Commentary - Acts 26:9-11

Bird's-eye view

In this section of Paul's defense before King Agrippa, we are given a window into the anatomy of unbelieving religious zeal. Paul is not recounting the actions of a man who was ambivalent or lukewarm; he is describing a man utterly convinced of his own righteousness, a man whose conscience was clean, but only because it was a seared and darkened conscience. This is a crucial point. Paul's pre-Christian life was not one of licentious rebellion in the modern sense, but rather one of intense, meticulous, and murderous religious devotion. He thought he was doing God a great service. This passage serves as a stark reminder that sincerity and zeal are no guarantors of truth. In fact, misdirected zeal, armed with theological conviction and institutional authority, is one of the most dangerous and destructive forces on earth. Paul lays bare his resume as a persecutor not to boast in it, but to magnify the sheer, unmerited grace of God that could arrest such a man and transform him from the chief of sinners into the apostle to the Gentiles. The darkness of his former life provides the perfect black velvet backdrop against which the diamond of God's sovereign grace would shine most brightly.

Outline

Context In Acts

This testimony occurs at a pivotal moment in the book of Acts. Paul is a prisoner in Caesarea, having been shuttled between various Roman authorities for two years. He has appealed to Caesar, and his journey to Rome is imminent. Before he departs, the local governor, Festus, brings him before King Agrippa II, a Jewish ruler who was "expert in all customs and questions which are among the Jews" (Acts 26:3). This provides Paul with his most strategic audience yet: a Jewish king who understands the theological framework of his claims. Paul is not just defending himself against charges of sedition; he is seizing the opportunity to preach the gospel, demonstrating that his faith is the true fulfillment of the promises made to the fathers. His testimony about his former life as a persecutor is not an aside; it is central to his argument. It establishes his credentials as a zealous Pharisee, making his conversion all the more inexplicable apart from a genuine, supernatural encounter with the risen Christ. This account of his persecution is the "before" picture that gives the "after" picture of his conversion its stunning power.

Key Issues

The Anatomy of a Holy Terror

Before we dissect these verses, we must get our minds around the kind of man Saul of Tarsus was. He was not a thug for hire. He was a theologian, a man of profound conviction. He was, in his own words, "zealous toward God" (Acts 22:3). His actions were not born of hatred for God, but rather what he believed was a fierce love for God's law and God's people. He saw this new sect of "the Way" as a blasphemous cancer on the body of Israel, and he believed it was his holy duty to excise it with a hot knife. He was a true believer, but he was truly believing a lie. And because he was a man of immense talent, energy, and intelligence, his true belief in a lie made him a holy terror. This is what sin does. It takes good things, like zeal and conviction, and twists them into instruments of death. Saul was trying to build a wall to protect God's honor, but he was using the bones of God's own saints as his building materials. The grace of God in his life is therefore not simply about forgiving a few bad deeds; it is about the complete demolition and reconstruction of his entire worldview, from the foundation up.

Verse by Verse Commentary

9 “So then, I thought to myself that I had to do many things hostile to the name of Jesus the Nazarene.

Paul begins with his internal state, his own thinking. "I thought to myself..." This is a confession of a sincere, but sincerely wrong, conviction. His conscience was not bothering him; his conscience was compelling him. He felt a duty, an obligation ("I had to do"), to oppose the name of Jesus. Notice the object of his hostility: "the name of Jesus the Nazarene." In the ancient world, a name represented a person's authority and identity. To Saul, the name of Jesus was an affront to the name of Yahweh. It was a rival claim to authority. And the addition of "the Nazarene" was likely a term of contempt. This was not just a theological disagreement for him; it was a holy war against a usurper. He was fighting for the honor of God, as he understood it, and his own mind was his greatest ally in this delusion.

10 And this is just what I did in Jerusalem; not only did I lock up many of the saints in prisons, having received authority from the chief priests, but also when they were being put to death I cast my vote against them.

Conviction quickly turned to action. He starts his resume in Jerusalem, the holy city, the center of his world. He was not a lone wolf; he acted with official sanction, "having received authority from the chief priests." This was institutional evil. The religious establishment weaponized Saul's zeal. His first charge is that he imprisoned "many of the saints." Think about that word. He now calls his former victims saints, holy ones. But at the time, he saw them as heretics. He was cleansing the temple, so he thought. Then the charge escalates. When they were being put to death, he "cast my vote against them." This indicates he was a member of some official body, likely the Sanhedrin, that had the power of capital punishment, at least in a religious sense. He was not a passive observer; he was an active participant in their judicial murder. He heard the evidence, such as it was, and rendered his verdict: guilty. Death.

11 And as I punished them often in all the synagogues, I tried to force them to blaspheme; and being furiously enraged at them, I kept pursuing them even to foreign cities.

The description of his rage intensifies. He punished them often and in all the synagogues. The synagogue was the local center of Jewish life and worship, and he turned these places into chambers of interrogation and torture. His goal was not simply to punish their bodies, but to break their souls. "I tried to force them to blaspheme." This is the heart of it. He wanted them to renounce the name of Jesus, to curse the one they called Lord. This was a spiritual battle. Forcing a Christian to blaspheme Christ would have been the ultimate victory for Saul, a validation of his entire crusade. His rage was not a momentary flash of temper; it was a settled, burning fury. He was "furiously enraged," a state of manic, obsessive hostility. This rage was insatiable. It drove him beyond the borders of Judea, pursuing them "even to foreign cities," which is precisely what he was doing on the road to Damascus. He was a man possessed by a mission, a mission fueled by a sincere, God-honoring, murderous rage.

Application

The testimony of Saul the persecutor is a mirror that the church must force itself to look into. It is easy for us to read this and thank God that we are not like this man, this furious zealot. But the spirit of Saul is a constant temptation for any Christian who begins to trust in his own doctrinal precision, his own moral effort, or his own tribe's righteousness. Zeal for the truth is a good and necessary thing. But when that zeal is untethered from love and humility, it becomes a monstrous thing. When we begin to believe that our doctrinal formulations are more important than the people for whom Christ died, we are taking our first steps on the road to Damascus, but we are heading in the wrong direction.

When we find ourselves "furiously enraged" at our theological opponents, we must stop and ask if we are enraged for the honor of Christ or for the honor of our own position. When we are more interested in forcing our brother to "blaspheme" his position than we are in winning him to a fuller understanding of the truth, the spirit of Saul is at the door. Paul's testimony is a stunning display of God's grace, but it is also a terrifying warning. The line between a defender of the faith and a holy terror can be razor thin. The only thing that keeps us on the right side of that line is a constant, desperate reliance on the grace of God. We must pray that God would save us from our enemies, but we must also pray, with fear and trembling, that God would save us from ourselves.