Okay, so, I dunno if this has been brought up before, it probably has, but I have an in depth question.
Acts 15:20-21 - but to write them to abstain from things polluted by idols and from fornication and from what is strangled and from blood. For from anchient times Moses has had in city after city those who preach him, because he is read aloud in the synagogues on every sabbath.
Okay. Here's my question. Paul told us we are no longer under the law (Gal. 3:23-25). This law is, of course, Moses' Torah, or however you like to refer to it, Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers and Deutoronomy. Unless I'm mistaken, outside of Acts, these are the books we find references to abstaining from blood. In Matthew 15, specifically Matthew 15:19-20, Jesus is talking to the apostles about a man's eating without washing his hands, and claims this is not unclean.
Matthew 15:19-20 - For example, out of the heart come wicked reasonings, murders, adulteries, fornications, thieveries, false testimonies, blasphemies.
These are the things Jesus says cause a man to be unclean. It is in reference to things that go into the stomach rather than out of the stomach, and, as Jesus basically puts it, the things which come OUT of a man is what makes a man unclean. Now, why was eating blood banned? Well, according to Genesis, it is because God will 'ask for it back' (Gen. 9:5-7). Now, unless there is more scriptures which explain a different reason, it sounds to me like the sacrifices of animals which were required of the Jews before Jesus. Now, look back at Acts. It seems like a reference to the old law which says we can't eat blood, but I see something else.
Acts 15:20 - For from anchient times Moses has had in city after city those who preach him, because he is read aloud in the synagogues on every sabbath.
What does this mean? This seems to me like the REASON we should abstain from certain things. Because of Moses being preached for years. Now other scriptures COLLABORATE the idea that fornication and that such are, indeed, things that defile a man. On the other hand, no other scripture in the New Testament supports the idea of not eating blood. And the LAW, which we are no longer under, is the only other evidence that we are not to eat blood. FURTHERMORE, Jesus said it is NOT what ENTERS a man which DEFILES him. It is what comes out of him.
So, my question, is, what did the letter mean when it said abstain from blood, in relation to other scriptures?