Follow-up to a suggestion made in class today:
It was suggested that the list of what WAS appointed for human food the beginning of Genesis also implies what was EXCLUDED, including the flesh of animals.
While it is never explicitly stated that eating of meat was ever forbidden, there IS a passage later in Genesis in which people are explicitly given permission to eat meat, lending some support to the suggestion that it was previously not on the menu. Extra glory for whoever can identify when this was! (Provocative hint: it is also at this juncture that the reported human lifespan decreases markedly!) Perhaps there's a hook here for marketing a vegetarian "Diet of Eden". :-)
(One might think that there is contrary evidence in the fact that Abel was a herdsman. But perhaps they just used the milk and wool...)
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the passage when humans are told by god they may eat meat is at the very beginning of chap 9: "Every moving thing that lives shall be food for you; and just as I gave you the green plants, I give you everything" (11.3). This happens right after Noah and his sons exit the ark and have "offered burnt offerings on the altar" (8.20) - and right before god makes the covenant. So it does seem to say that before the deal with Noah god wants humans (and beasts) to be vegetarians...
oh... god does have one condition: "Only, you shall not eat flesh with its life, that is, its blood" (9.4).
I think many people have already jumped on the Christian diet bandwagon.
The Food for Life company has lines named "Genesis 1:29" and "Ezekiel 4:9."
http://www.foodforlife.com/
Some of their items are carried at WesShop.
A quick search turned up
- The Bible Diet,
- The Maker's Diet http://www.makersdiet.com/public/default.aspx
- the Hallelujah Diet (raw fruits and veggies, no animal products).
Nice finds, Tressa!
(If the people on these diets start living to antedeluvian ages, I bet it will really catch on! ;-) )
Great work.
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