Is Food Dirty? Can Food be Unclean?

How the food laws help inform our relationship with food today.

So, as we as Christians attempt to appropriate the lessons of Leviticus 11, the fundamental lessons for us there are not what hygienic or health-related advantages we might get from following the dietary practices of the ancient Hebrews; but the principle for us is: how are we to be holy in this ungodly world? How are we to be in the world but not of it? — Ligon Duncan III

“Seed Oils Act Like a Death Accelerant.” 

New morning sunlight trickled in over my shoulder as I blinked and looked closer at the Instagram post on my phone. I flipped through the images in the carousel post. “Cheaply processed oils change our bodies’ chemistry in ways that breed every disease you can name.” “Eating a typical 5 oz. serving of most restaurant fries which are almost always cooked in vegetable oils equates to the toxicity of smoking 20 to 25 cigarettes.”

Years ago, this post would have sent me into a spiral. When an app told me all of my toiletries were full of cancer-inducing toxins, I broke down in tears fearing for my own health, the health of my future children, and the thought of buying all new expensive products on a single income. 

Someone commented on this post labelling it as “fear mongering” (which I heartily agree with), while somebody else commented back that that was just an excuse to not do the hard work of eating well and creating a healthy diet for our kids. According to them, fear is the right response to such information. 

Should we live in fear that our food is poisoning us, especially when some of us are barely getting by on non-organic and processed granola bars in our kids’ lunches? 

Stand with me at Mount Sinai while the voice of God booms above like thunder around a mountain full of smoke. We’re Israelites who have left Egypt and our leader Moses has disappeared for days on end upon that very mountain. But when he returned, he came with laws on living with this fearsome deity who washed away the Egyptians like grains of sand off a shirt. With our sandals in the desert dunes, let’s listen to the food laws of the Old Testament. 

But first, let’s define “clean” eating.

Defining “Unclean”

As I did leg lifts and crunches, my Pilates instructor taught us about clean eating. She reiterated over and over again how little value the bicep curls we did were if we didn’t also eat clean. But what defined “clean eating”? 

“There are a lot of variations to clean eating; but, basically, it refers to eating foods that are as close as possible to their natural state. This encourages us to make our meals from scratch to make them as ‘clean’ as possible . . . consuming foods rich in nutrient content directly from the earth that have not been overly processed.”¹ Dirty or unclean foods by this standard are overly processed or high in pesticides and certain chemicals that are defined as “toxic” by clean eating gurus and companies. 

Is this terminology helpful, though? Registered dietician Abby Langer says NO. 

Ever notice how many diets persuade us to shun foods that are “toxic” and “bad” in favor of “clean” and “good”? We label any sort of ultraprocessed food as bad, but why? You probably don’t want to base your entire diet on them, but dirty? Nope. Food is not laundry. It’s not “clean” or “dirty.” To assign it those words is to condemn the nourishment that sustains our lives. It also deems those who make the “wrong” food choices as lesser, which is elitist and morally wrong.²

Or, as a counselor once put it to me, food never committed any crime, so why the moral labels on it? This kind of language turns eating into a moral conundrum—Am I harming my family? Am I sinning?—rather than the God-glorifying act of enjoying his grace, caring for our bodies, and building more intimate relationships. 

This is where I found myself in my graduating year of high school and my first year of college. When my birthday came, my college friends bought me a fruit tray instead of a cake like they had for the others—not because they liked me less or didn’t want to put in the extra dollars, but because they knew the grief I’d cause myself if I had what I truly wanted: An ice cream cake from Dairy Queen. 

Whenever I ate something “unclean,” my heart burned with guilt and shame. I could not enjoy a single, fresh-out-of-the-oven cookie or my favorite apple pie at thanksgiving without later fending off a panic attack. I ruined my body! I undid all the hard work I put into it making it clean! I cheated yet again on good food with bad food. What must others think of me? What must God think of me—that I can’t exercise self-control when offered a fudgy ice cream sundae? 

Remember, food is for glorifying God by fueling our bodies and enjoying his grace and growing in relationships with our fellow humans. Do you see any of that happening here? “We need to arrive at a space where eating certain foods is not a guilty pleasure, but instead is just plain pleasure.”³

If the health gurus tell us to get rid of what they define as unclean foods because they are poisoning our families, why did God call certain creatures unclean and detestable when during the creation account he called them good? But then thousands of years later he corrected Peter for using such terminology, to not call what God had created good “impure.” Seems confusing, perhaps even contradictory. 

We must first consider the Noahic covenant. In the Noahic covenant, all things are given to everyone under common grace, and God promises never to wipe out all humanity in this way again. But the Mosaic covenant (in which the food laws are given) is like a parenthesis within redemptive history in which God calls Israel to be his chosen people, and by being his chosen people they must look different from the nations. They were his set apart people and they should look different. One of those ways they were to be set apart was through dietary laws. The food and table were meant to teach Israel about their covenant, holy Lord in very specific ways.

Directed Gaze

Speak to the people of Israel, saying, These are the living things that you may eat among all the animals that are on the earth. Whatever parts the hoof and is cloven-footed and chews the cud, among the animals, you may eat. Nevertheless, among those that chew the cud or part the hoof, you shall not eat these: The camel, because it chews the cud but does not part the hoof, is unclean to you. And the rock badger, because it chews the cud but does not part the hoof, is unclean to you. And the hare, because it chews the cud but does not part the hoof, is unclean to you. And the pig, because it parts the hoof and is cloven-footed but does not chew the cud, is unclean to you. You shall not eat any of their flesh, and you shall not touch their carcasses; they are unclean to you. (Lev. 11:2–8)

At first glance, the animals chosen and not chosen can seem quite arbitrary. What does it matter if it chews the cud or doesn’t part the hoof? Perhaps the health gurus’ advice seems a lot more logical. 

But to understand this particular group of animals, you need to consider the animals that were offered as sacrifices—oxen, sheep, and goats. The quadruped animals they were allowed to eat mirrored the animals they were allowed to offer. In this way, every animal they ate pointed them back to their holy God and the sacrificial system. They could eat what God “eats,” a reflection of the command to be holy as the Lord is holy. 

Similarly, the clean water animals pointed back to the sacrificial system. Just as the animals offered could have no defects, so the water animals had to be a normal class fish with scales and fins, and therefore not strange or defective. 

Permeated with Death

And these you shall detest among the birds; they shall not be eaten; they are detestable: the eagle, the bearded vulture, the black vulture, the kite, the falcon of any kind, every raven of any kind, the ostrich, the nighthawk, the sea gull, the hawk of any kind, the little owl, the cormorant, the short-eared owl, the barn owl, the tawny owl, the carrion vulture, the stork, the heron of any kind, the hoopoe, and the bat. (Lev. 11:13–19)

Consider the birds listed here: what do they have in common? All the unclean birds are predators—birds that swoop down, crush bones, and tear flesh. Birds they are allowed to eat are domesticated and don’t kill other animals to eat, just like the sacrificial animals such as doves. Violent deaths are impure, sinful, and a part of the curse, which is likely why God deemed the predatory birds unclean. Anything that reflects death is considered unclean in the Old Testament laws because death itself is the result of the curse. God wanted to create a bit of Eden among his people that would refract his life and goodness to the unbelieving world. 

Israel must also honor life among themselves, even among the animals; they must not violently kill like the birds of prey, but humanely and respectfully. This law came as a reminder of the kindness they must show to even the creatures they ruled over (Deut. 25:4; Prov. 12:10) and God’s hatred for murder of any kind.

Disorder Abounded

All winged insects that go on all fours are detestable to you. Yet among the winged insects that go on all fours you may eat those that have jointed legs above their feet, with which to hop on the ground. Of them you may eat: the locust of any kind, the bald locust of any kind, the cricket of any kind, and the grasshopper of any kind. But all other winged insects that have four feet are detestable to you . . . And these are unclean to you among the swarming things that swarm on the ground: the mole rat, the mouse, the great lizard of any kind, the gecko, the monitor lizard, the lizard, the sand lizard, and the chameleon. These are unclean to you among all that swarm. Whoever touches them when they are dead shall be unclean until the evening. (Lev. 11:20–23, 29–31)

Think back to the beginning days of creation, before anything was created at all. “The earth was without form and void, and darkness was over the face of the deep.” “Without form” refers to confusion, unreality, emptiness, and places of chaos. It’s used nineteen times in the Old Testament, referring to wastelands and empty idols that can do nothing for us, and the dark void that is space. God is the God of order, and he brought order from that swarming chaos. 

Theologians believe that the swarming creatures listed above are considered unclean because they reflect this disorder and disobedience. He named them detestable because of their disorderly swarming and bottom-feeding, associating them with the curse or what was before the goodness of creation. 

Some of these creatures also represent confusion in how they operate; they have legs but they also fly. God gave the exception to locusts and crickets because they don’t fly, they simply hop, acting according to their created order, but the others take on both flying and hopping, creating confusion in what they are and their purpose. In a way, this reflects disobedience. “[God] forbids them from eating swarming creatures of any type, for such disobedience makes them detestable in his sight.”⁴ It’s this chaos that God wanted the Israelites to see and stay away from because it did not represent the orderliness that God brings and creates. 

What Christ Accomplished

In light of all this, what purpose did the food laws serve? Every time an Israelite prepared a meal or a person felt the pangs of hunger in their stomach, the dietary laws came to the front of their minds and reminded them that their only way to have a relationship with God was by obeying his law. If their meals did not line up with what God laid out in the law, they would waste away. 

These laws not only help us better understand the Old Testament and the dietary laws the Jews had to abide by, but in grasping these laws, our hearts can only be compelled to rejoice all the more in the work Christ accomplished on our behalf and in so repealing them. 

The food laws once separated Israel from the world, setting them aside as God’s child to represent him before the onlooking world. “When YHWH had separated Israel from the nations, he purposed to separate Israel from the sinfulness of the nations—the pollution of idolatry, for example—so that, eventually, as a royal priesthood, Israel might serve as a mediator between holy YHWH and the unclean nations.”⁵ These food laws made a distinction between Israel and the rest of the world. L. Michael Morales explains, “Every meal served as a reminder of God’s election of Israel out of the nations, but also of Israel’s call—to be a holy people. The food laws thus became a sign of Israel’s identity and calling, a wall of separation between Israel and the nations.”⁶

Yet now, in the New Covenant, all people are welcome, and what sets us apart is the work of Christ, not our own works. Both Jews and Gentiles are welcome in God’s family. All things (and, therefore, all people) should be considered clean. All food can be eaten with thanksgiving! This is what God sought to teach Peter through his vision in Acts 10:9–16.

Peter had been traveling with other believers, and once they neared the city, he went onto a roof to pray. It was noon, and he felt those hunger pains we all feel squeeze in our stomachs. Only his hunger pains brought to mind the laws he had known since being a small child—no matter how hungry you were, you did not even touch those ritually unclean critters. Peter was a Jew with a clean mouth; he had never eaten anything impure or unclean. 

It’s in this hunger, in these memories, that Jesus crafts a vision before Peter’s weary eyes. The heavens opened and a large sheet lowered before him by its four corners. Wrapped inside this sheet scuttled, flapped, and squawked uncleanliness of every kind—disorder, chaos, and death reeked in this sheet. Yet a heavenly voice said to Peter, “Get up, Peter; kill and eat.”

We often rush through these stories from knowing them so well, yet pause with me and put yourself in Peter’s sandals. Think of all those laws we just meditated on. Think of what they represented to the Jewish person. Imagine living a life you have always known to be the way of righteousness and intimacy with God to now be irradicated in a single six-word sentence. Do you hear Peter’s voice with a bit more pity? “No, Lord! I have never eaten anything impure or ritually unclean.”

This is what Christ has freed us from. 

In his grace, God replayed this vision for Peter three times. Likely even then Peter still felt a sickening feeling in his stomach that wasn’t related to hunger. Perhaps this is why God gave a vision to a Gentile the day before about Peter and sent Peter to that Gentile’s house to witness his salvation. 

These dietary laws were a work-based system, but in Christ, we are saved by grace. For the food laws to be undone, finished, and accomplished in Jesus means that the requirements for holiness are finished and met. Christ fulfilled these laws perfectly with his holy life. We don’t need to become holy by the law but by Christ and faith in him.

We can confuse our own food laws with salvation. We think that by eating clean (or cleaner than the next person) that we’re doing better than our sister in Christ. We see ourselves as holier because we are caring for our family better than the mom with sugar-laden peanut butter in her grocery cart. Or perhaps we do the opposite and shame ourselves because we aren’t raising a hobby farm that produces everything we need for our kitchen table. 

The work of Christ is here for that too. You aren’t saved by your clean eating and God never even required it of you. He calls you to something better, something more freeing. 

How We Apply the Dietary Laws

Like the Israelites, we are to be set apart and holy. People see that in how we treat our bodies and how we eat, and we want them to see that our bodies are temples of the Holy Spirit. Through the food laws, God is telling everyone that our bodies are not our own but belong to him, and thus we must strive to glorify him through them (1 Cor. 6:19–20). Yes, the food laws were abolished, and God has deemed all food good and pure to eat, but he still says to us that “whether you eat or drink, or whatever you do, do all to the glory of God” (1 Cor. 10:31). 

God has given us this abundant freedom to eat however we see best for our families and bodies so long as it glorifies him. Where we may have felt shame and angst over food dyes, seed oils, sugars, fats, or carbs, God says to us as he did to Peter: Do not call dirty or impure what I have called good and clean. Do not call it poison. Do not shame your sister in Christ for feeding Cheerios to her baby. No more fear mongering to sell “healthier” products. 

Our diet is meant to set us apart as those who love the Lord, love one another, and believe in the goodness of his creation and mercy of his common grace. When we spend time in shame or anxiously over-reading food labels, we reveal to the world that we have little faith in our God’s grace. When we look down our noses at or spread our fears to our Christian siblings, we reveal that food has become a means of control and pride rather than a joyful gift from God for nourishing these bodies he gave us and bringing him glory. 

Clean or dirty? It’s all his. Choose today how you will serve him with your body and diet.

1. Eileen Dutter RD, “Clean eating: What does that mean?,” Mayo Clinic Health System, September 12, 2019, accessed December 4, 2024, https://www.mayoclinichealthsystem.org/hometown-health/speaking-of-health/clean-eating-what-does-that-mean.

2. Abby Langer RD, Good Food, Bad Diet: The Habits You Need to Ditch Diet Culture, Lose Weight, and Fix Your Relationship with Food Forever (Toronto, Ontario, Canada: Simon & Schuster Canada, 2021), 2.

3. Langer, Good Food, Bad Diet, 3.

4. Michael Reeves, Systematic Theology Study Bible: Theology Rooted in the Word of God, ed. Christopher W. Morgan, Robert A. Peterson, and Stephen J. Vellum (Wheaton, Illinois, United States of America: Crossway, 2017), 123.

5. L. Michael Morales, Who Shall Ascend the Mountain of the Lord?: A Biblical Theology of the Book of Leviticus, ed. D. A. Carson (Downers Grove, Illinois, United States of America: InterVarsity Press, 2015), 162.

6. Morales, Who Shall Ascend the Mountain of the Lord?: A Biblical Theology of the Book of Leviticus, 163.