<p>7:51 <em>You stiffnecked- </em>The reference is to how God wished to destroy a &quot;stiffnecked&quot; Israel and make of Moses another people of God (Ex. 32:9; 33:3,5; 34:9). The message contained in that one word &quot;stiffnecked&quot; was lengthy and powerful. The only other time we read of being stiffnecked and uncircumcised in the same verse is in Dt. 10:16; and again there is the point made that circumcision is of the heart more than the flesh: &quot;Circumcise therefore the foreskin of your heart, and be no more stiff-necked&quot;. This was an appeal to Israel. Stephen's allusion shows that he was not merely imprecating against the Judaists who surrounded him. He was appealing to them to change, so that they might enter the land of God's Kingdom. His hopefulness, up to his last words in this world, is amazing. His passion to save at least some of those hard hearts paid off, with the conversion of the worst of them, Saul, to become one of the Lord's greatest servants. See on &quot;hearts and ears&quot; below. &quot;Stiffnecked&quot; is formed from the word <em>sklero</em>, &quot;hard&quot;. The Lord uses just that word in telling Saul that it is &quot;hard&quot; for him to kick against the goads. A stubborn ox is literally stiffnecked. The Lord saw that this whole reasoning about being stiffnecked and uncircumcised had struck home in Saul's heart. And so He continues the allusion in further appealing to him. He does the same likewise with us in life and the encounters with verses in His written word which He leads us to.</p><p><em>And uncircumcised</em>- To call the circumcised Jews uncircumcised, when circumcision was for them the sign of Divine covenant, was just too much. Stephen is now making explicit what he has been saying earlier by way of allusion and implication- they were no more than Gentiles. And again, the listening, fuming Saul was deeply touched; for later he writes of how circumcision is a matter of the heart and not of the flesh; indeed, this is quite a theme with Paul (Rom. 2:28,29; Eph. 2:11; Phil. 3:3; Col. 2:11). Each time he thought and wrote about it, he would've remembered how the dying Stephen had made this point, and how furious he had been to hear it. We see in Paul's references to circumcision how he had not only taken note of Stephen's words, but had taken the reasoning further. Seeing Hebrews is so full of reference to Stephen's words <em>and developments of his reasoning</em>, it seems to me that Paul is the likely author; and the letter is addressed to Hebrews, perhaps to the Jerusalem ecclesia, who would have known Stephen.</p><p><em>In heart and ears</em>- They &quot;stopped their ears&quot; (:57). They refused the appeal Stephen was making to circumcise their hearts and ears, even at that late stage. Circumcision was to be not only of the heart, but of the ears. Circumcision of ears may seem a strange idea, at first blush. Stephen is saying that the sign of covenant relationship with God is how we hear; as his Lord had taught, &quot;Take heed how you hear&quot; (Lk. 8:18; again, it is Luke who records this). The circumcised ear will hear God's word; and the relevance of this otherwise throw away word &quot;ears&quot; is in that Stephen has been appealing to the Jews from the basis of Israel's well known history. He was asking them to hear that familiar Scripture with circumcised ears; and they refused. At least, right then at that moment they did.</p><p><em>You do always- </em>This could just mean 'earnestly, strongly'. But the idea of regular resistance to the Holy Spirit could refer to their refusal to hear the real Spirit of God's word as they regularly read it and encountered the incidents from Israel's history in their Bible study. For the Holy Spirit was the agency behind the writing of the Bible. See above on &quot;hearts and ears&quot;.</p><p><em>Resist the Holy Spirit. As your fathers did, so do you</em>- See on :42 <em>Gave them up to serve. </em>The allusion is to Is. 63:10 LXX: &quot;But they disobeyed, and provoked his Holy Spirit: so he turned to be an enemy, he himself contended against them&quot;. This resistance of the Spirit as we read the word of the Spirit, refusing to see the points the Lord is making to us, can be our failure too. The Jews were so proud of being descendants of the &quot;fathers&quot;. But as demonstrated throughout this commentary, Stephen has been pointing out the weakness of the Jewish fathers, and he appeals to them to now have a different Father- God.</p>