Children of Israel
Children of Israel
Le 11:2 Speak unto the children of Israel, saying, These [are] the beasts which ye shall eat among all the beasts that [are] on the earth.
Are you a child of Israel? Most of us are not descended from the man Jacob, who was given the name Israel, so literally, the dietary law never applied to us. This is one reason we don't hear much preaching on it i some circles. People have taken various positions on the law, discussed below, because they don't know how to understand it.
- Some believe since it was God's will for Israel, it is God's will for anyone who loves God. In light of God's command to Peter, that now all foods were clean, it is suggested that the law has nothing to do with morality. God does not change his position on morality.
- Some suggest that the diet proposed is healthier for one reason or another. But does God love the ancient Hebrews more than Christians? Doesn't he care if we get sick from eating bacon?
The only way to make sense of the law is to see it in the genre of the dinner theater; or prophetic riddle. [1] The Hebrews of the day understood a little about the law being a lesson in a play. [2]
Are you a child of Israel? Let me suggest that you are, and we know so by using the tools John taught us to parse out the meaning of 'Israel'.
- Israel Yisra’el ישׂראל - man יש joined by revelation ר to God אל . If you are spiritual Israel; joined to God by revelation, then you recognize 'eating' as a metaphor for 'learning'. The name Israel is one source for Paul's teaching that the wife (church) shall learn from her husband (Christ) [3]
Congratulations, you are a child of Israel. We know that the literal law no longer applies, because God changed it with Peter. [4] But since God is speaking to us now, as the true children bonded to him by revelation, as per the meaning of the name 'Israel', we need to understand the revelation. The literal children had to obey the law, his spiritual children need to understand the teaching learned from their performance in the dinner theater.
Notice that there was no penalty for not eating the clean animals. They could have chosen to be vegetarians. But then they would not have been actors in the play.- ↑ De 28:37 And thou shalt become an astonishment, a proverb, and a byword, among all nations whither the LORD shall lead thee.
- ↑ The Jews added to the dietary law in order to teach a lesson: Ge 32:32 Therefore the children of Israel eat not [of] the sinew which shrank, which [is] upon the hollow of the thigh, unto this day: because he touched the hollow of Jacob’s thigh in the sinew that shrank.
- ↑ 1Ti 2:11 Let the woman learn in silence with all subjection.
- ↑ Acts 10:11ff
