Herod Agrippa - Acts 12 - Intro

Around the time that Saul and Barnabas brought the aid from the saints in Antioch to the saints in Jerusalem, “Herod the king stretched forth his hands to vex certain of the church.” This begs the question, who was Herod and why did he care about the church enough to cause problems for the believers? This Herod was Herod Agippa I, a very interesting man. He was the grandson of Herod the Great who had all the baby boys murdered to try to kill the new “King of the Jews.” He was also educated in Rome and was BFF with the son of the Emperor, Drusus Caesar. After a tumultuous adulthood that included stints in prison, fleeing for his life several times, disgrace, and honor, Agrippa was finally made king over all the lands his grandfather had in Judea.

Agrippa was loyal to Rome but he was also incredibly respectful of his Jewish subjects. He was so ingratiated to them, in fact, that while performing the reading of the scriptures as part of a Jewish tradition, he teared up when he got to the part saying that the Jews should have no foreign ruler, to which the Jews cried out “Agrippa, you are our brother!” That’s a pretty strong relationship, especially when you consider the absolute disdain that the Jews held for their Roman overlords with previous kings. I think that there might be another couple of aspects to Agrippa’s devotion to the Jewish people that come into play as well.
When he was schooled as a boy in Rome, it was under the rule of Tiberius Caesar. I don’t know if it was through Tiberius’ death of natural causes or overthrow, but Caligula became the emperor afterward, then he was murdered and a power grab ensued, in which Claudius became Caesar, so Agrippa had seen his fair share of governmental overthrows. With the always changing political landscape came times of imprisonment for Agrippa for being on the wrong side of power. He had many family members who were executed or exiled, and he himself had spent a lot of time on the run from political rivals, so he knew that loyalty and treason were a slippery balance depending on who’s in charge at which time.
And regardless of who is ruling, no one likes a king who can’t keep his subjects in line. We have seen from the past with Pilate and other leaders that those who were appointed by Rome to oversee a portion of the empire, that they were encouraged to keep the people in line, but not unhappy to the point that they would rebel. It’s possible that Agrippa saw his devotion to the Jewish people as a means of keeping them controlled. If you love your leader then you don’t rebel, and you help him accomplish his tasks.
It’s also possible that Agrippa was just a people pleaser. It’s possible that he wanted the Jewish people to like him because that’s what was important to him personally. Whatever the reason, the opinions of the Jews, which probably means the Jewish leadership, was very important to Herod Agrippa. And that’s where we are introduced to him at this point, as the king of the Jews, but one who is very sympathetic to their cause and views himself and a member of their community.