Acts 26:11

I often punished the Christians that were in the Jewish meeting houses. I tried to get them to say bad things about Jesus. I was so angry with Jesus’s followers that I even went to other towns to get them.”

Plain English Version

In The King James Version

And I punished them oft in every synagogue, and compelled them to blaspheme; and being exceedingly mad against them, I persecuted them even unto strange cities.

In Context

10I started in Jerusalem. I put a lot of Christians in jail. The bosses of the Jewish ceremonies told me to do that. And if they judged any of those Christians and said, ‘Kill them,’ I agreed with them, and I said that too.

12Paul kept on telling his story. He said, “The bosses of the Jewish ceremonies in Jerusalem said that I can go to Damascus to grab the Christians there, so I started to go to Damascus to look for the Christians.

Read all of Acts 26

Cross References

Mark 3:28Listen, people might do bad things, and they might say bad things against God, but later, if they are sorry for those bad things, God can say they are not guilty.

Acts 13:45But the Jewish leaders saw those big mobs of people, and they got really jealous. They started saying bad things to the people about Paul, and they told them, “Paul is telling lies. His message about Jesus is not true.”

Acts 22:5The big boss of our Jewish ceremonies knows that, and so do the other men that belong to our Jewish Leaders Council. They gave me letters to take to our Jewish countrymen in Damascus. Those letters said that it was all right for me to grab the Christians there, and tie them up, and bring them to Jerusalem, for our leaders here to punish them. So I got some other men to join me, and we were going along the road to Damascus.

Matthew Henry on Acts 26:2-12

Paul's Fifth Defence. 1 Then Agrippa said unto Paul, Thou art permitted to speak for thyself. Then Paul stretched forth the hand, and answered for himself: 2 I think myself happy, king Agrippa, because I shall answer for myself this day before thee touching all the things whereof I am accused of the Jews: 3 Especially because I know thee to be expert in all customs and questions which are among the Jews: wherefore I beseech thee to hear me patiently. 4 My manner of life from my youth, which was at the first among… Read the whole commentary →

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Study Acts 26:11