When he had been in Jerusalem about a week, he went to the temple to worship. There happened to be also in the temple, some men who had seen Paul in Asia with the Gentiles. Thinking that he had brought some of these Gentiles into the temple, they stirred up the people, seized Paul, and cried out, "Men of Israel, help; this is the man that teacheth all men everywhere against the people, and the law, and this place; and further brought Greeks also into the temple, and hath polluted this place."
Of course, this was not true, but it served to arouse the crowd, who dragged Paul out of the temple and shut the doors. In their rage they were about to kill Paul, which they would have done but for the timely interference of a Roman officer.
Stationed in the castle north of the temple was a guard of soldiers under command of an officer called the "Chief Captain."
Rescued From Death.
When somebody told the captain, whose name was Claudius Lysius, that there was trouble in the outer court of the temple, he hurried the soldiers down there just as the mob began to beat and trample Paul to death. The soldiers rescued Paul; but the captain thinking he was a desperate man, commanded him to be bound with chains.
"Who is this man, and what has he done?" Claudius asked of the angry Jews.
Some cried one thing and some another in such confusion that the chief captain could understand nothing; so he said to the soldiers, "Carry him to the castle."
On the Castle Steps.
As the soldiers bore Paul away, the mob, acting like wolves after their prey, followed, crying, "Away with him." Just as they were going up the steps into the castle, Paul speaking in Greek said to the chief captain, "May I speak unto thee?"
"Canst thou speak Greek?" answered the captain, "Aren't you that Egyptian who sometime ago made an uproar here and led out into the wilderness four thousand men that were murderers?"