crying out, “Men of Israel, help! This is the man who is teaching everyone everywhere against the people and the law and this place. Moreover, he even brought Greeks into the temple and has defiled this holy place.”
28. Men of Israel, help. They cry out as if they were in extreme danger, and they call upon all men to help them, as if all religion were in hazard. Whereby we see with what furious hatred they were inflamed against Paul, only because in showing that the full and perfect truth is found in Christ, he taught that the figures of the law had an end.
Paul seized in the very temple where he ought to have been safe, where his blood nearly mingles with the sacrifices themselves. The informers were Jews of Asia, men who lived abroad in pursuit of gain, yet now they appear zealous for a sanctuary they habitually neglected, profaning with their own hands the place they pretend to guard.
AI summary
Commenting on Acts 21:27-40
Crying out, men of Israel, help,.... The Arabic and Ethiopic versions read, "help us"; to hold Paul, on whom they had laid their hands, and to assist in beating him: but why such an outcry for help against a single man, and he but little of stature, and weak in body, and so easily held and overpowered?