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From: Acts 16:22-34

Imprisonment of Paul and Silas

[22] The crowd joined in attacking them; and the magistrates tore the garments
off them and gave orders to beat them with rods. [23] And when they had inflicted
many blows upon them, they threw them into prison, charging the jailer to keep
them safely. [24] Having received this charge, he put them into the inner prison
and fastened their feet in the stocks.

The Baptism of the Jailer

[25] But about midnight Paul and Silas were praying and singing hymns to God,
and the prisoners were listening to them, [26] and suddenly there was a great
earthquake, so that the foundations of the prison were shaken; and immediately
all the doors were opened and every one’s fetters were unfastened. [27] When
the jailer woke and saw that the prison doors were open, he drew his sword and
was about to kill himself, supposing that the prisoners had escaped. [28] But
Paul cried with a loud voice, “Do not harm yourself, for we are all here.” [29] And
he called for lights and rushed in, and trembling with fear he fell down before Paul
and Silas, [30] and brought them out and said, “Men, what must I do to be saved?”
[31] And they said, “Believe in the Lord Jesus, and you will be saved, you and
your household.” [32] And they spoke the word of the Lord to him and to all that
were in his house. [33] And he took them the same hour of the night, and washed
their wounds, and he was baptized at once with all his family. [34] Then he
brought them up into his house, and set food before them; and he rejoiced with
all his household that he had believed in God.

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Commentary:

19-40. This is the first time St Paul comes into conflict with Gentiles. As might
be expected, the incident does not take the form of a riot, as happened in cities
of Asia Minor (13:50; 14:5, 19), but of a civil suit before local magistrates. The
people who bring the charge say nothing about their real reason — loss of profit.
They accuse Paul of two things. Their first charge is disturbance of the peace.
The second seems to be based on regulations forbidding Roman citizens to prac-
tice alien cults, especially where these conflict with Roman custom. They see
Paul’s exorcism and his preaching as an attempt to propagate what they see as
an unacceptable religion. It may well be that the charge also had to do with spe-
cific prohibitions on the propagation of Judaism to non-Jews. However, there is
no hard evidence that any such prohibition existed; therefore, the charge against
Paul must have been based on regulations in the colony separating Roman from
alien religious practices.

23. St Paul refers specifically to this punishment in 1 Thess 2:2. It was one of
the three beatings mentioned in 2 Cor 11:25.

24. St John Chrysostom, reflecting on the punishment Paul and Silas underwent,
sees them as sitting or lying on the ground, covered with wounds caused by the
beating. He contrasts this suffering with the way many people avoid anything
which involves effort, discomfort or suffering: “How we should weep over the dis-
orders of our time! The apostles were subjected to the worst kinds of tribulation,
and here we are, spending our time in search of pleasure and diversion. This pur-
suit of leisure and pleasure is the cause of our ruin. We do not see the value of
suffering even the least injury or insult for love of Jesus Christ.

“Let us remember the tribulations the saints experienced; nothing alarmed them
or scared them. Severe humiliations made them tough, enabled them to do God’s
work. They did not say, if we are preaching Jesus Christ, why does he not come
to our rescue?” (”Hom. on Acts”, 35).

25. Paul and Silas spend the night praying and singing hymns. Commenting on
this passage St John Chrysostom exhorts Christians to do the same and to sanc-
tify night-time rest: “Show by your example that the night-time is not just for re-
covering the strength of your body: it is also a help in sanctifying your soul. [...]
You do not have to say long prayers; one prayer, said well, is enough. [...] Offer
God this sacrifice of a moment of prayer and he will reward you” (”Hom. on Acts”,
36).

St Bede notes the example Paul and Silas give Christians who are experiencing
trials or temptations: “The piety and energy which fires the heart of the apostles
expresses itself in prayer and brings them to sing hymns even in prison. Their
praise causes the earth to move, the foundations to quake, the doors to open
and even their fetters to break. Similarly, that Christian who rejoices when he is
happy, let him rejoice also in his weakness, when he is tempted, so that Christ’s
strength come to his aid. And then let him praise the Lord with hymns, as Paul
and Silas did in the darkness of their prison, and sing with the psalmist, ‘Thou
does encompass me with deliverance’ (Ps 32:7)” (St Bede, “Super Act Exposi-
tio, ad loc.”).

30-34. This incident so affects the jailer with religious awe that he comes to be
converted. He has been helped to react in this way as a result of listening to the
prayers and hymns of the apostles: “Notice how the jailer reveres the apostles.
He opens his heart to them, when he sees the doors of the prison open.

He lights the way further with his torch, but it is another kind of torch that lights
up his soul. [...] Then he cleans their wounds, and his soul is cleansed from the
filth of sin. On offering them material food, he receives in return a heavenly one.
[...] His docility shows that he sincerely believed that all his sins had been for-
given” (Chrysostom, “Hom. on Acts”, 36).

A person can meet up with God in all kinds of unexpected situations — in which
case he or she needs to have the same kind of docility as the jailer in order to
receive the grace of God through the channels which God has established, nor-
mally the sacraments.

33. As happened with Lydia and her family, the jailer’s household is baptized
along with him. Noting that these families probably included children and infants,
the Magisterium of the Church finds support here for its teaching that baptism
of children is a practice which goes right back to apostolic times and is, as St
Augustine says, “a tradition received from the Apostles” (cf. “Instruction on In-
fant Baptism”, 20 October 1980, 4).

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Source: “The Navarre Bible: Text and Commentaries”. Biblical text from the
Revised Standard Version and New Vulgate. Commentaries by members of
the Faculty of Theology, University of Navarre, Spain.

Published by Four Courts Press, Kill Lane, Blackrock, Co. Dublin, Ireland, and
by Scepter Publishers in the United States.