Acts 26
1
And Agrippa said to Paul, You are permitted to speak for yourself. Then Paul stretched
forth his hand, and made his defence:
2
I think myself happy, king Agrippa, that I am to make my defense before you this day
touching all the things whereof I am accused by the Jews:
3
especially because you are expert in all customs and questions which are among the
Jews: wherefore I beseech you to hear me patiently.
4
My manner of life then from my youth up, which was from the beginning among mine own
nation and at Jerusalem, know all the Jews;
5
having knowledge of me from the first, if they be willing to testify, that after the
straitest sect of our religion I lived a Pharisee.
6
And now I stand [here] to be judged for the hope of the promise made of God to our
fathers;
7
to which [promise] our twelve tribes, earnestly serving [God] night and day, hope
to attain. And concerning this hope I am accused by the Jews, O king!
8
Why is it judged incredible with you, if God does raise the dead?
9
I truly thought with myself that I ought to do many things contrary to the name of
Jesus of Nazareth.
10
And this I also did in Jerusalem: and I both shut up many of the saints in prisons,
having received authority from the chief priests, and when they were put to death
I gave my vote against them.
11
And punishing them oftentimes in all the synagogues, I strove to make them blaspheme;
and being exceedingly mad against them, I persecuted them even to foreign cities.
12
Whereupon as I journeyed to Damascus with the authority and commission of the chief
priests,
13
at midday, O king, I saw on the way a light from heaven, above the brightness of the
sun, shining round about me and them that journeyed with me.
14
And when we were all fallen to the earth, I heard a voice saying to me in the Hebrew
language, Saul, Saul, why persecute you me? it is hard for you to kick against the
goad.
15
And I said, Who are you, Lord? And the Lord said, I am Jesus whom you persecute.
16
But arise, and stand upon your feet: for to this end have I appeared to you, to appoint
you a minister and a witness both of the things wherein you have seen me, and of the
things wherein I will appear to you;
17
delivering you from the people, and from the Gentiles, to whom I send you,
18
to open their eyes, that they may turn from darkness to light and from the power of
Satan to God, that they may receive remission of sins and an inheritance among them
that are sanctified by faith in me.
19
Wherefore, O king Agrippa, I was not disobedient to the heavenly vision:
20
but declared both to them of Damascus first and at Jerusalem, and throughout all the
country of Judea, and also to the Gentiles, that they should repent and turn to God,
doing works worthy of repentance.
21
For this cause the Jews seized me in the temple, and tried to kill me.
22
Having therefore obtained the help that is from God, I stand to this day testifying
both to small and great, saying nothing but what the prophets and Moses did say should
come;
23
how that the Christ must suffer, [and] how that he first by the resurrection of the
dead should proclaim light both to the people and to the Gentiles.
24
And as he thus made his defense, Festus says with a loud voice, Paul, you are mad;
your much learning is turning you mad.
25
But Paul says, I am not mad, most excellent Festus; but speak forth words of truth
and soberness.
26
For the king knows of these things, to whom also I speak freely: for I am persuaded
that none of these things is hidden from him; for this has not been done in a corner.
27
King Agrippa, believe you the prophets? I know that you believe.
28
And Agrippa [said] to Paul, With but little persuasion you would fain make me a Christian.
29
And Paul [said], I would to God, that whether with little or with much, not you only,
but also all that hear me this day, might become such as I am, except these bonds.
30
And the king rose up, and the governor, and Bernice, and they that sat with them:
31
and when they had withdrawn, they spoke one to another, saying, This man does nothing
worthy of death or of bonds.
32
And Agrippa said to Festus, This man might have been set at liberty, if he had not
appealed to Caesar.