Oct 10
The Jerusalem Council (again)
There are some perennial questions that never go away and never get resolved. April DeConick has reopened one of them: the Jerusalem Council of Acts 15. Loren Rosson responds to her, and April posts a second reflection. I always find these discussions leave me as indecisive as before, even if helpful in moving towards clarity, but I do have a few observations.
First, I am persuaded that, whatever the difficulties, the event of Acts 15 does refer to the same event as Galatians 2. They share a location, a general topic, and the same essential personnel. It is only economical to assume that they refer to the same event (I am a fan of Occam’s razor).
Secondly, I think Mark Goodacre has an important point when he suggests Luke may have moved the event to suit his purposes. (And see Mark’s discussion here and here) Luke does do this kind of thing, most notoriously in narrating John’s imprisonment before Jesus’ baptism. The Jerusalem Council represents Peter’s final appearance in Acts, and the movement of Paul’s mission to the Gentiles which will occupy the rest of the story receives authentication and blessing as the focus for the remainder. Luke seems to have crafted this pretty much as the mid-point of his narrative, and its representation needs to be seen within that framework.
Third, I resist the construction Loren puts on Peter’s behaviour, as a typical piece of agonistic game-playing. I think this is another example of fitting facts to cross-culturally derived theories. But if, as Loren seems to agree, Galatians 2 and Acts 15 refer to the same event, then after this event, Peter, left to his own devices is still quite happy sharing table-fellowship with uncircumcised Gentiles, on Paul’s own testimony. (Gal 2:11-12). There is no sense in our primary witness that Peter was either unwilling to receive Gentiles, or deliberately treacherous in the way he does so.
Update 12/10/2007: April DeConick offers an interesting revised scenario. I’m well aware that every solution to this has problems, but I do think unpicking Acts 15 to refer to two separate decisions is a real methodological problem. I further think that the broader evidence from Paul won’t easily let us reduce the reasons for “persecution” and conflict down to a debate primarily over circumcision, though it includes that.
December 8th, 2007 at 5:49 am
Doug,
I have been working on the Acts-Galatians question. It seems to me that Paul’s collection from Galatia, which he mentions in 1 Cor 16:1-2 was 7 years earlier than is normally supposed. That is to say, it was immediately before the ’second missionary journey’ and was conducted in response the the request that Paul “remember the poor”. Given this possibility, there is no real reason to displace the visit of Gal 2:1-10 (which = Acts 15) to after the evangelism of Europe. In fact there is much that can be said against this view of Knox and his followers. For example, the presence of Barnabas is a difficulty for Knox.
For much more on these historical questions, see me web site at
http://members.shaw.ca/rfellows/index.htm
Best wishes,
Richard.