Perhaps, however, there was also another reason why the battle had not been fought out at an earlier time. It looks very much as though this bitter opposition to the Gentile mission had arisen only through the appearance of a new element in the Jerusalem church. Were these extreme legalists, who objected to the work of Paul and Barnabas—were these men present in the Church from the beginning? The question is more than doubtful. It is more probable that these legalists came into the Church during the period of prosperity which followed upon the persecution of Stephen and was only briefly interrupted by the persecution under Herod Agrippa I.
These Jewish Christian opponents of the Gentile mission—these "Judaizers"—must be examined with some care. They are described not only by Luke in The Acts but by Paul himself in Galatians. According to The Acts, some of them at least had belonged to the sect of the Pharisees before they had become Christians. Acts 15:5.
The activity of the Judaizers is described by Luke in complete independence of the account given by Paul. As usual, Luke contents himself with a record of external fact, while Paul uncovers the deeper motives of the Judaizers' actions. Yet the facts as reported by Luke fully justify the harsh words which Paul employs. According to Paul, these Judaizers were "false brethren privily brought in, who came in privily to spy out our liberty which we have in Christ Jesus, that they might bring us into bondage." Gal. 2:4. By calling them "false brethren" Paul means simply that they had not really grasped the fundamental principle of the gospel—the principle of justification by faith. They were still trying to earn their salvation by their works instead of receiving it as a gift of God. At heart they were still Jews rather than Christians. They came in privily into places where they did not belong—perhaps Paul means especially into the church at Antioch—in order to spy out Christian liberty. Gal. 2:4. Compare Acts 15:1.
The rise of this Judaizing party is easy to understand. In some respects the Judaizers were simply following the line of least resistance. By upholding the Mosaic law they would escape persecution and even obtain honor. We have seen that it was the Jews who instigated the early persecutions of the Church. Such persecutions would be avoided by the Judaizers, for they could say to their non-Christian countrymen: "We are engaged simply in one form of the world-wide Jewish mission. We are requiring our converts to keep the Mosaic law and unite themselves definitely with the people of Israel. Every convert that we gain is a convert to Judaism. The cross of Christ that we proclaim is supplementary to the law, not subversive of it. We deserve therefore from the Jews not persecution but honor." Compare what Paul says about the Judaizers in Galatia. Gal. 6:12,13.
3. THE APOSTOLIC DECREE
At first sight it seems rather strange that Paul in Galatians does not mention the apostolic decree. Some have supposed that his words even exclude any decree of that sort. In Gal. 2:6 Paul says that the pillars of the Jerusalem church "imparted nothing" to him. Yet according to The Acts they imparted to him this decree. The decree, moreover, seems to have a direct bearing upon the question that Paul was discussing in Galatians; for it involved the imposition of a part of the ceremonial law upon Gentile Christians. How then, if the decree really was passed as Luke says it was, could it have been left unmentioned by Paul?
There are various ways of overcoming the difficulty. In the first place it is not perfectly certain that any of the prohibitions contained in the decree are ceremonial in character. Three of them are probably ceremonial if the text of most manuscripts of The Acts is correct. Most manuscripts read, at Acts 15:29: "That ye abstain from things sacrificed to idols, and from blood, and from things strangled, and from fornication; from which if ye keep yourselves, it shall be well with you." Here "things offered to idols" apparently describes not idolatrous worship, but food which had been dedicated to idols; and "blood" describes meat used for food without previous removal of the blood. This meaning of "blood" is apparently fixed by the addition of "things strangled." Since "things strangled" evidently refers to food, probably the two preceding expressions refer to food also. According to the great mass of our witnesses to the text, therefore, the apostolic decree contains a food law. A few witnesses, however, omit all reference to things strangled, not only at Acts 15:29 but also at v. 20 and at ch. 21:25. If this text be original, then it is possible to interpret the prohibitions as simply moral and not at all ceremonial in character. "Things offered to idols" may be interpreted simply of idolatry, and "blood" of murder. But if the prohibitions are prohibitions of immorality, then they cannot be said to have "imparted" anything to Paul; for of course he was as much opposed to immorality as anyone.
However, the more familiar form of the text is probably correct. The witnesses that omit the word "strangled" are those that attest the so-called "Western Text" of The Acts. This Western Text differs rather strikingly from the more familiar text in many places. The question as to how far the Western Text of The Acts is correct is a hotly debated question. On the whole, however, the Western readings are usually at any rate to be discredited.
In the second place, the difficulty about the decree may be overcome by regarding Gal. 2:1-10 as parallel not with Acts 15:1-29 but with Acts 11:30; 12:25. This solution has already been discussed.