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If you have not already done so, I recommend reading through Part One before continuing through this article. Though presented in two parts, these articles essentially represent one continuous narrative.
Immediately following the conclusion of the Gospel accounts, the record continues with the ‘Acts of the Apostles’. In the second chapter, we encounter an interesting conundrum…
Now when they heard this, they were acutely distressed and said to Peter and the rest of the apostles, “What should we do, brothers?” Peter said to them, “Repent, and each one of you be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins, and you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit. For the promise is for you and your children, and for all who are far away, as many as the Lord our God will call to himself.”
Acts 2:37 – 39
I draw your attention to the instruction Peter gives: “repent …”.
The point being, repent from what?
The obvious answer is sin… but if the Law given through Moses was superseded at the Crucifixion, how then are we to define sin in a post-Crucifixion environment? Did the apostles have or provide a definition of what constituted sin?
Turns out, they did:
Everyone who practices sin also practices lawlessness; indeed, sin is lawlessness. And you know that Jesus was revealed to take away sins, and in him there is no sin.
1 John 3:4
If there was, or is, a “law of Christ” that constitutes a separate, superseding body of law to that of the Torah, where in scripture can I locate it?
My research indicates that Yeshua did not point us to supersession of the Mosaic law, but to a principle; that being of bearing one another up in love. In fact, the very context of Galatians 6 testifies that this is, indeed, an accurate view.
Scripture paints a very different picture of the early believers than what is commonly perceived today. In it, we see the believers adhering to, and promoting adherence to the Torah. They do so, not from a standpoint of legalistic observance however. To the contrary, it is plain throughout the texts that such actions would be profit nothing. No, they do so in a heart of loving obedience for the one who bought them and redeemed them from certain destruction.
Motive matters.
Even Paul, so often maligned from his original intent exhorts us:
What shall we say then? Are we to remain in sin so that grace may increase? Absolutely not! How can we who died to sin still live in it? Or do you not know that as many as were baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death? Therefore we have been buried with him through baptism into death, in order that just as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, so we too may live a new life.
Romans 6:1 – 4
Once again, we have to ask ourselves how the apostles defined sin. Once again we are directed back to the definition provided in 1st John where, once again, we are pointed back to the Torah.
I have to admit, I find it amusing that in our present day, we find ourselves faced with some of the same debates that faced the apostles. With the rise of the Messianic and Hebrew Roots movements, we find ourselves faced again with the issue of “what to do about the ‘gentiles’”…
About noon the next day, while they were on their way and approaching the city, Peter went up on the roof to pray. He became hungry and wanted to eat, but while they were preparing the meal, a trance came over him. He saw heaven opened and an object something like a large sheet descending, being let down to earth by its four corners. In it were all kinds of four-footed animals and reptiles of the earth and wild birds. Then a voice said to him, “Get up, Peter; slaughter and eat!” But Peter said, “Certainly not, Lord, for I have never eaten anything defiled and ritually unclean!” The voice spoke to him again, a second time, “What God has made clean, you must not consider ritually unclean!” This happened three times, and immediately the object was taken up into heaven.
Acts 10:9 – 23
This passage has been misunderstood and misapplied ad nauseam.
Peter (Kefa in Hebrew) makes it plain throughout the account that he eats in accordance with biblical law; that is “Kashrut” or “Kosher”. Three times he sees animals the Torah defines as unclean, and three times he refuses them. To eat these creatures would constitute willful disobedience to the Torah; something no good, self-respecting Jewish man would do… and Peter is a good, self-respecting Jewish man.
He goes on to report the interpretation, both here and in verse 28:
He said to them, “You know that it is unlawful for a Jew to associate with or visit a Gentile, yet God has shown me that I should call no person defiled or ritually unclean.”
Acts 10:28
First, we need to be keenly aware that no commandment prohibiting association with gentiles exists in the Torah. As with the issue in Matthew 15 (as referenced in Part One), we must look to the customs of the day to understand why he made this statement and, why it is true from Peter’s perspective.
The Pharisees, in seeking to maintain a state of ritual purity, taught that to associate with a gentile would defile a person. The logic went something like this: if gentiles eat unclean animals and engage in unclean activities, associating with them would be defiling, e.g. making one unclean as well. Thus the traditions of the elders deemed this interaction to be “unlawful”.
You have to admit, you can kind of follow the line of thought there. The problem is, as Yeshua stated:
“You have nullified the word of God on account of your tradition.”
Matthew 15:6
Clearly, the animals in the vision did not represent God’s overturning of his prior commandment. He wouldn’t do that – he doesn’t change (reference Numbers 23:19, Isaiah 40:8, Malachi 3:6).
What they do represent is a symbolic reference to people that would have otherwise been considered “unclean”.
With the advent of gentile converts coming into the faith, and the clear instruction of God that this was as intended, the apostles found themselves with a conundrum. In Acts 15, we find the record of a significant debate regarding what should or should not be required of gentiles in order to be considered “saved”.
I say “considered” because, in reality, no human-being has any say on the matter. That judgment belongs to the Lord alone.
The issue, as reported in Acts 15:1, was circumcision.
If you’ve read all of the articles to this point, you can likely understand where this idea came from. The Torah teaches that gentiles had to be circumcised in order to observe the Passover and that in so doing they would “… be like one who is born in the land …” (Exodus 12:48).
Ultimately, the apostles and elders decided to send Judas and Silas with the following letter:
From the apostles and elders, your brothers, to the Gentile brothers and sisters in Antioch, Syria, and Cilicia, greetings! Since we have heard that some have gone out from among us with no orders from us and have confused you, upsetting your minds by what they said, we have unanimously decided to choose men to send to you along with our dear friends Barnabas and Paul, who have risked their lives for the name of our Lord Jesus Christ. Therefore we are sending Judas and Silas who will tell you these things themselves in person. For it seemed best to the Holy Spirit and to us not to place any greater burden on you than these necessary rules: that you abstain from meat that has been sacrificed to idols and from blood and from what has been strangled and from sexual immorality. If you keep yourselves from doing these things, you will do well. Farewell.
Acts 15:23 – 29
For many, this settles the matter. We have a clear list of commandments, straight from the apostles themselves, dictating what gentile believers are to observe.
There is however, a “fly” in the proverbial ointment: Beginning in verse 13, James speaks. The letter is actually drafted and sent out to the congregations abroad on his recommendation.
After they stopped speaking, James replied, “Brothers, listen to me. Simeon has explained how God first concerned himself to select from among the Gentiles a people for his name.The words of the prophets agree with this, as it is written, ‘After this I will return, and I will rebuild the fallen tent of David; I will rebuild its ruins and restore it, so that the rest of humanity may seek the Lord, namely, all the Gentiles I have called to be my own,’ says the Lord, who makes these things known from long ago. “Therefore I conclude that we should not cause extra difficulty for those among the Gentiles who are turning to God, but that we should write them a letter telling them to abstain from things defiled by idols and from sexual immorality and from what has been strangled and from blood. For Moses has had those who proclaim him in every town from ancient times, because he is read aloud in the synagogues every Sabbath.”
Acts 15:13 – 21
Again we must let context and logical thinking prevail when interpreting scripture. The issue only arises because there are gentiles coming into the faith – a distinctly Jewish faith.
The men debating in Acts 15 were born and raised in the Jewish faith. They knew from their childhood the covenant God made with Abraham, and the covenant made at Sinai. They had spent their entire lives learning, every Sabbath, the commandments and requirements of the law.
The point that James is making here is that while they, Jewish by birth, had been raised to know the ways of God, these gentile converts had not. Rather than foisting upon them the expectation of immediately adopting the observation everything the Torah commands and extricating scriptural truth from oral tradition, he admonishes the apostles to let them learn… “because he (Moses) is read aloud in the synagogues every Sabbath.”
In the words of the very Messiah himself:
Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And remember, I am with you always, to the end of the age.”
Matthew 28:18 – 20
שלום עליכם – Shalom Aleichem – Peace Be Upon You