Acts 23:9

Verse Acts 23:9. The scribes - arose, and strove] διεμαχοντο, They contended forcibly-they came to an open rupture with the Sadducees; and, in order to support their own party against them, they even admitted as truth, St. Paul's account of his miraculous conversion, and therefore they said, if a spirit or an angel hath spoken to him, c. He had previously mentioned that Jesus Christ had appeared to him, when on his way to Damascus and, though they might not be ready to admit the doctrine of Christ's resurrection, yet they could, consistently with their own principles, allow that the soul of Christ might appear to him; and they immediately caught at this, as furnishing a strong proof against the doctrine of the Sadducees, who neither believed in angel nor spirit, while the Pharisees confessed both.

Let us not fight against God.] These words are wanting in ABCE, several others, with the Coptic, AEthiopic, Armenian, later Syriac, Vulgate, and some of the fathers.