Jewish Views on Vegetarianism

This painting is called "The Peaceable Kingdom" by Edward Hicks (1780-1849), done around 1830. It illustrates the vision in Isaiah of an ideal world where animals and people all get along. This painting was actually created in response to a split in Hicks' Pennsylvania Quaker community (represented by the split tree trunk), and shows his desire for the factions to get along with each other. (https://www.metmuseum.org/art/collection/search/11081)

Jewish views on vegetarianism "on one foot":

The Torah and subsequent Jewish texts have much to say about the topic of Jews eating meat from animals. In short, vegetarianism is the Jewish ideal, meat is a concession, and you should limit your meat consumption. Keeping kosher (Jewish dietary laws) is a way to encourage both limited meat eating and also an awareness that eating meat requires taking a life created by G-d.

Original Instructions to Humanity

Context: This is from the Biblical Book of Genesis, in the first story of Creation. This takes place on the Sixth Day of Creation, after G-d makes people. Here people are supposed to be vegetarian. Notice that the animals are also supposed to be vegetarian.

The Instructions Change as a Concession

Context: This is from the Biblical Book of Genesis, after the Flood story. After all the animals are let out, Noah builds an alter and offers a sacrifice to G-d and G-d (using the J / Adoshem name) promises to not destroy the earth again. After this text, there's a rainbow and G-d (using the E / Elokim name) promises not to destroy the earth again. Here it seems that because people are born with an evil inclination, eating meat is seen as a way to divert some of the violent tendencies people have. Abarbanel, a Spanish-Jewish commentator who wrote his commentary in Italy after being expelled from Spain in 1492, comments on 9:1 that there was a concern that people would learn cruelty from eating meat, which is why the limit of not eating blood was imposed on them. Abarbanel, commenting on 8:15, also says that the allowance to eat animals might have been because after the devastation of the flood the survivors were concerned that they might not have enough food, though this doesn't answer why the offer wasn't time-limited.

Limits on Meat Eating in the Wilderness

Context: This is from the Biblical Book of Leviticus, after talking about the sacrifices in the Mishkan / Tabernacle on Yom Kippur. It limits the desire for meat to only happen when you are bringing a sacrifice during the travels in the wilderness. This would be like only eating meat if there was a meat meal at synagogue today.

Reiteration for the Israelites About to Enter the Land of Israel

Context: This is from the Biblical Book of Deuteronomy, from a discussion about offering sacrifices in the Land of Israel. The sacrifices constrain some of the meat-eating to only happen at approved places (eventually Jerusalem), and this text constrains things further to say that you can eat meat wherever and whenever once you get into the Land of Israel (Rabbeinu Bahya Deut. 12:20:2 -- 1290 Spain), but you can't eat blood. This text becomes the Torah basis for developing rules of kosher slaughter. Note that it is not commanding the eating of meat, but rather says how to respond if you have the urge for meat. The prohibition on eating blood shows up throughout the Torah: Gen. 9:4; Lev. 3:17, 7:26, 17:12-14, 19:26; Deut. 12:16, 12:23-25, and 15:23 -- Cassuto (Jerusalem, 1952) comments on Gen. 1:29 that the prohibition on eating blood reminds us of the original prohibition on eating animals in general.

Does a Vegetarian Diet Work?

Context: This is the very beginning of the Biblical Book of Daniel. Daniel could be considered the first "kosher-tarian" -- he ate vegetarian unless he could get kosher meat. This was the first test case in recorded Jewish history regarding the efficacy of a vegetarian diet (besides the generations leading up to Noah) and it seemed to work.

The Ideal Situation

Context: This is from the Biblical Book of Isaiah, describing a messianic or perfect world (this is the origin of the Jewish insistence that any messiah be able to bring about world peace the first time they come). This is where the phrase "the lion and the lamb" comes from -- it's actually "the wolf and the lamb", but that lacks alliteration. This perfect situation lines up with the original instructions in Genesis about the animals not eating each other, and presumably includes the other instructions in that same Genesis text about the humans not eating animals either.

​​​​​​​Context: This is from the Biblical Book of Hosea, saying that on the day when the Jewish people all turn back to G-d, there will be a covenant between people and the animals so that neither side will be afraid of being killed by the other party.

Kashrut as a Vegetarian Compromise

Context: This is from the Biblical Book of Leviticus, starting an explanation of which animals can and cannot be eaten. Kashrut, the Jewish dietary laws, becomes a constraint on the meat-eating impulse.

​​​​​​​Note that both rabbits and hares are forbidden -- hares are bigger than rabbits with longer ears, and hares tend to run from predators while rabbits prefer to hide.

Context: This is from slightly later in the same text in Leviticus. Here what is noteworthy is that while no sign is explicitly given for which air animals can be eaten, all of the forbidden ones are carnivores, either birds of prey or scavengers. Even when we are allowed to eat birds, we should only eat those who practice a vegetarian diet, perhaps nudging us toward that practice ourselves.

Including Kosher Slaughter

Context: This is from Midrash Tanchuma, a set of sermons about the Torah portions from around the year 500 CE. Here there's a question about why it matters how we kill the animals that we eat, and the answer is that it not for G-d but rather that it makes us better humans, more able to control our urges to take a life.

Context: Rabbi Jonathan Rubenstein was the co-rabbi (with his wife, Rabbi Linda Motzkin) of Temple Sinai in Saratoga Springs, NY. Here he writes that the laws of kosher slaughter are meant to sensitize us to treating all animals and people kindly.

Context: This comes from Maimonides' "Guide for the Perplexed", written in 1190 in Cairo. It's his work of philosophy. Here, he is showing the reasons for various commandments. Recognizing that it seems like G-d wouldn't care about how an animal is killed, the idea is that animals should suffer as little as possible.

Context: This is from the Shulchan Aruch, written in 1563 by Rabbi Joseph Caro. Put in other words, this text is saying that if a person released water that flowed and spun a wheel, and the knife slaughtered properly, this is considered kosher, but only after-the-fact. And this is only the first spin, which contains human force; but on the second or third spin, the animal is not kosher, since it wasn’t slaughtered from human force but rather the force of water. So, it's important for humans to be aware that they are taking the life of an animal and not get desensitized to that.

Maximizing Animal Welfare in Kosher Slaughter by Temple Grandin (4/27/11)

I have observed that when kosher slaughter of cattle is done well, there is almost no reaction from the animal when the throat is cut. Flicking my hand near the animal’s face caused a bigger reaction. When the cut is done well, 90% or more of the cattle will collapse and become unconscious within 30 seconds.

Context: Temple Grandin is known for her awareness of and sensitivity to the pain of animals. Here she verifies that kosher slaughter causes minimal pain to animals.

What if You Like to Eat Meat?

Context: We have already seen this text. Here we're looking at a subset of the text, showing that there's a human urge to eat meat.

Nechama Leibovitz, Studies in Deuteronomy, 136.

How grudgingly is such permission granted! ‘If you cannot resist the temptation and must eat meat, then do so’ seems to be the tenor of this barely tolerated dispensation.”

Context: Nechama Leibowitz was a 20th century Israeli Bible scholar who increased interest in studying the Bible.

Context: This is from the Babylonian Talmud, Masechet (Tractate) Bava Batra, which is about civil law. This is from a discussion about ownership of houses. There was a teaching that if your balcony fell down you shouldn't repair it as a sign of mourning for the Second Temple, and this led to a discussion about how else we mourn for the Second Temple. For example, if we are plastering our house, we leave a little bit undone, because the ways that people were thinking of mourning, like not eating meat, were untenable.

On the Other Hand, Craving Lots of Meat Might Be Bad

Context: This is from the Biblical Book of Numbers. Some of the Israelites had what was described as a "gluttonous craving", leading them to over-indulge on meat and die.

Context: This is from the Biblical Book of Deuteronomy, describing an extreme case of children who are challenging to handle. Among the traits is being "a glutton and a drunkard".

Context: This is from the Babylonian Talmud, Masechet (Tractate) Sanhedrin, which is about criminal law. The Torah called for stoning defiant children, but the Rabbis were very very uncomfortable with this. They couldn't erase it from the Torah, so they set so many definitions in place that they made it impossible to actually make this ever happen. One of the things they did was define "glutton" as "eating meat".

What About Eating Meat on Shabbat?

Context: This is from the Babylonian Talmud, Masechet (Tractate) Chullin, which is about kosher slaughter. Here we see that if you have enough money you should have meat every day (or perhaps something similarly filling, if we were to try to guess the spirit of the text), and if you don’t have enough money for meat every day then you should have it for dinner at the beginning of Shabbat (perhaps to make Shabbat special and different from the rest of the week).

Context: This is from Maimonides' (1138-1204, slightly less than half an hour) Mishneh Torah, where he reorganized the Talmud to make it easier to find what to do. Maimonides, also called Rambam, was the Egyptian sultan's physician, seeing poor patients in the evening. He was therefore making a medical assessment that people didn't need to eat meat every day.

Context: Same text, this time from the section about Shabbat. As part of a discussion about Shabbat and delighting on Shabbat, Maimonides says that both eating meat and drinking wine are considered a delight. However, that's not true if you can't afford the meat (or wine).

Context: This is from Rabbi Joseph Caro's 1563 law code, the Shulchan Aruch. In a discussion about Shabbat, he says that one should eat meat because it makes Shabbat special.

Context: This is one of the traditional z'mirot, or Shabbat songs, sung at Shabbat meals. Its author was Menachem ibn Saruq, a Spanish poet who lived around 920-970 CE. He produced one of the first Hebrew dictionaries and was involved in Spanish politics as an assistant to Chasdai ibn Shaprut (https://opensiddur.org/prayers/solilunar/shabbat/seudat-leil-shabbat/mah-yedidut-mnuhatekh-attributed-to-menahem-ibn-saruq/). Here we see that eating meat (or at least birds) was a Shabbat tradition in Spain during the 900s.

Context: This is a recording of the most common tune for "Ma Y'didut".

What About Eating Meat on Festivals?

Context: This is from the Mishnah, Masechet (Tractate) Chullin, which is about kosher slaughter. It is one of the source texts for the idea of eating meat on Festivals (but not necessarily beyond those times).

Context: This is from the Mishneh Torah, which we've already seen texts from. Here we get the idea that we should eat meat on Festivals because that adds to rejoicing on holidays (and Deut. 16:14 tells us that we should rejoice on holidays). This text also has the excellent line that if you don't help people less fortunate than you celebrate the holiday, then you are not celebrating the holiday but rather celebrating your stomach.

On the Other Hand...

Context: This is from the Babylonian Talmud, Masechet (Tractate) Pesachim, which is about Passover. Given that we are commanded to rejoice on the holidays, there is a question about whether meat counts for that. Because of a verse (Deut. 27:7) that connects rejoicing with the sacrifices, the Talmud answers that rejoicing through meat only counted when the Temple was standing.

Context: Before Rabbi Joseph Caro wrote the Shulchan Aruch in 1563, he wrote an expanded version called the Beit Yosef. Here he is pushing back on the text we saw from the Mishneh Torah based on the text we saw from the Talmud.

In General, If You Are Going to Eat Animals, Do So Sparingly

Context: This is from the Babylonian Talmud, Masechet (Tractate) Chullin, which is about kosher slaughter. Here we get several statements about why eating meat should be limited.

Kashrut Cultivates a Peaceful Person: Controlling blood lust

The 16th to 17th century Polish Torah commentator Solomon Efraim Lunschitz, author of K’li Yakar [a commentary to the Torah]:

“What was the necessity for the entire procedure of ritual slaughter? For the sake of self-discipline. It is far more appropriate for a person not to eat meat; only if he has a strong desire for meat does the Torah permit it, and even this only after the trouble and inconvenience necessary to satisfy his desire. Perhaps because of the bother and annoyance of the whole procedure, he will be restrained from such a strong and uncontrollable desire for meat.”

(Quoted in http://www.myjewishlearning.com/article/rav-kook-vegetarianism/2/.) ​

Context: The Kli Yakar is a set of sermons delivered by Rabbi Shlomo Ephraim of Luntshits in the 1600s. Here he is commenting on Genesis 27:3, where Isaac asks Esau to hunt some meat before giving him the blessing. We see that eating meat is considered to impart the traits of cruelty and violence. The Torah says several times to eat meat "like the deer and the gazelle", and here the interpretation is that those animals aren't found near homes, and so it's harder to get that meat. This means that people won't eat meat so often.

And You Can Go at Least a Week Without Meat

Context: This is from the Shulchan Aruch, in a discussion about what people do to reduce their joy in the 9 days from Rosh Chodesh (the first day of the month of) Av until Tisha B’Av on the 9th day that that month. The Talmud tells us (in Ta’anit 26b:3) that one should not eat meat in the meal before Tisha B’Av. One thousand years later, that had been expanded to not eating meat during the nine days before Tisha B’Av, unless it’s Shabbat or somebody finishes studying a book of Jewish text and makes a “Siyum” (conclusionary ceremony followed by a celebratory meal). However, fish is OK.

One can look at this as being pro-meat — we’re supposed to reduce our joy, so we don’t eat meat; thus, eating meat = increasing joy. However, there are two ways of looking at this as being anti-meat. One is that we shouldn’t be eating meat at all since the Temple was destroyed (Bava Batra 60b:11-13), but since people were too weak-willed to handle that we get an annual reminder about this. The other is that this practice is to help us realize that if we can make it for an entire week without meat except on Shabbat, perhaps we should incorporate that into the rest of the year. After all, we found other things to eat for that week.

Eating Meat is Bad for Your Soul

Context: This is from Sefer Ha-Ikkarim, by Rabbi Joseph Albo in Castille (Spain) in 1425. It's part of a discussion about Adam, Cain, and Noah. The idea here is that although there might be some health benefits of eating meat, there are many more character defects and so that's why G-d didn't want Adam to eat meat (and instead there were other good things to eat).

Context: This is from Genesis Rabba, a commentary on Genesis written around 400 CE in the Land of Israel. It's from a discussion about the story of Cain and Abel. Here the idea is that Cain had observed Adam killing animals for sacrifice (based on an interpretation of Psalm 69) and this showed Cain how to kill people.

Tza-ar Ba-alei Chayim - Not Causing Suffering to Animals

Context: This is from the Biblical Book of Deuteronomy, in a section discussing combinations that aren't a good idea. Ibn Ezra comments that this pairing is prohibited because donkeys aren't as powerful as oxen, and so it would be uncomfortable for them to plow together as they would be moving at different speeds.

Context: This is from the Biblical Book of Leviticus, from a section about sacrifices. The previous verse establishes that an animal should stay with its mother until it is old enough to be on its own. Only at that point is it eligible to be offered as a sacrifice. Nonetheless, at no point should an animal be sacrificed on the same day as its offspring. It is similar to how the Torah says three times not to boil a kid in its mother's milk (Ex. 23:19, Ex. 34:26, and Deut. Deut. 14:21), as well as the law of sending a mother bird away before taking its young (Deut. 22:6-7). Dr. Ruhama Weiss points out that this mindset has the Torah requiring that we see animals as having family units and being sensitive to their feelings just like we hopefully would to how we treat people. According to the Mishnah (Chullin 5:3), the punishment for causing emotional pain like this to animals is the physical pain of lashes.

Context: This is from the Biblical Book of Numbers, from the story of Balaam where he doesn't understand his donkey and whacks her three times. An angel of G-d finally confronts Balaam and says that animal abuse is not okay.

Context: This is from the Biblical Book of Psalms. Psalm 145 is a description of G-d, and one of the points is that G-d is good and merciful to all of G-d's creations. This text is also known as the Tet line of Ashrei.

Context: This is from the Babylonian Talmud, Masechet (Tractate) Bava Metzia, which is about labor law. In a discussion about the hours of workers, there was a story about Rabbi Elazar ben Shimon, and how he used the hours of laborers to deduce a thief. This then leads to a discussion about Rabbi Elazar and how he got along with him contemporary, Rabbi Yehudah HaNasi. One of the things that they had in common was that they both had physical sufferings, and this text tells the story of events that correlated with the beginning and end of Rabbi Yehudah HaNasi's sufferings.

Context: This is also from Bava Metzia, earlier in the tractate. Here, the topic of conversation is the labor involved in loading and unloading animals. Based on Exodus 23:5, the Talmud deduces that it is a Torah commandment / mitzvah to help animals that are suffering from an excessive load and that by extension it is a Torah commandment to prevent suffering to animals ("tza-ar ba-alei chayim"). Maimonides codifies this in the Mishneh Torah (Murderer and the Preservation of Life 13:1). This also comes up in the Babylonian Talmud (Shabbat 128b:4-7) with regard to whether or not you can not only feed but also make a trapped animal comfortable on Shabbat (answer -- yes, because Torah laws like preventing suffering to animals trumps Rabbinic laws like how you use things on Shabbat).

Context: This is from the Biblical Book of Deuteronomy, talking about the benefits that come from following G-d’s commandments. It is part of the “V’haya Im Shamo-a” paragraph that makes up the middle part of the Shema. Based on the order of how this verse is written, the Rabbis ruled in the Talmud that one had to feed one’s animals before you eat, since they can not just get food for themselves (Brachot 40a:1).

Are There Any Sources of Non-Factory Farm Kosher Meat?

Yes! There are a few.

1. Grow and Behold - https://www.growandbehold.com/our-story/

2. Kol Foods - https://kolfoods.com/the-kol-foods-way/

3. Kosher Organic - https://kosherorganic.com/info/about_us

What About Plant-Based "Meat"?

​​​​​​​Context: This is from the Babylonian Talmud, Masechet (Tractate) Sanhedrin, which is about criminal law. It comes from a section discussing a text from the Mishnah about those who blaspheme the name of G-d. In the course of this discussion, it is mentioned that a "Noahide", somebody who follows the 7 laws said to be given to the descendants of Noah, is also liable for the punishment given to those who blaspheme G-d. What follows is several pages of explication of the Noahide laws, including one about not tearing the limb off a living animal. This gets to other matters regarding how we treat animals, which brings us to our text approving the eating of "meat" that doesn't actually come from animals at all.

Fish in Jerusalem

Context: This is from the Biblical Book of Nehemiah, from the part where they are rebuilding the walls and gates of Jerusalem after returning from Babylonia. As Miron Hirsch points out, this is probably where fish (probably dried) were brought up from the coast and sold, as described in Nehemiah 13:16. The Fish Gate was built under King Manasseh (2 Chronicles 33:14), got a shout-out from Zephaniah about one hundred years before the First Temple was destroyed (Zephaniah 1:10), and when the walls were rededicated under Nehemiah the Fish Gate was on the parade route (Nehemiah 12:39). Many scholars think that it was in the Tyropoeon Valley in the NW wall of the city. (https://www.biblegateway.com/resources/encyclopedia-of-the-bible/Fish-Gate)

Do You Love Fish?

At a Shabbat dinner, a chassid (student) once told the Kotzker Rebbe, "I love fish." The Rebbe responded, "You don't love fish. If you loved the fish, you would not have killed it and cooked it on a fire."

https://www.chabad.org/parshah/article_cdo/aid/800124/jewish/Can-Love-Overcome-Resentment.htm

The Kotzker Rebbe, Rabbi Menachem Mendel Morgenszern of Kotzk, lived 1787-1859. Kotzk is now the town of Kock in Poland.

The "Arrogant Worms" Weigh In

This song by the Canadian band "The Arrogant Worms" shows some of the concerns of excessive cattle-raising for human consumption. This is the same band 10 years later, this time using an organ instead of a guitar: https://youtu.be/4avEm0tKplE?si=l6Bru_NUOjYI_LyA

And the same group, making a counter-argument.

With appreciation to: Aaron Philmus, Neil Tow, Rabbi David Polsky, Joshua Kulp, Geoffrey Stern, Ora Damelin, Tzvi Pittinsky, Gabe Greenberg, Rachel Solomin, Daniel Rosenthal, ELI Talks, Roni Tabick, Aaron Isaac, Michael Davies, Aaron Lerner, Rabbi Alex Kress, Rabbi Ruhi Sophia Rubenstein, Jacob Levin, Aaron Goldstein, Isabel Bard, Alan Krinsky, Asher Coleman, Nelly Altenburger, Nadav Caine, AJWS Staff, 929 English,

Appendix A: Other Thoughts About Vegetarianism

Does God Care About Cheeseburgers?

If you read the first chapters of the Bible, you will discover that human beings were supposed to be vegetarians (see Genesis 1:29 and 2:15). In the Garden of Eden, we ate only fruits and vegetables. We lived in peace with nature. Animals didn’t fear us, and the world was without conflict and violence. That was God’s dream. But humans had other ideas. We wanted to eat meat.

Let’s remember something: Eating meat means killing something. We tend to forget this because our meat comes all nicely wrapped from the market or served on a bun with pickles and ketchup at McDonald’s. But before it reached the market or the restaurant, that burger was a living, breathing creature that someone had to kill. There’s violence involved in the eating of meat.

One ancient Rabbi suggested that anyone who really wants to eat meat should have to kill the animal himself or herself. Think about that. If you really wanted a burger, they’d bring you the animal and a sharp knife, and you’d have to look the animal in the eye and do the killing yourself. Sounds gross? That was the Rabbi’s point. If it’s disgusting to imagine killing the animal ourselves, why is it less gross if someone else does it for us?

Although God dreamed that we’d be vegetarians, God recognized that people want meat. The laws of kashrut, keeping kosher, are God’s compromise. Their purpose is to let us kill animals for food but preserve our love and respect for life. Kill animals if you must, but don’t become a killer.

Tough Questions Jews Ask, by Rabbi Ed Feinstein, p. 59

Living a Jewish Life, by Anita Diamant

Vegetarianism certainly simplifies kashrut, since it does away with the need to find kosher meat and resolves issues around mixing meat and dairy. In addition to the biblical and religious justifications for this practice, there are also political, ecological, and ethical rationales for avoiding meat altogether. Given that meat is such a resource-intensive food and since so many other sources of high-quality protein are now available, a vegetarian lifestyle can be seen as a way of helping to repair the world.

- P. 88

Jewish Wisdom, by Rabbi Joseph Telushkin

​​​The Bible contains two descriptions of paradise: the Garden of Eden in the distant past, and Isaiah’s prophecy of a messianic age in the future. Although the “book of books” does not provide much information about either, it does disclose that the world once was, and again will be, herbivorous.

God said [to Adam and Eve]: “See, I give you every seedbearing plant that is upon all the earth, and every tree that has seed-bearing fruit; they shall be yours for food.” - Genesis 1:29

God also restricted animals to a meatless diet: To them He gave “all the green plants for food” (Genesis 1:30).

The wolf shall dwell with the lamb, the leopard lie down with the kid, and the lion, like the ox, shall eat straw. - Isaiah 11:6,8, prophesying about life in the messianic age

Regarding God’s motives for initially forbidding meat, a medieval Jewish philosopher comments:

In the killing of animals there is cruelty… and the accustoming of oneself to the bad habit of shedding innocent blood. - Joseph Albo, Sefer Ha-Ikkarim, Vol. III, Chapter 15. I came across this quote, as I did many others in this section, in Richard Schwartz’s comprehensive and passionately argued book, Judaism and Vegetarianism

My wife, Dvorah, who worked for many years as a translator, editor, and assistant to Isaac Bashevis Singer, the Nobel Prize-winning novelist and a strict vegetarian, recalls that he often said, “There will be no end of wars in the world until people stop killing animals. Slaughter and justice cannot dwell together.”

Just as God is depicted as initially forbidding meat to humans, so too it is He who later permitted it. Generations after the Garden of Eden, the world had turned evil, and God annihilated all of humanity except for Noah and his family. He then promised them and their descendants to eat meat:

Every creature that lives shall be yours to eat…You must not, however, eat flesh with its blood in it. - Genesis 9:3-4

How to account for God’s turnabout? The Bible doesn’t explain it. But as a result of this dispensation, the nature of the human-animal relationship changes: Beasts now dread people (Genesis 9:2).

With the permission to eat meat, however, the Bible now imposes an absolute prohibition against consuming blood. Biblical scholar Jacob Milgrom notes that “none of Israel’s neighbors possessed this absolute and universally binding blood prohibition. Blood is everywhere [else] partaken of as food… Man has a right to nourishment, not to life. Hence the blood, which is the symbol of life, must be drained, returned to the universe, to God” (“The Biblical Diet as an Ethical System”, Interpretation, July 1963).

Based on this enactment, the laws of kosher slaughter require that after an animal is slaughtered, its blood must be fully drained. What eventually became a Jewish obsession with not eating any creature’s blood (i.e. salting the meat so that every drop of blood is removed) helped to produce a general Jewish abhorrence of bloodshed. Thus, Jews have committed fewer violent crimes than their non-Jewish neighbors in every society with which we are familiar.

Kashrut and the Vegetarian Ideal

A man should not eat meat unless he has a special craving for it. - Babylonian Talmud, Hullin 84a, basing itself on the wording of Deuteronomy 12:20, which permits one to eat meat “when you have an urge to eat meat”

The laws of kashrut come to teach us that a Jew’s first preference should be for a vegetarian meal. If, however, one cannot control a craving for meat, it should be kosher meat, which would serve as a reminder that the animal being eaten is a creature of God, that the death of such a creature cannot be taken lightly, that hunting for sport is forbidden, that we cannot treat any living thing callously, and that we are responsible for what happens to other beings (human or animal) even if we did not personally come into contact with them. - Pinchas Peli, Torah Today, page 118

The dietary laws are intended to teach us compassion and lead us gently to vegetarianism. - Rabbi Shlomo Riskin, The Jewish Week (New York), August 14, 1987, page 21

While Jewish scholars have long noted that one important outgrowth of kashrut was limiting gratuitous pain to slaughtered animals, Richard Schwartz, a committed Jewish vegetarian, argues that kashrut laws today sometimes are perverted to permit cruelty to animals:

[How are veal calves raised?] After being allowed to nurse for only one or two days, the veal calf is removed from its mother, with no consideration of its need for motherly nourishment, affection, and physical contact. The calf is locked in a small slotted stall without enough space to move around, stretch, or even lie down. To obtain the pale tender meat desired by consumers, the calf is purposely kept anemic by giving it a special high-calorie, iron-free diet. The calf craves iron so much that it would lick the iron fittings on its stall and its own urine if permitted to do so; it is prevented from turning by having its head tethered to the stall… The calf leaves its pen only when taken for slaughter. - Richard Schwartz, Judaism and Vegetarianism, page 28

Defenders of eating veal claim that there are farms where veal is not raised in this cruel manner. The next time you are offered this meat, think about Schwartz’s description and ask the person offering it whether he or she is certain that the animal was raised on the kind of farm that did not practice such cruelty.

For those who believe that vegetarians manifest too much sympathy for “dumb creatures”, it is worth remembering the moral test posed by British philosopher Jeremy Bentham (1748-1832). The test of our behavior toward animals must be “not can they reason, not can they talk, but can they suffer?” (Quoted in The Extended Circle, edited by Jon Wynne-Tyson, page 28).

Two Twentieth-Century Reflections on Jews, Vegetarianism, and the Animal World

Now I can look at you in peace; I don’t eat you anymore. - Franz Kafka, ruminating in front of some fish at an aquarium; cited in Richard Schwartz, Judaism and Vegetarianism, page 153

When asked if he was a vegetarian for health reasons, Isaac Bashevis Singer answered, “Yes, for the chicken’s health”.

- P. 449-453

The Book of Jewish Values, by Rabbi Joseph Telushkin

On two occasions when the Bible describes a utopian world, the creatures inhabiting it are vegetarian. Thus, in the Garden of Eden, God instructs Adam and Eve to restrict their diets to vegetables and fruits (Genesis 1:29). Later, during the time of Noah, God gives humankind permission to eat meat (Genesis 9:3). But the prophet Isaiah, envisioning a future messianic age, sees it as one in which even the animals will be herbivorous, a world in which "the wolf shall dwell with the lamb and the leopard lie down with the kid," and "the cow and the bear shall graze, and their young shall lie down together" (11:6,7).

Although permission to eat meat was apparently granted initially as a concession to human nature, meat-eating has long since become an important part of traditional Jewish culture. In Jewish tradition, one of the characteristics of a joyous holiday meal is that both meat and wine are served (Babylonian Talmud, Pesachim 109a; obviously, vegetarians and recovering alcoholics should not feel bound by this tradition, since eating meat or consuming liquor would destroy the joy of the holiday for them).

Nevertheless, Jewish law never wanted the permission to eat meat to lead to an indifference to animal suffering. Thus slaughtering of animals was strictly regulated, and great effort was expended to limit their pain.

And although the Rabbis regarded human life as far more valuable than animal life (because people, unlike animals, are created "in God's image"), they also maintained that the treatment of animals is of concern not only to animals and humans; it very much matters to God. Of no less a figure than Rabbi Judah the Prince (editor of the Mishna, and the most distinguished rabbi of the early third century C.E.), the Talmud relates:

The sufferings of Rabbi Judah came to him because of a certain incident, and left him in the same way. What was the incident that led to his suffering?

A calf was once taken to be slaughtered. It [escaped, and] ran to Rabbi Judah, where it hid its head under his cloak, and cried.

Rabbi Judah, however, [pushed it away, and] said, "Go. It was for this that you were created."

It was then said [in heaven], "Since he has no pity, let us bring suffering upon him." [For the next thirteen years, Rabbi Judah suffered from various painful ailments.]

And how did his sufferings end?

One day his maid was sweeping the house, and she came upon some young rats. She was about to sweep them out of the house, when Rabbi Judah stopped her. "Let them be. As it is written in Psalms, 'His mercy is upon all His works' " (145:9).

It was then said [in Heaven], "Since he was merciful, let us be merciful to him" [and he was immediately healed].

In traditional Jewish thought, a tender concern for animals has long been regarded as an important characteristic of a great leader. A famous rabbinic Midrash suggests that Moses' kindness as a shepherd was one of the factors that motivated God to choose him to lead the Jews from Egypt.

Once, while Moses was tending the flock of his father-in-law, Jethro, one young sheep ran away. Moses ran after it until the sheep reached as shady place, where he found a pool of water and began to drink. When Moses reached the sheep, he said, "I did not know you ran away because you were thirsty. Now, you must be exhausted [from running]. Moses put the sheep on his shoulders and carried him [back to the herd]. God said, "Because you tend to the sheep belong to human beings with such mercy, by your life I swear you shall be the shepherd of My sheep, Israel."

- P. 323-325

Thoughts from The Observant Life, edited by Martin Cohen

On Passover, some Conservative rabbis have recommended that vegetarians, even if they are Ashkenazic Jews, need not feel obliged to abstain from rice, corn, millet, soy, and legumes.

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One of the fundamentals of the whole system of kashrut is that people who have taken the responsibility of taking the lives of animals themselves be acutely aware of the preciousness -- and the sanctity -- of God's gift of life. Although eating meat outside the sacrificial context is formally allowed by the Torah at Deuteronomy 12:15 (which was apparently intended to clear up the ambiguity of Leviticus 17), there is little question that the Torah posits the ideal menu to be the vegetarian one offered to Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden. Therefore the slaughter's role is, by definition, an ethically difficult one because the act of taking an animal's life so that people can eat meat is, at best, a compromise. With that in mind, the halakhah mandates that the slaughter of God's creatures must be scrupulous in terms of devotion to even the slightest detail of the law. To take life, even animal life, requires that the slaughterer be wholly attuned to the serious nature of the activity and never callous or uncaring.

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From the Torah, we learn that Adam and Eve were vegetarians and that it was not until the time of Noah that people were permitted to eat meat. But even then, the rabbis understood Scripture to be placing some restrictions upon them, most notably that they were forbidden from eating any limb of an animal that had been cut off while the best was still living. (The technical term for such a limb is eiver min ha-chai, cf. MT Hilkhot Ma-akhalot Asurot 5:1).

Scripture endorses the slaughter of animals not only food, but also as sacrifices. Initially, the Israelites were even told that they must bring animals intended for domestic slaughter to the alter first, where some of their fat would be offered up and then their flesh would be permitted to be eaten. (This legislation is preserved at Leviticus 17:1-7.) Subsequently, however, the legislation at Deuteronomy 12:20-25 was understood to permit profane slaughter even outside the Temple, or in our day, in the absence of Temple and priesthood entirely.

The clear implications of the scriptural narrative, however, is that the ideal state that prevailed in the Garden of Eden was one in which the animals and humans lived in harmony and either ate the flesh of the other. Should Jews strive to imitate that primeval perfection by becoming vegetarians? Or should they at least limit their intake of meat to the greatest extent possible? There are those who take this latter position, arguing that, if slaughter is a concession to human appetite, we should still do what we can to control those carnivorous urges and, at least, to save the ingestion of meat for special occasions. But the halakhah clearly permits the slaughter of animals for food and no law requires a Jew to refrain from eating meat out of ethical concerns.

There is a well-known story about the great sage Rabbi Judah the Patriarch, preserved in the Talmud at BT Bava M'tzi-a 85a, in which a calf, escaping the slaughterer, runs away to see shelter with the rabbi. The rabbi, however, fails utterly to show compassion to the animal, telling it, "Go back, for this is the purpose for which you were created." As punishment for his lack of sensitivity, Rabbi Judah suffered a painful illness that lasted many years, until he finally showed compassion to a litter of young weasels, which he did while quoting Psalm 145:9: "God's compassion extends to all creatures." The story is not intended to prohibit slaughtering animals, but simply to remind us of the importance of being compassionate to all creatures, even those whose flesh we eat.

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For those who are trying to incorporate the principles of kashrut into their lives, but are not quite ready simply to abandon all food in all unsupervised venues, a first choice can be to search out vegan or vegetarian restaurants. In these establishments, many of the problematic issues are solved almost ipso facto. When there are no eat products or meat by-products of any kind in the restaurant, one can feel relatively confident that the food is acceptable, even if the establishment is not kosher-certified or supervised.

The next best choice would be to eat only minimally processed foods when eating in unsupervised establishments. Breakfast, for instance, can be relatively simple. Many outlets serve some food prepared under certification, such as pastry, bagels, cold cereal, and yogurts. These foods can be consumed with confidence, as can coffee, tea, juices, and other beverages. For other melas, the choices become a bit more limited, but eating only minimally processed cold foods is always a reasonable option. Salad bars can provide many possibilities, although it is always best to ask what ingredients pre-prepared salads (and salad dressings) actually contain, and also to pay special attention to to mysterious items one cannot identify easily. One should always assume that ersatz meat products like bacon bits are at least partially made from meat products.

Less preferable than cold food is strictly vegetarian hot food. Many restaurants expect some clients to be vegans or vegetarians, and are eager to accommodate them and make them feel welcome. An excellent source of information on which restaurant chains offer vegetarian food options is the Vegetarian Resource Group (located on-line at www.vrg.org), which seeks out vegetarian restaurants and vegetarian options in chain restaurants. This organization also helps make vegetarian customers aware of hidden areas of concern in restaurant food, and that information can be invaluable to the kosher diner in a non-kosher restaurant.

- P. 208, 312, 866, 336-337

Appendix B: Other Articles About Vegetarianism

Justin Worland, "How a Vegetarian Diet Could Help Save the Planet," Time Magazine, March 21, 2016

Now, new research published in the journal PNAS combines the two perspectives to show that the widespread adoption of vegetarian and vegan diets could save millions of lives and trillion of dollars. “There is huge potential,” says study author Marco Springmann, a researcher at Oxford University, “from a health perspective, an environmental perspective and an economic perspective, really.”

Researchers assessed four different scenarios with humans consuming varying levels of meat to evaluate the links between diet, health and the environment. The lowest level of meat consumption—widespread adoption of the vegan diet—could help avoid more than 8 million deaths by 2050, according to the study. A vegetarian diet would save 7.3 million lives.

The environmental impacts of a dietary shift could be just as dramatic, according to the researchers. Livestock alone account for more than 14% of global greenhouse gas emissions, and by 2050 the food sector could account for half if cuts are implemented in other sectors along the lines that countries have committed to doing. A vegan or vegetarian diet could cut those emissions by 70% and 63%, respectively.

Changing dietary patterns could save $1 trillion annually by preventing health care costs and lost productivity. That figure balloons to as much as $30 trillion annually when also considering the economic value of lost life. And that doesn’t even include the economic benefits of avoiding devastating extreme weather events that could result from climate change.

Jewish and Vegan Q&A

Aren’t Judaism and veganism contrary to one another? If there are Jewish laws about sacrifices and keeping kosher, doesn’t that mean that Judaism and veganism don’t align?

Judaism and veganism are actually incredibly aligned.

Tza’ar ba’alei chayim – the idea that we should not cause any undue suffering to living creatures – is enshrined in Jewish law as far back as the Talmud, in which the rabbis draw on the following Biblical source text: “When you see the ass of your enemy lying under its burden and would refrain from raising it, you must nevertheless raise it with him.” (Exodus 23:5). The pshat, or plain meaning of this text, is that no matter how you feel about the owner of an animal, if you see the animal suffering, you should help the animal no matter what. The Rabbis extrapolate from this text that “the requirement to prevent suffering towards animals is by Torah law” (Babylonian Talmud Bava Metzia 32b). There’s no question about it – veganism is one of the top ways a person can prevent suffering towards animals.

Re: sacrifices – they haven’t been around in a literal sense since the destruction of the Temple. We’ve replaced them instead with prayers, study and symbolic actions. Rabbinic Judaism doesn’t require literal animal sacrifice and, in fact, many branches of Judaism have actually rejected sacrifice as an ideal. While some branches of Judaism do still hope for the restoration of the Temple in Jerusalem, as well as animal sacrifice, there’s definitely a strong traditional voice that argues that we’ll all be vegetarian/vegan in the Messianic era, and that all Temple sacrifices will be plant-based. “In the primitive ideal age (as also in the Messianic future …), the animals were not to prey on one another,” wrote Rabbi Joseph Hertz in his commentary on Genesis 1:29. Isaac Arama (1420-1494) and Rabbi Abraham Isaac Kook, the first Chief Rabbi of pre-state Israel, agree that in the days of the Messiah people will again be vegetarians: “the effect of knowledge will spread even to animals…and sacrifices in the Temple will consist of vegetation, and it will be pleasing to God as in days of old…”(Rabbi Alfred Cohen, Vegetarianism from a Jewish Perspective, Journal of Halacha and Contemporary Society, Vol. 1, No. II, (Fall, 1981) p. 45).

Kashrut is fundamentally about animal welfare. Because of the legal requirement of tza’ar ba’alei chayim (preventing the suffering of animals), eating animals is really only permissible if it is absolutely required, and the ideal of kashrut (even if it doesn’t happen this way in practice) is to slaughter the animal in the kindest, least painful way. Many scholars agree that the “permission” from G-d/dess to eat meat in the time of Noah was only a temporary provision, since all plant life was destroyed (Rabbi Isaak Hebenstreit, Graves of Lust (Hebrew), Resnow, Poland, 1929, p. 6). Even extremely traditional Jews dream of a time when we will go back to the way things were in the Garden of Eden, where it will be possible for every person to have a plant-based diet. Which leads us to…

Didn’t G-d/dess give us dominion over all the Earth, and permission to eat all of the animals?

The first time G-d/dess gives us any indication of what humans should eat, it’s all the way back in the Garden of Eden. S/he says to Adam and Eve, “See, I give you every seed-bearing plant that is upon all the earth, and every tree that has seed-bearing fruit; they shall be yours for food” (Genesis 1:29). The famous medieval commentator, Rashi, spells this out more clearly: “Scripture places cattle and beasts on a level with them (human beings: that is, it places all alike in the same category) with regard to food, and did not permit Adam to kill any creature and eat its flesh, but all alike were to eat herbs” (Rashi on Genesis 1:29). Our initial instructions about what to eat were 100% vegan. This only changed in the time of Noah, because it was a time of need, and even then, the consumption of animals was severely restricted, and became even more so when the laws of kashrut were instituted. Many Jews believe that G-d/dess’s original intention was for us to be vegan, and will be so again in the time of the Messiah (see above).

In terms of human dominion over the Earth – an idea that is called anthropocentrism – there is definitely a strong Jewish voice for this, as in other Abrahamic religions. However, it’s not the only way to read Jewish tradition, or indeed the only way that Judaism has ever been read. As with most things, Judaism is multi-vocal – there isn’t a singular “Jewish” way of viewing anything; the strength of our tradition is that there’s loads of different opinions. In his work, Kabbalah and Ecology, Rabbi David Mevorach Seidenberg argues that there are many strands within Judaism that undercut this idea. For example, the idea that the whole world – not just human beings – was made in the image of God, and so therefore we’re not at the centre of everything, we’re a part of the infinite web of creation. He argues for a Jewish ecotheology, a form of Jewish thought that weaves together the way we think about God, ourselves and the way that we must cultivate a healthy relationship to the natural world.

How do you do Shabbat without fish or meat?

The whole purpose of Shabbat is to enjoy, and there’s lots of yummy recipes that you can make that are also vegan.

https://www.jvs.org.uk/being-jewish-and-vegan-faqs/

Beyond Beef, Jeremy Rifkin

Appendix C: Rav Kook on Vegetarianism

The strongest support for vegetarianism as a positive ideal anywhere in Torah literature is in the writings of Rabbi Abraham IsaacHakohen Kook (1865-1935). Rav Kook was the first Chief Rabbi of pre-state Israel and a highly respected and beloved Jewish spiritual leader in the early 20th century. He was a mystical thinker, a forceful writer, and a great Torah scholar.

Rav Kook was a very prolific writer who helped inspire many people to move toward spiritual paths. He urged religious people to become involved in social questions and efforts to improve the world. His powerful words on vegetarianism are found primarily in "A Vision of Vegetarianism and Peace" (edited by Rabbi David Cohen).

Rav Kook believed that the permission to eat meat was only a temporary concession; he felt that a God who is merciful to his creatures would not institute an everlasting law permitting the killing of animals for food. [1] He stated:

It is inconceivable that the Creator who had planned a world of harmony and a perfect way for man to live should, many thousands of years later, find that this plan was wrong. [2]

According to Rav Kook, because people had sunk to an extremely low level of spirituality (in the time of Noah), it was necessary that they be given an elevated image of themselves as compared to animals, and that they concentrate their efforts into first improving relationships between people. He felt that were people denied permission to eat meat, they might eat the flesh of human beings due to their inability to control their lust for flesh. He regarded the permission to slaughter animals for food as a "transitional tax" or temporary dispensation until a "brighter era" is reached when people would return to vegetarian diets. [3] Perhaps to reinforce the idea that the ideal vegetarian time had not yet arrived, Rav Kook ate a symbolic small amount of chicken on the Shabbat day.

Rabbi Kook believed that the permission to eat meat "after all the desire of your soul" was a concealed reproach and a qualified command. [4] He stated that a day will come when people will detest the eating of the flesh of animals because of a moral loathing, and then it shall be said that "because your soul does not long to eat meat, you will not eat meat." [5] Along with permission to eat meat, Judaism provides many laws and restrictions (the laws of kashrut). Rabbi Kook believed that the reprimand implied by these regulations is an elaborate apparatus designed to keep alive a sense of reverence for life, with the aim of eventually leading people away from their meat-eating habit. [6]

According to Rav Kook, all the laws and restrictions serve to raise the consciousness of Jews, to get them to think about what they are eating, and to decide if the fare meets religious requirements. The eating of meat is thus not taken for granted, and this mandated consideration of what is on the plate can be a first step toward rejecting meat consumption.

https://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/the-vegetarian-teachings-of-rav-kook

Excerpts from “Rav Kook: A Vision of Vegetarianism and Peace”
Edited by R. David Cohen; English translation: R. David Sears

Chapter 1: The Just Treatment of Animals
There is a fundamental part of a lofty, humane, and progressive sensibility that, according to the present state of the prevailing culture, exists today only in the pleasant dream of a few extremely idealistic souls: an innate ethical striving, a feeling for what is humane and just, to consider the welfare of animals, with all that this entails. Certain cruel philosophies, especially those that denied belief in God, according to their views on human ethics based upon reason, have advocated that man completely stifle within himself any sense of justice for animals. However, they have not succeeded, nor shall they succeed, with all their self-serving cleverness, in perverting the innate sense of justice that the Creator planted within the human soul. Although sympathy for animals is like the glow of a smoldering ember buried under a great heap of ashes, nevertheless, it is impossible for them to negate this sensitivity within every feeling heart. For as a rule, the lack of morality among all humanity consists in failing to heed the good and noble instinct not to take any form of life, whether for one’s needs or physical gratification.
Our sages did not agree with these philosophical views. They tell us that the holy Rabbi Yehudah HaNasi was visited with afflictions because he told a calf being led to slaughter, that had sought refuge in the skirts of his garment, “Go! This is the purpose for which you were created.” His healing, too, was brought about by a deed, when he showed mercy to some weasels (Baba Metzia 85a). They did not conduct themselves like the philosophers, who exchange darkness for light, for the sake of pragmatism. It is impossible to imagine that the Master of all that transpires, Who has mercy upon all His creatures, would establish an eternal decree such as this in the creation that He pronounced “exceedingly good,” that it should be impossible for the human race to exist without violating its own moral instincts by shedding blood, be it even the blood of animals.

Chapter 2: Humankind's Original Diet was Vegetarian
There can be no doubt in the mind of any intelligent, thinking person that when the Torah instructs humankind to dominate – “And have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the birds of the sky, and over every living thing that moves upon the Earth” (Genesis 1:28) – it does not mean the domination of a harsh ruler, who afflicts his people and servants merely to fulfill his personal whim and desire, according to the crookedness of his heart. It is unthinkable that the Torah would impose such a decree of servitude, sealed for all eternity, upon the world of God, Who is “good to all, and His mercy is upon all His works” (Psalms 145:9), and Who declared, “The world shall be built upon kindness” (ibid. 89:3). Moreover, the Torah attests that all humanity once possessed this lofty moral level. Citing scriptural proofs, our Sages explain (Sanhedrin 57a) that Adam was not permitted to eat meat: “Behold, I have given you every tree… yielding seed for food” (Genesis 1:29). Eating meat was permitted to the children of Noah only after the Flood: “Like the green herb, I have given you everything” (Genesis 9:3). Is it conceivable that this moral excellence, which once existed as an inherent human characteristic, should be lost forever? Concerning these and similar matters, it states, “I shall bring knowledge from afar, and unto my Maker I shall ascribe righteousness” (Job 36:3). In the future, God shall cause us to make great spiritual strides, and thus extricate us from this complex question.

Chapter 6: Enlightenment and Vegetarianism
When humanity reaches its goal of complete happiness and spiritual liberation, when it attains that lofty peak of perfection that is the pure knowledge of God and the full manifestation of the essential holiness of life, then the age of “motivation by virtue of enlightenment” will have arrived. This is like a structure built on the foundation of “motivation by virtue of the law,” which of necessity must precede [that of "motivation
by virtue of enlightenment"] for all humanity. Then human beings will recognize their companions in Creation: all the animals. And they will understand how it is fitting from the standpoint of the purest ethical standard not to resort to moral concessions, to compromise the Divine attribute of justice with that of mercy [by permitting mankind's exploitation of animals]; for they will no longer need extenuating concessions, as in those matters of which the Talmud states: “The Torah speaks only of the evil inclination” (Kiddushin 31b). Rather they will walk the path of absolute good - as the prophet declares: “I will make a covenant for them with the animals of the field, the birds of the air, and the creeping things of the ground; I also will banish the bow and sword, and war from the land [and I will cause them to rest in safety. I will betroth you to Me forever; and I will betroth you to Me with righteousness, with justice, with kindness, and with compassion; and I will betroth you to Me with faith, and you will know God]” (Hosea 2:20).

Rabbi Abraham Isaac Kook, Orot Essays, p. 317-319
There is hidden reprimand between the lines of the Torah in the sanction to eat meat, for it is only after “you will say: ‘I will eat meat’, because you lust after eating meat – then you may slaughter and eat”. The only way you would be able to overcome your inclination would be through a moral struggle, but the time for this conquest is not yet… The commandments, therefore, came to regulate the eating of meat, in steps that will take us to the higher purpose… in the course of time people will be educated. The silent protest will in time be transformed into a mighty shout and it will triumph in its objective.

Appendix D: Other Relevant Texts

Rav Yechezkial Landau, the Nodeh B'Yehuda, writes a response to a question of Rav Gumfricht Oppenheim, a wealthy Viennese Jew, as to whether he could hunt the wild animals on his estate.

The Nodeh B'Yehuda writes that it is permitted to kill animals for human benefit, and that using the hides of the animals would destroy any possible violations of Ba'al Tashlichs. However, it is forbidden to hunt animals if the hunt is dangerous and life threatening, so perhaps one should not go big game hunting or whaling and stick to deer and pheasants.

But despite all of this, the Nodeh B'Yehuda is quite perturbed by the actual question. Hunting is an activity directly associated with Eisav and Nimrod. It is not, according to him, the way of our forefathers. In fact the Nodeh B'Yehuda ultimately concludes that hunting for the sake of enjoyment encourages cruelty and cruel behavior, and places a person in dangerous situations. Therefore, one is better off safe at home.

Introduction: In this Shiur, we will attempt to develop the Torah’s view on human consumption of meat. With names such as Rabbi David Aaron, Rabbi Shlomo Goren, Rabbi Lord Jonathan Sacks, Rabbi Joseph Ber Soloveitchik, and Rabbi Abraham Isaac Kook (aside from Shabbos) who all took the pledge against meat, it is well worth our time to try and see the Torah approach on the issue.

Unlike Rabbis Kook and Albo, R. Soloveitchik has no reservations concerning vegetarianism, and affirms it both as an ideal and a practice. He believes that all life, even animal life, is sanctified. . . . Hence, according to R. Soloveitchik, vegetarianism should be practiced, yet man, too desirous for meat, refuses to stop eating animal flesh.

-David Errico-Nagar

The law of the Torah forbade only the cooking of the goat in its mother's milk, and for an obvious reason: because of the cruelty and the feeling of abomination in this combination. In this respect, this prohibition of the Torah is similar to the warning "until seven days after calving, an ox or a sheep or a goat must be with his mother, and only from the eighth day onwards is it permissible to bring it as a sacrifice" (Exodus 22:29; Leviticus 22:27). It is also similar to warnings not to slaughter an ox or a sheep or a goat and its child in one day (Leviticus 22:28) and to send away the bird when taking its chicks or eggs (Deuteronomy 22:7), and all these warnings are based on a humanitarian reason.

-Menachem Haran

Instead of a Love Poem

From “thou shalt not seethe a kid in its mother’s milk”
they made the many laws of Kashrut
but the kid is forgotten and the milk is forgotten and
the mother is forgotten.

In this way from “I love you”
we made all our life together.
But I’ve not forgotten you
​​​​​​​as you were then.

-Yehuda Amichai

Can we say that these sources required their ancient readers to avoid eating animals? I must admit that I do not think so. The sources ask us to face ambivalence: they allowed us to eat animals but at the same time demanded that we remember that this act is morally distorted because we and the animals belong to the same family. We have all experienced a parent-child relationship, whether biological or otherwise. Al children want protection from their parents, and all parents are supposed to take care of their children. We all want to live and are afraid to die. No one wants to find themselves on a friend's dinner plate. No living entity is meant to be food. The idea that we humans, as those in power, are allowed to take newborn animals from their parents and eat them is chilling if we are willing to put it in the simple and true way the Torah formulates.

One can explain that the Torah permits eating animals because the quantity and variety of plant foods were limited in ancient times. By
contrast, there is no escape from the determination that in our time, in places where plant foods are in great variety, we must be careful to avoid eating animals and thus walk in God's way, as "God's mercies are over all God's works" (Psalm 145:9).

-Ruhama Weiss, PhD