This week at Sukkot, Frank Houtz taught a series that included a segment about dream interpretation in Scripture. One particular part tickled me…. (and, is a great lesson in hermeneutics.)
Generally, Christendom defends eating whatever they want, clean or unclean, by referring to Peter’s vision in Acts 10. Unfortunately, to arrive at that interpretation, one has to violate a principle of hermeneutics that says the dream or vision is not itself the interpretation, rather the interpretation given in Scripture is the literal meaning of the dream or vision. To explain, Peter’s vision is not the literal meaning, rather, Acts 10:28 is the literal interpretation of his vision. Acts 10:28 says,
Acts 10:28 And he said to them, “You yourselves know how unlawful it is for a man who is a Jew to associate with a foreigner or to visit him; and yet God has shown me that I should not call any man common or unclean.
Scripture defines for us exactly what the vision means and we can take it no further by implying some other meaning contrary to established Scripture, both present and future.
To believe the dream or vision is itself the interpretation is pretty absurd, because we would have to maintain the same rule throughout Scripture. Here is where I got tickled.
“Farmers should be afraid, very afraid of mixing skinny cows with fat cows!!”
Gen. 41:1-4 Now it happened at the end of two full years that Pharaoh had a dream, and behold, he was standing by the Nile. And lo, from the Nile there came up seven cows, sleek and fat; and they grazed in the marsh grass. Then behold, seven other cows came up after them from the Nile, ugly and gaunt, and they stood by the other cows on the bank of the Nile. The ugly and gaunt cows ate up the seven sleek and fat cows.
If the dream itself is the interpretation, then farmers should be scared to death of mixing skinny cows with fat cows. That is, according to this vision, the way to quickly reduce your heard by 50%!!
Here’s another one, but I’ll give you the vision first so you can formulate the interpretation based on the vision:
Judges 7:13 When Gideon came, behold, a man was relating a dream
to his friend. And he said, “Behold, I had a dream; a loaf of barley bread was tumbling into the camp of Midian, and it came to the tent and struck it so that it fell, and turned it upside down so that the tent lay flat.”
Hmmm…. Let’s see. This vision seems to indicate that tent camping can be very dangerous when barley loaves are present!! Or, maybe we better read on for the interpretation given in Scripture… (Credit for this little gem to Hope Egan in Holy Cow! Does God Care About What We Eat?)
There are more examples, like the seeming agricultural anomaly of Jacob’s son’s sheaves bowing to Joseph’s sheaf, or seven good ears on a single stalk, or…. you get the point.
If Christendom’s hermeneutic is consistent, then they will either segregate fat and skinny cows, or they will stop eating unclean meats… Pretty simple, really.
Meditate.
11:3 Restoration 
🙂 🙂 😀 😀 🙂 🙂
LikeLiked by 1 person