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the vegetable creation and not only the fruit of trees. However, after the flood God went further and added every living, moving thing to man’s diet (Genesis 9:3). Thus clearly man was then permitted to eat animals as well as vegetation. However, as in Eden, God introduced a prohibition: the eating of blood. The words “what is strangled” do not appear. These latter are no doubt introduced in Acts because, although we may not eat blood as, we may say, a thing on its own, we may eat it because it is in the flesh that we eat if it has not been poured out. We are not to eat “the flesh with its life, its blood” as is stated in the passage in Genesis 9 already referred to. Strangling does not normally result in loss of blood. It may be noted that there are no doubt people who think that had they been Adam or Eve in the garden of Eden they would not have eaten of the forbidden tree, but the question may be asked of them as to whether they take notice of the prohibition in Genesis 9:4 as reinforced in the Mosaic law and by the decrees of the apostles and elders in Acts 15. The prohibition was not something specific to the Mosaic ritual, but applied generally, that is, to ordinary eating as well as to sacrificial meals. We shall give further demonstration of this below. Eating with the blood is specifically mentioned as an evil thing in Ezekiel 33:25 (idolatry and sexual sin are also mentioned in the same chapter).

It is clear that when the children of Israel killed the Passover lamb they only ate the flesh; the blood was put in a basin and sprinkled on the two door-posts and lintel. The blood was not eaten; only the flesh. (Exodus 12:7/8 & 22). The pouring out of the blood is mentioned in relation to the sacrifices (e.g. Leviticus 4:7,18), but the prohibition relating to the eating of blood is not limited to them as is made clear in Leviticus 7:26/27; 17:10-14; 19:26; Deuteronomy 12:15/16; 15:22/23. This is in accord with what has been shown earlier, that the prohibition against eating blood (or the flesh with its blood still in it) is not something that was introduced in the law of Moses, but was introduced after the flood when man was told he could eat not only vegetation, but also animal flesh. It applies to all mankind and not simply Israelites who were under the Mosaic law.

Having reached this stage it may be well to note that the “necessary things” are all negatives. They

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