Are Tattoos Sinful?

*Edited July 10, 2015*

People use Leviticus 19:28 as an absolute to not get tattoos, which reads:  "You shall not make any cuts in your body for the dead nor make any tattoo marks on yourselves..."  The key words here are for the dead.  Here's the thing about Scripture:  It was not written to us.  Everything in Scripture was written to a specific people and culture in a specific place at a specific time.  Once we recognise this we can then learn how to apply each Scripture to our lives today.  So, you have to understand the historical and cultural context of everything that was happening at the time things were written.  During these times, there was a pagan custom of gashing the body as a sign of mourning and marking one's body with tattoo marks to ward off spirits of the dead and even the opposite effect to somehow have somebody's spirit continue living (so in this regard, getting a tattoo of a dead loved one's name is highly advised against, even if it's just to "respect their memory," because it's essentially the same thing).  Because God knew that the Israelites would follow the ways of the nations surrounding them (and indeed, we see that they did an over abundance of times), God prohibited them from practising pagan customs.  This was a part of the civil-political law, and as we know, we are no longer under law but grace (Romans 6:14).  The only parts of the Law that are applicable today is the moral law, which binds on all people at all times (such as the Ten Commandments).  We know this to be true because Jesus, who brought upon God's grace, refers to Old Testament graces that came from the moral law.  The Law reveals our sin and condemns us; grace (the Gospel) gives us freedom from those sins as well as forgiveness.  It is apparent that this whole tattoo issue is a matter of the civil-political law and nothing to do with the moral law.  Therefore, it is permissible for anyone, even Christians, to get tattoos.  The civil-political and ceremonial laws no longer apply because Christ fulfilled the Law (Matthew 5:17; Romans 10:4).

If it were sinful to get tattoos simply because it marks your body (which is a poor argument), we might as well say it's sinful to smoke cigarettes, or eat junk food, because clearly those things are bad for your body (indeed worse than getting a tattoo).  But we don't dare say such things because we know it's ridiculous.  Likewise, it is ridiculous to say that tattoos in general are sinful especially since we are no longer under law, plus the fact that we don't get them to ward off the dead like the pagans did.  Also, in the Gospel, God commanded a lot of things that were once unclean to now be clean, such as Peter's vision that he (and we) can now eat four-footed animals that used to be unclean, like pigs (Acts 10:9-16).  Since this was done for food, God could care less about something as harmless as a tattoo, so long as it doesn't involve pagan customs.  God gave Peter this vision because Peter was always a "good Jew" (much like Catholics today who say they're a "good Catholic"), and as a good Jew he would eat clean meat, even after being a disciple of Jesus because that's what he grew up with.  Because he grew up with it, his conscience still told him that it was sinful to eat "unclean" meat, so God made it clear to him that this is no longer so.  There came a time when Jews who became Christians where the question arose if they could eat unclean meat with a clear conscience, which is why God gave Peter this vision, since as Christians we are no longer bound to the Law.  So, God responded to this urgent matter by giving Peter a direct revelation of His will.  We read none about tattoos because it wasn't a problem during those times; it only became a problem today because people are so eager to condemn others in their self-righteousness when they consider something taboo, using the Law as backup.

St. Paul wrote, "I know and am convinced that by the Lord Jesus that nothing is unclean in itself; but to him who thinks anything to be unclean, to him it is unclean" (Romans 14:14).  There you go.  Can it be any more clear than that?  Just because you may think getting a tattoo is a sin doesn't mean that it is.  To you, and to you alone, it's a sin.  The truth was not Paul's own thinking, but of divine inspiration by the Holy Spirit, hence "in the Lord Jesus."  The word "unclean" in the Greek eventually evolved into meaning "immoral" or "evil."  This verse simply means that if someone is convinced that a certain behaviour is a sin — even if his assessment is wrong — he should never do it because if he does, he will violate his conscience and experience guilt, driving him back into the condemnation of the Law rather than the freedom we have received by grace through faith.  So, if they're convinced that something like getting a tattoo is a sin, even though they're wrong, it's better for them not to commit that "sin" simply because they truly believe it is and doing so would cause them guilt when the goal is our freedom in the grace of Christ.  It is wrong and intellectually dishonest, however, to proclaim that doing something you believe to be sinful is a sin when it is in fact not a sin — or when Scripture doesn't explicitly say it is.