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Excerpt Chapter 2: DIET: THE RELEVANCE OF THE PAST TO THE PRESENT When it comes to eating the contemporary, animal-based, high-fat diet, many people tell me: "That was the way our human and pre-human ancestors ate." ... "The Jews always sacrificed animal and ate them." "Jesus fed the 5,000 with five loaves and two fishes." "Mohammed allowed the eating of meat except for pork." ... And so they conclude, "This is the way we should eat." To varying extents, these assumptions are all false, as I will demonstrate below. ... THE HISTORY OF DIET, A TUNNEL BACK INTO TIME Foodways is the historical discipline which focuses on food as a way of penetrating into the past. ... GATHERING AND HUNTING ... Some of these early ancestors occasionally went hunting and had occasional feasts that included meat, but for the most part they prospered on a rich diet of seeds, roots, and herbs they gathered, plus the occasional ant or grub. We can study them by digging through their dumps, referred to by anthropologists as bone piles, by looking at their teeth, which show the wear marks that come from eating gritty, raw vegetables, and by looking at modern day gather-hunter societies such as the !Kung San Bushmen of southern Africa. Generally we read of pre-agricultural humans being hunter-gatherers. It is more appropriate to call them gatherer-hunters. One scholar estimates that 75 to 80 percent of their diet was plant-based, which is the case of the !Kung today. ... Thomas Hobbes said Stone Age humans lived lives that were "short, nasty and brutish." He could not have been more wrong. Sahlins refers to this era as the "original affluent society." ... OUT ON THE STEPPES: THE HORSE, THE COMPOSITE BOW ... By 5000 B.C., North Africa, southern Europe, the Near East, and much of Asia was becoming much drier. At the same time herding had spread from east to west, north to south, causing or assisting in the desertification process. The Sahara Forest became the Sahara Desert, a process probably hastened by animal herding. ... Cattlemen needing new grazing land initiated a state of generalized war, which has continued to the present. ... OLD EUROPE, BEFORE 4300 B.C., A PARADIGM OF PARTNERSHIP ... Pythagoras (569-470 B.C.) as quoted by Ovid (43 B.C.-17 A.D.) (Metamorphoses, XV, line 96 ff.) said the people of the Golden Age ate a diet free of flesh food. ... INVASIONS OF THE COWBOYS, A PARADIGM OF DOMINATION One summer evening around 4300 B.C., in a town in Old Europe, in what is now Romania or Bulgaria, people were working in a jewelry shop, worshiping in a temple, and sitting at a sidewalk cafe having dinner. The sky was clear, but there was an odd, low rumble, like thunder in the distance. It grew louder and louder still, like a stampede of wild cattle. Into town suddenly rode hundreds of cowboys on horseback. They were Kurgans from southern Russia. Some were armed with bows and arrows, some with sabers. There was fear in every heart. There was no communicating with these men. Their language was completely different. The Kurgans entered the jewelry workshop, the temple, the market, and the sidewalk cafe, and slew all the men, all the women, all the old people, all the boys. ... The Kurgans spared only the virgin girls: They ... could be made into breeding slaves. The Kurgans became the grandfathers of Europe; the surviving virgins its grandmothers. ... The scene was repeated all across Old Europe by endless waves of invading tribes ... as far west as Ireland. ... The world of Old Europe was turned upside down. Where there had been culture, education, literacy, medicine, equality, and the rule of law, there was now rule by the most skilled rider, archer, and swordsman. Artistic traditions were disrupted. ... Legends were changed to celebrate the sun god and the bull storm god. ... We are gradually recovering the balance of Old Europe, however, this positive change takes place alongside population explosion, environmental devastation, a form of capitalism that seems to know no limits .... It remains to be seen which tendency will win out: ... Will we will civilize the world before we destroy it? A LOOK BACK AT KURGAN CULTURE Who were our Kurgan ancestors, and what motivated them to be so destructive? ... Probably they moved west and south because droughts dried up their grazing lands. Probably their own overgrazing of the steppes contributed to the desertification. ... INDIA: BRAHMANS, JAINS, HINDUS, AND BUDDHISTS After 2000 B.C., powerful Aryan tribes of semi-nomadic cattle herder-farmers, descendants of the Kurgans, invaded first Persia and later India. ... There were two broad group of Indians, first, the dark-skinned Shramana, the indigenous Dravidians, and second, the Aryan, Vedic Brahmans, who had invaded India and subjugated the Shramana. From the Shramana tradition developed the Jain religion and later Buddhism. The Jains claim they and their Shramana predecessors have always been strict vegetarians. Their central teaching was ahimsa, non-injury to all living creatures. ... GENESIS AND JUDAISM The stories of Genesis are highly symbolic, but for one who is not afraid to interpret them in a less than literal way, there is much history to be found there. Scholars such as J.J. Bachofen and A.M. Hocart wrote of the "historicity of myth." (J.J. Bachofen, Myth, Religion, and Mother Right; p. 75.) Greek historians such as Herodotus and Strabo freely examined myths and drew history out of them. ... There is a legend referred to in the Talmud and the Bible that from the time of Adam to the Deluge, the predecessors of the Jews did not eat meat. According to Sanhedrin 59b: "Adam was not permitted meat for purposes of eating." According to the legends of Genesis: And God said, "Behold, I have given you every plant yielding seed which is upon the face of all the earth, and every tree with seed in its fruit; you shall have them for food. ... (Genesis 1:29 f.) ... The Jewish literature on vegetarianism is enormous, fascinating, and a door to many other aspects of Judaism and ancient history in general. ... The word "Adam" in Hebrew may derive from the word "adamah," a feminine noun which means "earth." I hypothesize that there had been a matristic version of this legend, before the patriarchal invasions, in which the hero of the story was Adamah, a woman. I hypothesize that the patriarchal editors put Adamah through a historical "sex change operation." ... According to Theodore Reik, the predecessors of the Hebrews worshiped a female goddess. (Pagan Rites in Judaism, p. 100.) I suggest that the old teachings from the matristic, partnership era survived by being grafted into legends from the father side. The religion of priests and priestesses was replaced by a religion of priests only. The gender of god was changed from female to male, from a goddess of ethics, law, and medicine into a god of war, conquest, and ethnic cleansing. ... I suggest, however, that the goddess side of the pre-Hebrew religion survived and gradually reasserted itself in Judaism, which by the time of the Prophets had become a progressive, philosophical religion that stressed high ethical standards. ...The goddess side was strong in early Judeo-Christianity and Gnostic Christianity. THE QUEST FOR THE HISTORICAL DELUGE Plato wrote that there had been a worldwide deluge and that the only survivors had been a few shepherds in the hills. ... As the last Ice Age was ending around 10,000 years ago, there was a pluvial age in which there were lengthy periods of extremely heavy rain. .... The sea level quickly rose around 400 feet. ... Albert Einstein endorsed the theory that the end of the last Ice Age and a Deluge of worldwide proportions could have been caused by the shifting of the lithosphere, that is the earth's relatively thin crust, in relation to the molten mantle it floats on. ... MEAT EATING ALLOWED ONLY AFTER THE DELUGE After the legendary Deluge, the eating of meat was allowed to Noah and his descendants: And God blessed Noah and his sons, and said to them, "Be fruitful and multiply, and fill the earth. The fear of you and the dread of you shall be upon every beast of the earth, and upon every bird of the air, upon everything that creeps on the ground and all the fish of the sea; into your hand they are delivered. Every moving thing that lives shall be food for you; and as I gave you the green plants, I give you everything." (Genesis 9:1.) There is universal agreement among Judaica scholars that kosher originally excluded sacrificing animals and eating meat. ... Although the Israelite cult developed a strong tradition of sacrificing animals, [B]iblical commentator David Kimchi (1160-1235) suggests that the sacrifices were never mandatory, but voluntary. ... ... The shortening of the life span of humans was the part of this legend (Genesis 6:3, 5), and the connection between wickedness, eating meat, and dying younger is obvious. ... After Moses led the Israelites out of Egypt, they wandered in the wilderness of Sinai and ate manna, a plant-based food. (Exodus 16:15, Numbers 11:7.) ... PYTHAGORAS, MUSICIAN, PHYSICIAN, PHILOSOPHER, VEGETARIAN, 569-470 B.C. Pythagoras is important to our inquiry because he extended the concept of ethics and justice to include animals and "… commanded [people] to consider these as their familiars and friends; so as neither to injure, nor slay, nor eat any one of them." (Iamblichus' Life of Pythagoras, p. 90.) SOCRATES AND PLATO ... According to Plato in The Republic, Socrates envisioned a city in which the diet was loaves of wheat and barley, olives, cheese, onions, greens, figs, chick-peas, beans, toasted myrtle berries, acorns, and wine. It is clear from the context that he intentionally omitted meat. ... THE ESSENES—VEGETARIANS The Jewish Essenes were vegetarians according to Josephus, Philo, and others. ... It appears that several movements and individuals were descended from the Essenes or were influenced by the Essenes: John the Baptist, Matthew, Peter, James the brother of Jesus, and Jesus all of them were vegetarians. ... Of the Essenes, Plinius said: ... [T]hey ate only fresh fruits and vegetables, seeds, grains, nuts, legumes, germinated seeds and grains, and tender, small, `baby' greens, taken fresh from the gardens and orchards right before their meals .... (Quoted from Edmond Bordeaux Szekely, The Essene Way: Biogenic Living, p. 95.) THE THERAPEUTAE—VEGETARIANS The Therapeutae were Pythagorean Jewish Essenes living in Egypt. Eusebius, an orthodox Christian historian, wrote of the Therapeutae around 325 A.D. ... Eusebius ... refers to them as "our ascetics," thus making it appear that by his day at least some Essenes had accepted Jesus as messiah. ... There is universal agreement among Judaica scholars that kosher originally excluded sacrificing animals and eating meat. ... Although the Israelite cult developed a strong tradition of sacrificing animals, [B]iblical commentator David Kimchi (1160-1235) suggests that the sacrifices were never mandatory, but voluntary. ... ... The shortening of the life span of humans was the part of this legend (Genesis 6:3, 5), and the connection between wickedness, eating meat, and dying younger is obvious. ... After Moses led the Israelites out of Egypt, they wandered in the wilderness of Sinai and ate manna, a plant-based food. (Exodus 16:15, Numbers 11:7.) .. THE NASARAEANS—VEGETARIANS Epiphanius (315-403 A.D.) was an ultra-orthodox bishop of and a native of Palestine. ... Epiphanius believed that the vegetarian Nasaraeans were a pre-Christian Jewish sect which existed beyond the Jordan. They differed from other Jews in that they rejected the authenticity of the ... first five books of the Hebrew Bible, ... believing the text had been written after Moses' day and had been tampered with. ... (The Panarion of Epiphanius of Salamis, Frank Williams, tr., 18, Book I, pp. 44 ff.) JOHN THE BAPTIST, VEGETARIAN ... It is probable that John the Baptist was an Essene. ... The Slavonic (Old Russian) edition of Josephus' The Jewish Wars contains an account of a prophet that almost certainly is John the Baptist: At that time a man was going about Judea remarkably dressed; he wore animal hair .... He called on the Jews to claim their freedom .... He replied: "I am a man called by the Spirit of God, and I live on stems, roots, and fruit…." Wine and other strong drink he would not allow to be brought anywhere near him, and animal food he absolutely refused—fruit was all that he needed. The whole object of his life was to show evil in its true colours. (Josephus: The Jewish War, tr. G.A. Williamson, p. 397-398.) MATTHEW, VEGETARIAN Clement of Alexandria, who lived from c. 150 to c. 215 A.D., said: "[H]appiness is found in the practice of virtue. Accordingly, the apostle Matthew partook of seeds, and nuts, and vegetables, without flesh." (The Instructor, 2:1, Roberts and Donaldson, Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume II, p. 241.) STEPHEN, PROBABLY A VEGETARIAN Stephen, one of the first Jerusalem Christians, made enemies who plotted his downfall. We read in Acts 6:11 - 7:60: ... ... Stephen refers to god's condemnation of the sacrificing of
animals to the golden calf (Acts 7:41), and the clear
implication is that he is putting the sacrificial system at the
Jerusalem Temple in the same class with sacrificing to idols. Thus, Stephen was saying that unless the sacrificing of animals was ended the Temple would be destroyed, and the Jews exiled from Jerusalem. ... My hypothesis then is that the enemies of Stephen and Jesus before him were not only the Romans but that small group of Temple Levites whose prosperity was based on the continuation of the sacrificial system. ... SIMON PETER, VEGETARIAN, AND THE CLEMENTINA Epiphanius in his Panarion (30:15:3), quoting from the Periodoi Petrou, The Journeys of Peter, and as part of his condemnation of the Ebionites as heretics, says: ... They have spoken falsely about Peter in many ways: ... that he abstained from that which had life in it and from meats, even as they do; and from all other food prepared from flesh …. (The Panarion of Epiphanius of Salamis, tr. Frank Williams, 30:15:3, Book I, Section II, p. 131.) ... Peter's argument was that Jesus was the true prophet whom Moses had predicted would come someday to finish his work (Deuteronomy 18:15 ff.), end the animal sacrifices, and lead the Israelites back to their original vegetarian diet. ...The prophet Jeremiah (8:8) had said the Hebrew Bible had been tampered with: .... In the Clementina, Simon Magus asks Peter: "How, then, is the truth to be ascertained …?" Peter responds: "Whatever sayings of the Scriptures are in harmony with the creation that was made by Him are true, but whatever are contrary to it are false." (The Clementine Homilies, 3:42, Roberts and Donaldson, ed., Ante-Nicene Fathers, Vol. VIII, p. 246; http://ccel.wheaton.edu/fathers2/ANF-08/) Peter seems to be saying that those sections of Old Testament scripture are authentic which conform to some higher standard inherent in the logic of creation, in effect an environmental and ethical standard. ... Simon Peter said, according to the Clementina, that Jesus
taught his followers not to read the Scriptures uncritically but to
question their authenticity: As to the mixture of truth with falsehood, I remember that on one occasion He [Jesus], finding fault with the Sadducees, said, "Wherefore ye do err, not knowing the true things of the Scriptures, ..."[a reference to Matthew 22:29]. ... And also, inasmuch as He said, `Be ye prudent money-changers,' it is because there are genuine and spurious words. (The Clementine Homilies, 3:50, Roberts and Donaldson, eds., Ante-Nicene Fathers, Vol. VIII, p. 247.) ... Peter applies the logic of a higher standard to the introduction of animal sacrifice: He then who at the first was displeased with the slaughtering of animals, not wishing them to be slain, did not ordain sacrifices as desiring them; nor from the beginning did He require them. …. (The Clementine Homilies, 3:45, Roberts and Donaldson, eds., Ante-Nicene Fathers, Vol. VIII, p. 247.) ... According to the Clementina, Simon Peter ate a vegetarian diet. I live on bread alone, with olives, and seldom even with pot-herbs; and my dress is what you see, a tunic with a pallium; and having these, I require nothing more.... JAMES, BROTHER OF JESUS, VEGETARIAN ... The original Christian church was the church in Jerusalem. After Jesus' death, his brother James became its first "bishop." (Acts 1:14, 12:17, 15:5, 15:13, 21:18; 1 Corinthians 15:7; Galatians 1:19, 2:9; "James," Interpreter's Dictionary of the Bible, 1962, Vol. 2, p. 793.) James and the leadership of the Jerusalem church were vegetarian .... The 2nd Century Hegesippus, quoted by the 4th Century Eusebius, said of James: Control of the Church passed to the apostles, together with the Lord's brother James … called the Righteous … holy from his birth; he drank no wine or intoxicating liquor and ate no animal food. ... Thus, Stephen and James—and Jesus as we will soon see__, in attacking the sacrificial system, made a direct threat to the income derived from that system. Probably, these three prophets were stricken down by the hand of First Century slaughter house greed. ... PAUL: NOT A VEGETARIAN AND HIS CONFLICT WITH JAMES One who proposes that James, Stephen, John the Baptist, Matthew, Simon Peter, and Jesus were vegetarians must deal with the fact that Paul—author of most of the New Testament and the primary missionary to the gentiles—was not. The explanation is simple: Paul had no sympathy for vegetarianism. ... Paul considered ... vegetarians as weak in faith. (Romans 14:1 ff., 1 Timothy 4:1-5.) ... He began a process that eliminated vegetarianism from western Christianity. Paul's theory was that one was saved by having a salvific experience; good deeds were the result of salvation, not its cause. However, Jesus said the one who would be saved and go to heaven would be the one who behaved ethically and who did good to those in need. (Matthew 25:31-46.) James held that a mechanical emphasis on salvation by faith alone —apart from ethical behavior—was misplaced, and he openly criticized Paul's faith-only position. (James 2:14.) THE JUDEO-CHRISTIANS OF THE FIRST CHURCH The first Christian church was the church in Jerusalem. Its members referred to themselves as Nazaraeans. (Acts 11:26, 24:5.) Its president was the vegetarian James, the brother of Jesus. Its members were all Jews or converts to Judaism. (Acts 6:5; ...) They were communalists, pooling all their assets. (Acts 4:32.) ... As gentile Christianity ... quickly became the Christian majority, it diverged from its Hebrew origins—allowing slave owners and members of the army to become Christians. The anti-Roman sentiments of the original Judeo-Christians were toned down; the Romans were exonerated for the crucifixion of Jesus, and the Jews were blamed for it instead. ... (Martin A. Larson, The Religion of the Occident: The Origin and Development of the Essene-Christian Faith, p. 182 f.) ... THE JUDEO-CHRISTIAN EBIONITES VEGETARIANS Regarding the Ebionites, Epiphanius said they denied the virgin birth .... He implied that the same sect was known as Nazoraean before the fall of Jerusalem and as Ebionite thereafter. But they use ... Clement's so-called Peregrinations of Peter .... and lied about Peter ... saying that ... he abstained from living flesh and dressed meat as they do, and any other meat-dish since both Ebion himself, and Ebionites, abstain from these entirely. [Regarding Jesus] ... their so-called Gospel says, "I came to abolish the sacrifices, and if ye cease not from sacrifice, wrath will not cease from you." ... But they misled themselves by ... saying, "Have I desired meat with desire to eat this Passover with you?" (Epiphanius, Panarion, 30, The Panarion of Epiphanius of Salamis, tr. Frank Williams, Book I, p. 120 ff. ... THE VEGETARIAN JUDEO-CHRISTIANS, ... The Judeo-Christians had problems on both flanks. The gentile Christian church soon outnumbered it. The gentile church rejected Judeo-Christian teachings and customs: the idea that Jesus, although messiah and true prophet, was the natural born son of Joseph and Mary; the teaching that gentiles ought to obey the Jewish law; and, to varying extents, their vegetarianism. ... The gentile Christians were adopting from mystery religions such as Mithraism the theory that Jesus was god incarnate. ... Gentile Christians claimed Jesus had been born of a virgin, as had Zoroastrianism, Buddhism, and mystery religions such as the cult of Dionysus. ... ... Gentile Christians came to regard Judeo-Christians as heretics who foolishly kept to the Jewish law and refused to eat flesh food. In the Council of Gangra in 340 A.D., the bishops, by this time gentiles only, condemned those who taught vegetarianism as well as those who taught celibacy. ... EARLY CHRISTIAN VEGETARIAN FASTING: THE DIDACHE ... Fasting was endorsed by John the Baptist and Jesus (Matthew 3:4, 6:16, Mark 1:6, 2:20, 9:29). It was practiced by the early Christian church (Acts 13:2 and 14:23, 2 Corinthians 11:27). The fast was a vegetarian fast, in which no meat, milk, or eggs were eaten. The vegetarian fast of the Judeo-Christians was adopted to varying extents by gentile Christians. ... In the Didache fasting was enjoined or advised. Early Christians were given two fasting options in the Didache: ...But do you either fast the entire five days [leading up to the Sabbath, Monday through Friday], or on the fourth day of the week [Wednesday], and [in addition] on the day of the Preparation [Friday]. ... (The Teaching of the Twelve Apostles and Constitutions of the Holy Apostles 7:23, which quotes the Didache, Roberts and Donaldson, Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume VII, p. 377, 469.) ... Although the custom was gradually abandoned in the West, [i]n the Greek and other [Eastern] Churches the practice of abstinence (îçñoöáãßá , [xerophagia], `dry food') is far more rigid. It extends to all Wednesdays and Fridays of the year, all days of the Major [Lent] Fast including Sundays, and several other periods, bringing up the number of days of abstinence to about 150; and not only meat, but fish, eggs, milk, cheese, oil, and wine are also forbidden. ("Abstinence," Oxford Dictionary of the Christian Church, p. 8; see also "Fasts and Fasting," p. 495.) ... Everyone was called on at least to try to be a vegetarian and at least be a part-time vegetarian: ... For if thou art able to bear all the yoke of the Lord, thou wilt be perfect; but if thou art not able, what thou art able that do. And concerning food, bear what thou are able; but against that which is sacrificed to idols be exceedingly on thy guard; for it is the service of dead gods. (Didache 6:1-6:3.) THREE
WINGS OF THE
JERUSALEM CHURCH, My hypothesis is as follows: Jesus was a vegetarian, an opponent of animal sacrifice, of Essene orientation, and an independent thinker. He was opposed to Roman domination but probably held that Jews had to become morally worthy before they could win their independence and fulfill their destiny to become moral and political leaders of the world. The original Jerusalem Christians were observant Jews who believed that animal sacrifice and eating meat were required in Judaism and, in fact, that an end to the sacrificial system was a condition precedent to the coming of the messiah and the fulfilment of his plan to bring peace and high ethical standards. ... WAS
JESUS A VEGETARIAN? ... After Christianity became the state religion of Rome, emperors such as Constantine and Theodosius commissioned the Roman censor to hunt down and selectively line-out or destroy offending books. The oldest books about Jesus were destroyed. ... We know of certain books by name which ceased to exist: the Gospel According to the Hebrews (http://home.sol.no/%7Enoetic/goeb.htm), The Preachings of Peter, The Travels of Peter, and the Ascents of James. ... Fortunately, parts of the last three are imbedded in the Clementina, and some sections are quoted by Church Fathers and heresy-fighters such as Epiphanius. ... THE MESSIAH WAS TO BE VEGETARIAN AND END THE SACRIFICES ... The messiah in Hebrew tradition was to be a vegetarian and lead the world back to a vegetarian Eden. For Jesus not to have been a vegetarian would have undermined his claim to be the messiah. ... Jesus explicitly endorsed the anti-animal-sacrifice theme of the prophets. Hosea had said, "For I desire steadfast love and not sacrifice, the knowledge of God, rather than burnt offerings." (Hosea 6:6; See also Amos 5:21 ff. and Proverbs 21:3.) Jesus refers to this theme (Matthew 9:13) when he says: Go and learn what this means, `I desire mercy, and not sacrifice.' ... Jesus opposed the use of animals for religious sacrificial purposes. He and his followers temporarily put a stop to the sacrificing of animals in the Temple. ... In the temple he found those who were selling oxen and sheep and pigeons, and the money-changers at their business. And making a whip of cords, he drove them all, with the sheep and oxen, out of the temple; and he poured out the coins of the money-changers and overturned their tables. ... (John 2:13-20.) ... Jesus did not attack only the money changers; he drove out all who were involved in buying, selling, and killing the animals, those who financed the system, and all the animals too. ... Jesus made two enemies: the Temple Levites, because he wanted to end the lucerative sacrifices, and the Roman leadership because he had declared himself to be messiah, which is "king" in Latin. ... Jesus' fight seemed to be focused against the Levitical cult and not the Romans. Eliminating the sacrifices was probably to Jesus a prerequisite to winning independence from the Romans. THE
JUDEO-CHRISTIANS SAID JESUS WAS A VEGETARIAN In the gospels as we know them, Jesus says, "I have earnestly desired to eat this passover with you …" which included roast lamb. (Luke 22:15.) However, Epiphanius, writing about the Ebionites, tells the Judeo-Christians' version of this story: "[T]he disciples say, `Where do you wish that we should prepare for you to eat the passover?' And he then replies, `I have no desire whatsoever to eat this passover meat with you.'" Another source reports this account as a question in which Jesus asks ironically, "Have I desired with desire to eat this flesh of the Passover with you?" ("Gospel of the Ebionites," Interpreter's Dictionary of the Bible, 1962, Vol. 2, p. 5- 6.; The Panarion of Epiphanius of Salamis, 30:22:4, tr. Frank Williams, Book I, p. 137 f.) ... JESUS WAS PRECEDED, FOLLOWED, AND SURROUNDED BY VEGETARIANS Those who preceded Jesus in his tradition—the Pythagoreans, the Essenes, the Therapeutae, and John the Baptist—were vegetarians. Pythagoras may have learned his vegetarianism from Jews in captivity in Babylon or from Buddhist missionaries in the West. Those who followed in Jesus' tradition—the Nazoraeans and the Jerusalem church, his brother James, Simon Peter, Matthew, and the Ebionite Judeo-Christians for four hundred years—were vegetarians. Various eastern orthodox sects were vegetarian up to 200 days per year. Within such a consistently vegetarian tradition, a meat-eating Jesus would be hard to explain. ... Unless vegetarianism went back to Jesus, such an odd practice would never have taken root. ... IF JESUS WERE A VEGETARIAN: What About... WHAT ABOUT THE FISH STORIES? ... Consider the stories of the feeding of the 5,000 men with five loaves of bread and two fish (Mark 6:38; Matthew 14:17) and the story of the feeding of 4,000 men with seven loaves and a few fish. (Matthew 15:34; Mark 8:6.) Fish was not originally on Matthew's menu. Irenaeus, bishop of Lyons (c. 130 to c. 200 A.D.), relying on versions of the gospels older than the ones later canonized by the orthodox gentile church, and from which we read today, twice states that the multitude was fed with bread only. (Irenaeus Against Heresies, 2:22, 2:24, Ante-Nicene Fathers, Roberts and Donaldson, ed., Volume I, p. 391, 395; http://ccel.wheaton.edu/fathers2/ANF-01/.) ... COWBOY CULTURE EXPANDS TO THE NEW WORLD ... Isaac Bashevits Singer, says: If a man has the heart to cut the throat of a chicken or a calf, there's no reason he should not be willing to cut the throat of a man. ("When Keeping Kosher isn't Kosher Enough," New York Times, September 14, 1977, p. 64.) Early American Quaker prophet Thomas Tryon warned Quakers that they should eliminate all violence from their lives, including violence against animals, and become vegetarians, or their experiment would fail. He warned the Quaker settlers that, if they brought up their children to kill animals for food, they might become so accustomed to handling weapons that they would finally be reluctant to renounce their use against their fellow man. (Peter Brock, Pioneers of the Peaceable Kingdom, Princeton University Press, Princeton, N.J., p. 64, quoted by Charles P. Vaclavik, The Vegetarianism of Jesus Christ, p. 2. Certain Quakers went on to participate in the Indian wars, the American revolution against the British, the Civil War, and other American wars, including the Vietnam War. Richard Nixon was a Quaker whose mother spoke to him using the Quaker "thee" and "thou." It seems Tryon was correct.
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