H. D. R. Jameson
Deuteronomy 14
4. These are the beasts which ye shall eat: the ox, the sheep...
6. And every beast that parteth the hoof, and cleaveth the cleft into two claws, and cheweth the cad among the beasts, that ye shall eat.
7. Nevertheless these ye shall not eat of them that chew the cud or of them that divide the cloven hoof; as the camel, and the hare, and the coney: for they chew the cud, but divide not the hoof; therefore they are unclean unto you.
8. And the swine, because it divideth the hoof, yet cheweth not the cud, it is unclean unto you:...
9. These ye shall eat of all that are in the waters: all that have fins and scales shall ye eat.
10. And whatsoever hath not fins and scales ye may not eat: it is unclean unto you.
11. Of all clean birds ye shall eat.
12-18. But these are they of which ye shall not eat; the eagle... the vulture... the owl, and the night hawk... and the bat.
19. And every creeping thing that flieth is unclean unto you: they shall not be eaten.
No portion of the inspired Word is ever obsolete: unchanging as the God it reveals, it sheds its enlightening rays on the path of the believer in all ages. Indeed its course is like that of the just: it “shineth more and more unto the perfect day,” so that what was but dimly understood at the outset is now resplendent with heavenly significance to those “upon whom the ends of the world are come” (1 Cor. 10:11).
To the unbeliever whose darkness has not been lightened, as has ours, through grace, such a chapter as that which we here consider possesses no present meaning or value; but to us are given two keys, which, used in dependence upon the Spirit’s guidance, cause the Scriptures to yield to us of their rich and varied store.
The first is that Christ is the One who is before the mind of the Spirit in all the Scriptures: of Him they are full, He is the theme and burden of the whole, and no part is rightly understood save as it is looked at in relation to Himself (John 5:39; Luke 24:27). The second key is this: “Whatsoever things were written, aforetime were written for our learning.” That does not mean that we are to interpret Old Testament Scriptures relating directly and primarily to Israel as though they immediately contemplated the Church — which indeed they do not. But they are there for our learning, (all of them, “whatsoever things were written afore-time”), and precious is their teaching.
Let us seek now to apply these two keys to the understanding of the teaching of the chapter from which leading verses are quoted above.
For Israel we have direct instruction as to what living creatures were “clean” in the sight of God — what He could approve; what they might eat of; what (in a more limited way) they might offer in sacrifice. This was typical, as was also the history of Israel (cf. 1 Cor. 10:11). Things then ordained were but a “shadow of good things to come” (Heb. 10:1).
In what is stated distinctively of all that which was “clean” in Jehovah’s sight, we have Christ brought before us in that which was pre-eminently and perfectly true in Him — the contemplation of this is food to our souls: of this we may eat. At the same time we have the traits presented which are pleasing in man generally as under the eye of God in an evil world, and here is instruction for our path. These are “things that please Him” (John 8:29).
Separation in the Power of Good.
Throughout Scripture the feet, when viewed typically, are identified with the pathway or course of a man in this world (compare Psa. 119:105), and so the feature first treated of is the hoof; and here at once, in verse 6, we have “division,” or “separation,” brought into prominence: an animal which God could account “clean” must have a divided hoof. That is but a shadow or type, but it is a shadow or type of a reality. When by the word of God light appeared in Genesis 1, then, immediately, darkness is put in contrast, and we get it stated “God divided the light from the darkness.” This is a principle that runs through all the Word of God, and which will have its ultimate issue when God by the “great gulf fixed” makes the stupendous division between good and evil, which at the “great white throne” is consummated and determined as final and eternal (Rev. 20).
Meantime the same principle of separation is to govern us. As to iniquity itself, the scripture saith: “Let everyone that nameth the name of Christ depart from iniquity”(2 Tim. 2:19); and as to some given up to its sway: “Come out from among them and be ye separate, saith the Lord” (2 Cor. 6:14-18).
But the “clean” animal not only divides the hoof, but also chews the cud; that is to say, this is not to be a mere outward separation as that of the Pharisees, or of the merely natural separatists contemplated in Jude 19: it is to be a separation produced by inward acceptance and appreciation of the precious truth of God — the truth received in the heart, meditated on there (which answers to “chewing the cud”), and brought into practice in a separation from iniquity, which is carried out in the power of what is good, inwardly known and enjoyed. This it is which alone is pleasing in the sight of God.
How perfectly is all this exemplified in Christ, the “blessed” Man of Psalm 1, who is seen, in verse 1, as to what is outward, as the Man that “walketh not in the counsel of the ungodly, nor standeth in the way of sinners, nor sitteth in the seat of the scornful”; and as to what is inward, it is said in verse 2, “but His delight is in the law of the Lord, and in His law doth He meditate day and night.”
Many are occupied with what is merely negative, that is, with “separation from evil,” but this is useless, and worse, if it does not go along with, and proceed from the enjoyment and power of positive truth. This is emphasized by the instruction that an animal even with a divided hoof was not “clean” if it were without also the other equally important typical feature of chewing the cud.
Amongst the latter class were “swine” (verse 8); and here we may remark on the perfect unity of Holy Scripture, for when, in the epistle of Peter, some are brought before us Who were not really converted, but had professed and even attempted a separation from the pollutions of the world, which did not proceed from a heart right with God, the simile which describes their retrogression to their own proper state is that of the return of a “sow that was washed to her wallowing in the mire.”
Separation, then, in its true and divinely pleasing aspect, is of the character contemplated by Moses when he prayed:
If Thy presence go not with me, carry us not up hence. For wherein shall it be known here that I and Thy people have found grace in Thy sight? is it not in that Thou goest with us? SO SHALL WE BE SEPARATED, I and Thy people from all people that are upon the face of the earth (Exod. 33:16).
For the New Testament counterpart to this see 1 Corinthians 14:24, 25:
But if all prophesy, and there come in one that believeth not, or one unlearned, he is convinced of all, he is judged of all:
And thus the secrets of his heart are made manifest; and so falling down on his face he will worship God, and report that God is in you of a truth.
Here in the abundance of that which is for “edification, and exhortation, and comfort” (1 Cor. 14:3) the presence of God with them is manifest even to the unbeliever; and those so marked are thus separated essentially in the power of good.
Remarkable is the contrast to this in Proverbs 18:1-2: —
The separatist seeketh after his own pleasure; against all that is beneficial he showeth his teeth.
The fool hath no delight in understanding; but only that his heart may reveal itself therein. (Delitzsch’s translation.)
Here no thought of the edification and good of others is present: the separatist treads a path of separation in pursuit of that which is pleasing in his own eyes, his own separate view and cherished ideas; whilst to all that is really beneficial his mind is opposed. The moral source of this is seen in verse 2: he who is there contemplated has not the necessary second mark of that which is “clean,” that is, that of “chewing the cud”; he delights not in good, in understanding itself; indeed in it he perceives no gain saving in so far as it may serve the end of self exaltation.
Thus we have divinely portrayed for us both the character and source of that merely schismatic separation which is an abhorrence to God, and also in bright contrast that energy of positive good which essentially separates those in whom it is active, according to God.
Reverting to our chapter we note that on the other hand there might be the chewing of the cud without the dividing of the hoof (verse 7). Such also were “unclean” in the sight of Jehovah. The possession of light but adds to man’s condemnation if he be not thereby affected and separated from what is unsuitable, to the One from whence that light proceeds.
Movement
Now as to what were in the waters: in verse 9 we read, “These shall ye eat of all that are in the waters: all that have fins and scales shall ye eat: and whatsoever hath not fins and scales may ye not eat; it is unclean unto you.”
The caudal fin, or tail, is the principal organ of locomotion in the fish, whilst the dorsal and ventral fins serve to balance it in the water that it may pursue a directed course; the scales form the protective covering of the whole body. Bearing in mind these simple uses of the distinctive and well known features brought before us here by the Spirit, we may pass to the consideration of the obvious typical teaching of these verses.
The waters in Scripture (in their wide aspect, as seas, etc.), typify the peoples (Rev. 17:1.5). The living creatures found in the waters were only “clean” in the sight of God — speaking always in the typical sense — if they were marked by two things: firstly movement not aimless movement, as the motion of a jellyfish drifting with the tides, but directed movement in an ordered course; and secondly, an efficient protective covering.
It is thus with the people of God. They are found in the midst of men, and their lot is to pass in and out amongst men in the pursuit of their daily duties and the ordinary affairs of life, but if they are to be pleasing in the sight of God they must be marked by these two things, the first of which is movement. This is a principle which obtains all through the believer’s pathway. When Israel began their history with God as a redeemed people, by eating the Passover in the land of Egypt, they did so with loins girded, shoes on their feet, and staff in their hand; and that very night, delivered from judgment, and enriched with plenty, they began to journey towards the promised land — “the children of Israel journeyed” (Ex. 12:37). Thenceforward movement was to characterize them, not settling down in any place short of the Promised Land. True, they wandered a good proportion of the years, but that was through unbelief; it was not the divine thought for them. When we reach the point in Israel’s typical history, at which they beheld the brazen serpent and reached the springing well, then immediately we read of their “setting forward” and “journeying,” and from that point the record of their successive encampments (Num. 21:10-20) reveals persistent unwavering movement, stage by stage, in as nearly as possible a bee line for the outposts of the promised land; and victory marked their progress (verses 21-34).
The Christian is not to settle down here, is not to drift aimlessly through life; but his loins are to be girded, and he himself is to be marked by movement — movement in an ordered and directed course, a course marked out for us by the blessed Lord Himself (for in Him all that should mark the Christian shines most perfectly); and the issue of that path is glorious (Heb. 12:1, 2). Paul too, with Christ before him, could write “One thing I do, forgetting those things which are behind, and reaching forth unto those things which are before, I press toward the mark for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus;” and then he urges others to be “thus minded” (Phil. 3:13-16).
Protection
Then the second point is protection from what is without. Now the Christian needs this. He is in an evil world, and he needs what answers to “scales” in the verse before us — that which will protect him from the seductive influences of all that is around. In what does this consist? Not in a set of rules; law could never form an efficient protection, and the Christian is not under law but under grace.
What then? Look at 1 John 2. We read: “These things write I unto you that ye sin not.” That is not mere prohibition of sin, not a statement simply that he was writing to them with direction that they should not sin. In chapter 1, of that epistle we have a marvelous unfolding of eternal life made known to men in Christ, and brought before us in Him for our souls’ communion. There is opened up to us fellowship with the Father and the Son that our joy may be full, and, along with that, other privileges which belong to those “in the light” (as all “begotten of God” are) — namely, fellowship one with another, with the knowledge of perfect cleansing. It is in the power of the positive good and blessing here unfolded that the Christian is kept from sin. These things were written to them that they might not sin, for in the present possession of heavenly joys the pleasures of sin lose their attractive force, and the Christian is preserved.
This will be perfectly exemplified in the heavenly city by and by: its gates are never closed, yet “there shall in no wise enter into it anything that defileth;” there is “no night there,” and evil is absolutely excluded in the expansive and expulsive power of positive good, for the glory of God doth lighten it, and the Lamb is the light thereof (Rev. 21:23-27).
Then, as always, for supreme exemplification we turn to Christ Himself, who could say “the prince of this world cometh and hath nothing in Me” (John 14:30). In Him absolutely and always was there the perfect intolerance of evil in the power of perfect good.
Light and Love
Next in order we come to the birds. These were all “clean,” save some specially enumerated. These latter all appear to possess one or more of three outstanding characteristics, that is, they are either birds of prey, as the eagle, vulture, and kite; birds of night, as the night-hawk, great owl, and bat; or birds of foul and unclean habits, as the lapwing (or hoopoo).
The birds that were unclean show by contrast that which in the believer is pleasing in the sight of God. He feeds not on the dead, as do vultures and the like, nor is his pleasure in that which is foul, as the lapwing: his food is Christ, the living bread, and his delight is in the things that are lovely, that are honest, that are of good report (Phil. 4:8). He is not of the night, but is a child of light, and belongs to the coming day towards which his eager footsteps ever press, “looking for and hasting unto the coming of the day of God” (2 Peter 3:12).
He lives not at the expense of others, as do birds of prey. Divine love has reached him at infinite cost to itself, and, learning in his measure the lessons of that love, he begins himself to live, first, unto Him who died for him and rose again, and second, for the good of others — to give, not to get; to spend and be spent. “He that loveth not knoweth not God, for God is love” (1 John 4:8).
“Things Above”
Lastly we have the creeping things that fly (or were winged). These were all unclean. The characteristics of those typified under the figure of creeping things, may readily be recognized in the following lament of the apostle Paul when writing to the Philippians. “Many walk, of whom I have told you often, and now tell you even weeping, that they are the enemies of the cross of Christ; whose end is destruction, whose god is their belly, and whose glory is in their shame, who mind earthly things.”
The parallel passage, Leviticus 11, intimates that there were certain exceptions to the rule that all such creeping things were “unclean”: yet the exceptions but serve to emphasize the typical teaching of that which was written, for these exceptions were marked as having “legs above their feet to leap withal upon the earth,” as the locust and grasshopper (verses 21 and 22). These possessed a length of limb which enabled them to leap, to rise above the earth. Thus it is with the believer: though on the earth and found in exactly the same earthly relationships and circumstances as the unbeliever, yet he possesses in the Spirit’s power the ability to rise far above the things of earth and enter into that which is spiritual and invisible: as “risen with Christ,” he is able to have his mind on “those things which are above, where Christ sitteth on the right hand of God” (Col. 3:1, 2), yea, through the Lord Jesus Christ and by that same Spirit he has access even to the Father (Eph. 2:18).
May the Lord give us to seek that which is thus brought before us as “well pleasing in His sight”: the separate path in the power of good; constant and definite movement in the ordered course; the expansive and expulsive power of heavenly joys; the unselfish life in this, the world’s night, along with an eager outgoing of heart to the coming day; and with, lastly, the soul’s present home in that which is above and beyond all that is merely of earth.
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The Green Pastures
“Oh that we used a wholesome frugality in our reading of uninspired books and tracts, and that we possessed a healthy appetite for the nutritious and strengthening Word of God! That we would not confine ourselves to our favorite chapters, but launch out into the free, majestic, infinite ocean of Scripture! That we fed on the green pastures, so spacious and so varied! Let me entreat the young especially to read the whole Scripture, copiously, regularly, and systematically.”
Have Faith in God
“I was writing to a friend in Canada whom I knew to be a true servant of the Lord working in entire dependence upon Him, when it occurred to me that he might be in need; I took my pocketbook out and found that a two-dollar bill was all it contained, and moreover that was all that I possessed, so I put it back, saying,” I shall need that myself.”
But I could not shake off the thought that had laid hold of me, and as I was enjoying the hospitality of a friend at the time and so had no immediate need, I put the bill in the letter and carried it unsealed to the post. On reaching the post-office it was evident to me that it must go, so I sealed it and dropped it into the letter-box. I had no sooner done so when a cheery voice said “Good morning, glad to see you, but I can’t stay,” and with a hearty shake of the hand he disappeared, he left something in my hand, however, which on examination proved to be a two-dollar bill.
The one to whom that bill was sent replied that it came to him just at a moment when he was being sorely tempted to doubt God’s care of him, and that it had turned his doubts to praise.”
In all circumstances make God the great circumstance.