Acts 21:31

Acts 21:31. And as they went about to kill him, tidings came onto the chief captain of the band, that all Jerusalem was in an uproar. Preparations apparently were actually going on to execute summary justice on the apostle. The crowds that came hurrying over the bridge no doubt hindered the arrangements for his death, and gave time to the Roman officer to come upon the scene of the tumult. Philo tells us that any uncircumcised person who ventured within the separating wall might be stoned to death without any further trial. But this would only apply to the case of the Ephesian Trophimus, who was not found in the temple. As for Paul, any such procedure in his case would have been simply a murder, hence the rapid interference of the Roman authority. ‘The chief captain,' literally ‘chili-arch,' or chief of a thousand, was Claudius Lysias (chap, Acts 23:26). He commanded the division of the Roman force which garrisoned Jerusalem, and was stationed in the fortress of Antonia, a castle built so as to overlook the temple and its courts.

This castle (Acts 21:37) or tower of Antonia, where the Roman force which at that period watched the temple was lodged, was built by the Asmonean princes for a residence under the name of Baris. Herod the Great rebuilt it with considerable splendour, and named it ‘Antonia,' after the Triumvir Mark Antony.

This fortress stood at the north-west corner of the temple area, and it communicated with the temple cloisters by means of two flights of steps. It stood on lower ground than the platform of the House, but it was raised to such a height that at least one of its four turrets commanded a view of what was going on in the courts within.

The ordinary Roman garrison was probably increased at the times of the great Jewish festivals such as Pentecost, as in these troubled and exciting periods, when the people were full of religious fanaticism, an outbreak among the pilgrims gathered together was not unusual. The officer here called the chief captain was commander of a thousand men. This appears to have been the number of the forces stationed during this Pentecost in Antonia.