Who came to the chief priests and the ancients and said: We have bound ourselves under a great curse that we will eat nothing till we have slain Paul.
οιτινες προσελθοντες τοις αρχιερευσιν και τοις πρεσβυτεροις ειπον αναθεματι ανεθεματισαμεν εαυτους μηδενος γευσασθαι εως ου αποκτεινωμεν τον παυλον
5 Church Fathers comment on this verse
They make even the rulers their accomplices, and the writer continues by pointing this out. See what extreme malice there is. They are not content to incline one another to evil, but resolve to incline the governor himself to the same thing with them.
"We have bound ourselves with a curse." That is, they said that they would renounce faith in God if they did not do what they had planned. Thus, if they made a false promise, they were under oath as deceivers. If they had succeeded in killing Paul, they would again have subjected themselves to a curse as murderers. Or God would have delivered them to anathema.
The Jews were greatly angered that the Roman official was not entirely on their side. They were also angered that Paul's trial had not fulfilled their desire to hand the Apostle over to death. Then certain fanatics from among them, forty in number, vowed neither to drink nor eat until they had killed Paul. To carry out their murderous design, they told the high priest and the other ranks of the Sanhedrin to ask the tribune to bring Paul to them again for trial. During his journey to the Sanhedrin, they intended to kill him. But their design was discovered and brought to the tribune's knowledge by Paul's nephew. The tribune continued to respect and protect Paul as a Roman citizen.
On the night before the day when the conspirators expected to carry out their design, he sent him under a strong guard to Caesarea, to Felix the proconsul of Judea. In a special letter he explained to Felix the circumstances of the Apostle's arrest, his Roman citizenship, and his political innocence.
To the chief priests and elders: that is, to members of the Sanhedrin, certainly on this occasion only of the Sadducean party. The Pharisees could not have taken part in this after what had happened the previous day (v. 7 and following).
The proposal made to the members of the Sanhedrin by the forty men concerning their wish to kill Paul recalls the proposal of Judas. But that earlier act bore more human features. There thirty pieces of silver were requested, while here the criminals were ready to give money themselves, if only they were permitted to kill Paul. Since they did not hope to buy this right themselves, they proposed that the members of the Sanhedrin appoint another hearing of Paul's case. For this they were to ask the commander to bring him out of the fortress. Then the conspirators would commit the evil deed they had planned against him. 'See what extreme malice,' exclaims St. John Chrysostom.
'Not content with inclining one another to evil, they decide also to incline the ruler to the same thing along with themselves.' Bishop Michael thinks these were the same Jews from Asia Minor who had stirred up this whole persecution of Paul (see Acts 21:27), joined with other local enemies of Paul. They probably did not act without assistance from the Sadducees. They supposed that Paul's military escort would be small and that, if there were resistance, they could overpower it.
Passages read together with this verse.
Greek text, 18 words with lemma, transliteration and Strong’s number. Tap to expand.
THEOSIS