Acts 23:2

‘And the high priest Ananias commanded those who stood by him to smite him on the mouth.'

The chairman of the council, the High Priest Ananias, then commanded that he be smitten on the mouth. This was possibly a preemptory reminder of who was in charge. A modern judge would have sternly told him that he must wait until he was called on. Or it may have been in order to suggest that he was not treating the aristocracy with sufficient deference. Normally they would be addressed as, "Rulers of the people and elders of Israel." Or perhaps it was just in order to indicate that he must not be so arrogant in front of his betters. Ananias was himself an arrogant man and full of his own self-importance, and by this demonstrated his arrogance and unfitness to be presiding. But prisoners, whether guilty or not, were often treated contemptuously by courts, and we have here another example of the way in which Paul was seen as ‘following in His steps', for Jesus had been treated in a similar way (compare John 18:22). It is the way the Master went, shall not the servant read it still?