Unclean Sheets

In my opinion, the next story in the book of Acts is one of the most misunderstood, misapplied, and critical stories of the book. In order to set up the context for the story, we may find it helpful to remind ourselves of the Jewish nature of the story. I find that far too many Christian readers will see what they call the “Old Testament” as a Jewish story and the “New Testament” as a story predominantly of Gentiles. While we’ve worked very hard to preserve the Jewishness of Jesus in our walk through the gospel accounts, it is even more difficult for us to maintain a Jewish perspective through the record of Acts. I mean, the whole book is a record of the Gentile church, right?

Not exactly.

It would serve us well to stop and realize or remind ourselves that up to this point, the entire story has been Jewish. While there has been plenty of Gentile interaction in the New Testament (this isn’t unique to the New Testament; Gentiles are all over the Tanakh as well), this interaction has always fit within a Jewish worldview and a Jewish context. The story of the Ascension is a story of a Jewish rabbi and his talmidim; the story of Pentecost is a Jewish story of Shavuot (yes, when you stop to consider it, Pentecost was a story about Jews, not Gentiles). The stories about the believers sharing their possessions, breaking bread, and praying together are stories about Jewish believers. The problem with the widows, the stoning of Stephen, and the life-change of Saul is all Jewish.

The story of Cornelius presents the first encounter with a Gentile not being assumed as a Jewish convert, and a Jewish apostle confronted in his worldview about how to interact with a fellowship of the goyim (the Hebrew word for “Gentiles”).

The story begins with a man named Cornelius who lives in Caesarea — which happens to be a VERY Roman city that doesn’t share the values of the Jewish world of Judea and Samaria — and has a love for the God of Israel and a heart of righteousness that gives to the marginalized and shows hospitality. After an incredible God-encounter, he sends for Peter, who happens to be down the road at Joppa.

As the messengers head out for Joppa, we are told about Peter, who is having an encounter of his own. He goes up to the roof of the home to catch a nap and has a vision of a sheet coming down with all kinds of animals. The passage specifically mentions that there are unclean animals included (reptiles and four-footed animals of “all kinds”). A voice speaks to Peter and directs him to kill and eat. Peter objects on the grounds that eating unclean animals is against the Law and he has never done this in all his life. The voice tells Peter not to call unclean what God has made clean.

It’s at this point where biblical interpretation starts to go off the rails for many of us. I have heard numerous times that this is where God decides all food is now clean, and kosher law doesn’t exist anymore. But such an interpretation completely ignores the details of the passage and demonstrates horrific Biblical exegesis.

First, God has not made unclean animals clean; God has very clearly called them unclean. This is why Peter is so confused by the vision. Three times the vision repeats itself and each time Peter insists on being obedient. The reasoning for Peter is clear: “I will not eat something unclean.” The voice says not to call unclean what is clean. Peter’s logic says, “That’s just fine, but that lizard IS unclean and I’m not to eat it.”

Second, we cannot forget the context of the vision. Peter is being prepared by God for a world-shaking encounter with Cornelius; Peter’s world is about to be blown up. To understand the cultural context, we have to understand what was called Jewish halakhah, or the oral traditions and teachings about how to walk out God’s commands. When God gave you Torah, He gave you 613 commands to follow; the problem has always been trying to figure out HOW to follow those 613 commands correctly. In order to help in this process, the Jewish world was working on a canonized oral tradition. This oral tradition stated that since you were trying to avoid contact with unclean things, a Jew should not eat with a Gentile. They are unfamiliar with kosher law and do things all the time that make themselves unclean.

What was often overlooked is the difference between God’s written law and the oral law (halakhah or traditions). To this day, the Jewish faith will see the oral law with similar authority (in fact, in some ultra-Orthodox circles, with MORE authority) as the written law. The Talmud teaches that when Moses came down the mountain with the written law, he also came down the mountain with the oral law. Whether they believe this to be literally true or not is beside the point; the application is that you cannot have written law without oral law.

I think this observation is true on principle and often poorly applied. As we’ve tried to show through the life of Jesus, he often questioned the oral traditions and critiqued them, while always upholding Torah to the letter. Peter finds himself in a world that has declared kosher law, by extension, means the Gentiles are unclean. You can search your Torah as long as you like — God never said such a thing. Nevertheless, at the point of the vision, Peter is very confused, but his encounter with Cornelius is going to fill in the blanks.

People often act like interpreting this passage is an arbitrary and ambiguous thing, but Peter interprets the vision for us! He tells the people in Acts 10 that they are well aware of the Jewish traditions, but he has recently been shown that PEOPLE are not unclean. To be clear, the vision of Peter has nothing to do with food; the vision is about people. The food issue for Peter is quite black and white; certain foods are clean, certain foods are unclean. But God is telling Peter that people are not unclean and he needs to see them as such.

Now, I know some astute readers are thinking, “Hey! Wait a minute! Are you telling me I should be eating kosher?” Wait on that specific answer, but the question itself is brilliant, because that question is what so much of the New Testament is about.

Certainly, the world of the apostles began to shake that day, as God starts to chip away at their assumptions and blow apart old wineskins so He could restore a world He has always been trying to reach. He had told Abraham at the beginning of the story He was looking for a partner to bless all nations. The story of the conquest put His people at the crossroads of the earth so they could bring shalom to chaos in the midst of the nations. The prophets spoke again and again of God’s people being a light to the nations and a hope for the goyim.

Sometimes, our oral traditions and our interpretations get in the way of what God is trying to do. When He blows apart our parameters and our insulators, our whole world begins to shake. But a shaking world of religious uncertainty is often the beginning of a revolution of redemption and the liberation of captives.