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9. What about the food laws?

Do they still apply or did Christ change Leviticus 11 & Deuteronomy 14?

First, God and Jesus cannot contradict themselves, otherwise we have much more serious theological problems than what God considers food. Therefore, if Jesus taught things that contradict what God said and defined in His eternal Word, as in the case of clean and unclean animals, then Jesus by definition would not be the Messiah. Jesus' teaching and God's teaching would be in total conflict. But thankfully, this is not the case.  [Remember also, Jesus said He only speaks and does what He sees and hears from the Father, John 5:19]


Now, in the eternal Word of God in Lev 11 and Deut 14, the Lord defines what He gave mankind for “food” and what He did not give mankind for food.  Yeshua/Jesus and the Apostles all assumed and understood the definition of “food” to be defined from these texts, not other cultures around them.  Paul says that both marriage and food have been sanctified (i.e. set apart) by the Word of God and prayer, meaning the Torah defines the purpose and function of marriage and the purity of the marriage bed (i.e. sanctifying it), and it also defines “food” for mankind (Lev 11/Deut 14), and we thankfully receive both from God in prayer (1 Tim 4:5).


Therefore, when someone tells you that the eternal commands in Lev 11 & Deut 14 have “magically” been “done away with” since Christ died to “redefine what constitutes food??”  Consider the inconsistencies of this thought process, the conflict it places between God the Father and the Son, and how out of context any attempt to validate such a teaching always is, no matter which text is used as supposed “proof text.”


In addition, note the following comparison of various translations below and how translator bias can totally change the meaning of the text in order to support the false assumption that says Lev 11/Deut 14 were “done away with.”  In the KJV, you note the proper one-for-one in order translation of the Greek, in the same word order (noted below it for the Interlinear version).  I have put the corresponding Greek terms in the same color as their English counterparts below.  Note that the NIV (a modern thought-for-thought translation) adds 5 extra words not found anywhere in the Greek, then they change the word order (or I should say manipulate the word order), then they translate the sentence completely out of context of what Messiah is even talking about both in the immediate context (which is going to the bathroom) and the greater context (why his disciples eat BREAD with unwashed hands at the BREAD does not become unclean or defiled).


Note “purging” and (or you could also translate it “cleansing”) has a very different semantic range meaning of the Greek word (in RED), than “clean” (as in the NIV’s version of declaring anything one puts in their mouth “clean” or “food”)  These are two very different interpretations of the sentence, and it is CLEAR, even to the novice translator, that the NIV is completely manipulated and a false translation of the actual underlying GREEK.  This is a classic case of translator bias that actually changes the meaning of the text.  BUT, it’s easily noted and corrected by simply cross referencing multiple translations and looking at the underlying Greek terms.


































Even in the NASB’s translation (which is usually my preferred translation for reading the Bible in English), Mark 7:19 states, "...because it does not go into his heart, but into his stomach, and is eliminated?" ({Thus He declared} all [the] foods clean.) [NASB, the is left out by NASB translators] You will note the translators have opted to take the same thought-for-thought translation as the NIV (even though the NASB is typically at word-for-word translation).  While both the NIV and NASB take the same “liberties” with the text, they do so to shape the text so that it appears as if Jesus said, thus you can eat anything you want, or put anything in your mouth and call it “food.” But this is taking the entire teaching totally out of context historically and grammatically on many levels, and it clearly breaks several standard principles and rules of sound hermeneutics.  I really would expect much more from these translators, but from the garden we have seen than man tends to ignore God’s instructions when it comes to what he wants to eat.









The King James actually got this one right, and you can click on this link to see the word for word breakdown and the corresponding Strong’s definitions via this link.
http://www.blueletterbible.org/cgi-bin/c.pl?book=Mar&chapter=7&verse=19&version=KJV#19 [Click on this link to view the word-for-word Greek behind your modern translation. You may click on the Strong's number for each individual word to get a further detailed definition of each word used in this text.]

In the end, Yeshua/Jesus in his analogy from Mark 7:19 has nothing to do with eating anything you want to stick in your mouth and undoing the eternal Word of God from Lev 11/Deut 14 (randomly!), instead the same story is told in Matthew 15 and specifically, Matthew 15:20 clarify the TRUE ending of the Lord’s thoughts, NOT the added “thus he declared all things one can put in one’s mouth food” false ending.  


Matthew 15:15-20 states,

“Peter said to Him, “Explain the parable to us.”  Jesus said, “Are you still lacking in understanding also?  17 Do you not understand everything that goes into the mouth passes into the stomach, and is eliminated?  18 But the things that proceed out of the mouth come from the heart, and those defile the man.  19 For out of the heart come evil thoughts, murders, adulteries, fornications, thefts, false witness, slanders.  20 THESE ARE WHAT DEFILE THE MAN; BUT TO EAT WITH UNWASHED HANDS DOES NOT DEFILE THE MAN.”


The CONTEXT is clear here.  The nature of the contamination is eating with unwashed hands, NOT eating something God declared unclean and NOT FOOD.


In other words, “dirt on the hands” does not contaminate or defile the CLEAN BREAD (since God declared Bread clean and suitable for food, therefore, no man’s tradition can un-do that reality concerning bread as fit for human consumption).  And even if you bread somehow did get contaminated, for argument’s sake, the body is designed to ELIMINATE THE UNCLEANNESS or “waste” in the form of excrement when you “go to the bathroom” (Mark 7:19)


The point of the compare Jesus is making in the analogy is the idea of uncleanness leaving the body.  In both cases, uncleanness is eliminated from the body (one physical and one spiritual), not because that which was eaten was itself “unclean,” but because the body eliminates anything that is “waste” (analogous of uncleanness) from the body automatically, whereas the spiritual “waste” is not so easily purged.  That is the nature of the comparison in the parable.  So if this parable is teaching that pig or shellfish are no longer “unclean” so you can now eat them freely, you lose the entire context (i.e. Related to answering the initial question of eating BREAD with unwashed hands) and you also lose the comparison Jesus is making in the parable itself related to the uncleanness of excrement that is eliminated from the body when you go to the bathroom in the toilet/draught/privy.


Within this context, Jesus demonstrates (1) how man's laws cannot change God's eternal Word, therefore, His disciples not washing their hands did not render the bread they ate 'unclean' (ie. unfit for human consumption as food) because God's word said it is clean and good for food. [Side note: Don’t you just love God’s sense of humor by the fact that He proceeds in the following verses to feed 4,000 people BREAD and I doubt seriously that any of them ritually washed their hands before eating it!]


(2) He reveals the evil in the hearts of the questioners, even if they try to look good on the outside with their hand washing ritual. The reason this is important to understand is because Jesus compares this fact to the fact that evil (lust, greed, envy, hatred etc.), sins that enter a man's heart, are not so easy to 'eliminate' (remove the waste) or get out of one's heart as is something consumed in the mouth that comes out in the toilet automatically.  Jesus’ assumption is that no one in the conversation would even ever consider eating anything declared NOT FOOD, so the issue is not eating something and sinning by breaking Lev 11/Deut 14, but eating something that may have been contaminated by ritual methods (sacrificed to an idol) or lack of ritual methods (not ritually washing the hands before eating bread).  If the questioners wouldn’t eat bread (something clean and declared food by God) if they did not ritually wash their hands, how much less would they ever consider eating pig/shellfish etc.  Had THEY understood Jesus to mean Lev 11/Deut 14 were now “no longer valid” because “Jesus said so,” they would have gone ballistic.   But even if we assume something unclean going into the body, for example, if a bug (something unclean) accidentally flew into your mouth and you swallowed it unintentionally, the “uncleanness” is going to be eliminated automatically.  BUT, The evil act of eating flies WITH INTENTION when one knows Lev 11/Deut14’s regulation by God against doing so, and that God did not give them for food, that they are unclean, is a rebellion against God in the HEART that is not so easily eliminated.

In the end, even if we REALLY REALLY stretch the text and allow modern critics to translate Mark 7:19 as, "thus Jesus declared all foods clean;" one is still left the with problem of having to DEFINE the word "FOOD" biblically and not according to various and numerous cultural definitions today. Therefore, even a gross mistranslation of the text still leads to the same conclusion regarding what God considers suitable for Christians to eat and not eat and this is clearly defined in God's Word, specifically in the Torah in Lev 11/Deut 14. Yeshua (Jesus) would never even think of eating a pig or shellfish or any unclean thing (or teaching others to rebel against the Torah and do so, Matt 5:17-19) , and neither should we as his disciples. Thus, it is true that all "FOOD" is clean, because all things God gave for food and all things God gave as food are in fact clean simply because God declared it such in His eternal Word (Lev 11/Deut 14); however, not all things created by God were (or are) given to man for food.

Matthew 5:17-19

17 "Do not think that I came to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I did not come to abolish but to fulfill. 18 For truly I say to you, until heaven and earth pass away, not the smallest letter or stroke shall pass from the Law until all is accomplished. 19 Whoever then annuls one of the least of these commandments [i.e. Lev 11/Deut 14, Sabbath, Feast Days etc.], and teaches others to do the same, shall be called least in the kingdom of heaven; but whoever keeps and teaches them, he shall be called great in the kingdom of heaven.