Even more info on this one verse.
Mark 7:18-19 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, Yeshua declared all foods “clean.”)
While most that study this verse know its true meaning, others have been misled by the part in the parentheses. We have covered this before but this needs to be known again in a different way. The part in the parentheses does not exist in the King James Version which is the usual go-to Bible for most. Go back even farther and one can’t find that ending in any of the previous Bible versions before the King James version. The Codex Vaticanus and Codex Sinaiticus do not have the ending either. Somewhere throughout time somebody added that ending to mislead HIS people. CRAZY to believe someone can do that. Even crazier to see how very few even know about it. As we studied we came across verses that confirm none of the New Testament writers ate anything unclean according to Yahweh’s commands given in Leviticus. That was just one example. Even if you believe all foods are clean because of the previous Mark verse, we should look about 5-10 years later at a Kepha statement on foods. Kepha tells the voice he has never eaten anything unclean when given the opportunity to eat during a vision. Here is the verse about the vision. It has nothing to do with what we can eat or drink. The vision turns out to be about allowing a Jew to touch a Gentile.
Acts 10 14 “Surely not, Lord!” Kepha replied. “I have never eaten anything impure or unclean.” 15 The voice spoke to him a second time, “Do not call anything impure that Yahweh has made clean.” 16 This happened three times, and immediately the sheet was taken back to heaven.
So we know that nowhere did Yahweh ever declare any unclean foods clean to eat up to this point. This Acts verse has to do with touching non-believers as Jews believed they weren’t supposed to touch them. Let’s use the Bible as a timeline on Dietary Law. At this point in Kepha’s life he had never eaten anything unclean. The Acts verse is a few years after Yeshua supposedly declared all foods clean in the Mark verse above. Roughly speaking, the Mark verse was written early 50ad-60ad and Acts verse was written 60ad-70ad. That leaves us with an assumption that either Kepha overslept that morning in the Mark verses (not possible) or he never got the memo about eating anything they wanted (again not possible). Is it possible that Kepha, who walked with Yeshua everyday for 3 years, just happened to miss the most important statement dealing with Dietary Law??? We don’t think so!!! Even if Kepha wasn’t there that day, somebody at some point in 5-10 years between the Mark verse and Acts verse would have told Kepha he could eat anything he wanted. By opening up our Bibles, we all know for sure that Kepha was there that day and he knew exactly what the vision was about and it had nothing to do with food. By using scripture to reproof scripture we can see that neither verse allows us to eat unclean foods as determined by Yahweh in the Torah (1st Five Books of Old Testament).
In common terms for everyday life, if we invited you into our home and said “Make yourself at home and eat/drink anything you want”, that doesn’t mean we are okay with you eating our sofa, or drinking our Drano Liquid Plumber. What we mean is you can eat or drink anything that we have available to eat and drink. Knowing that we eat clean according to Dietary Law, you would know nothing in our house is considered unclean to eat and drink according to the commands from God, therefore you could eat whatever you wanted.
Peter’s Vision was a correction to man-made Laws taught to him as YHVH‘s Law. He was being corrected by YHWH. What was being corrected was the false understanding that Gentiles are unclean (Talmud)(Jewish Oral Law).
In Schabbath, (145b) it says:
“Why are the Goyim(s) (Gentiles) unclean? Because they eat abominable things and animals that crawl on their belly.”
Likewise in Abhodah Zarah, 22b:
“Why are the Goyim(s) unclean? Because they were not present at Mount Sinai. For when the serpent entered into Eve he infused her with uncleanness. But the Jews were cleansed from this when they stood on Mount Sinai; the Goyim(s) (Gentiles , however, who were not on Mount Sinaim were not cleansed.”
Peter finally learns what his vision means in the verse below.
Acts 10:28
And he said to them, “You yourselves know how unlawful it is for a Jew to associate with or to visit anyone of another nation, but God has shown me that I should not call any person common or unclean.
We see this exact interpretation again in Acts 11
Acts 11:18
And they glorified God, saying, “Then to the Gentiles also God has granted repentance that leads to life.”
In conclusion, we know there are many other verses throughout the Renewed Covenant that talk about food. We also have studies on those. We have seen and read all the false teachings by HIS own people and we believe our duty is to uncover them and spread the message we find as we are cautious about teachings as HE commands. Remember that when “false teachers” are mentioned that means people who steer us away from obeying the TRUTH. We just hope, as with everything we find, that one day all believers in Yeshua will start to follow in his footsteps and try to be like HIM as commanded. If you made it this far in reading this page we have another study that shows the word “unclean” in Mark 7:18 does not mean unclean at all. It’s a misinterpretation and means “made common”. Click here to see the other study on this verse.
“Always Learning”
Biblical Truth
One other KEY factor that many people do not think about and that is what I call “cultural context.” This term means that when reading ANY document, whether sacred or secular, in order to properly understand what the writer of the document meant, one must ALWAYS read it in the context of the writer’s culture. In the comment on the book of Mark, the added phrase that Yeshua thus declared all foods clean, does not offend me in the slightest for one simple reason: the UNCLEAN animals that people now eat WERE NOT FOOD as far as He was concerned. Human food is defined and explained in Leviticus 11.
The biggest hindrance for Americans correct understanding of Scripture is that we read the Bible with a Westernized mindset and the entire Bible, from Genesis through Revelation, was written with a MIDDLE EASTERN and Hebraic mindset. An example of a misunderstanding that our WESTERN mindset causes is that because we say the new day starts at midnight, then that means when Yeshua met with His disciples AFTER His resurrection on the First Night of the week, WE believe He met with them on SUNDAY night instead of Yeshua‘s definition of the First night of the weeks being SATURDAY night.
There is no saving grace in eating or not eating certain foods. We are saved by grace through faith in Jesus Christ. Emphasizing something that isn’t necessary for salvation misleads people into thinking they can earn God’s favor by following the dietary laws of the Old Testament. You cannot save yourself, only Christ can. We are to glorify Him with the fruits of our faith, not the fruits that we physically eat.
So no Rules, no LAW, and throw away the Ten Commandments because they do nothing to gain YHVH‘s favor? That is not what Scripture says? Scripture may state we aren’t saved by following rules but it does say we have no eternal life if we don’t. YHVH made his Renewed Covenant with Torah Observant followers from the House of Israel and Judah.
Numbers 15:13 “‘Every citizen is to do these things in this way when presenting an offering made by fire as a fragrant aroma for ADONAI. 14 If a foreigner stays with you – or whoever may be with you, through all your generations – and he wants to bring an offering made by fire as a fragrant aroma for ADONAI, he is to do the same as you. 15 For this community there will be the same law for you as for the foreigner living with you; this is a permanent regulation through all your generations; the foreigner is to be treated the same way before ADONAI as yourselves. 16 The same Torah and standard of judgment will apply to both you and the foreigner living with you.'”
And Paul himself states in Romans 3:31 Do we then nullify the Law through Faith, no we establish it!