1. Agrippa said to Paul, “It is permitted for you to speak for yourself.” Then Paul stretched out his hand and began his defense.
2. “Concerning all I am accused of by the Judean leaders, I consider myself fortunate, King Agrippa, that it is before you that I am about to make my defense today—
3. since you are especially knowledgeable about all Jewish customs and issues. Therefore I beg you to listen patiently to me.
4. “Now all the Jewish people have known my manner of life ever since my youth, starting from the beginning in my own nation and also in Jerusalem.
5. They have known about me for a long time—if they were willing to testify—that according to the strictest sect of our religion, I lived as a Pharisee.
6. “Yet now I stand here being judged for the hope in the promise made by God to our fathers.
7. It is the promise that our twelve tribes hope to attain, as they earnestly worship night and day. And for this hope I am accused by Jewish people, O King!
8. Why is it judged incredible by any of you that God raises the dead?
9. “In fact, I myself thought it was necessary to do many things in opposition to the name of Yeshua ha-Natzrati.
10. And that is what I did in Jerusalem. Not only did I lock up many of the kedoshim in prisons by the authority I received from the ruling kohanim, but I cast my vote against them when they were being condemned to death.
11. I tried to cause them to blaspheme by punishing them often in the synagogues. In furious rage against them, I persecuted them even in foreign cities.
12. “While journeying to Damascus with the authority and commission of the ruling kohanim,
13. at midday, O King, I saw on the road a light from heaven, brighter than the sun, shining around me and those traveling with me.