Is It Really OK To Have Ham For The Holidays?

Word-Of-The-Day: ‘<Jesus said to the Pharisees,> ”Nothing outside a person can defile them by going into them. Rather, it is what comes out of a person that defiles them.”’ (Mark 7:15); (4) For everything God created is good, and nothing is to be rejected if it is received with thanksgiving, (5) because it is consecrated by the word of God and prayer.’ (1 Timothy 4:4-5)

A common question that comes up, sometimes during the holiday season, is the concern over eating pork products for the Christian.  There are some families that will gather this Thanksgiving with the traditional turkey (or the more recent turducken, with the combined turkey stuffed with a duck, stuffed with a chicken), and a ham.  Some families may forego the ham for Thanksgiving but will have the ham for Christmas.  However, some are concerned that eating ham, or any pork products like bacon, sausage, or spam is akin to blasphemy due to the prohibition of eating pork in the Old Testament, namely in the Levitical Code (Leviticus 11:7-8).

Many religions have a prohibition of eating pork as the Jewish tradition of avoiding pigs as being ‘unkosher’ and the Islamic tradition of pigs as ‘haram’ or ‘anti-halal’.  The Levitical Code specifically mentions pigs being unclean as they do not ‘chew the cud’ as a cow does.  It is likely also due to the observance that pigs are typically ‘dirty’ animals, wallowing in the dirt and known (like goats) of eating anything and everything when they are hungry. 

Pigs do not just eat grains or vegetation but can also eat meat, and often will eat rodents or other small animals, alive or dead.  Back in the time of Moses, after the Exodus, it is likely there were encounters with desert tribes who raised pigs, but without any regulatory agencies like the US FDA in place, these pigs likely ate ‘roadkill’ or anything that they came across.  An increase of getting sick was likely if one ate pig as they were more likely to be infected by something they ate.

With the Levitical Code in place, the Israelites avoided eating pork products.  Being ‘unclean’ animals, the Jewish people did not raise pigs as part of their livestock and so did not have great access to eating pigs at first.  We see in the latter part of Isaiah foreign influences had come into Jewish cultures and in Isaiah 66:17 the prophet writes of God’s disdain and outright indignation of the Jews that ate pigs among other repugnant acts.  These acts are considered, in Isaiah’s writings, as ungodly as they go against the worship of God. But was the act of eating pork evil due to it being the ‘wrong’ food, or was it evil due to it coming from an evil act or thought?

When did the eating of pork become acceptable for the Christian?  We find in Mark 7 Jesus responding to the Pharisees, who were the religious leaders of the time.   The Pharisees ‘caught’ Jesus and His disciples eating food with unwashed hands, which, according to the rules of the Pharisees (which added more rules to the Levitical Code) meant Jesus and His crew were eating ‘uncleaned’.  The standard set by the Pharisees was that a Jew should ceremonially wash their hands before eating.  The concept is certainly a good idea to do; one should, to avoid possibly contaminating their food, wash hands thoroughly to ensure their cleanliness (think back to COVID when the rule of thumb was to sing the first stanza of ‘Amazing Grace’ to properly time the scrubbing of one’s hands).

However, as Jesus brought to light, the Pharisees weren’t concerned over the intent of God’s precepts but for the people to obey their edicts.  In a certain sense, we see this today with some of our law-enforcement officers who place obedience to their commands over the rights laid out in the US Constitution (and there are many YouTube videos that showcase this); the need for the Pharisees to be the authority ruling over the Israelites superseded God’s Word and its intent. 

As stated in Mark 7, Jesus lays out this truth of the Pharisees and make the proclamation that the intent of the Levitical Code was not to limit the Jewish people as much as it was to provide them protection, both from illness and enemies, seen and unseen.  In Mark 7:15, Jesus clarifies that defilement is not what is consumed from the outside of a man (or woman) but what is produced within.  This is true whether one is consuming food, music, or media – if one can consume it without it causing an outpouring of sickness, or evil, it is OK.  We should know better not to consume rotten or spoiled food, as we should not to view or ingest media of evil intent, lest we spill it back out in kind.

Specially dealing with food, Jesus reiterates in Mark 7:19 that food – any food – is not ‘unclean’ in that it goes into the stomach and not the heart.  Timothy gives more clarification to this point in 1 Timothy 4:4-5 that if the food is given out of thanksgiving, or given out of friendship and love, then it is ‘clean’ food.  The dream Peter had regarding this in Acts 10 is God telling him, and other disciples and missionaries like Paul, that more than the food, all men are ‘clean’ and worthy of receiving the Salvation of Christ, thus opening the door for the Gentiles to receive the Gospel through the command of the Great Commission.

Gentiles, or the non-Israelites at the time of Jesus, ate pigs as part of their diet.  Samaritans and other people raised pigs and it was likely part of their ‘food pyramid’, which is why the people of the Gadarenes were not too happy with Jesus when he sent the ‘Legion’ of demons out of the two men into the herd of pigs, which then ran off a cliff into the Sea of Galilee to drown (Matthew 8:28-34). 

In essence, Jesus (through Peter’s dreams and later through Timothy’s writings) told Peter, Paul, and his disciples on mission that when they fellowship with Gentiles, a pork dish may be the only thing a Gentile family may be able to offer, and they would offer it not out of disrespect but out of love and caring for their guest.  They were to accept it as such, as they would accept the fellowship of the Gentiles as part of the family of Christ. 

Thus, it is acceptable today for the Christian to have bacon and eggs for breakfast, a pulled-pork BBQ plate for lunch, and a half-rack of ribs for dinner.  It is not what you put into your body to eat that you will be judged by (though we should not be gluttonous or be careless in what or how much we eat or watch on TV), but by what Righteousness we produce that comes out of our bodies for the benefit of Jesus and His Kingdom.