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"Without question, the animals that Lehi’s family eats have been 'ordained [by God] for the use of man'; eating meat saves Lehi’s family from 'famine and excess of hunger,' and they use meat 'sparingly as well as 'with thanksgiving' (D&C 89:15, 12). Nephi undoubtedly goes about killing the animals 'with judgment, not to excess, neither by extortion' (D&C 59:20). Nephi’s unusual use of the word 'sweet' for the meat seems to indicate that, when the time comes for God to 'require' the blood of the animals at the family’s hands (JST Gen. 9:5), he will hold them as blameless as if they had eaten fruit. The adjective 'sweet' also calls to mind, perhaps deliberately, the verses in the King James translation of Genesis 1 where God articulates what animal theologian Andrew Linzey calls his 'original will for creation,' instructing Adam and Eve that they are to share fruit and other plant foods with animals as their only 'meat' (Gen. 1:29, 30)."

Other Sources
Bart H. Welling
Other Writings of Mormons | “'The Blood of Every Beast': Mormonism and the Question of the Animal" in Dialogue: A Journal of Mormon Thought 44, no. 2 (Summer 2011).
Read 246 times Last modified on June 25, 2019