Mark 7:19

His heart. That is, his mind (see on Matt. 5:8). In other words, eating with unwashed hands had no moral effect whatever upon a man.

Into the belly. Ceremonially unclean foods (see on v. 15) went to the stomach, and there was no means by which the ceremonial uncleanness supposed to attach to them could be assimilated into the structure of the body.

Draught. Gr. aphedrōn, “a privy,” or “a toilet.” The word does not refer, as is commonly supposed, to a part of the human body.

Purging all meats. Literally, “making clean all foods [Gr. bromata, see on Luke 3:11].” In the KJV this statement appears to be a part of Christ’s instruction and to mean that the process of digestion and elimination has the result of “purging all meats.” The Greek, however, makes it clear that these are not the words of Christ, but rather those of Mark, and that they constitute his comment on Christ’s meaning. Accordingly, it is necessary to understand this expression in relation to the words “he saith unto them” of v. 18. Thus the latter part of v. 19 would read, “[this He saith unto them] making all foods clean,” or “thus he declared all foods clean” (RSV)—that is, irrespective of whether the eater had or had not performed the prescribed ritual ablution. This was the very point at issue (see on v. 2).

In the second place, it should be noted that the Greek word bromata, translated “meats,” means simply “that which is eaten,” “food,” and includes all kinds of food; it never denotes the flesh of animals as distinguished from other kinds of food. To limit the words “purging all meats” to flesh foods and to conclude that Christ here abolished the distinction between clean and unclean flesh used as food (see Lev. 11) is to ignore completely the meaning of the Greek.

In the third place, the context (vs. 1–14, 20–23) deals, not with biological uncleanness, but with uncleanness supposedly incurred from the omission of ritual washing (see on v. 15). The kind of food the disciples ate (vs. 2, 5) is not even referred to, but only the way in which they ate (see on vs. 2, 5, 15). Throughout, Christ deals with the problem of the “commandment of God” versus the “tradition of men” (see on vs. 5–15, 19). See on vs. 21–23.