The
Governing Bodies overstepped on blood
What
the Bible says about blood:
Genesis
9:4
Only flesh with its life—its blood—you must not eat
Levitcus 17:10-14
‘If any man of the house of Israel or any foreigner
who is residing in your midst eats any sort of blood, I will certainly set my
face against the one who is eating the blood, and I will cut him off from among
his people. 11 For the life
of the flesh is in the blood, and I myself have given it on the altar for you
to make atonement for yourselves, because it is the blood that makes atonement by means of the life in it. 12 That
is why I have said to the Israelites: “None of you should eat blood, and no
foreigner who is residing in your midst should eat blood.”
13 “‘If one of the Israelites or some foreigner who
is residing in your midst is hunting and catches a wild animal or a bird that
may be eaten, he must pour its blood out and cover it with dust. 14 For the life of every sort of flesh is
its blood, because the life is in it. Consequently, I said to the Israelites:
“You must not eat the blood of any sort of flesh because the life of every sort
of flesh is its blood. Anyone eating it will be cut off.”
In
government there is a legislative branch, executive branch and judicial
branch. Jehovah plays all 3 roles. But we were only given the Legislation in
Genesis and Leviticus and his enforcement of them.
Act
15:20 Therefore, my decision is not to trouble those from
the nations who are turning to God, 20 but
to write them to abstain from things polluted by idols, from sexual immorality,
from what is strangled, and from blood.
Acts 15:28,29 For the holy spirit and we ourselves have
favored adding no further burden to you except these necessary things: 29 to keep abstaining from things
sacrificed to idols, from blood, from what is strangled, and from sexual
immorality. If you carefully keep yourselves from these things, you will
prosper. Good health to you!”
Jesus
gave much criticism to the Pharisees for their taking of the Laws and adding
more restrictions to them beyond what was given. They made them a burden.
The
first two scriptures were direct from God.
But notice in Acts, the apostles acting as a Supreme Court deciding a
matter altered the words in the law in their restatement of it. They used a more general ‘abstain from’
along with several prohibitions, idolatry, fornication and blood. The Greek word apechomai, which means “to hold one's self off,
refrain, abstain” widens the scope of the prohibition. But I don't believe that their intent was to
widen the scope of the law. They used
the word ‘abstain’ with several other actions just to show a general prohibition.
Then
the modern day governing body acting as a Supreme Court further expanded the
law to include blood transfusions, the donating of blood or blood plasmas or
the storage of blood.
The
governing bodies are not lawmakers or enforcers. They just decide matters or interpret the law like courts.
I
was reading a case from the Michigan Supreme Court, People v Gilbert 414 Mich
191 (1982) about the principal issue of whether a radar detector is a
"radio receiving set" within the meaning of the statute prohibiting
vehicles with a radio receiving set. I
thought that this issue and discussion applies to the blood issue because when
the law was made there was no technology of radar detectors like when the law
on blood was given, there were no transfusions. But should the law be expanded to include technology?
The court stated:
“Words do not stand outside their history. They draw their
meaning from it. The plain-meaning rule of statutory construction assumes that
the words of a statute have the same meaning to those who authored it and to
those who read it. This assumption might be accurate if linguistic usage
remained static. But usage and meanings may change considerably over time, and
the semantic identity between author and reader which the plain-meaning rule
presupposes may be severed. A succeeding generation of readers may read
meanings into a text which were never intended. Words chosen to deal with a
specific problem may, as a result, be given meanings that could extend their
field of application well beyond anything the author could have envisioned
“A court's responsibility when
it construes a statute is to implement the purpose and intent of those who
enact it. A failure to
consider whether the Legislature understood the meaning of a term quite differently
when a statute was enacted than it is understood today would allow a statute to
be construed in a manner which extends its intended scope. The proper inquiry
is not whether the term "radio receiving set" would be understood by
a modern reader to include the use of radar but whether at the time the phrase
was used the Legislature provided for this technological development.
“Technological innovation may
not be an obstacle to the application of a statute where the new technology
facilitates the achievement of ends which the Legislature clearly meant to
encourage or discourage. But this is not such a case. Here the new technology
is itself responsible for generating issues of public policy which the
Legislature could not have foreseen or dealt with.
“In
states where the Legislature has specifically addressed the problem by
prohibiting the use of radar detection devices, the statutory language is clear
and unambiguous. Where, as here, the enactment of the statute preceded any
possible legislative consideration of the public policy issues, the proper
course of action is to await legislative judgment, not to engage in an uncertain
attempt to anticipate it”
“The
lodestar of statutory construction is legislative purpose or intent."
“Radar had yet to be developed when the Legislature
enacted this statute in 1929. During the 1930's, under the veil of military
secrecy, scientists were still seeking to develop a method for producing radio
signals with short wavelength characteristics so that the speed and position of
an object travelling through space could be monitored. Although the term
"radar" was not coined until 1942, by 1936 the United States military
had successfully developed a radar system for target tracking and navigation.
It was only after the Second World War that highway police began to use a
simple radar transmitter for the detection of speeding vehicles, the shifting
reflections from moving vehicles enabling instant and direct measurement of
their velocity. Thus, at the time this statute was enacted, the Legislature was
not in a position to realize that radar would come to be used as a means for
detecting speeding motorists, much less to assess the defensive measures
motorists would take to avoid surveillance.”
“Because
courts are wary of creating crimes, penal statutes are to be strictly construed
and any ambiguity is to be resolved in favor of lenity:
"`When
Congress leaves to the Judiciary the task of imputing to Congress an undeclared
will, the ambiguity should be resolved in favor of lenity. And this not out of
any sentimental consideration, or for want of sympathy with the purpose of
Congress in proscribing evil or antisocial conduct. It may fairly be said to be
a presupposition of our law to resolve doubts in the enforcement of a penal
code against the imposition of a harsher punishment.'" Bell v United
States, 349 U.S. 81, 83; 75 S.Ct. 620; 99 L Ed 905 (1955), quoted
approvingly in People v Bergevin, 406 Mich. 307, 312; 279 N.W.2d 528
(1979)."
“The scope of this statute is at least uncertain; it
should be applied only to those acts which the Legislature clearly meant to
proscribe. Far from resolving doubts in favor of the accused, the dissenting
opinion would stretch the wording of the statute to encompass acts the
Legislature not only failed to consider, but was in no position to foresee.”
To translate what was stated above to this issue:
Blood
transfusions or any other modern use of blood did not exist in Bible
times. But yet Jehovah could foresee
their development. It is up to him to
make and communicate the application of any law applying to it. When the law maker, Jehovah, left to the
apostles and the Governing Body the task of imputing to Jehovah his undeclared
will, the ambiguity should be resolved in favor of lenity. That is in agreement with Jesus’ teachings
in this not out of any sentimental consideration, or for want of sympathy with
the purpose of God's law in proscribing evil.
Courts can not expand the scope of laws, but yet the Governing Bodies
expanded the scope of God’s Law. It may
fairly be said to be a presupposition of our law to resolve doubts in the
enforcement of a penal code against the imposition of a harsher punishment as
that was the teachings of Jesus in speaking against the Pharisees. Also Jehovah was called merciful, that
would harmonize with resolving ambiguity in favor of lenity, where as the
Governing Body would have you dead and buried forever.
