Bible Strands
Genesis 9:3
Everything that lives and moves will be food for you; just as I gave you the green plants, I now give you all things.
Berean Standard Bible
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Study note
Setting — God addresses Noah and his sons immediately after the flood, marking a shift in human sustenance following the judgment.
The words — The Hebrew רֶ֙מֶשׂ֙ (Remes) means "creeping thing," joined with חַ֔י (Chai) for "alive," to specify that every living creature will become food. The phrase כְּ/יֶ֣רֶק (ke./Ye.rek) translates literally as "like the greenery," directly comparing the new animal provision to the prior plant provision.
The thread — This dietary expansion appears alongside the blood restriction in Genesis 9:4, reappears in Deuteronomy 12:15 regarding slaughter, and surfaces in New Testament debates on food on Romans 14:14 and 1 Timothy 4:3.
Why it lands — The text grants permission to eat animal flesh while immediately bounding that permission with a prohibition against consuming blood. A reader must treat the allowance as a structured provision rather than an unrestricted license.
Drafted by a language model from the text, its original words and its cross-references, then checked against them. It can still be wrong: open the verse in the app to report it.
The Hebrew words
King James Version
Every moving thing that liveth shall be meat for you; even as the green herb have I given you all things.
Cross-references
- Romans 14:14 I am convinced and fully persuaded in the Lord Jesus that nothing is unclean in itself. But if anyone regards something as unclean, then for him it is unclean.
- 1 Timothy 4:3 They will prohibit marriage and require abstinence from certain foods that God has created to be received with thanksgiving by those who believe and know the truth.
- Deuteronomy 12:15 But whenever you want, you may slaughter and eat meat within any of your gates, according to the blessing the LORD your God has given you. Both the ceremonially clean and unclean may eat it as they would a gazelle or deer,
- Colossians 2:21 “Do not handle, do not taste, do not touch!”?
- 1 Corinthians 10:31 So whether you eat or drink or whatever you do, do it all to the glory of God.
- 1 Corinthians 10:25 Eat anything sold in the meat market without raising questions of conscience,
- Colossians 2:16 Therefore let no one judge you by what you eat or drink, or with regard to a feast, a New Moon, or a Sabbath.
- Psalms 104:14 He makes the grass grow for the livestock and provides crops for man to cultivate, bringing forth food from the earth:
- Acts 10:12 It contained all kinds of four-footed animals and reptiles of the earth, as well as birds of the air.
- 1 Corinthians 10:23 “Everything is permissible,” but not everything is beneficial. “Everything is permissible,” but not everything is edifying.