Commentari biblici

Acts 26:1. Paul stretched forth the hand,— Elsner shews this to have been esteemed at that time a very decent expression of earnestness in one who spoke in public; though some of the most illustrious Greek orators in earlier ages, as Pericles, Themistocles, Aristides, thought it a point of modesty to avoid it. But this was the effect of a false taste; and it is certain, that the prince of orators, Demosthenes, often made use of this gesture.

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Acts 26:3. Because I know thee to be expert— Agrippa must have had great advantages for an accurateacquaintance with the Jewish customs, from his education under his father Herod Agrippa, and from his long residence at Jerusalem; and agreeably to this, by the permission of the emperor, he had the direction of the sacred treasure, &c. See on ch. Acts 25:13.

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Acts 26:4. Which was at the first, &c.— Doddridge reads this, Which from the beginning (of my youth) was spent among those of mine own nation, &c. Probably he had in his childhood been brought up in the school of Tarsus, and there formed an acquaintance with Greek and Roman authors, till he entered on a kind of academical course under the celebrated Gamaliel, about the fifteenth or sixteenth year of his age, when he came to Jerusalem, and was there educated from the beginning of his youth.

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Acts 26:5. After the most straitest sect— The strictest sect. So Josephus, in a variety of places, calls the sect of the Pharisees, almost in the very words which the apostle uses. They were in many respects stricter than the Essenes. It appears from the gospels, that many rigorous severities were used by them. Compare Luke 18:11-12.Matthew 23:25-28; Matthew 23:25-28. We are told, among other instances of their rigour, that many of them used to sleep on narrow planks, that, falling down from them, they might soon be awakened to prayer; and that others lay on gravel, and placed thorns so near them, that they could not turn without being pricked by them. See Witsius's Meletem. 100: i, sect. 15.

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Acts 26:7. Unto which promise, &c.— Great numbers of the ten tribes returned with the two tribes of Judah and Benjamin from the Babylonish captivity, Ezra 6:16-17; Ezra 8:35. Luk 2:36 and many of them who did not return to the land of Canaan, did nevertheless entertain hopes of the coming of the Messiah, and of a resurrection and future state of happiness. See the note on Luke 20:38.

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Acts 26:8. Why should it be thought a thing incredible, &c.— Beza, with the Greek scholiast, would place a mark of interrogation after the word τι, and read it, What? is it thought incredible, &c.? which is indeed well suited to the animated manner of St. Paul's speaking.

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Acts 26:10. I gave my voice against them.— St. Paul had no vote in the sanhedrim, nor do we certainly know that he was personally concerned in the death of any except Stephen, in whose condemnation there was no voting at all. But the meaning plainly is, that he instigated the people against them as much as he could in that instance, and any other that might occur, whether at Jerusalem or elsewhere; which, as we hinted on ch. Act 22:4 might perhaps be more than are recorded. Accordingly the Syriac renders it, I joined with those who condemned them.

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Acts 26:11. Compelled them to blaspheme;— A known passage in Pliny, lib. 10: ep. 97 proves that the Heathen persecutors obliged Christians who fell under their trial, not only to renounce Christ, but also to curse him; and it appears from this passage, that the Jews imposed the like test upon them. See ch. Acts 22:19.

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