A common point of confusion for believers walking back into Torah is the question of food.
When someone hears, “We eat biblically clean,” the assumption is often that this means keeping Jewish kosher. While the two overlap, they are not the same thing—and Scripture itself draws a clear distinction between God’s commandments and later rabbinic tradition.
At its foundation, biblical cleanliness is defined directly by God. In Leviticus 11 and Deuteronomy 14, the Father gives Israel specific instructions about which animals are clean and which are unclean.
Land animals must both chew the cud and have split hooves.
Fish must have fins and scales.
Certain birds are prohibited, while insects like locusts are permitted.
These instructions are not framed as cultural customs or temporary rituals, but as divine distinctions—“to distinguish between the unclean and the clean, and between the creatures that may be eaten and those that may not be eaten.’ (Leviticus 11:47).
It’s important to note that Scripture does not describe elaborate preparation methods, ritual inspections, or kitchen rules. The command is about what may be eaten, not about developing a system to ensure perfection beyond what God stated. An animal that is clean is clean because God says it is—not because of how it is slaughtered, salted, or supervised.
Jewish kosher, on the other hand, is a developed system that was originally built upon God’s biblical laws—but extended through centuries of rabbinic interpretation.
The kosher system as practiced today includes additional requirements not found in the Torah itself. These include specific slaughter techniques (shechita), salting meat to remove blood in a very specific way, strict separation of meat and dairy (even including separate dishes and cookware), waiting periods between eating meat and dairy, and rabbinic supervision to certify foods as acceptable.
These practices come primarily from the “Oral Torah”—later codified in the Mishnah and Talmud—rather than from the written Torah given through Moses. For Jewish communities, kosher observance is an expression of covenant identity and submission to rabbinic authority. It is a coherent system within Judaism, but it is not identical to what Scripture itself commands.
This distinction matters because Walking in Torah is about returning to God’s instructions—not adopting rabbinic authority.
As believers in Messiah, we affirm the Torah as God’s Word while also recognizing that Yeshua repeatedly rebuked the religious leaders not for keeping the Law, but for “teaching as doctrines the commandments of men” (Matthew 15:9) and for adding burdens God did not require.
Eating biblically clean, then, is an act of obedience to Scripture, not an attempt to live as Jews or submit to halakhic rulings.
A believer who avoids pork and shellfish is following God’s stated boundaries. That same believer is not required by Scripture to separate meat and dairy, purchase rabbinically certified foods, or follow extra-biblical food rituals unless they personally choose to do so.
This does not mean that kosher traditions are wrong or evil. Many of them are thoughtful, disciplined, and rooted in a sincere desire to honor God. But they are interpretations, not commandments. Torah observance for believers must always begin—and end—with what God actually said.
Prayerful Reflections
For believers, the goal is simple: honor God by obeying His instructions as written, while extending grace to others who are at different stages of understanding.
Eating biblically clean is not about earning holiness—it is about aligning daily life with God’s design.
We are doing what Scripture itself calls us to do: testing everything, holding fast to what is good, and letting God—not tradition—define obedience.
