Vegetarianism: Is It Christian?

VERLE STREIFLING, PhD | Minister, Author, and Missionary

Dear [Proclamation!] Editorial Staff,

I am very surprised that Verle Streifling thinks that Romans 14:1-2 is talking about vegetarianism. I would expect a good editor would promptly correct this in your next issue. Any good commentary will explain that the issue was whether a Christian who eats meat that has been offered in a worship service to an idol is participating in that worship service. Sometimes Kosher meat was not available, so the strong wise Christians saw that since this idol was not real, then neither was its man made worship service real. Meat was merely meat. These wise Christians went ahead and ate the meat.

The more childlike superstitious new Christians made this a test of fidelity to Christ and would eat vegetables only. If they were to see Paul eating idol sacrifices, their faith might be greatly shaken. Thus, Paul counsels that we must sometimes limit our own freedom if it will offend a younger brother. THIS TEXT HAS NOTHING TO DO WITH VEGETARIANISM!!! (If the vegetables had been offered in idol worship these weak believers would have the same problem.)

This was the hot potato issue in the Acts 15:20 Jerusalem Counsel. Here they decide that the Gentile Christians should also patronize the Kosher butchers rather than the temple meat markets because the meat had to be drained of blood. Evidently the temple butchers slaughtered their animals through strangling. The first command not to eat the blood was in Gen. 9:5 and was given to all mankind, since it was given to Noah long before the first Jew, Abraham. That means that even today Christians should not eat Scottish blood soup or strangled animals. Christians should only eat healthy animals that die of hemorrhage.

I expect good and Biblical editors not to let this egregious expository error to go uncorrected. In 3rd world countries any persons can bring any flesh to sell in the open markets. There are no inspections that protect the people from diseased decaying meat. It has been reported that SARS developed in China because they “eat everything but the table”. They think the virus originated from butchers of either bear or rodent meat.

Christians in these countries should be taught the Gen 9:5 instruction on proper slaughter. If they are not utterly starving for calories, they should exercise the selections God has instructed. God defined what animals were clean and unclean as they went into the ark and probably before, as only clean animals could be offered as a sacrifice. Since sacrifices were eaten, it is doubtful that Adam ate strangled or unclean animals. 

The meat of honest Kosher butchers is not as red, juicy or flavorful as bloody meat. Most of the flavor of meat is in the blood. The process of further extracting blood by packing raw meat in salt, then rinsing repeatedly, I have never seen in the Bible (please tell me if you know any references to this). This makes red meat almost a white meat. In Lev. 3 God instructed his people, “It shall be a perpetual statute for your generations throughout all your dwellings, that ye eat neither FAT nor BLOOD.”

If Christians followed God’s perpetual instructions, I believe the health of Christians would be a marvel to the world. 

Sincerely,
Elizabeth Randall Iskander, M.D.

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Verle Streifling Answers

Dear Sister Elizabeth,

Christian Greetings in Jesus’ Wonderful name! I wish to thank you for your letter of inquiry and comments concerning the article I wrote for Proclamation regarding “Is Vegetarianism Christian?” I appreciate your being an MD and, may I add, I received good comments from a former SDA MD, who really appreciated the article, maintaining that a best balanced diet would include meats as well as vegetables. Of course E. G. White also was concerned for those in Northern climates trying to apply vegetarianism to their situations when it would be anachronistic to the place.

However, as to your concern that Paul was not speaking about some eating only vegetables, or being vegetarians, and that any good commentary will tell you this was not the issue. Vine’s Expository Dictionary shows that, compared to the word ‘Botane’ (from which we get our English word botany), that speaks of plants in general, the Greek word that Paul used here was “LaXanon”, which “denotes a garden herb, a vegetable (from lachaino, to dig) in contrast to wild plants… Rom 14:2”

Thayer’s Lexicon at Strong’s word #3001 for “LaXanon” says essentially the same “…hence grown on land, cultivated by digging; garden-herbs, as opposed to wild plants; any potherb, vegetables…”

• My Interlinear Greek Bible has “Vegetables.” 
• KJV, “Herbs.”
• TEV, “Vegetables.”
• NIV, “Vegetables.”
• Jerusalem Bible, “Vegetables.”
• New American, “Vegetables.”
• Young’s Literal, “Herbs.”
• New KJV, “Vegetables.”
• RSV, “Vegetables.”
• Phillips Modern English, “The meat-eater should not despise the vegetarian; nor should the vegetarian condemn the meat-eater.” A number of well-respected New Testament commentators also agree that this verse speaks of eating “only vegetables” or being “vegetarian”.
• Expositor’s Greek NT, vol II p.701, “…the fact that he (Paul) knew there were Christians in Rome who abstained from the use of flesh.”
• Jamiesson, Fausset and Brown, “..restricting himself probably to a vegetable diet…”
• New Bible Commentary Revised, “…maintained vegetarian principles”
• Matthew Henry’s Commentary  “…he will eat no flesh at all, but eateth only herbs, contenting himself with only the fruits of this earth…
• Jerome’s Commentary, “only vegetables.”
• Barne’s Notes on the NT,  “…herbs or vegetables only; does not partake of meat at all…”

Thus, Sister Elizabeth, the real fact is that Paul was indeed speaking of those who, for their conscience’s sake, were indeed eating only vegetables—thus Vegetarians! 

One of the problems besetting the well-arranged added notes you provided was that of our tendency to eisegesis, that is, read into the text our understanding from other passages of Scripture, instead of taking the meaning directly and firstly from the context, and the dictionary meaning of the Greek Word that is or was used in that immediate context. From this procedure we may turn the Bible into our own ball of putty, to make it mean or say what we want, to make us feel comfortable with our own views.

In your good comments, Sister Elizabeth, you have shed light into a very possible— and even probable—reason for their eating only vegetables, or being vegetarian. However, that is a very different issue from the fact of their being vegetarian. These two ought not be confused. You see, one can be a vegetarian for any of a number of reasons, as you well know. Yet that does not change the fact that he is vegetarian. In Rom 14, Paul is not discussing the reasons for vegetarianism, but rather the issue of those who were vegetarian tended to criticize those who were not, and those who were not did the same for those who were.

Our tendency as SDAs has been to create a smoke screen over the secondary issues, that we may divert attention from what the text was really saying. Or we may try to change the issue from what was being discussed to another issue instead, for we did not like the Bible text that incriminates E. G. White as speaking “not according to This Word” so “there is no light in her”. (Isa 8:19-20). Perhaps unknowingly, Sister Elizabeth, you may have even done this, by diverting our attention to the issue of ‘blood sausage,’ which was neither in my article, nor has anything to do with being vegetarian and condemning other Christians who are not, as was the case with Ellen White, as I showed in my article. However, there are a number of important things that may be brought to bear in both this issue of ‘clean and unclean’ meats, or the issue of ‘abstain from blood’, on which a number of sects tend to trip.

As an MD, I’m sure you would be acutely aware of the difficulty with Jehovah’s Witnesses who refuse blood transfusions on the basis of Acts 15 saying that Christians must “abstain from blood”. Here, their bringing their own interpretation into the text may be as legitimate as us, if we do the same to Rom 14:2, or even use Acts 15 to say we must not eat anything that was strangled. Here, Elizabeth, I like the words of Dr. J. Vernon MacGee, the late renowned Bible Expositor, whom we hear on the Christian broadcasting stations frequently: “A text without a context is a pretext.”

To rightly understand this, we must really get into the reasons for these commands and why it was forbidden to Jews but not Gentiles in the Old Testament Law Covenant, and yet for the Noahic Covenant it was forbidden to all. And your citing Genesis 9 was good, for there, Sister Elizabeth, we see that Noah and all his descendants were allowed to eat all kinds of flesh or meat as food—not just those which God later gave to Israel as ‘clean’ compared to the ‘unclean’ To be consistent, SDAs who cite Genesis 9 for support of Acts 15 must also take Genesis 9 to apply that now from Acts 15 Christians may eat all kinds of flesh—and the ‘unclean’ descriptives were also abolished by Christ.

Thus, we understand the many injunctions saying that Christ’s followers may eat all things. (In this area, may I include for you Appendix #8 of my Bible Answers for Sabbath Questions?) I do have an equally good study concerning the issue of ‘Kosher’ foods, out of which all blood had been bled and severely beaten. It includes some important Biblical hermeneutics regarding the transference of customs, cultures and norms from one covenant setting to another, or from one cultural setting to another. Also, it speaks of the reasons for the prohibition of blood during the Old Testament times, compared to our New Testament time, when now that reason is no longer valid, thus making the command of itself invalid for Christians today.

From this basis, and the many New Testament texts saying that all things can be eaten, it shows the reason for the command being imposed on the Christians of the Apostolic era: because of the diversity of the Jewish and Gentile cultures within the same Christian church, there was the need to avoid offense to the weaker brother—the very same principle as is seen here in Romans 14.

In closing, Sister Elizabeth, may I thank you again for your letter and the opportunity to respond to your concerns about the article. May God continue to bless you as you continue seeking to learn His Truth from His Word.

Your Brother in Christ Because of Calvary,
V. Streifling, PhD

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Verle Streifling was raised in a devout Adventist family and graduated from Adventist schools. At age 26 he was born again, and intensive Bible study and the Holy Spirit led him out of Adventism and into Evangelical Christianity. In 1984 he was ordained for ministry, and by 1990 he earned his Ph.D. Over the past 25 years he has written numerous tracts and articles, a number of booklets and manuscripts, and his Bible Answers for Sabbath Questions is now being edited for publication. He and his wife plan to retire into full-time ministry in the Philippines next year. [2002]

—Republished from Proclamation!, January/February, 2004.