The life and work of St. Paul

158 THE LIFE AND WOBK OF ST. PAUL.
religions. All who, to the utmost of the opportunities vouchsafed to them,
fear and love God with sincerity of heart, shall be saved by Christ's redemption
some of them ; many of them will He lead to a knowledge of Him in
this life ; all of them shall see Him and know Him in the life to come. 1
Accordingly Peter proceeded to recall to these Gentiles all that they had
heard a of the preaching of peace by Jesus Chriet the Lord of all ; of His life
and ministry after the baptism of John how ; God anointed Him with the
how He went about doing good, and healing all
Holy Spirit and with power ;
who were under the tyranny of the devil ; and then of the Crucifixion and
Resurrection from the dead, of which the disciples were the appointed wit-
nesses, commissioned by the Voice of their risen Lord to testify that He is the
destined Judge of quick and dead. And while Peter was proceeding to show
from the Prophets that all who believed on Him should through His name
receive remission of sins, suddenly on these unbaptised Gentiles no less than
on the Jews who were present, fell that inspired emotion of superhuman
utterance which was the signature of Pentecost.
" The Holy Ghost fell upon
them." The six brethren who had accompanied Peter from Joppa might well
be amazed. Here were men unbaptised, uncircumcised, unclean men who
had been idolaters, dogs of the Gentiles, eaters of the unclean beast, whose
touch involved ceremonial pollution speaking and praising God in the
utterances which could only come from hearts stirred by divine influence to
their most secret depth. With bold readiness Peter seized the favourable
moment. The spectacle which ho had witnessed raised him above ignoble
prejudices, and the rising tide of conviction swept away the dogmas and
habits of his earlier years. Appealing to this proof of the spiritual equality
of the Gentile with the Jew, he asked " whether any one could forbid water
for their baptism ? " No one cared to dispute the cogency of this proof that
it was God's will to admit Cornelius and his friends to the privileges of
Christian brotherhood. Peter not only commanded them to be baptised in
the name of the Lord, but even freely accepted their invitation " to tarry with
them certain days."
The news of a revolution so astounding was not long in reaching Jerusalem,
and when Peter returned to the Holy City he was met by the sterner zealots
who had joined Christianity, by those of whom we shall henceforth hear so
often as " those of the circumcision," with the fierce indignant murmur,
" Thou wentest into the house of men uncircumcieed, and didst SAT WITH
THEM/" 3 To associate with them, to enter their houses, was not that pollution
enough P to touch in familiar intercourse men who had never received
the seal of the covenant, to be in daily contact with people who might, no one
knew how recently, have had " broth of abominable things in their vessels ''
Of. Rom. ii. 6, 10, 14, 15.
J Acts x. 86. To understand it* Arfyov here in the Johannino sense seem* to me
utterly uncritical.
* " He who eats with an unoircumclsed person, eats, as it were, with a dog ; he who
touches him, touches, as it were, a dead body ; and he who bathes in the same place with
him, bathes, as
"
it were, with a leper (Pirke Eabbi Slieter, 29).