Okay NotWorthy, let’s go back to Acts 15 once more. Do you know why those men had come from Judea to preach circumcision in Antioch? I’ll tell you if you don’t. That was a time when Paul had already finished his work to overturn the Nazarene Synagogue of Antioch into a Christian church. (Acts 15:1) Paul happened to be in Antioch, and a not-small contention was raised between the party of Paul and the one from Judea. Paul was the highest authority in his church; but the group that had come from Judea had higher authority to report to in Jerusalem. So, instead of dealing with the small people, Paul decided to go to those who had sent them to Antioch. They had been sent with the purpose to recover their Synagogue that Paul had robbed by converting the members.
What seems to you that James was showing some kind of control, that’s not the point. He just agreed somehow to lose their Nazarene Synagogue by recommending that Paul let them continue committed to at least the Noahite laws, as we have from Acts 15:29. In other words, those converts by the Nazarenes had returned to the state of Gentiles because of Paul’s Christian teachings, since all Gentiles were supposed to be bound by the Noahite laws anyways.
Antioch was not the only place or the only Synagogue the Nazarenes had lost to Paul. Everywhere throughout Asia Minor, wherever there was a Nazarene Synagogue, Paul would work his way through and turn it into a Christian church.Take a look at Galatians chapter one. There was also a blooming Nazarene Synagogue of Galatians. Paul turned it into a Christian church and the same group from Judea was succeeding to get a few of them back when Paul threatened them by saying that even if an angel came from Heaven with a different gospel from his, he would be cursed. Read it. It’s interesting.
Ben: