'And the apostles and brethren that were in Judaea heard that the
Gentiles had also received the word of God. 2. And when Peter was come
up to Jerusalem, they that were of the circumcision contended with him,
3. Saying, Thou wentest in to men uncircumcised, and didst eat with
them. 4. But Peter rehearsed the matter from the beginning, and
expounded it by order unto them, saying, 5. I was in the city of Joppa
praying: and in a trance I saw a vision, A certain vessel descend, as
it had been a great sheet, let down from heaven by four corners; and it
came even to me: 6. Upon the which when I had fastened mine eyes, I
considered, and saw fourfooted beasts of the earth, and wild beasts,
and creeping things, and fowls of the air. 7. And I heard a voice
saying unto me, Arise, Peter; slay, and eat. 8. But I said, Not so,
Lord: for nothing common or unclean hath at any time entered into my
mouth. 9. But the voice answered me again from heaven, What God hath
cleansed, that call not thou common. 10. And this was done three times:
and all were drawn up again into heaven. 11. And, behold, immediately
there were three men already come unto the house where I was, sent from
Caesarea unto me. 12. And the Spirit bade me go with them, nothing
doubting. Moreover these six brethren accompanied me, and we entered
into the man's house: 13. And he shewed us how he had seen an angel in
his house, which stood and said unto him, Send men to Joppa, and call
for Simon, whose surname is Peter; 14. Who shall tell thee words,
whereby thou and all thy house shall be saved. 15. And as I began to
speak, the Holy Ghost fell on them, as on us at the beginning. 16. Then
remembered I the word of the Lord, how that He said, John indeed
baptized with water; but ye shall be baptized with the Holy Ghost. 17.
Forasmuch then as God gave them the like gift as He did unto us, who
believed on the Lord Jesus Christ; what was I, that I could withstand
God? 18. When they heard these things, they held their peace, and
glorified God, saying, Then hath God also to the Gentiles granted
repentance unto life.'--ACTS xi. 1-18.
Peter's action in regard to Cornelius precipitated a controversy which
was bound to come if the Church was to be anything more than a Jewish
sect. It brought to light the first tendency to form a party in the
Church. 'They... of the circumcision' were probably 'certain of the
sect of the Pharisees which believed,' and were especially zealous for
all the separating prescriptions of the ceremonial law. They were
scarcely a party as yet, but the little rift was destined to grow, and
they became Paul's bitterest opponents through all his life, dogging
him with calumnies and counterworking his toil. It is a black day for a
Church when differences of opinion lead to the formation of cliques.
Zeal for truth is sadly apt to enlist spite, malice, and blindness to a
manifest work of God, as its allies.
Poor Peter, no doubt, expected that the brethren would rejoice with him
in the extension of the Gospel to 'the Gentiles,' but his reception in
Jerusalem was very unlike his hopes. The critics did not venture to
cavil at his preaching to Gentiles. Probably none of them had any
objection to such being welcomed into the Church, for they can scarcely
have wished to make the door into it narrower than that into the
synagogue, but they insisted that there was no way in but through the
synagogue. By all means, said they, let Gentiles come, but they must
first become Jews, by submitting to circumcision and living as Jews do.
Thus they did not attack Peter for preaching to the Roman centurion and
his men, but for eating with them. That eating not only was a breach of
the law, but it implied the reception of Cornelius and his company into
the household of God, and so destroyed the whole fabric of Jewish
exclusiveness. We condemn such narrowness, but do many of us not
practise it in other forms? Wherever Christians demand adoption of
external usages, over and above exercise of penitent faith, as a
condition of brotherly recognition, they are walking in the steps of
them 'of the circumcision.'
Peter's answer to the critics is the true answer to all similar hedging
up of the Church, for he contents himself with showing that he was only
following God's action in every step of the way which he took, and that
God, by the gift of the divine Spirit, had shown that He had taken
these uncircumcised men into His fellowship, before Peter dared to 'eat
with them.' He points to four facts which show God's hand in the
matter, and thinks that he has done enough to vindicate himself
thereby. The first is his vision on the housetop. He tells that he was
praying when it came, and what God shows to a praying spirit is not
likely to mislead. He tells that he was 'in a trance,'--a condition in
which prophets had of old received their commands. That again was a
guarantee for the divine origin of the vision in the eyes of every Jew,
though nowadays it is taken by anti-supernaturalists as a demonstration
of its morbidness and unreliableness. He tells of his reluctance to
obey the command to 'kill and eat.' A flash of the old brusque spirit
impelled his flat refusal, 'Not so, Lord!' and his daring to argue with
his Lord still, as he had done with Him on earth. He tells of the
interpreting and revolutionary word, evoked by his audacious objection,
and then he tells how 'this was done thrice,' so that there could be no
mistake in his remembrance of it, and then that the whole was drawn up
into heaven,--a sign that the purpose of the vision was accomplished
when that word was spoken. What, then, was the meaning of it?
Clearly it swept away at once the legal distinction of clean and
unclean meats, and of it, too, may be spoken what Mark, Peter's
mouthpiece, writes of earthly words of Christ's: 'This He said, making
all meats clean.' But with the sweeping away of that distinction much
else goes, for it necessarily involves the abrogation of the whole
separating ordinances of the law, and of the distinction between clean
and unclean persons. Its wider application was not seen at the moment,
but it flashed on him, no doubt, when face to face with Cornelius. God
had cleansed him, in that his prayers had 'gone up for a memorial
before God,' and so Peter saw that 'in every nation,' and not among
Jews only, there might be men cleansed by God. What was true of
Cornelius must be true of many others. So the whole distinction between
Jew and Gentile was cut up by the roots. Little did Peter know the
width of the principle revealed to him then, as all of us know but
little of the full application of many truths which we believe. But he
obeyed so much of the command as he understood, and more of it
gradually dawned on his mind, as will always be the case if we obey
what we know.
The second fact was the coincident arrival of the messengers and the
distinct command to accompany them. Peter could distinguish quite
assuredly his own thoughts from divine instructions, as his account of
the dialogue in the trance shows. How he distinguished is not told;
that he distinguished is. The coincidence in time clearly pointed to
one divine hand working at both ends of the line,--Caesarea and Joppa.
It interpreted the vision which had 'much perplexed' Peter as to what
it 'might mean.' But he was not left to interpret it by his own
pondering. The Spirit spoke authoritatively, and the whole force of his
justification of himself depends on the fact that he knew that the
impulse which made him set out to Caesarea was not his own. If the
reading of the Revised Version is adopted in verse 12, 'making no
distinction,' the command plainly referred to the vision, and showed
Peter that he was to make no distinction of 'clean and unclean' in his
intercourse with these Gentiles.
The third fact is the vision to Cornelius, of which he was told on
arriving. The two visions fitted into each other, confirmed each other,
interpreted each other. We may estimate the greatness of the step in
the development of the Church which the admission of Cornelius into it
made, and the obstacles on both sides, by the fact that both visions
were needed to bring these two men together. Peter would never have
dreamed of going with the messengers if he had not had his narrowness
beaten out of him on the housetop, and Cornelius would never have
dreamed of sending to Joppa if he had not seen the angel. The cleft
between Jew and Gentile was so wide that God's hand had to be applied
on both sides to press the separated parts together. He had plainly
done it, and that was Peter's defence.
The fourth fact is the gift of the Spirit to these Gentiles. That is
the crown of Peter's vindication, and his question, 'Who was I, that I
could withstand God?' might be profitably pondered and applied by those
whose ecclesiastical theories oblige them to deny the 'orders' and the
'validity of the sacraments' and the very name of a Church, to bodies
of Christians who do not conform to their polity. If God, by the gift
of His Spirit manifest in its fruits, owns them, they have the true
'notes of the Church,' and 'they of the circumcision' who recoil from
recognising them do themselves more harm thereby than they inflict on
these. 'As many as are led by the Spirit of God, these are the sons of
God,' even though some brother may be 'angry' that the Father welcomes
them.