The Bible Says
Acts 23:31-35 Meaning

In Acts 23:31-35, Paul is safely transported from Jerusalem to Caesarea and is accordingly delivered from a plot to assassinate him.

We previously saw that the Jews who wanted Paul dead had taken a vow to starve themselves until they had killed Paul (Acts 23:12). The plan was for the chief priests to lie to the Roman commander that they wanted to give Paul a second trial. When Paul was to be moved from the Roman barracks to the Council chambers, the Jewish assassins would attack Paul.

Paul’s nephew had informed the Roman commander about this ambush, so the commander, Claudius Lysias, mustered a small army to protect Paul and take him by night out of Jerusalem. The commander wrote a letter to Governor Felix, explaining the situation, so that Felix would have the background necessary to preside over a trial for Paul in Caesarea, safely away from the blades of assassins in Jerusalem.

Claudius Lysias’s plan to secretly transfer Paul out of the city is carried out:

So the soldiers, in accordance with their orders, took Paul and brought him by night to Antipatris. But the next day, leaving the horsemen to go on with him, they returned to the barracks (vs. 31-32).

The soldiers and horsemen escorting Paul were mustered that same day, “Get two hundred soldiers ready by the third hour of the night…with seventy horsemen and two hundred spearmen” (v. 23). The “third hour of the night” was nine o’clock. These soldiers, in accordance with their orders (meaning they obeyed the commands given to them), took Paul out of Jerusalem safely and marched all night down through the Judean hills into the coastal plain near the Mediterranean Sea.

This military unit of four hundred and seventy Roman soldiers brought Paul by night to Antipatris. Antipatris was a town about thirty miles northwest of Jerusalem. The soldiers clearly did not stop anywhere during the march if they made it to Antipatris by night.

We can speculate that in addition to having good reason to spirit Paul away from an assassination plot in Jerusalem, the commander might have viewed this as a training opportunity to keep his soldiers in shape.

According to some sources, Roman soldiers were kept in training to be able to march about twenty miles in five hours. The historian Josephus stated that Roman soldiers “never have a truce from training” and “their peace maneuvers are no less strenuous than veritable warfare.” He also said, “no fatigue exhausts them” (Josephus, The Jewish War, Book III, Chapter 5.1).

Although a normal daily march was more like twenty miles, at the end of that march the soldiers were expected to build fortifications. That would likely mean the legionaries (Roman soldiers) would be able to make the thirty-mile march to Antipatris by night as a matter of normal training regimen, given that they were only required to march.

They would have been able to arrive by morning. We are told the next day that the legionaries left the horsemen to go on with Paul, while the foot soldiers returned to the barracks in Jerusalem, and that this occurred on the next day. The next day could refer to the day following their arrival, with the soldiers remaining in Antipatris for a day and night then returning. However, the text seems to read that the next day referred to the next day after the night in which the soldiers brought Paul to Antipatris. Perhaps Luke included this detail to give his own nod to the resilience of the Roman soldier.

The text does not say that the soldiers made it all the way back to Jerusalem the next day. They might have taken a rest stop along the way. But we can infer that the commander was, for good reason, anxious to have his army at full strength sooner rather than later. It could be that he delayed telling the Jews their new trial venue was in Caesarea until his foot soldiers returned.

The objective was to remove the prisoner Paul far away from Jerusalem for his safety and the peace of the city. In Antipatris, Paul’s journey is paused, presumably for rest. The foot soldiers had departed, leaving the horsemen to go on with Paul, and they returned to the barracks. The barracks they returned to likely refers to the Antonia Fortress, a tower built into the temple complex in Jerusalem, where they had probably kept Paul during his imprisonment.

Once Paul was safely in Antipatris, with the escort of the seventy Roman horsemen, the threat on his life and the threat of a riot in Jerusalem were both substantially diminished. Only the seventy horsemen remained with Paul to take him the full distance to Caesarea.

Caesarea was located on the Mediterranean coast of Judea. Caesarea was built into a magnificent city by King Herod the Great (who was in power when Jesus was born-Matthew 2:1), and named after Caesar to flatter the Emperor. It was in Caesarea where the Roman governors of Judea preferred to live and rule, rather than Jerusalem, the actual capital of the Jews.

Caesarea was roughly another thirty-mile march from Antipatris. It was a Roman-style city built with Roman conveniences. The palace was right on the sea, lending it cool sea breezes. Caesarea had an ingeniously constructed man-made port that allowed for shipping and commerce.

The city also had a hippodrome (a racetrack) and arena for amusement. It was a fast getaway back to Italy via ship, if necessary. Caesarea would have been a much more familiar and comfortable location for a Roman governor compared to Jerusalem, particularly during months with warm weather. It is in Caesarea that the Holy Spirit was first given to the Gentiles (Acts 10:44-45).

Paul and the remainder of his escort (seventy horsemen) now cover the remaining near-thirty miles north from Antipatris to Caesarea:

When these had come to Caesarea and delivered the letter to the governor, they also presented Paul to him (v. 33).

The mission to safely transport Paul from the dangers of Jerusalem to the safety of Caesarea was now complete. The oath to assassinate Paul had failed. Luke writes that When these had come to Caesarea, referring to Paul and the seventy Roman horsemen, they delivered the Roman commander’s letter (Acts 23:25) to the governor, Felix. At the same time, they also presented Paul to him.

Governor Felix finds Commander Claudius Lysias’s proposal to be agreeable:

When he had read it, he asked from what province he was, and when he learned that he was from Cilicia, he said, “I will give you a hearing after your accusers arrive also,” giving orders for him to be kept in Herod’s Praetorium (vs. 34-35).

Felix read the letter and was now up to date on who Paul was and why he had been brought before him. Felix asked Paul from what province he was. He probably asked this because Claudius Lysias noted in his letter that Paul was a Roman citizen (Acts 23:27), so Felix naturally wondered where Paul originated from. Paul answers that he is from the province of Cilicia, which is in Anatolia (modern-day Turkey).

When Felix learned that Paul was from Cilicia, it apparently helps him decide whether or not he will agree to preside over a trial between Paul and his accusers. Felix may not have cared to go along with this arrangement had Paul been a non-Roman Jew from Judea or Samaria. During his term, Felix was cruel and exploitative of the Jewish people.

Years prior, in the province of Achaia (modern-day Greece), the Jews of Corinth tried to prosecute Paul before the proconsul, Gallio. But Gallio tossed the matter out of court, saying he had no interest in judging religious debates between Jews, and would only hear them if there was an accusation of murder or theft (Acts 18:14-15).

Here in Judea, Paul is also being “accused over questions about [Jewish] Law, but under no accusation deserving death or imprisonment” (v. 29). Felix seems inclined to give Paul a hearing because of the plot to assassinate him and the fact that he is a Roman citizen from the Roman province of Cilicia. As governor, Felix has dealt with several different insurrections (one of which he allegedly stoked the flames and profited from-Tacitus. Annals. 12.54). We also learn in the following chapter that he is angling for a bribe from Paul (Acts 24:26).

The hearing will be held after Paul’s accusers arrive in Caesarea also. Some of the elites in the Sanhedrin (the Jewish council)-Paul’s accusers-are likely just now being informed of Paul’s new whereabouts. They had been part of the plot to bring Paul down from the Roman barracks in Jerusalem to stand before trial a second time in front of the Sanhedrin, with the true intention of Paul being assassinated by an ambush of forty-plus conspirators. Now the Roman commander has outmaneuvered them, informing them “The trial has a change of location.”

By now, Paul’s accusers had learned that the Romans had escorted Paul all the way to the coast, and further trials would be overseen by the Roman governor. Five days later, the high priest Ananias himself will come to accuse Paul, joined by an entourage of Jewish elders and a lawyer, Tertullus (Acts 24:1).

In the meantime, Felix gave orders for Paul to be kept prisoner in Herod’s Praetorium. Herod’s Praetorium (headquarters) was the palace which Herod the Great built for himself, in which subsequent Roman governors would live during their tenure. It was a large, lavish palace with its own Olympic-sized swimming pool.

Paul, as a Roman citizen, appears to have been treated fairly well by being housed in the palace prison, rather than the general prison in Caesarea. He will remain in Caesarea for two years, often being invited to speak with Felix, and on another occasion with King Agrippa II. He will eventually see that he cannot get a fair trial here either and appeal to Caesar, which will take him on his long-awaited journey to Rome.