Vegan

In glossy adverts and sizzling billboards, meat is rarely just food. It is sex, power, and desire on a plate.

Fast-food chains, steakhouse commercials, and celebrity chefs sell meat through the language of lust: dripping juices, flesh torn apart, women seductively holding burgers.

As Carol J. Adams observes in her seminal work The Sexual Politics of Meat, meat advertising often sexualises both the flesh and the act of consumption itself, portraying meat-eating as an assertion of dominance, virility, and entitlement. This is no accident. Adams argues that meat is marketed to stimulate lust—not only for the food itself, but for what it represents: power, conquest, and status. In this light, our culture’s insatiable appetite for meat is not simply about satisfying hunger—it is about craving, addiction, and fantasies of dominance over others, both animal and human.

Modern fast food culture further fuels this dynamic by engineering products to reach the so-called “bliss point”—a calculated balance of animal fats, salt, and sugars that maximises desire and suppresses satiety. The result is not just nourishment, but a deliberately addictive form of consumption.

This modern phenomenon might seem far removed from the ancient world of the Bible. Yet when we turn to Deuteronomy 12, we find something remarkable: the Bible itself uses the language of lust, craving, and disordered desire when speaking of meat-eating. Far from celebrating the consumption of animal flesh, the Hebrew Scriptures frame it as a reluctant concession to human lust—a dangerous craving that must be carefully regulated, not enthusiastically indulged.

This ancient insight speaks with unsettling relevance to our flesh-obsessed, consumption-addicted culture today.

The Edenic Diet: Before Lust, There Was Peace

To understand Deuteronomy 12, we must first place it within the broader sweep of biblical narrative.

The Bible begins not with slaughter but with peace. The opening chapters of Genesis depict Eden as a plant-based paradise. God’s provision for both humans and animals is clear: “I give you every seed-bearing plant… They will be yours for food” (Genesis 1:29–30). There is no death, no bloodshed, no butchery. As Martin Luther once wrote, in this Edenic world, the killing of animals would have been considered an “abomination.”

This original harmony is shattered by human rebellion in Genesis 3. As sin enters the world, violence and death become part of the human condition. Only after the Flood, when arable agriculture had been destroyed, does God extend permission for humans to eat animals (Genesis 9).

Even so, the tone of the permission is sombre and laced with warnings: “The fear and dread of you shall rest on every animal… for your own lifeblood I will surely require a reckoning” (Genesis 9:2, 5). Notably, this permission lacks the divine affirmation that it was “good,” let alone “very good,” which accompanied the plant-based diet of Genesis 1.

Deuteronomy 12: The Meat of Lust

It is in this context that Deuteronomy 12 must be read.

At first glance, the passage appears to give Israelites wide freedom to slaughter and eat meat outside the sacrificial system, avoiding its strict welfare regulations. They are told: “When the Lord your God enlarges your territory… you may eat meat whenever you desire” (Deuteronomy 12:20). On the surface, this seems generous—even celebratory.

Yet beneath the English translation lies a darker current.

The Hebrew text repeatedly uses forms of the verb ’avah (אָוָה), connoting lust, craving, and unruly desire. This is no neutral term for appetite. It is the same root used in Genesis 3:6 to describe Eve’s desire for the forbidden fruit, in Numbers 11 when the Israelites lusted after meat in the wilderness, and in Psalm 78:30 where their craving provoked divine judgment.

Indeed, Numbers 11 offers the most sobering parallel. When the Israelites cried out for meat, God gave them quail in abundance—but followed it with a deadly plague. The place was named Kibroth Hattaavah—“the graves of lust”—a stark reminder of where disordered desires can lead.

Many Jewish commentators recognise this theme running through Deuteronomy 12. Richard H. Schwartz, quoting Torah scholar Nehama Leibowitz, describes the passage as a “barely tolerated dispensation” to slaughter animals if we cannot resist temptation. Some Jewish communities still refer to such meat as b’sar ta’avah—“meat of lust”—a telling phrase that casts such consumption in a morally ambiguous light.

Far from celebrating meat-eating, Deuteronomy 12 offers a regulated outlet for a dangerous human craving—meant to prevent even worse consequences, such as idolatrous sacrifices or violent rebellion.

Biblical Restrictions: A Curb on Human Appetite

The broader Torah reinforces this sobering picture. The sacrificial system itself was highly restrictive. Slaughter could only take place at the central cultic site, overseen by priests. The blood—representing life—was never to be consumed but poured out in recognition of life’s sanctity. Fat, the most flavourful part of the animal, was forbidden to the people and reserved for God alone.

Even the method of cooking was regulated. Boiling, not roasting, was prescribed—producing a gristly, unappealing stew. Roasted meat, which melts fats and produces sugars through caramelisation (creating the bliss point exploited by modern fast-food chains), was viewed with suspicion. The sons of Eli were condemned for demanding roasted meat—an act that revealed not only greed, but sacrilege (1 Samuel 2:12–17).

These laws served not only to ensure ritual purity and minimise cruelty, but also to curb human lust for animal flesh. It may have been necessary to slaughter animals to maintain a balanced herd, but eating their flesh was carefully regulated—to reduce harm to animals and to humans alike.

A Pattern of Concession, Not Celebration

Throughout the Old Testament, we see a pattern emerge: certain actions—kingship, slavery, divorce, war brides, and indeed meat-eating—are permitted by God not because they are good, but because of human hardness of heart.

Jesus himself identifies this pattern when he tells the Pharisees that Moses permitted divorce “because your hearts were hard”—but it was not so from the beginning (Matthew 19:8). The same could be said of meat-eating.

Even within Deuteronomy, the permission to eat meat is framed by language of lust, desire, and rebellion. It is a tolerated practice within a fallen world—carefully controlled to limit the damage it causes to animals, to people, and to the covenant community.

From Concession to Compassion: A Prophetic Trajectory

The trajectory of Scripture moves beyond these reluctant concessions toward a vision of peace, harmony, and reconciliation with all creatures.

The prophets envision a world where swords are beaten into ploughshares—and, significantly, not into slaughter knives. The wolf lies down with the lamb (Isaiah 11:6). The New Testament speaks of creation groaning for liberation (Romans 8:19–21), and Christ’s work is described as reconciling “all things” in heaven and on earth (Colossians 1:20).

In this eschatological light, the Bible’s reluctant permissions are not the last word. They point instead to God’s accommodation to human weakness—while gently urging us toward mercy, compassion, and peace.

A Forgotten Theology for a Hungry World

In our age of industrial animal agriculture, climate crisis, and unprecedented violence against animals, the ancient warnings about meat of lust feel tragically relevant. Unlike the subsistence farming of the Bible, slaughter is no longer necessary in wealthy nations.

Our culture’s voracious appetite for meat is rarely framed as lust—yet the parallels to biblical warnings are hard to miss: mass suffering, environmental devastation, and the commodification of life itself.

Far from outdated, this neglected thread of Scripture may offer the Church a prophetic voice in our food-sick, consumption-addicted world. It may call us not to judgment or legalism, but to humility, restraint, and a rediscovery of animals—not as meat, but as fellow creatures of God’s love.

Perhaps it’s time the Church dared to question the products on supermarket shelves and ask: Is this ‘meat of lust’? And if so, is this really what God desires for his people?

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About the Author
This article was written by a member of the Sarx staff team, with grateful acknowledgment to Dr Philip J. Sampson FOCAE for his scholarly insight.

Dr Sampson is a writer and lecturer on animals and animal ethics. His publications include Animal Ethics and the Nonconformist Conscience (Palgrave Macmillan, 2018); “The Ethics of Eating in ‘Evangelical’ Discourse: 1600–1876,” in Ethical Vegetarianism and Veganism, eds. Andrew Linzey and Clair Linzey (Routledge, 2018) and “Evangelical Christianity: Lord of Creation or Animal among Animals?” in The Routledge Handbook of Religion and Animal Ethics (Routledge, 2018).