Acts 15:2

When therefore Paul and Barnabas These Apostles would at once repeat their testimony of what "God had done with them" among the Gentiles, and thus become the opponents of the "men from Judæa."

dissension and disputation The authorities of best account give a simple instead of compound noun for the last word, and it would be well rendered " questioning," (so R. V.) as the subject in dispute is called a "question" at the end of the verse. The first noun rendered "dissension" does not imply any angry disputation, but only a division. They took different sides in the debate.

they determined( appointed)] i.e. the brethren of the church of Antioch. The verb, as well as the whole context, shews that the mission was sent by the whole Christian community, to which the question was one of most vital importance, probably affecting a large part of their members.

apostles and elders Peter, John, and James we find were now at Jerusalem, and these seem, from other notices in the N. T. (Galatians 1:18-19; Galatians 2:9), to have been the Apostles who continued to live in the holy city. These with the elders appear now as the governing body of the infant church. And Jerusalem was for the Jew, until its destruction, the place of chief authority (cp. Isaiah 2:3). The overthrow of the holy city did as much as anything to help on the knowledge of the universality of the Christian religion. Those who had been bred in Judaism, could not (as devout Jews to this day do not) cast away the thought that Jerusalem is "the place where men ought to worship."