a "Questions from readers" article in WT 15.04.83 dealing about that. There it is said that the situation described in Lev. 17:15 is only if an israelite erred "inadvertently", and ate a dead animal unbled. - Daniel1555
Thanks for raising this point. I remember when I first started researching this I felt relieved to see from the Index that the society had already dealt with this question. When I looked up the '83 WT and read their "answer" I was horrified. It is so clear that the context has nothing to do with accidentally eating unbled meat. I knew then that they had something to hide.
The context of the scripture is straightforward. It is a section about clean and unclean food. In addition to eating an animal that is not on the approved list there are two other circumstances related to food that could result in temporary unleanness - touching a "clean" animal that has died and eating a "clean" animal that was found "already dead".
The chapter has absolutely nothing at all to do with blood. It is simply about cleanness.
Imagine the dilemma of an Israelite farmer who goes out in the morning and finds one of his sheep has died during the night. It is physically impossible to bleed it. If he buries it he will be touching a dead body and will be unclean until the evening. If he eats it - including its blood - he will be unclean until the evening. Nobody gets cut-off in either case.
There are two other interesting references to eating an animal "found already dead" that show it had nothing to do with "inadvertently" eating blood.
There were a whole list of additional restrictions that applied only to the priests who served at the Tabernacle/Temple. for example they could not touch a dead body or eat an animal "found already dead". By naming this as something a priest was not allowed to do it shows that it was an option for non-priestly Israelites.
Secondly, Moses gives a lengthy speech to the nation in Deuteronomy following their 40 years in the wilderness. He encourages them to be a clean people and suggests that instead of eating an animal "found already dead" they sell it to a foreigner.
This shows that it was a matter of cleanness and not a universal law. If eating the blood of a dead animal was a transgression of the earlier Noachian law, it would have been immoral for them to entice anybody to eat the meat.
Hope that makes sense. Tomorrow I will look at Acts 15.