Acts 10:14

But Peter said, Not so, Lord; for I have never eaten any thing that is common or unclean.

EXPOSITORY (ENGLISH BIBLE)

Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers

(14) Not so, Lord . . .—The emphatic resistance even to a voice from heaven is strikingly in harmony with the features of St. Peter’s character, as portrayed in the Gospels, with the “Be it far from thee, Lord,” when he heard of the coming Passion (Matthew 16:22), with “Thou shalt never wash my feet,” in John 13:8. He had been taught that that which “goeth into the mouth cannot defile the man” (Mark 7:15), but he had not taken in that truth in its fulness, either in its literal or symbolic meaning.

Any thing that is common or unclean.—“Common” is used, as in Mark 7:2, in the sense of “defiled” or “impure,” that which excludes the idea of consecration to a special service.

Matthew Henry's Concise Commentary

10:9-18 The prejudices of Peter against the Gentiles, would have prevented his going to Cornelius, unless the Lord had prepared him for this service. To tell a Jew that God had directed those animals to be reckoned clean which were hitherto deemed unclean, was in effect saying, that the law of Moses was done away. Peter was soon made to know the meaning of it. God knows what services are before us, and how to prepare us; and we know the meaning of what he has taught us, when we find what occasion we have to make use of it.

Barnes' Notes on the Bible

I have never eaten ... - In the Old Testament God had made a distinction between clean and unclean animals. See Leviticus 11:2-27; Deuteronomy 14:3-20. This law remained in the Scriptures, and Peter pled that he had never violated it, implying that he could not now violate it, as it was a law of God, and that, as it was unrepealed, he did not dare to act in a different manner from what it required. Between that law and the command which he now received in the vision there was an apparent variation, and Peter naturally referred to the well known and admitted written Law. One design of the vision was to show him that that Law was now to pass away.

That is common - This word properly denotes "what pertains to all," but among the Jews, who were bound by special laws, and who were prohibited from many things that were freely indulged in by other nations, the word "common" came to be opposed to the word "sacred," and to denote what was in common use among the pagans, hence, that which was "profane," or "polluted." Here it means the same as "profane," or "forbidden."

Unclean - Ceremonially unclean; that is, what is forbidden by the ceremonial law of Moses.

Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary

14. Not so, Lord—See Marginal reference.

I have never eaten anything that is common—that is, not sanctified by divine permission to eat of it, and so "unclean." "The distinction of meats was a sacrament of national distinction, separation, and consecration" [Webster and Wilkinson].

Matthew Poole's Commentary

These words may signify one and the same thing, and the latter explain the former; showing that those things are said to be common, which the law, by forbidding them, had made unclean. Others make some difference; and by things common, understand all sorts of creatures, which were forbidden to the Jews, but were commonly fed upon by all nations round about them; and by things unclean, they understand such as by accident became so, as when any of the creatures permitted for use was strangled.

Gill's Exposition of the Entire Bible

But Peter said, not so, Lord,.... God forbid I should do this, so contrary to the law of God, and to my own practice, throughout the whole course of my life:

for I have never eaten anything that is common or unclean; in a ceremonial sense, which was in common use with Gentiles, but unclean by the law of Moses: this shows that Peter as yet closely adhered to the ceremonial law, nor did he know that it was abolished by Christ; and notwithstanding the commission given to him and the rest of the apostles to preach the Gospel to every creature, and the extraordinary gifts of speaking with divers tongues for that purpose, bestowed on them at the day of Pentecost; yet he and they remained greatly strangers to the calling of the Gentiles, and the admitting of them to a civil and religious conversation with them; the knowledge of every truth was not at once communicated to them, but gradually, as it pressed the Lord to enlighten their minds.

Geneva Study Bible

{2} But Peter said, Not so, Lord; for I have never eaten any thing that is common or unclean.

(2) Peter learns daily in the knowledge of the benefit of Christ, yea, even after he had received the Holy Spirit.

EXEGETICAL (ORIGINAL LANGUAGES)

Meyer's NT Commentary

Acts 10:14-16. Peter correctly recognises in the summons θῦσον κ. φάγε, Acts 10:13, the allowance of selection at his pleasure among all the animals, by which, consequently, the eating of the unclean without distinction was permitted to him. Hence, and not because only unclean animals were seen in the vessel, his strongly declining μηδαμῶς κύριε! This κύριε is the address to the—to him unknown—author of the voice, not to Christ (Schwegler, Zeller).

Concerning the animals which the Jews were forbidden to eat, see Leviticus 11; Deuteronomy 14:1 ff.; Ewald, Alterth. p. 194 ff.; Saalschütz, Mos. B. p. 251 ff.

ὅτι οὐδέποτε ἔφαγον πᾶν κοινὸν ἢ ἀκάθαρτ.] for never ate I anything common or unclean (the Talmudic פסול או טמא), i.e. for any profane thing I have always left uneaten. ἤ does not stand for καί (which Lachm. and Tisch. read, after A B א, min. VSS. Clem. Or.; perhaps correctly, see Acts 11:8), but appends for the exhaustion of the idea another synonymous expression. Fritzsche, ad Marc. p. 277; Bornemann, Schol. in Luc. p. xl. f. κοινός = βέβηλος; the opposite of ἅγιος (Ezekiel 42:20).

καὶ φωνή] and a voice (not ἡ φωνή, because here other words were heard) came again the second time to him (πάλιυ ἐκ δευτέρου, pleonastically circumstantial; see on Matthew 26:42; comp. on John 4:54).

ἃ ὁ Θεὸς ἐκαθάρισε, σὺ μὴ κοίνου] what God has cleansed, make not thou common (unclean). The miraculous appearance with the divine voice (Acts 10:13) had done away the Levitical uncleanness of the animals in question; they were now divinely cleansed; and thus Peter ought not, by his refusal to obey that divine bidding, to invest them with the character of what is unholy—to transfer them into the category of the κοινόν (Romans 14:14). This were man’s doing in opposition to God’s deed.

ἐπὶ τρίς] for thrice, which “ad confirmationem valuit” (Calvin); ἐπί, denotes the terminus ad quem. Bernhardy, p. 252. Comp. ἐς τρίς, Herod, i. 86; Xen. Anab. vi. 4. 16; and Wetstein.

The object aimed at in the whole vision was the symbolical divine announcement that the hitherto subsisting distinction between clean and unclean men (that hedge between Jews and Gentiles!) was to cease in Christianity, as being destined for all men without distinction of nation (Acts 10:34-35). But in what relation does the ἃ ὁ Θεὸς ἐκαθάρισε stand to the likewise divine institution of the Levitical laws about food? This is not answered by reference to “the effected and accomplished redemption, which is regarded as a restitution of the whole creation” (Olshausen), for this restoration is only promised for the world-period commencing with the Parousia (Acts 3:20; Matthew 19:28 : Romans 8:19 ff.); but rather by pointing out that the institution of those laws of food was destined only for the duration of the old theocracy. They were a divine institution for the particular people of God, with a view to separate them from the nations of the world; their abolition could not therefore but be willed by God, when the time was fully come at which the idea of the theocracy was to be realized through Christ in the whole of humanity (Acts 10:35; Romans 3.; Galatians 3:28; Colossians 3:11; John 10:16). Comp. Matthew 15:17-18. The abolition therefore does not conflict with Matthew 5:17, but belongs to the fulfillment of the law effected by Christ, by which the distinction of clean and unclean was removed from the Levitical domain and (comp. Romans 2:28-29) raised into the sphere of the moral idea. See also on Romans 15:14; Matthew 5:17.

Expositor's Greek Testament

Acts 10:14. Μηδαμῶς: absit (LXX for חָלִילָה), 1 Samuel 20:2; 1 Samuel 22:15 (Weiss).—Κύριε: Weiss refers to Acts 1:24, and takes it as meaning Jehovah, but others refer the expression here to Christ; the next verse shows us that there was still the same element of self-will in the Apostle which had misled the Peter of the Gospels.—οὐδέποτε … πᾶν: the words of strong negation, characteristic of the vehement and impulsive Peter—Hebraistic, cf. Exodus 20:10, Jdg 13:4, and in N.T., Matthew 24:22, Luke 1:37, Romans 3:12, 1 Corinthians 1:29; Simcox, Language of the N. T., pp. 72, 73, and Blass, Gram., p. 174.—κοινὸν = βέβηλος; 1Ma 1:62, opposed to ἅγιος, Leviticus 10:10, cf. Ezekiel 22:26, often used in N.T. for unclean, cf. Mark 7:2.—ἀκάθαρτος, Leviticus 20:25, of clean and unclean animals; κοινός in 1 Macc. above is used, as ver. 63 shows, for defilement from meats.

Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges

14. Not so, Lord] Cp. Ezekiel 4:14, where the prophet being shewn that the children of Israel shall eat defiled bread among the Gentiles, exclaims in words very like St Peter’s: “There never came abominable flesh into my mouth.” For the care with which the devout Jew observed the ceremonial distinction between clean and unclean, see Daniel 1:8-12; 2Ma 6:18.

common or unclean] The oldest authorities read “common and unclean.” The use of “common” in the sense of impure according to the Mosaic ritual is, as were the ordinances about which this language was employed, peculiar to the Jews. But it is easy to trace the steps by which the word came to be used thus. All persons who were not Jews were viewed as the “common” rabble, shut out from God’s covenant, then whatever practices of these outcasts differed from those of the chosen people were called “common” things, and as these “common” things were those forbidden by the Law, all such prohibited things or actions became known as “common.” Cp. Mark 7:2, where the margin explains that “defiled hands” is in the original “common hands.”

Bengel's Gnomen

Acts 10:14. Μηδαμῶς, by no means) A trance leaves a man liberty in respect to that particular thing which is vividly set before him: ch. Acts 22:19. But besides, it is a sign of the power being strengthened, even though the senses are bound, for example, in a dream, to maintain one’s conscientiousness. The first objection started by a man, when GOD orders something difficult, sometimes has an indulgence, ch. Acts 22:19-20 : but there ought to be no repetition of it: John 13:8 : Exodus 4:13; Deuteronomy 3:26; Ezekiel 4:14. From the delay (reluctance) of Peter, the will of GOD shines forth the more clearly. And on that account the more easily could Peter bear the doubts (hesitation) of the brethren: ch. Acts 11:2-3, “They that were of the circumcision contended with him, saying, Thou wentest in to men uncircumcised, and didst eat with them.”—οὐδέποτε, never) He who has once done anything, more easily repeats his act. See therefore that thou doest no evil for the first time (even once). Peter had always been observant of the law.

Pulpit Commentary

Verse 14. - And unclean for or unclean, A.V. and T.R. It is rather a striking testimony to Peter's religious character as a Jew before his call to the apostolate, that, poor Galilaean fisherman as he was, unlearned and ignorant, he had yet always conscientiously obeyed the Law of Moses in regard to things clean and unclean (comp. Daniel 1:8-15). The address, Lord (Κύριε), seems certainly to recognize the voice as that of Christ, which also agrees with the descent of the vessel from heaven. The answer is very similar to the refusals in Matthew 16:22; John 13:8. Acts 10:14

Vincent's Word Studies

Not so (μηδαμῶς)

Stronger: by no means. "With that simple and audacious self-confidence which in his (Peter's) character was so singularly mingled with fits of timidity and depression, he boldly corrects the voice which orders him, and reminds the divine Interlocutor that he must, so to speak, have made an oversight" (Farrar, "Life and Works of Paul"). Compare Matthew 16:22.

Common (κοινὸν)

Unholy.