Acts 15 and the Noachide Laws

[Wags]

Tim Hegg has written an intersting paper titled "Do the Seven , Go to Heaven? (http://www.torahresource.com/English%20Articles/NoachideETS2.pdf)" An investigation into the history of the Noachide Laws.

[plum]

ooh thanks Wags I haven't read that yet. any interesting points we could discuss here in particular?

[visionary]

One thing that I did notice in the article is the fact that Noahide Laws were well established by the first century. I am suspicious and believe that Noahide was put into place by Jews wanting to keep Gentiles out of the faith, which has never been God's intentions. IT just does not make sense that one tribe, out all nations of the world, is the only one who is commanded to not lie, steal, murder, respect parents, worship on sabbath, and no coveting anything of the neighbors.

[Steve Petersen]

The Encyclopaedia Judaica article on Noachide Laws makes it pretty clear that in the Tannaitic period (pre-Destruction era) and into the Talmudic era there were varying ideas about what these law were.

There is this interesting note though:

Acts (15:20) refers to four commandments addressed to non-Jews, "... that they abstain from pollutions of idols, from fornication, from things strangled, and from blood." This latter list is the only one that bears any systematic relationship to the set of religious laws which the Pentateuch makes obligatory upon resident aliens (the ger ha-gar and ezrah).


It seems that the Jerusalem council may have regarded Gentiles as 'strangers (from the word ger). This is really interesting in light of the commandments that the ger was obliged to keep.

[HaNotsri]

There are actually two types of gerim. The first was called a ger tsedeq. This was a ger who was a convert (proselyte) to Judaism, was circumcised, immersed in a mikveh, brought a sacrifice (in the time of the Temple), and took on the yoke of the commandments. He is the "ger" the Torah speaks of when it says "One law for the native-born and stranger alike." There is also the ger toshav who was not proselyte to Judaism, but was a gentile God-fearer and lived among Jewish communities (either in Israel or otherwise). He was expected to follow those seven laws of the children of Noach while living among the communities. But there seems to be a misunderstanding about these laws. The big one is it doesn't matter whether or not your religion encompasses those seven laws. You also had to believe that those laws were God's revelation to the gentile peoples and were revealed at Sinai. The ger toshav was the stranger that lives amongst the Jewish people that could not eat of the Passover, could eat non-kosher meats (as is suggested in the Torah), etc. This is probably what Cornelius (Acts 10) was.