22:3-5 Does this teach that Paul was a member of the Sanhedrin and therefore married, as some claim?
22:3-5 Does this teach that Paul was a member of the Sanhedrin and therefore married, as some claim?
No! This is not teaching that at all. Paul was neither a member of the Sanhedrin - the Jewish council of elders - nor was he married. In fact Paul himself clearly teaches that he was never married. Paul simply states here that he was taught the Jewish law by Gamaliel, a renowned teacher of the law, who was also a high-ranking member of the Sanhedrin (CP 5:34).
Paul was a superior pupil, surpassing his equals - those of his own age - in his knowledge of the law (CP Ga 1:14). Paul never claimed to be a member of the Sanhedrin, only that he was a zealous Pharisee (CP Ac 23:1-6; Php 3:4-6). As the young man "Saul" - before God changed his name to Paul (CP Ac 13:9) - Paul was given official authority by the chief priests to persecute Christians and imprison them (CP Ac 7:58; 8:1-3; 26:9-12; 1Cor 15:9; Ga 1:13-14).
Paul voted for Christians being put to death, but that does not prove he was a member of the Sanhedrin.
There is no warrant in scripture to teach that Paul was a member of the Sanhedrin and therefore married (one had to be married to be a Sanhedrin member). But Paul himself taught that not only was he not married, but also that he had never been married (CP 1Cor 7:7-9).
In V7 Paul is alluding to a gift of God he had. He was not referring to his unmarried state, but to his sexual control, which led in turn to his being able to remain unmarried - a state of being he chose for himself. We learn this from the phrase, "…it is good for them if they abide even as I," in V8, which refers to a state or condition; to remain one's own in his power.
Abide (KJV) is a verb in what is known as the Aorist tense in the Greek construction of the sentence, which means indefinite, expressing simple past time, e.g., "as I always have", "as I do", i.e. the gift of celibacy.
Thus we learn that Paul was always unmarried. The Aorist tense suggests a permanent and final decision: as I always have been and always will be (see also comments on Ac 8:1; 1Cor 7:7-9, and author's study Paul the Apostle - a Chosen Vessel unto God in his book Advanced Studies in the Christian Faith (Volume 2).).