Daily Manna, Year Two · Day 10 · January 10
Where They Had Been
“Now when they saw the boldness of Peter and John, and perceived that they were unlearned and ignorant men, they marvelled; and they took knowledge of them, that they had been with Jesus.”
Which conversation about God did you back out of most recently, and what reason did you give yourself on the way home? The council in Jerusalem had a reason for Peter and John, and the phrase they used has been misread for centuries. Now when they saw the boldness of Peter and John, and perceived that they were unlearned and ignorant men, they marvelled. Unlearned means without letters, no formal rabbinic schooling, never sat under a recognised teacher. Ignorant translates the Greek word that gave English its idiot, and what it meant was a private citizen, outside the profession, a layman rather than an official. Nobody there was calling them stupid. They were noting that neither man held a licence, that he was arguing anyway, and winning.
Scripture keeps a running file on this. Amos, hauled up for prophesying at Bethel, answers I was no prophet, neither was I a prophet's son; but I was an herdman, and a gatherer of sycomore fruit. Moses at the bush makes the same objection from the far end of a life: I am not eloquent, I am slow of speech, and of a slow tongue. Paul turns it into policy, telling Corinth that not many wise men after the flesh, not many mighty, not many noble, are called. What the council landed on was company: they took knowledge of them, that they had been with Jesus. The healed man stood beside them, which is why nothing could be said against it.
A warning runs alongside it, because this verse gets used as a licence and it is not one. Peter was untrained. He was not uninstructed. He had spent three years in the closest tutorial anyone has had, and when Apollos turned up, an eloquent man, and mighty in the scriptures, Aquila and Priscilla still expounded unto him the way of God more perfectly, and he let them. Unqualified is a fine place to start from and a poor one to settle into. If you back out of the next conversation, make sure the reason is not one you have been feeding.
Daily Manna runs on a two-year cycle. The year one reading for day 10 is Heart Surgery (Ezekiel 36:26).