Acts 22:22-29

After the Speech, in the Barracks. Like Stephen, Paul is interrupted, and threatened with stoning. The throwing dust into the air is probably to be understood as an expression of blind fury (cf. 2Ma_4:41). But the tribune takes him into the barracks and proceeds himself to deal with him. The story is taken up from Acts 21:38. If Paul is a leader of sedition, the case must be dealt with instantly. The examination was to be with scourging, as was customary with slaves and persons not citizens (see Luke 23:16). The apostle is being stretched out for (mg.) the scourging with leather thongs, when he remonstrates with the centurion in charge (as at Philippi, Acts 16:37) that he is a Roman who must not be subjected to such usage, and that there has been no trial. The tribune comes to inquire into the first point: he is a Roman himself, by purchase, and knows he has gone too far. It was a crime to bind a Roman citizen (Cic. in Verrem, ii. 5). On Paul's citizenship, which he inherited from his father, as he perhaps from his, see Ramsay, Cities of Paul: Tarsus.