A Daily Genesis
Genesis 9:1-3
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, 10-21-2015 at 08:57 PM (914 Views)
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[B][COLOR=#ff0000]†.[/COLOR] Gen 9:4 . .You must not, however, eat flesh with its life-blood in it.[/B]
That restriction is against life-blood; so then blood that cannot support life-- dead blood --is exempt.
Life-blood, is actually blood that's alive; blood that hasn't begun to spoil; viz: it's still fresh enough for a transfusion and contains enough active ingredients to carry oxygen and heal wounds.
Ancient Jews understood that verse to mean it is unlawful to eat meat that isn't dead; viz: it isn't merely uncooked; it's still viable-- fresh enough for a successful graft.
[COLOR=#006400][B]T.[/B][/COLOR] But flesh which is torn of the living beast, what time the life is in it, or that torn from a slaughtered animal before all the breath has gone forth, you shall not eat. (Targum Jonathan)
The way I see it: Man isn't forbidden to dine upon raw meat; only that it absolutely has to be dead with no chance of recovery. Same with blood. This law is the very first law God laid down in the new world after the Flood. It has never been repealed, and remains among the list of primary laws imposed upon Christians.
"It seemed good to the Holy Spirit and to us not to burden you with anything beyond the following requirements: You are to abstain from food sacrificed to idols, from blood, from the meat of strangled animals and from sexual immorality. You will do well to avoid these things. Fare well." (Acts 15:28-29)
A strangled animal still has all of its blood in it. The animal might be brain dead, and its heart may have stopped beating, but its flesh will remain alive for some time by reason of the viable blood still in its veins. Recent changes to CPR procedures include no longer giving victims mouth-to-mouth respiration for the first few minutes because the blood in a victim's system still contains useful oxygen that can save their life merely by pumping the chest as before.
Noah's Law #1 forbids Man to eat living flesh and living blood; and Christians are no exception. Because of the danger of pathogens, it was quite possibly necessary to add this limitation to the grant of liberty to eat meat, lest, instead of nourishing his body by it, Man should inadvertently destroy himself; and in this day and age of E.coli 0157:H7, 0104:H4, and salmonella; adequately cooking meat can be considered a form of self defense.
The prohibition against eating living flesh and blood is neither Jewish, nor is it Christian. It's universal; because God enacted that law long before there were any Jews or Christians. All human beings are under its jurisdiction. Man can eat all the raw meat he wants; and he can eat blood too; but he has absolutely no permission to eat either blood or meat that's still alive.
The animal world isn't so fussy. They routinely devour their prey alive all the time. Hopefully no one reading this will ever stoop that low. The very best way to assure that meat and its blood are dead is to cook it-- thoroughly; and double check it with a meat thermometer.
At issue with the prohibition against eating blood are the feelings of some that modern slaughter houses don't always kill animals properly.
Many use a device called a captured-bolt to stun the animals and then workers slit the animals' throats while they're unconscious. Sometimes the bolt kills an animal instead of knocking it out and then all that the slaughter house has to work with is gravity because the animal's heart isn't pumping to assist. So there are those who feel no one should eat common meat because you can't guarantee the animal's blood was properly drained.
Exactly what the definition of "properly drained" is I don't know because it's impossible to drain every last drop of blood out of meat no matter how you might go about it; so the prohibition against eating blood has got to be interpreted from a practical perspective rather than from a purist's perspective.
There are cultures that poke holes in cows' necks in order to drink blood straight out of the animal utilizing its own blood pressure like a tap to fill their cups. Other cultures cut open the thorax of animals freshly taken in hunting in order to take blood-soaked bites of the animal's heart. Those examples are probably about as close to vampirism as one can get without actually joining Edward Cullen's family and undergoing the conversion process.
[B][COLOR=#ff0000]†.[/COLOR] Gen 9:5 . . But for your own life-blood I will require a reckoning: I will require it of every beast; of man, too, will I require a reckoning for human life, of every man for that of his fellow man![/B]
Noah's Law #2 mandates capital punishment; viz: eye-for-an-eye retribution for the unjustified killing of a human being.
This law is also a universal law and applies to every family of Man and Beast that descends from the ark; no exceptions. God now requires an investigation into the death of a human being whenever it is caused by another human being or by a member of the animal kingdom. If the killing cannot be justified, the perpetrator has to be executed at the hands of human beings: no exceptions.
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