The Acts of the Apostles, the history of the early church, by Luke the physician - Acts 15:6-21 comments: keeping the Gentile Christians from idol worship

 

Acts 15:6 ¶  And the apostles and elders came together for to consider of this matter. 7  And when there had been much disputing, Peter rose up, and said unto them, Men and brethren, ye know how that a good while ago God made choice among us, that the Gentiles by my mouth should hear the word of the gospel, and believe. 8  And God, which knoweth the hearts, bare them witness, giving them the Holy Ghost, even as he did unto us; 9  And put no difference between us and them, purifying their hearts by faith. 10  Now therefore why tempt ye God, to put a yoke upon the neck of the disciples, which neither our fathers nor we were able to bear? 11  But we believe that through the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ we shall be saved, even as they. 12  Then all the multitude kept silence, and gave audience to Barnabas and Paul, declaring what miracles and wonders God had wrought among the Gentiles by them. 13  And after they had held their peace, James answered, saying, Men and brethren, hearken unto me: 14  Simeon hath declared how God at the first did visit the Gentiles, to take out of them a people for his name. 15  And to this agree the words of the prophets; as it is written, 16  After this I will return, and will build again the tabernacle of David, which is fallen down; and I will build again the ruins thereof, and I will set it up: 17  That the residue of men might seek after the Lord, and all the Gentiles, upon whom my name is called, saith the Lord, who doeth all these things. 18  Known unto God are all his works from the beginning of the world. 19  Wherefore my sentence is, that we trouble not them, which from among the Gentiles are turned to God: 20  But that we write unto them, that they abstain from pollutions of idols, and from fornication, and from things strangled, and from blood. 21  For Moses of old time hath in every city them that preach him, being read in the synagogues every sabbath day.

 

Interestingly, Peter gives us the order of salvation which can be very confusing by events earlier in Acts as I previously noted. The Gentiles hear the word and believe and then God gives them the Holy Ghost. There is no mention made of baptism as a requirement for salvation. Of course, here Peter claims that he is the minister to the Gentiles. Paul also says this.

 

Romans 15:16  That I should be the minister of Jesus Christ to the Gentiles, ministering the gospel of God, that the offering up of the Gentiles might be acceptable, being sanctified by the Holy Ghost.

 

Galatians 2:7  But contrariwise, when they saw that the gospel of the uncircumcision was committed unto me, as the gospel of the circumcision was unto Peter; 8  (For he that wrought effectually in Peter to the apostleship of the circumcision, the same was mighty in me toward the Gentiles:)

 

And while Peter did experience a notable conversion of the Roman in Acts 10 he will go on to minister to the Jews in the ancient city of Babylon where Jews were plentiful.

 

1Peter 5:13  The church that is at Babylon, elected together with you, saluteth you; and so doth Marcus my son.

 

It is here that the Babylonian Talmud, the central text of Rabbinic Judaism, will come from around 200AD. It is a combination of writings and oral law that sets the stage for and is the foundation of Judaism from the 6^th century AD onwards.

 

Verse 9 shows the error of thinking that the Jews are saved differently than the Gentiles. There is no difference between us now.

 

Peter recommends a light load be placed on the Gentiles even though Paul will accuse him of hypocrisy later.

 

Galatians 2:11 ¶  But when Peter was come to Antioch, I withstood him to the face, because he was to be blamed. 12  For before that certain came from James, he did eat with the Gentiles: but when they were come, he withdrew and separated himself, fearing them which were of the circumcision. 13  And the other Jews dissembled likewise with him; insomuch that Barnabas also was carried away with their dissimulation. 14  But when I saw that they walked not uprightly according to the truth of  the gospel, I said unto Peter before them all, If thou, being a Jew, livest after the manner of Gentiles, and not as do the Jews, why compellest thou the Gentiles to live as do the Jews? 15  We who are Jews by nature, and not sinners of the Gentiles, 16  Knowing that a man is not justified by the works of the law, but by the faith of Jesus Christ, even we have believed in Jesus Christ, that we might be justified by the faith of Christ, and not by the works of the law: for by the works of the law shall no flesh be justified.

 

From the last two passages we can see how both Paul and Peter came to a greater understanding of the difference between the Jew before Christ and the Jew and Gentile after Christ.  

 

Contrast verse 10 regarding the weight of the law with Christ’s promise of the lightness of the burden we bear because of Him.

 

Matthew 11:29  Take my yoke upon you, and learn of me; for I am meek and lowly in heart: and ye shall find rest unto your souls.

 

If your Christian faith is an immense burden on you filling you with anger, bitterness, bigotry, hatred both of yourself and others, and a fear of never measuring up then it is not of Christ.

 

Verse 11 says that by the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ we are saved. Paul notes elsewhere.

 

Ephesians 2:8  For by grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God: 9  Not of works, lest any man should boast.

 

Note in verse 14 James calls Simon Peter Simeon. Strong’s says the Greek version of the name Simeon is derived from Simon.

 

Verse 16 refers to the following from a different context;

 

Amos 9:11 ¶  In that day will I raise up the tabernacle of David that is fallen, and close up the breaches thereof; and I will raise up his ruins, and I will build it as in the days of old:

 

With the thought in verse 17 being interesting as a residue is what is left over. So consider the end times as well in this passage. But there are several verses that contain a similar thought about the Gentiles seeking after the Lord. Here is an example. Look for others.

 

Psalm 22:27  All the ends of the world shall remember and turn unto the LORD: and all the kindreds of the nations shall worship before thee.

 

However, note the figurative message in this passage likening the gospel message to rebuilding the tabernacle of David, curious enough as David did not build the temple and there was a temple finished by Herod that stood at that time. So what can you and I take from this? There is a different kind of temple being taught here, a true temple of God within the heart of the believer.

 

1Corinthians 3:16  Know ye not that ye are the temple of God, and that the Spirit of God dwelleth in you?

 

Contrast that with Paul speaking of a physical temple in 2Thessalonians 2:4 which will exist at the end of history long after the one he knew was destroyed by the Romans and the physical temple in Revelation, chapter 11. This might lead Evangelical expositors to say that the reference here in Acts 15:16 is a prophecy of the temple to come, a millennial prophecy, but I don’t believe the text warrants that as easily as it does make reference our temple of the spirit being the rebuilt tabernacle of David.

 

As Paul’s writings make it clear that there will be another physical temple and also that our spirit is God’s temple now we can easily see that both interpretations are true based on their context. There will be another physical temple just as there already is a spiritual temple within the believer.

 

Unlike modern fundamentalist preachers and the replacement theology of the Catholic and Protestant and Orthodox churches we Gentiles did not have many restrictions placed on us. What is given to the Gentile believers in this passage would probably be appalling to the modern preacher who likes to place burden after burden on the Christian to prove his or her spiritual state.

 

First, Gentile Christians were to avoid pollutions from idols. This is explained in the next passage as regarding eating things offered to idols. Paul goes into great detail about this in the first letter to the Corinthians, chapter 8. In the context we are talking about physical, literal idols. Although a modern preacher might talk about our idols as referring to our job, entertainment, or other things this is not about that. This is about the idols found in temples and a Christian mingling worship of God with worship of idols. I will go into more detail in my comments on the letters to the Corinthians.

 

Fornication here is not merely being sexually constant with a spouse although it does contain that meaning. There is the fornication that can occur with adultery and the fornication that can happen with temple prostitutes as in the temple of Aphrodite or Venus in Corinth. First, what is fornication. From the Greek word which gives us the English word pornography, fornication is linked synonymously with adultery.

 

Matthew 19:9  And I say unto you, Whosoever shall put away his wife, except it be for fornication, and shall marry another, committeth adultery: and whoso marrieth her which is put away doth commit adultery.

 

1Corinthians 5:1  It is reported commonly that there is fornication among you, and such fornication as is not so much as named among the Gentiles, that one should have his father’s wife.

 

1Corinthians 7:1 ¶  Now concerning the things whereof ye wrote unto me: It is good for a man not to touch a woman. 2  Nevertheless, to avoid fornication, let every man have his own wife, and let every woman have her own husband. 3  Let the husband render unto the wife due benevolence: and likewise also the wife unto the husband. 4  The wife hath not power of her own body, but the husband: and likewise also the husband hath not power of his own body, but the wife. 5  Defraud ye not one the other, except it be with consent for a time, that ye may give yourselves to fasting and prayer; and come together again, that Satan tempt you not for your incontinency.

 

This sexual sin extends to religious practices in the ancient world. This was a grave danger to Christians in the pagan world as I will discuss my comments on the Corinthian letters. Rising above Corinth was Acrocorinth, or Upper Corinth. It is the acropolis of ancient Corinth, a monolithic rock rising above.

 

Now the city of Corinth was known not only for the most expensive and skilled prostitutes in the Greek world but also the temple prostitution, common throughout the ancient world, of the cult of Aphrodite in her temple on Acrocorinth. Aphrodite, who was also Venus, Astarte, and Ishtar or the many other names listed in the Bible for her had, it is said, a thousand temple prostitutes with short hair or shaved heads servicing the devoutly religious pagan men of the city and pious visitors. We’ve already discussed how prevalent ritual prostitution, both hetero and homosexual, was in the ancient world. This is often disputed in scholarly circles with some saying that temple prostitution has been overemphasized. However, we have the context from the Old Testament of how prevalent the practice of ritual prostitution was.

 

Fornication, having sexual intercourse with someone who is not your lawful spouse in the eyes of the God of the Bible, is condemned by Him.

 

Aphrodite had her temple. I’ve read that the second most exalted temple in ancient Babylon to Ishtar, goddess of immigrants and prostitutes and freedom, who sits in New York Harbor under the guise of Lady Liberty, a statue patterned after one to the Egyptian version of Ishtar, Isis, was called the “White House” or “Shining House”.

 

Animals which were strangled would not have the blood properly removed from them, which is the interpretation used by most commentators. But consider the context. Pollution from idols, eating things offered to idols, is the first proscription. So, now we are in the realm of heathen worship. Then comes mention of fornication, which we do note as practiced in rites of certain goddesses. Keeping in the context of pagan worship we have things strangled and from writers like the Greek historian, Herodotus, we know that certain tribes practiced ritual strangulation in some of their ceremonies. We then come to the forbidding of eating blood which is banned before the Law;

 

Genesis 9:4  But flesh with the life thereof, which is the blood thereof, shall ye not eat.

 

Under the Law given to Moses;

 

Deuteronomy 12:23  Only be sure that thou eat not the blood: for the blood is the life; and thou mayest not eat the life with the flesh.

 

And, of course, here. Drinking blood was commonplace among many religions of the ancient world including Egypt just as it is a practice in witchcraft.

 

Psalm 16:4  Their sorrows shall be multiplied that hasten after another god: their drink offerings of blood will I not offer, nor take up their names into my lips.

 

So, taking these admonitions to the Gentiles in context it is at least arguable that they were from more a desire to keep Gentile Christians from the pollution of pagan worship than from a desire to make them a little Jewish. These forbidden practices defined ancient religion in its expression. Paul will go into more detail in Corinthians.

 

Matthew Henry wrote that verse 21 suggests that they would not try change the Jews who heard the Law read often and were used to its observance. There was liberty shown to the Gentiles and there was moderation in dealing with the observances of the Jews in honoring God.