Acts 10:27-29

It was taboo for Jews to associate with Gentiles and to visit them in their homes. [Note: Mishnah Demai 3:4.] Gentiles did not observe the strict rules Jews followed in eating, preparing, and even handling food, nor did they tithe or practice circumcision. Any physical contact with Gentiles laid a Jew open to becoming ceremonially unclean because of the Gentiles’ failure to observe these Mosaic laws.

"There is nothing more binding on the average person than social custom." [Note: Robertson, 3:141.]

Food was the crux of the issue that separated them. However, Peter had gotten the message of the sheet full of food: food does not make a person unholy or unclean. Consequently he had come without further objection. Peter’s explanation in these verses stressed the fact that God had convinced him to go against traditional Jewish custom, which was wellknown among the Gentiles.

"If the food laws of the Jews no longer were valid, there was no real reason to avoid social contact with gentiles, for those distinctions lay at the heart of Jewish clannishness." [Note: Kent, p. 93.]

"He [Peter] violates the first rule of homiletics when he begins his message with an apology. What he says is not a friendly thing to say. In fact, it is an insult. . . . How would you feel, especially if you are a lady who is a housekeeper, if some visitor came into your home and his first words were, ’I am coming into your home, which I consider dirty’?" [Note: McGee, 4:557.]

Nevertheless Peter quickly and humbly explained that he had been wrong about how he formerly felt about Gentiles (Acts 10:29).

". . . the Christian preacher or teacher must call no man common or unclean." [Note: Morgan, p. 218.]