A lecturer at a Bible college in Melbourne - a theologian and author, and an ordained minister - said that there are "some [cases] where he [Jesus] seemed to annul an old law, e.g. over food".
But if Jesus annulled the food Laws of the Old Testament, wouldn't Peter have known that? Why then was Peter later so adamant that he shouldn't arise, kill and eat, even when he was told to by the Lord Himself in a vision? Why should he have been so surprised at the Lord's command in the vision, if he'd already heard the Lord annulling the old food Laws while He was still with him?
It seems to me that nothing Jesus ever did or said during His ministry was intended as an annulment at that time of any of the food Laws - or any other point of Moses' (God's) Law.
Jesus taught that food alone cannot defile a man - that it's the attitude of man's heart that defiles him. But that didn't categorically mean Jesus was annulling the original intent of the food Laws. He was merely bringing proper perspective back to those Laws.
That was then - because at that time Jesus was ministering exclusively to the lost sheep of Israel who were under the Old Covenant, not to Gentiles who would later be grafted into a new covenant.
The manner in which the food Laws - and any other point of the Law - applies or doesn't apply in the new covenant, is another topic. But the point here is that during Jesus' earthly ministry, nothing He did or said was ever intended as an anullment of any point of the Law. Rather, He explained the Law.
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