Meat Sacrificed To Idols

How does the “meat which Yehovah’s people eat” and “meat sacrificed to idols” relate to one another? Quite simply, one is slaughtered in accordance to Yehovah’s ways and the other is slaughtered according to the standards of the rulers of this world.

“Oh – my dear Father in heaven, we have learned so many lies and accepted so many perverted ideas, as truth, concerning Your words given through Moses. Please use me to correct some of these false images in our minds and raise up Your eternal and unchanging ways concerning the meats that we now eat in ignorance. I repent of my wicked ways today and ask for Your forgiveness concerning all that I have done in ignorance.”

Most who read the title of this blog will say to themselves, “Why should I read this, I do not “sacrifice” anything, especially to ‘idols’?” And, at a casual glance, viewed through the doctrines and traditions of men, that attitude might seem right.Â However, it has taken me years of daily, full-time and devoted study of Torah and the prophets to uncover what I want to share with you over the next 9 articles. My hope is that the reader will see that the implications of these truths are life changing and have eternal consequences.

The question we must all ask ourselves is, “Am I content with the light of the word that I have (ha, or perhaps think I have)?” or “am I committed to becoming holy as Yehovah is holy?” If you are like me and want to learn and manifest and teach all the great truths that Yehovah has revealed about Himself and His kingdom to those around you, then your choice will be the latter.

The biggest challenge when learning something new is overcoming all the bad ideas that we previously accepted as true. For the first 45 years of my life I was pretty lazy – even an infant in understanding – concerning the study of Yehovah’s word. This is especially ironic because I had aÂ bachelor’s degree from Wheaton College in “Christian education” and I worked at a Christian school for almost 10 years. Iâ€™m ashamed to say that I did not even understand that Yehovah’s word was only the words that He spoke through Moses and His other prophets. These words, for the most part, begin with “thus says Yehovah (the LORD), speak to Israel’s seed (or “the sons of Israel” or worse, “the children of Israel) and say to them …”

The writer of Hebrews understood this.

For though by this time you ought to be teachers, you need someone to teach you again the first principles of the oracles of Elohim (THE lawmaker and judge); and you have come to need milk and not solid food. For everyone who partakes only of milk is unskilled in the word of righteousness, for he is a babe. But solid food belongs to those who are of full age, that is, those who by reason of use have their senses exercised to discern both good and evil. (Heb 5:12-14)

Yehovah, through Isaiah says,

“Whom will he teach knowledge? And whom will he make to understand the message? Those just weaned from milk? Those just drawn from the breasts? For precept must be upon precept, precept upon precept, line upon line, line upon line, here a little, there a little.” (Isa 28:9-10)

Meat Sacrificed To Idols Is Misleading For Those Who LackÂ Deeper Understandings

This is how it has been for me, Yehovah could not teach me knowledge, much more understanding, and still more, wisdom because I lacked the basic building blocks of His word. Contrary to what most “Christians” want to believe, the real truths of Yehovah’s word are not found in a single verse like the one in our present study about “meat sacrificed to idols.” Instead, real knowledge and understanding comes from being able to relate together precept upon precept, line upon line and even Hebrew word upon Hebrew word. And, to decode the English phrase “meat sacrificed to idols” we must be familiar with Exodus chapter 12, Leviticus chapters 1, 3, 11 & 17 and dozens of other passages in Torah which will aid us in our understandings. Not to mention digging into the Hebrew words which “meat sacrificed to idols” is actually translated from.

I am a blessed man and when I find truth I always make it a part of my life, no matter what the cost; and because I am willing to adopt the truths I have learned in the past, Yehovah continues to reveal new things to me. Two years ago I made a commitment to learn and teach the Torah on a weekly basis to all who would come.Â Currently we are going through Leviticus, which is for some, one of the most boring books of the Torah.

Let me say here that I am a man that has lived without a SSN, State Driver’s License or any other covenant with the UNITED STATES (a corporation) or any STATE in IT since January of 2000.Â But what I have learned in Leviticus 17 has changed my life in just the past few days and once again made me sigh and cry for even more of the abominations which are being done in the land, especially by those who “say” they are His people.

Yehovah has 4 main kor-van (×§×¨×‘×Ÿ, offerings) which His men (not women) get to bring to Him at His tabernacle or templeÂ in order to “draw near” to him. Here they are:

o-lah (rising) a.k.a. “burnt sacrifice”
min-chah (grain or unleavened bread) a.k.a. “grain offering”
she-la-mim (thanksgiving) a.k.a. “peace offering”
kha-ta-at (breach) a.k.a. “sin offering”

The first 3 are, for the most part, voluntary kor-van; ways for a man of Elohim to draw near to Yehovah, and the last is all about “closing the breach” that was created between Yehovah and His manÂ for unintentional sin. I like to use the word kor-van in place of offering because the latter is a word that is loaded with mental and emotional baggage. BUT, the word that this series is about is the word “sacrifice,“and it too is loaded with mental, emotionalÂ and religious baggage; it is a word that I hate, and warn my Sabbath class about at every opportunity.

There is No Word for “Sacrifice” In Torah!

I have long suspected the word sacrifice was a problem but did not begin to see this false image surface until I studied and taught about the o-lah (rising) or burnt kor-van in Leviticus 1. I found that practically every time the word o-lah is used in the Torah, the word “sacrifice” wasÂ added to it in my NKJV (New King James Version).Â These type of additions to Yehovah’s word may not bother most people, but it drives me nuts! Red flags raise in my mind and put me on alert. As a result I found that the o-lah was shaw-khat (×©××—×˜, killed), but not “sacrificed.”

The only other kor-van that uses this word translated as sacrifice is the she-la-mim (thanksgiving) or peace kor-van, which is introduced in Leviticus chapter 3. In my NKJV it is almost always called the “sacrifice of the peace offering” with the word “offering” being an added word to the text. What I have discovered, and the journey we are going to take in this series is all about getting a proper understanding of the word “sacrifice” which is often the English translation of the Hebrew word zevach (×–×‘×—) or zeh’-vakh, which is a slaughter.

There are many English words which are chosen by the translators out of ignorance (which come from their own theological biases) but I fear that some may have chosen their words purposely to mislead us from the ways that lead to life. The sad part is that those babes in the word that I discussed above, those who do not understand the message, will NEVER see the truth that is available to them because of these translation errors.Â In my opinion, translating the Hebrew word “zevach” as “sacrifice” is one of the worst!

We are going to see in part 2 that the word zevach is used in Torah only when the animal which is killed is also eaten by the one who killed it. As a result of translating the word zevach incorrectly we have accepted so many lies as truth and walked in ways that we should never have gone. Getting new knowledge and understanding concerning this word is just the beginning of the important journey which we will continue next time.

PLEASE – don’t stop here, we have hardly begun and this series is about life and death.Â Go to part 2 now, and please read all 9 parts. Like this article, the link at the end of each part will lead you to the next article in this series.