Did God Create Mankind To Be Herbivores, Or To Eat Meat?

Discussion in 'Faith & Religion' started by Yvonne Smith, Jun 9, 2018.

  1. Beatrice Taylor

    Beatrice Taylor Veteran Member
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    The short answer appears to be yes. I'm not clear if they did it with God's approval, very complicated and confusing to me.
     
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  2. Frank Sanoica

    Frank Sanoica Supreme Member
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    @Ken Anderson @Don Alaska
    Every cat which I have had after eating a bit of grass, soon vomited it back up, usually with clear mucus, never saw a bit of hair, though. Given their constant grooming, swallowing hair must be a given.
    Frank
     
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  3. Vinny Waccio

    Vinny Waccio Very Well-Known Member
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    If you believe in a God that created people it seem logical that since we are made to eat and sustain life with both choices, we were made to eat both using our free will to choose.
     
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  4. Bobby Cole

    Bobby Cole Supreme Member
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    We have free will to run a stop light but.......

    Free will simply means that you have the freedom to choose without anyone (or God in the Biblical sense) stopping you from doing it. It doesn’t mean that there are not some consequences attached to it.
     
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  5. Bobby Cole

    Bobby Cole Supreme Member
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    Yup.
    Deut. 18-1 gives that description but interested enough the person and his family who offered the sacrifice also shares in the boiled portions. (Leviticus 7:15)
    One further warning which had to do with the sharing of a sacrifice is that it had to be consumed that day. None could be left for the next day. ((health)
     
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  6. Bobby Cole

    Bobby Cole Supreme Member
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    That might fall into some of the writings of Epictetus in that God can be glorified by many of His own works.
    There is color in nature but if man could see no color, how then would God be glorified by His creation of color?

    Stretch that a bit further and we see that God applied some wonderful tastes to fruits and vegetables and if mankind did not have the ability to taste, how then would God be glorified by His works? Moreover, if all those tastes were made available but Adam did not eat then ..........

    Hmmmmm.......which brings a thought. Fruits and veggies can be pretty much eaten as they are but meat definitely needs to be seasoned and cooked in order to make it palatable and safe to eat.
     
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  7. Martin Alonzo

    Martin Alonzo Supreme Member
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    Sorry if I strayed from the topic Yvonne but here is what Jesus did. I don’t know if god gave him permission or not. Jesus must think we are omnivorous to give us that combination. Fishes and loaves
    John 6:1-14 NIV - Jesus Feeds the Five Thousand - Some - Bible ...
    https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=John+6:1-14&version=NIV
    8 Another of his disciples, Andrew, Simon Peter's brother, spoke up, 9 “Here is a boy with five small barley loaves and two small fish, but how far will they go ...
     
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  8. Babs Hunt

    Babs Hunt Supreme Member
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    In 1 Timothy 4:1-5 (KJV) it says:

    Now the Spirit speaketh expressly, that in the latter times some shall depart from the faith, giving heed to seducing spirits, and doctrines of devils.
    Speaking lies in hypocrisy; having their conscience seared with a hot iron:
    Forbidding to marry, and commanding to abstain from meats, which God hath created to be received with thanksgiving of them which believe and know the truth.
    For every creature of God is good and nothing to be refused, if it is received with thanksgiving.
    For it is sanctified by the word of God and prayer.


    Verse 3 & 4 in the Living Bible says it this way:

    They will say it is wrong to be married and wrong to eat meat, even though God gave these things to well taught Christians to enjoy and be thankful for. For everything God made is good and we may eat it gladly if we are thankful for it, and if we ask God to bless it, for it is made good by the Word of God and prayer.
     
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  9. Bobby Cole

    Bobby Cole Supreme Member
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    I think that in the interest of the original query, one has to examine how much mankind has evolved in just a few thousand years. Mankind has had to mentally and physically adapt to changes in environment, science, technology, health problems and yes, because our food supplies are vastly different than even 500 years ago, we’ve even had to adapt to the types of food our bodies process.

    Now, the question still stands as to whether God actually intended man to eat meat or was it an evolutionary process from the garden to man’s exile and beyond?
    If we examine some other mysteries such as: (1) God knew us before the earth was formed, (2) the omniscience of God and (3) God’s knowledge of future events
    we can surmise without conflict that most certainly God knew from the beginning that mankind would eventually be consuming meat because.......we do.

    The first question might be: Did God actually intend man to stay in the garden, eating fruits and veggies and staying totally sinless? (oxymoron alarm)

    Now the question we have to ask is: Would it be expedient for God to give us the ability to eat meat from the beginning or outfit mankind with a reasonable amount of adaptability and allow natural evolution (from herbivores to omnivores) to take its course?

    If we also examine the action of God to clothe Adam and Eve when they were exiled, why would He allow the wasting of the meat rather than showing the banished couple how to prepare it for consumption?
     
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  10. Yvonne Smith

    Yvonne Smith Senior Staff
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    Actually, what I was posing with the thread was the question about mankind originally (in the Book of Genesis) being instructed that we were given fruits, vegetables, and herbs as our food, and then in Leviticus (after mankind had been removed from the Garden of Eden), the whole thing changed, and certain animals could be eaten and others (like pork) were considered unclean.

    So, I have wondered if we were designed to only eat plant life of some sort originally, because it seemed that was the case back in the beginning and we were also supposed to live much longer (forever?) at that point, which would make it seem like this was the healthiest diet for mankind. Basically, this was just asking if God gave us the healthiest diet first, since that seems to make sense to me that he would do that.

    The Bible also says that it is important what comes out of a man’s mouth, and not what goes in it; so I don’t see this as something that affects one’s salvation in any way, but was asking more as a health question, but with a Biblical frame of reference.
     
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    Last edited: Sep 11, 2018
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  11. Ken Anderson

    Ken Anderson Senior Staff
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    Please, if you are not interested in replying to the topic of this thread, that is no reason to prevent others from doing so. I don't want to spend any more of my time here deleting irrelevant and off-topic posts in this thread. Derailing a conversation just because you consider your disbelief to be more important than anyone else's belief is just plain rude. Stop it.

    If you want to discuss your disbelief, start a thread for it.

    On-topic, as I was working on the Judaism section of the directory, I came across this site, which speaks to this topic. It's a Jewish vegan site whose authors argue that plant-based eating is rooted in Judaism. Given that Christianity is also rooted in Judaism, it might be interesting.

     
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  12. Bobby Cole

    Bobby Cole Supreme Member
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    Thus far, there is one thing that has yet to be examined.
    It is possible that God intended man to consume different types of plants and fruits in the stead of meat for his own healthy life, but what of that plant life?

    There is not a whole lot of information to glean from the the Antediluvian society versus that of post flood but there is one thing I believe to be certain; man’s consumption of meat is much more pronounced after the flood.
    With that in mind, I wondered about the types of plant life that was available pre and post flood for to be sure, some plant life probably didn’t make it during the flood.
    Most certainly, Noah had to take certain seeds, cereals, fruits and vegetables with him in order for he and his family to survive the one year ordeal aboard a huge ship but did he bring all the types of seeds needed to start a new world?
    We believe from scripture that he brought seeds for grapes because after the landing he grew a vineyard but what else came from the original plant life that God presented to Adam and Eve?

    Could it be that the vegetarian lifestyle Adam might have had was much healthier, so much healthier that it would enable the human physiology to live for hundreds of years?
    Could it be that certain pre-flood plants were so radically different that they were indeed a font of an extended life for those who consumed them?

    It is a given that certain seeds need certain conditions in order to germinate and the great flood would not have harmed them because they would have simply gone dormant but could it be that certain plants just didn’t make it which made it necessary to seek another source of life nurturing elements found in meat?
    Could it be, that much of the vegetables and fruit that was “meat” for mankind was deleted via the Noahic flood as a part of the “curse” provided by the fall of Adam and Eve?

    Just some questions to ponder.............
     
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  13. Don Alaska

    Don Alaska Supreme Member
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    I hope this is not outside the scope of this discussion, as it is not strictly Biblical, but when C. S. Lewis addressed this topic, his opinion was that the Christian diet should contain nothing that involved "unnecessary human labor or animal suffering". That doesn't address the health nature of the diet, but a philosophical attitude.
     
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  14. Don Alaska

    Don Alaska Supreme Member
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    There are certainly seas that would not be affected by the Flood, coconuts for one as they propagate and spread by floating sometimes for months or perhaps years on the ocean.
     
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  15. Yvonne Smith

    Yvonne Smith Senior Staff
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    I was thinking about something that directly relates to your post on this thread, @Ken Anderson . We have discussed at length the ideas that God at first instructed people that we should eat plant foods , and then later added that eating some animal foods was fine as well. Carrying that thought just a little further, one could ask the question, “what will we be eating in Heaven ?“ (assuming that people still eat then)
    It seems totally unlikely to me that there is going to be Burger King and KFC there, and the Bible talks about wolves living in harmony with sheep, and other examples of even carnivores not eating animal food.

    That would seem to say that our dietary requirements can be satisfied without eating animals, assuming that we DO eat food at that point. The next question would be , why do we not eat meat anymore in heaven, and the answer seems to be that God wants people to eat plants, and not be killing living beings of any kind, or making them to suffer.
    If that is so, then it makes total sense that what you are saying about the closer we get to becoming Christ-like, and less sinful, the more likely we are to become vegetarians, because we are becoming more aware of God in us.
     
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