Howbeit many of them which heard the word believed; and the number of the men was about five thousand.

But many of those who had heard the word believed; and the number of the men had become about five thousand.

and many of those hearing the word did believe, and the number of the men became, as it were, five thousand.

However, many of them which heard the word believed; and the number of the men was about five thousand.

But many of those who had listened to their preaching believed; and the number of the adult men had now grown to be about 5,000.

But a number of those who gave hearing to the word had faith; and they were now about five thousand.

But many of those who had heard the word believed. And the number of men became five thousand.

Many, however, of those who had heard the apostles' message became believers in Christ, the number of the men alone amounting to about five thousand.

And many of them which heard The apostles are put in prison, but the force of their preaching is spread far and wide, and the course thereof is at liberty. Of which thing Paul boasteth very much, that the Word of God is not bound with him, (2-Timothy 2:9.) And here we see that Satan and the wicked have liberty granted them to rage against the children of God; yet can they not (maugre their heads [1] ) prevail, but that God doth further and promote the kingdom of his Son; Christ doth gather together his sheep; and that a few men unarmed, furnished with no garrisons, do show forth more power in their voice alone, than all the world, by raging against them. This is, indeed, no common work of God, that one sermon brought forth such plentiful fruit; but this is the more to be wondered at, that the faithful are not terrified with the present danger, and discouraged from taking up the cross of Christ together with the faith. For this was a hard beginning for novices. Christ did more evidently declare by this efficacy and force of doctrine that he was alive, than if he should have offered his body to be handled with hand, and to be seen with the eyes. And whereas it is said that the number of those which believed did grow to be about five thousand, I do not understand it of those which were newly added, but of the whole church.

Footnotes

1 - "Omnia machinando," by all their machinations.

Howbeit - But; notwithstanding.
Many of them - This was one of the instances, which has since been so often repeated, in which persecution is seen to have a tendency to extend and establish the faith which it was designed to destroy. It finally came to be a proverb that "the blood of the martyrs is the seed of the church"; and there is no lesson which men have been so slow to learn as that to oppose and persecute men is the very way to confirm them in their opinions and to spread their doctrines. It was supposed here that the disciples were few; that they were without power, wealth, and influence; and that it was easy to crush them at once. But God made their persecution the means of extending, in a signal manner, the truths of the gospel and the triumphs of his word. And so in all ages it has been, and so it ever will be.
And the number - It seems probable that in this number of 5,000 there were included the 120 persons who are mentioned in Acts 1:15, and the 3,000 people who were converted on the day of Pentecost, Acts 2:41. It does not appear probable that 5,000 would have been assembled and converted in Solomon's porch Acts 3:11 on occasion of the cure of the lame man. Luke doubtless means to say that, up to this time, the number of persons who had joined themselves to the apostles was about 5,000. On this supposition, the work of religion must have made a very rapid advance. How long this was after the day of Pentecost is not mentioned, but it is clear that it was at no very distant period; and the accession of near two thousand to the number of believers was a very striking proof of the power and presence of the Holy Spirit.
Of the men - Of the "persons." The word "men" is often used without reference to sex, Luke 11:31; Romans 4:8; Romans 11:4.

The number - was about five thousand - That is, as I understand the passage, the one hundred and twenty which were converted before pentecost, the three thousand converted at pentecost, and one thousand eight hundred and eighty converted since the conversion of the three thousand; making in the whole five thousand, or ὡσει about that number: there might have been more or less; the historian does not fix the number absolutely. A goodly flock in one city, as the commencement of the Christian Church! Some think all the five thousand were converted on this day; but this is by no means likely.

Howbeit many of them which heard the word believed; and the (b) number of the men was about five thousand.
(b) While they thought to diminish the number, they actually increased it.

Howbeit, many of them which heard the word,.... The doctrine of the Gospel, preached by Peter and John:
believed; the report of it, and in Christ, as risen from the dead, which was the sum and substance of it: and this they did, notwithstanding the opposition made by the priests, the captain of the temple, and the Sadducces, and the violence they used to the apostles; for though they kept their persons in hold, they could not stop the free course of the word, which ran and was glorified:
and the number of the men was about five thousand; or "was five thousand", as the Alexandrian copy, the Vulgate Latin, and Ethiopic versions read; that is the number, not of the hearers, but "of them that believed", was so many; and so read the Arabic and Ethiopic versions: there were so many persons converted at this time; for this number does not include the three thousand that were converted under the first sermon, but regards those who now became true believers, and were added to the church; so that there were now eight thousand persons added to it; a great increase indeed! now had Christ the dew of his youth, and now were these fishermen fishers of men indeed: that our Lord's feeding five thousand men with five barley loaves and two fishes, should have any regard to the conversion of these five thousand men, is but a conceit.

the number of the men--or males, exclusive of women; though the word sometimes includes both.
about five thousand--and this in Jerusalem, where the means of detecting the imposture or crushing the fanaticism, if such it had been, were within everyone's reach, and where there was every inducement to sift it to the bottom.

Howbeit many of them which heard the word believed. Became converts. This (believed) is a usual scriptural expression for the whole change wrought by belief. "Faith comes by hearing . . . the word of God" (Romans 10:17), and faith leads to obedience.
The number of the men was about five thousand. It is probable that the meaning is that the number of men was now increased to five thousand. The term in the Greek (andres) does not properly include women, so that this is the number of male believers. It is probable that most of the converts of Pentecost and of this occasion were men. Oriental women were not likely to attend in large numbers on such public occasions.

The number of the men - Beside women and children, were about five thousand - So many did our Lord now feed at once with the bread from heaven!