Genesis 9:4

9:4 But ¹  you must not eat meat ²  with its life (that is, ³  its blood) in it. ⁴ 

Leviticus 3:17

3:17 This is ⁵  a perpetual statute throughout your generations ⁶  in all the places where you live: You must never eat any fat or any blood.’” ⁷ 

Leviticus 7:26-27

7:26 And you must not eat any blood of the birds or the domesticated land animals in any of the places where you live. ⁸  7:27 Any person who eats any blood – that person will be cut off from his people.’” ⁹ 

Leviticus 17:10-14

Prohibition against Eating Blood

17:10 “‘Any man ¹⁰  from the house of Israel or from the foreigners who reside ¹¹  in their ¹²  midst who eats any blood, I will set my face against that person who eats the blood, and I will cut him off from the midst of his people, ¹³  17:11 for the life of every living thing ¹⁴  is in the blood. ¹⁵  So I myself have assigned it to you ¹⁶  on the altar to make atonement for your lives, for the blood makes atonement by means of the life. ¹⁷  17:12 Therefore, I have said to the Israelites: No person among you is to eat blood, ¹⁸  and no resident foreigner who lives among you is to eat blood. ¹⁹ 

17:13 “‘Any man from the Israelites ²⁰  or from the foreigners who reside ²¹  in their ²²  midst who hunts a wild animal ²³  or a bird that may be eaten ²⁴  must pour out its blood and cover it with soil, 17:14 for the life of all flesh is its blood. ²⁵  So I have said to the Israelites: You must not eat the blood of any living thing ²⁶  because the life of every living thing is its blood – all who eat it will be cut off. ²⁷ 

Leviticus 19:26

Blood, Hair, and Body

19:26 “‘You must not eat anything with the blood still in it. ²⁸  You must not practice either divination or soothsaying. ²⁹ 

Deuteronomy 12:16

12:16 However, you must not eat blood – pour it out on the ground like water.

Deuteronomy 12:23-24

12:23 However, by no means eat the blood, for the blood is life itself ³⁰  – you must not eat the life with the meat! 12:24 You must not eat it! You must pour it out on the ground like water.

Ezekiel 33:25

33:25 Therefore say to them, ‘This is what the sovereign Lord says: You eat the meat with the blood still in it, ³¹  pray to ³²  your idols, and shed blood. Do you really think you will possess ³³  the land?

Acts 15:20

15:20 but that we should write them a letter ³⁴  telling them to abstain ³⁵  from things defiled ³⁶  by idols and from sexual immorality and from what has been strangled ³⁷  and from blood.

Acts 15:29

15:29 that you abstain from meat that has been sacrificed to idols ³⁸  and from blood and from what has been strangled ³⁹  and from sexual immorality. ⁴⁰  If you keep yourselves from doing these things, ⁴¹  you will do well. Farewell. ⁴² 

[9:4]  ¹ tn Heb “only.”

[9:4]  ² tn Or “flesh.”

[9:4]  ³ tn Heb “its life, its blood.” The second word is in apposition to the first, explaining what is meant by “its life.” Since the blood is equated with life, meat that had the blood in it was not to be eaten.

[9:4]  ⁴ tn The words “in it” are supplied in the translation for stylistic reasons.

[3:17]  ⁵ tn The words “This is” are not in the Hebrew text, but are supplied due to requirements of English style.

[3:17]  ⁶ tn Heb “for your generations”; NAB “for your descendants”; NLT “for you and all your descendants.”

[3:17]  ⁷ tn Heb “all fat and all blood you must not eat.”

[7:26]  ⁸ tn Heb “and any blood you must not eat in any of your dwelling places, to the bird and to the animal.”

[7:27]  ⁹ sn See the note on Lev 7:20.

[17:10]  ¹⁰ tn Heb “And man, man.” The repetition of the word “man” is distributive, meaning “any (or every) man” (GKC 395-96 §123.c; cf. Lev 15:2).

[17:10]  ¹¹ tn Heb “from the sojourner who sojourns.”

[17:10]  ¹² tc The LXX, Syriac, and Vulgate have “your” (plural) rather than “their.”

[17:10]  ¹³ tn Heb “I will give my faces against [literally “in”] the soul/person/life [נֶפֶשׁ, nefesh, feminine] who eats the blood and I will cut it [i.e., that נֶפֶשׁ, nefesh] off from the midst of its people.” The uses of נֶפֶשׁ in this and the following verse are most significant for the use of animal blood in Israel’s sacrificial system. Unfortunately, it is a most difficult word to translate accurately and consistently, and this presents a major problem for the rendering of these verses (see, e.g., G. J. Wenham, Leviticus [NICOT], 244-45). No matter which translation of נֶפֶשׁ one uses here, it is important to see that both man and animal have נֶפֶשׁ and that this נֶפֶשׁ is identified with the blood. See the further remarks on v. 11 below. On the “cutting off” penalty see the note on v. 4 above. In this instance, God takes it on himself to “cut off” the person (i.e., extirpation).

[17:11]  ¹⁴ tn Heb “the life of the flesh.” Here “flesh” stands for “every living thing,” that is, all creatures (cf. NIV, NRSV, NLT “every creature”; CEV “every living creature.”

[17:11]  ¹⁵ tn Heb “for the soul/life (נֶפֶשׁ, nefesh) of the flesh, it is in the blood” (cf. the note of v. 10 above and v. 14 below). Although most modern English versions begin a new sentence in v. 11, “For the life of the flesh is in the blood” (see, e.g., NJPS, NASB, NIV, NRSV), the כִּי (ki, “for, because”) at the beginning of the verse suggests continuation from v. 10, as the rendering here indicates (see, e.g., NEB, NLT; J. E. Hartley, Leviticus [WBC], 261; and G. J. Wenham, Leviticus [NICOT], 239).

[17:11]  ¹⁶ tn Heb “And I myself have given it to you.”

[17:11]  ¹⁷ tn Heb “for the blood, it by (בְּ, bet preposition, “in”] the life makes atonement.” The interpretation of the preposition is pivotal here. Some scholars have argued that it is a bet of exchange; that is, “the blood makes atonement in exchange for the life [of the slaughtered animal]” (see R. E. Averbeck, NIDOTTE 2:694-95, 697 for analysis and criticism of this view). It is more likely that, as in the previous clause (“your lives”), “life/soul” (נֶפֶשׁ, nefesh) here refers to the person who makes the offering, not the animal offered. The blood of the animal makes atonement for the person who offers it either “by means of” (instrumental bet) the “life/soul” of the animal, which it symbolizes or embodies (the meaning of the translation given here); or perhaps the blood of the animal functions as “the price” (bet of price) for ransoming the “life/soul” of the person.

[17:12]  ¹⁸ tn Heb “all/any person from you shall not eat blood.”

[17:12]  ¹⁹ tn Heb “and the sojourner, the one sojourning in your midst, shall not eat blood.”

[17:13]  ²⁰ tc A few medieval Hebrew mss, Smr, and Tg. Ps.-J. have “from the house of Israel” as in vv. 3, 8, and 10, but the LXX agrees with the MT.

[17:13]  ²¹ tn Heb “from the sojourner who sojourns.”

[17:13]  ²² tc The LXX, Syriac, Vulgate, and certain mss of Smr have “your” (plural) rather than “their” (cf. v. 10 above).

[17:13]  ²³ tn Heb “[wild] game of animal.”

[17:13]  ²⁴ tn That is, it must be a clean animal, not an unclean animal (cf. Lev 11).

[17:14]  ²⁵ tn Heb “for the life/soul (נֶפֶשׁ, nefesh) of all flesh, its blood in its life/soul (נֶפֶשׁ) it is.” The LXX, Syriac, and Vulgate leave out “in its life/soul,” which would naturally yield “for the life of all flesh, its blood it is” (see J. E. Hartley, Leviticus [WBC], 261, 263). The present translation is something of an oversimplification, but the meaning is basically the same in any case. Cf. NRSV “For the life of every creature – its blood is its life.”

[17:14]  ²⁶ tn Heb “of all flesh” (also later in this verse). See the note on “every living thing” in v. 11.

[17:14]  ²⁷ tn For remarks on the “cut off” penalty see the note on v. 4 above.

[19:26]  ²⁸ tn Heb “You shall not eat on the blood.” See the extensive remarks in J. E. Hartley, Leviticus (WBC), 319-20, and B. A. Levine, Leviticus (JPSTC), 132-33. The LXX has “on the mountains,” suggesting that this is a prohibition against illegitimate places and occasions of worship, not the eating of blood.

[19:26]  ²⁹ tn Heb “You shall not practice divination and you shall not practice soothsaying”; cf. NRSV “practice augury or witchcraft.” For suggestions regarding the practices involved see B. A. Levine, Leviticus (JPSTC), 133, and J. E. Hartley, Leviticus (WBC), 320.

[12:23]  ³⁰ sn The blood is life itself. This is a figure of speech (metonymy) in which the cause or means (the blood) stands for the result or effect (life). That is, life depends upon the existence and circulation of blood, a truth known empirically but not scientifically tested and proved until the 17th century a.d. (cf. Lev 17:11).

[33:25]  ³¹ sn This practice was a violation of Levitical law (see Lev 19:26).

[33:25]  ³² tn Heb “lift up your eyes.”

[33:25]  ³³ tn Heb “Will you possess?”

[15:20]  ³⁴ tn The translation “to write a letter, to send a letter to” for ἐπιστέλλω (epistellw) is given in L&N 33.49.

[15:20]  ³⁵ tn Three of the four prohibitions deal with food (the first, third and fourth) while one prohibition deals with behavior (the second, refraining from sexual immorality). Since these occur in the order they do, the translation “abstain from” is used to cover both sorts of activity (eating food items, immoral behavior).

[15:20]  ³⁶ tn Or “polluted.”

[15:20]  ³⁷ sn What has been strangled. That is, to refrain from eating animals that had been killed without having the blood drained from them. According to the Mosaic law (Lev 17:13-14), Jews were forbidden to eat flesh with the blood still in it (note the following provision in Acts 15:20, and from blood).

[15:29]  ³⁸ tn There is no specific semantic component in the Greek word εἰδωλόθυτος that means “meat” (see BDAG 280 s.v. εἰδωλόθυτος; L&N 5.15). The stem –θυτος means “sacrifice” (referring to an animal sacrificially killed) and thereby implies meat.

[15:29]  ³⁹ tc Codex Bezae (D) and a few other witnesses lack the restriction “and from what has been strangled” (καὶ πνικτῶν, kai pniktwn), though the words are supported by a wide variety of early and important witnesses otherwise and should be considered authentic.

[15:29]  ⁴⁰ tc Codex Bezae (D) as well as 323 614 945 1739 1891 sa and other witnesses have after “sexual immorality” the following statement: “And whatever you do not want to happen to yourselves, do not do to another/others.” By adding this negative form of the Golden Rule, these witnesses effectively change the Apostolic Decree from what might be regarded as ceremonial restrictions into more ethical demands. The issues here are quite complicated, and beyond the scope of this brief note. Suffice it to say that D and its allies here are almost surely an expansion and alteration of the original text of Acts. For an excellent discussion of the exegetical and textual issues, see TCGNT 379-83.

[15:29]  ⁴¹ tn Grk “from which things keeping yourselves.” Because of the length and complexity of the Greek sentence, the relative pronoun (ὧν, |wn) has been replaced by a pronoun (“these things”) and a new English sentence begun. The participle διατηροῦντες (diathrounte") has been translated as a conditional adverbial participle (“if you keep yourselves”). See further L&N 13.153.

[15:29]  ⁴² tn The phrase ἔρρωσθε (errwsqe) may be understood as a stock device indicating a letter is complete (“good-bye,” L&N 33.24) or as a sincere wish that the persons involved may fare well (“may you fare well,” L&N 23.133).