Does Acts 15 Negate the Torah?

Dave Currier | Featured Guest Writer | Guest Writer | Torah | Torah 101
Noel Joshua Hadley

The apostles and elders, your brothers,

To the Gentile believers in Antioch, Syria and Cilicia:

Greetings.

24 We have heard that some went out from us without our authorization and disturbed you, troubling your minds by what they said. 25 So we all agreed to choose some men and send them to you with our dear friends Barnabas and Paul— 26 men who have risked their lives for the name of our Lord Jesus Christ.27 Therefore we are sending Judas and Silas to confirm by word of mouth what we are writing. 28 It seemed good to the Holy Spirit and to us not to burden you with anything beyond the following requirements: 29 You are to abstain from food sacrificed to idols, from blood, from the meat of strangled animals and from sexual immorality. You will do well to avoid these things.

Farewell.

To the question of whether Acts 15 negates the instruction of Yahuah, the answer is a resounding no! In fact, James clearly affirms the Torah a few verses previous to this letter. But before we get into that, let us examine the 4 commands James decides are essential to a believer on day 1 of becoming a follower of The Way, The Truth, and The Life.

  • Exodus 34:15 – Abstain From Eating Food Sacrificed To Idols – lest you make a covenant with the inhabitants of the land, and when they whore after their gods and sacrifice to their gods and you are invited, you eat of his sacrifice,
  • Leviticus 17:24 – Abstain From Eating Blood –  “You shall not eat anything with its blood”
  • Leviticus 17:13 – Abstain From Eating Strangled Animals –  And whatsoever man there be of the children of Israel, or of the strangers that sojourn among you, which hunteth and catcheth any beast or fowl that may be eaten; he shall even pour out the blood thereof, and cover it with dust.
  • Leviticus 18:6-24 – Abstain From Sexual Immorality –  None of you shall approach to any that is near of kin to him, to uncover their nakedness: I am the LORD. … Thou shalt not lie with mankind, as with womankind: it is abomination. Neither shalt thou lie with any beast to defile thyself therewith: neither shall any woman stand before a beast to lie down thereto: it is confusion. Defile not ye yourselves in any of these things: for in all these the nations are defiled which I cast out before you:

One who claims that the Torah is abolished must first of all prove that Yeshua, who claimed the Torah was not abolished, in some way, also said that it was abolished. You must also prove that he lived a Lawless, Torah-less, and sinful life and taught others to do so (we are to follow his example after all). You must also prove that Paul did the same (imitate me, as I imitate Messiah). And lastly you must prove that James, here in Acts 15, is saying that these are the only 4 commands that matter. Obviously none of this can be proven because Yeshua taught the commandments and Torah, Paul taught the commandments and Torah, and here James is also reaffirming Torah. It’s actually fantastic. Let’s take a look at what he says:

It is my judgment, therefore, that we should not make it difficult for the Gentiles who are turning to God. 20 Instead we should write to them, telling them to abstain from food polluted by idols, from sexual immorality, from the meat of strangled animals and from blood.

Acts 15:19-20

This is great. But what is he saying? The next verse is so important.

21 For the law of Moses has been preached in every city from the earliest times and is read in the synagogues on every Sabbath.

Acts 15:21

Let me recap that in a different way: “It shouldn’t be hard for people to turn to God. Tell them at the very least, that they need to not eat anything to do with other pagan gods, stop doing anything sexually immoral, and make sure to avoid non-kosher meat. Everyone knows that they’ll hear the entire Law preached in the synagogues every Saturday anyway… [so they’ll learn the rest over time]”

If you are on the fence about whether Torah is for everyone, trust Yeshua. Not your friends, not your family, not you pastor. Just read the text. He is clear. And also trust Peter when he says that Paul’s letters are hard to understand. They are. He, in many cases, sounds like he’s preaching against Torah, but he isn’t. Paul was here at this conversation in Act 15. They were debating about what to tell day 1 converts of the faith, and this was it. You don’t have to learn 613 laws on day 1 to be saved. You just need faith that Messiah Yeshua will transform you, send the Ruach Ha-kodesh to help you learn and help you understand His perfect ways.

Dave

IN the summer of 2019, I was seated in the wine cellar of a walled Medieval town high above the Dordogne Valley of France, not far from Sarlat-la-Canéda, making phone calls, writing reports. I have given this story in other places and it appears as though you’re about to hear it again. Rob Skiba is a name you that you might be familiar with. Though he had made a name for himself as a Nephilim researcher, more recently Rob had taken a dive into the deep end of the pool via flat earth research. The recorded interviews I conducted between he and Rick Hummer, a fellow flat earth investigator and close friend of his, was published while still occupying that very wine cellar. Read all about it. Chicago Is Not a Mirage.

Word quickly spread. Within a few short weeks, dozens of flat earth researchers began accepting my invite for a private interview, if not a series of interviews. From a 17th-century tower built by King Louis XIV, and with a stunning view of the Alps, I sat down with Robbie Davidson, founder of the Flat Earth International Conferences, conducting multiple sessions. While staying in Dumfries, Scotland, David Weiss agreed to take part in the interviews, as did Bob Knodel of Globebusters. There were others. But when I asked the interviewees to discuss the moments that shaped their lives, among the many PSYOPs, false flag attacks, and hoaxes that were discussed, only these men committed commentary to the false 9/11 narrative.

The resulting recordings ballooned into The Unexpected Cosmology, a book which became a website and was even intended as an anthology. And of course, the following discourse was originally a chapter. It was Walt Disney who stated, “Disneyland will never be completed. It will continue to grow as long as there is imagination left in the world.” Those sentiments remain applicable here as well. American Sensationalism: The 9/11 Interviews was always intended to be expanded upon with the inclusion of new researchers. So I’m sorry to say the project became stagnant during the Covid-19 psychodrama. I took a break to tackle other projects. We lost Rob Skiba. Rob offered hours of private conversation regarding his life but we never got around to the big one. 9/11. It was in the cards. Sadly, Bob Knodel died soon afterwards. Voices are being squeezed from an entire generation. Gnosis passes with them.

In the aftermath, the FE community became fractured. People began going their separate ways. Robbie Davidson, among a noted few others who were interviewed for the project, got up and left the movement altogether. It is not my intent to erase his or the contributions of others if only brief. They came, they went, their testimonies remain.

The original vision may have hit roadblocks but it is not forgotten. I expanded this paper a few years later to include testimony from author Pauly Hart, a dear friend of mine. I had wanted to continue that trend every year thereafter but you know how it goes. For the 25th anniversary of the attack I have redirected my efforts to its first large scale expansion, including Andrew Hoy and Darrin Geisinger into the mix. Perhaps others will lend their experiences to the recorder in time.

The following is their report.

Read the 9/11 Interviews

Watch the Interviews