Acts 2:42-47 - The First "Church"

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BetteTheRed

BetteTheRed

Resident Heretic
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Acts 2:42-47 New Revised Standard Version Updated Edition



42 They devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching and fellowship, to the breaking of bread and the prayers.

Life among the Believers​

43 Awe came upon everyone because many wonders and signs were being done through the apostles. 44 All who believed were together and had all things in common; 45 they would sell their possessions and goods and distribute the proceeds[a] to all, as any had need. 46 Day by day, as they spent much time together in the temple, they broke bread at home[b] and ate their food with glad and generous[c] hearts, 47 praising God and having the goodwill of all the people. And day by day the Lord added to their number those who were being saved.

Footnotes​

  1. 2.45 Gk them
  2. 2.46 Or from house to house
  3. 2.46 Or sincere



Some questions for us to consider as we think about and discuss this passage:

Who are the apostles? Is it just the 12?

What exactly are “the” prayers? They are spending much time in the Temple. I’d love to know what one would do if one went to the temple every day with a bunch of other people? Does this imply a daily long church service? If the rest of the time is devoted to eating together, do they share the cooking/preparation tasks? Do some stay at home and others go to the Temple? Does this rotate?

What might the wonders and signs have been, and why don’t we get an example here?

Are verses 44 and 45 how we are meant to live today? Together, collectively, sharing everything? Changing the location of a communal communion dinner every night; walking from house to house to share a moving feast? In groups of how many? Could we organize this today within our congregations?

Wondering why the text refers to the Lord adding to the number of those saved. Wouldn’t it be the Spirit?

Finally, we have the “saved” word again. What were these people being “saved” from? Poverty, loneliness, hunger?
 
This would not accommodate high handed avarice! It drives economics!

Is it a wonder that folks are so hungry to suck the other dry for gain given the biblical sway to passion by ev angels? Shocking ... EVs ... back to the horse antes ... rendered sentience ...
 
Winds blow all ways and yet the winds of passion are favoured as countering thought ... thus they go down!
 
The description of communal living is quite lovely, isn't it?

During my lifetime I have heard of hippies living in communes and citizens in Israel living in Kibbutzim

Nuns and monks often live in similar arrangements. There are religious communities such as the Amish and the Mennonites who practice group living to varying degrees.

There must be pros and cons.
 
BetteTheRed said:
Who are the apostles? Is it just the 12?
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11, unless they appointed a replacement for Judas (did they, I forget if that is mentioned anywhere).
BetteTheRed said:
What might the wonders and signs have been, and why don’t we get an example here?
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I wonder if "Luke" (who also wrote Acts) just assumed people would realize he meant things like healings, similar to what we saw with Jesus. After all, he wrote this for what was still a fairly small community.
BetteTheRed said:
Are verses 44 and 45 how we are meant to live today? Together, collectively, sharing everything? Changing the location of a communal communion dinner every night; walking from house to house to share a moving feast? In groups of how many? Could we organize this today within our congregations?
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The problem is that the Christian community in Acts 2 is still very small. Communalism works with small communities, less so with very large ones. So if you're going to do this, you also need smaller churches. The house church movement is, I guess, kind of headed this way.

However, I would suggest that this passage seems descriptive rather the prescriptive. It is showing how the tiny early movement operated rather than setting this as a model for all time. Keep in mind that most Christians still expected to see the Second Coming and Judgement in the very near future so the idea that a single church could eventually have hundreds of members likely never occurred to Luke or his intended audience.

I do like the idea of smaller gatherings with more prayer/meditation and discussion, shared meals, and the like. And some degree of shared leadership. One thing you notice in the early church, both here and in Paul's letters, is less hierarchy. Some leaders like Peter and Paul, to be sure, but nothing like the Pope-Bishop-Priest hierarchy that comes later. So small, communal gatherings with maybe the current host as the "leader" for that evening. Each member sharing their gifts rather than someone being "in charge".
 
Luke describes the community getting 3000 converts on the day of Pentecost. Their first decision after the ascension was electing a replacement for Judas Iscariot.

I am guessing that converts were gathered into small house groups and the apostles were part of the lead house group or many convertsvl did not stay long. There were already enough Followers of the Way by the time of Luke that the Romans occassionally persecuted them. By the time Paul became involved, there were several communities scattered around the Middle East and thisvwas well before the gospels being written.

The description probably applied in a legendary way to the community in Jerusalem. Shortly after this passage, a story tells of the Spirit killing two converts for lying about how much wealth they had. It contradicts the tone of the other story.

The life of the various communities was probably much more complex than implied by Acts.
 
jimkenney12 said:
Luke describes the community getting 3000 converts on the day of Pentecost.
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Given the propensity of ancient writers to play fast and loose with numbers (e.g. the size of armies in battles), I would take that with a grain of salt. And, as you say, how many of those stayed past a few days. I would tend to assume that the community was maybe a few hundred at most meeting in small groups.
 
The Background of the Early Church's Primitive "Communism:"

After the resurrection, Jesus' mother and family members and His male and female disciples relocate from Galilee to Jerusalem to "receive power from on High" and to form a community with the major figures of the Jesus movement. But that relocation created financial hardship for many who now had to find a way to survive with big city competition for occupations. Before they were called "Christians." their movement was called "the way," "Nazarenes," and (most importantly for the discussion here) "the poor," a term reflecting the economic reality of the fledgling Jerusalem church. The Gospel of the Ebionites reflects this original economic reality. "Ebionite" derives from the Hebrew word for "the poor." When the apostles insist that Paul's ministry "remember the poor" in Jerusalem (Galatians 2:10), they may well have this term for their whole community in mind.

There were 400 synagogues in Jerusalem at this time and early Christians would have attended synagogue services until their eventual expulsion. These synagogues had differing ideologies and so did the Ebionites (the poor). Some rejected the virgin birth and the divinity of Christ, preferring to view Jesus as the Prophet like Moses prophesied in Deuteronomy 18:15-20. Eventually the entire Ebionite movement was condemned as heretical. Their last bastion was at Aleppo, south of Antioch and their last literary works were the 4th century Pseudo-Clementine Homilies and Recognitions.
 
The primitive Palestinian church's "communist" structure survived into the 2nd century and is ridiculed by the Syrian rhetorician Lucian in "The Passing of Peregrinus (11-14)." The beauty of their selfless community shines even more brightly through Lucian's ridicule:

"In no time he [Peregrinus] made them [Palestinian Christians] all look like children; for he was prophet, cult-leader, and head of their synagogue... He interpreted and explained some of their books... Then at length he was arrested for this and thrown into prison... The Christians, regarding this incident as a calamity, left nothing undone in an effort to rescue him. Then, as this was impossible, every form of attention was shown him... With great care; and from daybreak elderly widows and orphan children could be seen waiting near the prison. while their officials even slept inside with him after bribing the guards. Then elaborate meals were brought in, and their sacred books were read aloud,... and he was called by them "the new Socrates." Indeed, people even came from cities in Asia, sent by the Christians at their common expense, to help, defend, and encourage their hero. They show incredible speed whenever such public action is taken; and in no time they lavish their all... Much money came to him because of his imprisonment...

They despise death, and even willingly give themselves up into custody, most of them. Their first lawgiver persuaded them that they are all brothers of one another after they have transgressed once for all by denying the Greek gods and worshipping that crucified sophist himself and living under his laws. SO THEY DESPISE ALL POSSESSIONS AND CONSIDER THEM COMMON PROPERTY, receiving such doctrines traditionally without any definite evidence. So if any charlatan or trickers comes among them, he quickly acquires sudden wealth by imposing on simple people."
 
Literacy was taught under cover as the order of the day was that labourers were best if illiterate ... understanding this is subtle and like the diabolical things put in story as confusing virtues ... thus O' Din ... once known as a wandering bug! Stray words would impale the yuppers ... Yah m'n? Get a grip ... catch on ...

The greatest gift is a given (ad onus) the get learning as knowledge is accrued! At one time on a disc ...

So much is hidden and sacred under that plate ...
 
One could point put that 'Temple' and 'Church' are different entities.
 
Is the temple abstract while churches attempt to be absolute spots? Them's hard places when stoned ... then consider the optional addictions ...

There is that vision ... the freedom of a sheer peek ... what? Into a tome ... and be labelled well read and hated ... book-m! Thus inscribed ...

Scratch job the ithche ... fishing words out of where?
 
Redbaron said:
One could point put that 'Temple' and 'Church' are different entities.
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Agreed, although a bit niggly because they are both places to worship God? But these early "Christians" are worshipping as Jews going to the Temple. Every day.
 
BetteTheRed said:
Agreed, although a bit niggly because they are both places to worship God? But these early "Christians" are worshipping as Jews going to the Temple. Every day.
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Right, but temple worship isn't like church worship. In fact, it is quite different. It is about sacrificing and praying, or paying the priests to sacrifice and pray for you. There are no weekly services or even gatherings inside the temple. Those happen outside. Generally only the priesthood get go inside, at least all the way in. The temple is seen as a home for, or at least interface to, God, not a gathering place for people to worship.

The better analogy for a church in 1st century Judaea are the synagogues, which we know Jesus did attend.
 
One of the tourist attractions in Jerusalem is the building with "the Upper Room," where 120 seekers crowded together, waiting for the outpouring of the Spirit. But for the most part, house churches had just 1, sometimes 2, small rooms. So the courtyard would often need to be used.

Feminist Bible scholars have long recognized that house churches often allowed a leadership role for Christian women because in Greco-Roman society women were traditionally responsible for household management. The loss of female leadership can in part be tied to the gradual institutionalization of the church, with a male-dominant structure--bishops, elders, deacons.

As this institutionalization was established, "Junia" in Romans 16:7 was translated as "Junias" (The "ias" ending indicates a male name) to remove the implication that a woman could be an apostle, this despite the fact that "Junias" is unprecedented as Greco-Roman male name and even the early church Fathers conceded that this "Junia" was a woman. In Aramaic "Junia" is spelled "Joanna;" so Junia is likely the Joanna in Luke 8:1-3 who was a disciple of Jesus and, together with other female disciples, supported Him financially. Junia is the only woman Paul identifies as a believer before his conversion. There is no evidence that any of Jesus' male disciples offered financial support. Remember, they left everything to follow Him.

Aquila was presumed to be the teacher instead of his wife Priscille (= Prisca), even though Priscilla is mentioned first in 4 of the 6 NT references to this missionary couple. Giving the woman priority in this way was unheard of in Greco-Roman patriarchal culture and indicates that Priscilla was the missionary, while her husband Aquila paid the bills in his work as aq tent maker. This observation is important because Priscilla and her house church at Rome (Romans 16:4-5) make her the earliest missionary to Rome (c. 48 AD--see Acts 18:1-2) and therefore the best candidate as the founder of the Roman Church. She was likely deprived of the credit for this achievement due to her gender. Peter doesn't get to Rome until the 60s.
 
Now I thought there were many "denominations" in the early "churches", (I'm assuming like today?),so how would we know if there was only one way to do church that was acceptable?
 
If de nominated do these things suffer the fall? The only way those too far off from antipathy learn to care about the alternate state ... opposite to those that have grabbed everything ... even beyond there needs in Bashan ... an arid place east of what some believed to be Eden ... and Eve settled over those eastern sans ... from this period of dreams ... excessive myths ... stretched as mortals are racked on the wheel ...

All over considering different perspectives ... and we are cussed for projections that vary! Contrary to (sic) dogma ... thus regurgitation process! This happens in firm academia ... no wiggle room!
 
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