DEBATES—COURSE CARRIED BY JAMES AGAINST PETER.
Of what passed at this assembly, the only account we have—the account given to us by the author of the Acts—is curious:—curious at any rate; and whether it be in every particular circumstance true or not,—in so far as it can be depended upon, instructive.[33]
We have the persons mentioned as having spoken: they are, in the order in which they are here enumerated, these four:—to wit, Peter, Barnabas, Paul and James. Of the speech of Peter, the particulars are given: so likewise of that of James: of Barnabas and Paul, nothing more than the topic.
Against the Mosaic law in toto, we find Peter; and such contribution as he is represented as furnishing to this side of the cause in the shape of argument. On the same side, were Barnabas and Paul: what they furnished was matter of fact:—namely, in the language of the Acts, "what miracles and wonders God had wrought among the Gentiles by them:"—in plain language, the success they had met with among the Gentiles.
On this question, on the side of the chief of the Apostles, were—the manifest interest of the religion of Jesus as to extent of diffusion,—the authority derived from situation,—the express command of Jesus as delivered in the Gospel history,—and Jesus' own practice: not to speak of the inutility and unreasonableness of the observances themselves. Yet, as far as appears from the author of the Acts,—of these arguments, conclusive as they would or at least should have been,—it appears not that any use was made: the success, he spoke of as having been experienced by himself among the Gentiles,—in this may be seen the sole argument employed in Peter's speech. Thus,—in so far as this report is to be believed,—thus, upon their own respective achievements, did,—not only Paul but Peter,—rest, each of them, the whole strength of the cause.
Spite of reason, religion, and Jesus, the victory is in this account, given to James—to Jesus' kinsman, James. The motion is carried: the course proposed, is a sort of middle course—a sort of compromise. At the hands of Gentile proselytes, in deference to the Mosaic law, abstinence from four things is required: namely, meats offered to idols, blood, things strangled: these, and the irregularities of the sexual appetite,—whatsoever they were, that were meant by the word, rendered into English by the word fornication.
If any such decision were really come to,—by nothing but necessity—necessity produced by the circumstances of place and time—will it be found excusable. Abstinence from food killed in the way of sacrifice to heathen gods, on the occasion of public sacrifices: yes; for, for such food, little relish could remain, on the part of persons devoted to the religion of Jesus: from fornication, yes; for, for a sacrifice in this shape, even among the Gentiles, some preparation had been made by stoicism. But, as to blood and things strangled,[34] that is to say, animals so slaughtered as to have more blood left in their carcasses than the Mosaic law would allow to be left in them—animals slaughtered otherwise than in the Jewish manner,—thus forbidding teachings of the religion of Jesus, to eat a meal furnished by Gentile hands,—this, as above observed, was depriving them of their most favourable opportunities, for carrying their pious and beneficent purposes into effect, by adding to the number of believers.
Altogether remarkable is the consideration, upon the face of it, by which, if the historian is to be believed, this decision was produced. "For Moses of old time hath in every city them that preach him, being read in synagogues every sabbath day," Acts 15:21. "May be so: but what if he has? what is that to the purpose? Good, if the question were about the Jews: but, it is not about the Jews: the Gentiles, and they only, are the subjects of it. And the Gentiles—what know or care they about Moses? what is it that is to send them into the synagogues, to hear anything that is "read in synagogues"?
By this imaginary abstinence from blood,—for, after all, by no exertion of Mosaic ingenuity could the flesh ever be completely divested of the blood that had circulated in it,—of this perfectly useless prohibition, what would be the effect?—Not only to oppose obstacles, to the exertions of Christian teachers, in their endeavors to make converts among the Gentiles,—but, on the part of the Gentiles themselves to oppose to them a needless difficulty, in the way of their conversion, by rendering it impossible for them, consistently with the observance of this prohibition, to associate with their unconverted friends and families at convivial hours. Thus much as to what concerns the Gentiles.[35]