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Commentary Index | Return to PrayerRequest.com | DownloadBob Utley You Can Understand the Bible - Acts 23:12 - 23:15
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This Chapter Verse Commentaries:
NASB (UPDATED) TEXT: Act_23:12-15
12When it was day, the Jews formed a conspiracy and bound themselves under an oath, saying that they would neither eat nor drink until they had killed Paul. 13There were more than forty who formed this plot. 14They came to the chief priests and the elders and said, "We have bound ourselves under a solemn oath to taste nothing until we have killed Paul. 15"Now therefore, you and the Council notify the commander to bring him down to you, as though you were going to determine his case by a more thorough investigation; and we for our part are ready to slay him before he comes near the place."
Act_23:12-15 This paragraph informs us of the assassination pact of some of the Jews. This is another premeditated murder (cf. Act_23:21) like the one the Jews planned for Jesus.
Act_23:13 "more than forty" Forty is a Jewish idiom for a long, indefinite period of time, but here it is used of persons, so it is probably literal. See Special Topic: Numbers in Scripture at Act_1:3.
Act_23:14 "the chief priests and the elders" This was an abbreviated way of referring to the Sanhedrin. See Special Topic at Act_4:5.
NASB "we have bound ourselves under a solemn oath"
NKJV "we have bound ourselves under a great oath"
NRSV "we have strictly bound ourselves by an oath"
TEV "we have taken a solemn vow"
NJB "we have made a solemn vow"
These English translations are an attempt to translate a cognate idiomatic phrase, "with a curse we curse ourselves." These oath-takers did not kill Paul. I wonder if they starved to death? Apparently the oral tradition allowed a way out of these blood oaths. See Special Topic following.
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