Then they traveled through Amphipolis and Apollonia and came to Thessalonica, where there was a Jewish synagogue.

Some of the people were convinced, and threw in their lot with Paul and Silas, as did also a large body of Greeks who were accustomed to join in the Jewish services, and a great number of women belonging to the leading families.

But the Jewish leaders became jealous, and they took some contemptible characters who used to hang out in the public square, formed a mob, and started a riot in the city. They attacked Jason's home and searched it for Paul and Silas in order to bring them out to the people.

The brothers immediately sent Paul and Silas away by night to Beroea. When they arrived, they went into the Jewish synagogue.

But when the Jewish leaders in Thessalonica found out that the word of God had been proclaimed by Paul also in Berea, they went there to upset and incite the crowds.

where he found a Jewish man named Aquila, a native of Pontus, who had recently come from Italy with his wife Priscilla because Claudius had ordered all the Jews to leave Rome. Paul came to them,

While Gallio was proconsul of Achaia, the Jewish leaders gathered together, attacked Paul, and brought him before the judge's seat.

Paul was about to speak when Gallio admonished the Jewish leaders, "If there were some misdemeanor or crime involved, it would be reasonable to put up with you Jews.

When they arrived at Ephesus, Paul left Priscilla and Aquila there. He then went into the [Jewish] synagogue and held discussions with the Jews.

Paul went into the Jewish synagogue and spoke boldly for three months, discussing and convincing people about matters regarding the kingdom of God.

And certain of the Jewish exorcists also, who went about, took in hand to call upon those who had wicked spirits the name of the Lord Jesus, saying, I adjure you by Jesus, whom Paul preaches.

And there were certain men, seven sons of Sceva, Jewish high priest, who were doing this.

[It appears that] Alexander was appointed out of the crowd by the Jews [i.e., to be their spokesman in defending them from the charges being made against Paul]. He motioned with his hand [to get attention] and attempted to speak to the assembly in defense [of the Jewish viewpoint].

And we [ourselves] sailed away from Philippi after the Festival of Unleavened Bread [Note: This was the Jewish feast commemorating deliverance from Egyptian bondage], and five days later [we] joined them at Troas [i.e., the seven men mentioned in verses

He came to us, took Paul's belt, and tied his own feet and hands with it. Then he said, "The Holy Spirit says, "This is how the Jewish leaders in Jerusalem will tie up the man who owns this belt. Then they will hand him over to the gentiles.'"

And when they heard [all] this, they gave honor to God, then said to Paul, "Brother, you can see how many thousands of Jewish believers [in Christ] there are [everywhere] and all of them are eager to observe the [requirements of the] law of Moses.

Now these Jewish Christians have been informed that you are teaching all the Jews living among the Gentiles to give up [following the teaching of] Moses, [even] telling them not to circumcise their children and not to practice the [other] customs [of the Jewish religion].

Join these men, share their purification, and bear their expenses, so that they may shave their heads; and then all will see that there is no truth in what they have been told about you, but that, on the contrary, you yourself rule your life in obedience to the Jewish Law.

They laid hands on him, crying out, "Men of Israel, help! help! This is the man who goes everywhere preaching to everybody against the Jewish people and the Law and this place. And besides, he has even brought Gentiles into the Temple and has desecrated this holy place."

But Paul said, "I am a Jewish man from Tarsus in Cilicia, a citizen of no unimportant city. Now I ask you, allow me to speak to the people."

"I am a Jewish man born in Tarsus in Cilicia, but brought up in this city at the feet of Gamaliel, educated according to the exactness of the law received from our fathers, being zealous for God, just as all [of] you are today.

The head priest can also verify all this, and so can the body of [Jewish] elders. They furnished me with letters to our fellow-Jews in Damascus, to which I also traveled to bring people back here to Jerusalem, bound in chains to be punished.

There a man named Ananias, a strict observer of our Law, well spoken of by all the Jewish inhabitants, came to see me.

But the next day the commander released Paul [from the chains] because he wanted to know what specific charges the Jews has against him. So, he ordered the leading priests and the entire [Jewish] Council to assemble, then brought Paul down and placed him in front of them.

Paul [then] looked intently at the Council [i.e., the Jewish supreme court called the "Sanhedrin"] and spoke [in his defense]: "Brothers, I have lived before God with a good conscience all my life."

In the morning, the Jewish leaders formed a conspiracy and took an oath not to eat or drink anything before they had killed Paul.

They went to the leading priests and [Jewish] elders and told them, "We have bound ourselves under an oath [with serious consequences] to eat nothing until we have killed Paul.

Therefore, [all of] you, together with the Jewish Council, should notify the commander so that he will bring Paul [back] down to you, as though you wanted to consider his case further. Then we will be ready to kill him, [even] before he comes near [you]."

He answered, "The Jewish leaders have agreed to ask you to bring Paul down to the Council tomorrow as though they were going to examine his case more carefully.

Then he called two of his officers and said, "Get two hundred soldiers ready to go to Caesarea, along with seventy horsemen and two hundred spearmen, by nine o'clock tonight." [Note: This was calculated according to Jewish time].

Five days later the head priest, Ananias, came down [to Caesarea] with certain [Jewish] elders and an attorney [named] Tertullus, who brought their case against Paul before the governor.

The Jewish leaders supported his accusations by asserting that these things were true.

And after some days, [when] Felix arrived with his wife Drusilla, who was Jewish, he sent for Paul and listened to him concerning faith in Christ Jesus.

The high priests and Jewish leaders informed him of their charges against Paul, urging

When Paul arrived, the Jewish leaders who had come down from Jerusalem surrounded him and began bringing a number of serious charges against him that they couldn't prove.

while Paul made the defense that, “Neither against the Jewish law, nor against the temple, nor against Caesar have I sinned at all.”

But Festus, wishing to do the Jews a favor, answered Paul, “Are you willing to go up to Jerusalem and stand trial there in my presence [before the Jewish Sanhedrin] on these charges?”

But Paul said, "I am standing before the emperor's judgment seat where I ought to be tried. I haven't done anything wrong to the Jewish leaders, as you know very well.

When I went to Jerusalem, the high priests and the Jewish elders informed me about him and asked me to condemn him.

Then Festus said, “King Agrippa and all you gentlemen present with us, you see this man [Paul] about whom all the Jewish people appealed to me, both at Jerusalem and here, loudly insisting that he ought not to live any longer.

"I consider myself fortunate that it is before you, King Agrippa, that I can defend myself today against all the accusations of the Jewish leaders,

especially because you are an expert [fully knowledgeable, experienced and unusually conversant] in all the Jewish customs and controversial issues; therefore, I beg you to listen to me patiently.

[choosing you for Myself and] rescuing you from the Jewish people and from the Gentiles, to whom I am sending you,

For this reason the Jewish leaders grabbed me in the Temple and kept trying to kill me.

that the Christ (the Messiah, the Anointed) was to suffer, and that He by being the first to rise from the dead [with an incorruptible body] would proclaim light (salvation) both to the Jewish people and to the Gentiles.”

After three days Paul called the local Jewish leaders together. When they had assembled, he said to them, "Brothers, although I had done nothing against our people or the customs of our ancestors, from Jerusalem I was handed over as a prisoner to the Romans.

They said to him, “We have not received [any] letters about you from Judea, nor have any of the [Jewish] brothers come here and reported or said anything bad about you.

Now the practice of circumcision [i.e., the Jewish rite of identity, signifying the responsibility to observe the law of Moses] is worthwhile, providing you obey [the rest of] the law of Moses. But if you disobey the law, you might as well have never been circumcised.

Neither are all [Jewish] people children [of God], [simply] because they are Abraham's descendants. But [Gen. 21:12 says], "It is through Isaac that you [i.e., Abraham] will have descendants."

now if their fall be to the advancement of the world, and the few converts among them bring in whole numbers of the Gentiles: how much more so will it be, when the Jewish body recover?

[A summary of Jer. 31:31-34 says], "And I [i.e., God] will make this Agreement with them [i.e., Jewish and Gentile believers] when I take away their sins."

For they thought it was a good idea, and [besides] they were indebted to those Jewish Christians. For if the Gentiles [have] shared in the spiritual blessings of the Jews, [then] they owe it to those Jews to help meet their material needs.

For I received from the Lord what I also handed on to you: On the night the Lord Jesus was turned over [to the Jewish authorities] He took bread,

But I will wait [here] in Ephesus until the Day of Pentecost [Note: This was an annual Jewish festival, held at spring harvest time];

You have heard of my career and former manner of life in Judaism, how I used to hunt down and persecute the church of God extensively and [with fanatical zeal] tried [my best] to destroy it.

I advanced in the Jewish religion beyond many of my contemporaries among my countrymen. I have been extremely more zealous in advocating the traditions [taught] by my forefathers.

to reveal His Son in me so that I might preach Him among the Gentiles [as the good news—the way of salvation], I did not immediately consult with anyone [for guidance regarding God’s call and His revelation to me].

The rest of the Jewish converts were guilty of the same hypocrisy, so that even Barnabas was led away by it.

As soon as I saw that they were not walking uprightly in the spirit of the Good News, I said to Peter, before them all, "If you, though you are a Jew, live as a Gentile does, and not as a Jew, how can you make the Gentiles follow Jewish customs?

So also we [whether Jews or Gentiles], when we were children (spiritually immature), were kept like slaves under the elementary [man-made religious or philosophical] teachings of the world.

Believers, I beg of you, become as I am [free from the bondage of Jewish ritualism and ordinances], for I have become as you are [a Gentile]. You did me no wrong [when I first came to you; do not do it now].

Look, I Paul am telling you that, if you revert to [the practice of] circumcision [i.e., the Jewish rite of identity, signifying the responsibility to observe the law of Moses], then Christ's [sacrifice] will be of no value to you.

It is in [fellowship with] Christ that we [Jewish Christians] also were selected as [God's] inheritance [i.e., to receive His never ending blessings], having been predetermined according to the plan of God, who works out everything in harmony with what He wants.

The end [i.e., of being so predetermined] was that we [Jewish Christians], who had previously placed our hope in Christ, should bring about the praise of God's splendor.

by abolishing in His fleshly body the [entire Jewish] law of commandments contained in decrees. [This was] so that He could create in [unity with] Himself one new person [i.e., the church] out of the two peoples [i.e., Jews and Gentiles], thereby bringing about peace [between them].

Watch out for the "dogs!" [Note: "Dogs" were viewed with disgust by the ancient Jews (Deut. 23:18; II Kings 8:13; Rev. 22:15), so the term is used here derogatorily for Jewish Christians who were trying to impose on the church the requirements of the law of Moses]. Watch out for the evil workers! Watch out for those who mutilate the body meaninglessly! [Note: Paul here alludes, in a derogatory wordplay, to the Jewish practice of circumcision].

[I was] circumcised eight days after I was born; [I am] from the nation of Israelites; from the tribe of Benjamin and of Hebrew ancestry [i.e., an outstanding Hebrew]. As far as the law of Moses is concerned, [I am] a Pharisee [i.e., a strict sect of the Jewish religion].

Let no man condemn you, from an affectation of humility, in worshipping of Angels, boldly prying into matters which he knows nothing of, being vainly puft up with his Jewish conceits:

If then you are dead with Christ, in respect of those shadows of the Jewish state; why do ye, as if you were still in that state, submit to those ordinances?

And Jesus who is called Justus also sends greetings. In terms of Jewish converts, these are the only fellow workers for the kingdom of God, and they have been a comfort to me.

Those Jewish persecutors killed both the Lord Jesus and the Prophets, and drove us out of their midst. They are displeasing to God, and are the enemies of all mankind;

For there are many rebellious people, idle talkers, and deceivers, especially those with Jewish connections,

Not giving heed to Jewish fables, and commandments of men, that turn from the truth.

and of teaching about immersions [Note: The use of the plural word here suggests teaching on the distinctions between Jewish washings and John's and Christian immersion, whether in water or the Holy Spirit. See Acts 19:1-7], and about placing hands on people [Note: This act was practiced in the appointment of church leaders, in healing sick people and to impart supernatural gifts], and about people being raised from the dead and about never ending judgment.

We Christians have an altar from which the ministers of the Jewish Tent have no right to eat.

[This letter is from] James, a slave of God and of the Lord Jesus Christ, [who sends] greetings to the twelve tribes which are scattered throughout the world. [Note: This refers to Christians, probably of Jewish descent].

Then I heard the number of those who were sealed. [It was] one hundred forty-four thousand [in all] from every tribe of the Israelites [Note: This could refer to Christians of Jewish descent].

And great hail of about the weight of a talent [the Attic talent, pounds, the Jewish, 113] came down from heaven upon men; and men blasphemed God on account of the plague of the hail because its plague was very great.