Expositor's Bible Commentary Commentary Acts 21:25

"But as touching the Gentiles that have believed, we wrote, giving judgment that they should keep themselves from things sacrificed to idols, and from blood, and from what is strangled, and from fornication." — Acts 21:25 (ASV)

James and the elders reminded Paul of the fourfold Jerusalem decree of the early Christians’ agreed-on basis for fellowship between Jewish and Gentile believers. Having urged Paul to follow their proposed course of action, the leaders of the Jerusalem church went on to assure him that this in no way rescinded their earlier decision to impose nothing further on Gentile converts than these four injunctions given for the sake of harmony within the church and in order not to impede the progress of the Jewish Christian mission.