Israel was not to worship the LORD in the manner in which the other nations worshiped their gods. That prohibition stood within the wider call of Deuteronomy for Israel to turn away from the sins that had brought those nations to ruin and to serve God by keeping His law. The command belongs to the law given to Israel, the Levitical law, which is distinct from God's perpetual moral law. The broad permission in this chapter to eat whatever one desires is limited to the kinds of food God has set apart and does not extend to the animals specifically forbidden in the same laws.
Israel was not to worship the LORD in the manner in which the other nations worshiped their gods. That prohibition stood within the wider call of Deuteronomy for Israel to turn away from the sins that had brought those nations to ruin and to serve God by keeping His law. The command belongs to the law given to Israel, the Levitical law, which is distinct from God's perpetual moral law. The broad permission in this chapter to eat whatever one desires is limited to the kinds of food God has set apart and does not extend to the animals specifically forbidden in the same laws.