Does the Bible forbid Christians from Eating Pork?

DOES THE BIBLE FORBID CHRISTIANS FROM EATING PORK?

By Ezekiel Kimosop

The Old Testament Scriptures contain several dietary regulations which God prescribed for His covenant people.

Under Levitical law, the Jews were forbidden from, among other things, eating pork or unclean animals. They were also required to abstain from consuming animal blood.

In the New Testament Scripture, these regulations are not replicated by Jesus or by any of the New Testament writers. I find no foundation for establishing a Christian doctrine on dietary regulations.

The Jewish believers however continued to observe the ritual dietary laws. One of the resolutions of the Jerusalem Council of Acts 15 touched on the demand by the Jerusalem Church that Gentile believers should abstain from food offered to idols and from blood.

Acts 15:19-20 says "Therefore I judge that we should not trouble those from among the Gentiles who are turning to God, but that we write to them to abstain from things polluted by idols, from sexual immorality, from things strangled, and from blood."

Notice that no mention was made of pork or unclean animals in this resolution.

Elsewhere in the New Testament, the Bible proclaims the liberty of the believer in that we are no longer bound by Jewish ritual laws.

Gentile believers cannot however ignore the significance of Jewish moral law in our Christian faith and practice.

Colossians 2:16-23 says "So let no one judge you in food or in drink, or regarding a festival or a new moon or sabbaths, which are a shadow of things to come, but the substance is of Christ.

Let no one cheat you of your reward, taking delight in false humility and worship of angels, intruding into those things which he has not seen, vainly puffed up by his fleshly mind, and not holding fast to the Head, from whom all the body, nourished and knit together by joints and ligaments, grows with the increase that is from God.

Therefore, if you died with Christ from the basic principles of the world, why, as though living in the world, do you subject yourselves to regulations— “Do not touch, do not taste, do not handle,” which all concern things which perish with the using—according to the commandments and doctrines of men?

These things indeed have an appearance of wisdom in self-imposed religion, false humility, and neglect of the body, but are of no value against the indulgence of the flesh."

CONCLUSION

My view is that nothing in the New Testament Scripture forbids believers from eating or trading in pork. No dietary restrictions apply to Christians  the world over except in so far as the item is not harmful to human health.

Our bodies are the temple of the Holy Spirit and should be preserved and nourished to the glory of God.

1 Corinthians 6:12-14 says "All things are lawful for me, but all things are not helpful. All things are lawful for me, but I will not be brought under the power of any. Foods for the stomach and the stomach for foods, but God will destroy both it and them.

Now the body is not for sexual immorality but for the Lord, and the Lord for the body. And God both raised up the Lord and will also raise us up by His power."



Shalom




© Ezekiel Kimosop 2020