The council was stuck. They had no answer to Peter, and the evidence was standing in front of them. They admit it in this very verse: the miracle "is manifest to all them that dwell in Jerusalem; and we cannot deny it." Gill lists the options they weighed: "whether they should punish them by scourging them, or detain them longer in custody, or commit them to prison, or dismiss them." Barnes says, "The object which they had in view was evidently to prevent their preaching." They were not asking what was true, but how to stop it.

The council answered its own question in the next breath: "that it spread no further among the people, let us straitly threaten them, that they speak henceforth to no man in this name" (Acts 4:17). They called the apostles back and "commanded them not to speak at all nor teach in the name of Jesus" (Acts 4:18). Peter and John refused (Acts 4:19-20). In the end the council "further threatened them" and let them go, "finding nothing how they might punish them, because of the people: for all men glorified God for that which was done" (Acts 4:21).

The healed man was well known. He had been "lame from his mother's womb" and was laid daily at the temple gate to beg (Acts 3:2), and Luke notes he was "above forty years old" (Acts 4:22). Gill explains that because the cure was done so openly, it was the common talk of the city, "so that there was no smothering it." The ESV calls it a "notable sign," a miracle that pointed beyond itself.

The council could not punish them easily because the people were glorifying God for what had happened (Acts 4:21). Many had already believed, and the number of the men was about five thousand (Acts 4:4).

This question shows what happens when people see the truth and still refuse it. The council could not deny the miracle, yet they would not accept what it pointed to. Matthew Henry (Concise) observes that all their care was "that the doctrine of Christ spread not among the people," though they could not say it was false, and "they are ashamed to own the true reason."

But their plan could not succeed. They wanted the message to spread "no further" (Acts 4:17), yet the believers prayed for boldness, and "they spake the word of God with boldness" (Acts 4:29-31). God's word was not stopped by a council's decision.