Summary: According to Acts 10:9-16, a voice allegedly told Peter, when he was praying on a rooftop, to kill and eat a sheet of animals handed down from heaven. But Peter declined on the ground that he had never consumed unclean animals. The voice then said thrice, “Do not call anything impure that God has made clean" (Acts 10:15). This article, however, contends that God never wanted Peter to actually kill and eat animals. For, upon entering centurion Cornelius’s house later on, Peter explained that the purpose of the vision was to show that God had cleansed all gentiles and removed the divide between gentiles and Jews (Acts 10:27 NIV). Peter repeated this explanation to the other apostles when he returned home (Acts 11:4-17). Moreover, Peter remained steadfastly vegan throughout his entire life (Clement, Homily 7, Chapt. IV, Homily 12, Chapt. VI), and the command to kill and eat animals contradicted the Jerusalem Councils’ vegan decree (Acts 15:20), which was issued in 50 AD and reiterated to Paul in 56 AD. The story is so contrived and unreal that it is likely a fabrication imposed by the Pauline pro-gentile anti-vegan camp, as argued by Prof. Barrie Wilson (see History Valley 2023). These reasons are explicated in details as follows.
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1. A Command Never Enforced
In the vision, the sheet lowered from heaven to Peter contained ceremonially unclean animals like four-footed animals, reptiles and wild birds, and Peter was told to slaughter and eat them on the ground that what the Lord has cleansed must not be considered profane. Many flesh-eaters have seized upon this story to justify the murder and consumption of innocent creatures of God. But there is good reason to believe the message is not actually a Holy endorsement of meatism; and the whole story may even be fake. There are at least seven grounds for this contention.
Firstly, the command was never executed. Nowhere throughout the Bible is it ever mentioned that Peter ever killed and ate innocent creatures of God.
2. Gentile-Jew Divide Dissolved
Secondly, upon subsequently entering centurion Cornelius’s house, Peter explained to the people inside, “You are well aware that it is against our law for a Jew to associate with or visit a Gentile. But God has shown me that I should not call anyone impure or unclean” (Acts 10:27 NIV). This shows that the animal-sheet vision has nothing to do with food (cf. Hoffman 2017; Bruce 1959); its purpose is only to show Peter that God has cleansed all gentiles and removed the divide between them and Jews (cf. Hoffman 2017; Bruce 1984).
3. Same Explanation Made to the Other Apostles
Thirdly, when Peter returned to his home town Joppa, upon being confronted by his Jewish colleagues about the legitimacy of his entering the house of a Gentile, Peter retold them his animal-sheet vision and convinced them about its true meaning (Acts 11:4-17). Henceforth, Peter and the other ministers spread Jesus Christ's good news to gentiles all over the world without any discrimination or reservation (Acts 11:18-18 NIV).
4. Peter was Staunchly Vegan
Fourthly, Peter remained a vegan throughout his life (Clement, Homily 7, Chapt. IV; Homily 12, Chapt. VI). In Clementine Homily 12, Chapter VI, he reveals that his diet consist of “only bread and olives, and rarely pot-herbs.” In Clementine Homily 7, Chapter IV, Peter emphasizes that the things “well-pleasing to God” include, amongst others, “to abstain from the table of devils not to taste dead flesh.”
5. The Vegan Decree Issued by the Jerusalem Council
Fifthly, in 50 AD, the Jerusalem Council headed by James the Just, Peter and John issued a vegan decree which exempted gentile believers from circumcision and only required them "to abstain from pollutions of idols, and from fornication, and from thing strangled, and from blood" (Acts 15:20). In 56 AD, when Paul appeared before the Jerusalem Council for the last time, the decree was reiterated to him. The decree is a vegan one on the following grounds.
Number one, the prohibition against animals strangled (πνίγω/pniktos) has been perplexing theologians and commentators, for this sort of strangling was literally unheard of in the Middle East in those days and in our modern world (Akers 2020:152). A more likely meaning of the term pniktos is a way of cooking meat, e.g., roasting, baking, stewing or cooking in a rich sauce. I have found that according to Liddell-Scott-Jones's (1843) A Greek-English Lexicon, πνίγω means 1. strangled, 2. air-tight, 3. baked or stewed. The ban on pniktos would then appear to either suggest or even recommend a vegan diet (cf. Akers 2020:152).
Number two, it is at times claimed that the ban on blood is a reference to a kosher rule. But the decree never tells people to abstain from consuming blood; it just tells the believers to abstain from blood. "'Blood' could mean violence against either humans or animals; and some early Christians regarded blood as referring to violence against either humans or animals" (Akers 2020:152).
6. A Fabrication Concocted by the Pauline Anti-Vegan Camp
Sixthly, the animal-sheet vision in Acts (10:9-16) does not sound like Peter at all; the whole story has a peculiarly Pauline smell about it. Besides remaining a vegan for life, Peter actually withdrew from a table of Gentile flesh-eaters when visiting Paul's Antioch church in A.D. 50, immediately after Paul's return from a conference with the vegan Jerusalem Council. And Paul promptly yelled at Peter and accused him of apartheid (Galatians 2:11-14).
On the other hand, Paul argued that eating meat offered to an idol is not immoral, because “an idol is nothing at all” (I Cor. 8:4 NIV); and encourage people to eat any meat sold in the market without questions of conscience (1 Corinthians 10:25). Equally importantly, in Galatians 2:9, Paul reached an agreement with James the Just, Peter and John that Paul and Barnabas should go to the Gentiles while the 12 apostles would go the circumcised (the Jews). Thus not Peter but Paul was particularly keen about preaching to the gentiles.
In fact, Toronto York University Religious Studies Professor Emeritus Barrie A. Wilson, in an interview given to History Valley (2023) remarks that this vision is so contrived that it must be an effort to enforce the Pauline tradition upon all things - “In the book of Acts where Peter has a vision about all sorts of animals coming down from heaven and he can eat all of them. Up till then Peter had been following the dietary laws and all of a sudden… a vision…changes his whole attitude and he now becomes comfortable with a non-Jewish diet. That seems so hokey, and so far-fetched that it just makes one roll the eyes. I think Acts is primary an attempt to impose the Pauline tradition upon everything.”
7. Conclusion
In conclusion, to borrow John Tyler’s (2013) words, "the purpose of Acts 10 was clearly not to encourage Christians to eat meat, and never in Scripture is it implied that it was." The real purpose of the vision, if it ever existed, “was to show Jewish believers that the fullness of God’s Kingdom is available even unto the Gentiles” (Tyler 2013). So much the more, as Peter remained staunchly vegan throughout his life, this vision is likely a forgery implanted by the Pauline pro-gentile, anti-vegan camp, as Acts of the Apostles was written by Pauls’ underling Luke. Thus, put down your evil knives; follow the Vegan Christ!
References
Akers, Keith (2000/2020). The Lost Religion of Jesus. New York: Woodstock & Brooklyn.
Bruce, F.F. (1959). The Book of the Acts. Grand Rapids/Michigan: William B Eerdmans Publishing Co.
Clement (1886/2023). Homilies. Trans. by Peter Peterson. From Roberts, Alexander, Donaldson, James and Coxe, A. Cleverland (1886) eds., Ante-Nicene Fathers, Vol. 8, Buffalo, NY: Christian Literature Publishing Co. Revised and ed. for New Advent by Kevin Knight (2023). https://www.newadvent.org/fathers/0808.htm
History Valley (2023). “Paul Vs. James: The Battle That Shaped Christianity and Changed the World | Dr. Barrie A. Wilson.” YouTube channel History Valley, May 31. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fGgpOYf5gzM&list=FLnIswVET4MPwoMGrfuCTrMw&index=6
Hoffman, Frank L. (2017). "Acts 10:1-11:18 - The True Meaning of the Vision of the Animals in the Sheet". All-Creatures. Org. https://www.all-creatures.org/discuss/svtacts10.1-11.18-flh.html
John, Tyler (2013). "Towards a Theologically-motivated Veganism." https://www.academia.edu/6504500/Toward_a_Theologically_motivated_Vegetarianism
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