Sources: Acts 6–8; 11:19–26; Galatians 2:11–14; the “Q” source hypothesis.

Hellenistic Jewish Christians were Greek-speaking Jews who had accepted Jesus as Messiah — the culturally Hellenized wing of the early Jerusalem church, contrasted with the “Hebrews” (Aramaic-speaking Jewish Christians, Acts 6:1). The tension between these two groups surfaces in Acts 6 over the daily distribution of food: the Greek-speaking widows are being neglected. This leads to the appointment of seven deacons — all with Greek names (Stephen, Philip, Prochorus, Nicanor, Timon, Parmenas, Nicolaus). Stephen’s martyrdom (Acts 6–7) is the pivotal moment: his speech before the Sanhedrin is the most radical early Christian reinterpretation of Jewish history, arguing that Israel has always resisted the Spirit and that the Temple was never what God actually wanted (citing Isa 66:1). His execution and the subsequent persecution (Acts 8:1) scatter the Hellenistic Jewish Christians throughout Judea, Samaria, and beyond — beginning the Gentile mission. Philip evangelizes Samaria (Acts 8:4–8), and unnamed Hellenistic Jewish Christians first preach to Gentiles in Antioch (Acts 11:20). The Hellenistic Jewish Christian mission is the bridge between the Jerusalem church and the Pauline Gentile mission — the theological pressure point where Torah observance becomes negotiable for Gentile converts.