by Harry BuererIn Acts 15 there is a description of a meeting of leaders of the believing community in Jerusalem to settle a question that had arisen in Antioch when Paul and Barnabas were ministering there. The causes and results of this meeting have been misunderstood by many.
The controversy starts when some men come from Judea to Antioch and teach, “Unless you are circumcised, according to the custom taught by Moses, you cannot be saved” (15:1). What did they mean by this? If taken very literally, it would imply that women can’t be saved. We need to understand that circumcision is used as a kind of shorthand for conversion to Judaism. Jews were “the circumcised”, while “the uncircumcised” were Gentiles. The claim of these men was that in order to be saved, you had to convert to Judaism.
This was not such a far-fetched idea. Until quite recently, all the believers had been Jews, and synagogues were the main places that the apostles taught. But Paul and Barnabas recognized that this idea was a grave error. It was not Judaism that saved, but faith in Jesus. Throughout biblical times, before there was any concept of conversion to Judaism, there were Gentiles who embraced God and the people of Israel, for example, Ruth. Throughout the Torah there were instructions given to both the native-born and the sojourner (e.g. Lev. 24:22). It was clear to Paul and Barnabas that God accepted the faith of Gentiles.
Some potential confusion is thrown into the mix. When the apostles and elders meet in Jerusalem to discuss the question, “Some of the believers who belonged to the party of the Pharisees stood up and said, ‘The Gentiles must be circumcised and required to obey the law of Moses'” (15:5). From this verse many interpreters have concluded that the issue here was whether believers should obey the law of Moses. This is not the issue at all.
It helps to be aware that in biblical times as well as today there were considered to be three elements to conversion to Judaism. The person had to be circumcised (if male), immersed in water, and vow to follow God’s commands in scripture. It was this process that was being addressed here. Ther question was the same; “Do Gentile believers need to convert to Judaism to be right with God?”
After a lot of discussion, including testimonies of how God had brought Gentiles to faith, James, who was apparently the leader of the group, got up and summarized the biblical teaching from the prophets on promises regarding Gentiles. It seemed to be the consensus of the council that God saves Gentiles. James, however, recognized the difficulty that Gentiles would face in transitioning to a lifestyle of following God’s commands completely, seeing that it was difficult even for Jews who had been raised in Torah-observance to do so. So he suggests a compromise.
Newly-believing Gentiles would be encouraged to focus on four specific laws at first. Why these four? It seems that they are practices that would allow the Gentiles to be accepted in the Jewish community and not offend practicing Jews.
James concludes his presentation by noting that the law is taught in synagogues all over the empire. The implication is that these new believers will attend synagogue services and gradually increase in their knowledge of the ways in which God commanded his people to live.
This suggestion of James is accepted by all the apostles and elders, and was communicated by messengers to Gentile congregations in the diaspora.
The difficulty that many readers have with this passage, as well as the epistle to the Galatians, which addresses a similar theme, is that they think the apostles are teaching not to follow the law. If that were the case, the recommendation of four laws to start with wouldn’t make any sense, nor would the reference to Moses being taught in the synagogues.
The point of this passage, and the epistle to the Galatians, is that God saves Gentiles, as Gentiles, by faith in Jesus. Paul does point out in Romans and Ephesians that those Gentiles are grafted into the covenant people of God, but as to their identity, they remain Gentiles. God is the God of all peoples, not only the Jews. (Romans 3:29)