Above: Peter’s Vision of the Sheet with Animals
Image in the Public Domain
1 Samuel and 1 Corinthians, Part V: Food and Fellowship
AUGUST 12, 2023
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Blessed Lord, who caused all holy scriptures to be written for our learning:
Grant us so to hear them, read, mark, learn, and inwardly digest them,
that we may embrace and ever hold fast the blessed hope of everlasting life,
which you have given us in our Savior Jesus Christ;
who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit,
one God, for ever and ever. Amen.
–The Book of Common Prayer (1979), page 236
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The Assigned Readings:
1 Samuel 28:3-25
Psalm 5 (Morning)
Psalms 8 and 29 (Evening)
1 Corinthians 6:1-20
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When [Jesus] had left the crowd and entered the house, his disciples asked him about the parable. He said to them, “Then do you also fail to understand? Do you not see that whatever goes into a person from outside cannot defile, since it enters, not the heart but the stomach, and goes out into the sewer.” (Thus he declared all foods clean.) And he said, “It is what comes out of a person that defiles. For it is from within, from the human heart, that evil intentions come: fornication, theft, murder, adultery, avarice, wickedness, deceit, licentiousness, envy, slander, pride, folly. All these evil things come from within, and they defile a person.
–Mark 7:17-23, New Revised Standard Version
The politics of food in the Bible interests me. Some foods are unclean in the Law of Moses yet God declares them clean in the Acts of the Apostles. The Apostle Paul dealt with the issue of food in passing in 1 Corinthians 6 yet at length in the context of food offered to imaginary deities elsewhere. Paul could not have been aware of Mark 7:19b, in which Jesus declared all foods clean, for he died before the Gospel of Mark came into existence. But, if he was aware of the oral tradition or a written version of that teaching, he did not indicate that he was. There is also the matter of whom one eats and refuses to eat (as in 1 Corinthians 5:11 and elsewhere.) But the witch at Endor offered even the unsympathetic King Saul food.
There is a Russian proverb which states that one’s company, not the menu, makes for a good meal. By that definition Jesus considered prostitutes, Roman collaborators, and other notorious sinners to be good company. At least they knew of their need for forgiveness. And he did not condemn them.
“For me everything is permissible,” maybe, but not everything does good. True, for me everything is permissible, but I am determined not to be dominated by anything.
–1 Corinthians 6:12, The New Jerusalem Bible
That last clause is crucial. Any behavior or thing can become addictive under certain circumstances. Modern scientific knowledge regarding the pleasure center of the human brain explains the difference between the brain of an addict and the brain of someone not addicted. So we know that addiction is a matter of brain chemistry (affected by life circumstances, quite often), not one’s weak will. Yet the principle that we ought to master our appetites rather than be mastered by them is a timeless one. And we should also master our prejudices regarding who constitutes good company for table fellowship.
KENNETH RANDOLPH TAYLOR
OCTOBER 16, 2012 COMMON ERA
THE FEAST OF ALL CHRISTIAN MEDICAL PROFESSIONALS
THE FEAST OF HUGH LATIMER, NICHOLAS RIDLEY, AND THOMAS CRANMER, ANGLICAN MARTYRS
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ORDINARY TIME DEVOTIONS 
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