But I said, ‘Not so, Lord! For nothing common or unclean has at any time entered my mouth.’
Parallel translations
- WEB But I said, ‘Not so, Lord, for nothing unholy or unclean has ever entered into my mouth.’
- KJV But I said, Not so, Lord: for nothing common or unclean hath at any time entered into my mouth.
- BSB ‘No, Lord,’ I said, ‘for nothing impure or unclean has ever entered my mouth.’
- NASB But I said, ‘By no means, Lord, for nothing unholy or unclean has ever entered my mouth.’
- NLT “‘No, Lord,’ I replied. ‘I have never eaten anything that our Jewish laws have declared impure or unclean.’
Scripture taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
Scripture quotations taken from the (NASB®) New American Standard Bible®, Copyright © 1960, 1971, 1977, 1995, 2020 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission. All rights reserved. lockman.org
Scripture quotations are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996, 2004, 2015 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.
Quick answer
Peter objected that he had never eaten anything unclean. His protest shows his lifelong loyalty to the law.
Overview
Peter's refusal reveals a devout Jew who had carefully kept the dietary laws his whole life. His hesitation makes clear that the change to come was God's doing, against Peter's own instincts. The exchange demonstrates that only divine authority could overturn such deeply held practice.
Cross-references & the web
Cross-references · 7
- Rom 14:14I know, and am persuaded in the Lord Jesus, that nothing is unclean of itself; except that to him who considers anything to be unclean, to him it is unclean.
- Hos 9:3They won’t dwell in Yahweh’s land; but Ephraim will return to Egypt, and they will eat unclean food in Assyria.
- 1 Cor 7:14For the unbelieving husband is sanctified in the wife, and the unbelieving wife is sanctified in the husband. Otherwise your children would be unclean, but now they are holy.
- Lev 10:10You are to make a distinction between the holy and the common, and between the unclean and the clean.
- Lev 11:47to make a distinction between the unclean and the clean, and between the living thing that may be eaten and the living thing that may not be eaten.’”
- Ezra 9:11–12which you have commanded by your servants the prophets, saying, ‘The land, to which you go to possess it, is an unclean land through the uncleanness of the peoples of the lands, through their abominations, which have filled it from one end to another with their filthiness.
- Mark 7:2Now when they saw some of his disciples eating bread with defiled, that is unwashed, hands, they found fault.
Themes, concepts, people & topics
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Christ at the center
Acts is the risen Christ continuing his work by the Spirit through the church, as the apostles preach that there is salvation in no other name under heaven.
How Acts 11:8 points to him is part of the one story that runs through all Scripture — meet Jesus at the heart of the web, or follow a trail that traces him from Genesis to Revelation.
Original language
Each word below is tagged with its Strong’s number — tap one to see the underlying Greek word, its meaning, and every verse that uses it.