not elsewhere found in Acts, but it occurs Matth. xvi. 20, Mark v. 43, vii. 36 twice, viii. 15, ix. 9, and Heb. xii. 20. Verse 25: [———], Acts 8, Luke 11, Paul 17 times, elsewhere frequently. [———], i. 14, ii. 1, 46, iv. 24, v. 12, xii. 57, viii. 6, xii. 20, xviii. 12, xix. 29; so that this word, not in very common use even in general Greek literature, occurs 10 times elsewhere in the Acts, but, except in Rom. xv. 6, is not employed by any other New Testament writer. [———], i. 2, 24, vi. 5, xiii. 17, xv. 7, 22, Luke vi. 13, x. 42, xiv. 7, and elsewhere 11 times, [———], Acts 11, Luke 10 times, elsewhere common, [———] is not elsewhere used in Acts, but is found in Luke iii. 22, ix. 35, xx. 13, Paul 13 times, and is common elsewhere. Verse 26: [———], Acts 13, Luke 17 times, and common elsewhere, [———], xxi. 13, v. 41, ix. 16, Rom. i. 5, 3 John 7. Verse 27: [———], Acts 25, Luke 26 times, elsewhere very frequently. [———], xv. 32. [———], Acts 14, Luke 11, rest 21 times, [———], Luke vi. 23, 26; [———], Acts i. 15, ii. 1, 44, iii. 1, iv. 26, xiv. 1; Luke vi. 33, xvii. 35. Verse 28: [———], Acts 12, Luke 4, Paul 6, elsewhere 13 times; the same expression, [———]... is also found in Luke iii. 13. [———], Acts 13, Luke 6, elsewhere 21 times. [———] is not elsewhere met with in Acts, but occurs Matt. xx. 12, 2 Cor. iv. 17, Gal. vi. 2, 1 Thes. il 6, Apoc. ii. 24. [———], viii. 1, xx. 23, xxvii. 22, Luke 15, elsewhere 13 times. [———] is not elsewhere found in the New Testament. Verse 29: [———], xv. 20, Luke vi. 24, vii. 6, xv. 20, xxiv. 13, elsewhere 12 times. [———], xxi. 25, 1 Cor. viii. 1, 4, 7, 10, x. 19, 28, Apoc. ii. 14, 20. [———] occurs only in Luke ii. 51. [———], Acts 12, Luke 6, Paul 15, elsewhere 5 times only, [———], this
usual Greek formula for the ending of a letter, [———], is nowhere else used in the New Testament, except at the close of the letter of Lysias, xxiii. 30.
Turning now from the letter to the spirit of this decree, we must endeavour to form some idea of its purport and bearing. The first point which should be made clear is, that the question raised before the Council solely affected the Gentile converts, and that the conditions contained in the decree were imposed upon that branch of the Church alone. No change whatever in the position of Jewish Christians was contemplated; they were left as before, subject to the Mosaic law.(1) This is very apparent in the reference which is made long after to the decree, Ch. xxi. 20 ff., 25, when the desire is expressed to Paul by James, who proposed the decree, and the elders of Jerusalem, that he should prove to the many thousands of believing Jews all zealous of the law, that he did not teach the Jews who were among the Gentiles apostasy from Moses, saying that they ought not to circumcise their children, neither to walk after the customs. Paul, who is likewise represented, in the Acts, as circumcising with his own hand, after the decision of the Council had been adopted, Timothy the son of a Greek, whose mother was a Jewess, consents to give the Jews of Jerusalem the required proof. We have already shown at the commencement of this section, that
nothing was further from the minds of the Jewish Christians than the supposition that the obligation to observe the Mosaic law was weakened by the adoption of Christianity; and the representation in the Acts is certainly so far correct, that it does not pretend that Jewish Christians either desired or sanctioned any relaxation of Mosaic observances on the part of believing Jews. This cannot be too distinctly remembered in considering the history of primitive Christianity. The initiatory rite was essential to full participation in the Covenant. It was left for Paul to preach the abrogation of the law and the abandonment of circumcision. If the speech of Peter seems to suggest the abrogation of the law even for Jews, it is only in a way which shows that the author had no clear historical fact to relate, and merely desired to ascribe, vaguely and indefinitely, Pauline sentiments to the Apostle of the circumcision. No remark whatever is made upon these strangely liberal expressions of Peter, and neither the proposition of James nor the speech in which he makes it takes the slightest notice of them. The conduct of Peter at Antioch and the influence exercised by James through his emissaries restore us to historical ground. Whether the author intended to represent that the object of the conditions of the decree was to admit the Gentile Christians to full communion with the Jewish, or merely to the subordinate position of Proselytes of the Gate, is uncertain, but it is not necessary to discuss the point. There is not the slightest external evidence that such a decree ever existed, and the more closely the details are examined the more evident does it become that it has no historical consistency. How, and upon what principle, were these singular conditions selected? Their heterogeneous character is at once apparent, but not so the
reason for a combination which is neither limited to Jewish customs nor sufficiently representative of moral duties. It has been argued, on the one hand, that the prohibitions of the apostolic decree are simply those, reduced to a necessary minimum, which were enforced in the case of heathen converts to Judaism who did not join themselves fully to the people of the Covenant by submitting to circumcision, but were admitted to imperfect communion as Proselytes of the Gate.(1) The conditions named, however, do not fully represent the rules framed for such cases, and many critics consider that the conditions imposed, although they may have been influenced by the Noachiaii prescriptions, were rather moral duties which it was, from special circumstances, thought expedient to specify.(2) "We shall presently refer to some of these conditions, but bearing in mind the views which were dominant amongst primitive Christians, and more especially, as is obvious, amongst the Christians of Jerusalem where this decree is supposed to have been unanimously adopted, bearing in mind the teaching which is said to have led to the Council, the episode at Antioch, and the systematic judaistic opposition which retarded the work of Paul and subsequently affected his reputation, it may be instructive
to point out not only the vagueness which exists as to the position which it was intended that the Gentiles should acquire, as the effect of this decree, but also its singular and total inefficiency. An apologetic writer, having of course in his mind the fact that there is no trace of the operation of the decree, speaks of its conditions as follows: "The miscellaneous character of these prohibitions showed that, taken as a whole, they had no binding force independently of the circumstances which dictated them. They were a temporary expedient framed to meet a temporary emergency. Their object was the avoidance of offence in mixed communities of Jew and Gentile converts. Beyond this recognised aim and general understanding implied therein, the limits of their application were not defined."1 In fact the immunity granted to the Gentiles was thus practically almost unconditional.