At a later time such an appeal could not have been made; at a later time even the practice of the original apostles ceased to conform to Jewish custom. The tradition according to which the apostle Peter finally went to Rome is emerging triumphant[72] from the fires of criticism; and if Peter went to Rome, it is inconceivable that he separated himself from Gentile Christians. Even in the early days, in Antioch, he had begun to abandon his Jewish manner of life; surely he must have abandoned it more fully when he went to the capital of the Gentile world. The tradition as to the Ephesian residence of the apostle John also points to the abandonment of the Law on the part of the original apostles, and to their definite entrance upon the Gentile mission. That tradition has been rejected only by attending to late and dubious evidence to the neglect of what is plain. But it is not necessary to appeal to details. All that has been said above about the position of Peter in the mind of the Church shows that even the practice of the original apostles finally adapted itself to the needs of the expanding Gentile work. [72] See, for example, Lietzmann, _Petrus and Paulus in Rom_, 1915. But in the early period, in Jerusalem, before it had become evident that the Jewish people as such was to reject the gospel message, the apostles continued to observe the Law. And by doing so, they gave the Judaizers some color of support. Thus if the Judaizers did appeal to the original apostles in support of their legalistic claims, the appeal does not establish any real unity of principle between them and the original apostles, or any divergence of principle between the original apostles and Paul. But as a matter of fact it is by no means perfectly clear that the appeal was made; it is by no means clear that the Judaizers appealed to the original apostles for the content of their legalistic message rather than merely for their attack upon the independent apostleship of Paul. It is possible that they said no more than this: "Paul was not one of the original disciples of Jesus; his authority is merely a derived authority; he is, therefore, no more worthy to be heard than we; and we can tell you something new--the followers of the Messiah must unite themselves with the chosen people and obey the Law of God." At any rate, even if the Judaizers did appeal to the original apostles for the content of their message, the appeal was a false appeal; the original apostles repudiated the Judaizers, and recognized Paul as a true apostle, with authorization as direct as their own.