9
"I most assuredly thought with myself that I ought to do many things contrary to the name of Jesus of Nazareth.
10
This I also did in Jerusalem. I both shut up many of the saints in prisons, having received authority from the chief priests, and when they were put to death I gave my vote against them.
11
Punishing them often in all the synagogues, I tried to make them blaspheme. Being exceedingly enraged against them, I persecuted them even to foreign cities.
12
"Whereupon as I journeyed to Damascus with the authority and commission from the chief priests,
13
at noon, O King, I saw on the way a light from the sky, brighter than the sun, shining around me and those who traveled with me.
14
When we had all fallen to the earth, I heard a voice saying to me in the Hebrew language, 'Saul, Saul, why do you persecute me? It is hard for you to kick against the goad.'
15
I said, 'Who are you, Lord?' He said, 'I am Jesus, whom you persecute.
16
But arise, and stand on your feet, for to this end have I appeared to you, to appoint you a servant and a witness both of the things which you have seen, and of the things which I will reveal to you;
17
delivering you from the people, and from the Gentiles, to whom I send you,
18
to open their eyes, that they may turn from darkness to light and from the power of Satan to God, that they may receive remission of sins and an inheritance among those who are sanctified by faith in me.'
19
"Therefore, King Agrippa, I was not disobedient to the heavenly vision,