Acts 22:25

προέτειναν : “and when they had tied him up with the thongs,” R.V., i.e., with the ligatures which kept the body extended and fixed while under flogging; Vulgate, “cum astrinxissent eum loris”; but προέ. is rather “stretched him forward with the thongs,” i.e., bound him to a pillar or post in a tense posture for receiving the blows, see critical note. Blass takes προέτειναν as an imperfect, cf. Acts 28:2. τοῖς ἱμᾶσιν : referring to the thongs usually employed for so binding, and this seems borne out by Acts 22:29 δεδεκώς : not “for the thongs,” as in R.V. margin, so Lewin, Blass, Weiss and others, as if = μάστιξ. Grimm admits that the word may be used either of the leathern thongs with which a person was bound or was beaten, but here he prefers the latter. τὸν ἑστῶτα ἑκατόν.: the centurion who presided over the scourging, just as a centurion was appointed to be in charge over the execution of our Lord; on the form ἑκατόν., only here in Acts, see Simcox, Language of the N.T., p. 30, and see Moulton and Geden, sub v. - άρχης, and above on Acts 10:1. εἰ : “interrogatio subironica est, confidentiæ plena,” Blass (so Wendt). καὶ : “and that too,” δύο τὰ ἐγκήματα · καὶ τὸ ἄνευ λὁγου καὶ τὸ Ῥωμαῖον ὄντα, Chrys., cf. Acts 16:37. The torture was illegal in the case of a Roman citizen, although it might be employed in the case of slaves and foreigners: Digest. Leg. 48, tit. 18, c. 1. “Et non esse a tormentis incipiendum Div. Augustus constituit.” At Philippi St. Paul had probably not been heard in his protests on account of the din and tumult: “nunc quia illi negotium est cum Romanis militibus, qui modestius et gravius se gerebant, occasione utitur” Calvin.