David vs. Jesus - Reflections on Acts 2:14a, 22-32, Second Sunday of Easter, Year A
by John C. Holbert on Thursday, February 19, 2026
The lectionary collectors give us the rare opportunity to explore more deeply the very important Pentecost sermon, delivered by Peter to the assembled Jews “from every nation under heaven living in Jerusalem” (Acts 2:5), offering three full Sundays, focused on the sermon for extended study. Today, in the first Sunday after Easter, we will look at that section that uses the tale of David, Israel’s most memorable king, to compare that king’s life, now ended by death, with the life of Jesus, still very much alive by the power of his resurrection. And, claims Peter, that resurrected Jesus was predicted by David himself in his famous psalms.
Immediately, we modern readers are suspicious of Peter’s hermeneutics. How can he employ psalms, hardly composed by David, despite the superscriptions to those psalms that assert Davidic authorship, to announce anything that David in fact said? We must remember that in the 1st century, under the influence of rabbinic exegetical practice, it was more than common to use close analyses of texts from the Hebrew Bible to affirm any number of notions that we moderns would judge fanciful at best and dangerously isogetical at worst. Peter believes Jesus to be alive, and readily finds evidence of that fact in the psalms of David, a David who is clearly dead and gone. And that fact will serve Peter well as he makes his argument about the living Christ.
Peter begins this part of the sermon with words both factual and harsh: “Jesus the Nazorean was a man attested (NRSV— or “appointed”, “displayed”) to you by God, as shown by the powerful deeds, wonders, and signs that God did through him among you, as you yourselves know. This man, who was delivered up by the set plan and foreknowledge of God, you killed by crucifixion through the hands of lawless people” (Acts 2:22-23). The first part of this address consists of facts: Jesus did great signs and wonders—you saw them yourselves, he says. But also “you crucified him,” employing that most cruel of Roman deaths, aided and abetted by “the hands of lawless people.” Luke speaks here rather differently when he comes to the question of who is to blame for Jesus’s monstrous demise. In other places in Acts, he somewhat mitigates the blame of the people by suggesting “ignorance” (Acts 3:17), or placing primary blame on the leaders (Luke 24:20, Acts 13:27). The “lawless people” here may be the “wicked leaders” of the Jews, or even the “lawless” Gentiles. But here in the sermon, the charge of murder by crucifixion is direct and straightforward.
Still, blame is not Peter’s major concern here. He wants to demonstrate that the texts of the Jews themselves, from the hand of their greatest king, proves that Jesus’s resurrection and his ongoing life, have been foretold in the Jewish scriptures. “For David said about him, ‘ I have seen the Lord before me always, because he is at my right hand, so that I am not shaken’” (Acts 2:25). Peter here quotes exactly from Psalm 15:8-11 in its Greek (Septuagint) version. The superscription of Ps. 15 reads, “Song to (or “for” David).” The Hebrew preposition, lamed, can be seen as a sign of possession, that is, this is in fact a psalm that David wrote, one of his own. However, the preposition can also be heard as suggesting that the psalm was written “to David,” on his behalf, as the “patron saint of music,” a designation that by the first century would have been widespread. Peter, as many readers in that day, heard that heading to say that David wrote this psalm, and as such, was speaking of Jesus by using the word “Lord,” a common name for the man from Nazareth among his followers. The citation from Ps.15 is filled with phrases that, in the light of Jesus’s resurrection, seem to anticipate that event: “my heart is glad because of this, my tongue has rejoiced; my flesh will dwell in hope, because you will not abandon my life to Hades, nor will you let your holy one see corruption” (Acts 2:26-27). Luke finds here proof positive that Jesus’s eternal life has been anticipated by David, the king of Israel.
On the other hand, David the king is frankly dead; “he died and was buried,” intones Peter; “his tomb is among us even now” (Acts 2:29). I have also seen the tomb of David in Jerusalem during my several trips to that city, and Peter and his hearers have seen it, too. David thus can hardly be referring to himself in that psalm; for Peter, the referent can only be the living Jesus.
So what are we 21st century Christians to make of all that? I find Peter’s (Luke’s) argument specious at best, and cannot begin to imagine that the author of Ps.15 had Jesus in mind at all. Even given the reality of 1st century rabbinic exegetical argument, such ideas carry no weight for me in our time. I can appreciate the way Luke has worked here by way of convincing his audience that Jesus’s resurrection was both predicted and real, but I cannot follow him in this way. If the resurrection is to be believed now, this Lukan ploy bears no power for me, though I do not wish to speak for all of you. Peter brings to bear ideas and assertions that simply no longer speak to me. Still, I can affirm “Jesus is alive” without resort to 2000-year-old claims. And what I may mean by that statement may differ from your understanding of it; yet we may agree that the power of the living Jesus is very real indeed, and guides us still as we attempt to live our lives by his shining example.