Picking up where we left off last week. Listen to what God tells Moses in Leviticus 17:11—“For the life of the flesh is in the blood, and I have given it to you upon the altar to make atonement for your souls.” Why were people prohibited from eating blood? Because God gave it to them “on the altar to make atonement for your souls.” That was for the people living under the old covenant. What about those of us living under the new covenant? Did God provide blood upon an altar for us? Oh yeah, I think He did. Romans 3:24-25—24 Being justified freely by His grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, 25 whom God set forth as a propitiation by His blood, through faith, to demonstrate His righteousness, because in His forbearance God had passed over the sins that were previously committed. Ephesians 1:7—In Him we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of sins, according to the riches of His grace. Now, if Christ’s blood was given on the cross “to make atonement for your souls” and if God said the reason we are not to ingest blood is because it was given “to make atonement for your souls” and if God is to be consistent in His governing of men, then does it really make sense that he would have His Son teach men to break “the least of these commandments” and eat blood which was given “to make atonement for your souls”?
Besides, let’s consider another matter: Nothing that was considered sinful under the old covenant is ever allowed under the new covenant. That is, if something was considered sinful under the old covenant, it is considered sinful under the new covenant. Adultery, murder, homosexuality, incest—all these are met with the penalty of death under the old covenant. Any act that carried with it the death penalty is still prohibited under the new covenant. (The ceremonial offerings and feasts—these were not to be performed forever. These were meant to lead us to Christ, and have been fulfilled by Christ in His first advent, or will be fulfilled by Christ in His second advent). Now, I can think of a couple things that were spoken of in the Law that are no longer prohibited. The first is missing Passover. Under the Law, if anyone did not partake of the Passover, they were cut off. Numbers 9:13—“But the man who is clean and is not on a journey, and ceases to keep the Passover, that same person shall be cut off from among his people, because he did not bring the offering of the LORD at its appointed time; that man shall bear his sin.” Before you say, “See! Missing Passover was a sin, but we can miss Passover now!” Well, yeah—that’s because we no longer keep the Passover as they did then. We don’t kill a lamb and smear its blood on our doorpost. That is because Christ has become our Passover. 1st Corinthians 5:7—Christ our Passover was sacrificed for us.
And then, of course, there are all the dietary restrictions. The people were not allowed to eat pork or venison or calamari or clams. But here’s the thing—if the person did eat that which was considered unclean, they were not killed, nor were they cut off from their people. The penalty—they would need to bathe themselves and would be unclean until evening. But now, under the new covenant, I can boldly walk into Red Lobster and indulge in their “Endless Shrimp” promotion. I can go to Carabba’s and order fried calamari. SWEET! Why? Because God has taken away the restrictions on what His people can eat. In that well-known section in the book of Acts, when Peter is on the rooftop, and God tells him, “Rise, Peter, kill and eat!” Then Peter says “Lord, I have never defiled myself with unclean food!” What does God say? "What God has cleansed you must not call common" (Acts 10:15). God has cleansed all animals so that we can enjoy them. Why? Because, like the sacrificial system and the Levitical priesthood, these restrictions were only temporary. They were meant to train the Israelites to differentiate between clean and unclean, between holy and profane. Leviticus 11:46-47—“46 'This is the law of the animals and the birds and every living creature that moves in the waters, and of every creature that creeps on the earth, 47 to distinguish between the unclean and the clean, and between the animal that may be eaten and the animal that may not be eaten.'” But now we don’t need such regulations to separate holy from profane. We now have the Holy Spirit dwelling within us, and it is that Holy Spirit that teaches us to distinguish. John 16:13—“When He, the Spirit of truth, has come, He will guide you into all truth; for He will not speak on His own authority, but whatever He hears He will speak; and He will tell you things to come.” And isn't the fact that we have God Himself living in us, directing us and pointing us in the proper direction, much more comforting than trying to remember whether a rock hyrax is clean or unclean? And if one listens to the leading of the Holy Spirit, rather than the Infallible Magisterium™, one will see that when Christ said “Whoever eats My flesh and drinks My blood has eternal life” He wasn’t talking about His actual flesh and His actual blood.
Now, the Roman Catholic may try to convince you that even though it’s wrong to eat animal blood (or even the blood of other humans) that it’s really OK to drink Jesus’ blood. And, again, this is an absurd notion and a nonsensical idea. For not only did God warn against the practice under the old covenant, but God also spoke against it under the new. Consider the conclusion of the Jerusalem Council (Acts 15)—a council which, oh by the way, included “First Pope®” Simon Peter. Listen to their conclusion, Acts 15:23-29—23 They wrote this letter by them: “The apostles, the elders, and the brethren, To the brethren who are of the Gentiles in Antioch, Syria, and Cilicia: Greetings. 24 Since we have heard that some who went out from us have troubled you with words, unsettling your souls, saying, "You must be circumcised and keep the law"—to whom we gave no such commandment—25 it seemed good to us, being assembled with one accord, to send chosen men to you with our beloved Barnabas and Paul, 26 men who have risked their lives for the name of our Lord Jesus Christ. 27 We have therefore sent Judas and Silas, who will also report the same things by word of mouth. 28 For it seemed good to the Holy Spirit, and to us, to lay upon you no greater burden than these necessary things: 29 that you abstain from things offered to idols, from blood, from things strangled, and from sexual immorality. If you keep yourselves from these, you will do well. Farewell. Did you notice the injunction? Right there, smack dab in between idolatry and fornication is the injunction against what? Eating blood! And if the Roman Catholic is saying that by the words of the priest the wafer and wine turn into flesh and blood, then is this not a violation of a ruling agreed to by their “First Pope®”? Now, back to Leviticus 17.
Leviticus 17:13-16—“13 Whatever man of the children of Israel, or of the strangers who dwell among you, who hunts and catches any animal or bird that may be eaten, he shall pour out its blood and cover it with dust; 14 for it is the life of all flesh. Its blood sustains its life. Therefore I said to the children of Israel, 'You shall not eat the blood of any flesh, for the life of all flesh is its blood. Whoever eats it shall be cut off.' 15 And every person who eats what died naturally or what was torn by beasts, whether he is a native of your own country or a stranger, he shall both wash his clothes and bathe in water, and be unclean until evening. Then he shall be clean. 16 But if he does not wash them or bathe his body, then he shall bear his guilt.” Remember, the Law was not limited to the time when the people were camped at Mt. Sinai. These regulations carried over into the wandering in the wilderness, as well as when they arrived in Canaan. Moses would speak thus to them, in Deuteronomy 4:5-6—“5 Surely I have taught you statutes and judgments, just as the LORD my God commanded me, that you should act according to them in the land which you go to possess. 6 Therefore be careful to observe them; for this is your wisdom and your understanding in the sight of the peoples who will hear all these statutes, and say, ‘Surely this great nation is a wise and understanding people.’” God knew that there would be times when someone would be out in the wild, and far from the camp and that person would get hungry and need to kill and eat. And God being the gracious God that He is, gave them provisions for those times they would not be able to bring that blood to the tabernacle. And he says if you kill and eat, and you are far from the place where God dwells you can pour out the blood and cover it over.
There is, within this command, another warning not to do as the heathens do. Just as the Sabeans would kill an animal in the open field and offer its blood to their (little-g) god, so would they hunt and kill and they would gather together, believing that they were uniting their spirits together with the other spirits of the world while drinking the blood of the hunt. A little background on the Sabeans. These would be the same peoples who came down upon the household of Job, plundering his oxen and asses. Job 1:13-15—13 Now there was a day when his sons and daughters were eating and drinking wine in their oldest brother's house; 14 and a messenger came to Job and said, "The oxen were plowing and the donkeys feeding beside them, 15 when the Sabeans raided them and took them away—indeed they have killed the servants with the edge of the sword; and I alone have escaped to tell you!" These Sabeans were so named because they came from Sheba, which was part of an area known as Arabia Felix, which would be located at the southern tip of the Arabian Peninsula. They were descended from Jokshan, who was born to Abraham by his second wife, Keturah. Genesis 25:1-3—1 Abraham again took a wife, and her name was Keturah. 2 And she bore him Zimran, Jokshan, Medan, Midian, Ishbak, and Shuah. 3 Jokshan begot Sheba and Dedan. Not much is known about these Sabeans, much of their history being either not written down, or lost to time. We do have this tidbit, from the Jewish Encyclopedia, published in 1906:
“Among the Sabean gods the most important were Almaḳah ("the hearing god"?), Athtar (a protective deity and the male form of "Ashtaroth," to whom the gazelle seems to have been sacred), Haubas (possibly a lunar deity), Dhu Samawi ("lord of heaven"), Ḥajr, Ḳainan, Ḳawim ("the sustaining"), Sin (the principal moon-god), Shams (the chief solar deity), Yaṭa', Ramman (the Biblical Rimmon), El ("god" in general), Sami' ("the hearing"), Shem (corresponding in functions to the general Semitic Ba'al), Ḥobal (possibly a god of fortune), Ḥomar (perhaps a god of wine), Bashir ("bringer of good tidings"), Raḥman ("the merciful"), Ta'lab (probably a tree-god), and Wadd (borrowed from the Mineans). A number of goddesses are mentioned, among them Dhat Ḥami ("lady of Ḥami"), Dhat Ba'dan ("lady of Ba'dan"), Dhat Gaḍran ("lady of Gaḍran"), and Tanuf ("lofty").
“It becomes clear, even from this scanty information, that the religion was in the main a nature-cult, like the other Semitic religions; and this is borne out by a statement in the Koran (sura xxvii. 24) that the Sabeans worshiped the sun. Few details of the cult are given, although there are frequent mentions of gifts and sacrifices, as well as of "self-presentation," a rite of doubtful meaning, but one which evidently might be performed more than once. Ritual purity and abstinence of various forms also seem to have formed part of the Sabean religion, and the name of the month Dhu Ḥijjat or Maḥijjat, the only one retained by the Arabs (Dhu'l-Ḥijja, the twelfth month), implies a custom of religious pilgrimage to some shrine or shrines.”
(http://www.jewishencyclopedia.com/articles/12969-sabeans)
We also have this lengthy excerpt from Maimonides’ “Guide for the Perplexed”:
“Although blood was very unclean in the eyes of the Sabeans, they nevertheless partook of it, because they thought it was the food of the spirits: by eating it man has something in common with the spirits, which join him and tell him future events, according to the notion which people generally have of spirits…Such ideas people liked and accepted in those days; they were general, and their correctness was not doubted by any one of the common people. The Law, which is perfect in the eyes of those who know it, and seeks to cure mankind of these lasting diseases, forbade the eating of blood, and emphasized the prohibition exactly in the same terms as it emphasizes idolatry: "I will set my face against that soul that eateth blood" (Lev. xvii. 10). The same language is employed in reference to him "who giveth of his seed unto Molech": "then I will set my face against that man" (ibid. xx. 5). There is, besides idolatry and eating blood, no other sin in reference to which these words are used. For the eating of blood leads to a kind of idolatry, to the worship of spirits. Our Law declared the blood as pure, and made it the means of purifying other objects by its touch…Also the blood of those beasts that were killed for common use, and not for sacrifices, must be poured out," Thou shalt pour it upon the earth as water" (ibid. ver. 24). We are not allowed to gather and have a meal round the blood," You shall not eat round the blood" (Lev. xix. 26). As the Israelites were inclined to continue their rebellious conduct, to follow the doctrines in which they had been brought up, and which were then general, and to assemble round the blood in order to eat there and to meet the spirits, God forbade the Israelites to eat ordinary meat during their stay in the wilderness: they could only partake of the meat of peace-offerings…
“The commandment was therefore given that whenever a beast or a bird that may be eaten is killed, the blood thereof must be covered with earth (Lev. xvii. 13), in order that the people should not assemble round the blood for the purpose of eating there. The object was thus fully gained to break the connexion between these fools and their spirits. This belief flourished about the time of our Teacher Moses. People were attracted and misled by it…The prohibition of slaughtering cattle for common use applied only to the wilderness, because as regards the "spirits" it was then the general belief that they dwelt in deserts, that there they spoke and were visible, whilst in towns and in cultivated land they did not appear. In accordance with this belief those inhabitants of a town who wanted to perform any of those stupid practices, left the town and went to woods and waste places. The use of cattle for common food was therefore allowed when the Israelites entered Palestine...Furthermore, it was almost impossible that everyone who wanted to eat meat should come to Jerusalem. For these reasons the above restriction [against killing animals for any other reason than as an offering to YHVH] was limited to the stay of the Israelites in the wilderness.”
(Maimonides, The Guide for the Perplexed, chapter 46, p. 362. http://www.sacred-texts.com/jud/gfp/gfp182.htm)
As with the command in the Decalogue prohibiting the people from making images of the invisible God, the command to pour out the lifeblood of a slain animal and cover it with dust had behind it one central reason: discouraging the people from incorporating the practices of the neighboring pagans into the true worship of the true God. But, as Maimonides so astutely observed, time after time “the Israelites were inclined to continue their rebellious conduct, to follow the doctrines in which they had been brought up, and which were then general.” The prophet Ezekiel wrote many chapters chronicling the constant rebellion of the people away from the true worship god proscribed, and their constant embracing of heathenish practices. In chapter 16, we see God utterly castigate without mercy this adulterous woman—this woman that was worse than a harlot, God says, because men pay harlots, while Israel paid the lovers who ravished her. Ezekiel 16:27-34—“27 Behold, therefore, I stretched out My hand against you, diminished your allotment, and gave you up to the will of those who hate you, the daughters of the Philistines, who were ashamed of your lewd behavior. 28 You also played the harlot with the Assyrians, because you were insatiable; indeed you played the harlot with them and still were not satisfied. 29 Moreover you multiplied your acts of harlotry as far as the land of the trader, Chaldea; and even then you were not satisfied. 30 How degenerate is your heart!” says the Lord GOD, “seeing you do all these things, the deeds of a brazen harlot. 31 You erected your shrine at the head of every road, and built your high place in every street. Yet you were not like a harlot, because you scorned payment. 32 You are an adulterous wife, who takes strangers instead of her husband. 33 Men make payment to all harlots, but you made your payments to all your lovers, and hired them to come to you from all around for your harlotry. 34 You are the opposite of other women in your harlotry, because no one solicited you to be a harlot. In that you gave payment but no payment was given you, therefore you are the opposite.” These may be, by far, the harshest words God ever spoke to any individual or nation. He did not even say such things about the Babylonians or Assyrians. And yet to Israel, which he would at one point call “the apple of His eye” (Zechariah 2:8), He gives such a verbal beatdown, saying that they acted in ways which would bring shame even to a harlot.
And then, He reminds them of the paganism they stooped into when influenced by their Sabean neighbors. Ezekiel 24:6-9 (NASB)—“6 ‘Therefore, thus says the Lord GOD, “Woe to the bloody city, to the pot in which there is rust and whose rust has not gone out of it! Take out of it piece after piece, without making a choice. 7 For her blood is in her midst; she placed it on the bare rock; she did not pour it on the ground to cover it with dust. 8 That it may cause wrath to come up to take vengeance, I have put her blood on the bare rock, that it may not be covered.” 9 Therefore, thus says the Lord GOD, “Woe to the bloody city! I also will make the pile great.”’” He gives Jerusalem this parable, that it may recall to their memory one of their earliest adulteries, and the reason for the command in the Law to cover the blood of slain animals. Like the Sabeans who gathered around and feasted on blood and around blood, this “bloody city” had feasted around blood, and would be judged justly by the Great Lawgiver, that they may receive the recompense for their harlotry.
So that pretty much sums up the teaching on eating or drinking blood, Next week we will begin Leviticus chapter 18, discussing the commands concerning sexual sins.
Jesus Christ is Lord.
Amen.
