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What about Acts 15?
Posted : 30 Dec, 2009 04:29 AM
This will be the last series on this subject,
What about...The Jerusalem Church Council of Acts 15?
The Law which the legalistic Pharisees tried to bind on the brethren was called �the Law
of Moses.� We read that a great controversy arose in the New Testament Church which involved
the �law of Moses� and the matter of �circumcision.� Luke wrote in Acts, chapter 15, �But
some of the sect of the Pharisees who believed rose up� � these were Pharisees who believed Jesus was the Messiah � �saying, �It is necessary to circumcise them [Gentiles], and to command them to keep the law of Moses� (Acts 15:5). What was the real problem here? In verse 6 we read, �Now the apostles and elders came together to consider this matter.�After much discussion, the apostles ruled that God had given the Holy Spirit to Gentiles who
believed on Christ, �and made no distinction between us and them [Jews and Gentiles], purifying their hearts by faith. Now therefore, why do you test God by putting a YOKE on the neck of the
disciples which neither our fathers nor we were able to bear? But we believe that through the GRACE of our Lord Jesus Christ we shall be saved in the same manner as they� (Acts 15:5-11).
Let's understand this! These Pharisees were arguing that Gentiles, in order to be saved,
had to be physically circumcised, and to �convert� to Judaism! They claimed that Gentiles had
to become �physical Jews� by undergoing the rite of circumcision, as well as baptism, and come
under the obligation to obey all Jewish religious law � the whole �law of Moses,� which, in that day, included the observation of all the Jewish �halachah� � the rules and restrictions added by
generations of Rabbis from the time of Ezra down to the very day of the apostles! This included all the minutiae, and detailed 39 laws of �Sabbath� restrictions, and washings and the �traditions
of the elders� � things which were a �YOKE,� in the words of the apostle Peter! (Acts 15:10).
Paul speaks of it as a �yoke of bondage� in Galatians 5:1.
In other words, the Pharisee believers were teaching that Gentiles had to become �Jews�
first, before they could become �Christians�! They had to first convert to Judaism, and only then
could they become acknowledged as believers in Christ! They had to obey ALL the Jewish legal
requirements established by generations of Rabbis, and their interpretations of the fine points of the Torah, and Jewish tradition!
But Christ Himself had already ruled on these points, in actuality. The Pharisees accused
His disciples of breaking the law of Moses by transgressing the �traditions of the elders�
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(Matt.15:1-2). However, Jesus hurled their accusation back into their own teeth, saying, �Why
do you also transgress the law of God by your tradition?� (verse 3). He went on to say, �Thus you have made the commandment of God of no effect by your tradition� (v.6).
In other words, the Jews over time had added so many �halachic� principles and rules, in
their legislation, in interpreting the Law of Moses, that they had strayed from the very Law itself and had developed a legal system which, in reality, was contrary to and in violation of the spirit
of the original Torah, or law of God!
The argument, then, was not over the law of God itself � called the �law of Moses� in the
Scriptures, because it was first codified and laid out in full during the time of Moses, and through
the revelation God gave to His servant Moses (see Ezra 7:6, 10). It was over the �traditions� the
Pharisees added to the Law, and their perversions of the Law!
To continue the story in Acts 15,. After considering this matter fully, the apostles
decided that the Pharisaical believers were dead wrong! Conversion to Judaism, indicated by requiring Gentile believers to be circumcised and keep the entire law of Moses (including the
traditions of the elders), was NOT necessary for salvation!
But notice. After making this fundamental, paramount decision, the apostles then
decided to write a general letter to the Gentile believers throughout the Roman Empire, a very pointed epistle. James, the brother of Christ, and the apostle over the Jerusalem church,
declared, �Therefore I judge that we should not trouble those from among the Gentiles who are turning to God, but that we write to them to abstain from things polluted by idols, from sexual
immorality, from things strangled, and from blood. For Moses has had throughout many
generations those who preach him in every city, BEING READ IN THE SYNAGOGUES EVERY
SABBATH DAY� (Acts 15:19-21).
What is this? Why did James stress only these commandments? Was he ignoring or
neglecting the laws against murder, stealing, taking God�s name in vain, coveting, bearing false
witness, Sabbath breaking � many of the very Ten Commandments? Of course not! When we
read this entire passage IN CONTEXT, we see that first of all, James is singling out specific
issues which Gentile brethren would be confronted with in their local communities! In Pagan Gentile
society, in those days, idolatrous pollutions were rampant, sexual immorality and promiscuity
were also very commonplace, and meats containing blood � improperly killed � were the norm
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