What does the Bible say about cannibalism?

Top passages, ranked by readers

Rankings: OpenBible.info Topical Bible (CC BY) · Scripture: World English Bible

• Jeremiah 19:9

  I will cause them to eat the flesh of their sons and the flesh of their daughters; and they shall eat everyone the flesh of his friend, in the siege and in the distress, with which their enemies, and those who seek their life, shall distress them.

• Ezekiel 5:10

  Therefore the fathers shall eat the sons in the midst of you, and the sons shall eat their fathers; and I will execute judgments on you; and the whole remnant of you will I scatter to all the winds.

• Lamentations 2:20

  Look, Yahweh, and see to whom you have done thus! Shall the women eat their fruit, the children that are dandled in the hands? Shall the priest and the prophet be killed in the sanctuary of the Lord?

• Isaiah 9:19-20

  [19] Through the wrath of Yahweh of hosts is the land burnt up; and the people are as the fuel of fire: no man spares his brother. [20] One shall snatch on the right hand, and be hungry; and he shall eat on the left hand, and they shall not be satisfied: they shall eat every man the flesh of his own arm:

• Lamentations 4:10

  The hands of the pitiful women have boiled their own children; They were their food in the destruction of the daughter of my people.

• Leviticus 26:29

  You will eat the flesh of your sons, and you will eat the flesh of your daughters.

• 1 Corinthians 10:28

  But if anyone says to you, "This was offered to idols," don't eat it for the sake of the one who told you, and for the sake of conscience. For "the earth is the Lord's, and all its fullness."

• Micah 3:1-4

  [1] I said, "Please listen, you heads of Jacob, And rulers of the house of Israel: Isn't it for you to know justice? [2] You who hate the good, And love the evil; Who tear off their skin, And their flesh from off their bones; [3] Who also eat the flesh of my people, And flay their skin from off them, And break their bones, And chop them in pieces, as for the pot, And as flesh within the caldron. [4] Then they will cry to Yahweh, But he will not answer them. Yes, he will hide his face from them at that time, Because they made their deeds evil."

• Ezekiel 36:13-15

  [13] Thus says the Lord Yahweh: Because they say to you, You [land] are a devourer of men, and have been a bereaver of your nation; [14] therefore you shall devour men no more, neither bereave your nation any more, says the Lord Yahweh; [15] neither will I let you hear any more the shame of the nations, neither shall you bear the reproach of the peoples any more, neither shall you cause your nation to stumble any more, says the Lord Yahweh.

• Deuteronomy 28:53-57

  [53] You shall eat the fruit of your own body, the flesh of your sons and of your daughters, whom Yahweh your God has given you, in the siege and in the distress with which your enemies shall distress you. [54] The man who is tender among you, and very delicate, his eye shall be evil toward his brother, and toward the wife of his bosom, and toward the remnant of his children whom he has remaining; [55] so that he will not give to any of them of the flesh of his children whom he shall eat, because he has nothing left him, in the siege and in the distress with which your enemy shall distress you in all your gates. [56] The tender and delicate woman among you, who would not adventure to set the sole of her foot on the ground for delicateness and tenderness, her eye shall be evil toward the husband of her bosom, and toward her son, and toward her daughter, [57] and toward her young one who comes out from between her feet, and toward her children whom she shall bear; for she shall eat them for want of all things secretly, in the siege and in the distress with which your enemy shall distress you in your gates.

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