Page:Lives of the apostles of Jesus Christ (1836).djvu/257

 *tion of the apostles. So little settled, after all, were the views and feelings of these first preachers of Christianity about the degree of freedom to be enjoyed by the numerous Gentile converts, that all the Jewish prejudices of many of them burst out at once, and high ground was taken against any dispensation in favor of Gentile prejudices. After a long discussion, in full assembly of both apostles and church-officers, Peter arose in the midst of the debate, taking the superiority to which his peculiar commission and his long precedence among them entitled him, and in a tone of dignified decision addressed them. He reminded them, in the first place, of that unquestionable call by which God had chosen him from among all the apostles, to proclaim to the heathen the word of the gospel, and of that solemn sign by which God had attested the completeness of their conversion, knowing, as he did, the hearts of all his creatures. The signs of the Holy Spirit having been imparted to the heathen converts with the same perfection of regenerating influence that had been manifested in those of the Jewish faith who had believed, it was manifestly challenging the testimony of God himself, to try to put on them the irksome yoke of the tedious Mosaic ritual, a yoke which not even the Jewish disciples, nor their fathers before them, had been able to bear in all the appointed strictness of its observances; and much less, then, could they expect a burden so intolerable, to be supported by those to whom it had none of the sanctions of national and educational prejudice, which so much assisted its dominion over the feelings of the Jews. And all the disciples, even those of Jewish race, must be perfectly satisfied that their whole reliance for salvation should be, not on any legal conformity, but on that common favor of their Lord, Jesus Christ, in which the Gentile converts also trusted.

Challenge the testimony of God.—This is the substance of Kuinoel's ideas of the force of this passage, (Acts xv. 10.) [Greek: peirazete ton Theon], (peirazete ton Theon.) His words are, "Tentare Deum dicuntur, qui veritatem, omnipotentiam, omniscientiam, etc. Dei in dubium vocare, vel nova divinae potentiae ac voluntatis documenta desiderant, adeoque Deo obnituntur."—"Those are said to tempt God who call in question God's truth, omnipotence, omniscience, &c., or demand new evidences of the divine power or will, and thus strive against God." He quotes Pott and Schleusner in support of this view of the passage. Rosenmueller and Bloomfield take the same view, as well as many others quoted by the latter and by Poole. Bloomfield is very full on the whole of Peter's speech, and on all the discussion, with the occasions of it.

Chose me.—This passage has been the subject of much discussion, but I have given a free translation which disagrees with no one of the views of its literal force. The fairest opinion of the matter is, that the expression [Greek: exelexato en êmin], is a Hebraism. (See Vorstius and others quoted by Bloomfield.)

This logically clear statement of whole difficulty, supported by