Acts 9:9 - Coke's Commentary on the Holy Bible

And he was three days without sight,— Scales grew over his eyes, not only to intimate to him the blindness of the state that he had been in, but to impress him also with the deeper sense of the almighty power of Christ, and to turn his thoughts inwards, while he was rendered less capable of conversing with external objects. This would also be a manifest token to others, of what had happened to him in his journey, and ought to have been very convincing and humbling to those bigoted Jews, to whom, as the most probable associates in the cruel work that he intended, the sanhedrim had directed those letters, which Saul would no doubt destroy as soon as possible. It is very doubtful, and cannot at present be determined, whether the fast of three days, here mentioned, was a voluntary one, undertaken by Saul, in consequence of his deep humiliation on account of his former persecutions, or whether it was the result of that bodily disorder, into which he was thrown by the vision, and of the attachment of his mind to those new and astonishing divine revelations, with which during this time he seems to have been favoured. See 2 Corinthians 12:1.Galatians 1:11. If we compare the prophet Daniel's being affected by some of his visions, with this case of Saul, we shall find that they bear a great resemblance;only Daniel had not been guilty of such great crimes, and consequently did not pass through such bitter repentance, as Saul had. See the Reflections on this chapter.