Acts 15:2, commentary and pictures

At Antioch certain Jewish believers from Judea insisted that Gentile converts must be circumcised and keep the law of Moses in order to be saved, and this claim produced widespread contention and threatened division. Paul and Barnabas met the demand promptly and stood firmly against binding those Jewish rites upon Gentile Christians. To prevent continued debate from dividing the church, Antioch decided that Paul and Barnabas with other responsible men should go up to Jerusalem to lay the question before the apostles and elders in general council for a decision to be universally accepted. That council rejected the requirement of circumcision and the ceremonial law for Gentiles by a decision sanctioned by the Holy Spirit, while Jewish converts who chose to observe those ordinances were left free to do so. The sending of the question to Jerusalem shows the order that when a local church cannot agree, the matter is referred to a council of appointed delegates with the apostles and elders acting as counselors rather than rulers, so that scattered believers remain one united body.

Dispute at Antioch

The dissension arose at Antioch in Syria, the field from which Paul and Barnabas had been sent forth and to which they returned from their missionary journey. Upon their return they gathered the believers together and rehearsed all that God had wrought with them and how He had opened the door of faith unto the Gentiles. That church was large and growing, a center of missionary activity and one of the most important companies of believers, composed of many classes of people from both Jews and Gentiles.

Into that church came certain Jewish believers from Judea, of the sect of the Pharisees, who asserted with great assurance that except Gentile believers were circumcised and kept the entire ceremonial law, the law of Moses, they could not be saved nor belong to the church of Christ. Their claim produced widespread controversy at Antioch that grew into much discussion and contention and no small dissension. It brought consternation to the believing Gentiles, caused serious division, and threatened the unity of the church. Many of the believing Jews at Antioch favored the position of the brethren newly come from Judea.

Paul and Barnabas met this false doctrine with promptness and stood firmly against the introduction of Jewish rites and ceremonies as conditions for Gentile Christians. God had taught Paul that these unnecessary burdens were not to be bound upon the Gentiles, and his stand brought freedom to the churches from those rites. Human traditions and preferences must not take the place of revealed truth nor hinder the progress of the gospel.

The demand sprang from the difficulty of Jewish believers in accepting that God was opening the gospel to the Gentiles without requiring them to adopt Jewish ceremonies. In Jerusalem Jewish exclusiveness was strong, with attachment to national privileges and traditions, jealousy toward Paul as one who weakened the obligation of the Jewish law, prejudice against him, and resistance to Christianity moving beyond the ceremonies and traditions of Judaism. The dispute was part of Paul's defense of Christianity against the narrow restrictions of Judaism, carried on both at Antioch and at Jerusalem. The Jewish Christians urged circumcision and the ceremonial law because they feared Gentile practices connected with idol offerings, blood and things strangled, and sexual immorality would bring dishonor upon Christianity and disrupt fellowship between Jewish and Gentile believers. They regarded circumcision and the keeping of the ceremonial law as tests of sincere conversion and as a barrier to keep persons continuing in immoral practices from entering the church.

Council at Jerusalem

To prevent division from continued debate, the church at Antioch decided that Paul and Barnabas, with some other responsible men from the church, should go up to Jerusalem to lay the matter before the apostles and elders. There they were to meet delegates from the different churches and those who had gathered for the approaching festivals, and all controversy was to cease until a final decision was given in general council. That decision was then to be universally accepted by the different churches.

The delegation presented the controversy and its effects before the gathered churches, reporting both the success of the Gentile mission and the confusion caused by converted Pharisees who said circumcision and observance of the law of Moses were necessary for salvation. Paul first met privately with Peter, James, and John, who supported the position that Gentiles were free from the ceremonial law. At the apostolic council in Jerusalem where Paul's work among the Gentiles was considered, Paul related his conversion and the work God had done through him among the Gentiles. The Spirit bore witness to his words, the council set aside its prejudices, accepted his position, and sent an address to the churches expressing their agreement.

The council rejected requiring Gentile converts to observe the ceremonial law, including circumcision. It made recommendations about rites and customs and commended Barnabas and Paul as trustworthy workers, so that those who had criticized their methods came to share in decisions that helped unite believers. The decision was sanctioned by the Holy Spirit and remained in force. Jewish converts could observe Mosaic ordinances if they chose, but those ordinances were not obligatory for Gentile converts, though some continued to press for a distinction between the two groups. It recognized Paul's divine calling and equal standing as an apostle, and he followed the council's decisions in his work among the Gentiles.

Paul understood that the sacrificial rites had foreshadowed Christ's death and that their purpose had ended when the reality they prefigured came, while he nevertheless continued to keep the Ten Commandments. The false teachers in Galatia ignored the council's decision and urged converts to keep the law. The later advice to Paul to conform was not prompted by the Spirit.

Church Order and Unity

The serious dispute over circumcision and the law of Moses led Paul, Barnabas, and others to go up to Jerusalem to consult the apostles and elders for counsel on the disputed question. In that meeting the apostles and elders acted as counselors, not as rulers commanding the church, leaving room for the Holy Spirit to judge. Church order and organization are to serve the unity and perfection of the church, not to give leaders power to command or control fellow laborers. The course taken shows the model of bringing a serious church matter to responsible counsel rather than letting individuals impose authority beyond what was given them.

When dissension arose in a local church like Antioch and the believers were unable to come to agreement among themselves, such matters were not permitted to create division in the church. They were referred to a general council of the entire body of believers, made up of appointed delegates from the various local churches with the apostles and elders in positions of leading responsibility. This order made it possible for companies of believers scattered over a large territory to remain members of one body and to move forward solidly in concert and harmony with one another as a well-disciplined army. In this way Satan's efforts to attack the church in isolated places were met by concerted action on the part of all, and his plans to disrupt and destroy were thwarted.

The difference of understanding over circumcision, whether admission to the church should be granted to uncircumcised Gentiles, was a short-lived exception to the union that prevailed among believers after the resurrection and ascension, when they were all of one heart and one mind. The matter was soon settled, the meeting settled the difficulty, and the brethren rejoiced at the consolation it brought. Through the divine illumination and sanctification of the Spirit the believers were perfectly joined together in the same mind and in the same judgment. This harmony in understanding what is truth and unity in judgment exists only in proportion to illumination and sanctification, as believers receive the enlightenment of the living Spirit, and it is and always will be the fruit borne under the influence of the Holy Spirit.