By Martin Carey
The whole town of Lydda and the surrounding countryside were excited and couldn’t stop talking about it. Tabitha, also known as Dorcas to the Greeks, had been lost. She was much loved, and when she finally lost the battle with her fever, the sorrow was deep and widespread. They called for Peter to come and pray over her. After sending everyone out of the house, he gently turned to the body and said, “Tabitha, arise!” She opened her eyes and sat up. Peter called everyone back into the room for a joyful reunion (Acts 9:36-41). Then, after many emotional goodbyes, Peter and his companions walked the dozen miles back to where he was staying in Joppa, the house of Simon the Tanner.
Simon’s house stood at the end of his street, away from all the other houses, down by sea. As he approached, Peter could see Simon standing in his front doorway, watching the blue Mediterranean sea send wave after wave crashing on the beach. He was enjoying the fresh sea breeze after a long, hot day of work. His work was dirty, skinning dead animals, then stomping on the skins in big vats of smelly brown liquid. All the stomping produced strong, soft leather. Quality leather was always in demand, and Simon knew his craft. He was a successful man, but he had a problem with his community.
Leather tanning was an unclean business for a Jew, with its handling of dead animals and its use of animal excrement and urine to soften the skins.1 Jewish law condemned his work, for anyone who touched a dead animal was unclean (Leviticus 11), with few exceptions. Simon’s work kept him perpetually unclean, so he was seldom allowed at the synagogue or at the feasts. He was a man on the fringes of Jewish society.2 Everything had changed for Simon, though, when he met Peter who became a friend and told him about Jesus. Peter was not offended by Simon, and told him of the Messiah who received sinners, healed the sick, and died for his sins. When Peter needed a place to stay, Simon invited Peter to his home and treated him like family.
Peter did not realize that his living with Simon the Tanner was preparing him for an encounter that would change the world forever. His next mission lay to the north in Caesarea, a day’s journey away. A Roman Centurion named Cornelius of the Italian Cohort, who worshiped the Jewish God, was suddenly visited by an angel. Cornelius was told he must send men to bring Peter, who lived with Simon, a tanner who lived by the sea. Cornelius gathered three of his most trusted men and sent them to Joppa to find Peter.
The Scripture reminds us repeatedly that Simon was a tanner, a significant detail. Step by step, Peter’s Jewish fears and aversions for unclean food and people were being challenged by God. Even as Cornelius’s men were approaching Simon’s house, Peter was sitting on the roof, hungry and waiting for dinner. He fell into a trance and saw a great sheet let down from the sky by its four corners. It was full of all kinds of creatures, including reptiles and other loathsome things. “Rise Peter, kill and eat!” was the command from heaven.
Peter recoiled, “By no means, Lord; for I have never eaten anything that is common or unclean.” The sheet with the animals was let down in front of him three times, three times he was commanded to eat, and each time he refused. The voice said to him repeatedly, “What God has made clean, do not call common.” Peter came out of his trance and wondered about the vision. The Holy Spirit then told him that three men were down at the front gate looking for him. Peter was to go with them without any hesitation, for the Spirit had sent them.
Peter had just experienced the sheet full of unclean creatures three times, and he had hesitated each time. He was being disobedient to God for that hesitation, and thrice he was commanded not to call common what God had made clean. So Peter went down to meet with the three Gentiles.
Was the vision of the unclean animals given to Peter only for the purpose of teaching him that Gentiles are not unclean? Or, was it also a broader teaching that removes all barriers against people and their food; that prohibitions against mingling with unclean people and eating their unclean food are inseparable?
The prophet says…
As Seventh-day Adventists, we always insisted that the vision was only about meeting with “unclean” people, not unclean food. Ellen White vigorously denies that the Mosaic prohibitions against unclean meats are removed for Christians:
“This is a very narrow and altogether erroneous interpretation, and is plainly contradicted in the Scriptural account of the vision and its consequences.”3
Well, actually not. First of all, there is no plain teaching in the book of Acts or the entire New Testament that applies the Mosaic prohibitions against unclean meats to Christians. Paul and the other New Testament writers never forbid or condemn eating pork or any other Gentile meat. In fact, we have these plain-speaking Scriptures:
“And he said to them, ‘Then are you also without understanding? Do you not see that whatever goes into a person from outside cannot defile him, since it enters not his heart but his stomach, and is expelled?’ (Thus he declared all foods clean.) And he said, ‘What comes out of a person is what defiles him’” (Mk. 7:18-20).
“I know and am persuaded in the Lord Jesus that nothing is unclean in itself, but it is unclean for anyone who thinks it unclean” (Rom. 14:14).
“Eat whatever is sold in the meat market without raising any question on the ground of conscience. For “the earth is the Lord’s, and the fullness thereof’”(I Cor. 10:25, 26).
Now the Spirit expressly says that in later times some will depart from the faith by devoting themselves to deceitful spirits and teachings of demons…who forbid marriage and require abstinence from foods that God created to be received with thanksgiving by those who believe and know the truth. For everything created by God is good, and nothing is to be rejected if it is received with thanksgiving, for it is made holy by the word of God and prayer” (1Tim. 4:1-5).
Everything created by God and everything sold in the meat market: these categories cover a pretty broad spectrum of foods. Paul says with Jesus that everything is lawful, although not everything is helpful or builds others up (1Cor. 10:23). If someone has a tender conscience about eating certain meats, brothers and sisters in Christ should show sensitivity. If you have a medical condition that restricts your diet, good stewardship of the body requires you to be careful and responsible with all its weaknesses.
Fellowship of the Unclean
Mingling with Gentiles was very risky for a Jew who could be exposed to all sorts of contamination. Jewish midrash states:
“It happened that Shimeon the son of Kimkhith (the high-priest) went out to speak with the King of the Arabians, and there came a fleck of spittle from the King’s mouth upon the priest’s garment and so he was unclean; and his brother Judah went in and served instead of him in the high-priest’s office.”4
Knowing what that Arabian king might have eaten was enough to change everyone’s worship plans at the temple. One couldn’t be too careful.
Understanding the Jewish gentile phobias helps us understand the paradigm shift Peter faced when he was commanded to go with the three Gentiles to stay at the house of Cornelius. For his stay at the Gentile house, Peter didn’t need a cartload of kosher food to drag along for him and his Jewish companions so they could avoid being defiled by Roman cuisine. To enter a man’s house is to accept his hospitality. They could not sit outside with their sanitary sack lunches until mealtime was over. Peter knew what he was getting into, and God’s words were still ringing in his ears, “What God has made clean, do not call common.”
As a teenager on the island of Guam, I remember my classmates at public school bringing their lunches wrapped in foil. They would plop the bulging package down on a desk, open it up, and invite everyone there to come and eat with them—with their fingers. I usually hesitated, seeing their greasy fingers grabbing the chunks of meat among the noodles and vegetables. I was a little too good for them. But then, I so wanted to join them, and one day I actually did. The food and conversation with my new Guamanian friends felt really good, in spite of my little qualms. In fact, remembering this incident brings tears to my eyes. How many opportunities did I miss to make friends because of my food and people aversions!
Food and people come as a God-ordained package. That is how Jews were separated from the nations, and that is how Christians can make friends and show love to our neighbors, gathering around all kinds of ethnic food. Christian hospitality is His blessing to us who are no longer separated by the dividing wall of hostility, a wall created by Mosaic ordinances against the formerly unclean nations (Eph. 2:14-16). That is why Peter asked the assembled Christian leadership in Jerusalem,
“Now, therefore, why are you putting God to the test by placing a yoke on the neck of the disciples that neither our fathers nor we have been able to bear?” (Acts 15:10).
Peter was speaking of the Mosaic laws, not only circumcision, but also the food prohibitions. We know this because he proposed that the only laws about food they should impose on the Gentiles were the Noahic laws against things strangled and against blood. The Jerusalem Council in Acts 15 agreed and swept away all the food laws that divided Christians and impeded hospitality and fellowship.
No doubt, as Peter and his Jewish party sat around the big table with the excited Romans, food and dishes were passed around and touched, and just maybe a little spittle flew. They may have passed around lucania, the spicy Italian pork sausages that were a favorite of the Romans.
Gospel fellowship lowers barriers, but it is risky business for the squeamish. When we are guests, we don’t have much control over what our hosts will eat or say. Instead of reading labels or surgically removing ingredients from their dishes, we can respect, accept, and appreciate their kindness.
Christian hospitality is designed to humble us. By freely partaking around the Gentile table, we demonstrate the radical, open-armed acceptance that Christ has shown to icky people like us. Jesus received sinners and ate with them. He didn’t condone their sin, but He accepted them as people.5 No matter whose house or what country we’re in, we can feely give of ourselves and make the gospel come alive. May God open our hearts and our mouths for the sake of His good name. †
References
- A Quick History of the Leather Tanning Industry, http://www.blackstockleather.com/history-of-the-leather-tanning-industry/
- Emil Hirsch, Gotthard Deutsch, Nebelah, http://www.jewishencyclopedia.com/articles/11403-nebelah
- Ellen White, The Story of Redemption, 285.1, https://m.egwwritings.org/en/book/145.1353
- Midrash Rabbah, quoted in http://biblehub.com/commentaries/acts/10-28.htm
- Rosaria Butterfield, The Gospel Comes With a House Key, Practicing Radically Ordinary Hospitality in a Post-Christian World, Crossway, 2018, Preface.
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This is a very insightful article, for which I sincerely thank the author. I also love Beethoven’s music, and opera (a big no-no for SDAs!).