Annotation CCLXXIII

”Lest perhaps I should run, or had run, in vain.” — Galatians 2:2

On the four precepts of the apostles to those who [are] of the gentiles.

Ambrose [Ambrosiaster], in the commentaries, under the exposition of this period, touching in passing upon that passage of Acts 15 — where it is read that the Apostles commanded the gentiles to abstain from four [things], namely, from things offered to idols, from fornication, from blood, and from what is strangled — admonishes that by the Apostles there were not prescribed [any] but three, and that the fourth was added by the Greek corrupters of that passage. His words run thus: “IN FINE, these three commands are found [to have been] given by the Apostles and the elders — [things] which the laws of the Romans are ignorant of: that is, that they keep themselves from idolatry, and from blood, as Noah [did], and from fornication. Which [three] the sophists of the Greeks, not understanding — yet knowing that [one] must abstain from blood — adulterated the scripture, adding a fourth command, that [one] must also abstain from what is strangled. Which [addition], I think, they will now, by God’s nod, understand [to be superfluous], because it had already been said above [in the third precept, on blood] that which they added.” How much is to be attributed to Ambrose in this part, let others see: certainly Irenaeus, [in] the book against heresies, the third, chapter 12, relates this passage, and does not add [any] mention of things strangled.