Steven Carr

Mark 7 says '17 After he had left the crowd and entered the house, his disciples asked him about this parable. 18 "Are you so dull?" he asked. "Don't you see that nothing that enters a man from the outside can make him 'unclean'? 19 For it doesn't go into his heart but into his stomach, and then out of his body." (In saying this, Jesus declared all foods "clean."'

Acts 10 says 14 "Surely not, Lord!" Peter replied. "I have never eaten anything impure or unclean."

The disciples may have been a little dull, but surely even they would have noticed Jesus eating unclean food.

How can these 2 stories exist in one Bible?

Romans 14:14 says 'As one who is in the Lord Jesus, I am fully convinced that no food is unclean in itself. But if anyone regards something as unclean, then for him it is unclean.'

When did Paul start to think that other people's opinions were just as valid as the teachings of the person they worshipped?

Chris Weimer

The author of πραξεις αποστολων was different than the author of ευαγγελιον κατα μαρκον.

Ben C Smith

Ah, but the author of Acts was the same as the author of Luke, who is even more explicit than Mark in Luke 11.41:

But give that which is within as alms, and behold, all things are clean for you.

(I say that Luke is more explicit than Mark because the comment in Mark that Jesus cleansed all foods appears to me to be an after-the-fact interpretive remark, not part of the actual quote.)

Ben.

Steven Carr

Is that where Jesus did not wash before eating?

A fine example to set the children.

What would have been the effect on 1st cnetury Jews of seeing a Jew eating unclean food? (or never making a sin offering, for that matter)

Solo

Hello Ben,
... granted, and further just on that editorial comment of Mk 7:19: Since Mark was written probably two generations before Luke, the issue of what was, or was not, fit to eat cooled even further by the latter's time from a hot potato of "congregation policy" to the stuff of legend.

Paul's fit over Peter's lawless appetite and his "outing" it in front of the emissaries from the vegetarian James, morphed to Markan Jesus confirming he had no problem with it, and then in Luke, by whose time Peter received his culinary license by a more substantive ruling on the rooftop at Joppa, and therefore additional comments to Jesus by Luke would have been redundant.

What do you think ?

Jiri

aa5874

I would like the English translation, please.

voodoomage

After looking into the question myself, I found this website:

http://www.wcg.org/lit/law/unclean.htm

I am not well versed in some of the interpretation. Several other websites defending the continued separation of clean and unclean animals based upon the greek words used in Mark and Acts confused me, since I don't read or speak greek.

If there's huge, gaping holes in the website I posted, I would LOVE for someone to tear it apart and educate me.

Steven Carr

The website says 'Because he did not yet understand that they could be considered clean. He did not understand the implications of Jesus' comment. He did not yet understand that common meat (by anyone's definition) could be eaten. In his own experience as a Jew and as a Jewish Christian, he had "never eaten anything impure or unclean" '

So even after spending years with Jesus, and even after receieving the Holy Spirit, Peter still didn't have a clue what Jesus was teaching?

And we are supposed to think Peter preached accurately?

And why had Peter not noticed Jesus eating clean foods?

voodoomage

I read that passage more like a parable, especially since it came from a vision. Peter was explaining, from his own experience in the vision, that eating what the israelites considered unclean could not make a man unclean. I could easily be way off. I hardly spend much time bothering to interpret scripture, but this particular issue has cropped up in my daily life lately, so I was interested in seeing it addressed.

My particular curiousity lay not so much with Peter - although, for my purposes that passage may be more important than I realize, but with the issue of the laws of clean/unclean meats being abolished with the ascension of Jesus.

Ben C Smith

1. Acts of the Apostles.
2. Gospel according to Mark.

Ben.