The Vegan Lifestyle

Pork is forbidden by God as food. God said, in Leviticus 11:7, 8, that pig or swine is not clean, and of its flesh man should not eat nor touch its carcass.

Some people have not known that pork is forbidden by God. Some were shown the Bible verses in Leviticus, but still persist in eating pork. They try to rationalize, in their ignorance of words, that swine is not pig, and vice versa.

The King James Version and other versions of the Holy Bible use the word “swine”, whereas, the New International Version, and other modern versions of the Holy Bible use the word “pig”. Dictionaries can prove it that swine and pig are words of the same meaning, and can be used interchangeably to describe the same animal.

Other people have read Leviticus 11 verses 7 and 8, but still refuse to obey God. They say that the prohibition was given in the Old Testament, and is no longer binding in our time. They cite the last part of Mark 7: 19, and Acts 10:13 as proofs that pork can now be eaten as food.

What is spoken of in Mark chapter 7, and what is the truth about the last part of verse 19? Was it about flesh meat eating, or was it eating without washing the hands? Granted that the topic was flesh meat eating, it is very obvious that what they eat was not pork nor any unclean food. The disciples who eat without washing their hands were Jews, and Jews abhor unclean food.

The last part of Mark 7 verse 19 is not found in the original text. It is not found in the King James Version. Modern versions included it, but only enclosed in a parenthesis to show that it was only added and was not a part of the original text.

Acts 10 verse 13 narrates of a voice telling Peter to kill and eat the four-footed beasts which he saw inside a net being let down from heaven during a trance. As a Jew, Peter vehemently refused, arguing that he had never eaten any impure or unclean food. This happened three times, until the net was taken back to heaven.

The vision which Peter saw in a trance is symbolical. It is not meant to be literal. We cannot doubt this fact, for Peter himself explained it in verses 34 and 35, saying, after understanding and realizing the meaning of the vision, that God does not show favoritism, but accepts men from every nation that fear him and do what is right.

So the command in Acts 10:13 was not literally to kill and eat unclean four–footed beasts, but to accept the Gentiles, and preach the good news to them that God now accepts them through the redeeming blood of our Lord Jesus Christ that was shed on the Cross of Calvary.

Why is pork forbidden by God? Is it bad for our health and harmful to our body?

The only reason that God gives in the prohibition of eating pork was that it is unclean. Why is it unclean? Because the pig, God said, though it has a split hoof completely divided, does not chew the cud; it is unclean for us.

If you do not believe God that swine or pig is not clean, consider how pig wallows in dirty stinking mud of wastes and feces, and how it eats its own vomit. Consider the pandemic swine flu that is currently happening in Mexico, the USA, Canada, Hongkong, and other parts of  the world. There is fear in the hearts of many that this pandemic outbreak, if not contained, may take the lives of millions such as happened in the “Spanish” flu pandemic in 1918 that took 50 million lives.

It is true that swine flu is airborne, and pork eating cannot transmit it to human beings because the swine flu virus is killed during cooking. But swine flu is not the only danger from eating pork. Pork have trichina worms that cause trichinosis, and a fatal viral disease called foot-and-mouth disease that hit epidemic outbreak in the USA, Taiwan, United Kingdom, China, and other countries of the world in the past.

Pork is forbidden by God because it is not clean as food. It does not only have parasites,  and viruses that can be transmitted to human beings, but pork is also high in saturated fats that can cause atherosclerosis, strokes, and heart attacks.