The Stomach Purifies All Foods: Jesus' Anatomical Argument in Mark 7.18–19

This article offers a new interpretation of καθαρίζων πάντα τὰ βρώματα in Mark 7.19c. After reviewing and offering some nuance to an emerging non-antinomian interpretation of 7.15a/18b, I turn to Mark 7.19c and argue that the phrase καθαρίζων πάντα τὰ βρώματα should be understood as a part of Jesus’ speech in 7.18–19. Jesus’ argument, I suggest, is that ritually defiled food cannot defile humans through ingestion because humans purify all foods from ritual defilement through digestion. This reasoning depends on a widespread Jewish view that excrement is impervious to ritual impurity: because all excrement is pure, the stomach acts as a purifying agent that purifies all food from ritual defilement. I proffer that the common translation of Mark 7.19c—‘Thus he declared all foods clean’ (NRSV)—should therefore be abandoned.