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Phago.
"To eat with unwashen hands defileth not" (Matt. 15: 20).
"I have never eaten anything that is common or unclean" (Acts 10: 14).
"One believeth that he may eat all things" (Rom. 14: 2).
Another word that occurs in Rom. 14: in this connection is the word "meat". This is
the translation of broma, which is not limited to "flesh" but covers the whole range of
eatables. The word occurs in Rom. 14: where the Apostle says: "The kingdom of God
is not meat and drink" (Rom. 14: 17), and again in Col. 2:: "Let no man, therefore,
judge you in meat or in drink" (Col. 2: 16).
No one can read the Book of Leviticus or the writings of the Rabbis, without realizing
what an important place the question of clean and unclean food occupied in the mind of a
zealous Jew. Dr. Lightfoot calls the following the Pharisaical ladder to heaven:
"Whosoever hath his seat in the land of Israel, and eateth his common food in
cleanness, and speaks the holy language, and recites his phylacteries morning and
evening--let him be confident that he shall obtain the life of the world to come"
(Maimonedes).
The teaching of the law was supplemented by many glosses, and the Rabbis did not
scruple to bring in the unseen world to enforce their traditions. Thus we read: "Shibta
was one of the demons, who hurt them that wash not their hands before meat"
(Babylonian Taanith).
The feelings of the early Church on this question of eating find expression in the
reprimand administered to Peter in Acts 11::
"Thou wentest in to men uncircumcised, and didst eat with them" (Acts 11: 3).
These two things--circumcision and "meats"--distinguished Israel from the Gentile
world, and of these, the more important distinction was the eating of clean meats, for
Ishmaelites and other descendants of Abraham who did not discriminate in the matter of
meats were nevertheless circumcised.
Let us now turn our attention to the passage that deals with these scruples. The
following is the structure of Rom. 14: 2-5, but the reader should also refer back to
page 110 for the structure of the complete passage.