Acts 23:6 - Meaning and Application

Many troubles come to the righteous, but in one way or another the Lord delivers them from all of them. Paul had already known this truth in the persecutions he suffered among the Gentiles (2 Timothy 3:11): “Out of them all the Lord delivered me.” Now he sees again that the God who has delivered him does deliver him still, and will keep delivering him. The same Lord who rescued him from the crowd in the last chapter now rescues him from the anger of the elders.

Paul’s own wisdom and quick thinking also helped him here. His highest honor, the one he valued most, was that he was a Christian and an apostle of Christ. Compared with that, he counted all other honors as worthless, as if they were refuse, so that he might gain Christ. Even so, he sometimes made use of his other standing, and it served him well. In the last chapter, being a Roman citizen saved him from being beaten as a common troublemaker. Here, being a Pharisee saved him from being condemned by the Sanhedrin, the Jewish ruling council, as someone who had abandoned the faith and worship of the God of Israel. It fits well with a willingness to suffer for Christ that we also use every lawful means, and even wise strategy, to avoid suffering or get out of it.

Paul’s honest strategy here was to split his judges and turn them against one another, so that the hostility of one group would work in his favor. He saw that the council was made up of Sadducees and Pharisees (Acts 23:6). He knew their character from long experience and could tell who belonged to each party. One part were Sadducees and the other Pharisees, perhaps in nearly equal numbers. These groups strongly disagreed with each other, though they usually managed to work together when it came to running the council.

The Pharisees were strict men, very devoted to ceremonies, not only the ones God had given, but also the traditions of the elders. They strongly defended the authority of the religious leaders and pressed people to obey their rules, which often brought them into conflict with the Lord Jesus. Yet, on the great truths of the Jewish faith, they were still orthodox. They believed in spirits, in the resurrection of the dead, and in the life to come.

The Sadducees were, in effect, unbelievers. They did not like Scripture or divine revelation, meaning truth God has revealed. They accepted the books of Moses as a useful history and a good law, but gave little attention to the rest of the Old Testament (Matthew 22:23). They denied the resurrection, not only the body rising again, but also any future state of reward and punishment. They had no hope of eternal joy, no fear of eternal misery, and no expectation of anything after death. Based on those ideas, they could say, “It is useless to serve God,” and they could call proud people happy (Malachi 3:14-15).

They also denied angels and spirits, and allowed for no being except matter. They thought even God was bodily, with parts and members like ours. When they read about angels in the Old Testament, they took them to mean messages God sent, or impressions in the minds of the people who saw them, rather than real beings. They said the soul was only the body’s temperament or life-force, and they denied that it existed apart from the body or differed from an animal’s soul. They likely thought of themselves as free thinkers, but in truth they held very low, foolish, and enslaving ideas.

It is surprising that men with such corrupt beliefs could hold office in the Sanhedrin, the Jewish supreme council. But many of them were wealthy or influential, and they accepted the public religion, so they gained and kept their positions. Still, they were widely marked as heretics, grouped with the Epicureans, and prayed against. What a sad decline it was when such godless men sat among the rulers of the Jewish church.

In this dispute between the Pharisees and the Sadducees, Paul openly declared himself on the Pharisees’ side against the Sadducees (Acts 23:6). He cried out loudly enough for all to hear, “I am a Pharisee, and I was raised as a Pharisee, in fact, I was born into that family. My father was a Pharisee before me, and I still stand with the Pharisees in this, that I hope for the resurrection of the dead. Really, if the matter were understood rightly, that is what I am being judged for now.”

When Christ was on earth, the Pharisees opposed him most because he rebuked their traditions and their wrong interpretations of the law. But after his ascension, the Sadducees opposed his apostles most, because they preached through Jesus the resurrection of the dead (Acts 4:1-2). Acts 5:17 says that it was the sect of the Sadducees that rose up in anger against them, because they preached that life and immortality are brought to light through the gospel.

So Paul here calls himself a Pharisee, so far as the Pharisees were right. Though he stood against Pharisaism where it opposed Christianity, especially its traditions that rivaled God’s law or contradicted Christ’s gospel, he still agreed with them on the hope of the resurrection. We should never think less of a true teaching from God, or hesitate to own it, just because corrupt people also hold it. If the Pharisees hope for the resurrection of the dead, Paul is willing to stand with them in that hope.

He could also truly say that, as a Christian, this was the real issue being argued against him. Perhaps he knew that the Sadducees, though they did not have as much influence with the common people as the Pharisees, had secretly stirred up the crowd against him. They did this under the excuse that he had preached to the Gentiles, but really because he preached the hope of the resurrection. In any case, since he was being accused as a Christian, he could rightly say that he was on trial because of the hope of the resurrection of the dead, as he later argued too (Acts 24:15; Acts 26:6-7).

Paul had spoken against the traditions of the elders, as his Master had done, and in that he opposed the Pharisees. Yet he valued himself more on preaching the resurrection of the dead and life in the world to come, truths the Pharisees also held.

This led to a division in the council. The high priest likely sided with the Sadducees, as he had done before (Acts 5:17), and his anger toward Paul showed it (Acts 23:2). That made the Pharisees all the more uneasy. So a dispute broke out between the Pharisees and the Sadducees (Acts 23:7), and Paul's words made the Sadducees more eager and the Pharisees less eager to press the case against him.

The crowd split apart. There was a schism, a quarrel among them, and their hatred for Paul began to turn against one another. They could not continue against him when they could not agree among themselves, or accuse him of breaking church unity while they had so little unity of their own. First all the shouting had been against Paul, but now there was a great cry against each other (Acts 23:9).

So fierce and angry was the spirit among the Jews at that time that everything was done with noise and clamor. They were fighting over the great truths of their religion in a way that did little good, because human anger does not produce what God requires. People who oppose the truth may be answered by calm reasoning, but never by a great uproar.

The Pharisees then took Paul's side, which is surprising. They fought over him, saying, “We find no evil in this man” (Acts 23:9). He had behaved properly and respectfully in the temple, and he had attended the worship of the church. Even if that had been only sometimes, it showed he was not the kind of enemy they had claimed. He had also spoken well in his own defense and had given a good account of himself. Now he had declared himself sound in the chief truths of religion and careful in his life, so they could not see that he had done anything deserving death or chains.

They went further. “If a spirit or an angel has spoken to him about Jesus, and has led him to preach as he does, then even if we are not persuaded, we ought to be warned not to oppose him, or we may be found fighting against God,” as Gamaliel, a Pharisee, had argued before (Acts 5:39).

Here we may notice, to the honor of the gospel, that even its enemies were sometimes forced to witness for it. Truth can sometimes wring from persecutors confessions, not only of innocence, but even of worth. Pilate found no fault in Christ, though he still put him to death, and Festus found no fault in Paul, though he kept him in chains. The Pharisees here even thought it possible that Paul had received a message from heaven by an angel to do what he was doing.

Yet it seems that, as leaders, they later joined with the high priest in prosecuting him (Acts 24:1). They sinned against the light they had, and sometimes admitted, just as Christ said of such people, “They have both seen and hated both me and my Father” (John 15:24).

Still, we may hope that some of them at least afterward thought better of Paul than before, and became more favorable to him. They had now heard a satisfying account of both his life, which was a life of good conscience, and his faith about the world to come. If so, it was to their credit that their concern for the traditions of the elders, which Paul had set aside, was so far outweighed by concern for the great and basic truths of religion, which Paul still held fast. If he would join them against the Sadducees and keep to the hope of the resurrection of the dead, they would not count his setting aside the ceremonial law as an evil in him. Rather, they would charitably think he was walking according to the light God had given him, perhaps through an angel or a spirit, and they were ready not to persecute him, but to support and protect him.

The persecuting Pharisees of the Roman church are not of this spirit. Let a man be sincere and zealous for all the articles of the Christian faith, yet if he does not bow to their church authority, they find enough fault in him to persecute him to death.

The chief captain's care and conduct helped Paul as well. He had thrown this matter into the middle of a dispute between the Pharisees and Sadducees, which set them against one another and won him a fair witness from the Pharisees. But Paul was still in danger of being torn apart, with the Pharisees wanting him freed and the Sadducees wanting him put to death, or handed over to the people like Daniel in the lions' den. So the chief captain had to come with his soldiers and rescue him, as he had done before (Acts 21:32; Acts 22:24).

See Paul's danger. Between his friends and his enemies, he was almost pulled apart, one side hugging him to death and the other crushing him to death. Such violence often falls on people who are well known and much talked about, as Paul was, loved by some and hated by others.

His rescue was this: the chief captain ordered his soldiers to go down from the barracks, take Paul by force from among them, from the room in the temple where he had ordered the council to meet, and bring him into the castle, or Tower of Antonia. He saw that he could not make sense of their arguments or get at the truth of the case.

Still, divine comfort helped Paul most of all. The chief captain had rescued him from cruel men, but Paul was still in custody, and no one could say what would happen next. The castle gave him protection, but it also kept him confined. It saved him from such a death, but it might still be preparing him for a greater one.

We do not read that any of the apostles or elders in Jerusalem came to him. Perhaps they lacked courage, or perhaps they had no access. Maybe, on the following night, Paul was full of thoughts and worries about what would become of him and how his troubles might serve some good purpose. Then the Lord Jesus gave him a kind visit, and though it came at midnight, it was very timely (Acts 23:11). The Lord stood by him and came to his bedside, though it may have been only a bed of straw, to show him that he was with him all day long just as truly as he was with him then in plain sight.

This is a great comfort. No matter who is against us, we need not fear if the Lord stands by us. If he takes up our defense, we can face those who seek our harm without terror. The Lord is with those who support my soul, and then nothing can ultimately go wrong.

Christ tells Paul to take heart: “Be of good cheer, Paul. Do not be discouraged. Do not let what has happened sadden you, and do not let what may still lie ahead frighten you.” It is Christ’s will that his faithful servants keep a steady joy. Paul may have been wondering, in hindsight, whether he had spoken rightly before the council the day before. If so, Christ’s word assured him that God approved of what he had done.

Or perhaps Paul was troubled because his friends did not come to him. In that case, Christ’s visit itself was comfort enough, even without the words, “Be of good cheer, Paul.” Christ’s presence showed Paul that he was not forgotten.

The reason Christ gives is unusual comfort at first glance: “As you have testified about me in Jerusalem, so you must also bear witness in Rome.” It sounds almost cold to say, “You have suffered much for me, and you must suffer more.” Yet this was meant to strengthen Paul. It reminded him that his earlier troubles had been part of serving Christ as his witness.

It also told Paul that his work was not finished. Prison had not made him useless or set him aside from service. He was being kept for more work. Nothing troubled Paul more than the thought of being cut off from serving Christ and helping souls. Christ says, in effect, “Do not be afraid. I am not done with you.”

Paul also seems to have had a real desire, and a harmless one, to go to Rome and preach the gospel there. The gospel was already preached there, and a church had already been planted, but Paul, as a Roman citizen, longed to visit the city. He had planned to go there before, saying, “After I have been at Jerusalem, I must also see Rome” (Acts 19:21). He had also written to the Romans that he wanted to see them (Romans 1:11).

Now Paul may have thought those plans were ruined, and that he would never see Rome. But Christ tells him that he will still go there. In this way, Paul’s desire would be granted, since he wanted it for Christ’s honor and for the good of others.