Questions about the Bible: 14. Doesn’t the Bible forbid eating prawns?

Doesn’t the Bible forbid eating prawns?

The Bible has various types of writings: poetry, history, prophecy, letters, biography, and law. God gave laws to His people who were living in a theocratic (God-governed) nation. Some of these laws concerned religious ceremony, others religious observance, and some were simply rules governing social actions and personal activity. There were good reasons of hygiene for food such as prawns or pork to be forbidden, though there was religious symbolism too. God was demonstrating that His people, the Israelites, should live differently to nations around them. That difference was to be shown in several different but obvious ways.

However, it was made clear in the New Testament to God’s people, namely all who have put their trust in Christ, that such limited rules had served their purpose and no longer applied. In Acts 10 God spoke to Peter and said he was to eat the meat of animals that Peter was objecting to saying they were ‘unclean’. “Do not call something unclean if God has made it clean”.

God has given some instructions, contained in our Bible, that served a comparatively short period of time only. Later, the Bible explained why they have now been put to one side, although there remain spiritual principles from these rules, which are helpful to people of all times.

I remember hearing a well-known politician ridiculing the Bible on BBC’s ‘Question Time.’ She raised the issue of prawns! Actually, she was really demonstrating her ignorance of the Bible, and clearly had not carried on reading but stopped short.

Go to: What is the main message of the Bible?