Atos 15
Origen of Alexandria · Comentário Patrístico (catena)
Atos 15:1
Observe what he alleges as a proof of his statement: "Christians at first were few in number and held the same opinions, but when they grew to be a great multitude, they were divided and separated, each wishing to have his own individual party. This was their object from the beginning." That Christians at first were few in number, in comparison with the multitudes who subsequently became Christian, is no doubt true.…He also says that "all the Christians were of one mind," not noticing, even in this particular, that from the beginning there were differences of opinion among believers regarding the meaning of the books held to be divine. At all events, while the apostles were still preaching and eyewitnesses of Jesus were still teaching his doctrine, there was no small discussion among the converts from Judaism regarding Gentile believers and whether they ought to observe Jewish customs or reject the burden of clean and unclean meats as not being obligatory on those who had abandoned their ancestral Gentile customs and had become believers in Jesus. — AGAINST CELSUS 3.10-11
Atos 15:20
"Speak to Aaron and his sons and to all the sons of Israel, and tell them: If anyone who is from among the sons of Israel or from among foreigners, who happens to be among you, eats any blood, I shall place my spirit over the spirit which shall have eaten the blood, and I shall abolish it from among the people, since the spirit of every flesh is its blood. To you I have also given the blood so that by it upon the altar there might be propitiations for your spirits, since the blood will make expiation for the spirit. Therefore, I have said to the sons of Israel: Every spirit among you shall not eat blood, and any foreigner among you shall not eat blood." You see, therefore, that this law regarding blood, given equally to both the sons of Israel and to foreigners, is even observed by us from among the Gentiles who believe in God through Jesus Christ. Scripture tends to call proselytes foreigners, as when it says, "The foreigner who is among you will rise up above you, while you descend below. He shall be your head, and you shall be his tail." Therefore, even the church of the Gentiles took in common with the people of Israel the law regarding blood, for that blessed council of the apostles, understanding that these things had been so written in the law, then ordered and decreed in writing the teachings for the Gentiles that they abstain not only from what had been sacrificed to idols and from fornication, but also from blood and from what had been suffocated. Now perhaps you will ask, "If Scripture was so clear with regard to blood, should it not also teach clearly about what has been suffocated, whether a law was given as common to the people of Israel and to foreigners, since the teachings of the apostles decree that Gentiles also observe this law?" Listen how observantly even this is guarded against in the laws of God: "If a man, any man," it says, "from the sons of Israel and from the foreigners among you, hunts a beast or a bird, let him pour out its blood and cover it with earth, for the spirit of every flesh is its blood." — COMMENTARY ON ROMANS 2.13
Atos 15:29
Now in these precepts where it says that no other burden ought to be imposed on Gentile believers except abstinence from the sacrifices of idols, from blood, from what has been suffocated and from fornication, homicide is not forbidden, nor adultery, nor theft, nor homosexual acts, nor other crimes that are punished by divine and human laws. But if it is saying that Christians must observe only that which it has recounted, it will appear to some that it granted license concerning the rest. But consider how the Holy Spirit manages affairs: since other crimes are avenged by laws of the world, it seemed superfluous for those things, which are sufficiently covered by human law, also to have been forbidden by divine law. It only decreed those things about which human law had said nothing and which seemed proper to religion. — COMMENTARY ON ROMANS 9.28