flesh99 said:
Symes the food laws were to Moses and never to Gentiles. What of the gentile churches who had no idea of the food laws, how were they to know without being told? And yet we have no record of the food laws being taught to them. You ignore that the rules for food in Noahs time were different than in the Mosaic Law, you espouse that God does not change and yet Noah was given every living creature for food. At the time the clean and unclean designation had to do with sacrifice only. You ignore that Christ's words take us back to that point, back further than Law. We are not under the Law of Moses, but we are under the same rules given to Noah, which is every living thing. You have yet to prove that Christ's words didn't mean what they said, that 1 Tim doesn't mean what it says, and that Peter's vision didn't have two meanings.
I would like to know also where in the New Testament it tells us of Gentiles, upon converting to Christianity, were taught what foods they were allowed to eat and what foods they weren't allowed to eat as well as where it says they were expected to go through such fundamental changes in diet . .
It is one thing to want to follow the Old Testament dietary laws when it comes to which foods to eat because one beleives it is beneficial for them to do so . .
It is quite another to say that ANY CHRISTIAN is required to!!
I think if Gentiles, upon coming into the Church had been required to make such drastic and complicated changes to diets they had been used to all their lives, there would be some clear record of this in the New Testament or the Early Church Fathers . .
But we find
NOTHING to that effect . .not even the remotest hint of such a thing . .
Now, something that should be taken into consideration, in my opinion, is the issue of meats offered to idols, and the instructions in the New Testament about them, especially Paul's. .
This is what Paul said:
1Co 10:25
Whatsoever is sold in the shambles, that eat, asking no question for conscience sake:
1Co 10:26 For the earth is the Lord's, and the fulness thereof.
Now, the question is, what kinds of meats were offered to idols?
Just Jewish Kosher meats? Just meats declared CLEAN by the Jewish Law?
Why would someone think this since pagans were not Jewish and not under Jewish dietary laws? Is it reasonable to think this?
I had to do some searching, and becaue there is an abundance of SDA and other sites which want Christians to be restricted to Jewish kosher dietary laws (which are going to give me biased information) it took a long time to go through it, I didn't have time to contiune searching for more information.
But I believe that determining what kinds of food would find their way into the market place after being offered to an idol
is essential to helping us to understand the freedom we have in the New Testament . .
I found this as an example:
Worship
The most widespread public act of
worship in ancient
Greece was
sacrifice , especially the blood sacrifice of animals. The
temple s of the Greek religion generally were not public gathering places where people gathered socially for collective indoor prayer; most temples were little more than boxes that held a cult
idol of the deity.
Rather, the temples were part slaughterhouse and part barbecue;
ox en, sheep , horses, swine , dogs, various birds, and almost every kind of beast, be it fur, fish, or fowl, were offered as sacrificial victims to one deity or another, again depending chiefly on local custom. When we are told in studies of
mythology that "horses are sacred to
Poseidon " or roosters to
Hermes , what this meant first and foremost was that these animals were customarily offered as sacrifices to those gods.
Most sacrificial victims were food animals; for these, the usual practice was to offer the god the blood, bones, and hide of the victim, while the worshippers kept and ate the rest.
The
Roman formula expressed the attitude of worshippers to their gods in the formula
do ut des; I give sacrifices, so that the god will reward me in return. Public worship was aimed at pleasing the gods so that the gods would send rain, good harvest, military victories, and other public blessings. Private sacrifice was offered for personal goals.
Prayer was highly formulaic and ritualized. Most places did not have professional full-time
clergy ; priests were local officials whose priesthoods were not full time jobs. Major religious sites such as the
oracle s of
pilgrimage brought in enough spiritual tourism to need a full time clerical staff.
http://www.tutorgig.com/encyclopedia/getdefn.jsp?keywords=Greek_religion
Now . . looking at what would be the usual foods offered to idols Paul is speaking of, and his instruction to eat whatever was put before one without asking if it was offered to an idol, we see this . .
Here are several translations of this verse from above:
1Co 10:25
(ALT) Whatever is sold in the meat-market, eat, examining nothing, for the sake of the conscience.
(ASV) Whatsoever is sold in the shambles, eat, asking no question for conscience' sake,
(BBE) Whatever meat may be had at the public market, take as food without question of right or wrong;
(CEV) However, when you buy meat in the market, go ahead and eat it. Keep your conscience clear by not asking where the meat came from.
(Darby) Everything sold in the shambles eat, making no inquiry for conscience sake.
(DRB) Whatsoever is sold in the shambles, eat: asking no question for conscience' sake.
(EMTV) Eat everything being sold in the meat market, questioning nothing, for conscience' sake;
(GB) Whatsoeuer is solde in the shambles, eate ye, and aske no question for conscience sake.
(GNB) You are free to eat anything sold in the meat market, without asking any questions because of your conscience.
(HNV) Whatever is sold in the butcher shop, eat, asking no question for the sake of conscience,
(ISV) Eat anything that is sold in the meat market without raising any question about it on the ground of conscience,
(KJV+) Whatsoever3956 is sold4453 in1722 the meat market,3111that eat,2068 asking no question350, 3367 for conscience sake:1223, 4893(KJVA) Whatsoever is sold in the shambles, that eat, asking no question for conscience sake:
(LITV) Eat everything being sold in a meat market, examining nothing because of conscience,
(YLT) Whatever in the meat-market is sold eat ye, not inquiring, because of the conscience,
Given the wide range of, to the Jews, UNCLEAN anmals offered to idols and sold in the markest, the "WHATEVER" "EVERYTHING" and "ANYTHING " sold in the markets would include these unclean animals . . And Paul was instructing them that they could eat anything they found there . .
WHY?
(I have to shorten this post, so will continue it in the next one following this . . . 
)
Peace in Him!
