Subject: Acts 15 and the role of the Gentile
Date: Thu, 15 Jan 1998 23:02:24 +0000
From: heb_roots_chr@mail.geocities.com
Reply-To: heb_roots_chr@geocities.com
To: "Hebraic Heritage Newsgroup"<heb_roots_chr@geocities.com>

From:          Gregory Richardson
To:            heb_roots_chr@geocities.com
Subject:       Re: How the Church lost it's Hebraic Roots

> >From Eddie:
> ***************
>
> ...........When God poured out His Ruach HaKodesh/Holy Spirit, He did
> so upon both Jew and Gentile. The BIG controversy was how to disciple
> the Gentile into a Jewish faith. What was required of them? Did they
> have to become Jews? Did they have to be circumcised? This issue was
> so BIG that was  the meeting of the Jerusalem Council to decide this
> issue. What they decided was that that there were MINIMUM requirements
> for the Gentile to come into the Jewish faith and practice  but the
> Gentile were not required to keep all the commandments or have
> knowledge of all the commandments as did the Jews. However, since
> they went to the Synogogue to learn and study Torah every week (Acts
> 15:21), it was decided that the Gentiles should STUDY and LEARN and
> that  the Holy Spirit would guide them in their walk in further Torah
> observance.
>

As a further clarification of what Eddie had written:

    Many people read Acts 15:19 & 20 and conclude that the Gentiles
where not required to observe Torah.  Most fail, however, to grasp the
full significance of verse 21.  The church, at that time, was not
considered to be separate from the Jewish faith.  It was just one of
many sects within that faith; and all of those sects Pharisees,
Saducees, the Way (Christians) met in the synagogues every Sabbath.
What the Jerusalem conference had said, in essence, is that the
Gentiles should not be banned from fellowship because they had
not "first" met certain requirements.  The "prerequisites" were to be
kept to a minimum because the Gentiles had not learned these things
from childhood like the rest of the "church".  It was thought
that because Moses was read aloud every Sabbath that these
Gentiles would eventually learn to become fully "Torah observant".

-Gregory R

CRMI
http://www.geocities.com/Heartland/Valley/2080/ 

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