Meat

Merriam-Webster’s first definition of meat is “a: food; especially: solid food as distinguished from drink b: the edible part of something as distinguished from its covering (as a husk or shell)”. Meat is first mentioned in the Bible in Genesis 1:29-30: “And God said, Behold, I have given you every herb bearing seed, which is upon the face of all the earth, and every tree, in which is the fruit of a tree yielding seed; to you it shall be for meat. And to every beast of the earth, and to every fowl of the air, and to every thing that creepeth upon the earth, wherein there is life, I have given every green herb for meat”. Meat, as it was first defined, did not mean animals but rather plants. Meat = food; food = plants. This was later amended to “Every moving thing that liveth shall be meat for you; even as the green herb have I given you all things” (Gen 9:3).

What changed between 1:29-30 and 9:3? Adam and Eve changed, in what is commonly referred to as the fall of man or just "the fall". The Lord God commanded the man, saying, Of every tree of the garden thou mayest freely eat; but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, thou shall not eat of it: for in the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die (Gen 2:16-17). The serpent tempted Eve. Eve saw that the fruit was good for food. Surely Eve had seen that tree several times before. Surely she had seen that fruit and considered it but never saw it as food until the Serpent convinced her. Why would she have to be convinced that the tree was good for food if the fruit was indeed fruit and not a metaphor for something else. Some people believe it was literally an apple and others a fig. Some believe it was a metaphor for sex. If the tree of life (Gen 3:22) is a metaphor, would not the tree of knowledge of good and evil be one also? Surely it was not sex; the very first directive God gave man was be fruitful and multiply (Gen 1:28). Before God placed them in the garden, they must have already tasted that fruit a few times.

What if the first sin was the taking of life? Surely this would have been unnatural and needed some convincing. How would you persuade some one to take away the life from another creature and then consume it’s body? How would you convince someone to take away the light of life that God had given to a subservient creature and then consume it, considering that such a thing had never been conceived before? Surely it would seem wrong and foreign; as horrific and unappetizing as cannibalism would seem to you or me. But if you were convinced that doing so would make you as God; if the serpent reasoned that God gives life and by taking that life you will become as God, with wisdom of good and evil, the prospect of the forbidden fruit may have become more palatable to Eve. Before the fall, there was no death. Before the fall, animals did not eat animals or attack humans. Before the fall, humans could speak with animals. Eve’s first words after the serpent said “Yea hath God said” were not “holy s*^%t; a talking snake!”

After eating the forbidden fruit, Adam and Eve’s eyes were opened and they realized they were naked. To cover their nakedness, “they sewed fig leaves together and made themselves aprons” (Gen 3:7) but instead “Unto Adam also and unto his wife did the Lord God make coats of skins, and clothed them” (Gen 3:21).If in history up to this point, there was no death and all creatures were vegetarians, where did the skins come from? There are few places in the bible where God confronts man as directly and as intimately as He confronted Adam and Eve after eating the forbidden fruit. He seeks Adam out and asks him “what have you done”. The next time God confronts man in this manner is when Adam and Eve’s son Cain killed Able. This is considered by many to be the first murder but what if in fact it was the outworking of the sin of their parents? What if it was the second taking of life? The curse was similar in that Cain was marked and further ostracized. Why do animals eat animals today and attack man? The ground was cursed when Adam ate the forbidden fruit. God said that the blood of Able called to him from the ground. Did the blood of the first creature slain also call to Him? Was it the first blood spilt by Adam and Eve that spoiled the soil, made it produce thorns and cursed man to labor for his bread? “Jesus took bread, and blessed it, and brake it, and gave it to the disciples, and said, Take, eat; this is my body. And he took the cup, and gave thanks, and gave it to them, saying, Drink ye all of it; For this is my blood of the new testament, which is shed for many for the remission of sins” (Mat 26:26-28). Soldiers put a crown of thorns on His head to mock Him and nailed Him to a tree.

I hate to think that we traded immortality for a possum dinner. Maybe it was a slow moving sloth hanging out in the tree. Possibly the serpent even tricked her into killing and eating him. Personally, I hope it was a pig since I love beacon and ribs, or maybe a lobster or a catfish if she had some corn meal and a Tabasco plant. If you had no idea what animals tasted like, you would have no idea what was good or bad. It seems ridiculous to think that God would banish man from the Garden, condemn them to die and ultimately to damnation for killing and eating an animal. It sounds blasphemous to suggest that the precious blood of Jesus would be shed because of an animal. It is so common that we can barely conceive any offense in the act or stomach any requirement for redemption. The broader issue of the first sin is not just the life of an animal but a fundamental change of mindset toward all life. I have been more and more convinced of the sanctity of all life and the evil of devaluing any life. I can not say for certain that the forbidden fruit was an animal, but I am convicted that there is a fundamental violence to the character of God in the mindset that would see any life as a resource to be exploited rather than a creation to be celebrated. It’s not a huge leap between the mindset that would build the camps at Auschwitz and that which produced the meat packing plants described in Upton Sinclair's “The Jungle”; the buffalo slaughters or the killing fields of Africa. Puppy mills and sweat shops must be run by like minded people. The taking of life and the exploitation of life are at least branches on the same tree. Have we not become as gods, knowing good and evil? Perhaps we know them so well that they have become overly familiar?

A Blind Prophet and a Dumb Ass

In the story of Balaam’s ass (Numbers 22) the Lord opened the mouth of the ass (donkey) and she spoke. The prophet Balaam was in the process of disobeying God while riding his donkey where the Lord had told him not to go. The Lord sent an angel to stop Balaam. Three times the ass saw the angel blocking the way with sword in hand. Each time the donkey turned away, thus saving her master. Balaam, not seeing the angel, became more and more frustrated by the donkey and beat it more severely each time it turned. Finally the angel blocked them in a pass and the donkey simple fell down under Balaam. The Lord then opened her mouth and she said “What have I done to thee that thou hast smitten me these three times?” As the story unfolds, the angel tells Balaam that had the donkey not turned these tree times, he would surely have killed him and let the donkey live. The donkey saved her masters life and was ignorantly beaten by him for it. Was she a stupid animal without reason? Was she simply stubborn? No; as soon as she is able to speak, she is reasonable, humble and sincere with perfect memory of the events that had just taken place as well as a perfect recollection of the entire time she had been with the Prophet. Balaam tells her that he is so mad at her that he would kill her if he had a sword. Her response is both tender and terrible to consider. She says that she is his donkey and he has ridden her every day form the first day they met to the present. She then asks: have I ever let you down (or maybe, have I ever wanted to kill you). How man times has man laid the whip to an animal without consideration. How many animals are tortured and slaughtered daily without consideration? The fact that they are dumb (unable to speak) does not mean they are stupid. In fact it was a speaking serpent that out-reasoned the first humans. If the animal itself had no intellectual ability or moral culpability, why are there no dragons or other legged serpents. The Lord opened the Donkeys mouth so it could speak but she (the donkey) already saw the angel Balaam could not. He did not need to open her eyes. Balaam, on the other hand, was blind to the angel until God opened his eyes. Which is a greater proof of intelligence; a dumb ass that can see angels or a blind prophet that can speak? I wonder what our animals would say of us and what spiritual truths they keep silent.

America Lost

As we consider the prospect of financial collapse and the possibility of an ensuing depression; as our country divest itself of the fine robes of liberty to lace up the black boots of fascism and the riot gear of a police state, I sadly consider the example left by our forefathers. The revolutionary soldiers’ most feared enemy was not the British redcoat; it was the "Devil Soldier" Hessian. They were fabled to be so savage as to eat their prisoners. This reputation was not entirely without merit. The Hessians were German mercenaries that were conscripted by the British to fight the rebels in America. They were the Blackwater of their day. Consider that the Americans were a ragtag group of poorly clothed, poorly fed, poorly armed and poorly trained farmers, fighting a well trained, armed, clothed, fed and paid army. The revolutionary army had suffered great losses at their hands. When Hessians were captured, they had been so demonized that the revolutionary soldiers were at first inclined to torture them and treat them as subhuman. General Washington reminded the young patriots of the ideas they were fighting for. He reasoned that if we descend into barbarity we invalidate the very noble truths we fight for. In other words: we have already lost, even if we win the war. He also suggested that any soldier guilty of torturing prisoners should be tried and possibly even put to death. The Hessians were treated with such regard and respect that they developed respect and admiration for the Americans. The Americans fed them and sheltered them. The prisoners were even taken in by local townspeople and treated more as guests than prisoners. As a result, many Hessians joined the revolutionary army and fought against the British; others married and settled in America. In the war of hearts and minds, we won, not because of superior resources but because of superior ideas, superior virtue and superior humanity.

Some people predict the fall of America but it is abundantly clear that we are already falling if not already fallen. We are not a “light on a hill”. The core values and virtues that have made America a great country have been confused with our economic and military power, if not traded for them in wholesale. In a war to win hearts and minds, we are almost vanquished and bankrupt. I love America! I love the principles that shaped our young country. They were so powerful that even the faint remnant of them in our courts could grow liberty and justice anew. This however will require us to stand up and refuse to allow either a citizen or an enemy be arrested with out due process of law; generals and privates that refuse to allow the torture of prisoners; politicians that refuse to allow agencies or branches within the government to operate outside the law or the will of the people and congressmen and women, senators and representatives that refuse to pass legislation that hijacks the American people or the values we hold dear. It will require people of conscience to demand that our representative government actually represent the conscience of the people rather than just our perceived “best interest” or the overbearing interest of corporations and lobbies. We must remember that the greatness of America is in the ideas of farmers. When we had no standing army, no great wealth and little global influence, we were indeed a light on a hill and people around the world looked to us and flocked to us because of the ideas we represented. If we have lost those; we have already lost everything! The virtue of a nation is not proven in its treatment of friends but rather by its treatment of enemies.