Acts of the Apostles 21

¹ When we had at last torn ourselves away from them and put to sea, we set a straight course and arrived at Cos; the next day we reached Rhodes, and from there went on to Patara.

² Here we found a ship bound for Phoenicia, so we went on board and sailed in her.

³ After sighting Cyprus and leaving it to port, we sailed to Syria and put in at Tyre, since the ship was to unload her cargo there.

⁴ We sought out the disciples and stayed there a week. Speaking in the Spirit, they kept telling Paul not to go on to Jerusalem,

⁵ but when our time was up we set off. Together with the women and children they all escorted us on our way till we were out of the town. When we reached the beach, we knelt down and prayed;

⁶ then, after saying good-bye to each other, we went aboard and they returned home.

⁷ The end of our voyage from Tyre came when we landed at Ptolemais, where we greeted the brothers and stayed one day with them.

⁸ The next day we left and came to Caesarea. Here we called on Philip the evangelist, one of the Seven, and stayed with him.

⁹ He had four virgin daughters who were prophets.

¹⁰ When we had been there several days a prophet called Agabus arrived from Judaea

¹¹ to see us. He took Paul’s girdle, and tied up his own feet and hands, and said, ‘This is what the Holy Spirit says, “The man this girdle belongs to will be bound like this by the Jews in Jerusalem, and handed over to the pagans”‘.

¹² When we heard this, we and everybody there implored Paul not to go on to Jerusalem.

¹³ To this he replied, ‘What are you trying to do – weaken my resolution by your tears? For my part, I am ready not only to be tied up but even to die in Jerusalem for the name of the Lord Jesus.’

¹⁴ And so, as he would not be persuaded, we gave up the attempt, saying, ‘The Lord’s will be done’.

¹⁵ After this we packed and went on up to Jerusalem.

¹⁶ Some of the disciples from Caesarea accompanied us and took us to the house of a Cypriot with whom we were to lodge; he was called Mnason and had been one of the earliest disciples.

¹⁷ On our arrival in Jerusalem the brothers gave us a very warm welcome.

¹⁸ The next day Paul went with us to visit James, and all the elders were present.

¹⁹ After greeting them he gave a detailed account of all that God had done among the pagans through his ministry.

²⁰ They gave glory to God when they heard this. ‘But you see, brother,’ they said ‘how thousands of Jews have now become believers, all of them staunch upholders of the Law, and

²¹ they have heard that you instruct all Jews living among the pagans to break away from Moses, authorising them not to circumcise their children or to follow the customary practices.

²² What is to be done? Inevitably there will be a meeting of the whole body, since they are bound to hear that you have come.

²³ So do as we suggest. We have four men here who are under a vow;

²⁴ take these men along and be purified with them and pay all the expenses. connected with the shaving of their heads.[*a] This will let everyone know there is no truth in the reports they have heard about you and that you still regularly observe the Law.

²⁵ The pagans who have become believers, as we wrote when we told them our decisions, must abstain from things sacrificed to idols, from blood, from the meat of strangled animals and from fornication.’

²⁶ So the next day Paul took the men along and was purified with them and he visited the Temple to give notice of the time when the period of purification would be over and the offering would have to be presented on behalf of each of them.

²⁷ The seven days were nearly over when some Jews from Asia caught sight of him in the Temple and stirred up the crowd and seized him,

²⁸ shouting, ‘Men of Israel, help! This is the man who preaches to everyone everywhere against our people, against the Law and against this place. Now he has profaned this Holy Place by bringing Greeks into the Temple.’

²⁹ They had, in fact, previously seen Trophimus the Ephesian in the city with him, and thought that Paul had brought him into the Temple.

³⁰ This roused the whole city; people came running from all sides; they seized Paul and dragged him out of the Temple, and the gates were closed behind them.

³¹ They would have killed him if a report had not reached the tribune of the cohort[*b] that there was rioting all over Jerusalem.

³² He immediately called out soldiers and centurions, and charged down on the crowd, who stopped beating Paul when they saw the tribune and the soldiers.

³³ When the tribune came up he arrested Paul, had him bound with two chains and enquired who he was and what he had done.

³⁴ People in the crowd called out different things, and since the noise made it impossible for him to get any positive information, the tribune ordered Paul to be taken into the fortress.

³⁵ When Paul reached the steps, the crowd became so violent that he had to be carried by the soldiers;

³⁶ and indeed the whole mob was after them, shouting, ‘Kill him!’

³⁷ Just as Paul was being taken into the fortress, he asked the tribune if he could have a word with him. The tribune said, ‘You speak Greek, then?

³⁸ So you are not the Egyptian who started the recent revolt and led those four thousand cutthroats[*c] out into the desert?’

³⁹ ‘I?’ said Paul ‘I am a Jew and a citizen of the well-known city of Tarsus in Cilicia. Please give me permission to speak to the people.’

⁴⁰ The man gave his consent and Paul, standing at the top of the steps, gestured to the people with his hand. When all was quiet again he spoke to them in Hebrew. [*d]