These men are not drunk, as you suppose. It is only the third hour of the day!
This defense silences the charge at once. At nine o'clock in the morning, before the hour of sacrifice and prayer, no man, drunkard or otherwise, would be intoxicated. The Jews universally abstained until the third hour had passed. Peter appeals to a custom so binding even the dissolute did not break it.
AI summary
For these are not drunken, as ye suppose, seeing it is [but] the third hour of the day. (i) After the sunrise, which may be about seven or eight o'clock to us.
Peter and all the hundred and twenty here are sober men. The mockers claimed drunkenness, but it is only the third hour, nine in the morning, when no religious Jew tastes food or drink until after morning prayer. Even the intemperate keep this law strictly.
AI summary