They are idiots, not understanding that the purpose of blood is to sustain/save life. God did not always punish the "abuse" (intake) of blood. Not when it was done in a life-threatening situation:
When someone attacks you, trying to kill you, they lose their right to their life, their blood. You gain the right to use their life, their blood, only to save your own. You can choose to kill them and spill their blood in self defence with impunity. If your life is in danger then you can make any use of their blood, their life, that in your judgment protects or saves your life, your blood. So you can make any life protecting use of an attacker's blood without his consent, since his attack on your life, your blood, is an implied consent. The legal effect of the attack is merely to grant a consent to the victim to use the attacker's blood in a life protecting way. Therefore you can make any life protecting use of a non attacker's blood with his consent. Therefore you can take a blood transfusion from a consenting person in order to protect your life.
Putting this in a more simple way. God's law on blood exists to protect the sanctity of physical life which is represented by the blood and is owned by God. Therefore a use of blood which saves a life, does not break the law which forbid's abuse of blood. It is actually the purpose of blood to protect life!!!
This is not true of God's law on idolatry. If a false worshipper tells you he will shoot you unless you do an act of false worship, the thing to do is to refuse, and if necessary, kill him, run or get shot.
Here is the relevant part of 1Samuel14:
23 And Jehovah proceeded on that day to save Israel, and the battle itself passed over to Beth-aven.
24 And the men of Israel themselves were hard pressed on that day, and yet Saul put the people under the pledge of an oath, saying: Cursed is the man that eats bread before the evening and until I have taken vengeance upon my enemies! And none of the people tasted bread.
25 And all those of the land came into the woods, when honey happened to be over all the surface of the field.
26 When the people came into the woods, why, look! there was a dripping of honey, but there was no one putting his hand to his mouth, because the people were afraid of the oath.
27 As for Jonathan, he had not been listening when his father put the people under an oath, so he stretched out the tip of the rod that was in his hand and dipped it into the honeycomb and drew his hand back to his mouth, and his eyes began to beam.
28 At this one of the people answered and said: Your father solemnly put the people under oath, saying, 'Cursed is the man that eats bread today!' And the people began to get tired.
29 However, Jonathan said: My father has brought ostracism upon the land. See, please, how my eyes have beamed because I tasted this little bit of honey.
30 How much more so if the people had but eaten today from the spoil of their enemies that they found! For now the slaughter upon the Philistines has not been great.
31 And on that day they kept striking down the Philistines from Michmash to Aijalon, and the people got to be very tired.
32 And the people began darting greedily at the spoil and taking sheep and cattle and calves and slaughtering them on the earth, and the people fell to eating along with the blood [they did not bleed them before they cooked them].
33 So they told Saul, saying: Look! The people are sinning against Jehovah by eating along with the blood. At this he said: You have dealt treacherously. First of all, roll a great stone to me.
34 After that Saul said: Scatter among the people, and you must say to them, 'Bring near to me, each one of you, his bull and, each one, his sheep, and you must do the slaughtering in this place and the eating, and you must not sin against Jehovah by eating along with the blood.' Accordingly all the people brought near each one his bull that was in his hand that night and did the slaughtering there.
35 And Saul proceeded to build an altar to Jehovah. With it he started altar building to Jehovah.
36 Later Saul said: Let us go down after the Philistines by night and plunder them until the morning lightens up, and let us not leave a single one among them. To this they said: Anything that is good in your eyes do. Then the priest said: Let us approach here to the [true] God.
37 And Saul began to inquire of God: Shall I go down after the Philistines? Will you give them into the hand of Israel? And he did not answer him on that day.
38 So Saul said: Come near here, all you keymen of the people, and ascertain and see in what way this sin has come to be today.
39 For as Jehovah, who is the Deliverer of Israel, is alive, even if it is in Jonathan my son, yet he will positively die. But there was no one answering him out of all the people.
40 And he went on to say to all Israel: You yourselves will come to be on the one side, and I and Jonathan my son -- we will come to be on the other side. At this the people said to Saul: What is good in your eyes do.
41 And Saul proceeded to say to Jehovah: Oh God of Israel, do give Thummim! Then Jonathan and Saul were taken, and the people themselves went out.
42 Saul now said: Cast lots to decide between me and Jonathan my son. And Jonathan got to be taken.
43 Then Saul said to Jonathan: Do tell me, What have you done? So Jonathan told him and said: I did for a fact taste a little honey on the tip of the rod that is in my hand. Here I am! Let me die!
45 At this Saul said: Thus may God do and thus may he add to it, if you do not positively die, Jonathan.
45 But the people said to Saul: Is Jonathan to die, who has performed this great salvation in Israel? It is unthinkable! As Jehovah is alive, not as much as a single hair of his head will fall to the earth; for it was with God that he worked this day. With that the people redeemed Jonathan, and he did not die
46 So Saul withdrew from following the Philistines, and the Philistines themselves went to their place (1 Samuel 14).
This is a very interesting and technical account. Jonathon instigates an attack on the Philistines. Saul makes the people swear an unnecessary oath that limits their ability to do God's work. Jonathon inadvertently breaks this oath being unaware that it existed and God blesses him and the attack nonetheless. Saul then attempts to instigate a further attack on the Philistines on the next Hebrew day, but God does not indicate that he will bless Saul's attack.
in truth it was Saul who was to blame by putting his men in an impossible position with an oath that was tantamount to killing them. He took Israel into the oath in order to appear to be as courageous as his son Jonathon, with whom he was competing. He was actually jealous of his own son, and he risked the lives of the whole army in order to enhance his popularity (he could have run for office today on that ticket and won). Now God did not kill those of the sons of Israel who had eaten blood along with their meat. He could have instructed Saul to attack the Philistines and arranged for everyone who had eaten blood to be killed for example. He could have instructed Samuel to speak to Saul and tell him to kill everyone who had eaten blood. He could have sent an angel and struck them all down as he did in the case of 70,000 of those who agreed to be registered by Joab. But God did not punish any of his people, he merely embarrassed Saul by failing to bless him as he had blessed his son.
Now clearly God did not make a mistake or forget about the men who had eaten the blood! So there must have been extenuating circumstances for the sons of Israel who abused blood. Well if you are prosecuting a war which requires you to chase after people and hack them to pieces with swords, then being tired and hungry and therefore weak, is a life threatening problem. So the extenuating circumstances were that the soldiers were in mortal danger. If the Philistines had launched a counter attack on tired hungry and weak Jews, the result could have been fatal. So obviously there are circumstances wherein abusing blood carries no penalty. We deduce from this account that such circumstances are when the abuse of blood is for the purpose of saving or protecting life.
Phil
WT stance on blood transfusion is not biblical - proof from NWT
by Philippus79 3 Replies latest watchtower medical
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Philippus79
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beginnersmind
Interesting reading. Firstly I have to say I think the no blood transfusion ban should be lifted however I dont know wether I agree with your final interpretation of this account ie no penalty.
So obviously there are circumstances wherein abusing blood carries no penalty. We deduce from this account that such circumstances are when the abuse of blood is for the purpose of saving or protecting life.
If there was nothing wrong or no penalty how do you explain these verses?:
34 After that Saul said: Scatter among the people, and you must say to them, 'Bring near to me, each one of you, his bull and, each one, his sheep, and you must do the slaughtering in this place and the eating, and you must not sin against Jehovah by eating along with the blood.' Accordingly all the people brought near each one his bull that was in his hand that night and did the slaughtering there.
35 And Saul proceeded to build an altar to Jehovah. With it he started altar building to Jehovah.Are not those verses explaining what happened because the people were "eating along with the blood"? Were they making atonement for their sin? I dont know, I'm just saying it could mean that and if it did that would hardly prove they could take blood without penalty as it was still a sin.
Let me reiterate I do not support banning blood transfusion im just saying I'm not sure this proves what your trying to say it does.
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Burger Time
Yes this was to atone for their sin. But this proves it was not a "major" sin, they were not booted out or stoned for it.
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beginnersmind
Yes this was to atone for their sin. But this proves it was not a "major" sin, they were not booted out or stoned for it.
Yes but if were making a direct comparison today that would mean the jw would be repentent (atoning for their 'sin') after taking blood and wouldnt necessarily be booted out. In those verses it doesnt say if any refused to atone for their sin so in this instance we wont now what would have happened to any that did.
For me personally yes it was a sin to eat blood back then but I believe thats not binding now, simple as that.