Fishing, Jesus and the anti - part two

The second PETA site I visited dealt directly with Jesus and fish. It answers the question ‘Didn’t Jesus eat fish?’ by replying ‘probably not’. Well, I don’t want to spoil their party but even a casual glance at John Chapter 21, tells us that Jesus ate fish with his disciples on the shore. In fact, not only did he eat fish with them, but also it was at his instruction that they cast their nets in the first place.

Their claim that ‘most Biblical scholars agree that they (the references to Jesus eating fish) are very late additions to the Gospels’ is news to me. As a full-time ordained Minister, I have heard some attempts to justify one’s pet theory or point of view in my time, but this is one of the best yet. It seems that PETA are not only self-appointed guardians of all things that move and breath (but not including man of course. There is nothing on their sites that deal with some of the real problems that exist in our world), but now they are experts on the Bible as well.

They even take the only miracle that Jesus performed (The feeding of the 5,000. You know the one, where he took the few loaves of bread and the couple of fish and then proceeded to feed everyone) and which is recorded in all four Gospels and states ‘there is strong evidence that this story did not originally include fish’.

Again, this is news to me. Their attempt to quote scriptures chronologically following the feeding of the 5,000, where Jesus, in referring to the miracle he just performed, only mentions the bread, again, is a misrepresentation. If someone, as they say, included the fish in the telling of the miracle itself to prove a point, then the same person would also do the same a few verses on when Jesus uses the miracle to teach his disciples certain principles.

But the big question we ask ourselves is this - Why would someone doctor the Scriptures 2,000 years ago to endorse their own ‘fish eating’ ideas? After all, in those days it wasn’t an issue. It has only become one in the last 30 years or so.

But I reserve the best till last. As if not really sure of their previous attempts to prove that God really is on their side and a fully paid up member of PETA, they write ‘So what did Jesus definitely have to say about fishing? The argument they then proceed to make had me shaking my head in disbelief.

In reference to the verses of the Bible where Jesus calls Simon, Andrew, James and John (all fisherman) they write the following: 'Jesus calls multiple fishers away from their occupation of killing animals...this resembles Jesus’ call to others who are engaged in activities that are not in line with his message of mercy and compassion’.

It doesn’t take a lot of intelligence to read the scriptures that they refer to, to see that the story is not about the career the disciples had, but about the fact that Jesus was calling them into full-time service. Jesus also called Levi, who was a tax collector. Does that mean to say that a tax collector is an evil occupation? (Hmm, Ok. Maybe not a good point. All you Inland Revue tax inspectors out there – only joking).

But seriously, back to the plot. When God called me into full-time ministry, I worked in the upholstery industry. God didn’t call Simon, Andrew, James or John because they were fishermen. That was purely coincidence and totally irrelevant to the story.

In fact, what PETA conveniently choose to ignore is that before Christ verbally called Peter he actually got into the boat with him. He then told Peter to ‘put out into deep water’. When well out from the shore, he asked Peter to put out his nets. Peter’s reply was ‘Master, we’ve worked hard all night and haven’t caught anything. But because you say so, I will let down the nets’. What happens next is that they catch so many fish the nets begin to break. So actually, rather than drawing the Disciples away from fishing, Jesus actually encouraged them!