Kicking Against The Goads

Acts 26:14 ESV

And when we had all fallen to the ground, I heard a voice saying to me in the Hebrew language, ‘Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting me? It is hard for you to kick against the goads.’

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Devotions on the Greek New Testament: 52 Reflections to Inspire & Instruct

Kicking against the Goads (Acts 26:14)

Understanding the cultural background of the first century is often critical in learning to understand some of the idioms and imagery of the Greek New Testament. These idioms sometimes get lost in translation.

Take, for instance, the phrase from Acts 26:14, where, on the road to Damascus, the Lord Jesus says to Paul (at that time referred to as Saul): “It hurts you to kick against the goads.” The NASB, NIV, ESV, and even the NRSV all use “goads.” (The KJV uses “pricks”—not a good word to use today!) What are “goads” (κέντρα)? We do sometimes use the English expression: “You goaded me into it.” Likely, however, most modern English-speaking persons do not know what a “goad” is.

The Greek term κέντρον (sing.) basically means a “sharp point,” and it has negative connotations.

The word is used in Revelation 9:10 to describe the locusts that arise from the Abyss when the fifth angel sounds his trumpet; these locusts have “stings [κέντρα] like scorpions.”

The same word occurs as a metaphor in 1 Corinthians 15:55–56 to refer to the “sting” of death (which Paul identifies as “sin”).

Generally in Greek literature, a κέντρον is a pointy stick that functions similarly to a whip in controlling an animal. An animal’s owner wanted to make sure the animal did what it had been purchased to do—such as plow a field or carry something to market.

In other words, a κέντρον is analogous to the electric cattle prod that farmers use today.

Obviously, for an animal to kick against a κέντρον would result in the animal’s hurting itself.

An ancient Greek proverb depicts a horse saying to a donkey, “Let him not keep kicking against the goads.”

Why not? Presumably because it was self-defeating behavior that resulted in pain and more pain.

In Jesus’ message to Saul/Paul spoken from heaven, the reference to κέντρα was a metaphorical way of saying that as Saul was persecuting the church, he was actually hurting himself.

Saul was sinning against God by resisting God’s plan for his life. And the fact that Jesus uses a present tense infinitive in λακτίζειν (“to kick”) suggests that as long as Saul is persecuting the church, he is continuing a self-defeating activity—he is hurting himself.

True, at the time Saul was persecuting the church, he believed he was pursuing God’s will by trying to stamp out the fledgling Christian movement.

Later in life, however, he carried a burden of personal guilt over his “previous way of life in Judaism” (Gal. 1:13–14, 23; cf. also 1 Cor. 9:15–18; Phil. 3:6; 1 Tim. 1:12–15).

God’s message to us is the same. The more we sin against God, the more we resist his plan for our lives, and the more we tune out his call into our lives, the more pain we will feel.

Indeed, we are only hurting ourselves when we keep running into the brick wall of sin. Later on in life we may, like Paul, wonder whether God perhaps considers us the chief of sinners.

But, as God showed his forgiving mercy to Paul, he will show his forgiving mercy to us if we repent of our sins, turn to Jesus Christ as Lord, and accept his will for our lives.