Korean Job Discussion Forums

[Leslie Cheswyck]

[spike.matt]

I am a Christian, and I am a vegetarian(ovo-lactate). That out of the way, I agree with you Rteacher that yes, originally, in the bible, it seems that everyone was vegetarian. However, it even seems as if the animals were as well.

"And God said, ��See, I have given you every herb that yields seed which is on the face of all the earth, and every tree whose fruit yields seed; to you it shall be for food. 30 Also, to every beast of the earth, to every bird of the air, and to everything that creeps on the earth, in which there is life, I have given every green herb for food��; and it was so."

This seems to say that both humans and animals were vegetarian in the beginning. Your comment about human and animal intestines is interesting, and I agree with you. However, you use this fact and connect it to one bible verse, at the expense of the next verse which would make the discussion about intestines irrelivant. What it ends up looking like is that you seem to use the bible, koran, and other sacred texts to back up only what you say, not to promote true open discussion. Don't get me wrong though, I find your insights interesting, and I find you a very passionate person. As a Christian, I WISH I could find a verse, or verses in the bible to support my vegetarianism. I have not as of yet found one that says that RIGHT NOW, Humans are suppose to be vegetarians. I must follow the teachings of Jesus first, and I cannot presume to know for sure about the things I wish about.

that said, about the muslim vs the chrsitian part of this thread, it seems most christians want to believe that we have a nice, peaceful, all loving, no hating faith in Jesus Christ. That simply is not what the bible teaches. When God destroyed sodom and gomorrah, his wrath was very real. When the end times come, there will not be everyone living all together happily ever after. Yes, Jesus taught love. to not resist evil doers, to love our neighbour. But one cannot ignore the rest of the bible. God is both very loving and very violent. I use to see that as a problem until I realised, who am i to say, wait, god MUST be like this, and MUST do things a certain "logical" way? If the world says that Christianity is a ruthless religion, I'll say, "ok". I still follow Christ.

[Rteacher]

I think that if you faithfully follow Christ all apparent contradictions and mysteries will be resolved. As for vegetarianism in the Bible, I am definitely not an authority on that scripture, but I've heard (and seen examples...) that fourteen different words are loosely translated as "meat" ... And, King Constantine, who played a big role in secularizing Christianity by making it the official religion of the Roman empire, hated the idea of vegetarianism and animal rights so much that he used to literally boil vegetarian Christians alive in oil... I'm also inclined to believe that Jesus was an Essene (like his cousin John the Baptist...) and that he is the author of the Essene Gospel of Peace, which advocates basically a raw foods diet plus milk and honey...(Of course, many meat-lovin' religionists vehemently disagree...) http://www.soystache.com/jesus.htm

[Xian]

Re vegetarianism,

In general, we can get off track when we major on minors and minor on majors, but I guess that still makes for interesting discussion.
I guess I just say that because there are bigger issues than what we eat.
About findng a verse for vegetarianism, there isn't any. But no doubt, one can't refute the goodness of veges, but what we can prove (as noted in a number of previous posts), that meat is not forbidden, it is just that the circumstances at the time of writing (Romans 14) gave Paul reason to tell the Christians in Rome not to cause a problem for others in what they ate.
Eg: If I were to go an eat dinner with Rteacher, it would be very inconsiderate of me to order dog, pig, beef etc, so I wouldn't want to cause offense for him. Also, if as noted a number of times in the Bible there was meat to eat as a result of being offered as a sacrifece to another God, I, or others may choose not to eat it. This is discussed in 1 Cor (too late to search the verse right now) and Romans 14:20 (and whole chapter) (a guess from memory) discuss some of these issues regarding eating meat.

[Rteacher]

In social situations, I would normally (when I'm in my right mind...) never criticise someone for eating meat in my presence. (Of course, students bringing those stinky dried squid things to class and eating them is a little too much for me to stomach...) I'm certainly no better than a meat-eater (but I think I'm probably causing less harm to animals...)