---
title: Acts 15:23
url: https://jw-apologetics.app/verses/acts-15-23/
markdown: https://jw-apologetics.app/verses/acts-15-23.md
type: verse
perspective: Protestant (historic Nicene) response to Jehovah's Witness teaching
reference: Acts 15:23
testament: NT
section: Acts
index: https://jw-apologetics.app/llms.txt
---

# Acts 15:23

## Text (Berean Standard Bible)

> and sent them with this letter:  The apostles and the elders, your brothers,  To the brothers among the Gentiles in Antioch, Syria, and Cilicia:  Greetings.

## JW Usage

The Watchtower reads the letter beginning "The apostles and the older men, brothers" as a directive flowing from the first-century governing body to the worldwide brotherhood — the template the modern Governing Body continues. JWs treat the salutation as establishing universal jurisdiction.

## Protestant Usage

Read the salutation slowly. The letter is sent "to those brothers in Antioch and Syria and Cilicia who are from the nations." The geographic scope is explicit — three named regions, all affected by the specific circumcision dispute of Acts 15:1. The text does not address the churches of Rome, Ephesus, Corinth, or Thessalonica. It does not legislate globally or perpetually. It answers one pastoral question for one cluster of Gentile congregations. A letter with an explicit limited address cannot bear the weight of a claim to binding worldwide authority across the centuries.

## Arguments Using This Verse

- [Acts 15 — A One-Time Council, Not a Standing Body](https://jw-apologetics.app/arguments/acts15-one-time-not-template.md) — The Jerusalem meeting never reconvened, never legislated again, never appointed successors [Authority]