Questions From Readers
● When, in Genesis 1:30, God says: “To every wild beast of the earth and to every flying creature of the heavens and to everything moving upon the earth in which there is life as a soul I have given all green vegetation for food,” are we to understand that this absolutely excludes the idea that any animals ate meat at that time or before that? And on this basis are we to conclude that all animals will be vegetarian in the new world? How, then, can we account for the meat-eating birds, insects, reptiles and other animals with their poisonous fangs, hunting prowess, and so forth, apparently given them at creation and admirably equipping them as meat eaters?
Genesis 1:30, as just quoted, does not say that God had given “all green vegetation for food” to the wild beasts, the flying creatures and everything moving upon the earth in addition to what meat or flesh they could catch by hunting. The verse just ahead tells us that God said to Adam and Eve: “Here I have given to you all vegetation bearing seed which is on the surface of the whole earth and every tree on which there is the fruit of a tree bearing seed. To you let it serve as food.” (Gen. 1:29) We do not understand this to mean that Adam and Eve could eat animals that lived on grass and other vegetation, and that in eating such animals minus their blood Adam and Eve were eating vegetation indirectly, inasmuch as, to begin with, the animals ate the vegetation and then Adam and Eve ate the animals that lived on such vegetation to convert it into flesh. No! But it is evident that God set the perfect man and woman on a vegetarian diet, without suggesting even dairy products.
First after the flood God specified in so many words that Noah and his family and their descendants could eat bloodless meat or flesh. This indicates that God-fearing men like Abel, Enoch and Noah and his family had not lived on animal and bird flesh prior to the flood. What the ungodly men lived on till the flood we do not know. Abel, Enoch and Noah and his family did not reason in a roundabout manner and violate the Edenic dietary law that God stated to Adam and Eve in Eden, in Genesis 1:29, 30.
Of course, the Bible says a lot about zoology, but the Bible is no exhaustive treatise on all zoological matters. It therefore leaves in a lower or secondary position the discussing of details about the lower animal creation. It fixes first attention on Jehovah’s superior earthly creature, man, and specializes on that. Hence the facts about wild beasts, domestic beasts, flying creatures and insects are spoken of only incidentally, or in illustrations.
So, if the Bible itself does not give any answer to these questions about those creatures lower than man, it does not mean that there is no answer to the questions that is consistent with the Bible. It simply means that we are not to preoccupy ourselves with such questions. One big fact we must remember: that we humans are living and all these birds, insects and other animals are living in a system of things that has obtained since Jehovah God legalized man’s eating animal flesh minus its blood. Accordingly, if man has been eating animal flesh and insects for four thousand three hundred years and has teeth that can be adapted to eating such solid food as flesh, it is not strange that birds, insects and other animals should be also living on flesh that they hunt for and catch.
As to the preflood situation on the diet of man and animals, we may take the situation in Noah’s ark as an illustration. Under God’s instructions Noah and his family were to take into the ark wild beasts, domestic animals, flying creatures and birds, two each (male and female) of the unclean kind, and seven each of the clean kind. Besides this, Noah was to take into the ark every sort of food that is eaten to “serve as food for you and for them.” (Gen. 6:19-22) Now Noah had no deepfreeze unit nor any refrigeration installation to preserve processed flesh foods in the ark. The seven sheep, seven bulls and cows, seven goats, two horses, two pigs, and so forth, that Noah took into the ark would hardly have been enough flesh food for the two lions, two tigers and two of the other wild flesh-eating beasts of today to live on in the ark during the flood. Noah was not instructed to carry on a slaughterhouse in the ark to feed the wild beasts with flesh foods. Nor was he told to enmesh tremendous quantities of flying or creeping insects to provide fresh food for the creatures today devouring insects.
Noah came out of the ark the following year with not less wild beasts, domestic animals, flying and creeping creatures and birds than he took into the ark. It is possible that he had more when he came out, due to the breeding of these lower creatures. Well, then, on what did every living thing in the ark live during those twelve lunar months and ten days, or one full solar year, shut up inside the ark? Certainly not on flesh, nor on one another.
All those creatures, human and subhuman, were able to live without flesh for a whole year inside the ark. Why could not every one of those living creatures live without flesh during 1,656 years prior to the Flood, or back to the time when God specified to Adam and Eve in Eden what he had given to earthly creatures as food? And if they could subsist that way during the first 1,656 years of man’s existence, why can they not return to that way of life and keep living that way during the thousand-year reign of Jesus Christ and then for eternity? During his millennial reign Jesus Christ as King will have control over animal, bird, insect and fish life as well as over human life. He will regulate it according to God’s will and for the good of all creature life on earth. So we should not think only of the post-Flood side of the question and leave out of consideration the pre-Flood side of the question as if it had no bearing. Let us take the Bible position on the subject and not over-occupy ourselves with merely incidental matters to the extent of wasting time, thought and peace of heart and possibly stumbling ourselves into the camp of the godless evolutionists.
● How can girls guard against temptation in this sex-crazy world?
When a girl reaches the age of puberty or physical maturity, her body has developed in the matter of sex more than in the mind. Young folks like to be together, first in groups, later in twos. If they have not been instructed by their parents in regard to the matter of sex, a boy and a girl are likely to become too familiar and to engage in what is popularly called petting or necking. They may practice this for a time and see no bad results. However, the time will come when there will be great danger in such actions. Why? In answer to this question, we can learn about nature and sex from the bovine family of mammals, both wild and tame.
Large herds of cattle, both male and female, wander over the plains feeding. Ordinarily the male or bull would not think of approaching the female or cow for sex purposes. If he did approach he would not receive a hearty welcome, but, rather, he might be gored by the cow’s horns. There is no petting or sex relations between bull and cow permitted, because the female is not in physical condition to breed. The bull seems to understand this and keeps in his own place. However, when the female of the species is in condition to breed, she makes the matter known. If there is no male in the herd, she will go elsewhere looking for one and she is unsettled until she finds one and then is bred by him. Now she is contented, and the end result is a calf. In this connection it is interesting to note that the male animal has no season at which he is not willing to engage in the breeding act.
If we humans would take a lesson from these creatures, we would learn something of importance in matters of sex, as to its purpose and the results of its operation.
As with a cow, when a young girl who has reached her puberty is in physical condition to conceive and become pregnant, her sex emotions are greatly aroused. If she has association with a boy, she is inclined to think that it is the sweetness of the “boy friend” that causes this delightful and new feeling, and so she becomes infatuated with him. If the boy friend should become sexually aroused and lets her know it and then she yields her body to the advances of the amorous boy friend, she is likely to become pregnant as a result of just one sex experience of this kind.
Some persons foolishly think that they know when it is “safe” to have sex contact with those of the opposite sex and thus avoid becoming pregnant, but this is a serious mistake on their part. Even learned biologists do not know exactly when there is no danger of conception for a woman. This is due to certain irregularities in the case of various females.
When the ovum, that is, the egg cell from which the baby starts, is at large or is on its way from the woman’s ovary through her Fallopian tube to the uterus, there it remains for an uncertain length of time, which varies greatly with different females. Then is the time when conception can take place if the ovum is met by a male life sperm. During that same time the female is sexually aroused and is ready for the sex act that at this time will cause a baby to result. This bearing of children is the sole privilege of the female. In fact, this is one main reason for creating the female of the human species.
There are cases where a girl became pregnant as a result of one sex interview with a boy. What a price for a girl, a virgin, to pay for a few minutes of satisfied sex emotions! When persons start in this dangerous and sinful course, they find it hard to overcome future temptations. When a young, unmarried girl falls to the temptation, the price she pays is terrible: shame, sorrow, a ruined reputation, endless troubles, with the danger of being disfellowshiped from a congregation if the girl is a dedicated member. It is high time for girls to understand the make-up of their bodies and its functions, especially with regard to sex. Then if a girl understandingly takes care of herself while the ovum is at large and is causing sex disturbance and cravings within her, she will be able to act like a true lady of irreproachable morals at all times. She will avoid the violating of her virginity and the shame and conscience-stricken state due to this; and wisely she will direct her young life so as to end up in the position of a clean, happy wife and mother of legitimate children, journeying to the new world of righteousness, where there will be no sex problems amid a sex-crazy population.