Question:

Is all food clean? Did Jesus declare all food clean? In mark7:18-19 it seems to say Jesus made all food clean but I was told that in the Niv that sentence was added on to the scripture, I wanted to know is this scripture telling us that all food was clean.

Answer:

The simple answer is this:  Yes, all food is clean.  There is no dietary rule in Christianity.  I am not sure where you saw the claim that this sentence was added.  What most translations do is note that the phrase “In saying this, Jesus declared all foods clean” is a parenthetical statement by the author of Mark, not an actual statement by Jesus.  So, I could imagine that someone might have said that Mark added these words, and that they were not the actual words of Jesus in the context.  This would most likely be a correct statement.  Possibly, someone saw this legitimate statement and then went further to claim that the statement was not in the original of Mark.  There is no evidence to back up this claim as far as I know, and I have done some research into this.  In any case, we, as Christians, believe that the Gospel of Mark is inspired and that God allowed this parenthetical statement to be in the Scripture, so we believe that this is an inspired interpretation of Jesus’ words.

Besides, as Christians we are not any longer subject to the specific laws given at Mt. Sinai to the Jewish people.  We can now wear clothing of more than one material.  We do not have to report to a rabbi if we have a skin disease, and we do not have to make animal sacrifices.  So, even if we did not have the statement in Mark 7:18-19, we could conclude that no food is “unclean” or sinful for a Christian to eat, unless there is a statement by Jesus or one of the apostles to the contrary, but there is not.

John Oakes