Leviticus 17:15-16

Regulations for Eating Carcasses

17:15 “‘Any person ¹  who eats an animal that has died of natural causes ²  or an animal torn by beasts, whether a native citizen or a foreigner, ³  must wash his clothes, bathe in water, and be unclean until evening; then he becomes clean. 17:16 But if he does not wash his clothes ⁴  and does not bathe his body, he will bear his punishment for iniquity.’” ⁵ 

Leviticus 20:25

20:25 Therefore you must distinguish ⁶  between the clean animal and the unclean, and between the unclean bird and the clean, and you must not make yourselves detestable by means of an animal or bird or anything that creeps on the ground – creatures ⁷  I have distinguished for you as unclean. ⁸ 

Leviticus 22:8

22:8 He must not eat an animal that has died of natural causes ⁹  or an animal torn by beasts and thus become unclean by it. I am the Lord.

Deuteronomy 14:21

14:21 You may not eat any corpse, though you may give it to the resident foreigner who is living in your villages ¹⁰  and he may eat it, or you may sell it to a foreigner. You are a people holy to the Lord your God. Do not boil a young goat in its mother’s milk. ¹¹ 

Ezekiel 4:14

4:14 And I said, “Ah, sovereign Lord, I have never been ceremonially defiled before. I have never eaten a carcass or an animal torn by wild beasts; from my youth up, unclean meat ¹²  has never entered my mouth.”

Ezekiel 44:31

44:31 The priests will not eat any bird or animal that has died a natural death or was torn to pieces by a wild animal. ¹³ 

Acts 10:14

10:14 But Peter said, “Certainly not, Lord, for I have never eaten anything defiled and ritually unclean!” ¹⁴ 

Acts 15:20

15:20 but that we should write them a letter ¹⁵  telling them to abstain ¹⁶  from things defiled ¹⁷  by idols and from sexual immorality and from what has been strangled ¹⁸  and from blood.

[17:15]  ¹ tn Heb “And any soul” (נֶפֶשׁ, nefesh).

[17:15]  ² tn Heb “carcass,” referring to the carcass of an animal that has died on its own, not the carcass of an animal slaughtered for sacrifice or killed by wild beasts. This has been clarified in the translation by supplying the phrase “of natural causes”; cf. NAB “that died of itself”; TEV “that has died a natural death.”

[17:15]  ³ tn Heb “in the native or in the sojourner.”

[17:16]  ⁴ tn The words “his clothes” are not in the Hebrew text, but are repeated in the translation for clarity.

[17:16]  ⁵ tn Heb “and he shall bear his iniquity.” The rendering “bear the punishment for the iniquity” reflects the use of the word “iniquity” to refer to the punishment for iniquity. This is sometimes referred to as the consequential use of the term (cf. Lev 5:17; 7:18; 10:17; etc.).

[20:25]  ⁶ tn Heb “And you shall distinguish.” The verb is the same as “set apart” at the end of the previous verse. The fact that God had “set them apart” from the other peoples roundabout them called for them to “distinguish between” the clean and the unclean, etc.

[20:25]  ⁷ tn The word “creatures” has been supplied in the translation to make it clear that the following relative clause modifies the animal, bird, or creeping thing mentioned earlier, and not the ground itself.

[20:25]  ⁸ tc The MT has “to defile,” but Smr, LXX, and Syriac have “to uncleanness.”

[22:8]  ⁹ tn Heb “a carcass,” referring to the carcass of an animal that has died on its own, not the carcass of an animal slaughtered for sacrifice or killed by wild beasts. This has been clarified in the translation by supplying the phrase “of natural causes”; cf. NAB “that has died of itself”; TEV “that has died a natural death.”

[14:21]  ¹⁰ tn Heb “gates” (also in vv. 27, 28, 29).

[14:21]  ¹¹ sn Do not boil a young goat in its mother’s milk. This strange prohibition – one whose rationale is unclear but probably related to pagan ritual – may seem out of place here but actually is not for the following reasons: (1) the passage as a whole opens with a prohibition against heathen mourning rites (i.e., death, vv. 1-2) and closes with what appear to be birth and infancy rites. (2) In the other two places where the stipulation occurs (Exod 23:19 and Exod 34:26) it similarly concludes major sections. (3) Whatever the practice signified it clearly was abhorrent to the Lord and fittingly concludes the topic of various breaches of purity and holiness as represented by the ingestion of unclean animals (vv. 3-21). See C. M. Carmichael, “On Separating Life and Death: An Explanation of Some Biblical Laws,” HTR 69 (1976): 1-7; J. Milgrom, “You Shall Not Boil a Kid In Its Mother’s Milk,” BRev 1 (1985): 48-55; R. J. Ratner and B. Zuckerman, “In Rereading the ‘Kid in Milk’ Inscriptions,” BRev 1 (1985): 56-58; and M. Haran, “Seething a Kid in its Mother’s Milk,” JJS 30 (1979): 23-35.

[4:14]  ¹² tn The Hebrew term refers to sacrificial meat not eaten by the appropriate time (Lev 7:18; 19:7).

[44:31]  ¹³ tn The words “by a wild animal” are not in the Hebrew text, but have been supplied in the translation as a clarification of the circumstances.

[10:14]  ¹⁴ tn Possibly there is a subtle distinction in meaning between κοινός (koinos) and ἀκάθαρτος (akaqarto") here, but according to L&N 53.39 it is difficult to determine precise differences in meaning based on existing contexts.

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

[15:20]  ¹⁶ 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]  ¹⁷ tn Or “polluted.”

[15:20]  ¹⁸ 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).