The Book of Acts: Chapter 23 (pt 4 of 13)

Paul’s reaction is quick and sharp:

“God is going to strike you, you whitewashed sepulcher —you corrupt hypocrite! What kind of judge are you to break the law yourself by ordering me struck like that?” —Acts 23:3

Whoa! Now I don’t blame him, but that did not go over well. Some of those standing nearby said:

“How dare you insult God’s high priest?” (Acts 23:4)

Now if it had been me, I probably would have stood there silent (but thinking some pretty rotten things), but not Paul. He shot right back at him. Whoa! I do not blame Paul, but he had better be careful. In fact, the folks standing close to him said, “How dare you insult God’s high priest?” Oops . . .!

I do find it interesting that Ananias does not rebuke Paul for his harsh words and I take Paul’s words at face value, and believe that Paul did not know that Ananias was the high priest. Now there are many reasons why he did not know, but Luke does not bother to explain, so I will not even present a guess (although many commentators seem interested in doing this). If Paul had known what we know about Ananias, he could have said a whole bunch more about the hypocrisy of this man. He simply restricted his comments to the case at hand.

Ananias, as a member of this Council, was sitting in judgment of Paul. He was supposedly seeing to it that they upheld the law yet, in contradiction to the law, he had just ordered Paul to be struck in the face. How ironic this is! We just read that the Roman soldiers would not “interrogate” Paul with lashes because he was a Roman citizen and now, Ananias would have Paul punished when he was still presumed innocent under Jewish law. (Once again, go read the words of Nicodemus in Acts 7:50-51). Roman soldiers (“pagans”) are more meticulous about obeying the law than these Jews—and not mere Jews, but Jews who are sitting on the highest judicial council in the land. They are roughly the equivalent of our Supreme Court justices.

I wonder if the truth of Paul’s words stunned Ananias, at least momentarily. Not only was Paul right about this man’s hypocrisy; Paul’s indictment aptly rebuked Ananias for his conduct during his entire tenure as high priest.

The issue here is not the truth or accuracy of Paul’s response, but whether it was appropriate to say them in the first place. Ananias was the High Priest, and due to his position of the high priest, deserved more respect. Oh, go ahead and argue with me, but the same applies to, for instance, the President of the United States. Several months ago, a Senator called a comment the President made, a lie. Yes, it was, but it was inappropriate to say that in that particular forum. Whatever the reason was (which Luke doesn’t include in this account), Paul did not realize that Ananias was the high priest. His words, spoken hastily and in anger were inappropriate.

Actually, that is an understatement; by Paul’s acknowledgement, they were contrary to the Old Testament law:

“You must not blaspheme God or curse the ruler of your people” (Exodus 22:28; cited in part by Paul in Acts 23:5).

While Paul correctly cites Exodus 22:28, we have a higher standard than this by which to judge Paul’s response to Ananias—the example of our Lord Jesus, in very similar circumstances:

“While this was happening, the high priest questioned Jesus about his disciples and about his teaching. Jesus replied, ‘I have spoken publicly to the world. I always taught in the synagogues and in the temple courts, where all the Jewish people assemble together. I have said nothing in secret. Why do you ask me? Ask those who heard what I said. They know what I said.’ When Jesus had said this, one of the high priest’s officers who stood nearby struck him on the face and said, ‘Is that the way you answer the high priest?’ Jesus replied, ‘If I have said something wrong, confirm what is wrong. But if I spoke correctly, why strike me?’” —John 18:19-23

If interested, you can download the entire study of The Story of Acts

Advertisement