by allyouneedislove 12 Replies latest watchtower beliefs
Leolaia said:
So James still regarded uncircumcised Gentile Christians as Godfearers, and the stipulations in Acts 15 were likely not viewed as "recommendations" but more like the bare minimum that Gentiles were expected to observe.
would someone help me understand why murder, lie, and extortion, were not put in acts 15:29 if the stipulations were the "bare minimum"?
that is a new thought to me, Leolaia.
guess my problem with w82 7/15 30-31
is that is draws such a hard line in breaking technical laws in times of great need:
Numbers 15:32-36 While the Israelites were in the desert, a man was found gathering wood on the Sabbath day. Those who found him gathering wood brought him to Moses and Aaron and the whole assembly, and they kept him in custody, because it was not clear what should be done to him. Then the LORD said to Moses, “The man must die. The whole assembly must stone him outside the camp.” So the assembly took him outside the camp and stoned him to death, as the LORD commanded Moses.
It doesnt seem reasonable to think that they would have put him to death if he would be collecting firewood so that his family did not freeze or so he could cook a meal, in extenuating circumstances.
sorry for the bold, weird copy/paste
would someone help me understand why murder, lie, and extortion, were not put in acts 15:29 if the stipulations were the "bare minimum"? that is a new thought to me, Leolaia.
What I mean is that they are part of the minimum required; I don't necessarily mean that there aren't other rules. The Didache is instructive. The stipulation about food sacrificed to idols is appended to the Two Ways document. The stipulation says, in effect, we really recommend you follow the whole Torah, but if you can't do that, do what you can about food, but if there is anything you must do, it is to be on guard against food sacrified to idols. This makes the latter stipulation among the least optional of the Torah (or rather, halakhic application of the Torah). Nor is it that this is the only thing Christians had to follow. The preceding Two Ways document went into great detail about the what the righteous person should do and what he or she should not do.
But that brings up the other important point. We're not talking about pious people like the ideal worshipper of God from the Two Ways. We're talking about Godfearers! Gentiles involved themselves with the Jewish community in all sorts of loose ways without being subject to its rules. Those who want to start associating with Jews cannot have been expected to already be pious people, and early Christians certainly did not want to discourage potential converts (as stated in Acts 15:19) by expecting them to conform immediately to a lengthy ethical code. The Didache allows for a progressive growth in one's adherence to the Torah, with the convert going at their own pace in changing their lifestyle ("do what you can"). The purpose of the Noachide laws was "to establish a minimum of obligations for the Godfearers so they could be saved with the Jews who were required to strictly keep to the whole Law of Moses" (Huub van de Sandt & David Flusser, The Didache: Its Jewish Sources and Place in Early Judaism and Christianity, p. 246). The conflict throughout much of Acts concerned the status of Gentile Christians who did not follow the Torah (especially Paul's converts). Were they just Godfearers, or did they have full rights as members of the community? The council at Jerusalem did not settle this question, as the incident at Antioch later shows (and indeed as Paul's conflicts with the "Judaizers" also indicate). All it did was agree on some minimum Noachide requirements that uncircumcised Gentiles were expected to adhere to. The earliest attested Noachide rules were tripartite (against bloodshed, idolatry, and fornication), then this was expanded to four (adding a provision against theft), until eventually settling on seven laws in later rabbinical Judaism.
About murder, btw, it is possibly covered by the reference to blood; abstaining from blood (notice it doesn't say abstaining from the eating of blood) potentially covered both bloodshed and the eating of bloody meat. Both are mentioned together in the commandment given to Noah in Genesis 9, and similarly appear together in Jubilees 7. The complex of bloodshed/idolatry/fornication as the laws of central importance appears widely in rabbinical Judaism, which corresponds especially in the Western Text (which has a tripartite form) to blood/food sacrificed to idols/fornication. The form of the stipulations in the apostolic letter suggests there were more specific concerns than a general prohibition of murder, idolatry, and fornication. Specifying "food sacrified to idols" instead of "idolatry" focused specifically on a matter that was a significant issue for first century Christians (Paul expends two chapters talking about it in 1 Corinthians). The change from "bloodshed" to the more general "blood" may have also had an eye on dietary issues, as the addition of "things strangled" also suggests.
