Biblion Bible Commentary
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Great pomp, and nothing to write
Acts 25:23-27
23 So on the next day, when Agrippa and Bernice had come with great pomp, and they had entered into the place of hearing with the commanding officers and the principal men of the city, at the command of Festus, Paul was brought in. · WEB
The grandest audience in the book assembles to hear a prisoner, and the governor's opening admits he has no charge to put on the paperwork.
On the next day, when Agrippa and Bernice had come with great pomp, and they had entered into the place of hearing with the commanding officers and the principal men of the city. The writer lets the display stand without comment, and the contrast makes itself: royal ceremony, five military tribunes, the leading citizens of a provincial capital — and then, at the command of Festus, Paul was brought in, in chains.
It is worth remembering who assembled that room. This is not a trial; the appeal has been made and the case is out of Festus' hands. The whole occasion exists because a king was curious and a governor had a document to draft. Every person of consequence in Caesarea has turned out to hear a prisoner talk, and none of them intended to be evangelized.
Festus opens by describing the pressure he has been under. All the multitude of the Jews petitioned me, both at Jerusalem and here, crying that he ought not to live any longer. The demand has been continuous and in two cities, and its content is death.
Against that he sets his own finding, and it is unambiguous: I found that he had committed nothing worthy of death. This is the fourth Roman authority to say so — a proconsul, magistrates, a tribune, and now a governor — and a king and his council will make it five before the chapter after this one closes.
Then the admission the scene turns on: of whom I have no certain thing to write to my lord.
A prisoner is being sent to the emperor with an appeal, and the governor forwarding him cannot state what he is accused of. The legal report requires charges, and Festus does not have any that would survive being written down. His closing sentence is a confession of the absurdity: it seems to me unreasonable, in sending a prisoner, not to also specify the charges against him.
That is the position the case has reached after two years, two governors, and repeated hearings. Nobody has produced a witness, nobody has proved anything, everyone in authority who has examined it has found nothing, and the man is still in chains — because releasing him would displease the people who want him dead.
The purpose of the assembly is therefore not justice but paperwork. Festus wants Agrippa's expertise so that after examination I may have something to write. The most distinguished audience Paul ever addressed was convened to help a bureaucrat fill in a form.
And the phrase my lord, used of the emperor, is a small detail that would have registered with any Christian reading this. The title Festus gives Caesar is the one the church gives Jesus, and Paul is about to spend a speech explaining which of them he serves.
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