90 Peter Spitaler by doing exactly that (ἀναστὰς συνῆλθεν αὐτοῖς, v. 39). During his vi- sion, Peter (10:13) is told to “get up, slaughter, and eat” (ἀναστὰς θῦσον καὶ φάγε), which he refuses to do. However, after his vision, when Peter is told to “get up, go down, and go with” Cornelius’ servants without protest (ἀναστὰς κατάβηθι καὶ πορεύου μηδὲν διακρινόμενος, 10:20), he obediently leaves the next day (ἀναστὰς ἐξῆλθεν, 10:23). Appearing throughout the narrative that precedes, and includes, verse 10:20, this distinctive command and response pattern supports a render- ing of μηδὲν διακρινόμενος as “contesting/protesting nothing” because command and response are social, interactive events. In the cited pas- sages, each person addressed interacts with another: person, an angel, “the voice”, the spirit, or Jesus – and obeys, either immediately or under protest. None of those addressed responds to the command to get up and do something in the same manner in which one would respond to an intrapersonal conflict, that is, with “doubt” or “hesitation”. Second, the verb διακρίνομαι occurs once again in 11:2, διεκρίνοντο πρὸς αὐτὸν οἱ ἐκ περιτομῆς (“those from the circumcision contested with him”). The other disciples in Jerusalem disagree with Peter’s decision to enter a Gentile’s house and share a meal with the members of Cornelius’ household. With the recurrence of the middle διακρίνομαι at this place in the narrative, Luke triggers a deliberate echo of the spirit’s command in Joppa that Peter should stop “contesting”: as Peter reacts to the spirit’s instruction to eat forbidden food (i.e., by contesting), so also his fellow disciples in Jerusalem react to the news about Peter eating with Gentiles (i.e., by contesting)33. Rendering διακρίνομαι as “contest” or “dispute” forges a significant literary link between 10:20 and 11:2 that is lost if one translates “hesitate” or “doubt” in 10:20, and “dispute” or “critique” in 11:234. The link also vanishes in Baumert’s analysis35. Third, parallel to Peter’s three protests against “the voice’s” instructions during his vision (10:16)36, Luke records the vision story three times, first in third-person narrative (10:9-16) and, thereafter, twice in first-person account through Peter’s mouth (10:28-29; 11:5-17)37. Each narration has a different geographical setting (Joppa, 10:9; Caesarea, 10:24; Jerusalem, Johnson (Acts 197) also observes this link. 33 Cf., for example, Moessner, “Power of Poetics” 101; Witherington, Acts 362 n. 138. 34 Cf. “Wortspiel” 31. 35 Luke reports Peter refused three times to “get up, slaughter, and eat” (10:16). 36 Witherup (Functional Redundancy 47; cf. also William S. Kurz, “Effects of Variant 37 Narrators in Acts 10-11”, NTS 48 [1997] 570-88, here 570-71) labels the repetitions of the Cornelius story “functional redundancy”, i.e., a narrative technique that ensures “a full and unambiguous reception of the message.”