“God will strike you, you whitewashed wall!”
God will strike you, you whitewashed wall! You sit here to judge me according to the law, yet you yourself violate the law by commanding that I be struck. (Acts 23:2–5 BSB)
What it sounds like today
An angry insult, quickly retracted.
The cultural key
The image is Ezekiel 13: a flimsy wall slapped with whitewash to look sound, doomed to collapse when the storm tests it, the prophet's picture of corrupt leaders (first cousin to the whitewashed tombs of Matthew 23). The target earns it: the high priest Ananias, whom Josephus portrays as greedy and violent; he was in fact assassinated by the sicarii at the war's outbreak, which gives 'God is going to strike you' an uncomfortable accuracy. Paul's apology on learning the man's office quotes Exodus 22:28 exactly: even a corrupt ruler's office keeps its scriptural protection.
Recovered meaning
A prophet's insult, precisely aimed: paint over rot, judging by a law you break in the act of judging. And then the equally scriptural walk-back, honoring the office while the verdict on the man stands, and history countersigns it.