Acts 6:9. Descendants of Jews who, having been taken prisoners by Pompey and other Roman generals in the Syrian wars, were enslaved and afterward emancipated, and who returned to their native land. Many Jews at Rome were freedmen allowed by Augustus to settle beyond the Tiber. Four thousnd freedmen were expelled to Sardinia, others were to leave Italy unless they game up Judaism (A.D. 19 under Tiberius (Tacitus, Annals ii. 85; Josephus, Ant. 18:3, section 5; Philo Legat. ad Caium). Humphrey conjectures that, having made their way to Jerusalem, they naturally were Stepben's bitterest opponents as having suffered so much for that religion which Christianity was supplanting. They had a synagogue at Jerusalem.