So What About Ezekiel Bread?
Patrons of health food products have asked me about Ezekiel Bread. You can purchase this bread at most health food outlets and the claim is, the ingredient combination is based on Ezekiel 4:9. {The FOOD FOR LIFE company actually markets several products with “Scriptural” names, including Gen. 1:29 muffins, and many variations of the Ezek. 4:9 claim}.
What about this? At first, the consumer with a love for the Bible may conclude this has to be a good product. If it’s in the Bible . . . if God gave the recipe . . . it must be good for you, right?
Remember what good Bible teachers and preachers have taught you for many years, expressed in one word: CONTEXT. Look at Ezek. 4:9, and read before and after that verse. Take into account the role of Ezekiel as a prophet to his fellow exiles in Babylon prior to the 586 BC event (final destruction of Jerusalem).
In Ezek. 4, God is not giving a recipe for healthy bread as a universal prescription. In fact, a careful reading of the context will show, this was polluted bread and the point of this meal for Ezekiel was to dramatically illustrate misery. (Observe how this bread was baked.)
The makers of the popular Ezekiel bread may have done their best to use some of the ingredients in Ezek. 4:9, but no claim can be made that this is what God wants all of us to eat. That stretches that meal way outside the context of Ezek. 4.
It is certainly permissible to eat the modern version, and you may conclude that those ingredients in that arrangement are best for you. But “buyer beware” applies here. Read the passage and context.
By Warren E. Berkley
The Final Page
From Expository Files 17.8; August 2010
