It is obvious, however, that every consideration which represents the decree as more completely emancipating Gentile Christians from Mosaic obligations, and admitting them into free communion with believers amongst the Jews, places it in more emphatic contradiction to historical facts and the statements of the Apostle Paul. The unanimous adoption of such a measure in Jerusalem, on the one hand, and, on the other, the episode at Antioch, the fear of Peter, the silence of Paul, and the attitude of James become perfectly inconceivable. If on the contrary the conditions were seriously imposed and really meant anything, a number of difficulties spring up of which we shall presently speak. That the prohibitions, in the opinion of the author of the Acts, constituted a positive and binding obligation can scarcely be doubted by anyone who considers the terms in which they are laid down. If {266} they are represented as a concession they are nevertheless recognised as a "burden," and they are distinctly stated to be the obligations which "it seemed good to the Holy Spirit" as well as to the Council to impose. The qualification, that the restrictive clauses had no binding force "independently of the circumstances which dictated them," in so far as it has any meaning beyond the unnecessary declaration that the decree was only applicable to the class for whom it was framed, seems to be inadmissible. The circumstance which dictated the decree was the counter-teaching of Jewish Christians, that it was necessary that the Gentile converts should be circumcised and keep the law of Moses. The restrictive clauses are simply represented as those which it was deemed right to impose; and, as they are stated without qualification, it is holding the decision of the "Holy Spirit" and of the Church somewhat cheap to treat them as mere local and temporary expedients. This is evidently not the view of the author of the Acts. Would it have been the view of anyone else if it were not that, so far as any external trace of the decree is concerned, it is an absolute myth? The prevalence of practices to which the four prohibitions point is quite sufficiently attested to show that, little as there is any ground for considering that such a decree was framed in such a manner, the restrictive clauses are put forth as necessary and permanently binding. The very doubt which exists as to whether the prohibitions were not intended to represent the conditions imposed on Proselytes of the Gate shows their close analogy to them, and it cannot be reasonably asserted that the early Christians regarded those conditions either as obsolete or indifferent. The decree is clearly intended to set forth the terms upon which Gentile Christians were {267} to be admitted into communion, and undoubtedly is to be taken as applicable not merely to a few districts, but to the Gentiles in general.