Ellen G. White and Her Critics

The Jerusalem Council’s Action

Acts 15:28, 29 is quoted to support the claim that all restrictions on meat and drink have been done away in the Christian Era, because the ceremonial requirements of Judaism have been done away. We have already shown that there is nothing ceremonial in the dietary teachings of Mrs. White. We wish, now, to show that the very text quoted to prove that in the Christian Era there are no restrictions on foods really proves the opposite. The Jerusalem Council deliberated on the question of ceremonial requirements and prohibitions and decided that strictly ceremonial features of the Old Testament Era were no longer binding. The question before them was not whether the Gentiles should be allowed to eat meat. That was allowed by Moses, who was “read in the synagogues every sabbath day.” Hence the council ruling did not discuss it, but the council, so far from saying that what the Gentiles ate had no relation to right living, specifically set up certain restrictions: “That ye abstain from meats offered to idols, and from blood, and from things strangled, and from fornication: from which,” added the council, “if ye keep yourselves, ye shall do well. Fare ye well.” EGWC 368.4

No Christian reasons that if a man keeps himself from fornication he has fulfilled all the moral requirements of Christianity. Then why should anyone reason that the limited dietary restrictions set up by the council—and they were restrictions—represent all that might be listed? Mrs. White simply provides reasons why certain further restrictions should be placed upon the diet. EGWC 369.1