FOOD

CLEAN, UNCLEAN
Torah has both medical and ceremonial concerns about touching unclean objects. The Luitical (Levite) priests were to educate everyone, since they were the physicians and food handlers for the chosen ones. It’s not difficult to understand, all we have to do is look into the concept called "niddah", which involves the touching of anything ritually unclean. You can get a quick course on this at http://www.fossilizedcustoms.com/niddah.html

FOOD
Food is not whatever we want to eat, but that which is set apart
by the Word to be food. What Yahuah has declared to be food, and what men have declared to be food, are two entirely separate fields, although they intersect.
We are not even to touch the dead body of an unclean animal, so the
thought of ingesting it is out of the question.

"Proclaim the Word! Be urgent in season, out of season.

Reprove, warn, appeal, with all patience and teaching.

For there shall be a time when they shall not bear sound teaching, but according to their own desires they shall heap up for themselves teachers tickling the ear, and they shall indeed turn their ears away from the Truth, and be turned aside to myths.”

– 2Timothy 4:2-4

The phrase “according to the commands and teachings of men” (Col 2:22) influences the understanding, since we know we cannot add nor take away from the instructions for living that Yahuah has given to us. He told us what is food, and what to completely avoid, which include the dead carcasses of all unclean animals. They remain unclean for eating, wearing, or offering as slaughter-offerings. We call the instructions of men the old wine, which due to false teachers, most have received into their wineskin (heart).

The food instructions will never change, yet binding (forbidding) and loosing (permitting) is done all the time by eisegesis - taking phrases or words out of context, and making them seem to apply to what is already believed - making the Scripture seem to say what they already believe. One thing that Paul had to address concerning food was how people perceived eating food offered to idols.

THERE IS ONLY ONE

1Co 8:4-13: "So then, concerning the eating of food offered to idols, we know that an idol is no matter at all in the world, and that there is no other Alahim but one. For even if there are so-called mighty ones, whether in heaven or on earth – as there are many mighty ones and many masters – for us there is one Alahim, the Father, from Whom all came and for Whom we live, and on Master Yahusha ha'Mashiak, through Whom all came and through Whom we live.

However, not all have this knowledge. But some, being aware of the idol, until now eat it as having been offered to an idol, so their conscience, being weak, is defiled.

But food does not commend us to Alahim, for we are none the better if we eat, nor any worse for not eating.

But look to it, lest somehow this right of yours become a stumbling-block to those who are weak.

For if anyone sees you who have knowledge eating in an idol’s place, shall not his conscience, if he is weak, be built up to eat food offered to idols?

So this weak brother, for whom Messiah died, shall perish through your knowledge!

Now sinning in this way against the brothers, and wounding their weak conscience, you sin against Mashiak.

Therefore, if food makes my brother stumble, I am never again going to eat meat, lest I make my brother stumble."

Gnosticism is also a huge influence on this study, since “secret knowledge” was considered necessary for anyone seeking “ascension”. Gnostics came into the belief among the Natsarim in the latter 1st century CE. The believed all physical matter was defiled/unclean and imperfect, and everything spiritual was perfect. Some taught that Yahusha could not have been “in the flesh”, but was an ephemera (apparition). These ideas came from the eastern religions, what we call Hinduism. The concept of light/dark, good/evil, perfect/imperfect is reflected in the “yin-yang” logo they promote. The monks of the east were austere, and seemed to despise their own bodies for just being alive, as this was keeping them from ascending to “Nirvana”. Paul and Yahukanon wrote against such ideas that were in some of the minds of their 1st century students.

In the 1st century, the primary schools were at Antiok and Alexandria. Alexandria dominated, and emphasized an allegorical interpretation of Scripture, being heavily influenced by Gnostics and Mandaeans. It was the school supported by Rome, and edicts based on the school’s doctrines were imposed on the whole empire. The school was known as the Didascalia, or the Catechetical School at Alexandria. The teachings of the “post-Nicene” Circus fathers are embraced today by a large majority of the multiple Christianities that exist today, and their writings are taught in seminaries.

ASCETICISM: A severe, self-denying, austere way of life, supposed to permit union with the

Pagan monks and hermits often lived this way, most often celibate, and they still

practice it. This was used by Catholicism, accompanied by “vows”, to control literate men who

copied and translated the Scriptures. In these monk factories, sentences from Scripture were

divided, so the men could not make sense from them as they were copied and translated; a “vow

of silence” was imposed so they could not discuss what they had worked on with others, so the

When Paul writes at Romans 14 about “fasting” and special days, he is addressing traditions of the

Yahudim that arose, not Commandments. When the Temple was destroyed in 586 BCE, it became

a custom to fast each year on the “9th of AV”. The Temple was destroyed both times on this day.

Ferdinand and Isabella’s expulsion of the Yahudim from Spain occurred on this same day.

At Col. 2:8, Paul says, “See to it that no one makes you prey through philosophy (commentary) and empty

At Col. 2:21,22, Paul condemns asceticism (obsessive self-denial, austere living) because

Another place Paul’s writings are used to negate Commandments is Col. 2:11-23. If you read the

various translations, you will see huge differences in the texts, and even sentences that say the

opposite of other translations. The text says, “Let no one judge you . . . FOR the body of Mashiach.”

The KJV shows the added word, “IS”, to the phrase, “but the body (is) of Christ.” At 2:16, it is

being stressed that only the body of Mashiak should “judge” what you eat or drink, or regarding

The NIV butchered the text, and men over the years have read into the text what they wanted to see.