Acts of the Apostles 22

¹ ‘My brothers, my fathers, listen to what I have to say to you in my defence.’

² When they realised he was speaking in Hebrew, the silence was even greater than before.

³ ‘I am a Jew,’ Paul said ‘and was, born at Tarsus in Cilicia. I was brought up here in this city. I studied under Gamaliel and was. taught the exact observance of the Law of our ancestors. In fact, I was as full of duty towards God as you are today.

⁴ I even persecuted this Way to the death, and sent women as well as men to prison in chains

⁵ as the high priest and the whole council of elders can testify, since they even sent me with letters’ to their brothers in Damascus. When I set off it was with the intention of bringing prisoners back from there to Jerusalem for punishment.

⁶ ‘I was on that journey and nearly at Damascus when about midday a bright light from heaven suddenly shone round me.

⁷ I fell to the ground and heard a voice saying, “Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting me?”

⁸ I answered: Who are you, Lord? and he said to me, “I am Jesus the Nazarene, and you are persecuting me”.

⁹ The people with me saw the light but did not hear his voice as he spoke to me.

¹⁰ I said: What am I to do, Lord? The Lord answered, “Stand up and go into Damascus, and there you will be told what you have been appointed to do”.

¹¹ The light had been so dazzling that I was blind and my companions had to take me by the hand; and so I came to Damascus.

¹² Someone called Ananias, a devout follower of the Law and highly thought of by all the Jews living there,

¹³ came to see me; he stood beside me and said, “Brother Saul, receive your sight”. Instantly my sight came back and I was able to see him.

¹⁴ Then he said, “The God of our ancestors has chosen you to know his will, to see the Just One and hear his own voice speaking,

¹⁵ because you are to be his witness before all mankind, testifying to what you have seen and heard.

¹⁶ And now why delay? It is time you were baptised and had your sins washed away while invoking his name.”

¹⁷ ‘Once, after I had got back to Jerusalem, when I was praying in the Temple, I fell into a trance

¹⁸ and then I saw him. “Hurry,” he said “leave Jerusalem at once; they will not accept the testimony you are giving about me”

¹⁹ Lord, I answered, it is because they know that I used to go from synagogue to synagogue, imprisoning and flogging those who believed in you;

²⁰ and that when the blood of your witness[*a] Stephen was being shed, I was standing by in full agreement with his murderers, and minding their clothes.

²¹ Then he said to me, “Go! I am sending you out to the pagans far away.”‘

²² So far they had listened to him, but at these words they began to shout, ‘Rid the earth of the man! He is not fit to live!’

²³ They were yelling, waving their cloaks and throwing dust into the air,

²⁴ and so the tribune had him brought into the fortress and ordered him to be examined under the lash, to find out the reason for the outcry against him.

²⁵ But when they had strapped him down Paul said to the centurion on duty, ‘Is it legal for you to flog a man who is a Roman citizen and has not been brought to trial?’

²⁶ When he heard this the centurion went and told the tribune; ‘Do you realise what you are doing?’ he said ‘This man is a Roman citizen’.

²⁷ So the tribune came and asked him, ‘Tell me, are you a Roman citizen?’ ‘I am’ Paul said.

²⁸ The tribune replied, ‘It cost me a large sum to acquire this citizenship’. ‘But I was born to it’ said Paul.

²⁹ Then those who were about to examine him hurriedly withdrew, and the tribune himself was alarmed when he realised that he had put a Roman citizen in chains.

³⁰ The next day, since he wanted to know what precise charge the Jews were bringing, he freed Paul and gave orders for a meeting of the chief priests and the entire Sanhedrin; then he brought Paul down and stood him in front of them.