Recently a quote from the late Dr. Michael Heiser was shared, attributed to his podcast, that claimed no argument can be made that we should be keeping the dietary laws found in Leviticus 11 and Deuteronomy 14 today. Now, the quote was slightly different from what was actually said in the original podcast message, titled Naked Bible 74: Leviticus 11, which I listened to in its entirety. So, I want to provide for you the original quote as stated by Heiser in his podcast, where he said:
"This is Israelite. This is Semitic culture. This is the Ancient Near East, the Ancient Eastern Mediterranean, that kind of thing. At least part of Leviticus 11 needs that culture to make sense. It's also a ritual setting. That takes us into the whole theocratic mentality, the theocratic rationale. And since we aren't living in ancient Semitic culture and we no longer have a theocracy, my view is that these food laws are not meant for us today.
They are culturally isolated and they are theologically isolated because of their attachment to the cult of Yahweh, the rituals of Yahweh. For those who missed earlier episodes cult is an academic way of referring to the sacrificial system, to the ritual system. So because it has to do with the tabernacle and temple and all that sort of thing, we don’t have that by design, by divine design. I don't think there's an argument to be made that we should be following the food laws."
After seeing this as it was first shared with me I went to one of Heiser’s websites and searched for anything else he may have said about this topic and found a short article titled The Bible and Food by Scott Munger, Ph.D., with this stated:
“At times, however, God has changed the rules about eating. Adam and Eve were vegetarians (Genesis 1:29-30). Later, God told Noah he could also eat any animal, but not blood (Genesis 9:3-4). Later still, through Moses God gave very strict dietary regulations to the nation of Israel. That helped make them distinct as His special people. But God also intended that those religious laws create certain problems. He wanted the Israelites to learn that no one was perfect—that no one could do all God required (Acts 15:10; Galatians 4:1-5:3). Later, when Jesus lived on earth, He once again declared that any food could be eaten without fear of breaking God’s rules.”
Of course, such a statement creates a huge problem. Malachi 3:6 tells us that God does not change and Hebrews 13:8 emphatically declares: “Yeshua the Messiah is the same yesterday, today, and forever.” As you can see, Munger’s and Heiser’s schizophrenic god is in direct conflict with The God of The Bible and our Messiah Yeshua. In addition, he promotes the popular lie that God only gave The Torah to Israel to prove nobody could keep it. Not only does this too contradict Scripture, as Deuteronomy 30:11-14 says that following The Torah is easy and 1 John 5:3 says the commandments are not burdensome, but this view requires us to believe that God delivered His chosen people from actual bondage in Egypt only to turn around and put them under what “Christians” seem to view as the harsher bondage of The Law.
Perhaps, however, the most concerning point of Heiser’s views on this topic is the notion that the food laws were not actual commandments from God but were simply a cultural disdain for certain kinds of animals—perhaps much like modern Americans would find eating spiders to be repulsive. He expresses this earlier in the podcast message where he says this:
At least part of the rationale for how food, how diet, is connected with being set apart has to do with culture. It has to do with a people's opinion collectively in Semtic cultures that they already have, in other words, their opinion about what is abhorrent to eat is not given to them by God.
You don’t get some sort of mental zap that oh, yesterday I used to like bacon and today I hate it. Today I think it's abominable. No, there are parts of this that are already within the cultural context of what people think is disgusting to eat, so that's at least part of the rationale. It’s a cultural thing. It's a Semitic thing. It's a second millennium BC Semitic Eastern Mediterranean kind of thing. It’s part of their world, part of their worldview, part of their frame of reference.3
Did you catch how he indicates that the Leviticus 11 food laws were not given by God? His argument here is that the Israelites already found these animals to be “disgusting and abhorrent” as part of their culture and apparently must have just added this to The Torah. This is problematic on a number of levels, but I also have to wonder why Heiser wouldn’t consider that unclean animals were established as unclean prior to the flood and it would seem logical that later Semitic Israelite culture was simply following what had already been given by God—even before the flood. So, Heiser is implying here that a commandment that is attributed to God in The Bible didn’t really come from God and fails to consider the earliest record of the food laws, which we will further look at in this message.
Now, I have done a lot of research into the food laws over the course of the past 20 years. In fact, it’s entirely possible that I have studied this topic more than even someone like Michael Heiser or other professional Bible scholars, as I concluded a long time ago that this one thing may hold a key to unlocking the importance of the entire Torah on new covenant biblical faith practice. At some point, I would like to do a thorough cover-to-cover study of all passages that might be directly related to the food laws but because this came up and this man said that he does not think an argument can even be made that we should be following the food laws, I want to go through several passages of Scripture that do make this argument quite well. While each of these can warrant a broader study beyond the scope of this message, I think in just this overview we will see that clearly an argument can be made that we should be following the food laws given in Leviticus 11 and Deuteronomy 14.
Before I get into that, I want to note that a lot of people, even some otherwise very intelligent scholars, have a habit of using Ancient Near East Culture as a way to minimize or dismiss certain commandments. Recently a ministry friend of mine, Daniel Botkin, who is a great author and Bible teacher, published an article titled The ANE Excuse: A Convenient Loophole & A Slippery Slope where he addresses this, which he has allowed me to share online and you can read it at TruthIgnited.com. In this article he says: “I am opposed to using information from ANE studies to make unprovable assumptions about what the Bible ‘really means,’ and then to dogmatically present those unprovable assumptions as facts — especially when those so-called ‘facts’ provide a loophole for people who are looking for a way to justify sin and disobedience to the plain meaning of the text.” And I believe that is exactly what we have with Michael Heiser’s quote here, a prime example of someone spinning what he apparently thinks a commandment meant to the Ancient Near East world in order to conclude that, “no argument can be made that we should be following the food laws” today under new covenant faith practice.
Let me also say, before getting into this, that while knowledge of ancient customs and cultures, especially those of the pagan nations, is really not necessary to know whether or not you should be obeying a commandment given by God, it can be important in understanding certain biblical narratives as The Bible is set within the culture of the Ancient Near East. One Bible teacher that I feel has great content and does not do the kind of things Botkin expresses concerns with is Rico Cortes of Wisdom In Torah Ministries. His research into ANE and The Jerusalem Temple are certainly worth looking at. While I do think the greater focus today should probably be on the 2.4 billion “Christians” who think The Bible tells them they can eat swine flesh and the abomination and don’t seem to know what day The Sabbath is or what holidays God gave His people to celebrate, I also feel like Rico is a guy who was specifically anointed and divinely appointed by The Spirit of God to research and teach on these topics.
So, with all of this in mind, let’s get into this. Can an argument be made that we should be following the biblical food laws today? I believe there can be, and not just a single argument either. Some, like Heiser if he were still alive today, might reject these arguments to hold fast to their claim that arguments cannot be made, but this should not change the fact that these arguments can be made and should be taken seriously.
The Genesis 3 Argument
To start things off, I think the biggest argument that must be considered is the incident in Genesis 3:1-5. Let’s take a look at what it says.
But the serpent was shrewder than any animal of the field that Adonai Elohim made. So it said to the woman, “Did God really say, ‘You must not eat from all the trees of the garden’?”
The woman said to the serpent, “Of the fruit of the trees, we may eat. But of the fruit of the tree which is in the middle of the garden, God said, ‘You must not eat of it and you must not touch it, or you will die.’”
The serpent said to the woman, “You most assuredly won’t die! For God knows that when you eat of it, your eyes will be opened and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.”
Now, while this is not directly connected with the Leviticus 11 food laws in the sense that it’s not dealing with clean and unclean animal meats, in a more general sense it is dealing with an issue of food. God created people, created a garden for them, told them to eat anything in the garden except for the fruit of one tree, and they ended up eating the fruit of that tree. They ate something that God said not to eat. In this way, this is clearly a text that should be weighed against the conversation related to the Leviticus 11 food laws and their continued mandate.
Let’s just think about this logically, with good common sense, for a moment. The entire problem of sin started with this single act of eating something God said not to eat. Now, I know a lot of people claim that these early statements of Genesis are not literal, that they are allegory, hyperbole, etc. But even at that, the storyline is that God said not to eat something, they ate it anyway, and now we have every sin, sickness, and a whole curse on our planet. That’s the message of Genesis 3.
So, let me ask some simple questions: If the act that caused the earth to go into turmoil and sin to plague the whole of human history was the act of eating something God said not to eat, why would anyone want to conclude that something later in The Bible permits people to eat something else God said not to eat? Does that even make sense? When the only character in The Bible to ever lead people to a belief that they can eat something God said not to eat is Satan, why would anyone want to today claim that the food laws are annulled and we can eat things God said not to eat? Wouldn’t that make such people synonymous with Satan? This is something to really think long and hard about, and quite honestly I think this is the only “argument” that even needs to be made that we are to be following the food laws. You know, we’ll look at more arguments from other passages of course, but when a theological position so closely aligns with what Satan said in Genesis 3 that really should be a huge red flag, and no theological position so closely aligns with this than the belief that the Leviticus 11 food laws don’t apply to “Christians”. At a minimum the only intelligent conclusion here would be: “I’m not convinced that they are still mandated, but I’m also not taking any chances, swine flesh and ocean roaches just aren’t important enough when there are plenty of things available that God clearly approved for us to eat.”
The Noah Argument
The next important passage we come to regarding the food laws is the narrative of Noah, the ark, and the flood. This, of course, is told through Genesis chapters 6 through 9. For this there are two important points we must consider, the first comes from Genesis 7:2, which says:
Of every clean animal you shall take with you seven of each kind, male and female; and of the animals which themselves are not clean two, male and female;
You know, most “Christians” today still speak boldly about issues of gender and sexuality, noting that in Genesis 1:27 there are two human genders: male and female. But here we have in Genesis 7 two kinds of animals: clean and unclean. This, I will remind you, is still before the actual flood—Noah had not yet brought the animals onto the ark when God spoke to him about this—and it was definitely long before Moses. The IVP Bible Backgrounds Commentary: Genesis-Deuteronomy by Dr. John Walton and Dr. Victor Matthews states: “Additional clean animals would be needed both for sacrifice after the flood and for quicker repopulation for human use,” and, “The distinction between clean and unclean animals was not an innovation established at Sinai, but here is seen as early as Noah.” Remember how Heiser claimed that these distinctions were an invention of Ancient Near East Semitic culture? Yet, just like the two genders of male and female, the distinctions of clean and unclean were also established in Genesis—long before there was a nation of Israel, a “Jewish” people, a Tabernacle or Temple, an Ancient Semitic culture, and anything else people seem to think is a “reason” the food laws don’t apply to them.
The next passage of importance comes from Genesis 9:3, which says:
Every crawling thing that is alive will be food for you, as are the green plants—I have now given you everything.
This is probably one of the most misunderstood passages in the whole Bible, and it comes from the way a single word is translated—that word being in Hebrew kol-remes. However, as Walton notes in The NIV Application Commentary: Genesis, this word appears to be more specific in reference to wild ruminants that were hunted for food, of which he says includes wild cattle, antelope, fallow deer, gazelle, and ibex. In other words, this term kol-remes appears to not be as broad as referring to all living animals, including those deemed unclean even before the flood, but to biblically clean wild ruminants.
I often point out that since Noah had a minimum of seven of each kind of clean animal—there is debate about whether he took seven total or seven pairs for a total of fourteen—and only one mating pair of unclean animals, then if he were to have had a hog roast after the flood as some people would have us believe there would not have been any pigs on the earth after that. Remember, Noah was told to take each animal after its kind, not all of the individual breeds. So, Noah had two pigs on the ark—not two potbelly pigs and two boars and two peccaries and two Red River hogs, and two warthogs, etc. So, if he ate one the other would have no mate and there would be no pigs left to even debate about eating today. Noah knew this because he understood what God meant by kol-remes.
Then in Genesis 9:9 God establishes covenant with Noah and his seed. And once again we see something that “Christians” today love to point out from the Genesis record, that the rainbow is the symbol of God’s covenant. But this covenant was made with the man we see the distinctions of clean and unclean animals first given to, at least within the biblical record because I believe that even Adam and Eve knew about them. I pointed out that there are two human genders mentioned in Genesis 1:27, and many “Christians” believe that a deviation from this is a perversion of the rainbow symbol. But these same “Christians” believe they have some permission from God to eat things He called unclean, which it would seem is a more direct perversion of the rainbow as a sign of His covenant with Noah. The plain fact of the matter is that both a deviation from Genesis 1:27 and Genesis 7:2 is listed as an abomination all throughout The Bible, and so through the record of Noah and the establishing of clean and unclean animals before the flood, along with the fact that according to The Bible all humans would be Noah’s seed, we have another solid argument that we are supposed to follow the food laws and we haven’t even gotten to Leviticus 11 yet.
The Torah For Everyone Argument
Another point we must consider is that several passages in Scripture tell us that all Believers, and perhaps even all of humanity, throughout all of human history are expected to live by The Torah, which would include following the food laws. Check out the following passages:
The same Torah applies to the native as well as the outsider who dwells among you.
—Exodus 12:49 (TLV)
The same Torah and the same regulations will apply to both you and the outsider residing among you.
—Numbers 15:16 (TLV)
A final word, when all has been heard:
Fear God and keep His mitzvot!
For this applies to all mankind.
—Ecclesiastes 12:13 (TLV)
Here is the perseverance of the kedoshim—those who keep the commandments of God and the faith of Yeshua.
—Revelation 14:12 (TLV)
In these passages we see very clearly that everyone is supposed to be following The Torah, including the food laws. A different translation of Ecclesiastes 12:13 says that this is what being human is all about. And while the deceivers of popular “Christian” religion may try to claim the first three are “Old Testament”, they can’t even use that tired line about Revelation.
When The Bible says that everyone is supposed to follow The Torah, then everyone is supposed to follow The Torah. When The Torah itself says the same Torah applies to the native-born Israelites and gentiles who enter into covenant—because that is actually what Exodus 12:49 and Numbers 15:16 are saying in context—then that’s a commandment within The Torah and is to be followed as such. Much like the Noah argument, these passages testify that the food laws are meant for all of humanity at all times in history—they should not be treated as some ancient cultural practice that doesn’t apply to modern culture. We can, then, contrast this with two other important passages of Scripture.
Her kohanim have done violence to My Torah and have profaned My holy things; they have made no distinction between the holy and the profane, nor have they taught the difference between the unclean and the clean. They shut their eyes to My Shabbatot. So I am profaned among them.
—Ezekiel 22:26 (TLV)
“Not everyone who says to Me, ‘Lord, Lord!’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but he who does the will of My Father in heaven. Many will say to Me on that day, ‘Lord, Lord, didn’t we prophesy in Your name, and drive out demons in Your name, and perform many miracles in Your name?’ Then I will declare to them, ‘I never knew you. Get away from Me, you workers of lawlessness!’”
—Matthew 7:21-23 (TLV)
We see these same themes all throughout Scripture where following the commandments is the expectation and rejection of the commandments is met with rebukes of profaning the holiness of God and the threat of being rejected by Yeshua. This all continues to support the continued mandate of the food laws in the new covenant.
The Isaiah Argument
Next, we’ll turn to the prophet Isaiah, who had a couple of things to say about the food laws. Consider these two passages.
These people provoke Me continually to My face, sacrificing in gardens, burning incense on bricks, sitting among graves, spending the night in cave-tombs; eating swine’s flesh, and the broth of detestable things is in their pots, who say, ‘Keep to yourself, don’t come to me, for I am holier than you!’ These are smoke in My nostrils, a fire that burns all day.
—Isaiah 65:3-5 (TLV)
Those who consecrate and purify themselves to enter the groves, following after one in the midst, who eat swine’s flesh, vermin and mice, will come to an end altogether.
—Isaiah 66:17 (TLV)
Clearly these passages do not present a favorable view of eating unclean things. But before you think, once again, “That’s Old Testament”, we must consider at least regarding Isaiah 66 that the chapter is widely regarded as a Messianic prophecy about the second coming. Support for this view comes both from verses 22 and 23 where it says that after the establishing of a new heaven and new earth everyone will be keeping The Sabbath and from paralleling the statements in the chapter with those of Revelation 19. This also indicates that in the millennium people will be keeping the food laws, which is further supported by the fact that everyone will be keeping the biblical Feasts related to Passover and Tabernacles in the millennium (Ezekiel 45:21, Zechariah 14:16-19), and in order to biblically do this the food laws must be followed. So, this begs the question: If the food laws were the expectation under the Sinai covenant and are going to be the expectation in the millennium, where do all of these “Christians” get the idea that we live in some magical window of time where they don’t have to follow them?
The Yeshua Argument
Let me make a point that no serious and honest Bible scholar would refute, including Heiser if he were still alive: Yeshua was a Jewish Rabbi who lived according to The Torah, which included keeping The Sabbath, celebrating the Torah-appointed Feast Days, and following the food laws. In fact, the only thing The Bible ever says Yeshua did with pigs was to cast devils into them and drown them in the sea—and considering that other passages indicate He was not one to waste food, it could be argued that He clearly did not consider pigs to be food. While that may be more of an assumption, there is something that is much more worthy of consideration. 1 John 2:4-6 states the following:
The one who says, “I have come to know Him,” and does not keep His commandments is a liar, and the truth is not in him. But whoever keeps His word, in him the love of God is truly made perfect. We know that we are in Him by this— whoever claims to abide in Him must walk just as He walked.
Considering that, as we saw a moment ago, He will reject those who practice lawlessness and following The Torah was part of His own walk that we are to follow after, we can again argue that a logical conclusion is that we must follow the food laws just as He did. Throughout His life and teachings, we only see Him upholding The Torah and telling others to live by it. He is The Righteous One (Isaiah 53:11, Acts 7:52, 22:14), and righteousness is defined in Deuteronomy 6:25 as following, keeping, living by all of the commandments.
In contrast to this there is a lawless one (2 Thessalonians 2:8-9) that is connected with the activity of Satan—that ancient serpent who in Genesis 3 told people it’s OK to eat something that God said not to eat. Is this at all coming together for you? Are you at least beginning to see the error in the theology against the food laws yet? We are to follow Yeshua, our Messiah. Some people contend that He kept The Torah because He was still under the old covenant, but this idea is absurd. First of all, nothing indicates that He recanted everything He taught about following The Torah and repented of His own Torah-keeping after the resurrection. Second, the clear evidence of Scripture is that His followers continued to live by The Torah after the resurrection—there are 85 Sabbaths documented in Acts as kept by the apostles and early followers of Yeshua and not a single “Sunday church service” because those wouldn’t be invented until hundreds of years after the time of the apostles, Paul in Acts 20:16 and 1 Corinthians 5:6-8 expresses the continued keeping of the Torah-appointed Feasts, in Acts 10 we see Peter saying that he has never eaten unclean things, and Acts 21 tells us that Paul was clean according to the requirements for entering The Temple—something that would require a lifestyle of following the food laws. We are followers of Yeshua, are we not? Then why do so many who claim this not follow Yeshua in such things as the food laws?
The Apostolic Argument
The next point really is not as much an argument directly in favor of keeping the food laws as it is an argument that “Christian” interpretations of a number of passages in the Apostolic Writings are wrong and by default means that there is no argument in The Bible against following the food laws. There are certain passages of Scripture that those who claim the food laws to be abrogated go to, such as Matthew 15 and Mark 7, Acts 10, Romans 14, 1 Corinthians 8, 1 Corinthians 10, 1 Timothy 4:3-5, and Colossians 2:16-17. The problem is that that none of these passages clearly state that they overturn the food laws, this idea has to be read into them and it contradicts the actual context of each passage. Consider the following:
• Matthew 15 and Mark 7 are about whether not washing your hands before eating bread is “unclean”. The entire narrative in each record of the event is about elevating the traditions of men above the Law of God. It, therefore, makes no sense to claim that the passage is about overturning one of the Laws of God.
• Acts 10 is about opening the door of the Gospel to all nations. Even Peter recognized that the vision was ultimately about God wanting all people in His Kingdom and never indicated that the vision was an overturning of the food laws. After figuring out the meaning of the vision, Peter didn’t grab a pork chop and chow down, he went out to preach salvation to the gentiles.
• Romans 14 and 1 Corinthians chapters 8 and 10 are about idolatry connected with meat sold in the markets and whether or not it was prohibited to buy such meats if you didn’t know whether or not someone had first offered it to an idol or a pagan god. Nowhere in the text does it indicate anything regarding a permission to eat what The Torah deemed unclean.
• 1 Timothy 4:3-5 is a grossly misunderstood passage dealing with a Gnostic heresy. The same problematic beliefs Paul was addressing included forbidding marriage, so it makes no sense that he was saying literally all animals are now allowed to be eaten. I’ll touch more on this passage in a moment.
• Colossians 2:16-17 was dealing with “philosophy and empty deception, according to the tradition of men and the basic principles of the world rather than Messiah” (see verse 8). A proper study of who Paul’s original audience in the Book of Colossians was reveals that they were mostly gentile converts who were being mocked for their acceptance of biblical faith that included keeping The Sabbath, food laws, and festivals established in The Torah. Paul was telling them to keep their head up and not be discouraged by those harassing them and making fun of them for living by The Torah of God.
So, you see, when we consider the actual context of these passages, none of them really have anything to do with the Leviticus 11 food laws, and they especially do not overturn them. It’s funny, or sad really, that “Christians” have to go to The Torah to build the foundation of their case for every commandment they believe is still to be followed, yet they use distorted and twisted “interpretations” of the Apostolic Writings to claim that other commandments are voided—despite the fact that the apostles who wrote those things were Jews who believed in living according to The Torah. “Christians” are not “not under the law” as they claim, they are under their own delusional force of lawlessness as stated in 2 Thessalonians 2:7-12.
Let’s look a little closer at that one in 1 Timothy 4. One of the things that it states, that all the “we can eat swine flesh and ocean cockroaches Christians” love to misrepresent, is: … every creature of God is good, and nothing to be refused…
Well, check this out. There’s something that I call the 1 Timothy 4:4 challenge.
First, we can look at things that would gross most people out. Say I gave you a plate of spiders or earthworms, would you eat them or would you refuse—going against your belief that the passage says nothing is to be refused? But, some might contend that you may have to, like if you’re on a missionary trip, eat “whatever is set before you”, another statement always taken out of context, in order to not offend the people you are trying to witness to. So, we might look at human flesh, after all humans are scientifically a part of the animal kingdom and are primates, technically making us unclean animals, so what if you were served up some good old human flesh right off the grill? Would you refuse or would you eat it? Now, again, some might say that you may need to, you know, like if you were in a true wilderness survival situation and your comrade died. But then we come to the true test. There are several animals—they would fall under that “Christian” view of “every creature is good, nothing to be refused”—that are highly and even fatally toxic to humans.
A lot of people talk about turtle soup, apparently this is some kind of special delicacy in parts of the world. Well, there is the hawksbill sea turtle that is so toxic that eating it can cause nausea, vomiting, diarrhea, and other stomach problems. The pufferfish is another one, this time deadly “if not prepared correctly”. It too is a delicacy in some cultures because it’s seen almost as a gamble to eat it—as you can die from eating it. And then we have my favorite, the golden dart frog, which is no bigger than your thumb but contains enough poison to kill ten grown men. So, these are also “creatures of God” and as such, per popular “Christian” theology, are good for food and not to be refused. Shall we get you a plate of golden dart frogs, or are you willing to at least reconsider your position on what the apostles taught regarding the food laws?
You know, in Acts 10 Peter continually said that he never ate anything unclean and as noted nothing indicates that he changed this after the vision—he understood the vision to mean something completely different than what “Christians” say it means. In Acts 21 Paul is said to be purified to enter the Jerusalem Temple to offer sacrifices, something that would be impossible if he ate unclean meats. In 2 Corinthians 11:4 Paul included a quote from the prophet Isaiah to “touch no unclean thing” as a prerequisite to being received by God—and we’ve already reviewed what Isaiah said regarding the food laws. In 1 Peter 1:16 the same apostle who had the famous vision reminds us, “it is written, be holy just as God is holy,” a direct quote from The Torah and a phrase twice linked with keeping the food laws (Leviticus 11:44 and 20:25-26). So, we have established that the popular “proof-texts” of those who deem the food laws annulled are all taken out of context and we have much clearer statements from these same two apostles that indicate the food laws continued to be seen as a mandate in the new covenant.
And then we come to the Book of Revelation, which was written by the apostle John. Take a look at this passage:
Fallen, fallen is Babylon the great! She has become a den for demons, a haunt for every unclean spirit and for every unclean bird and for every unclean and detestable beast.
—Revelation 18:2 (TLV)
So, let’s see here—first we have proof that the majority of “Christians” have taken a number of passages out of context, then we have the apostles Paul and Peter making statements that would strongly endorse the continued mandate to follow the food laws in the new covenant, and now we have a passage clear at the end of Revelation, the last Book of The Bible, telling us that unclean birds and unclean beasts are still unclean? One Spanish translation of this passage, the TLA, even includes, seemingly as a paraphrase in place of the word unclean, the words: “and we should not eat.” It seems that the translators had enough sense to know that unclean in regard to animals in The Bible always and only refers to things God said not to eat. Some may contest this method of translation, but it is in harmony with the whole counsel of Scripture. Should we go with The Bible, or should we believe a guy like Michael Heiser who apparently thought that no argument could be made that we should follow the food laws and possibly—I’ll at least give him some benefit of the doubt that it was poor word choice—that the Torah food laws were not given by God? It seems we have looked at some very compelling arguments. But let’s look at one final argument that the food laws should be followed.
The Creation Design Argument
We are going to end where we began, in the beginning of the Book of Genesis. However, for this we must also look outside of The Bible to what we can observe in the world around us and certain things we can learn from history and what results from people eating unclean animals. Consider these passages of Scripture:
God spoke: “Let us make human beings in our image, make them reflecting our nature So they can be responsible for the fish in the sea, the birds in the air, the cattle, And, yes, Earth itself, and every animal that moves on the face of Earth.” God created human beings; he created them godlike, Reflecting God’s nature. He created them male and female. God blessed them: “Prosper! Reproduce! Fill Earth! Take charge! Be responsible for fish in the sea and birds in the air, for every living thing that moves on the face of Earth.”
—Genesis 1:26-28 (The Message)
The Lord God put the man in the Garden of Eden to take care of it and to look after it.
—Genesis 2:15 (CEV)
The nations were enraged, but Your wrath has come and the time for the dead to be judged— to reward Your servants, the prophets and kedoshim, and those who fear Your name, the small and the great, and to destroy the destroyers of the earth.
—Revelation 11:18 (TLV)
Here we have at the beginning of The Bible a mandate to humanity to be responsible for Yah’s Creation, taking care of it and looking after it—another translation says to tend and care for it. In contrast to this, it says toward the end of The Bible that God will destroy the destroyers of the earth. With these two points in mind, let’s look at a few things that have resulted from humans eating things on the unclean list, animals that God emphatically told humanity not to eat.
• According to a 2007 report by The Washington Post, titled Decline of Big Sharks Lets Small Predators Decimate Shellfish, the overharvesting of sharks for the production of shark-fin soup, a Chinese delicacy, initiated a chain effect where predatory species in the middle of the food chain, no longer controlled because of the decline of sharks, decimated shellfish population, which threw the entire ecosystem into chaos.
• In a 1988 study by the University of Maryland, titled Ecological Changes in Chesapeake Bay: Are They the Result of Overharvesting the American Oyster, Crassostrea virginica?, it is reported that the overharvesting of oysters in the Chesapeake Bay caused drastic environmental changes resulting in elevated carbon levels that created an environment toxic to other aquatic species in the region.
• The book Rare Birds by Elizabeth Gehrman discusses how ancient mariners crossing the Atlantic ocean deposited pigs on islands like Bermuda that, with no natural predators, decimated local species causing the extinction or near extinction of numerous plants and animals native to these islands.
• A 2012 study by Lake Forest College, titled The biology of native and invasive Wild Boar (Sus scrofa) and the effect it is having in its invasive range, found that the introduction of wild boar into the United States by immigrants, primarily in the 20th century, has caused devastating effects on the environment, as well as many native plant and animal species.
• A paper published by the USDA Forest Service from the 18th Biennial Southern Silvicultural Research Conference in 2016 titled Wild Pigs: inciting factor in southern pine decline? revealed how non-native wild pigs have been particularly destructive to pine forests, stating that: “Wild pigs negatively impact almost all aspects of ecosystem function and structure.”
• A story that ran in The Chicago Tribune in 2016, titled Spills of pig waste kill hundreds of thousands of fish in Illinois, reported that waste biproduct of a pig farm caused pollution that resulted in the loss of nearly 150,000 wild fish and over 17,000 freshwater mussels, negatively affected aquatic life in other ways, and even after four years that ecosystem still had not recovered.
These are among the many examples of what results from humanity eating the things God said not to eat. He told us to be responsible for His Creation—to tend it, care for it, look after it, cultivate it, cause it to flourish with life. He said that He will destroy the destroyers of the earth. Well, seeing as the simple act of eating things He said not to eat, from the tree in the midst of Eden to people’s insatiable desire for swine flesh, rodents, ocean roaches, and other such things, eating what God said not to eat causes the destruction of the earth. If none of the other arguments are convincing enough that we are to follow the food laws, certainly this that shows a direct link to this commandment and our mandate to care for and not be a destroyer of the earth should make that case quite well.
Another aspect of the creation argument relates to the human body. In 1 Corinthians 3:16-17 and 6:19 we are told that our body is the Temple of Yah and of His Spirit and that if anyone destroys Yah’s Temple, He will destroy him [or her]. There is debate about whether the term “body” here refers to individual Believers or the Body of Messiah as a whole unit, but either way we must consider the defilement that comes from eating unclean things on the human body—and personally I see no valid reason why these passages cannot refer to both the individual human body and the Body of Messiah.
There has been a lot of research done on the negative effects eating unclean things has on the human body, resulting in diseases, parasitic infestations, cancers, and other terminal illnesses. There are often reports of someone facing death or dying from a condition that directly resulted from eating something on the unclean list. While the food laws as a “health code” is not directly supported by Scripture, it is well worth consideration with the plethora of studies and cases relating to this idea. A full examination of this argument of the food laws as a health code is beyond the scope of this study, but consider this question posed by author Francis Chan from his book Letters To The Church: “When the fire came down and God’s glory filled the temple, would you have considered taking a sledgehammer and striking the temple? Of course not!”14 So, if we consider the abundance of good information about the relationship the food laws have with human health, whether considering how this defiles individual human bodies or the Body of Messiah as a whole, why would you eat unclean things and destroy your body, the creation and the temple of your God?
The possibility or even probability of the food laws as a “health code”, being primarily extrabiblical, would make it secondary to the many truly biblical arguments for the continued mandate to follow the food laws in the new covenant. However, since there are many great books and studies that support this idea, even though there are some that contest it, as our body is both the creation of our God and the temple of our God we certainly should not quickly dismiss this idea of the food laws as a “health code” either. Some, like Heiser, try to dismiss these ideas and explain them away. There are, however, rational answers to all of the objections people like him try to make. But, if we are being completely honest, when they do this they just sound like the serpent in Genesis 3, trying to explain away the commandment in order to justify eating things that God clearly said not to eat.
The Closing Argument
Someone recently asked the question of how “brilliant scholars” like Heiser, as well as others I have addressed specifically regarding the matter of the food laws in the past like Dr. Christopher J.H. Wright and Dr. Sandra L. Richter, can be so brilliant in their knowledge of history, the Ancient Near East in particular, and other matters related to The Bible and be so completely wrong about such a simple biblical matter as the food laws. Even John Walton, a brilliant scholar in his own right, who recognizes the truth about Genesis 9:3 seems to still hold to the belief that the food laws are not for today. He probably comes to that conclusion from a different path than Heiser, but he’s still got it wrong nevertheless. The answer is simple, but it will not be popular and even exposing it puts me at risk of extreme backlash and ridicule from those who love these Bible scholars.
The answer goes right back to the first argument I made, the Genesis 3 argument. Satan started the entire sin problem through leading people to break a food law. Today Satan has raised up these brilliant minds to lead people into the same. Think about it. How easy is it to deceive the masses when you have people so brilliant in matters that have nothing to do with sin, repentance, redemption, and salvation that turn around and tell you there is no obligation to follow the Torah food laws? Their reputation as credible Bible scholars means that the moment they tell you something like “the food laws are not meant for us today” or that “no argument can be made that they should be followed” the majority will just believe them, because how can someone so knowledgeable about The Bible and ancient cultures related to it possibly be wrong about that? And yet this whole thing mirrors Genesis 3:1-5. Whenever I hear people like Michael Heiser or numerous others give their diatribe against the food laws or any other commandments they oppose following all I hear is the tongue of the serpent—it’s like the teacher from those old Charlie Brown cartoons, but with more of a hissing sound.
If you have ever seen the movie iRobot, the character played by Will Smith uttered this famous line: “You are the dumbest smart person I have ever met.” I do not want to be disrespectful at all, particularly to people who have passed from this world like Michael Heiser, but to be so brilliant in so many ways regarding The Bible, including a vast knowledge of the ancient world and Hebrew culture from the time period of The Bible, and still think that there is no case to be made for a continual mandate to follow the food laws, I am very sorry to have to say, makes these people among the dumbest smart people in Bible academics. But it’s really not their fault, they are probably just victims of Satan’s deception as well. However, their position of influence means that they were raised up by Satan to deceive the masses. It’s just that simple, and you can get mad at me for saying it all you want to, but The Bible is the authority, not a “Bible scholar”, no matter how much that “Bible scholar” may be right about historical facts that have nothing to do with your salvation and your obedience to The Torah of Yah. And we need to govern our beliefs based on what The Bible says, not what someone thinks they figured out from Ancient Near East studies or anything else that seeks to explain away clear commandments from God.
You know, Heiser’s whole thing, if you listen to the entire podcast message, where he claims that God didn’t give the food laws and no argument for keeping them can be made, it was heavily focused on contesting a number of extrabiblical theories people have come up with to try and explain the reason God gave them. Instead, he should have, as I did, go through The Bible and examine all of the relevant passages of Scripture on this matter. Perhaps then he would have seen that there are plenty of arguments, from The Bible, that favor the continued mandate to keep the food laws, even in the new covenant and even as a “Christian”. This is shockingly bad theology from someone who is supposed to be so highly regarded as a Bible scholar.
Do not fall for the deception. There is an argument to be made that the food laws are to be followed under the new covenant, many in fact as we have covered in this study, and anyone who says otherwise is a liar and the truth is not in them. Let me ask you this to close this message: If you are a “Christian” who currently believes that the food laws were voided, is that pork, shellfish, or any other unclean meat you seem to desire truly worth the gamble for your eternal salvation? Why not just do the smart and logical thing and err on the side of caution, eating only things you can know for a fact that God approves of in His Word? Don’t be foolish. Look, I didn’t bring this up earlier, but Philippians 3:18-19 says: “For many walk who are enemies of the cross of Messiah—I have often told you about them, and now I am even weeping as I tell you. Their end is destruction—their god is their belly and their glory is in their shame. They set their minds on earthly things.” Really, just think about that! It’s not religious legalism or Judaizing to do what The Bible plainly says and walk as Yeshua your Messiah walked—obeying the biblical commandments and following the Torah lifestyle of Yeshua is what we are supposed to do.
A STATEMENT FROM TRUTH IGNITED MINISTRY
Friends, I need to make a statement here, and this is in addition to the main points of this message. And I do not want to upset or offend anyone, I know this is sensitive, but I would be remiss if I did not say this and I cannot concern myself with how some people might react to it. Dr. Michael Heiser was a tremendous scholar who made wonderful contributions to the study of ancient Israelite culture in relation to The Bible, among other things—his work in debunking Bible codes and Hebrew Word Picture codes is also of particular interest. But part of his argument against the food laws involved dismissing them as “a health code”, he spent a good part of his message contesting this idea. Additionally, he claimed that if you make the matter of the food laws theological, you have to “bend the New Testament to your will, to your preference”. Of course, so did he, as I have shown that all of the “New Testament” passages used against the food laws are being taken out of context and nothing in The Bible actually supports the idea that the food laws are to be disregarded, let alone that “no argument can be made” that we should keep them today. There is a fully pronomian way to understand every passage of Scripture used in the discussion of the food laws that is hermeneutically sound and better harmonizes with the whole counsel of Scripture. However, that aside, there have been some studies to suggest—and several years ago the World Health Organization published a report regarding this—that certain types of cancers such as bladder and pancreatic cancers are linked to eating certain processed meats, most of which are made from pork. While the indications may lean toward added nitrites and nitrates in these meats, most of this stuff (bacon, ham, sausages, etc.) is made from pork and frequently non-pork alternatives are made by more health-conscious producers that do not add the questionable nitrites and nitrates. Dr. Heiser passed away at only 60 years of age in 2023 after a battle with pancreatic cancer. Now, to be clear, I am NOT saying that his cancer was caused by eating pork, as I cannot prove that, but much like the Philistines of 1 Samuel chapters 5 and 6 whose tumors appear to have come at a time when history indicates they transitioned from a diet where lamb and goats were their primary source of meat to a diet heavy in pork, it seems this could be more than a coincidence. Scholars are very helpful within their field of research, but when scholars lead you to go against the clear commandment of God, we must use wisdom and discernment and always go with what The Bible plainly says. The Bible from cover to cover upholds the food laws as a mandate, even in the Book of Revelation. This man, as brilliant as he was, insisted on eating things God said not to eat, things that major health research groups have now linked to the exact type of cancer that he died from. Are you really so sure you want to continue following what he said about the food laws? Or do you, perhaps, through this study think that maybe it’s time to reevaluate this topic against the whole counsel of Scripture and follow what the writers of The Bible believed, all of whom were Torah-keeping Israelites who never would have viewed any statement anywhere in The Bible to justify an overturning of the food laws? Please, sincerely take the time to think on this. As the statements I have addressed in this message were from a teaching Dr. Heiser gave in 2015, I really do not know if he changed his position on this matter after that. However, if he didn’t, and especially since at least one part of it was nothing short of blasphemy in saying that a literal commandment of Yah was nothing more than a cultural preference, or food disdain, of ancient Israelites, there is a very real possibility this cost him big in the end. For Dr. Heiser, repentance is no longer an option, but for you it is. If you are a student of Dr. Heiser, a fan of his work, or even if you have never heard of him, and you currently have been led to believe the food laws don’t apply to you, I encourage you to rethink this, really study it out honestly with a Bible, and consider repenting of what truly is a violation of God’s Torah.
Blessings and Shalom
©2023 Truth Ignited Ministry
