What does it mean in Genesis 9:4: "But you must never eat any meat that still has the lifeblood in it"?
Genesis 9:4
KJV - 4 But flesh with the life thereof, which is the blood thereof, shall ye not eat.
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Asked August 07 2024
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peg caudill
Supporter
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Paula Fether
Supporter
According to https://www.studylight.org/bible/eng/amp/genesis/9-4.html under Gill's Notes, "The animal must be slain before any part of it is used for food. And as it lives so long as the blood flows in its veins, the life-blood must be drawn before its flesh may be eaten. The design of this restriction is to prevent the horrid cruelty of mutilating or cooking an animal while yet alive and capable of suffering pain. The draining of the blood from the body is an obvious occasion of death, and therefore the prohibition to eat the flesh with the blood of life is a needful restraint from savage cruelty. "
Donna Williams
Supporter
It means that eating any flesh with the blood still in it was a sin, and any person who disobeyed the commandment would be cut off or put to death. I believe it was more than likely a practice of the heathen nations around them. The LORD told them that "the life of the flesh was in the blood." In Leviticus 17:11, "For the life of the flesh is in the blood, and I have given it to you upon the altar to make atonement for your souls; for it is the blood that makes atonement for the soul." At first they were commanded to pour the blood onto the ground, but in this verse they are commanded to pour the blood of the animal sacrifices on the altar to make atonement for their souls. This was a foreshadow of the blood of Jesus that would be poured out for the atonement for our souls on the cross; which the altar represented in the Old Testament. Jesus is the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world! See John 1:29.
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