Acts of the Apostles 8

¹ Saul entirely approved of the killing. That day a bitter persecution started against the church in Jerusalem, and everyone[*a] except the apostles fled to the country districts of Judaea and Samaria.

² There were some devout people, however, who buried Stephen and made great mourning for him.

³ Saul then worked for the total destruction of the Church; he went from house to house arresting both men and women and sending them to prison.

⁴ Those who had escaped went from place to place preaching the Good News.

⁵ One of them was Philip who went to a Samaritan town and proclaimed the Christ to them.

⁶ The people united in welcoming the message Philip preached, either because they had heard of the miracles he worked or because they saw them for themselves.

⁷ There were, for example, unclean spirits that came shrieking out of many who were possessed, and several paralytics and cripples were cured.

⁸ As a result there was great rejoicing in that town.

⁹ Now a man called Simon had already practised magic arts in the town and astounded the Samaritan people. He had given it out that he was someone momentous,

¹⁰ and everyone believed what he said; eminent citizens and ordinary people alike had declared, ‘He is the divine power that is called Great’.

¹¹ They had only been won over to him because of the long time he had spent working on them with his magic.

¹² But when they believed Philip’s preaching of the Good News about the kingdom of God and the name of Jesus Christ, they were baptised, both men and women,

¹³ and even Simon himself became a believer. After his baptism Simon, who went round constantly with Philip, was astonished when he saw the wonders and great miracles that took place.

¹⁴ When the apostles in Jerusalem heard that Samaria had accepted the word of God, they sent Peter and John to them,

¹⁵ and they went down there, and prayed for the Samaritans to receive the Holy Spirit,

¹⁶ for as yet he had not come down on any of them: they had only been baptised in the name of the Lord Jesus.

¹⁷ Then they laid hands on them, and they received the Holy Spirit.

¹⁸ When Simon saw that the Spirit was given through the imposition of hands by the apostles, he offered them some money.

¹⁹ ‘Give me the same power’ he said ‘so that anyone I lay my hands on will receive the Holy Spirit.’

²⁰ Peter answered, ‘May your silver be lost forever, and you with it, for thinking that money could buy what God has given for nothing!

²¹ You have no share, no rights, in this: God can see how your heart is warped.

²² Repent of this wickedness of yours, and pray to the Lord; you may still be forgiven for thinking as you did;

²³ it is plain to me that you are trapped in the bitterness of gall and the chains of sin.’

²⁴ ‘Pray to the Lord for me yourselves’ Simon replied ‘so that none of the things you have spoken about may happen to me.’

²⁵ Having given their testimony and proclaimed the word of the Lord, they went back to Jerusalem, preaching the Good News to a number of Samaritan villages.

²⁶ The angel of the Lord spoke to Philip saying, ‘Be ready to set out at noon along the road that goes from Jerusalem down to Gaza, the desert road’.

²⁷ So he set off on his journey. Now it happened that an Ethiopian had been on pilgrimage to Jerusalem; he was a eunuch and an officer at the court of the kandake, or queen, of Ethiopia, and was in fact her chief treasurer.

²⁸ He was now on his way home; and as he sat in his chariot he was reading the prophet Isaiah.

²⁹ The Spirit said to Philip, ‘Go up and meet that chariot’.

³⁰ When Philip ran up, he heard him reading Isaiah the prophet and asked, ‘Do you understand what you are reading?’

³¹ ‘How can I’ he replied ‘unless I have someone to guide me?’ So he invited Philip to get in and sit by his side.

³² Now the passage of scripture he was reading was this: Like a sheep that is led to the slaughter-house, like a lamb that is dumb in front of its shearers, like these he never opens his mouth.

³³ He has been humiliated and has no one to defend him. Who will ever talk about his descendants, since his life on earth has been cut short![*b]

³⁴ The eunuch turned to Philip and said, ‘Tell me, is the prophet referring to himself or someone else?’

³⁵ Starting, therefore, with this text of scripture Philip proceeded to explain the Good News of Jesus to him.

³⁶ Further along the road they came to some water, and the eunuch said, ‘Look, there is some water here; is there anything to stop me being baptised?'[*c]

³⁸ He ordered the chariot to stop, then Philip and the eunuch both went down into the water and Philip baptised him.

³⁹ But after they had come up out of the water again Philip was taken away by the Spirit of the Lord, and the eunuch never saw him again but went on his way rejoicing.

⁴⁰ Philip found that he had reached Azotus and continued his journey proclaiming the Good News in every town as far as Caesarea.