Is it true that the Bible forbids shellfish? Why?

Answer 1

The Mosaic food regulations also forbid shellfish and other sea foods. Again, this is a common source of food poisoning. Many shellfish are filter-feeding bivalves which strain minute particles from the water as their food source. A particularly rich source of food particles today is untreated marine sewage outfalls! The potential for contamination by human pathogens is the reason for current regulations regarding the treatment of shellfish which are intended for human consumption. This entails keeping them in clean seawater for a specified period in order to allow them to clear the contaminated material from their guts. Shellfish need careful cooking to eliminate pathogens, which doesn't quite square with the fashion to eat oysters raw and alive!

The code which the Law of Moses applies to determine what is allowed is simple and effective:
"Of all the creatures living in the water of the seas and the streams, you may eat any that have fins and scales.

But all creatures in the seas and streams that do not have fins and scales... you are to detest... you must not eat their meat...
Anything living in the water that does not have fins and scales is to be detestable to you."
Leviticus 11:9-12

This simple rule excludes all mussels, oysters, clams, whelks, winkles and also lobsters, crabs, prawns, shrimps etc. but allows normal "fish". It seems that strict observance by Jews excludes eels since, although they have evident fins, their scales are too small to be seen with the naked eye!

Answer 2

It forbids a few different types of animals. Some of them were likely for health reasons and some were strictly for the purpose of making Jews distinct from other people by their dietary laws. With no refrigeration shellfish likely did not keep well, pigs dogs and other omnivores/carnivores likely were loaded with parasites. Everything from mange through to tapeworms that can be lethal.
Generally carnivores incuding birds are on the banned list and it does make sense. Banning rats and other rodents makes sense, rabbits are included. Even today in Arizona rabbits are still one of the reservoirs for bubonic plague, and tuleremia. It is possible that they had no idea how the diseases worked but only knew that people who ate such stuff often got sick and got much sicker than those who did not eat them.
If you read the rules you also find a collection on how to handle dead animals and what to do with them.

The natives on the California coast had rules against eating shellfish at certain times of the year and actually posted guards in the routes to the ocean to warn people coming from the inland areas not to eat them. They might not have understood what red tide was but the knew the symptoms of paralytic shellfish poisoning and if they had similar problems in the middle east it would likely have been noticed.

Answer 3

Well, there is some sense in not eating shellfish, since they scavenge from the wastes of other creatures and from dead animals on the sea floor. Why it is considered a sin that is punishable by death, however, is not explained. People eat all sorts of things they shouldn't, but you don't see any biblical laws against candy, chips, or fast food. You'd think the Almighty Omnimax Creator of Everything would have foreseen the need for such rules and included them just to be proactive.

Oh, and have you noticed how hardly any Christians obey that law? They base their persecution of homosexuals on O.T. biblical laws, ignoring that those same laws forbid the eating of shellfish, which they eat whenever they go to Red Lobster or Long John Silver's. Hypocrites, as usual.

Answer 4

The idea that all revealed truth is to be found in "66 books" is not only not in Scripture, it is contradicted by Scripture (1 Corinthians 11:2, 2 Thessalonians 2:15, 2 Thessalonians 3:6, 1 Timothy 3:15, 2 Peter 1:20-21, 2 Peter 3:16).

It is a concept unheard of in the Old Testament, where the authority of those who sat on the Chair of Moses (Matthew 23:2-3) existed.

In addition to this, for 400 years, there was no defined canon of "Sacred Scripture" aside from the Old Testament; there was no "New Testament"; there was only Tradition and non-canonical books and letters.

Our Lord founded a Church (Matthew 16:18-19), not a book, which was to be the pillar and ground of Truth (1 Timothy 3:15).

We can know what this Church teaches by looking not only at Sacred Scripture, but into History and by reading what the earliest Christians have written, what those who've sat on the Chair of Peter have spoken consistently with Scripture and Tradition, and what they've solemnly defined.

To believe that the Bible is our only source of Christian Truth is unbiblical and illogical.


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Answer 5

It is in the Old Testament in the Jewish dietary laws. It is because shell fish are bottom feeding scavangers. Just like the law regarding the consumption of pork, it was given to protect the Jews from illnesses associated with such consumption. (ie trichinosis from poorly cooked pork). However, Christians are not bound by these dietary laws. God told the Apostle Peter in a vision to stop calling "unclean" what God now called "clean".

Answer 6

That was for the Israelites. Not us. However, shellfish are supposedly unhealthy. When reading the Bible ask, who?, what?, where?, when? and why?

Answer 7

It was recorded as part of the Jewish Kosher laws.
Shellfish, including lobsters, were considered unclean.
It was probably because someone got sick from them.
Just as pork was considered to be from an unclean animal.
They had no understanding of bacteria in those days.
So if someone got sick or died, they interpreted it as God.

Answer 8

According to Leviticus it is an abomination.

Leviticus also contains my favorite scripture of the bible.

Leviticus 20:9 Any child that curses his mother or his father shall be put to death.

Evidently the biblical monster not only approves of, he demands we kill our kids for cursing us.

Answer 9

YES, in the OT it 's under the law of moses which we are not under anymore.
BUT ever since i read why I can't eat shrimp. I'm grossed out by shrimp and lobster...alassss...

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Answer 10

God's law given to Israel may have. However, the death of Jesus put an end to that law. Christians today live under a "new covenant".