Ecclesiastes 3:19-21: A View of the Souls and Spirits of Humans and Animals

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Ecclesiastes 3:19-21: A View of the Souls and Spirits of Humans and Animals
By Frank L. Hoffman - 12 Mar 2005

Dear Robert:

Thank you very much for writing back.

We have studies some of the Hebrew thought concerning the peaceable kingdom (Isaiah 11:6-9), and the belief is that it's a call to us, as faithful believers, to become filled with the knowledge of the Lord and do everything in our power to bring about a peaceable kingdom upon the earth, and then Messiah will come to complete the task.

As part of this compassionate living, our dog, Heidi, lived to very old and she was a vegan, and only died because of complications from an insect bite.

The Genesis 9:3 passage is a concession, and not a commandment as you wrote. If we look at Genesis 8:21, we see that after Noah sacrificed some of the animals, God said that humans were evil from their youth, because there was still sufficient plant food available, and only after this killing did he allow them to eat flesh.

You might be interested in a sermon we have on our web site that speaks about some of these concessions. http://www.all-creatures.org/sermons98/s17mar2002.html

In the Love of the Lord,

Frank