I for one would love for this to be discussed on this board on this thread or another one.
The subject intrigues me.
Tor
JW Blood Doctrine Dismembered
by AlanF 26 Replies latest watchtower beliefs
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detective
Thank you for the article. I stashing it away as it may someday come in handy (god forbid!)
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shadow
Another scripture of interest is found at Lev 17.
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Rbi8 Leviticus 17:13-16 ***13
"?As for any man of the sons of Israel or some alien resident who is residing as an alien in YOUR midst who in hunting catches a wild beast or a fowl that may be eaten, he must in that case pour its blood out and cover it with dust. 14 For the soul of every sort of flesh is its blood by the soul in it. Consequently I said to the sons of Israel: "YOU must not eat the blood of any sort of flesh, because the soul of every sort of flesh is its blood. Anyone eating it will be cut off." 15 As for any soul that eats a body [already] dead or something torn by a wild beast, whether a native or an alien resident, he must in that case wash his garments and bathe in water and be unclean until the evening; and he must be clean. 16 But if he will not wash them and will not bathe his flesh, he must then answer for his error.?"Here is a post from another discussion board on this topic:
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Conspicuous by its absence in Acts 15 is any prohibition of eating animals found already dead. This absence is notable inasmuch as anyone eating this meat would of course be eating blood along with the meat. This serves to bolster the argument that draining the blood of an animal killed for food was an act of respect to the Giver of Life and this act is only done by his permission. Since the council included experts on the Law it is hardly tenable to say this omission was an oversight.
So can a case be made that eating such meat is a violation of Christian principles?
*** w75 5/15 300-2 'Eating and Drinking to God's Glory' ***
Note that religious regulations prohibiting certain foods are actually an evidence of a falling away from true Christianity. This means that persons claiming to be Christian but commanding certain dietary restrictions as a required means for gaining divine favor are in reality dishonoring God. How can this be? Did not God?s law to Israel rule out certain foods as unacceptable? . . . .
Hence, for religious organizations of Christendom to impose the dietary restrictions of the Mosaic law, the whole or in part, would mean their denying that the reality belongs to the Christ. They would be acting contrary to God?s ?word? that has sanctified or set apart all things usable for food as acceptable. Religious dietary restrictions other than those contained in the Mosaic law would likewise be in opposition to divine revelation that ?every creation of God is fine? and therefore suitable for food.
The institution of dietary restrictions as a religious duty is not a minor matter. It constitutes rejection of Christian faith and accurate knowledge. It implies that there is something defective in God?s ?word,? that it does not reveal the full scope of what people need to do to gain divine approval and that man-made precepts are therefore needed. The importance of God?s ?word? is minimized and human regulations are elevated. By thus misunderstanding the only standard for judging truth, the Scriptural standard, the door is opened for other apostate teachings. Accordingly, to command obedience to man-made dietary restrictions as a religious duty dishonors God. However, if an informed Christian abstains for the time being in order not to stumble or offend the conscience of a person who feels bound by such dietary rules, he is doing a considerate thing and is looking for the liberating and salvation of a rule-bound person.?1 Cor. 9:19.
HOWEVER, that is exactly what they later do.
*** w83 4/15 30-1 Questions From Readers ***
Now let us carefully examine Leviticus 17:10. It says that no ?man of the house of Israel or some alien resident? should eat blood. Was that because the animal had been killed by a human and so the blood had to be returned to God? To claim such is to read into the verse more than it says. Further, if guilt resulted only if blood was from a creature killed by man, then Deuteronomy 14:21 and Exodus 22:31 would not have forbidden Israelites to eat unbled flesh from animals that were not killed by men. Yet the Israelites clearly knew they could not eat such meat. Ezekiel stated: ?My soul is not a defiled one; neither a body already dead nor a torn animal have I eaten from my youth up.??Ezekiel 4:14; compare 44:31.
Why, then, does Deuteronomy 14:21 say that the ?alien resident? could be sold unbled meat, but Leviticus 17:10 forbids the ?alien resident? to eat blood? Both God?s people and Bible commentators have recognized that the distinction must have been the religious standing of the alien involved. Aid to Bible Understanding (page 51) points out that sometimes the term ?alien resident? meant a person among the Israelites who was not a full proselyte. It appears that this sort of person is meant at Deuteronomy 14:21, a man who was not trying to keep all of God?s laws and who might have his own uses for a carcass considered unclean by Israelites and proselytes. Jewish scholars, too, have offered this explanation.
So, no worshiper of God could eat blood, whether from (or in the flesh of) an animal that had died of itself or from one that was killed by man. Why, then, does Leviticus 17:15 say that eating unbled flesh from such an animal that died of itself or was killed by a beast merely produced uncleanness?
We can find a clue at Leviticus 5:2, which says: ?When a soul touches some unclean thing, whether the dead body of an unclean wild beast . . ., although it has been hidden from him, still he is unclean and has become guilty.? Yes, God acknowledged that an Israelite might err inadvertently. Hence, Leviticus 17:15 can be understood as providing for such an error. For example, if an Israelite ate meat served him and then learned that it was unbled, he was guilty of sin. But because it was inadvertent he could take steps to become clean. This, however, is noteworthy: If he would not take those steps, ?he must then answer for his error.??Leviticus 17:16.
Thus eating unbled flesh was not a trivial matter; it could even result in death. No true worshiper (Israelite or full proselyte alien) could voluntarily eat unbled flesh, no matter if it was from an animal that died of itself, was killed by another animal or was killed by a human. (Numbers 15:30) The apostolic council confirmed this. Writing to Christians making up the spiritual ?Israel of God? it forbade eating that which was strangled, whether the unbled meat was from an animal that died from accidental strangulation or it was from one strangled by a man.?Galatians 6:16; Acts 21:25.
HOW does an animal get accidentally strangled??? Acts 15 confirms what was required of Noah re: blood but the Society adds to it.
IN the first paragraph quoted above they warn against reading into a verse more that it says. Two paragrahs later they do exactly that.
"Why, then, does Leviticus 17:15 say that eating unbled flesh from such an animal that died of itself or was killed by a beast merely produced uncleanness?
We can find a clue at Leviticus 5:2, which says: ?When a soul touches some unclean thing, whether the dead body of an unclean wild beast . . ., although it has been hidden from him, still he is unclean and has become guilty.? Yes, God acknowledged that an Israelite might err inadvertently. Hence, Leviticus 17:15 can be understood as providing for such an error. For example, if an Israelite ate meat served him and then learned that it was unbled, he was guilty of sin. But because it was inadvertent he could take steps to become clean. This, however, is noteworthy: If he would not take those steps, ?he must then answer for his error.??Leviticus 17:16."
WHAT does the scripture actually say?
*** Rbi8 Leviticus 17:13-16 ***
13 ??As for any man of the sons of Israel or some alien resident who is residing as an alien in YOUR midst who in hunting catches a wild beast or a fowl that may be eaten, he must in that case pour its blood out and cover it with dust. 14 For the soul of every sort of flesh is its blood by the soul in it. Consequently I said to the sons of Israel: ?YOU must not eat the blood of any sort of flesh, because the soul of every sort of flesh is its blood. Anyone eating it will be cut off.? 15 As for any soul that eats a body [already] dead or something torn by a wild beast, whether a native or an alien resident, he must in that case wash his garments and bathe in water and be unclean until the evening; and he must be clean. 16 But if he will not wash them and will not bathe his flesh, he must then answer for his error.??
NOW I am not a Hebrew scholar, but it sure seems to me the situation is not about anything hidden at all. The Israelite was out hunting and found an animal already dead and decided to eat it. Nothing about going to someone's house and not knowing the kind of food he was eating. I find it hard to believe that this is actually suggested as a likely scenario. Of course the simple clear understanding of this scripture might cause problems with blood transfusion policy. This 83 WT spin was a change from previous comments.
*** w54 4/1 223 Questions from Readers ***
"How can we harmonize Deuteronomy 14:21 (NW), ?You must not eat any dead body,? and Leviticus 11:40 (NW), ?And he who eats any of its dead body will wash his garments and he must be unclean until the evening???D. H., Eire.
Actually, there is no disharmony between these two texts. One prohibits eating an animal that died of itself or was found dead, and the other shows the penalty for eating in violation of the prohibition. The mere fact that the eating of a dead body is forbidden does not mean that will never take place. The Law contained prohibitions of many things, but it also contained penalties for violating those prohibitions. The mere fact that a thing was prohibited did not of itself mean it would never be indulged in; hence penalties were set up to give force to the prohibitions. There were prohibitions against stealing, talebearing, adultery, murder, and many other sins of varying magnitude, and penalties of varying severity were fixed by the Law to guide Israel in dealing with violators. So it was in the matter of eating a dead body."
THE following month is more like the 83 WT:
*** w54 5/1 286-7 Questions from Readers ***
? Some think it is wrong to hunt and fish, while others see no wrong in such pursuits. Some who think hunting permissible do contend, however, that the game should be thoroughly bled immediately after it is shot to avoid violating the prohibition of eating blood. This bleeding is not generally done. What is the Scriptural view concerning these matters??A. A., United States.
If the hunter failed to bleed his game properly he was put to death, or ?cut off.? To eat unbled game not only was prohibited to Israelites under the Law, but also is forbidden for Christians: ?Keep yourselves free from things sacrificed to idols and from blood and from things killed without draining their blood and from fornication.? (Acts 15:29; 21:25, NW) Immediately following the instruction to hunters to bleed their game and that to eat blood will mean their death, we read: ?As for any soul that eats a dead body or something torn by a wild beast, whether a native or a temporary resident, he must in that case wash his garments and bathe in water and be unclean until the evening. Then he must be clean. But if he will not wash them and will not bathe his flesh, then he must answer for his iniquity.? (Lev. 17:15, 16, NW) A body that dies of itself or of wounds inflicted by another animal would not be properly drained of blood, and hence was not to be eaten. Penalty for deliberate violation of the commandment to eat no blood is death, but in the last-mentioned case guilt could be erased by a ceremony of purification, which indicates it was a case where the commandment was violated innocently, unknowingly, as might happen when someone purchased or bartered for meat, or when eating as a guest of someone else. Now, as in Israel?s day, one who violates the command concerning blood accidentally, without knowing it, not doing so deliberately, can gain forgiveness by repentance and avoiding a recurrence of the trespass.
WHY do they make the statement that this must have been done unknowingly due to the fact that it required only bathing? Other acts that were done unintentionally had a more stringent requirement.
*** Rbi8 Leviticus 5:14-19 ***
14 And Jehovah continued to speak to Moses, saying: 15 ?In case a soul behaves unfaithfully in that he actually sins by mistake against the holy things of Jehovah, then he must bring as his guilt offering to Jehovah a sound ram from the flock, according to the estimated value in silver shekels, by the shekel of the holy place, as a guilt offering. 16 And he will make compensation for the sin he has committed against the holy place and he will add to it a fifth of it, and he must give it to the priest, that the priest may make an atonement for him with the ram of the guilt offering, and so it must be forgiven him.
17 ?And if a soul sins in that he does do one of all the things that Jehovah commands should not be done, although he did not know it, yet he has become guilty and must answer for his error. 18 And he must bring a sound ram from the flock according to the estimated value, for a guilt offering, to the priest; and the priest must make an atonement for him for his mistake that he committed unintentionally, although he himself did not know it, and so it must be forgiven him. 19 It is a guilt offering. He has positively become guilty against Jehovah.?
IF Acts 15 does not prohibit eating animals found already dead, it is evident that it does not cover all blood in all situations. -
sf
Alan,
Are you going to educate the judges of Minnisota on the reasons the ruling is bunk? Or keep your stuff solely for internet seekers? I placed each judges bio into the thread Kenneson created. Please have a look and consider the suggestion.
I mean, yes the blood issue is a lethal WT policy. Yet your time would be better spent contacting the judges who rule in wt child abuse cases by taking your 'stuff' off the net and put it into the hands of the decision-makers in our courtrooms. JUST MY OPINION sir.
Thank you, sKally
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AlanF
I wish contacting judges would do some good, Skally, but it doesn't -- especially after they've given a ruling. They highly resent being pressured about a case by people not in the "law community", so doing so could do more harm than good.
What really puts pressure on them is publicity. Unfortunately our so-called justice system makes appointed judges virtually unaccountable for individual decisions, which can be changed only by appeal to a higher court. Only in the case of elected judges are they somewhat accountable to the public. Appointed judges, which I believe includes all or most federal judges, can only be held accountable for specific acts of corruption -- not for bad decisions. And proving corruption is incredibly hard.
AlanF
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jst2laws
Hey Shadow,
Some good reasoning. And I have not welcomed you to the board yet.
Welcome,
Hope to hear from you more.
Jst2laws
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sf
Thx for the reply and pm Alan.
sKally
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TD
Earnest,
Although Paul is talking about Mosaic Law, I believe that is also true of the Noachian Law which is only binding on those that acknowledge it.
As it relates to Deuternonomy 14:21, "Foreigners" would be one thing, but I don't believe you may legitimately make this suggestion in regard to an "Alien resident inside your gates." The term had and still has a specific and widely recognized connotation both to Jews and Christians alike.
There is no suggestion in Deuteronomy or elsewhere that those who are not worshipers of God are obliged to keep his laws.
I'm perplexed by this statement. Do you deny that it is possible to "sin without law?"
You actually seem to express an idea completely contrary to the whole of Romans chapter 2. Verses 12-14 which you cite, open with hosoi gar -- For as many as ("For example" in conversational English) and are therefore a direct amplification illustrative of the preceeding statement of God's impartialilty in verse 11.
In other words, God's impartiality is manifest in the exacting of payment for transgression regardless of whether one is under law or not. This is in fact clearly stated in verse 9: "There will be trouble and distress for every human being who does evil: first for the Jew, then for the Gentile" Verse 13 further explains: "For it is not those who hear the law who are righteous in God's sight, but it is those who obey the law who will be declared righteous." Again, the point being that the requrements upon which God's laws are based are universal.
Tom
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Earnest
Hi Alan,
Sure, it'd be beneficial to continue this discussion of blood transfusions. However, in order not to hijack this thread, why not start up a new one? Then you can lay out your arguments, and see what happens as other posters add their two cents.
I agree it is probably better to start a new thread as my intention is not to defend the JW blood doctrine as it now stands, but simply to share the conclusions I have reached. In some respects they are not much different to your own...but while you say that "whether the language [in Genesis 9:4] was meant to actually include a ban on eating blood itself is a matter for speculation" (Visit From Elders), I would say it is a matter of exegesis but the effect is the same, namely that it is a matter of conscience. I will develop that further in due course in a thread of my own. However, I do think it is pertinent to reply to your comments specifically relating to Deuteronomy 14:21 and its relevance to the law given to Noah.
The scripture says "You shall not eat anything which dies of itself. You may give it to the alien who is in your town, so that he may eat it, or you may sell it to a foreigner" and you asked :
...[if this is implicit in the Noachian law] how can one claim that God is acting self-consistently if he gives explicit permission for Jews to enable gentiles to break such a supposedly major law? Can you imagine God giving permission for Jews to enable gentiles to, say, murder people whenever they please?
You are quite right I cannot imagine God's approval on the Jews enabling gentiles to murder whenever they please. Which leads me to conclude that this law is not related to the Noachian law on blood. Leviticus 17:10-16, which refers both to blood and to dead animals, seems to bear this out :
As for any man of the house of Israel or some alien resident who may be residing as an alien in your midst who eats any sort of blood, I shall certainly set my face against the soul that is eating the blood, and I shall indeed cut him off from among his people...As for any man of the sons of Israel or some alien resident who is residing as an alien in your midst who in hunting catches a wild beast or a fowl that may be eaten, he must in that case pour its blood out and cover it with dust...Anyone eating it [the blood] will be cut off. As for any soul that eats a body (already) dead or something torn by a wild beast, whether a native or an alien resident, he must in that case wash his garments and bathe in water and be unclean until the evening; and he must be clean. But if he will not wash them and will not bathe his flesh, he must then answer for his error.
This Mosaic law is quite clear that no blood of any sort was to be eaten. It then specifies what is to be done with the blood of an animal caught in hunting. Then it says that if they eat an animal found dead or torn by a wild beast they must purify themselves. But the law has clearly specified without any qualification that no blood is to be eaten, and those who do will be cut off. So this law on animals found dead or torn by a wild beast is in addition to the law on blood. Even if eating this dead animal did not involve blood (which could happen if a wild beast had torn its throat) it was still not to be eaten as a matter of purity. "Because you are a holy people to Jehovah your God." (Deut. 14:21; Ex. 22:31) But such flesh could be sold to the gentiles.
What convinces me of this conclusion is that this verse in Leviticus speaks of a native (i.e. an Israelite) eating something found dead and he is already clearly forbidden to eat blood of any sort.
Tom,
While I have not replied to any of your threads on blood I have read them with great interest and want to thank you for the depth of research which they show. Thanks also for your comments on Romans 2. You ask :
Do you deny that it is possible to "sin without law?"
Paul says that Jews as well as Greeks are all under sin. (Romans 3:9) We are all sons of Adam and thus sinful. But in saying that those who are not worshippers of God are not obliged to keep his laws I had in mind the thought in Romans 7 "I would not have come to know sin if it had not been for the Law...I would not have known covetousness if the Law had not said: 'You must not covet'". Paul is saying (I think) that he would not have recognised coveting as sinful if he had not been under Law. However, I have concluded above that the law against eating animals found dead was in addition to the law on blood and so was not applicable to those outside the Mosaic covenant whether or not the Noachian laws applied to them.
"Foreigners" would be one thing, but I don't believe you may legitimately make this suggestion in regard to an "Alien resident inside your gates." The term had and still has a specific and widely recognized connotation both to Jews and Christians alike.
A comparison of Deuteronomy 14:21 and Leviticus 17:15 suggests different "alien residents" in the two verses. Calvin comments on this and says (in Harmony of the Law):
But we must bear in mind that he sometimes calls those strangers who, although born of heathen parents, had embraced the Law. Circumcision, therefore, connected them with God, just as if they had derived their origin from Abraham; whilst there were other strangers, whom uncircumcision separated from the children of Abraham as profane and excommunicate. The sum is, that whosoever allege God?s name, and boast themselves to be His people, are called to cultivate holiness, and to keep themselves pure from every stain.
It does seem that, even within the gate, some of the alien residents were proselytes and some were not.
Earnest
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shadow
Earnest,
I found your comment quite interesting. Are you familiar with the 83 WT QFR on this matter? They put the spin on Lev 17 that for this to apply to a Jew, they must have eaten in ignorance. I have no idea how that would be implied by this scripture. Isn't the context discussing hunting?
Is not the difference between the proselyte and the pagan alien who ate an animal found dead simply this: the proselyte would be required to bathe while the pagan would not.
Also, is the procedure the same as this?
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Rbi8 Leviticus 15:16-18 ***16
"?Now in case a man has an emission of semen go out from him, he must then bathe all his flesh in water and be unclean until the evening. 17 And any garment and any skin upon which the emission of semen gets to be must be washed with water and be unclean until the evening.18
"?As for a woman with whom a man may lie down with an emission of semen, they must bathe in water and be unclean until the evening.