - was one of those great notabilities among Christians, those dear familiar 'household words,' which to leave but half expressed by the mouth or pen was only the more vividly to call them up to the minds and send them home to the hearts of all that loved Christ's blessed name. Yet the Ascension and the Assumption of Christ are not quite same. The Ascension х anabasis (G305) = ana (G303) + basis (G939)] was His own act (see John 6:62; John 20:17; Ephesians 4:8): the Assumption was the Father's act, translating Him up from "the lower parts of the earth," to which He had descended, far above all heavens, to where and what He was before-only now in our nature-in all the mediatorial glory to which His finished work on earth entitled Him (John 17:4-5; John 17:24; Philippians 2:6-11).
After that he through the Holy Spirit had given commandments unto, [ enteilamenos (G1781 ), or 'had charged'] - the apostles whom he had chosen. This may either mean that Jesus, 'chose the apostles through the Holy Spirit,' or that the risen Saviour 'through the Holy Spirit charged the apostles' whom during His public ministry He had chosen. The former is the sense given to the expression by the two chief Syriac translators, and by Augustine, Beza, Olshausen, DeWette, Green, probably because nowhere else are such communications of the risen Redeemer expressly ascribed to the agency of the Holy Spirit. Humphry and Webster and Wilkinson incline to apply the statement to both acts-the choice at the first and the charge at the last-as both "through the Holy Spirit." But to us it seems far more natural to take the sense, with our translators, exclusively in the latter sense-that is, that it was through the Holy Spirit that the risen Redeemer gave His final charge to the apostles whom in the days of His flesh He had chosen. (So the Vulgate, Erasmus, Calvin, Bengel, Meyer, Stier, Alford, Hackett, Alexander.) No doubt Jesus, in the exercise of His public ministry, did everything "through the Holy Spirit," and it was for this very end that God 'gave not the Spirit by measure unto Him' (John 3:34).
But let it be remembered that after His resurrection-as if to signify the altogether new relation in which He stood to the Church-He signalized His first meeting with the assembled disciples by "breathing on them," just after giving them His "peace," saying, "Receive ye the Holy Spirit;" thus anticipating the great Pentecostal donation of the Spirit from His hands (see the note at John 20:22). And it is on this principle, we believe, that His parting charges are here said to have been given "through the Holy Spirit," as if to mark that He was now all redolent with the Spirit, and that what had been husbanded during His suffering work for His own necessary uses was now set free, was all ready to overflow from Himself to His disciples, and needed but His ascension and glorification to be formally dispensed and flow all forth (see the note at John 7:39). Chrysostom calls attention to the fact that it was while charging them in words full of the Spirit that He was taken up. The charge itself was doubtless just what is recorded in Mark 16:15-18 and Luke 24:44-49, particularly the great ministerial commission of Matthew 28:18-20.