Expositor's Dictionary of Texts - Acts 26:1-32
Reasons for Doubt Acts 26:8 That is a new apologetic; that is a Strategic move of the first order. This is new to me; that is a masterstroke. What a sagacious statesman was the Apostle Paul! Hitherto we had been thinking that it was the place of faith to give reasons; the Apostle pushes the war to the other side, and says, You must give reasons for your doubt. Why, that opens a wide field of criticism and observation and profitable comment. It is the Apostle who says, Stand up, and defend... read more
Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers - Acts 26:17
(17) From the Gentiles, unto whom now I send thee.—The distinct mission to the Gentiles seems, in Acts 22:21, to be connected with the trance in the Temple, three years after the conversion. Galatians 1:15-16, however, agrees with what we find hero in connecting it with the very time when the Son of God was first “revealed in him.” The distinction between “the people,” i.e., Israel, as emphatically entitled to that name, and “nations,” the “Gentiles,” should be noted. (Comp. Note on Acts 4:25.)... read more