{"author":null,"canonical_references":[],"database_sha256":"8cfbe7284c6936871d57c02dc6aa63ebbdfd4722422d539dd9f716e46e91112e","date_end":null,"date_start":null,"edition_year":null,"id":"sermonindex-ecf-3296","native_reference":{"book_number":510,"chapter_from":9,"chapter_to":9,"system":"MyBible module coordinates (mapping unverified)","verse_from":9,"verse_to":9},"public_import_allowed":false,"record_kind":"verse-keyed-module-record","review_required":["English edition and exact text","author/work attribution","dating","verse mapping and citation kind","reuse and attribution","split author quotations and deduplicate"],"review_status":"unreviewed","source_html":"<p><b>Bede</b>: And he was without sight for three days. Because he had not believed that the Lord had conquered death by rising on the third day, he is now instructed by his own example, who would change the darkness of three days with the returning light.<br/><i>— Commentary on Acts</i></p><p><b>John Chrysostom</b>: And for three days he neither did eat nor drink, being blinded. What could equal this? To compensate the discouragement in the matter of Stephen, here is encouragement, in the bringing in of Paul: though that sadness had its consolation in the fact of Stephen's making such an end, yet it also received this further consolation: moreover, the bringing in of the villages of the Samaritans afforded very great comfort.<br/><i>— Homily on Acts 19</i></p><p><b>John Chrysostom</b>: But why did this take place not at the very first, but after these things? That it might be shown that Christ was indeed risen. This furious assailant of Christ, the man who would not believe in His death and resurrection, the persecutor of His disciples, how should this man have become a believer, had not the power of His resurrection been great indeed?<br/><i>— Homily on Acts 19</i></p><p><b>John Chrysostom</b>: Be it so, that the other Apostles favored His pretensions: what say you to this man? Why then not immediately after His resurrection? That his hostility might be more clearly shown as open war. The man who is so frantic as even to shed blood and cast men into prisons, all at once believes! It was not enough that he had never been in Christ's company: the believers must be warred upon by him with vehement hostility: he left to none the possibility of going beyond him in fury: none of them all could be so violent.<br/><i>— Homily on Acts 19</i></p><p><b>John Chrysostom</b>: And he eat not, neither drank: he condemned himself for the past, he confessed, prayed, besought God. But should any say, This was the effect of compulsion: we answer, The same thing happened to Elymas: then how came it that he was not changed? What evidence could be more compulsory than the earthquake at the Resurrection, the report of the soldiers, the other miracles, the seeing Himself risen? But these things do not compel belief, they are calculated to teach it.<br/><i>— Homily on Acts 19</i></p><p><b>John Chrysostom</b>: Why did not the Jews believe when they were told of these things? That he spoke truth was manifest: for he would not have been changed, had this not happened; so that all were bound to believe. He was not inferior to them that preached the Resurrection, and was more credible, by being all at once converted. He had no intercourse with any of the believers; it was at Damascus that he was converted, or rather before he came to Damascus that this happened to him.<br/><i>— Homily on Acts 19</i></p><p><b>John Chrysostom</b>: I ask the Jew: Say, by what was Paul converted? He saw so many signs, and was not converted: his teacher Gamaliel was converted, and he remained unconverted. Who convinced him-and not only convinced, but all at once inspired him with such ardent zeal? Wherefore was it, that he wished even to go into hell itself for Christ's sake? The truth of the facts is manifest.<br/><i>— Homily on Acts 19</i></p><p><b>Oecumenius</b>: Because he judged himself most harshly over the persecution of the Church, and, grieved, he begged God to be forgiven.<br/><i>— Commentary on Acts</i></p><p><b>Philoxenus of Mabbug</b>: And again it is written concerning Paul, that before he was baptized, and received the Holy Spirit, he neither ate nor drank for three days, nor rose up from his place, because he was lying upon his face praying, and thus he received the Holy Ghost. And he was occupied in fasting and prayer during the whole of the remaining period of his life after his election, even as he himself testifieth everywhere concerning his fasting, and his prayer, and his many tribulations which he bore for the sake of the Gospel.<br/><i>— 13 Ascetic Discourses, Discourse 11 -- On Abstinence</i></p>","source_html_sha256":"2729e89e2e4ca389d08f4ff4f5002086038c4e28f0fd6142a6a93c84ff38b3dc","source_module":"ECF","source_row_id":3296,"source_url":"https://www.sermonindex.net/commentary/ecf/","text_sha256":"d70fb81d774040d5843856bb2e19cd2dd631d1c26014ef9d9f838a4065ae0f43","translator":null,"work":null}