Coke's Commentary on the Holy Bible · Acts Capitolo 22

Acts 22:3. Brought up—at the feet of Gamaliel,— Strabo tells us that it was customaryamong the inhabitants of Tarsus, for the young people, when they had gone through a course of education at Rome, to travel abroad for further improvement. Concerning Gamaliel, see on ch. Acts 5:34. The phrase of being brought up at his feet, plainly alludes to the posture in which the scholars were usually placed, who sat on the ground, or on low seats, while their teacher was raised on a kind of throne. Hence, in one of the rabbies, "to dust themselves with the dust of their feet," is a phrase for being a disciple. See on Luke 2:46; Luke 10:39. Instead of taught according to the perfect manner, &c. Dr. Doddridge renders it accurately instructed in the law of our fathers. Vitringa, and some other learned critics, would connect, and as it seems very properly, πεπαιδευμενος, taught or instructed, with the foregoing clause, at the feet of Gamaliel, which makes the enumeration more particular;—by profession a Jew,—born at Tarsus,—bred in this city,—instructed in the law at the feet of Gamaliel.

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Acts 22:4. And I persecuted this way unto the death,— We know that he was concerned in the death of Stephen: ch. Act 8:1 and if he was not so in that of many more, it was not for want of zeal and rage, but merely of power. However, there is no reason to think that the sacred history contains a full account of all the outrages committed against Christians during the period to which it extends.

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Acts 22:5. The high-priest doth bear me witness,— That is, "I can appeal to him for the proof of this." It will not follow from hence, that he who was nowhigh-priest, also bore that office when St. Paul persecuted the Christians; he might then perhaps be only an inferior member of the sanhedrim. Instead of all the estate of the elders, some read the whole court of the elders; the Greek is πρεσβυτεριον, the presbytery, or sanhedrim.

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Acts 22:9. But they heard not the voice— See on ch. Acts 9:7.

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Acts 22:14. And see that Just One,— Some commentators refer this to a future vision of Christ, and a future commission to be received from him; but it clearly appears from St. Paul's own narration, that he had already seen him and heard him speak. It seems therefore most natural to refer it to the past, rather than to a future event; though it may possibly include both.

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Acts 22:16. Be baptized,— Baptism, in respect to adults, except in the very peculiar instance of our Lord, was a token of confession and humiliation for sin; and of a desire to be cleansed from it, as the body is by water cleansed from its pollution; and being administered to such professed penitents by divine appointment, is called the baptism of repentance, Matthew 3:11.Mark 1:4; Mark 1:4.Luke 3:3; Luke 3:3.

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Acts 22:18. And saw him— That is, the Lord Jesus. Some suppose, that this memorable event happened in the second journey that St. Paul made to Jerusalem. See ch. Acts 11:30. But the expression rather seems to intimate that it was on his first return to Jerusalem that he had this vision in the temple; and what he pleads here, Act 22:19-20 as to the probability of their receiving his testimony, suits that circumstance of time much better than the other. His dispute with some Hellenist Jews who, toward the close of his first visit to Jerusalem, attempted to kill him, ch. Act 9:29 engaged the brethren to hasten his departure; and our Lord's orders to him at this critical season would of course determine him to yield to their instances, which perhaps his desire and hope of usefulness at Jerusalem might otherwise have opposed. But when he had been forced in that manner to flee for his life, while the memory of his zeal against Christianity was comparatively fresh in their minds, it does not seem natural to suppose that he would have pleaded the probability of their regarding it, after an interval of six years more.

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Acts 22:24. He should be examined by scourging;— One of the ways of examining by torture among the Romans, as well as among the Jews, was by binding the person to a pillar, and severely scourging him; so that this infamous practice of extorting a confession has, to the disgrace of human nature, prevailed among almost all nations!

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Acts 22:25. Is it lawful, &c.?— See the note on ch. Acts 16:37.

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Acts 22:28. But I was free born.— This is thought, by some, to have been in consequence of his being a native of Tarsus; but Dr. Lardner has produced many strong arguments against admitting that city to have been a colony, or what the Romans call municipium, that is, a place where all the natives were free of Rome by birth. It seems therefore much more probable, that St. Paul's father, or some other of his ancestors, might have been rewarded with the freedom of the city for his fidelity and bravery in some military service, as an auxiliary to the Romans, as Josephus says several Jews were. It is also most certain that the freedom of the city of Rome might be bought.

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