Leviticus 11:1 - Meaning and Application

Now that Aaron had been consecrated as high priest over God’s house, God spoke to him together with Moses and appointed them both as joint messengers of his will to the people. He spoke to both Moses and Aaron about this matter, because it especially belonged to the priests to tell the difference between what was clean and what was unclean, and to teach the people to do the same.

After the flood, when God made a covenant with Noah and his sons, he allowed them to eat meat (Gen 9:13), whereas before that they were limited to the plants of the earth. But the freedom given to Noah’s family is here limited for Israel. They could eat meat, but not every kind of meat. Some animals were to be treated as unclean and forbidden, while others were clean and allowed. The law is very detailed and very strict.

What reason can be given for such a law? Why should God’s people not have as free a use of all creatures as others do? First, it is reason enough that God willed it. His will is a good enough law, and also a good enough reason, because his will is wisdom itself. He chose this to test and train the obedience of his people, not only in the worship of the altar, but also in the daily matters of their own tables, so that they would remember they were under authority. In the same way, God tested Adam’s obedience in innocence by forbidding him to eat from one tree.

Second, most of the foods forbidden as unclean were really unhealthy and not fit to be eaten. Even those we now think are harmless enough, such as rabbit, hare, and pig, may have been harmful in those lands and to those bodies. In that case, God was acting like a wise and loving father who keeps his children from food he knows will make them sick. The Lord cares about the body, and it is not only foolish, but sinful, to damage our health just to please our appetite.

Third, God wanted his people to be visibly different from other nations, not only in worship, but also in ordinary life. In this way he showed them that they must not be counted among the nations. It seems there had already been some difference in food between the Hebrews and other peoples, kept alive by tradition, because the Egyptians and the Hebrews would not eat together (Gen 43:32). Even before the flood, there was a division between clean and unclean animals (Gen 7:2), though much of that was later lost among the Gentiles, along with many other acts of religion. By this law the distinction was fixed and kept among the Jews, so that by having their own diet they would be kept from close fellowship with idolatrous neighbors, and would also point forward to God’s spiritual Israel. That people should not be shaped by little rules about food, but by a holy spirit and a holy way of life, and should not be molded by this world.

The learned also note that many of the creatures here called unclean were highly honored by the heathen, not mainly as food, but for fortune-telling and sacrifice to their gods. So the very animals the Gentiles treated with superstitious respect are here marked as unclean, even where the Israelites would not be tempted to eat them. This helped keep up a holy dislike for what the Gentiles prized in a false way. The pig was sacred to Venus, the owl to Minerva, the eagle to Jupiter, the dog to Hecate, and so on, and all these are made unclean here.

As for the land animals, the rule is simple: only those that both divide the hoof and chew the cud were clean. These are listed again in the repeated law (Deu 14:4, Deu 14:5), where it is clear that Israel still had plenty of variety and no real cause to complain of restraint. Any beast that did not do both was unclean. By that rule, pork, hare, and rabbit were forbidden to them, though they are commonly eaten among us. So whenever we eat any of these, we should thank God for the liberty the gospel gives in this matter, for it teaches that every creature of God is good, and that we are to call nothing common or unclean.

Some have seen meaning in the rule itself. Meditation and other acts of devotion done in the hidden life of the heart may be pictured by chewing the cud, like digesting spiritual food. Justice and kindness toward others, along with a good outward walk, may be pictured by dividing the hoof. But neither one by itself is enough to make us acceptable to God. Both must go together, good desires in the heart and good works in life. If either is missing, we are not clean.

Of all the creatures forbidden here, none was more hated by devout Jews than pig’s flesh. Many were put to death by Antiochus because they refused to eat it. They were probably most at risk of being tempted to eat this one, so they taught themselves and their children to feel a special disgust for it, even calling it by another name, “a strange thing.” It seems the Gentiles used it in superstitious ways (Isa 65:4), and so God forbade his people to use it at all, lest they learn from their neighbors to make a bad use of it.

Some have suggested that the prohibition of these animals was also meant as a warning against their bad qualities. We must not be filthy or roll in the mud like pigs, nor be timid and weak like hares, nor live for the ground like rabbits. Let no man, who has honor, make himself like those beasts that perish. The law forbade not only eating them, but even touching them, because anyone who wants to avoid sin must keep away from its temptations, and from everything that leans toward it or leads to it.