Revised Common Lectionary (Semicontinuous)
22 Up to this point the crowd listened to Paul. But now they began to shout.
“Away with him from the face of the earth!” they yelled. “Someone like that has no right to live!”
Roman citizenship comes in useful
23 The crowd was shouting, tearing their clothes, and throwing dust in the air. 24 The tribune gave orders for Paul to be brought into the barracks, and he told the guards to examine him by flogging, so that he could find out the reason for all the uproar against him.
25 As they were tying Paul up ready for the whips, Paul spoke to the centurion who was standing beside him.
“Is it lawful,” he said, “to flog a Roman citizen without first finding him guilty?”
26 When the centurion heard that, he went off to the tribune and spoke to him.
“What d’you think you’re doing?” he said. “This fellow’s a Roman citizen!”
27 The tribune came and spoke to Paul.
“Tell me,” he said. “Are you a Roman citizen?”
“Yes,” replied Paul.
28 “It cost me a lot of money to buy this citizenship,” said the tribune.
“Ah,” said Paul, “but it came to me by birth.”
29 The people who were about to torture Paul stepped back quickly from him. As for the tribune, he was afraid, discovering that he was a Roman citizen and that he had had him tied up.
30 On the next day, still wanting to get to the bottom of it all, and to find out what was being alleged by the Jews, he released Paul, and ordered the chief priests to come together, with the whole Sanhedrin. He brought Paul in and presented him to them.
Paul before the Sanhedrin
23 Paul looked hard at the Sanhedrin.
“My brothers,” he said. “I have conducted myself before God in a completely good conscience all my life up to this day.”
2 Ananias, the high priest, ordered the bystanders to strike Paul on the mouth.
3 “God will strike you, you whitewashed wall!” said Paul to Ananias. “You are sitting to judge me according to the law, and yet you order me to be struck in violation of the law?”
4 “You are insulting the high priest?” asked the bystanders.
5 “My brothers,” replied Paul, “I didn’t know he was the high priest. Scripture says, of course, ‘You mustn’t speak evil of the ruler of your people.’ ”
6 Paul knew that some of the gathering were Sadducees, and the rest were Pharisees.
“My brothers,” he shouted to the Sanhedrin, “I am a Pharisee, the son of Pharisees. This trial is about the Hope, about the Resurrection of the Dead!”
7 At these words, an argument broke out between the Pharisees and Sadducees, and they were split among themselves. 8 (The Sadducees deny that there is any resurrection, or any intermediate state of “angel” or “spirit,” but the Pharisees affirm them both.) 9 There was quite an uproar, with some of the scribes from the Pharisees’ party standing up and arguing angrily, “We find nothing wrong in this man! What if a spirit spoke to him, or an angel for that matter?”
10 Faced with another great riot, the tribune was worried that Paul was going to be pulled in pieces between them. He ordered the guard to go down and snatch him out of the midst of them and bring him back up into the barracks.
11 On the next night, the Lord stood by him.
“Cheer up!” he said. “You have given your testimony about me in Jerusalem. Now you have to do it in Rome.”
Scripture quotations from The New Testament for Everyone are copyright © Nicholas Thomas Wright 2011, 2018, 2019.