Peter’s statement that these people have received the Holy Spirit, just as we also did does not imply that he is identifying the speaking in foreign languages at Pentecost with the speaking of strange tongues here. What he is saying is that in both instances God was obviously present.

The question which Peter raises, Can anyone, then, stop them from being baptized with water? is a rhetorical question expecting the answer “No.”

Being baptized with water may be restructured in some languages as “using water to baptize them.”

Quoted with permission from Newman, Barclay M. and Nida, Eugene A. A Handbook on The Acts of the Apostles. (UBS Handbook Series). New York: UBS, 1972. For this and other handbooks for translators see here .